So, I was planning on blogging about our engagement pictures tonite, but tonite we went to a tasting at our venue, Sodo Park, sponsored by our caterer, Herban Feast. I'm really excited to share about that, so I'll blog about the pictures tomorrow. The tasting was absolutely fantastic. Not only was the food good, but it was great to see the venue again. We also got to get a sense of what it looks like at night. That really helped know what kinds of light we might need.

Plus, they had floor plans from some of the weddings they'd done before, which was awesome. 

Wait...I'm getting ahead of myself...I'll start in the beginning...I haven't even talked about the venue here yet.

We're going to be getting married at Sodo Park in the Sodo area of Seattle. It's an old factory that's been refurbished and has great exposed beams, huge windows & some great character. It also has different seating areas, including a couch area with comfortable chairs that will be great for people who don't want to dance. Sodo Park is owned by the same people that own the catering company Herban Feast, so they'll be our caterers. Since then, Sodo Park & Herban Feast have gotten the 2009 Vendors' Choice Awards from the Seattle Bride Magazine for "Best New Wedding Vendor", "Best New Reception Site" and "Best Caterer".  Here's a couple pictures from their website:

 

When we signed the contract with Sodo Park, they told us that we'd also get to attend their regular tasting events. The events would let us sample the options for the menu, as well as get to see what the venue looks like at night. Since our wedding is in late March, though, we're kind of in between seasons for the food. So, the things we tasted tonite may not be available for our wedding; we'll find out what's available once we get closer to the date.

A few weeks ago, we got an email from our coordinator, Reese, telling us that the first tasting was coming up. We RSVP'ed as soon as we got it. Heck yes we were showing up!

You see, our caterers opened up a restaurant, Fresh Bistro, in May and we've been going way too frequently. It's absolutely awesome. 

Not only do we really enjoy the food, but the people there are so nice, friendly & genuine. The first time we went there, K was parking the car and dropped me off at the door. When I went in, they asked if we wanted to sit at the kitchen table.  Well, duh! Of course we did!

So, that evening, we sat at a bar, over looking the kitchen and talked to the chefs. That was the first time we met Dalis Chea, the executive chef and co-owner of Sodo Park, Herban Feast & Fresh bistro. Chef Chea sat and talked to us, answered our questions, told us about the food & offered us samples of the various things.  It was one of the best dining experiences we've ever had.

Since then, we've taken friends there, gone for special occasions (both of our birthdays) and attended their first wine tasting dinner. Every time we've gone the staff has been incredibly friendly and the food has been fantastic.

So, we jumped at the chance to try the catering menus, even if they wouldn't be the exact same as the Fresh Bistro menu.  When we got there, we were greeted and invited in. The hostess recommended that we try their signature drink (a lemon basil martini - YUM) off of the "drink tree" they have or grab a glass of wine at the bar.

 

Instead, we walked around a bit & then headed for the food. :-)  We didn't take any pictures of it, but boy was it good - as we expected.

Chef Chea was there; when he saw us, he shook our hands and was genuinely glad to see us. He took the time away from what he was doing and chatted with us for awhile about the food and the wine tasting dinner we went to recently. He also said not to worry too much about the food because they'd have a private menu tasting for us closer to the date. I thought that was the absolute sweetest thing. I feel honored that he remembered us; I know they serve a lot of people every day. The fact that he remembers us - he remembers that we're getting married there - and he knows that our wedding is between seasons & is willing to do something special for us speaks to his personality and customer service. Here's a picture of our favorite chef:

 
We sat and ate the food we chose and then walked around the venue to try to imagine what we'd want.  I think we now have a general idea of how we want the ceremony & reception set up, and where the kids area, candy buffet, escort cards, gift tables and DJ will go.

Plus, some of the rentals companies had binders there with sample linens and I think we picked out our table cloths!  We'll do these as an overlay over either white or navy floor-length table cloths.  I'm so excited. It's neat to see the copper coming out as a major color in our wedding; I was concerned it would become an accent against the navy instead of equal to the navy.

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K took a bunch of pictures of the venue with his cell phone (I forgot our camera) so that we'll remember what it looks like & get an idea of what we need as far as flowers & decorations. I've included some of them above, here are the rest. (Sorry that some of them are blurry, but you can get an idea of the space.)

