Sanity is a Cozy Lie

I’m a bit of an anxious wreck right now. Which is why there is no blogging, and nothing is coming out of my mouth that isnt wedding related, seriously, I’m useless.

Tomorrow is my 26th birthday, and I cold care less, its means nothing to me. NOTHING I TELL YOU! This coming from a girl who likes to celebrate ‘Birthday week” too!

I know there are definitely people who take wedding planning way less seriously, and let lots of other people help them and let things be imperfect. Congrats to them, I’m and insane control freak.  I’m so excited though. I’m just thrilled by how many people are coming and how much fun everyone is going to have. I’m also just really excited to see my whole vision come together. I hope everything looks as awesome as I planned and that people think its unique and they enjoy themselves. I hope its the perfection I see in my head.

I just wish this anxious almost sick feeling would go away. I also wish I had a better answer to everyone’s “are you getting nervous” “what can I do to help” questions, as I tend to just ramble like an idiot and not actually say anything interesting or productive. Sleep has also become a bit…restless.

So tonight I’m going to go to bed with my lunch packed and my gym clothes waiting by the door. I will go to work, then the gym, then maybe a little birthday dinner. I will also accomplish at least 1 painting that ships this week and I will I cross off at least 1 wedding task. Until then, send me good thoughts of sanity, I’m off to make lists.

xoxo

(hopefully will be normal soon) Morgan

TWELVE DAYS…AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

me: My lips look so JUICY!

This weekend was pretty awesome. Nothing overtly exciting happened, but a lot of pretty good things did, and those add up. I also didn’t have that over whelming “I’m not getting enough done!” feeling that comes with most of my weekends.

The Accomplished:

-Made a mock table setting and was pleasantly surprised that it all came together and looked really good. I think there is a struggle with wedding decorations (especially table settings) to really fill the space in a cohesive way. It bugs me when table settings are too plain, or have a whole bunch of weird “Monogrammed stuff” or confetti or little marbles strewn all around. I will be the FIRST to stand up and say that I am a wedding centerpiece SNOB! So really ignore me, unless you are too, and then join the club and hate on some flat colored marbles with me!

-Painted Frames Mustard. I bought a bunch of ornate frames at the Salvation Army (all 99 cents thankyouverymuch) and some mustard yellow spray paint from a fine-art supply store. Hardware stores only carry YELLOW spray paint, and I just didn’t want that (note that you will send closer to $9 on a can of a fancy color). The frames will be used to hold little signs around the wedding like: WELCOME, FOOD MENU, DESSERT BAR INSTRUCTIONS, and so on.

-Create a Menu. We managed to sit down and write out exactly what we will be serving at the wedding including drinks and dessert bar treats. My Grandma and my Aunt Jody came up today from Seattle to go over everything. I’m so excited the food is going to be amazing!

-Dollar Tree Stock Up! Did you know the Dollar Tree sells packs of FIVE of these for $1! I bought 10 packs, but will be going back for at least 5 more. I also bought mini tongs for our dessert bar. They have such good cheap basic party supplies AND buffet serving dishes (big clear bowls and serving platters, etc).

-Had Dinner with my MOH (Mallory) and her Fiance (Aaron). Always nice to see her. The fact that I get to see her probably once a month compared to twice a year makes me soooo happy! And to be honest I can’t wait until my wedding is done and I get to just help her with hers and do all the fun MOH tasks for her! She is awesome.

-Wrote our Vows! Yup, I was sitting on the couch listening to Adele Pandora (duh) and they just came spilling out. Thankfully I had my laptop and I typed away. They are sweet and funny and it was so easy for Mr. Gaunt to use my format to write his own set. DONE, such sweet relief. And yes we have read each others, we aren’t the sappy surprising type.

-Cleaned my house. For Grandma…duh.

-Bought the PERFECT wedding Lipstick. My sister and I went to Macy’s and did what I had read about, hunt around for a makeup counter girl who’s makeup you like. I did this and spotted a fantastically done-up girl at the Lancome counter. She was awesome and put a bunch of colors and liners and shadow on me until we had the perfect one. It is nothing like I thought I wanted, and yet it is perfect. Worth the $30 (EEEEEEEEEK) it cost. I have never in my life bought nice lipstick (and liner), this was quite the treat. I then proceeded to go home and wax my eyebrows and tried to (unsuccessfully) re-create the whole look. Needless to say I can do the lipstick perfect, but the rest I will leave to the professionals.

-Decided to wear my hair down for the wedding. The vote is in and the hair will be down! now where are my Lauren Conrad extensions?

-Made all the wedding papers. I spent a few hours on Photoshop the other day and made all the paper things we need printed for the wedding. I even managed to tie in Hula (our cat) into some of the items, which brings me such joy:

• Table numbers
• Welcome Signs
• Menu’s
• “Vegetarian & Vegan” signs for select dishes
• Cake topper
• Dessert Bar Banner
• Boutonniere Stickers

I have to go some time this week to Kinkos and get everything printed and cut out.

-Ordered Groomsmen Gifts and looked into Bridesmaid Gifts. Because they are all do nice to us and deserve a treat for being our slaves for the day.

