Road to the Aisle

DIY Wedding Albums

2009-05-04T10:01:00.003-04:00

Look at me! After all this time, posting something back over here at Road to the Aisle. But I figure this is definitely wedding related, and since it's yet another DIY project, it's only fitting that it be posted over here, as well as on my current blog, Heather Drive.

Back at Christmas, I mentioned how we had given our parents wedding albums for gifts. I promised to take photos of the pages and post a full review.

Well, 4+ months later, here I am, and I'm finally doing what I said I'd do. I stole my mom's album for the weekend and took photos of it for all of you to see.

We had the albums made from Mpix.com. They are their "Assembled Albums," and we chose the 8" x 10" size, with 40 pages. The cover is black leather, and it is quite beautiful, and very sturdy.

We had our names and the date foil stamped on the cover. This cost a little bit extra, but we thought it was worth it.

I designed all of the pages myself, using Photoshop. I created a separate Photoshop document for each page using the specifications (measurements) from Mpix. From there, I pretty much had complete creative freedom.

The photo pages are mounted onto the album pages leaving a 1/16" border around the edges. If you decide to do collage pages like I did, you can make your background any color you want. I decided to keep it kind of classic-looking, and made my backgrounds black. I added a thin white border around all of the photos to give it a more finished look.

We did a couple of black-and-white spreads, too.

Mpix doesn't offer any templates, so this was all me. I experimented with different sizes with the photos, different crops, different positioning. Once I found combinations that worked, I repeated them on several pages, sometimes just changing them slightly. Above, you see that the templates on these pages are simply mirror images of each other.

For the groomsmen and bridesmaid pages, I decided to add a little text. Our parents didn't know all of the bridesmaids and groomsmen prior to the wedding, but everyone got along really well. I wanted them to be able to remember the names of everyone in the bridal party, so we had these pages that included a photo of each of the groomsmen and bridesmaids separately, with their names underneath. They came out really well.

Our parents' albums were slightly different from each other. Some pages were identical in both albums, but we swapped out some of the family photos. For instance, above, you see a page with photos of my parents and me. In Michael's parents' book, that page contained photos of him with his parents.

I love that the pages lie flat when you're flipping through them.

On the right, I cropped the photo to be 8" x 10" size, and uploaded it as it was so that it took up the entire page.

One limitation to these albums (as compared to some others) is that you cannot span a photo across both pages (as a two-page spread). If I had that option, I probably would have done it for the photo of our bridal party in the field.

The page on the right is one of my favorites. Our photographers had taken a photo of us dancing from an angle that included a lot of the floor in the shot. I cropped the photo to fit to the full 8" x 10" page, then layered smaller photos over the top of it (over the dance floor). I just loved how it turned out.

We had to have a full spread dedicated to the toast. SO. MANY. AWESOME. TOAST. PHOTOS. It was so hard to narrow them down.

This is another one of my favorite spreads. Love the huge full-page photo of the cake!

For the reception, I ended up using a lot of smaller photos. We had so many good ones, and we decided we would rather use more photos at a smaller size than have to narrow them down and use less of them at larger sizes. These turned out to be some of my favorite pages, simply because they are so filled with FUN.

Last page, with the back cover.

Here is a close-up of one of one of the pages with a full-page photo. You can easily see the 1/16" black border that they leave around each page. The photos are mounted onto the album pages really well.

Here is another photo of one of the corners. I wanted to show you what one of the pages looked like that had the black background.

We are extremely happy with how these turned out, and couldn't be more pleased with Mpix. These albums are a bit pricey--definitely more than you'd pay should you decide to use Blurb, My Publisher, etc. But the quality, in my opinion, far surpasses that of the other companies. These are professional albums, and if you look at it that way, the prices aren't bad at all.

They were delivered to us really quickly, too. Once I uploaded the pages and submitted our order, I want to say they were on our doorstep less than a week later. I think they generally process and ship orders within 24-48 hours.

Disadvantages to these albums? Well, the biggest one is that you kind of have to know what you are doing. Experience with design and layout certainly helps, especially when you have to be mindful of leaving space around the edges for trimming. As I mentioned before, Mpix doesn't provide any templates, so you have to start from scratch on your own. For some people, that's a huge advantage--total freedom to do what they want with every page--but for others, it's a disadvantage because it is wayyy more work.

We plan to eventually make an album like this with our honeymoon photos. I just have to find the time! For our parent albums, we had a reason to get them done quickly--I had a deadline! But it was all very time-consuming. I spent the better part of a WEEK in front of the computer designing pages.

In the end, it was completely worth it. Before we gave them to our parents, I was flipping through them myself several times a day. They're beautiful, and the quality of the photos is fantastic. I have no doubt that these albums will stand the test of time, and will be something our parents will be able to share with people for years to come.

If you have any questions about the albums, please let me know in the comments. Be sure to check back, because that's where I'll answer the questions as well. I have already answered a bunch of questions about this over on my other blog, so please take a look there.

Trash the Dress - The Beach

2008-10-13T12:14:00.000-04:00

Our first location probably ate up 2.5-3 hours of time.

The entire time (no lie) we were inside of the brick factory, I had to pee sooo badly. Seriously, every time we moved or I had to get into different positions, I was dying. And I felt so bad for Judy and Darsi because they had to put up with me complaining about it. I tried not to be too annoying, but my god, it was torture. And hey, I still did everything they asked. Well, until the end of location #1.

The original plan was to spend some time around and/or in the ponds surrounding the brick factory, but there were no restrooms available and there was no possible way I could wait any longer. So they took me to the nearest Wendy's.

(I can't even tell you how funny I felt walking in there. Here I am, wearing a wedding dress with a zip-up sweatshirt over it, with like an inch of makeup on my face. Walking into Wendy's. I'm convinced customers thought I was some kind of hooker. But I digress.)

After the bathroom break, Judy and Darsi decided that since we were already in the car, there was no point in going back to the brick factory. Instead, we'd take a detour and go to a completely different location--the beach.

Oddly enough, the beach seemed to be at least 5 degrees warmer in temperature. In the brick factory, I was freezing. On the beach? It was cold, but not as cold.

It was a lot more comfortable, too. Lying in nice, cushy sand (as opposed to brick walls, beams, and scrap metal)? No problem.

As I was lying in the sand to get shots like the above, I saw something coming toward me out of the corner of my eye. I look, and there is this dog, running down the beach at full speed, coming right at me. Behind her, her owner, screaming, "Tasha! Tasha!!" and then, to us, "WATCH OUT! She's going to try to kiss youuuuu!!!"

Too late. I had time to sit up, thankfully, but there Tasha was, jumping up on me and kissing my face. After she attacked me with her tongue, Darsi got the brunt of it. She was trying to speak (or scream) or something when the dog jumped up on her and managed to french kiss her a bit. No, I'm not kidding.

It was hilarious. All of us were laughing, and Judy kept snapping. Eventually, Tasha's owner caught up to her and managed to get her attention to call her back. She apologized profusely.

Still laughing.

And then? Tasha decided to turn around to come back for Round 2. Here is my "OH NO!" look. But Tasha's second attempt was thwarted as her owner managed to wrangle her.

And then I had the giggles. Could not stop laughing at the replay in my head.

OK. Back to business.

An old lifeguard shelter on the beach. The weathered steps were very cool. And whoops, I just noticed you can see my flip flops in this shot. I'm surprised Judy didn't photoshop them out. I guess maybe they add to it since it's the beach? :)

Then we moved right down near the water.

I like this one.

Putting an old lifeguard stand to good use. Bride--to the rescue!

Time for a little nap.

If everything had gone according to plan, I would have actually gotten into the water after this. But in the end, we all agreed that it was too cold (I'm pretty convinced I would have come out with hypothermia).

I'm actually really glad that I didn't get in the water. I don't think my dress would have been ruined or anything like that, but it would have been a bigger pain in the ass to haul home and take care of.

Now, I'm just trying to decide what to do with my dress. I need to get it cleaned, but am not sure whether I should go with a local place (can't find any recommendations!) or ship it off to Wed Clean. I need to figure it out soon, given that my dress is currently hanging in the entryway of our house. What to do, what to do...

Trash the Dress - Brick Factory

2008-10-13T08:12:00.000-04:00

Over the weekend, I got my trash the dress photos back from the photographer. Some pretty cool shots. I'm glad I did it, just for fun. Not sure I'll actually ever do anything with any of these pictures (aside from showing them to all of you), so I'm also kind of glad it wasn't something I actually paid for.

Anyway, I got more than 600 photos back--it was insane to try to look through them all. They've been narrowed down, but I'm still going to split them into two posts for the two locations--first for the abandoned brick factory, and then for the beach.

The brick factory was such a cool location. Every time we took another couple of steps, Judy found yet another goldmine in terms of backdrops.

Umm, yeah. With this one? I was definitely afraid that old green door (that was merely balancing on a pile of scrap metal) was going to fall and cause me to land on my head. That would have made an interesting trip to the emergency room. But alas, I stayed safe. And my boobs stayed in place, too. Praise the lord.

Rickety old catwalks, all still standing. Pretty amazing.

Cold beam. COLD.

These shots with the broken down brick wall are some of my favorites of the day.

An old red chair that just happened to be sitting there. You honestly could not have set up things this cool.

This last one was clearly an old manager's office or something. All of the drywall was broken off and/or deteriorated, but there was still old office furniture up there.

I will post the beach ones later...

Trash the Dress - Preview

2008-10-07T08:06:00.000-04:00

Well, we didn't really trash the dress. As Judy, the photographer, said--it was more like "celebrate" the dress. And we did.

Judy just e-mailed me with some preview photos. Weeeee! She made sure to say, "These aren't even some of the best ones... I figured I'd save those for later." So now I'm really curious as to what they all look like. But I'll share the teasers with you. Photos are copyright of Judy Cormier at Elementz of Fotographie.

To tell you a little bit about the shoot as I take you through the pics...

It was a lot of fun. When I got there, Judy had a makeup artist ready to do my makeup for the shoot. Judy wanted it to be dramatic, so that's what she did. It was pretty funny to catch glimpses of myself in a mirror now and then. I don't wear a lot of makeup so it was like I wasn't even looking at myself.

We started off in an old, abandoned brick factory in Toronto. We sorta had to sneak in through an opening in a fence--which was a challenge in a wedding dress--and down this short, steep hill into a makeshift entrance at one of the corners of the building. As soon as Darsi (Judy's assistant) stuck her head inside, she was like "Oh my god!!" (Judy and Darsi had never actually been inside before. They had only heard it was cool.) At first, I didn't know if that reaction was a good or bad thing. As it turned out, it was good.

There was graffiti everywhere, which made for some interesting backdrops. All of the catwalks and kilns and such were all still standing, so I was all over the place in there for different poses.

At one point, when I was up on the catwalk, something happened to catch my eye on the far wall. Someone had actually spray painted "TRASH THE DRESS" in big red letters. So apparently we weren't the first dress trashers to ever be in the brick factory. But of course we had to stop and take a few photos in front of it. Can't let a perfect backdrop like that go to waste.

They also played around a bit, using a video light and a grate/cage looking door. These ones are actually sorta dark (almost creepy!) looking. Very non-bridal. I like it.

Then I went down into one of the kilns (they were long and hallway-like), and she asked me to run. From an axe murderer. OK, she didn't say that, but doesn't it look like I'm maybe in some horror movie?

I think this next shot is from Judy's favorite location/pose of the day. Also in one of the kilns. The brick factory had these skylights all throughout, and in these shots, Judy used the natural light coming down from them.

I'll recap the rest later this week/next week when I have the rest of the photos. I think some of the stories will make more sense that way.

Cool

2008-10-04T20:58:00.000-04:00

One of the locations today for my trash the dress shoot. I will do a better recap later but it was a fun experience. Hopefully will have some preview photos soon!
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Trash it.

2008-10-01T08:08:00.000-04:00

So, I am trashing the dress. This Saturday.

For those of you unfamiliar with this trend, I encourage you to visit trashthedress.com, or to Google it. Many, many photographers and former brides are doing fabulous things with these types of photo shoots.

Here is a YouTube video:

Me? Well, I'm only doing it because I don't have to pay for it. Otherwise, I wouldn't be able to justify spending the money on more pictures of myself in my wedding dress.

Several months back, before I even got married, a photographer in Toronto put a notice on her blog that she was looking for brides to photograph for an artistic series she is doing. I sent an e-mail with my photo, and I heard back from her right away, saying she wanted to photograph me. All summer, I waited to hear from her to schedule the shoot, and I started to wonder whether it was actually going to happen. A couple of weeks ago, she e-mailed me to try to set up something for fall.

And so I will go on Saturday, drive up to Toronto to be a model for 6-8 hours. Actually sounds pretty fun, right? I'm excited to see how things come about. She has shared some of her plans for locations, and it sounds like it could be pretty amazing.

When all is said and done, I get all of the high-res photos on DVD, so it's a nice deal. I model for free, but have the benefit of getting to wear my dress one more time, and also get the photos.

I'm a little bit anxious about what will happen with my dress. I haven't had it professionally cleaned yet, so I plan to do so shortly after this shoot. While there is part of me that doesn't care about the dress--not ever going to wear it again, it wasn't that expensive, etc.--there is also part of me that definitely doesn't want it RUINED. From what I hear from other "trash the dress" brides, they actually do come clean. So here's hoping. Also, I talked to my mom over the weekend, and she mentioned that my dress is already looking pretty trashed as it is. It got pretty filthy at my reception, and I guess that over time, the stains have become more and more noticeable. Luckily, the photographer said this isn't a problem--most spots probably won't even show in the photos, and if they do, they can be photoshopped out.

So stay tuned... I'm definitely going to be sharing photos here once I get them back. (I'm thinking it could be a while since I'm not a paying client--these are photos she is doing for her own portfolio/show piece, and I'm sure editing them will get pushed to the bottom of her priorities for a while!)

In the meantime, if you did a trash the dress session... leave a link to your photos in the comments in you have them up somewhere. I'd love to see them, and maybe some of the people who still visit this blog would, too. :)

Reflection

2008-09-05T16:34:00.001-04:00

Recently, at work, I showed our wedding pictures to some of the ladies I now share office space with. From there, we got into a conversation regarding decisions made for our weddings--what we were so happy we did, and what we wish we would have done differently.

Since then, I've been thinking about things like that, and I figured I might as well write them down and share them with all of you, since many of you are still planning. So I'll get right to it.

I'm SO glad we:

1. Ended up hiring a videographer. We originally weren't planning on having one, but about three months before the wedding, I started freaking out that maybe we would regret it. After a bit of discussion, we decided to look around for one.

We hired one a short time later, and we are so glad that we did. There are so many things that I would have been devastated to never get to see/hear again (i.e. our fabulous toasts given by Lindsay and Justin). And there were many things I didn't see on the wedding day that were captured by the videographer (i.e. Michael's grandmother dancing up a storm).

If you're wavering on this decision, I'm telling you... DO IT. If you've decided against having one, I urge you to reconsider.

2. Planned it so that we would NOT miss our cocktail hour. We owe some of the credit to our photographers, who were extremely efficient taking pictures between the ceremony and reception. We said from the very beginning of our planning that we DEFINITELY wanted to be at our cocktail hour. Our thought was, we're paying so much money to throw this party--we want to be there to enjoy every single minute of it. And we did! The Krackes got us there on time (we may have even been a few minutes early!).

We had that extra time to walk around and relax, mingle with guests, enjoy drinks, etc. I also had a few minutes to go in the bathroom and have a friend fix my hair, have Lindsay assist me with going to the bathroom, etc. :) It was a great decision.

3. Involved our families so much in the wedding. Both of my parents walked me down the aisle, and I'm so glad that I made the decision to do it that way.

My brothers were groomsmen; Michael's sisters were bridesmaids. We were SO happy to have our siblings with us every step of the way. Although, I am misleading you... I act like this was a conscious decision we made. It wasn't. From the very beginning, it was never a question. Even before we were engaged, I always knew that when Michael and I got married, my brothers would be groomsmen and his sisters bridesmaids. It was a given.

We always looked at it like the entire bridal party was ours. I would never have chosen anybody to be a bridesmaid that Michael disapproved of, and vice versa. I hate reading on The Knot when a bride says she excluded the groom's sister, or that her groom is excluding her brother, because "I'm not that close to her" or "It's his side so he can choose who he wants; he doesn't want my brother." I'm sorry, but that is bullshit. That's your future husband's sister, and unless she's a crackwhore or an uber bitch that your fiance doesn't even talk to, she belongs in your wedding party. Period. And if your fiance is excluding your brother and you want him to be in it... you need to speak up. It's family.

