Duck Progress

The ducks are starting to line up, and it feels SO GOOD!!!

Last Thursday (as I was coming down from my NKOTB high), I called Good Shepherd Catholic Church looking for a priest to officiate our wedding. I was greeted by an answering machine, so I left my appropriate information. Gary called me the following day, but I was fast asleep at 9:40am. Unfortunately, I didn't listen to his message till after 1:30pm, which was right at the time he left the office. So, I had another conversation with the office answering machine.

This morning, Christine from Good Shepherd called me. Again, I was fast asleep at 9:25am. But she was still in the office when I called about 20 minutes ago. Yay! I received more information than I thought I would ~ from what I should expect in the packet they'll be sending us, to who the best priest is, and how their pre-marital counseling sessions work vs. individually filling out a questionnaire if we're unable to do the sessions.

The questionnaire goes through topics talked about in the sessions. From our answers, the priest sees areas where Andrew and I might need to discuss...or say "You two are PERFECT for each other!" It's not a pass/fail sort of thing; just a tool to help us prepare for marriage.

As for my other ducks falling in line...photographers! Andrew and I have a meeting with Amore Wedding Photography tomorrow. I'll be honest...they were our number one choice in the beginning, but after researching other photographers when they went MIA, we got an even better idea of what we're looking for. Suddenly, their photos just didn't compare. Even with their personal discounts for us, we could possibly go with someone else. It all depends on the portfolio we see tomorrow, and of course, how we get along with the photographer.

We also have a meeting with Jill Thomas tomorrow night via video chat. She seems like an easy, friendly person to work with, and her documentary-style photography is more in line with our vision.

It would be great to have at least one more photographer to interview to round out our choices, but we'll see how it goes tomorrow. If we're absolutely sold on one or the other, then that's it! Search OVER! If not, I'll be picking up the phone and calling one or two other photographers I recently contacted via email.

The ducks are starting to fall in line, and I am SO happy!

TMI: Just Among Us Girls ;-)

Okay. So, we still need an officiant. We still need a photographer. We ARE steps closer in finding both!!! People have actually returned my phone calls/emails! YAAAY!!!

Last night, I was reading Mindy Weiss's Wedding Book, which I do lovingly call her "Big Wedding Book," and I came across the chapter that has actually had me most concerned...but mainly concerned simply in my *present moment.* Skincare.

Obviously, being an esthetician, I feel more of the need to have the best skin possible - everyday. I need to be that role model for my clients. In all honesty, I'm still trying to figure my own skin out! I've come to the definite conclusion that birth control pills ~ especially OrthoTricyclen or the generic brand of TriSprintec DEFINITELY helps me! Otherwise, my cheeks become SO congested.

But in reading Miney Weiss's chapter on beautifying yourself for the big day, she suggests taking care of that WELL in advance. Schedule facials and/or microdermbrasion (which I'll be doing) every 2 months, or get your appointments set with a dermatologist! OMG, I was going back and forth on whether or not to see a dermatologist (with the thought that I might possibly have rosacea), and my last thought was that I would simply plan on going back on TriSprintec, continue with my Murad cleansing at home, and do the microdermabrasions... but Mindy made a good point: if you're prone to blemishes (that's me!) be sure to make a dermatologist appointment a day or two before your wedding *just in case*! The dermatologist can inject a shot of cortisone to the blemish, which will make it disappear in a couple of hours.

Dang! What to do?!? If the TriSprintec and microdermabrasion helps my skin, I probably won't need a dermatologist...but what if I get that nasty blemish the day before?!? My mind is in overdrive!

Stepping away from it...I'll wait a month or two and see how my skin does. If it clears up, then I'll consider myself home free! If it's still congested, I'll be sure to bring myself over to the dermatologist.

Speaking of the TriSprintec...what prompted to write up this blog is that I'm now checking out the calendar to see when my "monthly visitor" will make it's appearance surrounding my wedding. And since I have to start up on it again, I have my choice of WHEN to start. At the moment, if I started this Sunday, it would show up the Sunday BEFORE my wedding, and basically be leaving the day of or the day after my wedding. BUMMER!!! Yesterday would've been a more perfect time to start!

