Dress!

All right, the dress got the mom seal of approval, so we bought it today! It was little more plain than I thought I'd get, but that makes it a lot easier to customize. We are thinking of colorful hardanger in the front, plus some beaded accents...

What do you think?

Things happening!

Well it has been a few months since we thought about anything wedding, but we decided to think about dresses today, and went to Milton's Bridal in Milton square off como. Sadly, they are going out of business in January but lucky for us that means that all wedding dresses are 50% off! We went thinking we were just going to look at dresses, because this kind of thing takes forever, but we saw a few nice ones, Megan tried them on, and we left with a deposit down on one! I didn't bring a camera (because we didn't think Megan was going to even try one on) so I found a few similar styles online. It is a 2 piece satin dress with corset style ribbon on the back of the top. It is all ivory with no embroidery, so we are thinking of ways to add a little something extra to it.

Megan and her Mom are going to go look at it next week, and decide if it really is the right one.

And if anyone thinks we are deciding too fast, it was the second dress Megan tried on, not the first!

Also, we are still seriously thinking about a crown cake from Scandia Bake shop, thanks to an article in Edible Twin Cities magazine.

Country Social

Photos :)

Inspirational wedding

Check out this wedding.
Things I like:
- A location away from it all
- access to amazing wilderness
- colorful paper decorations!
- a napping spot at the reception (I am stealing this one)
- live music
- local wine
- lights (glow-sticks are a cool idea)

Valley Grove, One Year Out

We spent the afternoon celebrating and planning for the wedding, which is now just less than one year away.

We ate lunch at Chapati, our old favorite Indian restaurant in Northfield. They have a buffet for lunch every day, and we have been talking (joking at first, now talking) about having them provide the catering for the wedding. They are relatively inexpensive, close, and have great food. The trick is to get Indian food, without having it be an "Indian food" wedding. So we ate through everything in the buffet and think we have a good idea how we could make it work using Chapati as the main source of food, and then supplement with extra salads and such from elsewhere. The trick is to get food that is not too spicy, and not too sloppy. Of the food we had today, here is what we thought would work:

• Tandoori Chicken. A bright red yogurt marinated chicken with very mild spices that is baked. Everyone likes their Tandoori Chicken.
  
• Lots of Naan flat bread with their mango (sweet), onion (medium hot), and green (hot) chutneys. Everyone likes Naan. 
  
• Lamb Sabzi. An chunky onion curry made with spices that we really liked. It was a little sweet and very festive with hints of cardamom.
  
• A vegetarian dish. We didn't think any of the ones we tried today would work. The only thing close was the Chicken Palak, and well...
  
• Mango pudding, and lots of fresh fruit. Yum. 
  
• Chicken and Veggie Pakora. Think of really good fried chicken fingers and veggie nuggets. Thats what they are. 
  
• Of course lots of basmati rice

That's about all we would get from Chapati. The rest would be things from other places like salads, both the leafy and hearty kinds, along with all the deserts and drinks. I don't know if this would be more or less difficult, but we really think it could work well. 

After lunch, we went over to Valley Grove to see what things would be like this time of year. The answer was yellow, very yellow! The prairie was awash in three distinct and very yellow flowers that are very beautiful. The photos we took look a little brown and green, but in person it is a field of yellow.  There is also a smattering of some blue and white flowers, and wild berries that round off our gigantic bouquet.  It was 83˚ and sunny today, but also really windy so it felt nice and cool. But I can't imagine a tent holding up to that wind, the St. Olaf wind turbine even had to shut off! 

The last two photos are another idea of ours. It is a photo of the Big Woods state campground about 1 mile away from the church. For $50 we can sleep 16 people, with $3 a person more after that, up to 32 people! I said before that this wedding was going to be a rock concert, but this would really make it so! Anyone interested? We can reserve any time. 

Lighting idea

Now that we have a place picked out, all we need to do is, well everything else! So I will throw out one idea, lights! Via EvilMadScientist.com is an easy way to make temporary outdoor lighting with out candles to get blown out on our windy hill. I think they look like fireflys in little jars, which is really nice.

Look, look!

If you visit valleygrovemn.com, this is what you'll see! Check out August 29, 2009:

We haven't officially made a deposit yet, but it feels really good to have made a tentative decision about the place and date! And something about seeing the phrase "Megan and Chris wedding" makes me smile (awww).

a visit to valley grove

Chris and I made the drive down past Northfield this weekend to check out Valley Grove Church. There are actually two churches that make up Valley Grove- the smaller stone church (pictured first) was built in 1862, and the larger white church was built in 1894.



The white church isn't super special inside, although as our tour guide said, "Ah, you only spend 15 minutes in here anyway!" It does have a bell (which he let us ring!) and supposedly has really nice acoustics.

The stone church is where we would have the reception. It holds about 80 people comfortably, or 90 people uncomfortably. It was recently remodeled to make it more reception-friendly and historically accurate. This unfortunately meant putting plaster over the stone interior, but fortunately meant removing the false ceiling to open up the balcony that had been hidden for years. After they took the false ceiling off, they discovered that the original ceiling had been blue, and they restored the original color. Unlike the horrors that St. Olaf unleashed on Boe Chapel by trying to paint the ceiling "traditional Scandinavian colors", the blue in the stone church is really lovely.