We also chose family members to do readings. Michael's uncle, my cousin, my brother's girlfriend (who is now his fiancee). Great, great decisions. No matter what happens in life, these people will always be our family.

4. Chose to do a sweetheart table. Sitting down quietly to dinner with just my new husband was a fabulous part of the evening. We were able to have a few minutes just to ourselves, and we had fun chatting together for that time. The day goes by in a huge blur, and much of it was spent apart (as silly as that is). I'm glad we at least had that time together. Plus we got to do a little trash talking about the no-show guests!! :)

5. Listened to the recommendations of professionals. The big one that comes to mind is our florist. I went into the florist meetings with an open mind because I wasn't quite sure what color flowers to pick for the aqua blue bridesmaid dresses we picked out. When she first suggested hot pink and orange, I thought to myself--gross. I even said to her, "I like the idea of the hot pink, but I am not sold on the orange." She asked me to trust her and I did.

The ladies at work said they would have vetoed her, and said what a shame that would have been. They would have missed out on a BEAUTIFUL color combination! I loved the way the hot pink and orange popped against the aqua blue. Fantastic.

6. Had a morning after brunch, and waited until the Monday after the wedding to leave for the honeymoon. It was nice to get an opportunity to see a lot of our guests again the next morning. Everyone was still on a high from the fun of the night before, and we got to reminisce about things while they were still fresh in our minds.

But man, were we exhausted. I'm not sure I have ever been so tired in my life! We really needed a day at home to recoup and regroup before we left for our honeymoon in Hawaii.

Speaking of Hawaii...

7. Splurged and went to Hawaii. It was amazing, and we're not sure when we'll have another opportunity to 1) take that long of a vacation, and 2) spend that much money on one. We're looking at kids in the next few years, and once that happens, lord knows we likely won't have the chance to go again until several years down the road.

I think that's it for now... if I think of anything more, I will put together a "Reflection: Part 2" post! As for things we wish we didn't do... I honestly can't think of anything. I don't think we have any regrets.

I hope this "advice" helps people. Good luck!

FOR SALE: Votive Candle Holders

2008-08-24T20:08:00.005-04:00

Last up (for now)... votives!

We used these as part of our centerpieces. We used four votives for each table. Loved the candlelight, it was all so beautiful!

I have almost six dozen of these. I had six dozen, but two mysteriously disappeared (who knows?). So it's a total of 70 votives. The candles have been burned for several hours, but do have quite a bit of burn time left in them. The candles can be removed easily by sticking them in a freezer and then popping out the old candle with a butter knife, and the votive holders can be washed. New candles can then be inserted.

I'm asking $25 for all.

E-mail me at roadtotheaisle@gmail.com if you would like to purchase.

All buyers are responsible for shipping costs + optional insurance. All sales are final. Payment will only be accepted through Paypal.

FOR SALE: Black Umbrellas

2008-08-24T20:02:00.003-04:00

We purchased these umbrellas for our bridesmaids and groomsmen (and ourselves!) in case of rain on our wedding day. We thought simple black umbrellas would have made for some really cool outdoor pictures with our bridal party, if need be. Luckily, we didn't need them!

I gave my bridesmaids their umbrellas in their tote bags as part of their gifts at the rehearsal dinner, but we kept the groomsmen umbrellas in a bag.

So, here they are... brand new, unused black umbrellas. We have six of them. They are compact and lightweight. When opened up, they are a standard sized umbrella.

Six of them for $6, or $1 each. I am willing to separate the batch of them if you don't need all six.

E-mail me at roadtotheaisle@gmail.com if you would like to purchase.

All buyers are responsible for shipping costs + optional insurance. All sales are final. Payment will only be accepted through Paypal.

FOR SALE: Photo Frame Cardbox SOLD!

2008-08-24T19:49:00.005-04:00

***Update (8/24/08, 11:07 p.m.): The cardbox has been sold.***

I'm selling my photo frame cardbox. This was a big hit at our wedding, and was plenty big to hold all of the cards we received at the reception.

It is made out of 8" x 10" frames with 5" x 7" mattes. The box holds four 5" x 7" (with "portrait" orientation) photos. It sits on a lazy susan. The box spins so guests can easily see all four photos.

All these pictures of the box were taken yesterday.

One catch with the box is that is difficult to remove and insert the photos without taking the box apart. I will have to unscrew some of the brackets in order to remove our pictures... if you already have your photos picked out for the frame, you can e-mail them to me and I'd be happy to print them and insert them in the frames for you at the same time. That way, it doesn't need to be unassembled at all once it gets to you. Or, you can do it yourself. It's not hard... just screws. Let me know if you have more questions or concerns about that.

This pictures shows that there are two additional layers of foam board underneath the top to boost the top up a bit.

Inside of the box.

I am asking $45 for the box. I also have extra fabric that I used for the top. I'd be willing to throw that in for an extra $4, in case you want to make a new top or reupholster it for any reason.

E-mail me at roadtotheaisle@gmail.com if you are interested in purchasing the box.

All buyers are responsible for shipping costs + optional insurance. All sales are final. Payment will only be accepted through Paypal.

FOR SALE: Table Number Luminaries

2008-08-24T19:22:00.005-04:00

Next up are my table number luminaries.

Here is a picture of one of them at the wedding. All the pictures I have were taken when it was still light outside. They were beautiful on the tables, and looked better and better as it got darker outside (we had a lot of natural light in our venue). Obviously, they were useful as our table numbers, but they also added to the overall look of our tables and centerpieces.

Here is a picture that I took of one of them yesterday:

We have 16 luminaries. Table numbers 1-15, and then a "Mr. & Mrs." luminary that we used for our sweetheart table.

They are in really good shape. We used mini pillar candles inside of them. They melted down quite a bit, but probably still have a few hours of burn time left on them. Or, you can obviously put a new candle in each of them. The mini pillars are available in 8-packs at Michael's or probably any of the other craft stores for $5.99 per pack.

The candles we had in there melted down flat, so you could actually just set a new candle on top of the old one. Or, the candles should be easy to remove if you chill the glass a little bit (stick them in the freezer--instructions can be found here, or through a simple Google search). The candle should pop right out with a butter knife and a little effort.

Here is a picture of what the insides look like (also taken yesterday):

I'd really like to sell these to someone who is also using the aqua color for their wedding. Trying to remove or replace the ribbon may damage the surface of the candle, and plus it is a whole lot of extra work for you! So for you aqua brides... they are up for grabs!

I'm asking $40 for the 16 luminaries. Need a few more table numbers? I'd be happy to use these four extra glass cylinders (if they are not already sold!) to make them for you for an extra $20, or $5 each. The extra cost is to cover the extra supplies used and my time to make them.

I would LOVE to sell these to a local bride so we can arrange pick-up/drop-off instead of having to ship them. Any takers? Even though I would prefer to sell locally, I am willing to sell them to an out-of-towner, too.

E-mail me at roadtotheaisle@gmail.com if you would like to purchase.

All buyers are responsible for shipping costs and optional insurance. All sales are final.

FOR SALE: Glass Cylinder Vases

2008-08-24T19:19:00.004-04:00

I bought these to make table number luminaries (also for sale--check it out), but it turned out that I had extras. I kept them around because I thought perhaps I'd find some other use for them, but I never did.

These are brand new, never used. 3" diameter x 9" tall glass cylinder vases. I have four of them for sale. $3 each, or $12 for all.

They can be used for candles, flowers, centerpieces, etc.

I am also offering these up as an option for extra table number luminaries (if you need them, I will make them for you). See the table number luminary listing for details.

E-mail me at roadtotheaisle@gmail.com if you would like to purchase.

All buyers are responsible for shipping costs + optional insurance. All sales are final. Payment will be accepted only through Paypal.

Selling off wedding items

2008-08-24T19:19:00.002-04:00

Two months after the wedding, and I am just now getting organized enough to sell off my no-longer-needed wedding items. I'm going to give each item its own post so that it's easier to separate pictures and information.

My "for sale" posts will be coming up soon. And there may be additional "for sale" posts in the future as I find things that are still hanging around our house! So if you're looking for something in particular, definitely keep checking back every once in a while.

Happy shopping...

Thank You Cards...

2008-08-22T09:28:00.003-04:00

...are the devil.

Don't get me wrong, I want to send them. I want to thank our guests.

But damn are they a pain in the butt. And the hand. And the wrist. Not to mention the wallet.

Our goal is to get them completely finished this weekend. Wish us luck!

Video Recap

2008-08-09T15:28:00.002-04:00

This recap "music video" appears at the end of our DVD that we were given by our videographer.

We figured out how to get the video off the DVD and onto our computer, and as a result, we're able to share it via YouTube.

Obviously, the quality of the video is greatly affected when uploaded on the internet... but I always figure it's better than nothing. :)

Pro Pics, Part 13: Fun at the Reception

2008-08-08T12:17:00.000-04:00

We did an anniversary dance. I love this picture of my Uncle Gary.

This is Michael's great aunt and great uncle. They ultimately "won" the anniversary dance. We gave them a bottle of champagne. They have been married for 60 years.

So sweet.

After that, the fun really began.

I don't know if you can tell by looking at the pictures, but I don't think anybody had any fun at our reception.
Nope, this is not fun.
Not fun at all.

In all seriousness, I have never had so much fun in my entire life. Surrounded by all of our friends and family, with good music, drinks, and a fantastic reason to celebrate. It was a good night.
I loved that we had children at our wedding. It was a good decision.
Love this picture of my brother and my mom.

Busting out the Michael Jackson impressions.

Our groomsmen, Jason, does a really good job with it. It's hilarious.

My grandma is so cute. Now that we have the video, we know that at this point, my grandma was dancing to Nelly. Hilarious.

My dad has always loved to let loose and dance (or at least that's what my mom tells me). He has a horrible back, though. My mom asked me at one point during the night, "How is your dad doing all of that dancing with his back?" Come to find out the next day... he was able to do it because of all the rum he had.

Booze. The natural painkiller.

He certainly did pay for his fun the next day, though. He was sore and hungover.

Well, that brings us to the end of the wedding day. I still have one or two more "installments"--all of our detail shots. But chronologically, this is it! :)

Our video is ready!

2008-08-07T16:31:00.002-04:00

Michael went and picked it up on his lunch break. I can't wait to watch it!

Unfortunately, I have my cake decorating class tonight, so we can't watch it until later. But I think we're going to preview the "recap" music video that he does to give us a sneak peek.

Eeeeeeeek! So exciting.

Pro Pics, Part 12: Bouquet & Garter Toss

2008-08-07T16:30:00.000-04:00

All the single ladies came out to the dance floor...

They were quite enthusiastic.

I was aiming for a certain someone... it was a lot of pressure.

How am I going to get this into her hands? I toss...

The girls watch it fly...
And ummm, yeah. It hit the ceiling, and then hit the floor. I'm not going to be a professional bouquet tosser any time soon. Ultimately, my 6-year-old cousin picked it up off of the floor and gave it to Marie, my brother's girlfriend. Luckily, that was exactly who I wanted to have it. You see, my brother had confessed a month or two before the wedding that he was planning to propose to Marie sometime after our wedding. She didn't know about the pending proposal, but I thought it would be fun if we could rig it so that she would catch the bouquet and he would catch the garter.

I have no idea what I was telling him. Probably that I don't want to be embarrassed in front of our grandmothers. Ha!

The toss...

Score! That's my brother. We were happy that although it wasn't perfect, the plan worked out quite nicely.

We only did the garter replacement and dance because it had turned out the way we wanted. Had the bouquet and garter ended up in the hands of strangers, or even people who weren't dating, we would have nixed it on the spot. Our DJ was aware of how we felt, so he was prepared to go either way with it.

We had planned for them to dance to "God Bless the Broken Road." I'm not sure if it's actually "their" song, but I knew it was one that they liked.

Cute! My brother ended up proposing on the 4th of July. We were still on our honeymoon in Hawaii, but they text messaged us to share the happy news. They're going to get married in October 2010.

Pro Pics, Part 11: Parent Dances

2008-08-05T12:54:00.001-04:00

Shortly after the cake cutting, we did our parent dances.

I agonized for quite a while over what song to use for the "father/daughter" dance. None of them seemed quite right. I finally decided to give the song research and choice to my dad as his one "fatherly duty," and he came to me a week later with a YouTube link to "I Loved Her First" by Heartland. It was more cliche than I originally wanted, but the song meant a lot to my dad, and it ended up being perfect.

Getting ready to dance.

Love this picture. It is one of my favorites from the day.

My dad got super emotional. Oh, and you should have seen my mom on the sidelines! I only looked at her once because I was afraid she was going to make me cry. She was bawling her eyes out! Her best friend had to go over and comfort her, haha!

Have I mentioned lately how much I loved my dress? ;)

Next up were Michael and his mom. They danced to "What a Wonderful World" by Louis Armstrong.

Pro Pics, Part 10: Cake Cutting

2008-08-03T21:26:00.000-04:00

We had a brief moment where we joked that we were going to cut the cake "karate chop" style. Hence the look on my face and our stance. :)

Michael looks mischevious here. Not sure what he was thinking. No cake smashing, though. We agreed.

The cake was so good! Our reception venue saved the top layer for us, even though we didn't intend for them to save it. Our baker makes us a free, FRESH anniversary cake for our 1st anniversary, so we didn't want to save it. However, we did take it home with us, and my mom cut it up and froze it for us while we were on our honeymoon. Now, it's in our freezer at home and every couple of weeks, we've been taking out a couple of slices to defrost and eat. It's still delicious!

Pro Pics, Part 9: The Toasts

2008-08-02T20:50:00.002-04:00

Next up on the agenda were the toasts. This series of photos resulted in some of my absolute favorites from our entire day.

My matron of honor (my cousin, Lindsay), and Michael's best man (his friend from high school, Justin) were our speakers.

Linds was up first. We are only 9 months apart in age, so we grew up together. Her speech centered around a lot of our memories and funny moments from when we were children.

I'm pretty sure this was the part when she told everyone how we used to make up dance routines to Wilson Phillips and Barbra Streisand songs. Then we used to make my mom videotape them. Luckily, none of the videos surfaced for the wedding. Or for blackmail, for that matter.

"When I got married a few years ago, my sister was my maid of honor. In her speech, she gave some great advice. She said, 'Lindsay, never go to bed angry.' (pause) 'Stay up and fight ALL NIGHT LONG!"

Then, she continued: "Well, I'm here to tell you... GO TO BED and get some sleep! It's not worth it!"

Lindsay did a great job. It was the perfect matron of honor speech.

Uh oh. Justin has the mic. I wasn't sure what to expect. He started off with a short tale about how he and Michael met, and reiterated some of the stupid jokes they have shared over the years.

To fully appreciate the following photos, I feel like I have to tell a little back story.

To try to tell a short version of the story Justin shared with our guests: Basically, we were at a Buffalo Bills game a few years back (just the three of us--Justin, Michael and myself). We were tailgating, when we saw this guy in a throwback Buffalo Bills Steve Tasker jersey. He was tossing a football innocently with his friends.

When he turned around, we noticed something. It didn't say "Tasker" on the back of his jersey. It said "Koch." It was one of those personalized NFL jerseys that people get with their own last names on them. So, to amuse ourselves over our beers and subs, we started making up all of these stories about Koch. How he got the jersey (Debbie and the kids gave it to him for his birthday), what he does for living, etc. I even managed to be all stealth about it and snapped a few photos of him. For whatever reason, we thought all of this was hilarious.

Ever since that game (probably four years ago now), we have continuously used Koch as an inside joke. During his toast, Justin shared this story with everyone. Then, he said, "Now... all the way from Buffalo... I give you KOCH!"

As you can tell from this photo, EVERYONE turned to look. Justin managed to fake out every. single. guest at our wedding. Even our videographer came up to us afterward and said, "I totally turned around! He had me fooled!" Even Justin's girlfriend (who just became his fiancee this weekend!), who knew the joke ahead of time, said she turned.

Of course, I never expected that the actual Koch would come out of the back. I suspected he was going to have someone come out dressed like him or something. Two seconds later, Justin said, "Nah, I'm just kidding."

Once we realized the joke he had just pulled off, we were hysterical.

I think Justin was pretty proud of himself. :)

Then he pulled out a matching throwback Steve Tasker jersey (just like the one Koch was wearing that day). We suspected what might be on the back of it (I love Michael's face in this photo), but it didn't make the "big reveal" any less funny.

HILARIOUS. Justin presented Michael with his very own "Koch" jersey. And now we have a whole new set of jokes to make. Best speech ever.

Pro Pics, Part 8: Introductions & First Dance

2008-08-01T18:48:00.002-04:00

So, are you guys thinking the pro pic series must be coming to an end?

Well, if you are... you're wrong. I figured it out last night, and I still have seven more "installments" to do. That means a whole 'nother week of pro pics. Hopefully you're not sick of seeing them.

