Two months and one day...

This weekend, Terry, Scout, and I ventured up north for a few important appointments (not to mention wishing my mom a very happy Mother's Day).

First, we had our finalization meeting with our venue, the Palm Event Center. Our coordinator, Monique, knows absolutely everything about weddings at this gorgeous location, and we know she will take care of all the little details leading up to and on the big day. Before the meeting, we had to complete a ridiculously detailed questionnaire - and I'm so grateful we did! The questions illustrate that the venue takes our event seriously and that they truly know what they are doing. My mom was amazed at all the details we need to think about, and Monique put our minds at ease. She was able to provide some insight regarding a few of our decisions, and we'll be much more able to finish the rest of our planning with her guidance.

We also had an appointment to meet the woman who will make all the alterations on my gown. First we stopped at J'aime Bridal, the salon where I purchased my dress, to pick it up. My dad and Terry convinced me that it wouldn't be far to walk to the alterations place, and you should have seen it: I had my giant dress bag in my arms, and I ended up having to walk at least three blocks with a 25-pound (perhaps only a slight exaggeration) dress. Regardless, I made it to the alterations place, Monika's Alterations, with my mom, and the dress still makes my heart race. The seamstress will need to take it in a bit (yay!), and of course she's adding a bustle. My mom was even happy with the price, so everyone wins!

And then, to top off a rather productive day, Terry and I bought a car! We have been planning to purchase a car for awhile, and a family friend happened to have one ready for us this weekend. Obviously, it's the largest purchase we've made together, and it was both scary and exhilarating to sign all those papers and make that down payment. We ended up with an awesome 2011 KIA Sorento. On the way back to my parents' house, we discussed how exciting it is that this car will eventually take us on road trips and carry car seats and move us into the first house we buy. Amidst all the wedding planning, it's even more exciting to plan for our marriage.

200 Days!

Today marks 200 days to the wedding! Terry and I are knee-deep in holiday festivities (not to mention decorations and wrapping paper), and we are so excited that next Christmas we will be celebrating our first holiday season as a married couple.

This year will be Christmas with the Heinrichs, followed by a few nights up north with my family. I'm really excited to experience Christmas Eve and Christmas day with Terry's family and to learn about their traditions. Christmas at the Lanier house will definitely be different this year, but my family has lots to celebrate, especially my mom's retirement after 33 years with Menlo Park Police Department. We are so proud of her, and Terry and I are especially excited at the thought of my parents coming down to visit us more!

Terry recently finished up his third-to-last quarter in his Master's program. While he still has work this week, we're both excited to finalize our invitation design and figure out our printing options. Hopefully the process will work out beautifully, but no matter what it will have a very personal touch. I've been looking forward to the invitations and other paper products, because there is so much room for creativity and unique designs. I can't wait to see Terry's finished product and then to assemble everything!

Another exciting event: Our menu tasting at Palm Event Center is coming up in January! A few months ago, I asked Terry what he is most excited for in the wedding planning process; not surprisingly, he responded, "The tastings..." Well, here it is! Unfortunately, our venue only offers tastings on Wednesdays, so we have to fly up midday on a Wednesday and back to LA at the break of dawn on Thursday, but it'll be worth it!

While we're up north next week, we have a few exciting meetings. First, we're finally doing our engagement session with our wedding photographer, Rhee Bevere, and we are so anxious to get to know her better and to learn more about her photography style. Secondly, we're meeting with our DJ, Rob Mutzl, to work out some details and hear more of his ideas.

If I could give one piece of advice (pre-wedding, sure, but I've learned a thing or two about wedding planning), here it is: Choose vendors who have worked with your venue! Our vendors know the staff at the Palm Event Center, plus they have a million ideas that can work at the place. The great thing about choosing such awesome vendors is that we feel we can completely trust their expertise; we know for certain that they will incorporate ideas into what they know works at the Palm.

So with 200 days left to go, we are ready to start the details. We want our wedding to feel like our wedding, and we know that personal touches are the way to do it. We look forward to making the magic happen!

Starting the Details

Now that the all-important one year mark zoomed by us, we know we need to start actually planning the wedding. We have a general vision of what we want, but how do we make that all come together? Slowly, by the looks of it. One thing at a time. We chose to start with hotels.

The Livermore wine valley, home to our venue, hosts a multitude of weddings each July, we want to ensure that our guests have no trouble getting a great hotel at a great rate. Our venue recommended the Courtyard Marriott a few miles from the event center, and we love anything Marriott, so we booked a huge block for our wedding weekend. The hotel also provides great services, such as a complimentary shuttle service to the wedding from the hotel, no cancellation fees to a certain date, and a discounted rate.