One of the most unique features of Valley Grove (and definitely something that we'd never find at a venue in the Twin Cities) is the acres of prairie surrounding the churches, with Big Woods State Park lying just beyond them.


And, while we agreed that this shouldn't be a major factor we look for in choosing a site, it's important to note that Valley Grove is definitely Winnie-approved!


So, that was our visit! What do you all think of it?

All quiet on the wedding front

I apologize for the recent lack of wedding blogging, but it's mainly because there's not much to write about lately. I alternate between not thinking about the wedding at all to thinking "oh crap oh crap oh crap we're late!!". I think the best thing to do for now it avoid those darn timeline checklists and focus on getting big things into place.

Oh, and look at pretty pictures- like this wedding, where the bride handmade all the flowers. The ones above are all made of Post-It Notes. Awesome.

How not to shop for wedding supplies

Courtesy of Man Stroke Woman:

Places

Here's our list of places to explore over the next few weeks as we try and choose a location...

• Valley Grove Church: a cute country church next to an even cuter country church near Northfield, MN
• Mill City Museum: whoa, you can get married in ruins in the middle of Minneapolis?!
• Minnesota Landscape Arboretum: ah, no need add decorations...
• Camrose Hill Flower Farm: again, no need to add decorations, and Stillwater has so many fun places to explore
• Wabasha Street Caves: oh boy, caves
• Theatre de la Jeune Lune: I've never been here, but Chris assures me it would be a most amazing place to have a city wedding
• Lake Harriet Bandshell: An outdoor wedding with a bit of protection in case of rain...
• James J. Hill Library: Mmm, historic, and surrounded by books...
• Minnesota Zoo: Ah, well, we have to have at least one option that involves animals!

I'm sure there will be more options and we rule some out and find others. Any suggestions?

Color palette

Yay to A Practical Wedding for reading my mind on colors:

Whenever someone asks us what our wedding colors are, it always reminds me of that scene from Steel Magnolia's where Julia Roberts says her colors are "Blush and Bashful," And her mother says very flatly in a southern drawl, "Her colors are pink and pink. It looks like the sanctuary was hosed down with pepto bismol"

Right.

So when David suggested getting rid of "wedding colors" I was on board. David pointed out that the whole 'wedding colors' thing feels like sort of a scam. Why do we have to pick two or three wedding colors? So we can buy matchy matchy bridesmaids dresses? So we can buy ribbon and flowers and chair covers that all match? Somehow that just feels like a excuse to sell us things.

A color palette is sensible, since it gives you a visual theme and prevents people from clashing. But colors? I don't know. I'm not that focused a bride, I don't think. I don't really want to control that many elements of the day.

And we are seeing more and more images from weddings where the couple didn't make everything match perfectly, and I think they look just lovely. So we are thinking of just going with jewel tones, and not narrowing it down much beyond that.

Hooray! So I'm not crazy for not wanting to limit us to a few colors. Now the question is... what should our palette be?

Colors

How come people just choose two or three colors for weddings? I like lots! The prairie sure seems to do colors right...

Searching

As we now start searching through a flood of things for our big party, it is interesting to think of what the task of looking really does. So Via Boing Boing is Swedish ethnologist Erik Ottoson of Uppsala University whose work focuses on people shopping and searching for things.

The people in the study are not just looking for certain things – they are also seeking to come to terms with what they are actually looking for. Ideals of what is beautiful, useful and reasonable materialise in conjunction with the experience of what is available and what is absent or out of reach. It is suggested that this mode of looking for goods is not only about purchase deliberations, but more importantly is a specific way of interacting with the world and making places meaningful. It can be viewed as a way of creating and moderating anticipation, and thereby cultivating affect. Searching for things thus becomes an experiential horizon

That's Dandy

So Megan gets a dress, and I get a suit. But what kind of suit? For a while I have been thinking of something a bit different than a normal tux, just as Megan has been thinking of something a little bit different than a normal white dress. (She can talk about that)

What exactly? I don't know but the Indians sure know how to dress up a guy! And the image on the left was painted in 1809 of Count Victor Kochubey around the time of the "Dandy" (also known as a "Dude" - who knew). Or this one of Francois Jean Baptist Isabey in a riding coat.

There just seemed to be a time when men wrote clothing that varied more than then a black suit with tie. Perhaps I am just old fashioned circa 1800.

Inspiration

Since I was never the type of girl who spent her childhood thinking about her future wedding (but oh yes did I have plans for my future vet practice/pet store/animal shelter!), and since I've only been to a handful of weddings in recent memory, I don't have much to go on. I tried to look at wedding magazines yesterday, but only managed to flip through a few pages before I got scared and retreated. Thank goodness for the intertubes and its vast amount of easily-accessible information!

The lovely blog Snippet & Ink showcased a beautiful wedding this morning that provided me a first dose of inspiration. My favorite bits are the incorporation of native flowers and the dining hall (especially the mismatched chairs). *purr* Pretty...

Winnie Loves Weddings too!

In an effort to keep our main blog free of wedding talk for those folks who read it for the vet stuff, politics, cars, or the benefits of forest fires, we present a new parallel blog: WinnieLovesWeddings.blogspot.com ! Watch this spot as we figure out how to do this whole wedding thing. Comments are encouraged!