59 degrees and rainy is not what i want to hear

I got my hair colored today. OH MY GOD. I was so happy. First of all, I have literally been ashamed to walk out of the house the last couple of days: my hair looked THAT BAD. The theatre had its' annual Gala (ahem, benefit) on Saturday and I had to get all dressed up and all I could think about was my stupid hair and how I hoped no one would look at it. But now they can't HELP but look at it! Listen. I went to this place "tease", and if you live in Staunton, you should go there. Heck, even if you don't live in Staunton, you should come here JUST TO GET YOUR HAIR DONE. I was more relaxed and felt better afterwards than I did after I got my massage. The shampoo chairs had massage and heat, they did the massaging hair wash thing, there was lots of white noise (my favorite sound) from the hair dryer, they gave me free coffee and free samples, I had a great conversation with my stylist about the APOCALYPSE and THEN... my hair looked (looks) FANTASTIC!!!!!! I was so happy. I still am. I never want to go anywhere else because I am just elated with my experience. Thank you, tease, for making my wedding dreams come true. And my everyday dreams of not hiding my head in a bag.

I wasn't going to post the following picture because it's too funny and I wanted it to be a surprise... but then... I decided I had to. I had given up hope of finding a cake topper that I liked. I was searching etsy (as I am wont to do) while at work last Monday and I found a seller called nakedpeggies. What I originally found were two characters from the Royal Tenenbaums (which I almost used) but then I asked IF she would be able to do a customized version of us for the cake within the week. She could. She did. I screamed when I saw this picture.


How funny and awesome are these things!?!?! I keep saying that it looks EXACTLY like Chris... even without the nose and mouth. BUT IT DOES, DOES IT NOT?? If you click on the photo and see the enlarged version you'll see how she did the necklace, boutonniere and flower headband as well as matching Chris' shirt and tie exactly. The best part is that we can totally put these on a shelf or something after the wedding and they won't look ridiculous. They'll just continue to look awesome. Anyway, I had to post it because... I just had to.

I bought lipstick today. I'm trying to drink a lot of water. We got all kinds of travel products the other day for Disney World and things like sunscreen. And toothpaste. Tomorrow we are going to pack. I can't believe tomorrow we are going to pack. I mean... that's unbelievable. This is going to happen one week from today. I mean, one week from right now we'll already be married. Sometimes I think I live more inside my imagination than not so it's almost hard to comprehend.

Now I am obsessively checking the weather....

I'll try to post before Saturday, but I might not be able to. I'm kind of busy losing my mind over here. I will also TRY to post some pictures on Sunday of Saturday night.

made for the western pools!

Two weeks from today is the "BIG DAY." I like saying it with quotation marks because the day could obviously not be any larger than any other day... and how could a day have physical measurement in the first place? I am becoming pretentious. This is why I should not wake up before 9am. It makes me a jerk. Anyway, it sure is getting close to May! Even when it's miserable outside, it's less miserable because you don't have to have the heat on (at least in Virginia). We have our car reserved to drive back to Ohio on the 29th and then back here on May 13th. We got Chris a summer wardrobe that is also a Disney World wardrobe and basically includes cotton polos and shorts. I will only be wearing dresses in Disney World... and maybe shorts some days. I come up with these weird ideas (like not bringing pants to NYC in March or only wearing dresses in Disney World) and they are rarely good ideas.

I made some more guitar boutonnieres. They're pretty cool. I'll take a picture when I get home and maybe I'll edit this post to include it. Chris wanted two for my dad and his dad. One of them is super cool. It's a BLUE guitar.

So, last Wednesday (April 15th) was the last day to file your taxes and the last day to RSVP for our wedding and/or reception. Just like people who forgot to file their taxes, we had to track down people who forgot to RSVP (or just didn't). I'm sure everyone who has ever had a wedding has had to do this. I will remember to RSVP immediately for any wedding I am ever invited to. If I have learned any lesson, that is the lesson. Saturday we've got somewhere around 150 or something so everything is staying the same with regards to food but we have less than 60 coming on Monday which is GREAT because it means we can get REAL FOOD instead of just hors d'oeuvres. Ernie, please don't be too disappointed that there won't be cut up Tyson chicken fingers with tooth picks in them. There is going to be a pasta bar on Monday! OOOOOOOOooooooooh. AND, they have wheat pasta, which I didn't think they would, but they DO and I was really happy about it. So, whether you like it or not, I am going to force you into eating healthier, high-fiber whole wheat pasta. Hahahahaha! Take that, refined grains!