Our reception started at 5:30 p.m., beginning with our cocktail hour. Thanks to our amazing photographers and their efficiency, we remained on schedule throughout the break between the ceremony and reception, and we actually made it to the cocktail hour on time! We may have actually been a few minutes early. We told them from the very beginning that we wanted to be at our entire reception. We figured we're throwing this expensive party--we want to enjoy every minute of it with our guests!

As I mentioned in yesterday's post, we did sneak out for a few minutes during dinner, which was a nice compromise with our photographers. We certainly weren't missing much since our guests were busy eating. Since we had done the receiving line at the church, there wasn't any pressure to go around and do table visits.

Anyway, at around 6:30 p.m., the DJ lined up the bridal party for introductions.

It's funny, I have no recollection of what song our parents entered to. The DJ had a suggestion for it, and I let him run with it. I guess I'll find out once we get our video, huh?

This was a mistake on the part of the DJ. As previously explained, my parents are divorced, but friendly. I wanted them to be introduced together. I explained to the DJ that they should be introduced with separate names.

My mom still has my dad's last name (she never changed it back). I wanted them introduced as "Charles Lastname & Cynthia Lastname" instead of "Charles & Cynthia Lastname" (which implies they're still married). I guess the DJ didn't understand what I was saying, because he called them completely separately, and made them walk out by themselves. I hated that, but there was obviously nothing I could do to fix it. In the grand scheme of things, not a big deal.

Then the song changed for our bridal party. Prior to our final meeting with the DJ, we had problems coming up with a song for bridal party introductions. But then we got the same request from 3-4 different bridal party members. These guys wanted to come out to "Sexyback!" So that was that. The decision was made for us.

Carrie and Jay were very into it. As you can probably imagine, they were two of the people who had specifically requested "Sexyback." :)

Then it was our turn. We were introduced to "Signed, Sealed, Delivered." We liked that it had a nice beat to it. And obviously the words make sense. Adding to all of that, we're big Barack Obama fans and his campaign played the song pretty regularly throughout the primary season. So it was our subtle nod to Barack, too. ;)

We went right into our first dance to "I'll Always Be Right There" by Bryan Adams.

Ring shots.

Loved my dress so much!

A twirl! Every girl loves twirling in a big dress. :)

Our bridal party was apparently amused by the twirl, judging by this photo. Love the look on Carrie's face.

More to come!

Pro Pics, Part 7: Just Us

2008-07-31T20:46:00.002-04:00

After the bridal party photos on the hill, we stopped at two more locations that the photographers chose for pictures of Michael and me. We got out of the limo to do pics, and our bridesmaids and groomsmen stayed on and partied. All was right in the world. :)

At the reception, Michael and I were served our dinners first. As a result, we were also done first. Our photographers grabbed us to take a few more photos outside in the evening light. We started on the deck, and then went out to the golf course.

Screeching Halt

2008-07-30T12:58:00.000-04:00

I have been agonizing over this decision for several weeks now. Even before the wedding, I had thoughts about, "What will I do?"

But now I realize what I have to do. I have to stop.

For all of you who have e-mailed me and have not received answers... I apologize. But I just can't keep up. I get sooo many e-mails. And unfortunately, it pains me to say: I can't accept your orders. I can't answer all of your questions. It's just too much for me to handle.

I would love to be able to help all of you. Really, I would. But I have a full-time job. A house that I've noticed is often a huge disaster. Things that I want to do for myself that I have put off. And you know what? I want to relax.

It's a shame, because if I ever wanted to start my own business, now is the time to do it. I often think of how nice it would be to work from home, spend my days painting and being creative.

But the fact of the matter is that I am not brave enough to quit a steady job and start doing this stuff full time, and I'm not strong enough to do it all on top of another full-time job.

I want to cook more. I need to clean more. I want to have hobbies. I want to live my life.

I already have a long list of orders I have accepted from people, and I will fulfill those orders because it's the right thing to do. If I'm being completely honest, I am seriously lacking the motivation to get even those ones done. Just taking care of them is going to keep me busy for quite a while. And the truth is that it's daunting. It's daunting to look at my long list, and it has been killing me to watch it grow. So I have to put a stop to it... it can't grow any larger.

As of right now, I am no longer accepting orders. I am SO sorry.

I will try to catch up on the e-mails that are sitting in my inbox, because you all deserve some kind of response.

I will certainly post about this again if something changes. But looking forward, I can only see my life getting busier. In September, aerobics classes will start up again during the week. Football begins. Friends are having babies. We have stuff going on most of the weekends. My workload at my job will pick up again.

I hope you all can understand.

Pro Pics, Part 6: Bridal Party Photos

2008-07-29T21:09:00.002-04:00

After our family photos outside, we spent a little time indoors with the bridal party, taking pics like these:

By the time we were done, the weather outside had completely cleared and it was--once again--a beautiful day. We were so happy that we were able to spend the rest of the photo time outdoors.

Our photographers scouted photo locations prior to our wedding day. They tried to find interesting places that were en route from the church to our reception site. The limo followed them to each location. When we pulled up this one and saw the huge hill, we were all wondering what the heck was going on. But it was a fun location, and we ended up with some pretty unique pictures there.

Look at that sky!

After they did the whole "lifting Michael" thing, they insisted on doing it with me, too. By this time, they had all had a few beers, so it was a little more scary than it should have been!

Trying a new header on for size...

2008-07-29T17:01:00.000-04:00

I think it works.

Pro Pics, Part 5: Family Portraits

2008-07-28T20:49:00.003-04:00

Immediately following the receiving line, we took a few more bridal party portraits on the altar inside the church. Once we were finished with that, the photographers said the rain was letting up outside--enough so that they wanted to attempt to take our family pictures outdoors, on the steps of the church. We got dripped and drizzled on a little bit, but it was worth it to have the pics outside in the natural light.

With our nephew, Brendan. He had a three-piece suit on. It was hilarious, and one of the cutest things I have ever seen.

With Michael's family.

With my "little" twin brothers. They are two years younger than me, and I bullied the hell out of them while we were growing up. Unfortunately, they outgrew me around the time I was a senior in high school. They then proceeded to spend the next couple years executing their revenge on me by torturing me on a regular basis. Yeah, that sucked. Luckily, the three of us came through it all unscathed, and we are really, really close. I was so happy that they were such a big part of our wedding as members of the bridal party.

My mom, grandma, and me. They both looked so beautiful!

With my family.

With Michael's family again (minus Andy and Brendan).

With Michael's grandfather ("Poppy").

Michael with his two sisters, whom I adore.

The two of us with my grandma.

Michael with his grandma at the reception. She didn't get the memo about staying at the church for pictures after the ceremony, so Michael and the photographers were able to catch up with her later in the night. I'm glad we ended up getting this photo of her.

Pro Pics, Part 4: The Ceremony

2008-07-27T18:48:00.002-04:00

Our ceremony began at 2:00 p.m. We had a Catholic ceremony, but without a full mass.

My grandma, getting her corsage pinned on before the ceremony.

My mother-in-law, also getting pinned with her corsage.

The bride has arrived, the bride has arrived! Actually, I stayed on the limo coach while all of the bridesmaids went inside. Since guests were still arriving, I couldn't get into the church yet without being seen.

The ladies hanging out on the church steps.

Even though she is blurry in the background, I still love this picture of Carrie laughing at Father Joe.

It's almost time. Everyone getting lined up for the processional.

While standing in the limo, I started to hear a few rumbles of thunder. Lindsay (matron of honor) came running out to get me off the bus. She said I needed to get inside while I could because it looked like the sky could open up at any minute.

Michael's parents walking down the aisle. At this point, I was in my tiny hiding room with Lindsay. "Ave Maria" was being sung, and Lindsay and I could barely hold it together. So we just started talking and laughing as much as possible. Lindsay even started chanting "toilet water, toilet water, toilet water!" so that we would keep from crying. A funny memory.

Lighting the unity candle.

My mom was escorted down the aisle by my twin brothers. She went down to "Ave Maria" as well.

Once she lit the unity candle, she actually came back up the aisle so that she could escort me (along with my dad) down the aisle.
Peeking out of my hiding place. I wanted to see everyone enter the church. I hated that I was missing the action!
Here come the bridesmaids...

Cristina

Melissa

Bethany

Carrie

Sabrina

Lindsay. After Lindsay had started down, they closed the back doors so that they could situate me behind the door for the "big reveal."

Awww, look at my dad. He looks emotional.

Trying to catch my breath as "Canon in D" starts to play.

The doors open, and here we go...

Kissing my mom and dad.

Nope, I wasn't excited. Not at all.

Cutie boy Brendan. He needed a nap.

Our friend, Kristin, was our soloist. She has such a beautiful voice. She is expecting a baby girl in October.
My cousin, Carly, did the first reading.
Father Joe. Yes, he has a ponytail. He is the coolest Catholic priest EVER. :)

One of our guests checking out our layered programs.

Michael's Uncle Frank did the second reading.

Laughter during the homily.

Time for some vows!
And the rings...
Are we married yet?

The kiss!

Unity candle lighting. We used the song "One Hand, One Heart" from West Side Story. Kristin sang it beautifully, of course.

My brother's girlfriend, Marie (who, as of July 4, is actually his fiancee!), read the Prayer of the Faithful.

It's official, we're hitched!

I love these pictures of our bridal party, paired off as they come up the aisle. Everyone looks so nice! Lindsay and Justin.

Sabrina and Dave.

Bethany and Jason.

Carrie and Jay.

Melissa and Tyler.

Cristina and Trevor.

My parents. I loved getting this picture back and seeing that they were holding hands. They have been divorced for almost 20 years. And they actually get along! I know, a shocker! It's so nice for us kids, though. A big hooray for friendly parents.

Receiving line. We had to move it inside once it decided to thunder, lightning, and downpour during our ceremony. Even during the receiving line, it was absolutely pouring rain outside. I worried we wouldn't be able to take any outdoor photos.

With Father Joe before he had to hit the road.

Pro Pics, Part 3: Pre-Ceremony Photos

2008-07-26T21:36:00.003-04:00

We planned it so that we would take as many photos as possible prior to the ceremony. Since we didn't want to see each other prior to me walking down the aisle, these pictures only consisted of "bride with bridesmaid" and "groom with groomsmen" photos, as well as each of us with our parents.

For the girls and me, we did our photos right at my mom's house, before the limo picked us up. For the guys, they did theirs at the church while they were killing time waiting for the ladies to arrive. It worked out well.

My parents and me

Michael with his parents

Lindsay (matron of honor) and me

Sabrina (my cousin) and me

Bethany and me. Bethany is expecting a baby girl in late October. I can't wait to meet her! :)

One of my new sisters-in-law, Melissa. She's Michael's older sister, and Brendan's mommy. I'm pretty sure Brendan is kinda famous on this blog. Our baby nephew that I love so much, and love to post pictures of.

Carrie and me. Carrie is a good friend that I have known since high school. Her claim to fame is her talent for making mimosas. I also credit her with most of my underage drinking. She is a couple years older than me, and must've had a good fake ID back in the day. Needless to say, we have plenty of good memories (some of them fuzzy) and good times together. :)

The other new sister-in-law, Cristina. She's 17. Since Michael and I have been together for more than 6 years now, I have pretty much watched her grow up. It's pretty incredible to think about how "little" she was back when we first started dating.

My whole group of ladies. Love them all! And loooove the colors. The aqua with the hot pink and orange--so thankful for my florist's suggestion!

All of the handsome guys.

Michael and his good friend, Jay.
The guys got a bit goofy. Funny pictures.
Michael with Jason, another good friend.
Michael and his best man, Justin. They went to high school and worked together for quite a few years. I love all the guys, but have a special place in my heart for Justin. The three of us have had many good times and good laughs (which all came to be part of the toast at the reception!) :)
Michael with my brother, Tyler. My brothers both get along with Michael really well. I love that.
Michael with his friend, Dave.

With my other brother, Trevor.

Playing on the whole height difference, I assume. My brothers like to mess with him about that.
With both brothers.

Lined up like an offensive line, with Michael as the QB. Crazy guys.

Pro Pics, Part 2: The Guys Get Ready

2008-07-25T15:56:00.000-04:00

The guys were scheduled to get picked up by the limo at 12:30 p.m. We told them all to meet at our house, dressed, by noon.

Michael's best man, Justin, showed up first (good guy, keeping Michael company!).

Kurtis (the husband of our husband/wife photography team) showed up between 11:30 and noon, after he had dropped off Julia at my mom's.

And this is where the day began for the guys.

Helping Michael get his cufflinks on.

Rings! Mine is there, too. You can barely see it because it's actually tucked inside of Michael's.

The groom's attire.

The groomsmen's attire (this is my brother, Trevor).

My other brother (they're twins), Tyler.

All seven guys and their shoes. Walking all over our carpet. Gotta love it.

They actually did a really good job figuring out the pocketsquares.

Someone brought over some frozen Bagel Bites for them to munch on. And here's Chef Michael. I cringe when I think of them eating these saucy, cheesy snacks in their white dress shirts (especially Michael, with the white tie!). Sometimes, it's good to be oblivious.

I guess Jay got into some of the leftover groom's cake from the rehearsal dinner the night before.

The guys hanging out, watching a movie. I'm told that "Snatch" was the film of choice.

Getting ready to go.

In this picture, Michael is cutting up cheese to take in the limo for the crackers and cheese snacks we had between the ceremony and reception. He remembered everything. Love my husband.

Michael and Justin.

They were listening to some god-awful music in the limo. Really, really heavy metal rock. I know this only because they left it on when they exited. The bridesmaids and I were greeted with it when we got on the limo a short time later.

Killing time at the church.

Did someone call the Secret Service? OK, seriously, the guys all looked so good!

Chit chatting with Father Joe.

Looks like it's time to go!

Pro Pics, Part 1: The Girls Get Ready

2008-07-24T22:03:00.006-04:00

On the morning of the wedding, the activity started bright and early at my mom's house. Two of my bridesmaids, Carrie and Bethany, stayed over at my mom's with me the night before.

Bethany and I slept in the spare queen bed my mom has, and we both woke up before 7:00 a.m. I remember trying to lie there quietly, and all of sudden Bethany says, groggily, "Heather! It is absolutely BEAUTIFUL out!" And it was. Sun was shining, birds were chirping. It was a great way to wake up. And there was certainly no going back to sleep after that.

We got up, showered. My mom went and got bagels and stuff for breakfast. Henry, my hair stylist practically all my life, showed up to start doing hair (ALL of us!) at 8:00 a.m.

Our photographers were scheduled to start right around noon. They are a husband/wife team. Julia was dropped off at my mom's around 11:30 a.m. This is where we begin!

When she arrived, I was getting my hair finished up (the curls had been setting all morning).

I love this picture. The look on my face is hilarious. This is when my brother called me to tell me something was wrong with his tux. "They gave me a tux jacket with FAKE POCKETS!" He yelled. This was a problem because he was trying to put a pocketsquare in.

Henry is looking at my mom and laughing in this picture, because I very calmly replied, "Well, then you just need to drive down to the shop and rip them a new one."

Bethany and my mom look on and listen, concerned. Of course, the second I hung up, it occurred to all of us that my brother is just an idiot. His pocket was stitched together. Poor kid had apparently never encountered such a thing before. Mini crisis averted.

This is my great-grandmother's rosary. She passed away in 2002 at the age of 96. I was really close to her. My grandma gave me her rosary when I was baptized/confirmed in April 2007.

The night before the wedding, it spent the night in the bushes outside of my mom's house. Putting a rosary in the bushes is supposed to bring you good weather for your wedding day.

For the most part, it worked.

Later, my bridesmaids attached it to my bouquet to serve as my "something old."

Tessa was at the house while we were getting ready. Once it was time to get in the dress, she followed me up the stairs and we were able to get this shot of her. Awww.

My mom: "Wait, wait... what does it say on your butt?" Me: "'Mrs. Newlastname.'" My mom thinks this is hilarious. The photographer proceeds to come over and take a photo of my ass. I'm not sharing that one for more than one reason. ;)

Stepping into the dress (and hoop skirt) is the way to go! No risk of messing up the hair or getting makeup on the dress.

My mom had to tie all of the bridesmaids' sashes because she was the only one who knew how to do a flat knot.

Another piece of my great-grandmother that was with me on my wedding day. This was my "something borrowed." It was her engagement ring. A few years before she died, she gave it to my mom. My mom attached it to me by lacing it into the corset back of my dress.

Once I was all laced up, Lindsay straightened out all of my layers underneath my dress. Unfortunately, we realized that I hadn't pulled the hoop skirt up high enough of my waist, so it was sticking out the bottom.