Besides delaying the start another week or two (or more?), there's the option of moving on to the next pack one month during a week that I'm supposed to have my period. And yes, I know there are the pills that you make you have your period four times a year. That's the last one I was on, but my insurance doesn't cover for 3 months...SO, I have to go back to the monthly pack. Besides, like I said, it's (TriSprintec vs. Seasonique) better for my skin. ;-)

Anywho, I'm just finding it amusing that I'm completely managing my doctor's appointments, facials, when I'll start TriSprintec again all based around the wedding! Who knew it would be this complex?!?

Down to the Details

What? No wedding blog posting for a week? Or has it been longer?

For the past week, I've been on a New Kids on the Block HIGH, fun with friends, meeting and greeting the guys, and experiencing a once in a lifetime FRONT ROW experience!

BUT that's for another blog. ;-)

The latest in wedding news is that we received our Planning Packet from Disney Fairytale Weddings! Tedious, but fun in its own odd way. At least it came with some fun gifts like Mickey Groom & Minnie Bride pens, and a Disney Fairytale Weddings pin for my lanyard! I feel like I'm missing something, but there were so many little things in there ~ business cards for vendors, postcards for photographers and bobble-head makers. More to do!

Once the planning packet is done, we'll be scheduling our planning session with Disney. On top of that, we also will be going through our florist's estimate to see where we can adjust items to meet our budget.

It's been hard to think about all of these details with the NKOTB high that I'm on...

TRYING to Get My Ducks in a Row

It's been a stressful couple of days. Now that we have a venue and date set, we need an officiant and photographer. Our photographer who we've been in touch with went MIA for over a week, so we started to look for other photographers to interview. Murphy's Law, as soon as I send out emails, our photographer gives me a call! Guess we shall see how it goes from here.

And as for an officiant...I made the call, and he has yet to call me back. Time to start calling our other options.

Schnix mix. (I don't know...a Chex Mix commercial was on. :-))

In the meantime - in the midst of getting crossed eyed looking at one photographer's site after another, and perusing Disney Brides message boards...we received an email from Disneyland with an attached Excel sheet for our guest list! They'll be sending out Save the Dates for us. Yay! One less thing for us to worry about. And Traci informed us that her request to be our "service manager" is now official! I've been calling her our "coordinator" this entire time, but apparently, I was wrong with that term.

And here's a cool thing that I found... You can find out what your weather will *probably* be like on your wedding day! Here's the outlook for November in Anaheim, CA (click on the images to make it bigger):

http://www.weather.com/activities/events/weddings/?from=eventsfeatures

And you can find out when the sun sets! Fabu-fun stuff!

Our First Florist Meeting

I feel like we're doing things out of order. First on the priority list of booking vendors (according to Mindy Weiss - see previous post ;-)), are an officiant and photographer. I would've started calling priests this past week had I not had plans and meetings every day. As for the photographer...well, I'm waiting to hear back from our "chosen one."

In the meantime, Traci suggested a florist for us to get in touch with. Brian Bosch used to work for Disney Fairytale Weddings and now works for himself. I contacted Brian earlier this week and received an email from him a few days ago. We exchanged emails through the day to talk more about our decor vision and to make an appointment to meet at Disneyland to flesh our ideas out even more.

I knew I liked Brian as soon as he wrote me with an email saying "I don't know how much Traci told you about me, but I'm a designer at heart. In fact, the Disney wedding team called me David Tutera, Jr. (it was a little weird to be introduced to him that way)." LOL!!! HELLO! Didn't I say in a blog-past "if only David Tutera could come design my wedding"? If I can't have David Tutera, his "junior" is good enough for me! AND Traci let us know that Brian worked with David Tutera when David was at Disneyland creating his Couture Collection. After viewing his website, Brian also sent me a few samples of tall centerpieces he's done. LOVE IT!

So, since we have "David Tutera, Jr.," not only is Brian willing to help out with the floral, but he is also available to work with linens and all other decor. We've got an event designer on our hands!

Our meeting day worked out to be on a day where Traci had two weddings going on in the Rose Court Garden. One at 11:30am and another at 7:30pm. So, we headed to Disneyland early and arrived at 11:45am to peek into the wedding. We were pleasantly surprised to find that even with the simplest of decor, the Rose Court Garden was still beautiful! This couple only had an aisle runner and some rose petals scattered along the sides.