We actually have very little (of the big things) left to do. Just little stuff here and there and then the stuff for the week of. I got time off work and so did Mr. Gaunt. About half our guests have RSVP’d (any advice on how to get more people to do this?). We have picked a place to have a rehearsal dinner and will be going in next weekend to reserve it. I’m getting really excited! My weight is also down about 5 pounds since I joined the gym and started eating less, the dress needs to fit!

Ok I’m done boring everyone with my wedding plans. I’m just feeling really good about things!

I leave you with a random mish-mash of pictures from the last 2 weeks:

Picking dinner from the garden!

Mr. Gaunts first trip to Whatcom Falls Park

Me trying to convince him the V necks are sexy. He was having none of it...lol!

Worlds most flattering dress I got for $18 at Value Village!

Sad day for all Prego Thrill Seekers at the Fair!

 

Because it makes you feel all warm and tingly inside.

I am of course talking about crossing things off my Wedding To-Do Lists….duh.

The following were completed this past week:

-Make Cake Topper

-Touch base with DJ (who in case you were wondering is the male performer in this video. Amazing I know)

-Touch base with Photographer

-Reserved Room blocks at hotels

-Finished making 5 cake stands and a cake-pop stand for the desert table

-Ordered Coasters

-Mailed out the last of our invites

-Recieved the invite to my own Bachelorette party! SQUEEEL!

-Ordered a dress for my bridal shower

-Made some photo props (a Thank You banner)

-Confirmed who is going to mary us and began discussing ceremony ideas

-Found a tailor for my dress alterations

This weekend will be more planning, like always. We get paid on Friday and all extra fundage of course will already need to be shelled out to the vendors we owe money to. Someone asked me recently about our wedding budget. I’m sure I could do a whole boring post on that, but in short we really don’t have one. We are doing as much as we can, and trying to be savvy with making lots of stuff ourselves and enlisting the help of friends and family. In the end though, YES it is crazy expensive. I’m not willing to say it’s not worth it though, because it’s going to be awesome and amazing and something we will never get to do again! In a weird way it has also shown me that if we prioritize and really focus, we can make things we want/need really happen. I’m proud of us for taking on so much and not going into ANY debt for it. Its been quite the learning experience.

So that’s that. We have ummm…FORTY FIVE DAYS until the wedding. That is insanity and I know they are going to fly by in no time, especially since really that means we have SIX weekends left to get stuff done…OMG. In case you are in the beginning stages of planning I seriously suggest doing everything early as time will fly by. Especially if your taking on a lot of stuff yourself. Alright I’m off to bed with visions of wedding bells dance in my head.

The Finishing Touches

This week (or next) I have to have my sister and her friend come over to do a makeup and hair run through for the wedding. I’m really unsure about both hair and makeup. I have never liked my hair, nor have I ever thought I looked especially good with makeup on. HOWEVER I want to look very “Made up” on my wedding day. My dress is casual enough, I want the hair and the make-up to be VaVaVoom!

My sister (as I have mentioned before) is just a few weeks shy of graduating from Toni & Guy Hair Academy. I am having her and a few class mates (who also specialize in make-up) do the hair for me and my bitches Bridesmaids…(:

So I have been looking around a bit for what I want to do. First off I mentioned Spray Tanning in my previous post. I’m also thinking I need to get a hair piece. I can’t afford extensions, but sometimes just a clip in (non mall-trashy) hair piece can add volume. Have you seen Jessica Simpsons Hair-Do? WANT! They can do some pretty cute stuff with some faux hair…

So I’m going to hit up Sephora to see if I can find one that matches my hair. I also am on the hunt for the PERFECT lipstick. I never ever wear lipstick, and I think it will be the stand out feature that says “I’m done-up” yah know? However I have no idea what shade I am, I’m more of a clear gloss kinda gal. So I’m going to go to Mac or Sephora, or Macys and make them figure it out for me. Oh and I need some big fake eyelashes too!

So hopefully all of this will get figured out in the next few weeks. I leave you with some photos of maybe the look I’m going for.

I bought a bling bling headband off Etsy that would look kind of like these

 

Just call me Morgan Stewart

Because me and Martha would make an awesome team…seriously.

There has been a truck load of wedding crafting around here! I really do plan to show more of these items in detail, this is just a splash of crafty candy for your eyes! to say that my house is a bit of a mess wouldn’t be a lie. Oh well, it keeps me entertained.

Needless to say Hula does NOTHING but lay around on the coffee table looking adorable.

 

Dried Wedding Flowers

I decided because all of my bridesmaids will be wearing grey, that I wanted to spice things up with their flowers. Originally I had wanted them all to carry little potted plants, however we decided that would be a bit awkward for them as they wouldn’t be able to link arms with their groomsmen and they would look kind of like they were presenting me with an offering…which is weird. So last week I decided to just order a few dried flowers that I will mix with some greenery for bouquets.

The things I ordered are dried Billy Balls, and dried yellow Babies Breath! It’s actually really cool.

I’m very exited for these to show up so I can play around with them! I think they will be super cute. This last weekend I went with my MOH Mallory to help her find a dress and shoes AND I bought my own wedding shoes. It was an excellent shopping trip that ended with SPRAY TANS! Today I look like I should be on the Jersey shore….very entertaining.