We didn't want to have to unlace it and relace again, so Lindsay had to squeeze her hands ALL the way up under my dress (inside my corset bodice!) to pull the hoop skirt up higher.
Oh. the. pain.

Who said being a bridesmaid wasn't hard work? Hoop skirt situation fixed.

Putting on my DIY jewelry.
Getting ready to go reveal myself to all of the people downstairs.

Outside for a few pictures.

I loved my flowers oh so much.

Kissing my dad.

Off we go!

My seamstress said that if I could avoid sitting before the ceremony, I should. Since we had a limo coach, I was able to stand for the ride to the church.

That's it for now... tomorrow, we'll check in and see what the guys were up to!

Thank You Card Design

2008-07-23T12:27:00.001-04:00

Now that our pro photos are back, we have to order our thank you cards ASAP. It's already been a month since the wedding, and the VistaPrint order might take a couple of weeks to get to us, so... I think if we get them all out by the end of August, we'll be in good shape. That's my goal.

Anyway, for those who may be wondering... I'll be posting many of our wedding pictures soon. I need to wait to get the DVDs from our photographers (which will happen tomorrow), because right now, all the images I have access to are low-resolution for the web, have a watermark, and would really be a big pain in the butt to save and post. It'll be much easier once I have the actual files in my hot little hands.

Plus, I was thinking about it this morning, and since there are so many pictures that I want to share, I'm probably going to post them as a series... a different part of the wedding each day. For example, "the girls get ready" on Day 1, "the guys get ready" on Day 2, etc. It'll be like... wedding week or something! So prepare yourselves. :)

For right now, I need your help. We need to choose between these two card designs. Exactly the same, except for the color of the "Thank You" part. I can't decide. The white background? Or the black? By the way, the photos here are stand-ins. I have to swap them out for the real ones once I get them tomorrow. So the pics will be of better quality, and won't have the watermark.

Penny for your thoughts. (OK, not really. But help a girl out.)

Look good?

They're here!

2008-07-22T23:20:00.000-04:00

Our pro pics are in! We just got an e-mail with a link to our online proof gallery a little bit ago. We couldn't resist taking a sneak peek of them before heading to bed. From what we've seen so far... we are happy!

I can't wait to check them out more closely tomorrow. And then I'll be sharing with all of you.

Stay tuned!

One Month!

2008-07-21T12:24:00.002-04:00

We have been married for one month.

On one hand, it's hard to believe that time has passed so quickly. On the other, the wedding seems like it was ages ago already. It's weird.

I've been getting a lot of the "So how's married life?" question. It's funny, because I'm never quite sure how to answer that one, aside from saying, "It's good! Very good." I try to come up with a more unique answer, but seriously... what do you say?

The truth is that married life--at least for us--is not much different than unmarried life. We already lived together for three years before we got married. With the wedding and the marriage, all we did was make it official.

The biggest change has just been my name. I'm still getting used to it. I honestly haven't had to use it that much yet, so in a way, it hasn't even hit me that I'm not Heather Oldlastname anymore. I always knew I'd change my name when I got married. I didn't think it was a big deal. But I'll admit to being a little bit sad on the day I was at Social Security and the DMV, "handing over" my old name for the new one. It is just an odd thing--I've spent almost 26 years of my life as Heather Oldlastname, and now I am not "her" anymore. I don't regret changing it, though. I know I'll adjust.

And I love saying "my husband" now. That's a change, too.

We are still waiting (impatiently) for our pro pictures and our video. I thought for sure we would have both by Friday of last week, but apparently everyone is running a bit behind. Hurry it up already, I want to relive my wedding!

You hear people talking about "wedding withdrawal." After spending so much time and effort planning the wedding, there are the people who are really sad when it's over and don't know what to do with themselves.

Yeah, umm... that's not me. I have not really experienced any of that. There are times when I think I'd like to go back and relive the day over again. But that's only because 1) It went by so fast, and 2) I had SO much fun.

On Friday night, we were at my mom's house for a party. At one point, I did sneak away to go "visit" my dress. It's still hanging on the back of the closet door in one of her spare bedrooms. I hadn't seen it since the day after the wedding, so it was kind of funny. It is still completely filthy. I had a lot of second thoughts about my dress between the time I bought it and the wedding day, but now, I can't imagine having worn anything else. On the wedding day, as soon as I put it on with everything else--made-up hair, professional makeup, my jewelry, the bouquet--it all really came together for me and I knew I had made the right decision.

We aren't really "celebrating" tonight. I'm just going to make dinner at home.

So here I am, on the other side. And I gotta tell you... life is good.

Driver's License

2008-07-18T12:02:00.000-04:00

My new driver's license came in the mail on Wednesday. Took 9 days from when I went to the DMV, so that wasn't bad at all. And the picture wasn't nearly as horrendous as it looked on the computer screen at the DMV (it's actually an "upgrade" from my previous picture), so all is well on that front. :) My signature is still a squished up mess, though. Ah well.

I was going to take a picture of my new license and post it, but then I realized I would have to blur out pretty much ALL information, so it seemed pretty pointless.

Still waiting on my bank debit/ATM cards, and my Mastercard. I'm in between identities right now, it's kind of weird. I have to remember to use/sign Newlastname on some things, and Oldlastname on others. I'll be happy when it's all switched over and I can really start adjusting to the new name.

Post #1

2008-07-16T22:02:00.002-04:00

Wow, it is really hard to go back to the beginning.

I started this blog on July 2, 2007. More than a year later, with 238 posts officially logged onto "Road to the Aisle," I am now back at the start. All the way back at post #1.

My new blog is up and running.

Table Delivered!

2008-07-16T07:42:00.000-04:00

Our new dining table and chairs were delivered yesterday!

When Michael got home from work, we tinkered with a couple of different ways to set it up, and ultimately decided to put it the same way we had our old table. Only difference is... this one looks MUCH better. :)

It's going to take some getting used to. The table is taller, and square (our old one was oval), so it's just a completely different style. Now we can't wait to have people over and entertain!

A few pictures from yesterday...

The empty dining area, before the table arrived (don't mind the lingering wedding crap in the corner)

The table, after it first arrived. This is with the butterfly leaf in use, so the table is huge, with the 8 chairs around it. We don't have room to keep it open like this on a regular basis--this will only happen when we have a larger group over!

The set-up we finally decided on. Table centered in the middle of the room, six chairs around it.

Another angle

Tessa has been extra snuggly since we returned from the honeymoon. Love her.

What's in a name?

2008-07-15T15:39:00.002-04:00

First, a clarification: Road to the Aisle is not--and never was--in danger of going anywhere. I would never take it down or move the content somewhere else. The only thing up for debate right now is what I do with myself (and my blogging) moving forward.

I have decided for sure that I'm going to start a new blog and gradually move myself over there. But first? A name.

The name thing is killing me. I don't know why it's such a big deal, but I'm finding things wrong with every name I've come up with.

A couple of you suggested "After the Aisle"... that name actually did occur to me already, but when I think about it, I really don't want the title to revolve around the wedding in any way. The whole point of moving to a new blog is to start something new. I don't define myself by my wedding day, and I feel like "After the Aisle" implies that my life has only just begun because I walked down an aisle. Sure, I put a lot of work into my wedding, and the planning consumed much of my life for a year... but in the end, it really was just one day. A fantastic, fabulous day... but a day.

Yes, I'm probably reading too much into that. But there's my issue.

God help me when I have to pick baby names someday. I can't name a blog, how the hell am I going to name a human?

In Limbo

2008-07-14T07:52:00.001-04:00

Now that I'm married, I'm not really sure what to do with myself. I'm referring to my blog, of course. ;)

The way I see it, there are a few options. I'll go over them, and then I'll recap some of my feelings on each of those options.

1) I could keep posting here, even though most of the stuff I post from now on won't be wedding related.

2) I could keep posting on Road to the Aisle for the last few remaining wedding things (pictures, some of my last projects, etc.) and then just stop posting.

3) I could keep posting on Road to the Aisle for wedding things, but start a new blog for everything else. The two blogs could be linked together under my Blogger account, and I can kind of coexist on both of them.

OK, those choices seem simple enough. But I run into little problems with each option.

For option #1... I am attached to Road to the Aisle. It started off as a little blog, a tool for me to use to keep a "diary" for myself during the wedding planning. I had never seen a wedding blog (now I see them everywhere!), and thought it would be something fun for me. And to my surprise, it has turned into so much more. I never expected anyone to actually read it, but they do.

At the same time, it doesn't feel "right" to stay here. I want Road to the Aisle to continue to be a place for brides-to-be to go, to use it as a resource for ideas and instructions for projects. Do I really want to flood it with a bunch of non-wedding related stuff? I have problems with that.

Option #2... I could just stop posting. I have definitely thought about it. Blogging is not always the easiest thing to do, which is evidenced by the fact that I have seen many abandoned blogs out there. Months pass with no new posts. It's sad, really. Well, unless the person was never really interesting in the first place. I hope that's not me.

The problem with stopping, however... I really love having a record of the past year of my life. Not just the wedding stuff--I love being able to look back through the archives and see last summer's trip to the Poconos. The announcement regarding our nephew being born. My LASIK eye surgery. Thanksgiving with my family. When I was younger (we're talking middle school days), I was pretty good about keeping journals. It is hilarious to go back and read some of the entries and see where my mind was at during those times. There are things in there that I would NEVER remember had it not been for the journal.

Last summer, my mom gave me a journal she kept when I was little. I think I'm between the ages of maybe 18 months and 3 years old. Sometimes, she was good at keeping it up, with multiple entries over the course of several weeks. Other times, you'd see that months would go by without any writing. But some of the stories in there? Priceless. They're mostly stories about my brothers (who were babies) and me. Mostly, the things I would say. And we all know how funny kids can be. If she hadn't written those things down--they would have been gone forever.

In so many ways, blogs are journals. Public ones, sure... but journals, nonetheless. With pictures, videos, etc. they are even better than the old ones.

So in that sense, I do NOT want to stop blogging. Will I post as often as I did throughout those last few months of wedding planning? Probably not, but who knows.

That leaves me with option #3. This seems like the best option. Only issues I have here are: a) my previously mentioned attachment to Road to the Aisle--it's hard to give up.

b) I have no clue what to name it. I've thought about sticking with some kind of "Road" theme, but many of the names I have thought of are taken already (well, the blogspot name/URL is taken). I've thought about going in a completely different direction. And what is the "theme" of this new blog? Is there one? I try to think of a design for it (the header), and even that seems impossible.

c) I wonder, will anybody even read it? What is the point if nobody reads? But then I remind myself about the things I discussed regarding option #2, and stopping blogging. I go back to the root of why I started blogging in the first place. It's for me, not for anyone else.

So there you have it. I suppose there will be some kind of changes on the horizon in terms of this blog... I'm just not 100% sure which direction to take it in.

I'm open to suggestions, should anyone have any. I need to get this figured out so I can stop losing sleep and move on with my life (kidding, kidding!!).

New Dining Table

2008-07-12T10:38:00.000-04:00

We found a new dining table last night. We absolutely hate the one we have now, so we've known for a long time that our first purchasing priority after the wedding was going to be a new table.

We've been in our place for three years now. When we moved in, we didn't have a table, so my mom offered us her old one since she wanted to get a new one anyway. Her old one had been through hell--three kids and their friends beating the crap out of it over the years. But hey, it was a table. More than we had, for sure.

Anyway, we were looking for something pretty specific. We really like the counter-height tables, and we wanted a dark color. After running around to several furniture stores, we finally found something within our budget. Michael was able to negotiate the price a little bit, so we're happy.

We're getting the table, which has a butterfly leaf, and 8 chairs. We don't have room for 8 chairs, so we're going to have to store the extra ones in my mom's basement until we get a house. But we figured they would be good to have "on hand." Every once in a while, we do have a larger group over to our house, so it would be nice to be able to go over and get the extra chairs in preparation for those gatherings.

Here are a few pictures of the new table and chairs. We might re-upholster the chairs; we're not sure yet. We'll see how they look once we get them into the house. The pictures are from my BlackBerry, so they are not the best--but you get the idea. I'll post more once we have the table.

That last picture shows the little storage cabinet that is under the table. Anything that provides us with a bit of extra storage is alright in my book. It's a pretty big cabinet for being under a table--we're thinking we'll store a couple of our serving pieces under there, or maybe table linens and accessories.

The floor model was a little bit beaten up and dusty, so I'm excited to see the brand new table when it arrives. And the best part? It will be delivered on Tuesday! We don't need to wait for weeks. :)

Maui Condo Review: Mahana 804

2008-07-10T07:54:00.001-04:00

We had an incredible honeymoon in Maui and Kauai. And we stayed in incredible places. I thought I should give credit where credit is due, so I wanted to make sure to write up reviews and post pictures of the condos at which we stayed.

We originally booked the condos way back in September of last year. Our initial plan was to stay five nights on each island. Somewhere along the way, we decided to add an extra night in Maui, so it turned out that we were in Maui for six nights (June 23-June 29).

When I started researching a possible honeymoon to Hawaii, I was kind of appalled at what some of the hotels cost. Sure, they're beautiful, they have gorgeous landscaping and state-of-the-art luxury pools, etc. For us, however, we wanted to have a nice place to come home to at night--but wanted to feel like we had the freedom to go out and explore. If we wanted to lounge around a pool and drink frozen cocktails all day, we wouldn't have traveled all the way to Hawaii. We could have done that for much cheaper in the Caribbean. What's the point of paying for a bunch of extra amenities if you don't use them?

Last June, we went on vacation with a bunch of our friends in Outer Banks, NC. It was during the planning for that trip that I was introduced to the concept of "vacation rentals by owner." We ended up renting a huge, gorgeous, perfect beach house for our large group, and so with Hawaii, I thought--I need to look into this.

And so it came to be that I found Mahana 804. I don't even really remember how I found it, exactly. I started with VRBO.com and went from there. I probably looked at photos and descriptions of at least a couple hundred condos. But with Mahana 804, the price was right--and so were the pictures. The perfect combination.

I love being up high with a view. Whenever we do stay in hotels, I always like to be on the higher floors. Mahana 804 is a one-bedroom suite on the 8th floor. Take a look at their website for all of the amenities and features of the place, because I'll only touch on them here. I'll start posting pictures, and provide info in between.

First, let's talk about the building itself.

We were really pleased with the overall appearance and condition of The Mahana. The lobby is clean, nicely decorated, and looks just like a nice hotel. Upon arrival, we checked in at the desk, received two key cards, got a parking pass, etc. Then we hit the elevators (which were really fast throughout our entire trip--nothing more frustrating than waiting forever for an elevator).

In back, they have a nice pool area with a hot tub. During the day, there is a small snack and beverage bar open there, but as far as we could tell, they do not serve alcohol. In the picture below, it was about 6:00 a.m. (or even earlier--we were messed up with the time difference), so it is still quite shady back there. But I can tell you from walking past it numerous times that they do get really nice sun back there. We never did relax by the pool, or even go in. Too many things to do, too many sights to see! :)
Beyond the pool area, there is a long and thin area of grass with some lawn lounge chairs. There is not much of a beach at The Mahana, so if you're looking to stumble out of your room into the sand to lounge every morning... this is probably not the place for you. We actually enjoyed having the water as close as possible (not 100+ ft. of sand in between us and the view of the ocean). Also, we didn't have to deal with crowds of people hanging out on "our" beach. It was peaceful and quiet.

There is free WiFi access throughout the building. We had trouble with it. It was very spotty--we could only pick it up in certain areas of the condo (an info sheet we had said that it was best picked up on the lanai--which is definitely nice, but come on... it'd be nice to have some flexibility). It was also kind of slow and unreliable. Luckily, we were trying not to spend too much time on the internet. Mainly, we just wanted it to keep up with our numerous blog posts to chronicle our time in Maui. :)

We rented a car, so we also had to deal with parking... which was a non-issue. Plenty of parking available. Never had to fight for a spot (in fact, we often got one of the spots closest to the building).

There was some contruction going on next door, which was sort of unsightly when we were driving up, but it was never a problem. We never heard any noise as a result.

The location of The Mahana was pretty convenient for us. We were only two minutes off of the main highway which can pretty much get you anywhere on the island. But the resort itself is nestled back away from the road, so it was completely quiet and private. There was a grocery store (Star Markets) in a plaza right across the road from us, but we chose to shop at Safeway down in Lahaina (short drive). Lahaina was about a 10-15 minute drive, depending on traffic. With the convertible, we weren't complaining! :)

Oh, and the Mahana employees? All super friendly. In passing, everyone would say, "Aloha!" They were also helpful with requests for information, or with questions we had. Even the grounds crew... on the first day, we were having trouble with the convertible top to our rental car (couldn't get it down all the way--it would only go so far and then stop). One of the guys working outside with a leaf blower came over and spent a few minutes with us to try to figure it out. And thanks to him, we did.