After some lunch at ESPN Zone and going over the big wedding planning book :-), we walked back to Disneyland Hotel and saw from the outside that the newlyweds had decorated the Sleeping Beauty Pavilion with the gorogeous ceiling drapes. We rode the elevator up to check it out. Unfortunately, the wedding party was lined up, ready to make their entrance...so, there was no way to peek in! But we DID get to see another reception, down the hall, in the midst of a set-up. Forgive the blurriness...I was trying to be quick and stealthy. ;-) I couldn't believe it! The color scheme was the same as ours (well, with a different shade of blue), and the centerpieces had everything I could ever want in a centerpiece! Tall candelabras, floral, branches, candles, CRYSTALS!!! I was in AWE...

(Photos just came in from Traci...)

We then hurried off, back to the Rose Court Garden to meet with Brian. In first seeing him, he was friendly, approachable, and younger than I expected. No problems there ~ I just - for some reason - had pictured him to be older. I don't know why!

We moved our meeting to the lobby of the Wonder Tower. For the next hour or so, we discussed every detail of decor and flowers. As a designer, he totally came through for us (at least here for these beginning stages ;-)), bringing all of our ideas and pulling everything *together* into a coherent wedding design plan. Areas where we did not have a clear vision, he placed the missing puzzle piece(s) and has us completely excited with this new picture!

And yes, we did talk about flowers...in general. Since I don't know exactly what I want yet, we simply came up with a general idea based on our colors.

At the end of our meeting, the three of us strolled to the wedding offices to say a quick "hello" to Traci. She met us with a dolly of boxes. Poor girl wasn't even done with half her day yet! One greet led to another, and the four of us were suddenly talking about Toy Story's Midway Mania game! Then Brian tells us that they're coming out with a Wii game of the ride! WHAT?!? As we all got excited about this, I realized we were four Disney dorks standing around gushing over all things Disney! LOL ~ love it...Owning it!

Heading back to the car, Andrew sighed and said "Well, it was just what I was afraid of..." Confused as to which way he was gonna go with this, I asked "What?" He said "IIII like him!" YAY!!! Andrew really liked everything Brian suggested and loves that he would take care of all the decor, making our lives that much easier. If Brian's estimate is within our budget, we have no need to look any further. :-)

Keeping the fingers crossed!

Get This Book!!!

For all those planning a wedding, or know someone who is getting married, I HIGHLY recommend Mindy Weiss's "The Wedding Book: The Big Book for Your Big Day." I'm probably only 1/4th of the way through, and I am learning more about planning, etiquette, and gaining more ideas than I have in the last four books that I've read!

The amount of detail that Mindy goes into ~ from listing out booking priority of vendors to explaining the many different types of dinnerware to look out for as you're you deciding on what to add to your registry...to a registry checklist (there's where I ended last night ;-))!

I'm thoroughly impressed. Where I thought I knew what I needed to do next and what was ahead, Mindy threw a "Well, did you know about this?" to me. I love it! Plus, I know it's a handy guide that Andrew will be happy to flip through ~ especially the dinnerware and pots & pans section...my little chef of a fiance! ;-)

A NKOTB Proposal

While things are kinda on the down-low and we're arranging meetings and such to move our wedding plans along, I thought I'd share this sweet story with you. As some of you might know, I am a HUGE New Kids on the Block fan ~ some may say that's putting it mildly, but we all know there are fans out there who are even bigger fans than me! Hard to believe, but true.

This is a story from the New Kids on the Block community board that touched so many of us on the board. For a man to know his girlfriend so well to do this sort of proposal is absolutely amazing! (sidenote: which is also why we give mad props to my fiance for proposing to me at a Disney park. ;-))

Forever... - The marriage proposal at the Dusseldorf concert
Posted by Mariska & Martijn on February 25, 2009 at 11:24am

Being in my early teens I was a real romantic little girl. Like so many girls I was in love with the new kids on the block. I listened to their lyrics and used to dream of a love like that. When I got older I still loved those songs, but did start to believe that that kind of romance only existed in fairytales.

The New Kids split up and I grew up. Went on to live my life, finished my education, started my own business and fell in love with my best friend. I became a very realistic, down to earth young woman. The ups and downs of life made me no longer belief in fairytales anymore.

All of a sudden and out of the blue the New Kids announced their comeback and I don’t know what happened…but like magic the down to earth woman vanished and became a 12 year old girl all over again. My boyfriend (Martijn) saw this transformation and I’m sure I sometimes drove him crazy. I played their old cd’s, I played their new cd, I played their videos all day every day while singing out loud and dancing in the living room (trust me; that’s not something you’d want to hear or see).