I found a new thing to stick on my head after Chris accidentally threw away my hair clip (from etsy seller bungalow). It's so pretty and it looks kind of vintage-y, which works well with my dress since it's totally vintage-y. It also matches my shoes. It's also a big flower. Also, I love it. It came in the mail on Saturday and I only purchased it on Thursday! Sometimes people can be etsy flakes (or so I've heard) but not so much with me. Well, I guess one time, but I hadn't actually bought anything from this girl, I was just asking her about something that cost $2.50 and then she disappeared from etsy altogether. All in all, though, etsy has been awesome for me (knock on wood). I just purchased our favors the other day from naturefavors. They are little hearts made out of birdseed. They kind of look like cereal, don't they? You kind of want to eat one, don't you? Don't do it. You know what the BEST part was? They were only 50 cents each!!! I only had to spend $30. That's awesome and I win. Also, YOU win if you're going to be there on Monday. You'll have a mouth full of birdseed.

I have an appointment to get my hair colored on Monday, April 27th. I am excited about this because I have only had my hair professionally colored once, yet it has been dyed... oh... you know... more than 40 times. At least. Ugh, that's disgusting. How do I still even have hair? I would stop doing it, but I can't, because I have too much gray showing in my dark roots. I would have some weird gray stripe like Stacy London or Rogue from the X-Men. That's cool for them but not for me. So, since I am getting new headshots taken on Friday May 1st and, you know, getting married a few days later, I figured there was no better time to have my hair actually look GOOD. There's a cool local salon in town that does color and highlights for one price (the salon I usually go for hair cuts charges separately for each) so I am going there and the guy who owns the place is doing it, and he is listed as a "Master" hairstylist. That's cool. I don't even know what that means but it sounds cool. Maybe it's like being an Honor Thespian in the International Thespian Society (which, yes, I am). If it is, I can totally relate to it, because it took me a while to earn all the points necessary to become an Honor Thespian.

We're starting to come up with our set list for Saturday. It should be pretty fun. Chris suggested I sing "Barracuda" after the ceremony on Monday and I thought it sounded like a great idea. Get ready.

do we have everything ready? no way

Today I tried on my finished dress at Jenny's house and it will now live in our wardrobe until we go back to Ohio. It is perfect and I love it. I am so happy that I decided to have her (and that she offered) still make the dress even with the significantly reduced amount of prep time. No pictures of that until May 4th... which, if you look at a calender, you'll realize is only 3 weeks from Monday.

I was trying to break in my shoes tonight at work. It was fine but it made it really hard to move the bar cart around in 3 inch stilettos. Chris was "breaking in" his suit tonight, too. I received my necklace the other day and I looooove it. Here is a real picture (you don't have to use your imagination this time!). I was a little worried that it would be too long with the strapless dress, but it's totally not.

I took a picture the other day of the guitar boutonnieres that I made. Here, obviously, is that picture. Our camera broke while Chris was visiting Ohio so it was really hard to take the picture but it's still possible. It does suck, though, because we definitely have to get a new camera before the wedding and the trip to Disney World.

We picked up our rings on Wednesday!! I am so happy with what I ended up getting. We kept looking at mall stores and I just wasn't finding anything I liked. I actually had no idea what I liked until I saw something in a JCPenney that was kind of along the lines of what I was looking for. There is a jeweler in downtown here who is also a huge supporter of the theatre and for some reason I never thought to go into her store. She didn't have a ton in the store but she had a LOT of catalogs and when I told her what I was looking for, she immediately found some and ordered two different kinds that week. My ring just got back from being re-sized and Chris was able to just buy one that she had in stock. Mine is white gold and has a flowery pattern wrapped around it; Chris's is titanium. Let me tell you, there was NOTHING like the ring I ended up getting at any mall store... plus, the lady who runs the place gave us a 20% discount since she knew we worked at the theatre. You can't beat that.

Our RSVP deadline is approaching very fast... we sent invites to somewhere around 225 total people (for both Saturday and Monday). We have received a total of 55 responses. Sheesh. I mean, they have 5 days to finish their taxes and to rsvp to us. What are they waiting for?? On Sunday we're going to compile a list of people we haven't heard from and hand them off to the people who invited them to make them call them and ask what's up. 15% of those names will be going to my parents because only ONE PERSON from my entire family has responded and it's the one that I expected to be able to come. We (my family) didn't really invite that many people and I invited even less, most of whom I knew would not be able to go. My friends Ben and Ernie are coming from Chicago which is SO GREAT, my friend Jenny from high school, a couple people from down here and hopefully a couple college friends will be able to make it but I won't have to bug that many people because I didn't invite that many. I guess that's good for my desire to not bother people.

i thought i had more to say when i started this post

Tomorrow we are one month out. A month from yesterday is our reception, a month from tomorrow is the wedding. I think a month from today we might go to the African Wildlife Safari or something. :)

Chris is in Ohio right now. He is currently beardless (which is craaaazy since I haven't seen him without a beard in over 2 years) and will stay that way until he is forced to start growing it back on May 5th. He got his headshots taken by our awesome wedding photographer, which was part of the deal I made with him. New headshots for both of us, our wedding photography AND a small engagement portrait session, all for the price of what is a usual wedding package (plus 50 more dollars). My powers of persuasion are awesome. Sort of. Chris also scoped out the yacht club. He said he thinks it will be fine.