One thing is that we did end up with a mysterious $3.70 charge on our credit card from The Mahana when we got home. Since it's only $3.70, I wasn't going to call and put up a stink about it--only thing I can think of is that I made two local calls to confirm our reservations with the zipline place and the Old Lahaina Luau. It must have been that... kind of crappy that we had to pay for local calls! I'm sure the information was probably laid out somewhere, but I missed it. If I had known, I certainly would have used my cell phone! Oh well.

OK, now on to our specific condo, 804.

What did we love? It was SO CLEAN. Loved the VIEW and the kitchen. Loved the huge doors from both the bedroom and the living room that went out onto the lanai. We slept with the bedroom sliding glass door open every night so we could sleep with the sound of the crashing waves in the background. The HUGE bed (huge for us anyway, we're used to sleeping in a full) was extremely comfortable.

The shower was awesome--great water pressure (which I was impressed with, given that it's in a big building and on the 8th floor), and good temperature control (which is important!). We also really liked having laundry machines right in the condo. We left Maui without a single article of dirty clothing, which was nice!

Nice, big refrigerator. We stocked up with drinks--beer, bottled water, soda, wine.

One thing to note is that there isn't daily maid service (we knew ahead of time and were OK with it), so be prepared to clean up after yourselves. Even though we were SO careful, toward the end of our stay, we could start to feel the stray bits of sand on the floors. There IS a vacuum in one of the closets--it just never got bad enough for us to feel like we had to use it.

Possible improvements or extras we wish they had? All really minor things.

A small cooler would have been nice. We didn't necessarily miss it at the time, but after Maui, we went on to Kauai, and the condo there had one. We used it every day, packing sandwiches and drinks. We didn't have that in Maui, and since we're not fans of eating out for every meal, we generally tried to scrape by during the day on things we could carry with us--such as almonds.

Pump hand soap for the bathroom. The bar soap provided (like in hotels) got disgusting after the first night. We picked up a bottle of pump soap from Safeway and then left it there... hopefully the cleaning service left it for the people to come after us, because it was definitely nice to have.

OK, and this is REALLY nitpicky, but would have been helpful--just a print-out index of the television channels, i.e. NBC = Channel 3 or whatever. When we were relaxing at night, sometimes we'd be looking for something specific and it was difficult to find.

I think that about sums it up! It was definitely a nice place to spend our honeymoon. It felt like "home" while we were there, and we looked forward to spending our evenings there. We'd get back from a day out, and enjoyed our hour or so to get ready and sit around a little bit before going out to dinner. We'd enjoy a beer or a glass of wine. We'd do the same once we got home from dinner--turn on the TV, pour the drinks, and just RELAX. Very nice.

I dealt with the owner, Ken Green, almost completely by e-mail. Everything went smoothly. We put our deposit down back in the fall, then had to pay the balance about 60 days before our trip. It was nice going into it knowing that it was all completely paid off already.

We did have to call him at one point during our stay--the cleaning service called on Friday and asked what time we would be checking out on Saturday. Only problem was that we were not checking out on Saturday, we were checking out on Sunday. We had added the extra night to our reservation back in December, and somehow lines got crossed a little bit and the cleaning service still thought we were leaving Saturday. No big deal. Ken called me right back and it was fixed.

As you can see from the photos, it's an absolutely beautiful condo that has obviously had a lot of work put into it. At the beginning of our search, it was important to us to find something that felt "luxury," and we wanted to know EXACTLY what condo we were getting. If you rent through a condo resort, you could end up with any unit--one that has been recently updated with $1 million renovations, or one that hasn't been touched since 1979. And who wants to take that kind of risk with their honeymoon? Or any vacation, really? For us, renting through the owner was the way to go.

We highly recommend Mahana 804 and would absolutely stay there again. If you're in the market for a vacation in Maui, definitely check it out. I don't think you'll be disappointed.

A review of our Kauai condo will be coming soon. :)

Officially Heather Newlastname

2008-07-07T17:17:00.003-04:00

After almost two hours of waiting, everything went smoothly at the Social Security Office. I left there and immediately went to the DMV. Luckily, they were running quickly. I was probably only there for less than 30 minutes. I got my picture retaken (ugh), filled out a couple of forms while I was waiting, paid $10, and bam... done.

They gave me my new registration on the spot, and a temporary license. My photo license and my new title for my car will come in the mail within two weeks. Now, I can change my name with everything else... work, banks, credit cards, etc. I'm going to try to get all of that squared away this week so I don't have to keep living with a bit of an identity crisis. I'm Heather Newlastname some places, but still Heather Oldlastname in others! Confusing.

What an afternoon!

Social Security

2008-07-07T12:43:00.001-04:00

Sitting in the Social Security office, just trying to change my name. They are currently serving number 87. I have number 51. This means I have to get all the way up to 99, then back through 1-50 before I get helped. How pathetic is that? I am going to be here for hours. Just how I wanted to spend my day. Lovely.

Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Say what?

2008-07-06T16:14:00.002-04:00

What is this "making dinner" thing you speak of?

Wait. We actually have to figure out what to have for dinner, and then... MAKE it?

No. I refuse to believe it's true.

*sigh*

Some parts of coming back to normal life? Well, they just suck.

Home Sweet Home

2008-07-06T10:53:00.002-04:00

More than 27 hours after arriving at the airport in Kauai to begin our journey back to New York, we finally got home around 9:00 p.m. last night.

Although it sounds like the trip from hell, and we definitely were exhausted, it really wasn't that bad. Our time in Hawaii was certainly worth everything we went through to get there and back.

We were so happy to come home to our dog, Tessa! She has been so clingy since we got home. I think she's happy we're here.

Today, we're just trying to get caught up and get back into the swing of things. Tomorrow, Michael goes back to work (I took one extra day off to recover), and I go to the Social Security Office and the DMV to start the process of the name change (assuming our marriage certificate is in our pile of mail at our neighbor's house, which we still have to go pick up).

As much as we loved Hawaii, it is good to be home!

Last Day

2008-07-03T08:21:00.004-04:00

Last full day, anyway.

We woke up this morning and decided to give the water next to our condo another try. We wanted to see more sea turtles, and we hoped the water would be more clear so we could see what else is there.

Well, it was a hassle to get into the water. The beach right there is rocky, and getting in, I was knocked off balance by a wave and fell into the water, cutting my knee on some coral. Wow, did that hurt. Looking at it in the water, I thought I just lightly scraped it, but once we got out, I realized I actually did quite a number on it.

This is the one photo I took before we decided it wasn't worth staying in there (plus my knee hurt).

When we were rinsing off our feet at the outdoor shower, one of the construction workers noticed my knee and asked, "Did you cut yourself on the coral?" I said I wasn't sure if it was coral or a rock, and he asked if it was the water right outside the condo. I said yes, and he said it was probably coral. He said to wash it out really good, because coral is full of bacteria and the cuts can get infected. Fantastic. We went inside, and I washed it with antibacterial soap and water.

We got ready to take a drive up to the east shore. On our way out of town, we stopped by the Big Save to get some Neosporin. Big ripoff, of course.

Our first stop was at Lydgate State Park, which we heard was pretty and had good "beginner" snorkeling. Well, they weren't kidding about beginner. It's basically a good place for kids to learn to snorkel because it is enclosed by a bunch of boulders. Fish and water can get in, but the rocks break the waves so that section of water is protected from the surf and current.

It was pretty crowded, and I was still being a bit of a wimp about my knee, so we decided to stay dry.

We sat down at a picnic table to eat lunch overlooking the ocean.
Our view from our picnic table

Once we were done with lunch, we decided to drive a little further north to Kapa'a to do some shopping. We haven't really gone into any shops in Kauai, and we still had a few people we wanted to shop for (including ourselves). We found a cool "Kauai Products Fair" location, which is basically like a flea market. Unfortunately, we didn't have a lot of cash on us, so we're hoping to have time to go back there tomorrow before we have to go to the airport.

Wild chickens that were in this one lady's shop... they are everywhere!

After that, we drove back south and stopped off at Wailua Falls.

From there, we started to drive back to Poipu. We wanted to have an opportunity to relax for a bit before dinner at the Beach House. On the way back into town, we stopped to return our snorkel gear. We got shave ice (coconut and pineapple flavors this time) at the little place next door to the snorkel shop.

Back at the condo, we watched a couple of sea turtles in the bay outside of the condo for a little bit. We showered to get ready for dinner, and then we actually did quite a bit of packing. When we left Maui, we left all of the packing for the morning we were leaving, and we felt too rushed. Tomorrow, we want to take it a bit easier (plus, checkout is at 10:00 a.m.), so we packed up pretty much everything except the stuff we'll need tonight and tomorrow morning.

We shared cocktails, and I wrote a message in the guestbook before we had to head out for our 6:00 p.m. reservations at the Beach House Restaurant next door.

We were seated at a really nice table right at the edge of the restaurant, overlooking the nicely landscaped lawn and, of course, the ocean. From our seats, we were able to watch a bunch (probably a couple dozen) surfers out in the water riding the early evening waves. It was pretty impressive.

Because we are (well, I am) huge dorks, we took pictures of all of our food. :) It was just too good not to document!

Fresh baked ciabatta bread

View from our table

My mango mama. I ordered a lava flow, but the waiter mistakenly brought me this. I tried it and it was really good, so I didn't mind. I ended up getting a lava flow later anyway. :)

Michael's seafood corn chowder

My caesar salad

My pork chops with apple something or other... garlic mashed potatoes and bok choy.

Michael's Kauai Duet--Crab topped fresh fish, seared scallops, edamame risotto and sweet thai chili buerre blanc

Sun starting to set

Michael with a mai tai

Dessert - Molten Chocolate Desire

Tomorrow, we say aloha to Hawaii! I can't believe it's almost over. :(

Kauai from the air

2008-07-02T19:25:00.003-04:00

We got up at 6:30 this morning in order to get to our helicopter ride on time. With the Port Allen airport 20-30 minutes away, we wanted to leave around 7:00 for our 7:30 check-in time. We arrived on time, and went inside the little office. The airport was pretty hilarious... really tiny.

Once inside, we had to watch a short safety video.

Now, I have to admit... now that it's all over, I'm not afraid to admit it to myself. I was extremely scared of the helicopter ride. But it was one of those things that I really wanted to do... mind over matter. So I forced myself to do it.

Our flight was supposed to take off at 8:00, but our helicopter was late arriving. Inter-Island Helicopters also does search and rescue work. Apparently, our helicopter was up along the northern coast looking for a lost/stranded hiker. I don't know whether they found him/her or not, but our helicopter arrived for our tour about 20-30 minutes late.

There was a plumeria tree right where we were waiting to board the helicopter

Another important thing to note about Inter-Island Helicopters... you fly with the DOORS OFF! I thought this sounded pretty amazing (it's not the heights I was afraid of, it was the potential crashing), so this is one of the main reasons we decided to go with this company.

Once we were up in the air, I was actually OK. Everything was so beautiful, it was hard to think about anything bad happening. It was REALLY windy and cold up there! They tell you that it is, but it was even more so than I imagined. It was a really cool way to see the island, though. Quite the experience of a lifetime!

Between the two of us, we took more than 500 photos during the hour flight. It was extremely difficult to choose which ones to share... this is just a sampling. And, as always... the photos do not do this any justice.

We started by flying over (and into) Waimea Canyon. We saw it from the lookout the other day, but it was even more spectacular by air:

That's another helicopter in the middle there... we saw several during our flight

We went from the canyon to the Na Pali Coast, which is only accessible by air and by sea. It's basically all wilderness because of this reason, and it is absolutely gorgeous. Indescribable, really. It was my favorite part of the helicopter tour.

From there, we flew to the north shore of the island. It was cool to see the places we visited yesterday (Tunnels Beach, Hanalei Bay--where we took surfing lessons, etc.) from the air.

Then, we flew toward the middle of the island, and went inside the crater of the volcano (which is obviously not active) that created the island. Kauai is so green!! It rains a ton in this area of the island. We could definitely feel the moisture in the air (remember, we were out in the open), and it was noticeably cooler while we were inside the crater.
Waterfall. It was strange to see birds flying around, and seeing how small they were. It helped put what we were seeing in perspective. These mountains, these waterfalls... all enormous.

This is the Jurassic Park waterfall. Toward the beginning of the movie, when the characters are arriving at Jurassic Park, they are in a helicopter that lands right near a waterfall. This is the waterfall they used in the filming of the movie.

We also flew over many fields of coffee, which was pretty cool to see from above.

Before we knew it, we were arriving back at the airport to land. The airport is in a beautiful spot, right on the ocean.

I was so happy to be back on the ground safely. A huge weight of anxiety was lifted off of me, and I was now able to fully appreciate what I had just experienced. Would I do it again? Yes. And I'd recommend it to anyone else visiting Kauai as well. It's the only way to really see the beauty of the whole island.

Michael and me (self portrait) after we landed

With our helicopter and our cool pilot (I think his name was Luke or Lou)

After the helicopter tour, we went back to the condo and relaxed for a few hours. We have been on the go much of our honeymoon, and it's starting to wear on me a little bit. We didn't come all the way to Hawaii to lounge on the beach or by the pool, so I'm happy that we have done all that we have... but I just needed a few hours to veg out.

Once we recuperated a little bit, we decided to take the short drive down the road to see Spouting Horn. It was really cool to watch. It's basically a lava shelf where water from waves is forced through a small opening, which causes water and air to squirt out a blowhole. Pretty impressive. Below is a series of pictures I took (gotta love our Canon digital SLR!), so you can see it in stages:

Cool, huh?

We then went back to our condo to change into our bathing suits and try snorkeling in the little alcove next to our building. We could see several sea turtles swimming in there and wanted to try to go out and see them up close and personal.

Unfortunately, conditions were not ideal. I was actually pretty scared getting into the water. There were some pretty big waves coming in, and the current was rough. We were only out there for a few minutes before I decided I was too nervous (plus, we could barely see anything), and we got out. We're going to try again if we can... we want to wait to see if the water might be more calm at a different time of day. We want to go swim with those turtles! They are such neat animals, and we love watching them pop their little heads above water to get air, right from our lanai.

On the way down to attempt snorkeling, we did run into a little gecko:

We showered and headed up to Lihue for dinner at Scotty's Beachside BBQ. This restaurant is owned in part by the author of the Revealed guidebooks. Several people left good reviews for it in the guestbook here at the condo, so we decided to give it a try. It's supposedly the only decent place to get BBQ on the island of Kauai.

It was quite a drive for us from Poipu with traffic, but we wanted to try it. Plus, who can complain about driving around when there is such wonderful scenery everywhere you look? We were there early (right around 5:00 p.m.), so we were seated right away. Come to think about it, though... we have not waited at a single restaurant throughout this entire trip. I don't know if we've just had good luck, good timing, or what... but we've been going to some of the more popular and most recommended restaurants, and we still have not had any problems getting a table right away. Love it.

View from our table. The seating here is tiered so that every table has an unobstructed view of the ocean. It was nice.

I was not very impressed with my strawberry margarita (it was sort of icy, not all blended together very well like you usually find at restaurants). But all was forgotten once our food came.

We both ordered pulled pork. It came without a bun (they had garlic bread on the side), french fries, and baked beans. They have three different kinds of sauce on the table for you to use... two BBQ sauces (that they make at the restaurant)--one mild, one hot--and some other kind of plum sauce. We used both the mild and hot BBQ sauces. Both were excellent. We loved the sauces. I preferred the hot one just because it gave the food a little kick, which I like. Yum! The pork itself was really tender and tasty. The garlic bread was also delicious. All around, another very good meal for us.

On our way back through Lihue, we stopped at the Walmart there to pick up a few things. We also bought a couple of cheap movies. We plan to settle in and watch one tonight. That was one thing we neglected to pack--we should have brought a couple of DVDs from home to put on in the evenings when there is nothing on TV. Oh well, live and learn.

Tomorrow is our last full day in Hawaii! I can't believe it... it has gone by so quickly.

Hang Ten

2008-07-01T20:09:00.000-04:00

We called a couple of surf "schools" this morning to get information and availability for taking lessons. We ultimately decided to book a 12:00 p.m. lesson with Titus Kinimaka Hawaiian School of Surfing on the North Shore.

Since the North Shore is about 70-90 minutes from where we're staying, we decided to head on up there. The weather was beautiful here this morning. Perfect, really. Sunny, not too hot... well, as we went more and more north, the weather got crappier and crappier. Cloudy, rainy... yuck.