We also booked our own room for the wedding night. My parents talked us into a really nice hotel, convincing us that if we ever had a good reason to spend money on a hotel room, our wedding night is it. We didn't exactly resist.

Finally, since I'm still home all day with my casted foot, I created our wedding website. We tried several, and several custom websites exist, including The Knot, WeddingChannel.com, mywedding.com, but ultimately we just created one through Google Sites. I had a lot more creative freedom to design a site that flows with the theme of our wedding.

We feel like the planning is now officially underway! Get excited for some pictures from Heidi and Ed's wedding this weekend!

March already???

It seems impossible that March is here already, but, alas, here we are. Our wedding is inching closer, and we are still finding time to love engaged life!

2010 has been a fun challenge for us. Our New Year's resolutions and commitments to Lent have been great for helping us grow individually and as a couple. Our New Year's resolutions are to avoid fast food for a whole year, along with flossing daily and cooking a new recipe every Sunday night. We've had an awesome time coming up with new things to cook, though we miss In-N-Out! For Lent, we gave up sweets, which is probably going to kill me sometime soon, or I'll kill Terry because I'm craving sugar so desperately, but we're okay right now. I'll keep you updated. Meanwhile, work keeps us busy, but my cheer season has slowed so I can be home more with my fiance! Terry won't travel again until fall, so we are grateful for our time together.

In the way of wedding planning progress, we are nearing some important dates. Long-distance planning is tough at this stage, because we need to interview potential vendors. This month, however, we'll finally have a chance to get up north (our last trip was when we finalized our contract with The Palm Event Center. You can read about it here). During our weekend up there, we will meet with a few potential photographers and hopefully a DJ or two.

For photographers, I started by using the "Recommended Vendors" list from our venue. I also found some photographers on miscellaneous websites and used recommendations from friends. I then researched photographers' websites and focused on quality of the images, pricing and packages, and style. We're looking for a candid style that will capture the most important moments of the day, and, ideally, we would prefer two photographers for the whole day. We have always said photographs are one area we assume will take up most of our budget, and we could not have been more right. Photographers run at least a few thousand dollars, plus extra for overtime, travel, or any bonuses.

Dress shopping will (finally? already?) get underway this month, also. My mom and I will hit up our first store when I'm in the Bay Area. We've both looked at pictures of dresses we like, and our tastes are surprisingly similar, so hopefully we can get a good idea of what works with my body so that subsequent trips are easy and fun. Some of my favorite high school memories are of shopping for prom dresses with my mom, and I'm so excited to continue that tradition with her again!

A few weeks ago, Terry and I attended a Crate and Barrel "Wedding Party" in Beverly Hills. We chose Crate and Barrel for its high quality, range of products, and reasonable prices. At these Wedding Parties, the store opens early for couples who RSVP, and those couples get the entire store to themselves to register. We decided to check it out, regardless of how ridiculously early it is to register, and we had a BLAST! The Crate and Barrel staff was incredibly attentive, the breakfast was delicious (not to mention the mimosas!), and the empty store felt relaxed and easy. Only five other couples attended, so we essentially had the entire floor to ourselves. Terry got the scanner gun, and I got the checklist. We took off running!

Most of our kitchen gadgets are registered through Crate and Barrel, but we are also going to register for our honeymoon. Registering for a honeymoon is becoming a popular option for registries, especially for couples who live together before they are married. The idea is that someone can contribute to your honeymoon rather than giving either cash or a physical gift. There are plenty of companies who run these types of registries, but we are going with Honeyfund. Our friends Nick and Jocelyn used this site for their wedding registry last year and had no problems, so we're giving it a shot! Researching the honeymoon "items" that we're registering for makes us so excited for our trip. 16 months can't go by fast enough!

And lastly, our first set of engagement pictures are in! Our incredible photographer (and great friend), Roxanne Neal, with the help of her husband Chris, took some awesome shots of us at Point Dume in Malibu. She is so talented, and we were so excited to see our photos. We want to share them all eventually, but we haven't decided how we will use them all quite yet, so for now, enjoy one of our highlights!

The Date! (And Venue!)

We have been looking forward to posting this one - we have officially booked our venue! We chose the Palm Event Center in Pleasanton, California. And of course, that means we picked a date! We will be getting married on July 9, 2011, or as I (Terry) like to put it, 7-9-11. Always the math nerd.

The (unofficial) decision came on December 23 (Happy Festivus!) when we visited another venue, Ruby Hill Golf Course. In the word of my future mother-in-law: "OMG, this place is gorgeous." And was it! The drive up alone is breathtaking as you wind your way up a little hill littered with mulit-million dollar homes that could easily be rented out for a wedding reception (the thought crossed my mind). Upon walking into the golf club, you find yourself in the area where the ceremony would take place. We would be married under a skylit dome before the banister of the grand staircase. At the base of the stairs is the reception hall which is lined with columns and windows providing a view to the luscious green course. Connected to the hall is a bar and lounge which evokes the feeling of a rustic log cabin. Right outside is the primary location for the ceremony. They really pushed this spot to us, but with a summer wedding, we just don't think that out in the heat is the best setting. All in all, the grounds and venue are beautiful, and the staircase is perfect for a "Cinderella Wedding."

