Elsja Down Under

Sick In Sydney February 25, 2010

Back in Sydney, feeling miserable.

My trip to the US was great. I got SO much accomplished for the wedding and now there’s not much more I can do until August. That’s exciting and sad at the same time. The lower stress levels are beneficial, but the fun of planning will be missed. I suppose there are still a few things I can do from Australia, but a majority of it will all come in the last few weeks. Only 6 months to go now!!

My trip to Georgia was awesome as well. I had so much fun spending the weekend in beautiful Roswell with all my friends. It’s rare that we all get together now that we live in 4 different places, so it seems that weddings are the only things that ever bring us all together.

Amanda’s wedding was beautiful! The Clermont lounge was not beautiful. Let me paint a picture for you. The Clermont lounge is where a group of 16 or so of us went on Thursday night. Try to visualize this…a small dive bar, horrible rock band, thick layers of smoke (seriously, get with the times Georgia, why can you still smoke indoors?) and to top it all off… 60 year old strippers! WHAT? Yes, you read that right. There was a complete assortment of strippers from a super skinny tatooed girl to significantly overweight middle-aged girls wearing heinous outfits to a cute little old lady wearing a little red riding hood costume. Weirdest place I’ve ever been. The rest of the weekend was far less weird. The rehearsal cocktail party and wedding were full of much more taste and class (and less smoke), thank GOD!

The only thing that really sucks is that there must have been some funk going around in Atlanta because Shannon, Jen, Alison and I all caught a nasty bug. I haven’t been this sick since well before I met Andrew. I never get sick anymore and I honestly feel like I don’t even know how to respond to this. I feel like the biggest wuss. Will someone please send an un-packing fairy to take care of my luggage that has made it’s home on our living room floor?

Can I Breathe Yet? February 12, 2010

I am always a bad blogger when I come back to California. My life in Sydney is pretty simple and straight forward- I am not a super busy person all of the time. But when I come back for visits I sometimes feel like I have no time to breathe! Why haven’t I blogged lately? Let’s see… in the last 1.5 weeks that I’ve been here, I’ve been busy doing the following:

• Meeting with the florist and deciding on flower budgets
• Creating our wedding website (it’s almost finished)
• Meeting with a baker
• Talking to places about tuxes
• Sending emails to Andrew with pictures of cakes and tuxes
• Ordering our cake
• Buying my wedding shoes
• Buying my wedding jewelry
• Finalizing invitations with my friend/designer
• Attempting to get said invitations printed but still haven’t because kinkos sucks
• Buying paper products for invitations
• Buying wedding bands
• Meeting with the caterer/rental guy to plan out our seating and other venue details
• Meeting with hotel sales managers to organize discounted rooms for our guests
• And lastly… picking up my dress!

Let’s not forget that I was also working, spending time with friends and family, doing dinners and going to gym as well. Yes, I do feel like I’m going to explode. Part of the benefit of having a year long engagement is that you don’t have to rush the planning. Yeah, that’s not really the case in our situation. When I head back to Sydney in a few weeks- that will be the last of my California-based wedding planning until I fly back out in August so I really have to do AS MUCH as possible while I’m here. Rushing around to get everything done in two weeks sort of takes the fun out of some of the planning. It’s not fair, I shouldn’t have to be rushing and feeling this pressure when our wedding is still 6 months away!!

Wedding Update January 24, 2010

With just over 7 months to go, I think we are in pretty good shape with the wedding planning. In all reality, I think I’m way ahead of where some people would be at this stage, but I still feel like there is so much to do. Some things I have NO idea about… like transportation, men’s tuxes and how to do my hair but at least I have most of the big stuff under control. Here’s a little recap on all that we’ve (i.e. I’ve) done to date.

Set the date.    Bought the dress.    Picked the venue.    Booked the caterer and rentals.    Booked the DJ.    Booked the photographers.    Bought the bridesmaid dresses.   Started purchasing accessories.  Reserved a florist.    Nearly finished with the invitation design.    Partially completed our wedding website.    Figured out what we’re doing for favors.    Set up a cake tasting appointment.   Nearly finalized the guest list.    Started looking into blocking hotel rooms for out of town guests.   Got the guest book all sorted out.    Designed the centerpieces.    Picked some of the music.   Wrote out a tentative schedule of  the day.