But, since we had driven all the way up there, we definitely wanted to go through with our lessons. We met at a Quiksilver Surf Shop, where we paid ($55 each for 90 minutes... not bad, it was worth it) and were given rash guards to wear. We also got directions to the beach where we would meet up with our instructors.

We brought our digital camera in the underwater case, thinking that we'd take pictures. But once we got there, a photographer introduced himself to us and said that he takes pictures of all of the lesson groups while they are out on the water. He said that he snaps a bunch of pics, and we'd have the option of buying the CD of all pictures at the end of the lesson. The CD was $30. We decided it was worth it to not have to try to carry the camera while also trying to learn to surf.

Ready to try out this surfing thing

The beach where our surf lessons were... even when overcast, it was beautiful

The boards all lined up for the lesson

The beginning of the lesson was spent on the beach, just practicing positioning on the surf board, and learning the best techniques for standing up on the board once you catch the waves. After a decent amount of practice, we followed the instructors, paddling out into the water. Once out there, the instructors all stood in the water. One at a time, each of them would take one of us and wait for a good wave. They would give us a good push, tell us to "paddle, paddle, paddle!" and then they'd say "stand!" Then it was up to us.

I'll tell you... it was challenging. Michael was definitely better at it than me. I had trouble not looking down at the board. When you look down, it throws off your balance and you usually fall. You're supposed to focus on one point on the shore, and just look straight ahead at it. I didn't have too much trouble standing up on the board--my problem was staying up. I eventually got it, and toward the end of the lesson, I became OK at it. Michael had the stance down, so he balanced more easily and did a good job.

Boat! It's not as close as it looks, don't worry. The surf school wouldn't push me onto a wave with a boat coming to hit me. :)

Wipeout!

I'll tell you another thing... damn, it was tiring. I guess I never really thought about it before. But when you ride a wave into shore, you have to turn around and paddle all the way back out to catch another wave. The more successful you are at riding the wave in, the longer you have to paddle back out. The 90 minutes seemed like an eternity. At one point, I looked at Michael and said, "Isn't this over yet?" I was having fun, but I was exhausted. And hungry.

The 90 minutes did finally end, and we paddled back to shore and dropped off our boards. We went back to the surf shop to drop off our rash guards and pick up the disk of pictures (and obviously, you're looking at the photos).

We drove up the road a little bit and found a nice place to park with a view of a beach. We ate our sandwiches in the car, and then continued on up to go snorkel at Tunnels Beach (which is supposed to be amazing).

Well, due to the weather, and probably the time of day, the conditions at Tunnels Beach sucked. We got into the water with our masks and snorkels, but we were out there maybe five minutes. Visibility was awful, and the waves were tossing us around. We quickly decided to pack it up and just go home.

Once back at the condo, we showered and got ready for dinner.

This morning, on our way up to the North Shore, I was looking at the Revealed book again. I came across the review of Duke's, and noticed that it mentioned Duke's had burgers, pizza, ribs, etc. I found that odd, since (as I blogged about yesterday), we looked at the menu online and it was all seafood. I went to the website on my Blackberry and figured out the problem. We had been looking at Duke's Restaurant, which is in the same place... but what we wanted was Duke's Barefoot Bar. The Barefoot Bar is downstairs from Duke's Restaurant, and it's much more casual. The food? Right up my alley. So we decided this morning that we would actually be making a trip to Duke's.

It took us a little while to get there since it is up near the airport in Lihue, but the drive was nice and it wasn't bad at all. We were seated outdoors with a nice view of the beach. We really liked the look and feel of the place.

View from our table at Duke's

We shared two appetizers, which were very good... and then we finished off the meal with the famous Hula Pie. What is Hula Pie? Well, they don't have a description of it on the menu, so we weren't really sure. But essentially, it's Oreo (I think it was Oreo) cookie crust, vanilla ice cream, whipped cream, fudge, and crushed peanuts. So yeah, what's not to like? It was enormous... definitely only need to order one.

Now we are home and relaxing. We have to get up early tomorrow for our helicopter tour (should be interesting!). I'm nervous for it just because I'm not a big fan of small aircraft, but I'm sure we'll make it through. Should have some amazing pictures to share tomorrow!

Polihale & Waimea Canyon

2008-06-30T08:29:00.001-04:00

Today, we explored the western part of Kauai. We woke up around 8:00 a.m. and got ready to head out for the day. The condo here provides a cooler, so we packed it up with things for lunch so we would be prepared. We stopped by Big Save to get some turkey cold cuts and we were off to the western most point of Kauai (well, the furthest west that you can drive).

We stopped at a lookout along the way because we thought it was beautiful... little did we know what we would see later on in the day.

Once you drive to the end of the state highway (route 50), you have to turn on a dirt road and continue down another 3-5 miles (depending on where exactly you want to go). It's a bumpy ride, but it was worth it for the view.

We started off right toward the end of Polihale Beach, right next to the beginning of the Na Pali Coast (only accessible/visible by boat or helicopter).

With the camera attached to my face... too beautiful

Polihale Beach... it's important to note that pictures really do not do these places justice. You have to see them for yourself to truly get how beautiful they are.

The little bit of the Na Pali Coast that you can see from Polihale Beach

Consulting the "Blue Bible" (Kauai Revealed) to try to figure out how to get us to Queen's Pond so we could swim. The book (and numerous signs) warned against swimming in this area. The surf and current are so strong that it's pretty dangerous. We didn't want to take any chances.

We backtracked down the dirt road a little bit and were able to find the access to the area of the beach called Queen's Pond. There were other people swimming there and the water looked relatively calm. We were dying to get in (so hot), and didn't waste any time.

Swimming in Queen's Pond

After swimming and taking in the beautiful beach and water for a little bit, we went back to the car and started heading back east. Back on the highway, we came across a little beach/park area with small pavilions and picnic tables. Since it was noon, we decided to stop and eat our lunch.

The view at the park at lunch

We didn't really plan ahead about what we were going to do with our afternoon, so while we sat at lunch, we figured it out. Since we were already over on the west side of the island, and we had seen many signs for Waimea Canyon, we decided to take the drive up the mountain to go see it today.

On the way, we saw a cool waterfall on the side of the road and stopped to take some pictures.

Here is Michael with the red dirt and the waterfall

Wild chickens EVERYWHERE on this island!

We continued up the mountain and eventually reached the Waimea Canyon Lookout. The view was literally breathtaking. I have never seen the Grand Canyon, but I assume it must look something like this.

Well, I suppose the sign is different at the Grand Canyon. :)

After spending a good chunk of time looking at all the glory that is Waimea Canyon, we continued up the mountain to try to see the Kalalau Valley. Unfortunately, when we got all the way up there, we were in the middle of a huge cloud and couldn't see a thing. :( It looks stunning in the Revealed book, so we're disappointed... but oh well, we can't control the weather! Who knows, maybe we'll give it another shot before we leave, but it's kind of a long drive to go all the way up there not knowing what the conditions will be like.

On the way down the mountain, we stopped at a couple of other lookouts. One had a different angle view of the Waimea Canyon, and others were just pretty countryside.

Our rental convertible for Kauai... brand new!

We ran into a little bit of traffic (with only one road that goes around the island, that's bound to happen) on the way back to our condo. Once there, we showered and got ready to go out to dinner. We had planned to go to Duke's at the Hyatt because we heard it is excellent. I happened to check out the menu online before we left and found that it wasn't really going to work... they have like one item on the menu that isn't seafood. Given that I don't touch seafood (picky eater), we decided to nix that idea, and had to find another place quickly.

We ultimately decided to go to a little Italian place called Casa di Amici. It was our nicest dinner we have had so far on our honeymoon (we have reservations for the Beach House later this week). We liked the atmosphere and the food was excellent. We shared a caesar salad to start--it was unique--the dressing was amazing!

My chicken marsala

Michael's pistachio crusted salmon with butternut squash and cheese risotto

OK, there is a funny story behind this last picture. We found Casa di Amici because of a recent comment left in the guestbook here at the condo. The woman wrote, "The food was so good, I almost cried." Obviously (hopefully?), this was an exaggeration to describe that the food was excellent, but Michael got a kick out of it. So at dinner, after we had our food, he started acting like he was crying because it was so good. ;) My funny husband. We were cracking up. Even now, looking at the picture, I can't stop laughing.

We ended the evening at Lappert's for ice cream. I can't remember what mine was called, but it was something like praline ice cream, fudge swirls, pretzels, peanuts, etc. It was excellent. Michael had Banana Fudge. Yum. Our friends came to Kauai as part of their Hawaiian honeymoon last summer and said they couldn't stay away from Lappert's... they said they spent like $75 there in four or five days. I can see why!

We're not 100% sure what our plans are for tomorrow, but we're thinking about heading up to the east coast for the day. We'll see what the morning brings.

Travel Day

2008-06-29T20:12:00.002-04:00

Unfortunately, much of today was spent getting ourselves from Maui to Kauai. The flight itself was easy--less than an hour--but it was all of the packing and preparing ot leave Maui, and then the unpacking and settling in to Kauai. Oh well, we are here in Kauai now, and we're ready for another fun-packed 4.5 days.

We got up at about 8:00 this morning (I think it's official--we may actually be somewhat adjusted to the time change now). We relaxed around the condo in Maui for a little bit, and then started packing. By the time we got everything packed up and cleaned up, it was time to head to the airport.

It was pretty sad to leave Maui. We had such a great time there, and the condo we stayed in was beautiful. After we get back home, I plan to write up full reviews (with a ton of pictures) of each condo we stayed in and post it to the blog for anyone interested in possibly staying there. We were really pleased with our experience at The Mahana, and would highly recommend it to those who might prefer a condo over a hotel (we sure did).

We stopped to drop off our snorkel gear at the rental shop, and then made the approximately 40 minute drive to the airport.

We were kind of late getting to the airport, but didn't have any problems dropping off the rental car and then checking in for our flight. We had plenty of time.

I was a bit scared of the plane. As you saw in my post earlier, it was a small prop plane. I prefer the big ones, haha. But it was fine. A nice flight (so short--less than an hour), and you get to see the different islands as you fly over.

Preparing to land in Kauai

Once we landed in Kauai, the airport was easy to navigate (it is so small). Our bags took forever to get out to the carousel. Or, I should say, it took us forever to find them. Once we had waited for what seemed like a really long time, I actually took off to the rental car headquarters to try to pick up our car while Michael continued to wait for the bags. As it turned out, they came out on a different carousel than we were originally told, so they were sitting over to the side waiting for us to find them. *sigh*

Meanwhile, I was in the slowest moving car rental line EVER. Which reminds me, I really want to call National and complain about the service we received today. We waited well over a half an hour in the stupid line just to get our rental contract. It was ridiculous. There was only one woman working at the desk, and with every customer, it took her eons to wait on them. Michael eventually ended up meeting up with me since it took so long, and we continued to wait and wait and wait. Of course, when we got up there, our contract didn't seem to take so long--I have no idea why. The other customers suck, I suppose.

As if that weren't bad enough... we get on the shuttle to go to the rental car lot, and the driver drops us off in the convertible "section" with another family (who was also renting a convertible), and says, "Those two convertibles to my right, you take those." We get off and he drives away... and only then do we find out that the two convertibles he motioned to? Well, both of them have "DEAD BATTERY" written on the driver's windows in grease pen. LOVELY.

We look around, and there were tons of other convertibles. But upon inspection of them, they are all either a) filthy dirty inside, or b) the gas tank was not full. Obviously these were cars that had been returned and had not yet been serviced. So we start to look around for someone to help us. This woman comes out of a booth and gives us attitude about how they only have two service agents and we need to be patient. Patient, my ass. I'm sorry, but we have already been screwing around the stupid rental car place for an hour now, and we were pissed.

The other family ended up taking a convertible out of the returned car lot (I guess they were satisfied enough with it) and taking off. Finally, a guy comes over and says he's getting us a car. We see him pull a convertible out of the line (freshly washed), and then he takes off... off the lot! Michael and I are looking at each other like what the hell, and the lady comes out of her booth again and says the guy has to go put gas in the car. Seriously... what the hell. What is the point of making a reservation if they don't have any cars ready for you??

The guy came back and gave us the car, which turned out to be really nice, actually. It's brand new--only had 320 miles on it when we climbed in. But ugh, what an inconvenience that whole thing was.

We plugged in the condo's address into our GPS and took off. The drive from the airport was really nice. Only about 20-25 minutes, and the scenery was pretty.

Kauai looks a lot different than Maui. For one, all of the areas we have been in so far have been pretty quiet and sort of rural looking. We stayed in a pretty "hustle and bustle" area in Maui, so this is a change. And just the scenery itself is different... Kauai is a lot more green.

We "checked in" to our condo (and I use that term loosely, since we basically checked ourselves in... they don't have a manned desk here. You just sign in the book, and you get your keys out of a lockbox next to the front door of each condo--the owners gave us the code). We took some pictures, unpacked a few things, and then headed back out again.

We decided to stop and rent our snorkel gear to get that out of the way. We don't want to be running any of these errands tomorrow! That took longer than expected, too (figures). The guy didn't know what he was doing with the computer. Gotta love it. But we have our stuff now and should be able to snorkel right outside of our condo tomorrow. We've already seen some sea turtles swimming around out there.

In the snorkel/dive shop

After that, we stopped at a grocery store to pick up a few snacks and essentials. We also decided we wanted to make dinner in the condo tonight, so we picked up all the ingredients for salad, pasta, and meat sauce.

We went to Big Save because it was the most convenient. "Big Save" is not exactly the best way to describe it, but oh well. In Maui, we noticed that things were definitely more expensive than they are on the mainland, but we also didn't really see what all the "Hawaii is SOOO expensive!" fuss is all about. The prices aren't that bad. But we were treated to our first real sticker shock at Big Save. Like... $7 for a bag of salad. Or $7.50 for a gallon milk (we got a half gallon, haha!). $5.30 for a box of cereal (the STORE brand!). But hey, we're on vacation... we're not going to worry about it.

Michael and I aren't much for eating out. We both like to eat fairly healthy, so we eat home most of the time. After being here almost a week now, we're kind of sick of restaurants. After a day of frustration, we just wanted to be "home" for the night.

We unpacked the groceries, cracked open a few Coronas, shared some crackers and cheese, and started on dinner.

Gotta love that view while cooking dinner, eh? :) We loved cooking in this kitchen. It's so beautiful!

Our finished product. So good. It really hit the spot, and it was nice to have a home cooked meal tonight.

We ate at the table overlooking the ocean. It doesn't get much better than that! Then we cleaned up (and watched some "Dodgeball" on TBS). We took a little walk outside around the property and down the street to get a feel for everything. We are right next door to the Beach House Restaurant--famous with all of the knotties--and we actually have reservations for later this week. It looks beautiful, we can't wait to go.

Not totally sure yet what our plans are for tomorrow... we're interested in surfing lessons, as well as kayaking. And of course snorkeling and hiking/sightseeing. We'll see what the morning brings!

Oh, and Happy Birthday to my Mom! Love you. Let me know if there is anything Hawaiian you'd like me to bring back for you. :)

To Kauai

2008-06-29T18:44:00.001-04:00

Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Zip zip

2008-06-28T20:40:00.000-04:00

This morning, we actually did sleep in! Well, at least we slept in later than we have the entire time we were here... I think it was almost 8:00 a.m. Woohoo for adjusting a little bit!

We had the zipline tour scheduled for noon, so with the few hours we had in the morning, we decided to go back up into the West Maui mountains to do a little bit more sightseeing. There are such beautiful views up there, so we stopped in a few places to take pictures.

On our way back toward the condo, we stopped at Honolua Bay, a wild life preserve where we heard there is excellent snorkeling. We had to park the car along the side of the road (no real parking), and then we walked down a path toward the beach.

The beautiful walk down to the beach!

Once down to the beach and in the water, we were impressed with how clear it was. The visibility was much better than the other places we have snorkeled so far. Probably for two reasons: 1) It was in a bay, so the waves were not big at all (calm water conditions), and 2) it was still pretty early in the day.

Our attempt at an underwater self portrait

A few colorful fish. These ones are called Raccoon Butterfly fish.

A very scary looking urchin. There were plenty of them hanging out on the bottom. We stayed far away.

The most awesome part of this snorkel trip. A school of fish... probably a thousand fish (no joke). I couldn't keep my eyes off of them. It was completely fascinating. I got a cool video, too, but unfortunately, it doesn't play back well when optimized for the web. You can't even tell what you're looking at.

I'm pretty sure this is a Bluestriped Snapper. It was really cool looking. Flourescent.

This is an overlook view of Honolua Bay, where we snorkeled.

