4 Months to Go

I know I've been slightly absent recently... but I can't let today's 4-month mark come and go without an update as to how we're doing on our monthly To Do list. I'm freaking out a little bit because this past month totally flew by, and it feels like I just wrote about what my goals were! Gurr...

Past Month Goals:

1) Schedule our marriage counseling session. Check! We had to fill out little online tests, then we'll have a 3+ hour session with our marriage counselor the morning on my bridal shower in March.

2) Completely design our invitation suite, order all the paper and supplies, and begin printing. Hmm... can I give myself half of a check? We ordered all the paper and supplies, got most of the way through designing, but have come no where close to printing.

3) Book the flight, hotel, and transportation for our videographer. Check! It took me a while to mark this one off because it was up to our videographer to take care of the flight. But I can finally say it's done.

4) Get all three bridesmaids to order their dresses. Check! This one was pretty quick. My bridesmaids are rockstars like that.

Other Accomplishments:

• I finished purchasing gifts for my bridesmaids.
• Ryan ordered photo books for his groomsmen.
• Test-ran our new return address stamp to see if it would go through the mail.

That's about it! We've been total slackers this month on the wedding front! (But, somehow... still spent a ton of money!).

Goals for the Upcoming Month:

• Have our invitations completely designed and printed. Begin assembly.
• Hire a sound engineer for our wedding ceremony (he will make sure everything sounds good and give us a CD of the ceremony afterwards).
• Ask our ushers to be ushers.
• Notify the people we would like to give toasts during the reception.
• Schedule my wedding dress fitting.
  
• Book a limo.
• Choose what Ryan and his groomsmen will wear.

You have no idea how many items are on my To Do list for this month that I left off that list right there. Eek! I need to get cracking on this stuff!

On an uplifting note, I've lost 14.4 lbs total since I started Weight Watchers 8 weeks ago. I'm almost exactly halfway to my goal!

Also, my map store has been picking up business. I like each map I make even more than the previous one!

Happy Friday, everyone!

Fitness Friday: WW Week 6

(If you aren't into the Weight Watchers talk, skip to the bottom for more wedding stuff!)

Sorry I missed posting my WW update last Friday! I'm lame. I only lost .4 pounds last week, and was a little too disappointed to write about it.

But I'm back! And I lost 1.4 pounds this week. Back on track!

That brings my total weight loss to 11.8 pounds in 6 weeks. After 5.2 more pounds, I'll have hit my 10% mark!

But I need to vent for a moment about my WW meetings. I'm starting to get really aggravated with the other members. I'd like to think that perhaps it's because they are all much older than me (mostly 55-75 age), so I have a hard time relating to them... but I told Ryan today it was because they are just plain annoying!

They like to interrupt the leader while she's talking and take the conversation in weird and unrelated tangents. Once, someone asked if anyone would sell her a dog crate. Today, someone else wanted to show everyone photos of her new grandchild.

Sigh.

I just don't have patient for that type of crap. I want to listen quietly, learn, and leave. How hard is that?


Plus, they ask soooo many questions... week after week... they raise their little hands and ask the same questions over and over. They don't track their points, and then wonder why they haven't lost any weight.

Public notice: Weight Watcher is not rocket science, people! Follow the program, do what they say, and it'll work.

Ok. Rant over.
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On another note, I've been such a busy map-maker recently! I added color maps to my Etsy shop, and I'm really excited with how they're turning out.


Packages continue to come our way on a daily basis. I think I'm developing an unhealthy addiction to receiving mail. I don't know what I'm going to do once this wedding is over!

I want so badly to make some serious progress on our invitations, but it doesn't look like this weekend is the time to do it. Ryan and I are going skiing up in Michigan as a belated Birthday present to him. I've been skiing since I was 5, and he hasn't skied since he was in 7th grade... so this should be an interesting experience to say the least!

I'm getting slightly frustrated with a couple vendors who are holding up progress on my never-ending To Do list. People need to learn to return phone calls and emails a little bit better!

Happy Friday, everyone. See you next week!

Where Are We?

That's a question I don't want our guests asking on our wedding day, 3 minutes before the ceremony is set to begin.

Thus, it was always my intention to include a map in our invitation suite.

But I'm not going to show you any of those crazy expensive, $450 watercolor maps that none of us can afford (if you can afford that... get out. Now, please).

The rest of you can continue on to see what I created for our wedding map...

(Click to enlarge)

After creating that, I thought, Hmm... why can't I create these for other people too?

So I did. And here's the result of that (click any to enlarge)...


The Staten Island one has to be my favorite so far... probably because I put the most time into it, and it has a cute little Lady Liberty.

Now comes to shameless self-plug.

If you would like your very own custom, hand-drawn map, you can visit my brand spankin new Etsy shop at...

http://www.etsy.com/shop/kessyud

I'm currently charging $25.00 per map. I'm super fast, and eager to please. If you think this is something you might be interested, then I look forward to hearing from you!

Outside the Box

I was going to write about invitations (I promised), but considering we've made absolutely no progress in that area, I'll postpone that topic for another day.

Ryan and I spent the morning cleaning up our apartment that had been taken over by boxes.


I seriously love all the mail we've been getting recently... but man, does it make a mess!

Amongst this pile of boxes was part of my bridesmaid gifts...


An invisible-ink pen for numbering our RSVP cards...

"Hi Ryan!"

Bulbs and Screens for printing our invitations on my Gocco...


Another necklace for one of my bridesmaids...


And lastly, cardstock and envelopes for our invitations...


Sidenote: We ordered 150 of each card, but the labels say "150+" with a little smiley face next to it. Thanks, cardstock people!

On my personal "To Do" list for this weekend? Work on our invitations! Stay tuned on Monday... I have something very interesting for all of you!

What the...?

I called in sick this morning (ugh. What's new.) Well... I didn't call. I emailed (totally legit since it was 7 am).

And after my email, I went straight back to bed. Ahhhh... sleep.

But I was rudely woken up at 9:15 by a loud pounding on our front door. I didn't actually get up to see who it was... but after trying to go back to sleep, curiosity got the best of me, and I shuffled downstairs to check it out.

This is what I found...


Those are two very large Macy's boxes. But what I found inside the boxes would take anyone by surprise...

Not one... not two... but six sets of china.

Six!


I knew Macy's was having a buy-one-get-one-free sale on our china, and I knew it was being snatched up fast... but I had no idea we'd get this much of it at once!

We now have 8 full sets of china, which means we could throw a very swanky dinner party ((in our less-than-swanky house)).

While this was some excellent mail to receive, it's really just the beginning. I'm expecting packages from Bath & Body Works, Paper-Source, Cut Cardstock, Amazon, and 2 from Etsy.

Plus, I received this delightful necklace in the mail yesterday...


Ryan and I both agree that it's even cuter in person than it is in the photos.

Next up... an update on our invitations, and our hand-drawn map!