But something just drew us back to the Palm. After our trip to Ruby Hill, we swung by the Event Center (literally a half mile away) to take a quick look inside, just for comparison. Jules and I made a brief survey around the place and silently smiled at each other. This place just clicked with us. We knew this is where we want to get married.

Ultimately, while we had lists of what we wanted in a venue, what made our decision was the overall ambiance of the Palm. We could envision our wedding here, not just another wedding at a cookie-cutter site. We love the barrels on all sides of the rooms, the idea of tea lights everywhere, the romance of getting married at a winery instead of a country club. We can envision a million awesome photo opportunities, and we think our guests will truly enjoy the entire experience. Plus (and this is a big one), we have heard nothing but wonderful reviews about the Palm, both from guests of past parties and from former brides. Those references tell us that we will have an unforgettable experience and a perfect wedding.

So after all the research, the visits, the meetings, the tours, on December 26th (Happy Kwankzaa!), Julie and I booked our wedding at the Palm Event Center for July 9, 2011. Julie's parents were with us through the entire process, from tours to that first down payment, so it was fitting that we all got to celebrate with a nice dinner that evening. We worked with Mackenzie, the most adorable wedding coordinator you can imagine (Julie's words), and we look forward to working with her throughout the next year and a half. The Palm offers a wedding coordinator service for rehearsal and day-of coordination for only $250, so we are gladly taking advantage of having someone available to put out any fires that (will inevitably) arise.

The Palm provides an incredible list of amenities for brides and grooms who book their special day there (do I sound like a wedding expert yet?), including:

Day of Event:

• Bridal Party and Vendor Access to Property 2 Hours Prior to Event for Photos and Set-Up
• 5 Hours of Event Time (i.e. guests on the property, which includes ceremony time)
• Access 2 Hours Prior to Event to Dressing Room with Floor Length Mirrors
• 1 Staff Member per 15-25 Guests (depending on style of service)
• 1 Bartender per 100 Adult Guests
• Team of Palm Management and Banquet Staff to Detail and Execute Event
• Set-Up and Break-Down of Included Equipment
• Choice of Ivory or White Floor-Length Linen
• Choice of Ivory or White Napkins with Standard Napkin Fold
• Glassware, Flatware, and China (excluding specialty items)
• Black Banquet Chairs
• Choice of Family Style, Buffet, or Sit-Down Food Service. All Service Styles Include House Appetizer Table, Choice of One Served Salad, Choice of Two Seasonal Entrees, Chef’s Choice of Two Starches and Seasonal Vegetables, and Palm Breads.
- Family Style and Buffet Include Both Seasonal Entrees for Each Guest
- Saturday Package Includes Choice of 3 Passed Appetizers from Seasonal Menu
• One Toast Pour of Sparkling Wine or Sparkling Cider Per Guest
• One Pour of Red or White Dinner Wine Per Guest
• 4 Consecutive Hours of Open Bar to Include Palm Signature Drink, Mitchell Katz Wine, Mitchell Katz Sparkling Wine, Non-Alcohol Beverages (sodas and juice), House Tap Beer, Standard Mixers, and Hard Liquor (no shots or doubles) From Your Selected Beverage Package. Bar Opens After Ceremony or Upon Guests Arrival for Offsite Ceremony Weddings.
• Cake Cutting Service
• Coffee and Hot Tea Buffet Served After Dinner Service

We feel that this package suits our needs exactly, especially the 4 hours of open bar, which we know both our brothers (and Matt Frankel) will appreciate. Since the venue is on a winery, we are of course limited to drinking only their wines, so we all ventured over for a tasting "just to make sure we like them..." And the wines were great! We're proud to have our guests enjoy Mitchell Katz wines; plus, as an added bonus, guests can go for their own tasting in the mini-wine region of Pleasanton during their weekend in the Bay Area, should they need some entertainment before or after the wedding.

If we had to name some problems with the venue, Julie and I would agree that the location, while gorgeous and perfect for a wedding, is far from any airports. With so many out of town guests, we realize that Pleasanton is less than ideal, even with three airport options (Oakland, San Jose, and San Francisco) in the vicinity. Cab rides will be costly, but I'm hoping we can arrange some kind of shuttle system among the people we know in the area to avoid forcing our guests to incur extra fees on top of the hotel and the flights. Otherwise, this location is truly idyllic, and we can't wait to start planning the rest of the event!