Unfortunately, we didn't have much time to snorkel at the bay before we had to head back to the condo to get ready to go ziplining. Our check-in time was at 11:45 a.m. at the Skyline Eco Adventure headquarters/shop in Ka'anapali.

We changed into shorts and t-shirts, charged our camera battery, and then went to the shop. Once there, we had to sign our lives away (again--you have to sign them away for pretty much every excursion), and get weighed (I guess they want to make sure you're not lying). They gave us all Nalgene water bottles and loaded us into a van to make the trek up the mountain.

The first five minutes or so of the ride was on normal roads, but then we went off roading... we had to endure quite a bumpy ride. Our first stop was at a little building they have set up. Here, we met our guides and got all of our equipment. When we walked up the steps onto the deck, I noticed the cutest black lab lying in the corner, sleeping. He made me miss my puppy. :( Of course I had to go over and visit with him for a few minutes. Too cute, he barely even opened his eyes.

We met our guides--Troy and Sean. These guys were funny from the very first minute. Cracking jokes, being sarcastic, making up far-fetched stories... they certainly kept us on our toes and entertained.

All geared up and ready to go!
Michael in his gear

We were then loaded into a different van with our guides. We actually had to keep our helmets on in the van (more off roading). You know why? Some geniuses that were riding up several months back ended up knocking their heads together. I guess a week later, they decided they might be able to cash in on that little mishap, and actually visited a hospital and found a doctor to attest to their injuries. They are currently trying to sue Skyline Eco Adventures. So now, helmets are required just to ride in the van, thanks to those idiots. Gotta love it.

After a few more minutes of rough riding, we unloaded and walked a short distance to the first zip. We had about 12 people total in our group (plus the two guides)... and I was actually the first to go! I happened to be standing closest to the line and was ready with my gear. I was surprised that I was not more apprehensive about it. But I was excited... I leapt right off the platform and was on my way! It's quite a thrill... you get going pretty fast and it's cool to look and see everything around you--side to side, below.

Before the first zip

Here is a video of me on one of the ziplines:

After four ziplines, we took a break for lunch. We walked to a little shelter they have built on a cliff overlooking the mountains and the town of Ka'anapali below. It was beautiful.

Lunch was good, too. Deli sandwiches, pasta salad, tortilla chips with bean dip, and chocolate chip cookies. We were hungry so it really hit the spot.

The view from up on the mountain, where we were ziplining. This is actually the view from where we stopped for lunch.

After lunch, on the walk toward our 5th zipline

At points during the tour, they were telling us different things about the environment up there--the land, the animals, the history, etc. They told us about how the mountain is home to many wild boars, and actually told us what to do if we were to encounter one (with a few jokes in there for good measure, of course).

When we were walking back to the course from lunch, Troy disappeared but no one really noticed he was missing. The next thing I know, there's commotion from the bushes and this guy walking behind us is mildly freaking out. Turned out that Troy had appeared in the bushes with a "boar" mask on. Hilarious.

Here's Troy as an angry wild boar

After lunch, more ziplines. With each one, it seemed to get longer and scarier (well, if you're scared of that sort of thing--which, for whatever reason, I wasn't). I couldn't wait to get on each one. I was actually taking flying leaps off of the platforms to gain more speed!

My husband, waiting for one of the ziplines

We had SO much fun. Out of all the things we have done so far, this is the thing that I would go back and do in a heartbeat. Hell, I'd go back and do it again tomorrow. We'll be talking about this for years. It was a total of eight ziplines, and the tour itself (with the van rides and lunch included), was probably right around four hours.

Once done, they took us back down to the building to get out of our harnesses and helmets, then we bid farewell to Troy and Sean and headed back down to Ka'anapali. We actually bought t-shirts (had to have something to commemorate the experience!) and Michael got a pint glass (he collects them).

We were really happy with the whole thing... the company was extremely professional and our guides really made the tour for us. If we had boring people, it wouldn't have been as much fun. We were the only honeymooners in our group. We were accompanied by three families. Everyone got to know each other a little bit, got to talking and laughing, etc. A very fun time, indeed.

Once done, we drove back to our condo to shower and get ready to go out to dinner. I think I was the dirtiest I have been in a really long time. COVERED in red dirt. Good thing I wore dark clothing (which Skyline Eco Adventures highly recommends).

Our dirty hiking boots. Essentially ruined (they will never be the same color again!). But that's what they're for, right? :)

Tonight is our last night in Maui, so we got dressed and went down for one last dinner in Lahaina. We went to Moose McGillycuddy's. They had awesome happy hour specials (all cocktails and beer--$3 each!), and the food was really good.

Now, we are just preparing to leave tomorrow. We are island hopping over to Kauai tomorrow afternoon. We're doing all the laundry we can since we have a washer/dryer in our condo. In Kauai, I think we have access to laundry, but it's a shared facility on each floor (definitely not as convenient!).

Our inter-island flight is at 1:10 p.m. We're trying to decide what we have time to do tomorrow before we leave here. It'll depend on what time we get up.

We're disappointed to be leaving Maui... there is so much to do here, we definitely could have filled many more days with fun activities, and could have eaten many more meals at all of the wonderful restaurants. But we're also excited to go and see all that Kauai has to offer.

I guess we'll find out tomorrow!

Snorkeling & Old Lahaina Luau

2008-06-27T21:38:00.002-04:00

Today was our morning to "sleep in." Yet I still woke up at 6:30 a.m. Damn time zones. Oh well.

We did, however, relax for a bit this morning. We basically just did nothing around the condo until around 9:30, when we finally started getting ready for the day. We decided to hit up a couple of good snorkeling spots.

First, we drove a little bit north to Kapalua Beach.

This little bastard kept trying to fight me or something. He was an aggressive little thing. Certainly got a really good look at him, though! The pictures didn't come out as nicely since he kept darting around. This is a Rectangular Triggerfish, which is the state fish of Hawaii.

A very cool looking fish. I think there is one of these in Finding Nemo (if my memory serves me correctly). This is a Moorish Idol. They were difficult to get pictures of because they liked to hide underneath and behind the coral and rocks.

After we felt we had exhausted Kapalua Beach, we went back to the condo to have some lunch. By this time, it was noon and we were starving.

Around 1:00 p.m., we decided to walk down to the north end of Black Rock. It's quite a hike down the beach from our condo, but the nearest parking to Black Rock is really not close at all, so we figured we might as well walk it.

Once we got down there and into the water, we weren't disappointed.

A beautiful flourescent looking fish. We've had trouble identifying this one because it doesn't look exactly like any of the pictures our "guide" shows.

Our turtle friend! We were so excited to stumble upon a sea turtle. I've read that we're going to have an abundance of them in the water right outside of our condo when we go to Kauai, but wasn't sure whether we'd actually see one here in Maui. But sure enough, there he was. I was overwhelmed by the size of him (her?) when he got really close to me. They are HUGE!

Just another cool fish. Not sure what this one is, either.

We made the walk back from Black Rock to get ready for the Old Lahaina Luau. We caught the bus into downtown Lahaina since the luau had open bar and we wanted to take advantage. We actually arrived early, killed some time in the mall across the street, and then went back when it was time.

Once on the grounds, we were greeted with mai tais and fresh flower leis. I also was given a flower for behind my ear... it goes behind your left ear if you're "taken," behind your right if you're "available." As a married lady now, that bloom immediately went behind my left ear! :)

We had time to walk around the property and explore a little bit. The scenery was really beautiful, and the atmosphere is fun and really "Hawaiian," for lack of a better way to describe it. Basically, it's stereotypical Hawaii... what you'd expect to see, hear, and smell based on what you've seen in the movies and on TV. Simply put, it's just really pretty!

We were impressed by how many people they had working there. It's a really well-run operation. Many greeters, servers, etc. All are authentically dressed. I overheard someone say that they only hire true Hawaiians because they want to make sure it's as authentic as possible. Well, it certainly worked for us!

At about 6:20 p.m., they made a big show out of unearthing the pig. They removed it from the imu (underground oven), after cooking for 12 hours. It was cool, and part of the experience... but pretty gross, too! ;)

When we sat down at the tables, we had a little bit of entertainment while we waited for dinner. There were four couples (including us) at our table. Three of the four couples were newlyweds. All of the other three were from Los Angeles. One couple was married on Friday, June 20. The couple across from us was married the same day as us, June 21. So that was kind of fun.

The show itself was fast paced and entertaining.
Toward the end of the performances (which were fun to watch), they recognized all of the honeymooners by asking them to get up and dance to a traditional Hawaiian wedding song.

Us dancing with all of the other newlyweds

When it was over, we caught a cab back to our hotel... another tiring but exciting day and night! Off to bed!

New Friend

2008-06-27T16:03:00.001-04:00

Just got back from swimming with a sea turtle. Too cool.

More later...

Road to Hana

2008-06-26T21:14:00.014-04:00

Today, we tackled the Road to Hana. Overall, I'm kind of disappointed in how it worked out.

We had a great first half of the day. We were up at about 6:00 a.m. (naturally... I am so not an early riser, but the time change is messing with me), and left at 7:00 a.m. We made several stops.

Our first was a little hike through a bamboo forest to a little waterfall. There were supposed to be a few other waterfalls to see but we had trouble finding the second one and decided to move on to the next thing. We had fun hiking through the bamboo, though, and the waterfall we saw was pretty.

Back on the road, we ran into (well, not literally) a wild peacock, which was really cool. We got a picture of him before he attacked. He didn't really attack us, but I have an irrational fear of birds so when he was approaching the car, I got a little freaked out. :) As we drove away, he was in the middle of the road and we were terrified a car was going to come around the corner and hit him.

Our next stop was at a little trail back to a beautiful waterfall and pool, called Upper Puohokamoa Falls. There were people jumping off the cliff and into the pool below. It looked really fun. I actually regret not doing it. Oh well... guess the good news is that I didn't hurt myself, eh?

We stopped at several scenic overlooks, which were all beautiful.

Around 10:30-11:00 a.m., we stopped in a little community/town called Ke'anae. The coastline was beautiful. Here, we found a little snack stand. We bought a small loaf of fresh banana bread, and also had our first taste of Hawaiian shave ice. It was excellent! At that point, we were really hot, so the shave ice hit the spot. We had a strawberry/mango/banana flavor combination... yum.

A little later, we stopped at a waterfall called Upper Waikani Falls, nicknamed "Three Bears" Falls. The overlook to the falls is up by the road, and you couldn't actually see it that well. Thanks to the Maui Revealed book, we knew about a trail leading down closer to the falls. A couple of girls watched us hike down the edge next to the bridge, and I heard one of them say, "You guys are CRAZY." It actually wasn't crazy at all. The first couple of steps were steep, but after that, it was an easy hike through a little bit of bamboo and some trees, over some river rocks, and we were there. The view was so much better down there, and we enjoyed the little hike down to the falls.

Look, this is what we hiked down to get to the falls!

Unfortunately, this was the last stop that I actually enjoyed. Shortly after getting back into the car, I started to feel really sick. We were already about 20+ miles into the winding roads, and it was taking its toll. I'm not usually prone to motion sickness, but these roads are ridiculous.

We fought on for a few more stops. We pulled off on Nahiku Road and drove down to a beach that had a view of the whole coastline (that we had just traveled). We were there when it started to rain (the weather didn't help with the sick feeling, either). Beautiful sights, but they were hard to enjoy with a spinning head.

We tried to go down an unpaved, dirt road to see Blue Pool, but when we got to the end, there were all of these "NO TRESPASSING" signs, and we didn't really feel welcome. There weren't any other cars parked there, so we decided to turn around.

Our last stop was Wai'anapanapa Park. There were spring-fed freshwater caves, and also a volcanic black sand beach.

The trail down to the caves

One of the caves

Black sand beach

We had grand plans to go beyond Hana (where the best sights are supposedly located), to the Red Sand Beach, and the Seven Sacred Pools, etc. We only made it into Hana before we decided to turn around and go back. I was DREADING the approximately 35 miles of winding roads to head back, and if I'm being honest, it was a horrible, horrible ride back. Torturous, even.

I'm disappointed that motion sickness got in the way of us accomplishing all of the things that we hoped to see... there are places I really wanted to visit that we couldn't. Booo. But, I keep trying to look at the bright side. We have seen some really beautiful things so far, and we will certainly see more before we leave. And we still have Kauai to visit, too!

It took us a little over two hours to get all the way back to our condo from Hana. I still felt really, really sick. I think part of it was the lack of food, too. All we had eaten was cereal before we left the condo in the morning, and then the banana bread and shave ice. Oh, and some almonds we brought with us. So yeah... not exactly nutritious.

When we were back, I jumped right in the shower and we got ready to go grab some dinner. We wanted something a little different than what we have eaten the last few days, so we chose an Italian place called Penne Pasta Cafe in Lahaina. It got a good review in Maui Revealed.

When we arrived, we were surprised to find that it was set up like a fast food place. We ordered at the front counter and paid, then went and sat down with an order number outside. A waitress brought our food out to us, but that was about it for service. Cheap meal, though... we both ate for around $30. I had a baked penne dish, and Michael had calamari with pasta (it looked NASTY). Michael didn't like his dish very much, but said it was OK. Our standards have been lowered a little bit since the meal the other night (haha). Not the best meal we've had, but not the worst, either. I liked mine, but it was a pretty standard baked pasta dish.

When we got back to the condo, we watched the sunset (it was kind of overcast, so not the best one we've seen so far). We also finally cut up the Hawaiian golden pineapple we bought the other day (delicious!), and popped open the bottle of champagne we bought on our first night here (we haven't had the energy to drink it before now). We're hanging out here relaxing, watching TV--and blogging, of course. :)

We don't have any big plans for tomorrow... we hope to sleep in a little later than we have been. During the day, we want to hit up several snorkeling spots, and then tomorrow night, we have the Old Lahaina Luau.

We're having a great time... I can't believe tomorrow is Friday already. But we've certainly been cramming in as much as possible without being crazy about it. There's really no possible way to see everything, so I guess we'll have to come back some day. :)

Haleakala Riders

2008-06-25T20:01:00.001-04:00

When the alarm went off at 1:45 this morning, I was not a happy camper. I stumbled out into the hallway and said to Michael, "This is so wrong on so many levels." We somehow managed to get dressed and situated, then went downstairs to catch our ride for the Haleakala sunrise bike tour.

We picked up several other people at a few more hotels, then we headed to the Mountain Riders headquarters to pick up the trailer full of bikes, as well as our guide. We had a great driver, Jason, and guide, Pops. Pops was really talkative and made sure to get everyone involved in interacting. On the way up the mountain the dark, he asked what the name of the mountain was. I said, "Haleakala" (which, by the way, means "House of the Sun") and he said, "Right! What's your name?" I told him Heather, and he said, "Alright, Heather, you get a bike with brakes!" So as you can see, he had a nice sense of humor, too.

Before we left the headquarters, they had "breakfast" for us... some Costco muffins, coffee, and juice. Then we all loaded back into the van to head up the mountain. Michael and I both managed to doze off a bit on the way up. Once there, we got out and walked up to the observation area. It was still pretty pitch black, but started to get lighter pretty quickly. We were probably up there for about an hour total. The sun came up over the clouds, which was really cool (it was FREEZING in the meantime).

After sunrise, we went back, got into the van, and went a little bit further down the mountain to start the bike tour part of the excursion. I was nervous about it prior to the start. I had this impression that we'd be riding down the mountain on the shoulder with cars whizzing past us. However, as it turned out, our guide went down on the bikes with us, leading the way... we rode right down the middle of the road (well, our lane). The driver followed us in the van and blocked the lane so that cars couldn't pass us until we were ready for them to (we would squeeze over to the shoulder).

It was really awesome. I loved the bike ride part. I'm glad we did the whole sunrise tour to experience it once, but if I were going to do it again, I would just do the bike ride (they offer daytime tours, too). No reason to put yourself through getting up in the middle of the night for it for a second time.

Getting ready to fly down the mountain!

On the way down, we stopped every 5-10 miles (it was a total of 30 miles) to take pictures and rest. At every stop, we shed more and more clothing. At the top, I had several layers on. By the time we got to the bottom, I just had shorts and a t-shirt. The temperature difference at every stop was pretty amazing.

One of the photo op stops we made on the way down. Still in our "space suits" because it was quite chilly!

At one point, we stopped at a little garden/snack shack type thing and got a little something to eat and drink. Back on the bikes to finish the ride. The views were beautiful the entire way down, and there were so many cool smells--eucalyptus, lavender, sugar cane--it was truly an adventure for all of the senses.

At the little farmer's market/snack stand, one of our stops on the way down Haleakala

We ended the ride at an historic Catholic church, which was really beautiful. Jason loaded the bikes back into the trailer and then we headed back to the headquarters before we were all taken back to our hotels. We were back at the condo by noon. We had already been up for more than 10 hours, so we were exhausted. Michael and I settled in for about an hour nap.