I still am not sick of it all. I still am not stressed.

I want to plan our wedding forever and ever.

Wedding Nightmares December 8, 2009

Am I the only bride-to-be that has recurring nightmares about our wedding? If there is anything that could ever go wrong with a wedding, I’ve dreamt about it. Here is a list of just some of the nightmares I’ve had (at least all the ones I can remember).

• My hair and makeup is not done when it’s time to walk down the aisle
• Being totally late because I run out of time getting ready
• My dad not showing up to walk me down (I’ve had that one twice, in the most recent one my sister walked me instead)
• Getting to the altar and not knowing who I am marrying. Then when I see the guy he is some unknown nasty man and I get really sad and don’t want to marry him
• Instead of flowers, the florist puts up giant crepe paper daisies… hideous
• My bouquet flowers are the wrong color
• Forgetting to give a schedule to the DJ and caterers so no one knows what is going on
• Forgetting to sort out who will actually be marrying us (luckily someone at the wedding just happens to be authorized to do so)
• Turning into a total bridezilla and actually yelling at people because NO ONE is doing anything
• Having to tell my mom to go sit down because she wants to walk down the aisle after me
• Waking up the day after the wedding and realizing I remember NONE of it and being SO sad that I will never remember our wedding

Andrew thinks I’m crazy- but he also thinks it probably happens to all brides. Maybe I am crazy. If we’ve got 9 months until the wedding and I’m already having these issues, how much worse will it get when I only have 1 month left to plan?

Wedding Mania November 18, 2009

When we first got engaged, I was the crazy obsessed bride. I assume this happens to most girls in the month following the proposal… at least that’s what I hear. I read blogs, checked out The Knot 50 times a day, researched photographers non-stop, called vendors and visited wedding forums. Then once I had planned a few things everything totally died down. I had done about as much as I could do from the other side of the world considering we still had a year until the wedding so I needed to chill out a bit. 

Well, once I got back to California, obsession took over again. I met with the caterer Friday and had a tasting. My mom filled in as my surrogate fiance (and as the designated beef taster) and I was really happy with the food. I’m pretty sure we’ll put a deposit on that in the next couple of weeks. I also was able to visit the residence where we’ll be having the wedding as well. I’ve been there a million times but it was nice to see it again with fresh wedding eyes. The DJ came and met me there so he could scope out the setting and determine the equipment he’ll need to bring. In person I am so happy with how I THINK it will turn out. If it ends up how I imagine, it will be beautiful.  

Lastly, I finally got to experience the most exciting bridal task of all – dress shopping!! I really struggled to find anything I liked at first but then I found two dresses I LOVE. They are both beautiful in different ways. They look NOTHING like each other so I really have to decide what type of look and feel I want to go for. I found them Saturday when  I went shopping with my mom, sister and perfect little niece. I was so torn between the two that I went back tonight with my best friend Jen. Yeah, the 2nd trip didn’t make it much easier. I’m still so torn although I am thinking one is starting to take a slight lead over the other. I  know so many girls try on a dress and just KNOW that it’s the right one. Well I got that feeling, but with 2 dresses. How do I pick one without wondering for the next 9 months if I made the right decision??  

I seriously love planning our big day. I will be so happy to marry Andrew yet so sad when the day is over. Kinda like the day after Christmas when you know you have a whole year before you get to celebrate another one. That’s how I’ll feel times 10 because I’ll never get to plan a wonderful wedding where I get to marry my wonderful love ever again. Then what will I have to look forward to?? Please don’t say babies. Waking up 6 times a night to a screaming, pooping baby is not nearly as fun as deciding on centerpieces.

Registry Events October 14, 2009

Andrew and I most likely will not be registering for gifts for the wedding. You see we have this challenge… if we register in the US, we have to find a way to get all the gifts back to Australia. If we register in Australia, no one in the US will be able to order the gifts online because ONLINE SHOPPING SUCKS HERE!

