Honeymoon Dream Destinations

As you may know, I work in international development. It's really my passion and I'm one of those people who truly hope to make the world a better place. A very solid not-so-small side benefit is travel... I love to travel! Even better? I found a solemate who also loves to travel. Awe-some!

Some of my recent trips include:

(Rwanda... personal picture)

(Liberia... Also a personal picture)

(Personal pic from when I lived in Uruguay)

(Taken by one of my students in Costa Rica)

I have lots more visits scheduled with my workplace for the coming year or so, and am beyond excited. This means, however, that our honeymoon destination is quite the decision. Our plan is to go the honeymoon registry route to be able to afford a honeymoon (+ using  miles). Mr. T really wants to go to Europe, as he's never been. I, of course, want something a little less developed. Something like Mozambique, Indonesia or Thailand would be ideal.

We're working on a compromise, but for now I present to you my evidence of why I am right:

(Bridesmaid L's picture from her trip in Thailand)

(BM L and her man in Thailand)

(Their hotel room and private pool)

All of these pictures were taken by my Bridesmaid L and.. umm.... they're amazing. They epitomize my dream honeymoon: adventure+relaxation+privacy in one. Am I right or am I right? Now I just have to convince the Mr. of that fact.

Are you going on a honeymoon? How did you pick your destination?

Craft Supplies and Crosswords

Yup, those items pretty much characterized my weekend. Mr. T and I went to Michaels to buy some necessities: ribbon, glue, a paper cutter, and a hole punch. Then we got to work.

(Random side note - I wholeheartedly recommend investing $20 in a paper cutter rather than using scissors for everything. The lines definitely come out straighter, and the time it saves is soooo worth the moola.)

You may remember that a couple of weeks ago I tried my hand at designing a crossword puzzle to get guests speaking to one another. We're hoping on making this a dual use to brighten up the tables, since the venue gives us white linens. While I like the computer design I did, printing it out made it clear they would not fit at the tables and just wouldn't really work in general. Le sigh. After numerous ways of cutting, folding, and organizing paper, here are what we came up with:

(All are personal pictures - thus the green paper that looks yellow for some reason)

And here's  how:

1. Create a crossword on http://www.armoredpenguin.com/ or a similar site
2. Create a .pdf of the image
3. Decide on a print layout, after lots of attempts (see below for ours)
4. Cut all pieces out of the main document
5. Cut the cardstock in half length-wise
6. Glue the 'Across' section on the bottom-most part of the document
7. Fold up directly above the 'Across' section
8. Glue the 'Down' section and the crossword directly above the fold
9. Glue the directions on the front flap (FYI - ours said "Try to answer these random tidbits about D&L... You may have to ask around!")
10. Hole punch (x2 on each) at the top of the cardstock
11. Tie a nice little bow on the top (easier said than done, btw).

12. Repeat, repeat, repeat. We've done 35... only another 175 or so to go :)

I really like how they're looking, especially with the nice new ribbon. Full disclosure - I'm wondering if it's worth all the time, given that I know how unneccessary they are and how many other things we need to do. Oh well - I've already begun!

Are you including any totally unnecessary items in your wedding? Are they worth it? (please say yes!)

Progress for the Kiddos

Remember how I talked about designing some bilingual kids' activity books way back when? Well, progress has been made! I found some paper I liked lying around the workplace (sshhh) and printed those babies out to do a mock-up.

We will be using a different color green for the real things; as well as a different twine/ribbon. This one looked much too thin, but did the job. We just poked 2 holes in the left side and put the twine through - easy peasy! (I was considering doing a spiral down the whole left side. Mr. T thought it would be too much work so this was the other option.)

Here's the inside of the book:

(All pictures were taken by my lovely cell phone... Sorry for the dark and blurries!)

Not too shabby, right? I figure this will be one of the easiest projects. We'll trim the cover, glue it on the cardstock, poke holes, and tie together. Even Mr. T can do that :) Any suggestions for what to tie it all together with?

Have you had any easy DIY projects? Are you putting something out to keep the kids entertained?

Choose the Shoes

Sounds like a TLC original show, right? Okay, maybe not.

As you know - I'm not much of a shoe or brand name or fashion icon. I wear a pair of shoes until they break, fix them somehow, and keep it going until they're totally destroyed. My BMs will likely be barefoot or in flip-flops; and I have not thought twice about my feet for the big day.... Until now.