When the New Kids announced their European tour I knew I HAD to be there. I asked Martijn to take me to the New Kids on the Block concert in Dusseldorf as a birthday present ( he certainly wouldn’t be able to say no to my birthday wish). On my birthday (which I share with Joe Mac, December, 31st ) I got exactly what I wanted!!!! Two tickets to the New Kids concert Dusseldorf. And from there on things only got better……

In the last two weeks for the concert I started to think that Martijn maybe had a little secret. I knew this because each time I turned around and looked at him he would grin at me. It was a kind of grin I had never seen before. Being my own impatient, curious self I couldn’t leave matters alone. So I forced him until he spilled the beans…The big secret was he had two meet & greet tickets for the concert. OMG, I was going to meet them??!!!!!!!!! I was so happy that I didn’t see Martijn was hiding an even bigger surprise for me……….

On the day of the concert I was nervous and excited. We left Holland and drove for three hours to our hotel in Dusseldorf. We had about an hour to get ready before we had to leave and go to the Phillipshalle. We didn’t have a lot of time but Martijn for some reason spend a lot of time getting ready. He wanted to put on the right clothes and made sure his hair was right. I just didn’t understand why he made almost a bigger fuzz than me. I got a little stressed because I wanted to get there on time. When he finally got ready and we stood in the elevator I took a moment and looked at him. And there it was…..in his eyes; a certain nervous look. It was very short and I almost did not notice it, but it was different somehow from his normal look. I said to him that he looked kinda nervous and that he almost seemed more tense than I did. Which I didn’t understand since he wasn’t about to meet his teen heroes. He just said he was afraid we would be late and I accepted that explanation since I was too busy imagining meeting Jon, Jordan, Danny, Donnie and Joe.

We were getting ready for the meet & greet. They would call one group of ten people (usually all girls) to meet with the New Kids and take pictures with them. So I was waiting in line and talking to some of the girls in my group. I lost track of Martijn since my mind was already with the kids. When we finally were allowed to go in I was so happy to see and meet them! I hugged them all and asked Donnie how he was feeling since I heard he had the flu. And then we were told that the pictures were going to be taken. I stood next to Joe and then Danny stood on the other side of me. I felt great between these two hansom men with their arms around me. They took the two pictures and felt great, but was sorry to that the meet &greet was almost over.

When the second and last picture was taken Joe stepped forward. He told everybody to wait because there was someone who had to make a special announcement. I didn’t know what was going on and then Martijn stepped forward. When Martijn started talking I thought he was making jokes but in a nervous kind of way. I didn’t get it and by the surprised looks of the guys they didn’t get it either. I was wondering what the point of his story was but for some reason thought he was staling (in hindsight I know he was trying to build the courage to do what happened next). I saw him getting down on one knee whilst shaking and pulling out a little box out of his jacket. As he sat there in front of me everything but Martijn and the kids became one big blur to me and I thought: ‘ o my god he is proposing to me, right here right now in front of the New Kids?!’ He opened the box, hold my hand and asked me to marry him. I believe I stopped breathing there for a little while. I could not believe this was happening. In the background I heard the New Kids cheering us on and I remember looking at their faces and they looked happily surprised. I just stood there not being able to react. Then I remembered Martijn was probably waiting for an answer..So I said yes and nodded with probably still the same surprised look on my face.

Then all of a sudden things happened very fast. I was still in shock so I remember only bits and pieces and probably not in the right order. After I said yes I believe I heard people applauding and the kids cheering. When Martijn stood up I believe I grabbed him and just kissed him. When I let go I heard somebody saying to kiss him again and I did. When I stopped kissing I remember being hugged by first one then two and then all of the new kids. I found myself in the middle of a huddle, a New Kids on the Block huddle!! There just ain’t nothing like it!!!! They were dancing and singing and jumping up and down and Martijn and me were in the middle of it feeling so much love and happiness.

As they let go they started to congratulate us one by one. That meant yet another hug from each and every one of our guys!!!!! Those were one of the most sincere warm best hugs ever. It still felt like an out of body experience. I especially remember the look on Jons face. His eyes led up and he had the warmest smile. When he held me and smiled at me It brought me back in the moment. I don’t believe ever feeling that happy. When Martijn and I walked away from the meet & greet we felt we were the happiest persons on earth.

It took me three hours right up to the concert to come back from this heavenly state of mind. The concert rocked!!! All of a sudden I heard the lyrics of their songs once more and this time they took on a whole different meaning. From now on I will believe in fairytales, forever……

* thanks to ILAA for the photo's!