End of the ride... Historic Catholic Church

When we woke up, we decided to finally go out and try our snorkeling gear. We drove to a nearby beach, figured out the gear, and then dove right into the water (face first!). It was really, really fun. We saw a lot of cool fish, coral, and got tossed around by the current (it was pretty strong). We also tried out the underwater case for our camera (so cool) for the first time. It worked great. We managed to get a lot of pictures and even a few video clips. Totally worth the little investment in the case! We can't wait to use it again.

After about a half hour or so in the water, I couldn't stand my flippers anymore. When we rented at the dive shop, I was kind of in between sizes. The guy told me my feet would shrink half a size in the water... well, I don't think mine did. My feet were KILLING me in those things. I couldn't handle the pain anymore and was too afraid to go barefoot because of the coral, so we called it a day. It was already after 3:00 p.m., and we hadn't had a real meal all day, so we decided to go back to the condo and shower and get ready for an early dinner.

Once cleaned up, we headed into downtown Lahaina to go to Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. What a cool little restaurant. I guess it is a chain that is in many touristy cities throughout the world, but it was new to us.

A flower in the lot where we parked to go to dinner in Lahaina

On our way to dinner in Lahaina

The whole restaurant is centered around the movie... menu items, decor, etc. Obviously, the majority of the menu consists of shrimp dishes. Bad news for me since I hate seafood. Michael loves it, however, and I hate to deprive him when we're in coastal areas with fresh seafood. So we went... I ordered a burger and was pleasantly surprised with how good it was. Michael had a shrimp and mahi mahi dish, which he thought was excellent.

We stopped for ice cream on the way home, and now we're just ready to crash. Getting up in the middle of the night has taken its toll and we're ready for a good night's sleep. We're getting up relatively early again tomorrow to do the Road to Hana, but it will be NOTHING like this morning, so we're OK with it. :)

More tomorrow...

Commercialism vs. Wilderness

2008-06-24T20:20:00.002-04:00

After we woke up this morning, before we even changed out of our pajamas, we went downstairs and out to the beach to walk around and take a few pictures. It's beautiful out there--not much of a beach in front of our hotel, but the water is sparkling blue.

Michael's first "dip" in the Pacific Ocean

We came back up, showered, then went across the street to rent snorkel gear for the week. We rented from Maui Dive Shop. The guy there, Joseph, was really helpful and gave several suggestions of where to stop for good snorkeling this week.

Next, we went to downtown Lahaina to explore. We visited several shops, checked out the menus at a few restaurants, and just got a feel for where everything is on the island.

A random patch of grass in the middle of Lahaina

The quiet streets of Lahaina. We haven't seen them this empty since!

Oh, and we figured out our convertible! When we first went down to the parking lot this morning, we couldn't figure out how to get it open all of the way. We had to ask one of the groundswork guys if he knew how the heck to work it. Turned out that there was this part in the trunk that we had to fold down to stop from blocking the top going down. Oops. But seriously, how were we supposed to know that? Since then, we've put the top down and back up again at least 15 times... it's so easy! :) We loooove the convertible. Totally worth the extra money... gotta have a convertible in Maui!

Me in the rental car in front of our hotel

We bought a few souvenir type things (Michael bought his first Hawaiian shirt--uh oh), and then took a short trip to Safeway to pick up a few things that we discovered we didn't have at the condo.

Then... back into downtown Lahaina for lunch. We chose to eat at this little place called Cheeseburger in Paradise. We have the Maui Revealed book, and it was recommended in there. Plus, we had walked by it earlier in the morning and liked the atmosphere. Not only that, but I was in the mood for some serious french fries. According to Maui Revealed, the fries at Cheeseburger in Paradise are amazing. Well, we weren't disappointed. We both had a "polynesian style" chicken salad sandwich. It was chunks of chicken with green onions, cashews, red peppers, etc. in a ginger sauce. Delicious! Why not a cheeseburger? Maui Revealed claims that ironically, their cheeseburgers are the weakest items on the menu. I was also trying to branch out from my usual "play it safe" ordering. I'm glad I did.

After lunch, we decided to take a ride up Route 30 to see some of the "West Maui Sights" highlighted in Maui Revealed. The scenery on the way was completely breathtaking. It was our first real glimpse at the "real" Maui. This is why people come here!

Driving down Route 30 with another Sebring convertible in front of us. Pretty drive!

Our first stop was at the Nakalele Blowhole. We hiked a little bit of the way down and took some beautiful photos of the view. Unfortunately, the blowhole wasn't really doing much... apparently we were there at the wrong time of day. We're going to try to go back later this week to catch some massive amounts of spraying water.

On the cliffs above the Nakalele Blowhole (it was below this). Hang loose!

More driving, more spectacular sights... next stop was at Olivine Pools. We had to hike down some pretty steep and rocky terrain (and a "DANGER: Do Not Go Beyond This Point" sign), but it was really cool. We were in flip flops (stupid), so it took a little longer and was a little scarier than normal, but we made it and it was worth it. We took a dip in the pools to cool off. Our camera battery decided to die shortly after, so we headed back up the mountain and to our car to go back to the condo.

The Olivine Pools from above. See the rough terrain we hiked down?

Taking a swim in one of the Olivine Pools

Only we didn't go back to the condo... we ended up taking yet another drive to nearby Ka'anapali Beach to see Black Rock. We parked at Whalers Village and explored that a little bit as well. We ended up buying some aqua socks/water shoes that are sure to come in handy this week. Then we FINALLY decided to head back to the condo to clean up to go to dinner.

Snorkelers at Black Rock

We have to be ready to be picked up by Mountain Riders at 2:10 a.m. tomorrow morning (yes, that's right), so we ultimately decided to just go get takeout. We decided to go with a local place that was recommended to us by the concierge downstairs. It also had a decent review in the Maui Revealed book. Called Honokowai Okazuya, it is just a little hole in the wall in a plaza not far from our condo.

We were excited for our takeout. This is obviously before we ate it. Two thumbs down. Wayyy down.

Well, let me just say... this was a major miss. It was disgusting. Granted, I am picky about my meat. But I ordered their "world famous" Korean Style Chicken BBQ, and I could barely even stomach a few bites of it. Just gross. The chicken still had skin on it (which I didn't realize), and it was fatty. Ew, I just don't even want to think about it any longer! Michael had some other chicken dish, which he also sad was chewy. Nasty. So, moving on...

We have to get up in about 6 hours, and we're not even in bed yet. Suppose I should sign off... more tomorrow!

In Paradise

2008-06-24T12:38:00.001-04:00

Got in last night and ran a few errands before heading to our condo. We went to a walmart near the airport to get a few food essentials, then made the roughly half hour drive to our condo resort. It was already dark when we got here so there wasn't much to see at that point. We baked a frozen pizza we picked up and then crashed. I think it took less than a minute for me to fall asleep. We are up bright and early (we woke before 6) because we are not used to the time difference. We are going to explore today, drive around with our convertible top down... Gotta go shower and eat breakfast!

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Seattle

2008-06-23T18:05:00.001-04:00

This is about all we are seeing of Seattle. Our plane was a little late leaving Detroit, and we only had an hour layover to begin with. They held the maui plane for us and other passengers. So we had to get off the one plane and practically run to the next. Guess we will be getting dinner in maui, then! The last leg until we are finally there!

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Pro pic preview!

2008-06-23T11:31:00.001-04:00

Our amazing photographers surprised us last night by emailing us a few teaser pics. I am sure they have only begun to scratch the surface in terms of going through the probably couple thousand pics they took on Saturday. I can't wait to see the rest. Good thing I am bored in the airport with time to kill, huh? :)

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In Detroit

2008-06-23T11:02:00.001-04:00

We made it to Detroit safely. Ate $16 quiznos (gotta love how airports jack up the prices), and are now just killing time until we board. So far, so good!

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And... We're off!

2008-06-23T09:14:00.001-04:00

At the airport, about to board
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Perfect Day

2008-06-22T14:06:00.009-04:00

It was everything I dreamt it would be, and more. I would not have changed a single thing.

I sent that "It's almost time" photo when I was standing in the limo bus by myself, waiting for my matron of honor to come get me when it was time for the processional to begin. Shortly after I sent it to the blog, she came out to tell me that the church coordinator had closed the doors to the church and that the coast was clear for me to come inside. Moments later, "Ave Maria" began playing as our mothers walked down the aisle to light the unity candle.

And in a blink of an eye, it was all over. It really is true, what all brides say... it really does go by THAT fast. It's a total blur, but it was fabulous. I absorbed it all as much as I could, but it's still a blur.

The weather was fantastic. I woke up to sunny skies, and before the limo came to get us, we had pictures with the girls and my parents at my mom's house, while Michael had pictures with the guys and his parents outside of the church. As we pulled up the church, the sky was darker, and we began to hear rumbles of thunder. And once we were in, and I was down the aisle, it POURED. Boy, did it pour. The thunder rolled.

After the ceremony, it continued to pour during our receiving line (which was thankfully moved inside), and then, it let up. We managed to take family photos outside on the church steps in between sporadic showers. Then? The sky cleared and it was absolutely beautiful and sunny for the rest of the day. Incredible.

We took awesome bridal party pics and photos of just the two of us in these great locations that our photographers scouted and found for us. And the photographers... they were incredible. We LOVED them. We can't wait to get the pictures back.

The reception was flawless. The food was fabulous, music was fun, and everyone had a blast. I honestly had the time of my life. It was the most fun I have ever had... ever.

We'll be getting other pictures back from our guests (or at least we hope we will), but so far, only my boss's husband has come through for us. :) We just got home from our morning-after brunch to find almost 100 pictures in my e-mail. And it's extra fabulous because he is actually a professional photographer. We didn't hire him for the wedding, but he can't help himself--he brings his camera everywhere. He could only make it to the reception (so no ceremony photos yet), but we reaped the benefits... a few extra "pro" pics.

And now I can share them with all of you! Just a "sneak peak" of the day...

It is almost time

2008-06-21T14:00:00.001-04:00

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Getting married tomorrow!

2008-06-21T00:44:00.002-04:00

Well, technically today. I am lying in bed, about to turn the lights out on my last night as a single woman. My last night as a "girl," I suppose. The rehearsal and dinner were fantastic. My great grandmother's rosary is out in a bush out front of my mom's house because it is supposed to be good luck and bring good weather. My dress is hanging here in the room with me and everything is done. Tomorrow, all that is left to do is let everything go, enjoy it all, and get married. Wow. See you all on "the other side!"

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Bridesmaids' Gifts

2008-06-18T21:50:00.001-04:00

OK, I finally have all of the bridesmaids' gifts purchased, wrapped, and packed up, ready to go.

They are each getting a personalized tote. I bought the black totes at AC Moore for like $2-3 each, then bought the sparkly name stickers from an ebay seller. I used embellishment glue to attach them to the bags so that they would stick better than just stickers.

Inside each bag:
- Wedding day jewelry (earrings and necklace) that I made
- A pair of PJ pants from Old Navy
- A black umbrella from the dollar store (in case it rains!)
- A pair of flip flops from Old Navy that they can wear at the reception (if they want)

Everything else I bought was personalized to each girl. Michael's sister, Melissa, gets two nice photo albums because she loves pictures and always prints them and puts them into albums. His other sister, Cristina, is obsessed with her DVD collection, so I bought her two movies. For Bethany, she's pregnant (due in October), so I bought her a gift certificate for a pedicure in her hometown so that she can get her toes done when she can no longer reach them herself. For my cousin, Sabrina, a bottle of Shiraz (her favorite wine), and two cool wine glasses from Pier 1.

While shopping for Sabrina at Pier 1, I stumbled upon gifts for the last two bridesmaids as well. For my friend, Carrie, I found these serving dishes in the shape of stars... so awesome, because Carrie LOVES stars. One is big, to hold chips or something, and the other is smaller, for dip or salsa. For my cousin and matron of honor, Lindsay, I found two really cool serving dishes as well.

Here are a few pictures of some of the stuff:

All set for the rehearsal dinner on Friday!

Guess who called today

2008-06-18T21:21:00.003-04:00

The jeweler. My ring is done.

That's right, done. You know, the ring that a stupid saleslady told me would take 10 days, and couldn't possibly be done by Friday. Turns out that the "10 day process" only takes 2 days.

When the woman called me (who just so happened to be Michelle, the lady who originally told me it could be done), she said, "I'm calling to let you know your ring is ready." I immediately said, "Get outta here!" She said, "Well, I couldn't let you go without your engagement ring for too long!" I told her that I appreciated it, but was very surprised to hear from them so soon since the other lady had made it seem like it would be a stretch to get it done by Friday. So she said, "Well, you just stick with me from now on!" I told her I will!

So tonight, Michael and I went over to pick it up. I was anxious to see it. It looks AWESOME. It is SO sparkly that it nearly blinded all of us as she took it out of the bag. And there is not a scratch on it. It looks just like it did a year ago when Michael gave it to me for the first time. And I had forgotten how good it looked! :)

It looks so good, in fact, that I refuse to wear it. I'm voluntarily living with a naked hand until Friday. And that's that.

Farewell to Work

2008-06-17T22:02:00.003-04:00

Today was my last day of work for three weeks! I don't go back until July 8.

Here I sit with a glass of wine, knowing that I don't have to go to work tomorrow... yet it still feels like I must have to go to work tomorrow. It'll be nice to sleep in a little bit in the morning.

I have never taken this amount of time off of work. This is a first for me. After three weeks off, I'm not really sure how I'll manage to go back. But I guess I'll cross that bridge when I come to it. For now... 20 days of total bliss. And after Saturday, all of those days should be pretty damn fun and/or relaxing.

It was strange to leave work today. I was actually a little bit reluctant because it felt like I must be forgetting to do something. But I knew that I wasn't... summer is pretty slow for me, so I just had a few things to wrap up, and that was it. I met with my boss and passed off a few things that were still pending, and done!

I had to resist the urge to put "I'M OUT GETTING MARRIED!!!" in my out-of-office auto-reply for my e-mail. That would have been fun. Oh well.

My dad gets into town tomorrow from Virginia. It's all becoming so real, yet I still can't grasp the fact that the wedding will actually be here in 4 days. It's a very strange feeling that I can't quite describe.

Today at work, there were a couple of times when I got a butterfly-like feeling in my stomach. So I think it's slowly sinking in.

And somehow, I managed to lose 3 lbs. without even trying last week. I ate pretty normally, and I had at least a glass of wine almost every night (stress reliever!). Interesting. I hope that weight loss continues (or at least holds steady) through this weekend! It'd be nice to be feeling really good by being down a few pounds.

We're in the homestretch now, people. It's really almost here.

4 days!

Road to the Aisle

DIY Wedding Albums

Trash the Dress - The Beach

Trash the Dress - Brick Factory

Trash the Dress - Preview

Cool

Trash it.

Reflection

FOR SALE: Votive Candle Holders

FOR SALE: Black Umbrellas

FOR SALE: Photo Frame Cardbox ***SOLD!***

FOR SALE: Table Number Luminaries

FOR SALE: Glass Cylinder Vases

Selling off wedding items

Thank You Cards...

Video Recap

Pro Pics, Part 13: Fun at the Reception

Our video is ready!

Pro Pics, Part 12: Bouquet & Garter Toss

Pro Pics, Part 11: Parent Dances

Pro Pics, Part 10: Cake Cutting

Pro Pics, Part 9: The Toasts

Pro Pics, Part 8: Introductions & First Dance

Pro Pics, Part 7: Just Us

Screeching Halt

Pro Pics, Part 6: Bridal Party Photos

Trying a new header on for size...

Pro Pics, Part 5: Family Portraits

Pro Pics, Part 4: The Ceremony

Pro Pics, Part 3: Pre-Ceremony Photos

Pro Pics, Part 2: The Guys Get Ready

Pro Pics, Part 1: The Girls Get Ready

Thank You Card Design

They're here!

One Month!

Driver's License

Post #1

Table Delivered!

What's in a name?

In Limbo

New Dining Table

Maui Condo Review: Mahana 804

Officially Heather Newlastname

Social Security

Say what?

Home Sweet Home

Last Day

Kauai from the air

Hang Ten

Polihale & Waimea Canyon

Travel Day

To Kauai

Zip zip

Snorkeling & Old Lahaina Luau

New Friend

Road to Hana

Haleakala Riders

Commercialism vs. Wilderness

In Paradise

Seattle

Pro pic preview!

In Detroit

And... We're off!

Perfect Day

It is almost time

Getting married tomorrow!

Bridesmaids' Gifts

Guess who called today

Farewell to Work

FOR SALE: Photo Frame Cardbox SOLD!