My necklace and earrings from lillyella on etsy are finished and on their way. This is kind of what it looks like. I mean, this has no chain but it's basically what it looks like. It also won't have the baby blue flowers. Use your imagination and leave me alone.

Planning a ceremony is hard! Besides our awesome officiant BEN we only have one other things set in stone: our dear friend Rick Blunt is going to be reading A Lovely Love Story, which is the book Chris gave me when he proposed. This story will make everyone cry. When I first read it, it was January of 2008 and I was standing in line at the Borders in Sandusky. I just picked it up to see what it was (it clearly looks adorable) and I couldn't put it down. I mean, it's only like 15 pages so it didn't exactly take long but I am not kidding when I say that I cried like an effing BABY. I'm in the middle of a Borders, crying my eyes out over a book about dinosaurs in love. You are next to cry your eyes out. Be prepared. It is my favorite book.

Anyway, we're trying to come up with other stuff to do... we're looking at Shakespeare sonnets and stuff, maybe someone will sing a song, perhaps an interpretive dance will happen (it's unlikely)... but I am ALSO putting the idea of having the White Album play back on the table. Chris really thinks this idea is weird and I have no idea why. Listen. I would want to cut "Why Don't We Do It In the Road" and probably "Piggies" and maaaybe "Don't Pass Me By" (I will pass Ringo by on my ipod any day) but everything else I would want to keep. Oh, and we'd end with "I Will" instead of going on to "Julia" because I'm afraid of "Julia." And, also, I'm only talking about the first half of the album, not the whole thing. Chris is all, "if we're going to have the White Album, it's all or nothing." But WHY? We can't have WDWDIITR because this is a grandma-friendly occasion... and it's the last song before "I Will." If I ENTER during "I Will" after WDWDIITR just played that would be really... embarrassing. For some reason he's most against "Wild Honey Pie." Please. There is nothing wrong with that song. I really want to do this. I said to Chris, "The White Album can stand on its own! It's not like Abbey Road where you can ONLY have it play all the way through. We can cut it. If the ASC can cut Hamlet we can cut songs off the White Album to suit our purposes!"

now people KNOW we're getting married

We sent our invitations out on Friday and they started arriving yesterday. We've already received a couple responses and a lot of compliments. :) I am so happy with how they turned out. This is the invitation, minus details and contact information (for obvious reasons). When Alyssa showed me the original sketch I laughed for like 5 minutes. Of course, we printed like a million too many and they are going to be sitting in a box until we recycle them or something but I suppose it's better to have more than not enough.

The last time I was writing a post on here I was talking about shoes. I decided to get different ones WHILE writing the post. I returned the other shoes yesterday. Here are the new ones. The heel is really thin and it is going to take some getting used to for me to wear them (i'm used to wearing heels, just really thick, sturdy heels) but otherwise I LOVE THEM. They don't hurt my feet at all and they look great. I am currently working with lillyella on etsy for my necklace and earrings which she is making. Chris bought me a necklace from her shop for Christmas and I loved it, her packaging and the fact that she's from Cleveland so much that I wanted to work with her for wedding jewelry, too. I'll say it for the rest of my life: I LOVE etsy!

I went to NYC for a couple of days and when I came back I was looking for a hair clip that I left on our table. It was wrapped in tissue paper and it was the very first thing I bought for our wedding. I wore it on Valentine's day and was all "I am going to wear this in our wedding!!" Well... it's gone. I'm pretty sure Chris threw it away when he was cleaning up, thinking the tissue paper was from his Men's Wearhouse bag instead of something I actually wanted. Yes, I shouldn't have left it on the table but we never use the table and I was afraid I'd lose it if I moved it. I guess I was wrong. When I realized it was gone I was wandering around the apartment like a lost dog. It's not like it was expensive but it WAS one of a kind and since it was the very first thing I bought I kind of had a sentimental attachment to it. Sigh... so.. that was a bummer. On the plus side, now I can look for another hair thing without feeling guilty.