 

 

So, what do you think?  Any ideas of how we could decorate?

And the winner is....

Hey everybody!

(Can you tell I always feel weird about starting a blog entry without a salutation? It feels like I've just walked up to you & started talking in the middle of the conversation. Anyone ever felt that way before? lol - probably not...anyway...)

Some exciting wedding(ish)-related news: K & I went to a bridal show at the spur of the moment on Saturday. It was at the Tacoma Convention Center, and it had maybe 20 booths. It was kind of cute, actually & not at all overwhelming like I thought it would be.

We were talking to somebody (I think about ice sculptures - lol) and all of the sudden K said, "Honey, we have to go - we just won something!" It turns out, they'd called our names for door prizes! The prize was a huge basket from the Ram restaurants- I should have taken a picture. In it, there were several gift certificates for free deserts, appetizers and drinks at the Ram. There was also a free brunch at their restaurant on the Tacoma Waterfront, CJ Shenanigans, and two $60 gift certificates to their new Mexican restaurant in the U-Village, Sonrisa.  Sounds great, eh?

But wait!
There's more! 

In the basket there was a bottle of wine, a t-shirt and there was also a growler & a membership to their growler program.  What's a growler program, you ask?  Well, clearly you don't go to as many micro-breweries as my fiance & I do. ;-)  Basically a growler is a big jug for beer, like this:

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The growler program gives you a discount on beer when you buy (or receive in a gift basket) a growler.  It's a great way to get to try different beers at a decent price.

K & I were totally psyched. In fact, we felt a little guilty that we didn't need any catering (which is what the Ram was there selling).  I told K that at least we got something we could use - I was afraid we'd get something we already had, like a discount for a bridesmaids dress.  Of course, now that I think about it, maybe we could have used that to look for a dress for C (I have *no* idea what the kids are going to wear).

After that, the bridal show seemed pretty boring. ;-)  We did talk to a bakery that we're probably going to go look at. They already work with our caterers a lot, and they were totally psyched about our idea for the cakes - which was a lot of fun. Their sample at the show was pretty good, but the real test will be taking the kids over there & seeing what pleases their discriminating pallates.

We also talked to the Partylite people. It was pretty funny, we kind of got trapped because K's a nice person & has trouble saying "no" when people start talking to him.  So, we stopped & looked through the displays they had. The lady tried to sell me something that we could use if our venue doesn't allow candles to spray a scent.  I decided it would be tactless to tell her that I'm generally very anti-scented things (except soaps). It was kind of odd to be sold something that looked like a fancy version of this:

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She did give me a good idea for our aisle decoration, though.  I'd been thinking about doing something like this along each row, except bigger (I couldn't find the picture where I found this originally):

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Except, I found these floating candles that look like the flame is actually floating on the water:

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The only problem with those is that they're smaller than I would want the vases to be (for stability sake & looks), so I thought they might look funny. The Partylite lady told us that their tea lights float, though. So, now I'm thinking that we may do that - with lots of little flames instead of one big one.

So, all in all, it was a pretty productive afternoon - which I completely didn't expect.  Has anybody else ever won a cool doorprize before?

All I Got Is This Photograph

Mad props to anyone who knows what song that's from (no Googling!)  Now, the lucky few of you who know that song have it stuck in your head; just like I have since I thought of the title. ;-)

Anyway...today I thought I'd talk a little more about one of the vendors we've selected.

The vendor that's been the most difficult so far has been our photographer. That wasn't because we're photography snobs (we're definitely not); it was because there were so many factors we had to consider.

One important factor in this decision was K's kids. There aren't very many wedding photographers who showcase kid pictures on their websites. Those that do, don't always have very good kid pictures. The kids are a big part of the day; it's very, very important to us that they feel comfortable in every part of it. The pictures are something I'm concerned about, since it will take up so much time on the day of the wedding. We definitely wanted to hire someone who has a lot of experience working with kids & taking kids' pictures.

We also had a very generous offer from a close friend (BM M's wife), who's a wedding photographer, to take our pictures.  In the end, we decided that we wanted her to be able to relax during the wedding. I'm confident that Christine would have handled the "frendor" relationship beautifully & professionally, since I've seen her do it before, but I was concerned that I wouldn't handle it as gracefully.  Despite our decision, if you're looking for a wedding photographer in Houston, I highly recommend her.  You can see her work on her website here.

