This is overdue

Ok, I promised this months ago, specifically at the end of this post. It's about time for me to pony up.

My best friend is awesome. Seriously. She is creative, intelligent, funny and incredibly beautiful. I'm lucky to have her as my bestie and my maid of honor. She's always there to talk. Always checking up on me. And she is completely selfless. Amanda always puts her family and friends first. If she needs to change anything, it's to take a little more time to herself. She deserves to be spoiled every once in awhile.


(Ama looking damn sexy on Halloween. Photo credit: Ama)

Last fall she made me two amazing gifts. A wedding planner and a file folder. They rock. They have everything I could ever need in them for all my wedding planning. The planner is a 3-ring-binder that has tabbed sections for the ceremony, reception, honeymoon, bridal party, vendors, beauty/fashion... There is a timeline/checklist, a guest list tracker and tons upon tons of worksheets. The file folder is so cute and has tons of pretty folders inside for me to keep track of things I rip out of magazines or flyers I pick up from wedding fairs. There is also a pocket for pens and she tossed in a mini stapler. The binder also came with tons of heavy duty paper clips and 3 colors of post its! Isn't she amazing? She thought of everything.




Now I just need to get my butt in gear and fill it out. Ned said we could take some time this weekend to go over all our worksheets and start working on the checklist. We have so much we need to get done.






But how great is this- I'm right on track with my 8 months list with working on fitness and nutrition!


- Gan

Wait...What?? 8 months?!?!

Where does the time go? It seems like just yesterday Ned and I were headed to the Pantages Theater in downtown to see the very brilliant Henry Rollins when, after a short picnic dinner by Lake of the Isles, Ned pulled the car over on Franklin Avenue to propose to me. Wasn't that just yesterday? I swear it was.





Or, was yesterday when Ned took me to San Francisco for the first time and I got to spend time in the city where he went to college and spent 7 or so years in his twenties?





Or, maybe yesterday was when Ned and I purchased our first house together in the quiet neighborhood of Nokomis Heights in Minneapolis?


But really, all those things happened some time ago. It's quite shocking that its been over a year since Ned proposed. Over a year ago that we went to San Francisco. And almost a year ago that we bought our first house. Now it's time to face reality that there are just 8 months left to go until the wedding. That was something I was shocked with this morning when I opened my email to find an update from TheKnot.com that said exactly that. 8 months. 8 months left until we throw one huge kick ass party with all our friends and family. 8 months until I get to say, "I do" to the man of my dreams.

As I sip out of my giant latte cup from The Knot that I scored at a wedding fair, I'm realizing that we are still pretty far behind. No dress. No caterer booked. No florist. Haven't even sent out our Save The Dates. Haven't even finalized our guest list. But we do have a caterer we want to book and have discussed things with. We do have some ideas for the florist we want. And Ned has designed our Save The Dates already. It's all just a matter of taking that next big step and finishing things.

I find it a bit funny though that my email from The Knot says that we should be registering for gifts right now. Gifts? 8 months from the wedding? Really? Seems a bit early to me. I have no idea what we are going to register for as we already have a lovely home with lovely things. And wont stuff change between now and the wedding? Wont we just have to redo the registry as items become unavailable? Waste of time in my opinion. For now, we just need to focus on the other things. I think the project for this week will be getting those Save The Dates out. Especially to our friends and family in Austria.



- Gan

Officially less than 1 year...

Wow! Time is flying. We officially have less than one year to go. I couldn't be more thrilled. There is still so much to do, but we are slowly knocking those things off the to do list.

I really wanted to blog yesterday since it was the one year mark. But with working overtime and an amazing date night with Ned, there was just no time.

To celebrate our one year to go mark, we had a lovely dinner of amazing vegetarian and vegan sushi at Midori's. We then followed dinner up with the lovely sounds of Joshua Radin at the Pantages Theater.





Yesterday, I received an email from TheKnot.com. It was my official "you've got 12 months to go" newsletter. It was comprised of the things we need to be working on this month:

- Research vendors - Check!
- Finalize your budget - Budget? Whats a budget? Budget shmudget.
- Wedding style ideas - I think weve got this one down. This has been the most exciting part so far. (Besides the part where I get to call Ned my husband.)

Id say we are about right on track if not still ahead of the game. And Im just joking about the budget part. We don't really have one, but its all about being responsible and not going overboard. We know our limits, but that doesn't mean we aren't going to have one hell of a shindig.

Today Ill leave you the beautiful music of Josh Radin. Im sure there will be plenty of his songs played at our wedding. (Which is kinda funny because he made a bunch of jokes about weddings last night.)







- Gan

Home sweet home

We got in from our lovely adventure to Europe last night. I feel rested and refreshed even though a majority of the time was spent hiking and exploring. Even a 1,400 stairs hike inside a mountain (700 up and 700 down)...and that was after hiking up the mountain itself! But we had a great trip and once again we saw how well we travel together.

I have not had time to really go through our photos yet, but trust me, we have some cute ones. I figured I should post a small entry about our to-do list for now. I think its growing, instead of shrinking, every day.

Things we have done
- Photographer booked
- First set of engagement photos shot
- Reception venue booked
- Photo booth booked
- My wedding party chosen and informed
- Ceremony location chosen
- Caterer chosen

Things that need to be finalized in the next few weeks
- Ceremony location booked
- Caterer booked
- His side of the wedding party
- Cake tastings
- Save the dates need to be finished & mailed
- Guest list (!!!)
- Wedding dress search continues
- Engagement party/housewarming party

We haven't even seen a teaser photo from our engagement shoot and Im getting a bit restless. I know its only been 2 weeks, but I was hoping to get at least one photo emailed to us while we were on vacation. Im excited, but also nervous to get them back. Just an email to let us know they turned out ok would have been nice! Im totally impatient. But Jenn is a great photographer so I have no need for doubts.

Hopefully tonight Ill get through some of our vacation photos. And maybe we can start tackling some of our other to-dos.

- Gan