Supposedly, your shoes should be picked out before your dress fitting, which means less time than anticipated. And surprisingly, I like heels even more than sneakers. Yup, it's all or nothing for this girl here. So it's time to buy shoes. Solemates will likely follow.

(Source)

I absolutely adore those cute pictures of bright colors popping out below a wedding dress. Sure, it's trendy now - but I liked it before it became big!

(Source)

The logical color choices would be green or purple but I haven't found anything that pops out yet, have about $0 budget for this, and want to be able to wear them again. Enter yet another DIY project: the 'Pretty Shoes'

(Source and Instructions)

Are these not amazing? Basically, you take regular shoes and tie/add on chiffon fabric in a cute and funky way! They seem easy, too (watch me eat my words)! And, best of all, if I change my mind as I so often do - I can just change them to different fabric!

Are you going the traditional route with your shoes? Are fashion or comfort your priority for the big day?

Being Mean

I don't like being mean - unless it's to my sister :) So the whole 'you have to assert yourself to get your dream wedding' thing has not been my cup of tea. I blame much of my procrastinating on not wanting to be mean, but every once in a while you have to bite the bullet.

(Source)

Here's the deal: A group of 15 or so college friends decided to rent a house together. They finally added me to their email planning list.... and what do I find? Almost all of them are planning on bringing a +1! One even added another sort-of friend (who wasn't invited) to the list! Aaaah! This is my group of single friends - not one of whom have a +1 according to my list. And the invites aren't even out yet!!!

(Sorry for all those exclamation points in 1 paragraph. There's a lot of emotion in there.)

And thus blossomed my first 'being mean' wedding-related experience. I wrote the group an email, trying to be light-hearted, emphasizing my status as a poor bride-to-be. I think it worked for the most part, but 3 people have written back begging - crazy. I know I'm not an expert on wedding etiquette, but oh my goodness!

Lesson learned: clarify from the beginning to avoid being mean later. My RSVPs on the invites will definitely specify the number invited!

Have you had to 'be mean' during the process of your wedding? Does everyone have crazy RSVP stories?!

Non-Naked Bridesmaids

I've received confirmation: my bridesmaids do not want to be naked for the wedding. Darn. That means I have to get on the ball and find dresses for them.

As you may remember, my grand plan was to pick out a fabric and have each girl pick out a dress they wanted made. I had someone on Etsy who would sew the dresses and that way each girl would get the dress of their dreams. 10 dresses, all different, all what they wanted. Easy peasy, right? Not so much.

I couldn't find affordable fabric in the color I wanted and a decent material. Since we're now about the 6-month mark, I think I'm going to have to move forward with the alternative: Dessy dresses.

(Source)

The body shapes of my BMs range from 0 to 16. That's a big range, so I knew from the beginning one dress for everyone was not going to cut it. I've been told Dessy's 'Concord' color is right about what I'm looking for. I've also been told http://www.netbride.com/ is able to order them cheaply and reliably. They have lots of styles that the girls can choose from to flatter their body types and hopefully wear afterwards (a girl can hope!). It's a decent alternative, but not the dream.

Have you had to give up on certain aspects of your wedding? How did you decide on your BM dresses?

Engagement Pictures... Now what?

I know I've mentioned Groupon to you previously, but Mr. Tango and I just bought another one - this time for our engagement pictures! (Can't beat $49 for the session AND 35+ pictures). This of course resulted in me spending hours of work time looking at engagement pictures in D.C. Tangs wants to have the session in October with the changing leaves because athough it's not a novelty for this New England girl, he still loves them!

Now we have to decide:
1. What to wear
2. Where to have them
3. Theme/props/etc.

(Source)

I love this picture  - it's so classic and yet DC. And since D.C. is where Luis and I met and are building our new lives together, that holds an appeal.

(Source)

(Source)

The first one is just so natural-looking and timeless. The second shows some passion and modernity. Mr. T and I are passionate people, so I want that to come out in our pictures. Of course - timeless and classic means we can hang it in our house, pass it down, and all that good stuff.

(Source)

And this one is just beautiful! But we also want some fun and funky pictures. Us kicking up leaves in our bare feet, us in front of brightly colored backgrounds, etc... I'm not sure how we can get all of these ideas in one: fun, modern, classic, and classy.

How did you choose your engagement location? Did you come up with must-have shots?