This makes me oh so sad. For years I’ve dreamed of walking around my favorites home good stores with one of those scanner guns selecting everything I’ve ever wanted! Anyone who knows me knows that I’d MUCH rather go on a shopping spree in Crate and Barrel or Pottery Barn than Nordstroms or the Gap. But no… no registry for us.

Lately I’ve discovered yet another reason to be bummed about this… REGISTRY PARTIES! OMG I can’t tell you how many emails I’ve received from Macy’s, Crate and Barrel and Bloomingdales all asking me to join them for these awesome registry events. My most recent invite states “Scan your registry, sip wine, sample savory hors d’ouevres and indulge your sweet tooth with cake tastings. Take in bridal fashion and take home a fabulous gift bag. No purchase necessary.”

Um… yes please.

A night eating, drinking and shopping for housewares without spending a penny? It’s like my dream come true. Even if I don’t expect to get any gifts off of a registry, can I still just show up to these events and enjoy free food all while creating my dream registry? I could just scout out every event for the next year and every time I’m back in CA I’ll show up at the store using a different alias and createa new regsitry. It could be so fun, but it could also be quite depressing when I realize I won’t actually be getting any of the stuff I register for. At least there would be free wine.

Wedding Update September 7, 2009

Ok so I try not to make this blog all about wedding stuff. People would probably just get really bored reading about that all the time; however, by attempting to avoid the wedding talk, all I’m doing is avoiding blogging all together- and that’s no fun!

So screw it… I’m going to update everyone on our wedding plans! Here’s what we’ve (i.e. I’ve) done to date…

1. Set the date- Aug 28th, 2010!!

2. Picked the venue (a.k.a. our awesome family friends’ home)

3. Created the guest list

4. Picked the color scheme

5. Found bridesmaid dresses that I love

6. Booked the DJ

7. Booked the photographers (I’m so excited that these guys will be our photographers. I LOVE their artsy style)

8. Got some catering quotes

9. Planned ideas for flowers and talked to a florist

10. Gathered up all my crafty, creative and artsy friends to help design invitations, centerpieces and other decor

11. Pretty much have the favors all sorted out

Wow… I’m going to run out of stuff to do. Does anyone else need my help with planning their wedding? Evidently I’m really good at it!

A Few Updates August 18, 2009

My life has suddenly become so exciting, and yet so boring at the same time. Exciting because I have all this wedding stuff swimming around in my brain and it’s exciting to plan and organize and browse websites looking for ideas. It’s boring, because other than that- I fee like I have hardly anything else to discuss!! So… I’ll just give a tiny brief wedding update and then I’ll try to find something else to talk about

• We’re 95% set on the location- just need to figure out a few logistics, but hopefully we’ll know for sure by Wednesday
• This means we’re also 95% sure on the date… if all goes well it will be 8.28.10
• I decided on a color scheme and hopefully bridesmaids dresses as well
• We’re pretty set on our guest list

Now on to other news…

This weekend was spectacular in terms of weather! Here’s what we did on Sunday:

Andrew, our friend Ben and I went down to Balmoral and had an impromptu picnic. It was such nice weather- we couldn’t pass up the opportunity to sit in the sun for a bit. The beach was packed and we didn’t feel like getting sandy so we sat on the grass and ate our little picnic lunch. Sinead met us down there as well and it was great to catch up. Not bad for a winter’s day!!

Lastly I decided to finally update my 101 list seeing as how I haven’t updated it in FOREVER. Here are a few things I’ve accomplished over the last few weeks:

#20- Get engaged… YAY!!

#11- Got 5 people to create a 101 list

Here are a few of them but I apologize that I cannot remember them all – Daisy , Laura, Natasha (no more blog?), Ruthann and there’s one more… someone please remind me who you are

#76- create a signature cocktail… remember my Grapelberry Fizz? That counts, right?

#93- get renter’s insurance- FINALLY! Only took us nearly 2 years of living here!!

I’m well on my way with a few other tasks as well… so hopefully I should have a few more to cross off in the coming months!