Next post: Introducing our pastor and our first Christmas together

Winter Break Wedding Planning

Winter Break!!!

Right this very moment, Terry is on his way back from Buffalo, and this time he gets to stay home for good. He is going to take Monday through Wednesday off work - a well deserved break - which gives us 16 full days off together! I am so lucky that Terry's job allows him this long break, so we can enjoy each other's company, spend time with family, celebrate the holidays, and, of course, plan our wedding!

My wonderful parents have offered to visit two additional venues as a preview for us before we come up to the Bay Area. If these places are comparable to or better than Palm Event Center, we'll go back to check them out ourselves.

Bridges Golf Club

Bridges looks gorgeous but doesn't have an indoor ceremony space, which is a must-have for a July wedding in the Bay Area. If we end up loving the rest of the venue, we can look at other ceremony spaces.

Ruby Hill Golf Club

Ruby Hill is also beautiful, but the reception space looks a bit tight.

Hopefully my parents will be able to give us a better idea of whether these spaces might work for us. In an ideal world, we'll make our deposit on a venue before the new year! Once we make that first big decision, we'll be able to slowly start planning the rest!

Here We Go

Yesterday marked our first official stop on the wedding planning express. Was that too cheesy? How about, Yesterday marked the first steps in the beautiful journey to come. Okay, fine. Yesterday was our first wedding venue visit. So much for the beauty of language.

Since late August, I have been researching venues online, primarily through theknot.com, focusing on their "In Your Area" vendors search. The site allows you to edit your profile based on the season, location, color, size, and formality of your wedding, which makes hunting for venues ten times easier than using a simple web search. The Knot provides, for each venue, pictures, price ranges, capacity information, and amenities that the venue offers, such as valet parking and whether or not a ceremony site is available.

Another great site is Here Comes the Guide, similar to The Knot. This site breaks down locations by more specific regions ("East Bay" rather than "Northern California"). Actually, this service was somewhat of a disadvantage to us in that we were not sure exactly where in the Bay Area we wanted to get married, but I can see it being helpful to most couples.

In conducting my not-so-scientific research, I realized I needed two vital pieces of information before we could even get close to booking a place: 1) the guest count (approximate), and 2) the budget. There would be no sense in falling in love with a place if it could only accommodate 75 people and was way over our budget. So we called in the families for help. Parents were "assigned" the task of creating a tentative guest list by November 7, which was also the date the families would all get together for the second time since the engagement. After that, Terry and I typed up the lists and estimated a grand total of 258+. Not everyone will attend (it is, after all, somewhat of a destination wedding), and not everyone will bring a date, so our magic number lands at approximately 200.

After conducting months of research and creating an (as-yet-unfinished) enormous Excel spreadsheet of possible venues, I sent out feelers to a few places. Here were our major requirements:

• Keep it close to home. As much as I have always wanted to get married in San Francisco, logic tells me the day (and year and a half of planning) will be ten times less stressful if the location is close to Fremont, where my family's house is. I have also always wanted to have the rehearsal dinner at my parents' house, so it makes sense to keep the following day nearby (within 30 minutes of Fremont).
  
• Can everyone fit? We now have a guest list of about 200, and Terry and I are adamant about making sure that everyone has plenty of room to eat, dance, and be merry. We have been looking at venues that allow for 250 or more in order to ensure that 200 is a perfect fit (not a squeeze).
  
• It must be indoors. As gorgeous as outdoor weddings can be, we know we want our wedding in July. In California. In the afternoon. It's going to be HOT. We don't want our guests to suffer in the heat, and we don't want anyone passing out from dehydration. Additionally, the Great Outdoors offer too many potential unknowns, and we don't want to mess with Mother Nature (moreover, we don't want Mother Nature messing with us) on our wedding day.

Our first visit was to the Palm Event Center in Pleasanton, California. We entered the gorgeous vineyard event room to find a king's table set up with photo albums from previous weddings. Stephanie, a fantastic tour guide, greeted us immediately, and we had her full attention for the next hour. Stephanie answered every question we had before we knew we had it, and she didn't oversell any aspect of the venue. She showed us each space and offered ideas for different options, and her demeanor maintained a professional and friendly tone. I could not have felt more impressed, and Terry and my parents felt the same way.

The space at the Palm, as you can see in the pictures, focuses on wine - perfect! Terry and I (and our parents) love wine, the wine country, wine tasting, you name it. The vineyard would make an ideal backdrop for pictures, and the Estate Room would make a gorgeous ceremony setting.

While we still need to see a few other venues for comparison's sake, we liked a lot of what the Palm has to offer. I hope to book within the next month or so. If this first stop on our wedding planning journey is any indication, the next year and a half should be a fun ride!