July Update - 46 days to go!

I had my first dress fitting last week in NYC.  My good friend and bridesmaid, Miranda Shields, came with me to get a 2nd opinion on the fit and make sure all looked good (and to make sure I stayed sane)!  The seamstress had to ask me to please take the dress off - I could have stayed in it for hours. :)   It's such a sparkly feeling inside to be wearing THE dress!  You all will definitely see that sparkle shining through me on September 1st!  Super duper excited!  Oh yeah!

Big props to my Maid-of-Honor, Kathryn, for putting together what promises to be an exciting bachelorette/bridal shower weekend.  Kathryn has done a great job coordinating the weekend and making sure everyone is on the same page with the planning.  I'm so pumped to spend time with the amazing women in my life before tying the knot.  Love you girls!  Thank you all for your work in putting that together so that we may toast my becoming a Colwell in UES style! 

I've already begun receiving messages of delight via email, text, and phone from friends and family who have received their invitation in the mail.  A big thanks to my mom for writing out all the envelopes and putting everything together!  It's so fun to see the invites packaged after all the cutting and gluing over the past month.  Even from far away, my mom has been so supportive and helpful in big ways throughout this process. Thank you, mom!

Now, onward to TheKnot.com (which has begun to haunt me in my sleep) where the next 10,000 tasks await me! 

Back to Wedding Land

It's been a while since I last posted, and so much has happened.  I had to take a couple of weeks off from wedding planning as I traveled to MD with my theatre company to open our first show of the summer season.  But I'm back at the arts and crafts now as the big day inches closer.

First of all, we have a new reception venue and it's wonderful!  A lovely couple who are members of the church where we are getting married is letting us use their property and barn.  Clay and I are so thankful for such a great find and can't wait to celebrate with our family and friends in this unique setting!  Finding a venue last minute was no easy task, but we ended up with a place even better than what we had originally.  Many thanks to everyone who pulled together to help us.  Crisis averted!  Here are a couple of photos to give you an idea...

The Barn at Horseshoe Bend

Road to Forever 

So the venue is booked and now I'm in DIY invitation land.  You can save hundreds of dollars by cutting and gluing the invites yourself.  Luckily, my go-to girl, Nina Kari, is also an excellent designer.  Nina's beautiful design will be used not only for the invitations, but also throughout our wedding.  

It's been a fun process!  I scoured five different paper stores in NYC looking for just the right shade of sage card stock and different types of shimmer paper - the price had to be right, too!  I finally found the perfect shade at Printicon  and ordered everything else including envelopes from Paper Presentation (coming in way under budget).  Once we had the design, Nina and I spent one Sunday morning printing, cutting, and gluing invites & RSVPs to card stock...

reception road block

I haven't blogged about the wedding in a while because everything was falling into place and we have both been so busy with work. However, yesterday we hit a major road block on the wedding planning front and I feel the need to document...

We found out we no longer have access to our reception venue.  Yep.  No venue.  I won't go into detail, but let's just say some people are simply not very considerate.  While upsetting, we are not letting this get us down!  We are so blessed with many friends in the area doing everything in their power to help us scramble last minute to find a place, including our awesome Minister, Rev. Matthew Davis!  It's not easy finding a wedding venue with only 3 months to go, but I have faith.  I know this happened for a reason, and am thankful this unfortunate situation occurred BEFORE we printed invitations and signed the contracts. I'm really sad to let go of the vision I've had in my head for the past 4 months, but I've learned a lot and we have a grasp on what we like and don't like.  I'm confident we'll still be able to utilize a lot of our decorations and ideas in the new venue...wherever it may be...

In the meantime, I should mention that James Maroldi from Dish Catering is awesome!  When we let him know the change in our circumstances, he was very understanding and is holding our date.  James immediately sent us several ideas for a new venue.  Check out DiSh Catering.  Here are pictures from some of their fine work...

Engagement pics

Nina Kari is an amazing photographer!  Here are samples of our engagement photos...

save the dates

Our amazing event planner/designer/photographer friend, Nina, has been working hard on ideas and designs for our pictures, save the dates, and invitations!  Our friends and family will be receiving her beautiful work through the mail in the near future, but I wanted to post a couple of the designs she did for us.  We ended up choosing a different postcard design for our save the dates, but these were great options I wanted to share...

engagement photos and more

So much is happening on the wedding front all at once, and slowly but surely everything is falling into place! 

Yesterday we had a wonderful time strolling through Central Park with our talented friend, Nina, as she snapped lots of photos of us.  Nina has a great eye for details, and made us both feel comfortable during the session.  We also stopped by St. Bartholomew on Park Avenue at the end of the day, just as it was beginning to rain.  Clayton's parents were married at St. Barts, so it was special for us to capture our own moment in front of such a meaningful place - on Palm Sunday! Enjoy a sneak peak of our photos...more to come soon!

the sparkle

I had my engagement ring cleaned for the first time today...it's extra sparkly!  Rings have never been my accessory of choice, but I have to say this beautiful sparkly thing on my finger makes me smile.  Every time the gleam catches my eye, it reminds me of how blessed I am to have found such an awesome man.  It's not about the diamond - it's a symbol of unique and lasting love.  

My fiance had my ring made for me by Michael at Little King Jewelry here in NYC.  They specialize in exquisite 21st century heirlooms, jewelry that is uniquely your own.  This ring is truly my own - I love it!  We will also be ordering our wedding bands there.  I would highly recommend Little King Jewelry to anyone looking for something different.  They just moved to a new location on Lafayette St and the store is lovely!