Chris picked up his suit on Monday and I also made him a GUITAR BOUTONNIERE! It is so awesome. It was also so easy. I will post pictures of it soon and you will say, "Wow, Alisa, maybe you should start your own etsy shop and only make guitar boutonnieres and people will buy them if they don't think they're stupid." I will say, "Yes... yes I should." I stole the idea from an issue of Modern Bride. I would be so much cooler if I thought of it myself.

a lot happens in a month

We got our candy, napkins and cameras in the other day. They are sitting in a box or in the freezer! The cameras were really plain (no surprise, since they were $1.50) but luckily I found these awesome stickers on Etsy (60 for $12) which just arrived yesterday. This was the mock-up she did for us after I placed the order... I didn't just happen to find some randomly that already said "Alisa & Chris." That would have been crazy.

So, I ordered both those bouquets. The fabric one was great, no problems whatsoever, but when I got the paper one I was really disappointed. First of all, I could see the glue. Second, the paper wasn't entirely covering everything it was supposed to. It was also smaller than I thought it would be and the smaller flowers were kind of popping off the bouquet. So, I sent it back and the seller girl was awesome and not only gave me a refund, but also a shipping refund and a couple extra dollars to cover fees (which I gave back). I am, at least, keeping the first one I bought. The same seller who made that one has a couple other ones that I like so if I decide to get my sister one, I'll start with her shop. (Seriously, etsy rules.)

Chris bought his suit. It was only $99! It also has... ugh... pleats. I thought he would have noticed something like this but apparently he didn't know until I said two days later, "Are you sad that the suit has pleats?" "WHAT?????" he replied. Apparently he doesn't notice stuff like that, which is weird because they're so obvious. I don't know. Anyway, so now he's kind of sad. He liked it a lot when he bought it, even with the pleats. Or, at least, he liked it enough. Pleat removal is not an easy alteration (from what we hear). If only there were suits on etsy!

The shoes I bought came and I like them a LOT except that the strap kind of hurts the back of my heel. I think that's easily fixed, though. They look good with both dresses, though, and that's really the most important thing. Jenny is nearing completion of the alterations/building of the dresses. They are both exactly the same length (just above the knee). I don't know why I don't like long dresses. I don't like my calves so you'd think I would like them. I think it's hard to move in them. Good thing I'm not getting one.

Our invitations are finished and printed and they are GREAT. Now all we have to do is figure out how to print on the envelopes or just give up and write them out ourselves and send them away!!

I am on a music quest!! We need songs that Chris and I can play easily on the guitar at our pre-(wedding) reception on Saturday and other stuff to just play on an ipod. I don't want anything stupid and I don't want anything EPIC (like "My Heart Will Go On"). If you have any suggestions for non-stupid, non-epic songs, pass them my way!

Also, Ben is now an officially licensed minister. His credentials came the other day. We laughed a lot. It looks like a diploma. That's a lot of power to give to someone. He could marry a cat to a dog, now.

napkins and candy

Chris and I just got really lucky. Because of a super sale, free shipping and a coupon, we're getting 300 personalized mini Hershey bars, 200 personalized napkins and 15 throw away cameras for just over $100. That is a LOT of stuff!! Imagine this napkin in lavender with our names and "May 4, 2009" while retaining the AWESOME guitars and you'll be imagining our napkins. Keep the color and the butterfly, change the names and date and you'll have our candy. YAY!

I had my first dress fitting with Jenny today. It is going to look GREAT! I'm excited. I'm now in the process of trying to find shoes that will match both the white and blue dress. I've been looking at some pink sling backs on 6pm.com. I don't normally wear pink or sling backs but or some reason I am totally drawn to them. Yes, they are returnable. I'm also going to probably need to find a crinoline, which I will definitely be dyeing. I wonder what color I should use. We don't have a set of colors or anything so I just keep throwing things together.

My little fabric bouquet came the other day! It is SO adorable. I'm still trying to decide what exactly to do with it (use it for myself or let my sister use it) but, just so you all know, it's very cute. I also got my samples of paper for invitations and Alyssa is finished with the design, so we'll probably get started on that really soon. I mean, we pretty much have to. Time is ticking away.

I think I want red velvet, carrot and yellow cake. You might be asking, "But how can you have all three???" I can because my mom is making it (or... uh... them). I've been having a crazy sweet kick lately. I wish I could eat all that cake right now!

We have our ceremony photographer set up!! He is also going to take our headshots, one of these sessions FOR FREE!!! We got an amazing deal just because I asked. Remember to ask. I think I am going to write a car company and ask them for a free car. Just to keep.

The other night I dreamt that someone was trying to keep Chris and I apart and they erased my memory and made me date all these other people. I kept dumping them because I hated them and I was saying, "Who is that guy that makes my heart feel better?" Suddenly I realized it was Chris and I set out to find him. I saw him at the end of this long, wide hallway, surrounded by other people (who were trying to hide him from me) but I recognized him because of his beard.