Once we'd made that decision, K and I started looking around at local photographers. We looked at a bunch and narrowed it down to two.  We met with both of them, and decided to go with Kris Allen.  No, not this Kris Allen:

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This Kris Allen:

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Our first meeting with Kris was insanely comfortable; we met her at Sorci's, a restaurant down the street from us, with the girls. We didn't necessarily have an idea of what we wanted, but (as per our usual decision making process) we were both confident we'd know it when we saw it. 

Kris was definitely "it".  She takes great pictures. She's a former project manager, which totally appeals to me & gives me confidence that she knows how to manage the complexity of a wedding shoot. She's really friendly and easy to get along with. We had a similar sense of humor & at the end of the first meeting, it felt like we were talking to an old friend.

The ringer for Kris, though, is that she does family portraits most of the time. So, she understands kids (well, as much as anyone can) & knows how to get good pictures of them. We've seen the pictures she takes of families and they're really good. I think that with Kris' experience working with kids, we're more likely to have fantastic wedding pictures. Here are some of my favorites from one of her recent shoots (all from www.krisallenphotography.com)
 

 

 

To help the kids be more comfortable with Kris, we're having family pictures taken in a few weeks. That way the kids can get to know her and we can all get more comfortable having our picture taken together. K & I definitely think this will be helpful, since we got so much more comfortable with her during our engagement shoot last week.  I'll talk more about that later, but here's a teaser:

 

Ring a ding ding

One thing we skipped over as I dove right into wedding stuff is my ring. K got me the most incredible ring; it is absolutely perfect in my completely unbiased opinion. ;-)

How did he find this ring, you ask?

It all started (like many shenanigans do) at the Sumner Wine Walk. For those of you who've missed this, Sumner (the town we live in) sponsors a wine walk twice a year. Each of the shops hosts 2 wines and you go around to each of them tasting the wine. K & I usually have a bunch of friends over for some pre-walking festivities. We eat some food, drink some wine & then head out shopping. One of the shops is the jewelry store on Main Street.

In one wine walk (I have no idea which one), we were looking at the engagement rings display and saw one with sapphires on each side of the setting. It was gorgeous & absolutely perfect. They offered to take it out of the display, but I declined.

As K & I got more serious, we'd keep an eye on that ring. One Wine Walk, it was gone. I was completely bummed. The owners didn't even remember the ring, but we did. A few weeks later, K mentioned that in order for him to get me a ring, he had to know what size. So, I went into the same jewelry store and tried on a few of their rings. One of them was a setting with square diamonds on each side diagonally.

Fast forward a few months and K proposed. (It's a good story, but I think most of you have heard it - leave a comment if you haven't & I'll retell.) With this...

The diamond is a 1 karat radiant cut in a platinum band. I love it.  I had it sized a few months ago & after I got it back (and it was all shiny) I played with it some in the yard & around the house to get these pictures.  I hope you enjoy them:

So, there you go - that's all about my ring!  Is there anything else you've been wanting to know about that I haven't mentioned yet?

All Tied Up

First things first, the title for this post was K's idea because I was stuck.  I'd say something about how if you think it's cheesy, blame him - but all of mine have been cheesy too.  So, I'm not saying anything other than "that was K's recommended title."

Anyway - getting on to the good stuff....

I'm a details person. I love details; I think the details are what makes something special.  When my MOH, R, & I went to Spain together, the thing that I loved the most (besides spending time with her) was the incredible detail in the buildings - the tiling, the archways - it was incredible.

I've been trying to show the same sort of attention to detail in our wedding. It's an interesting balance, though, because I don't want to create more work for us than absolutely necessary; nor do I want to invest time, energy or money into a detail that isn't really meaningful.  For example, we're not going to have personalized napkins; I know people do it & it's a detail that can make the wedding more personal. To me, though, it's not worth it. It's not worth the money or figuring out what font, or where to get them from, or where to put them, or what to put on them....

As I've read blogs & browsed websites, though, I have looked for the details that are either meaningful to one or both of us, serve a purpose or bring everything together.  One example of that I found while on Weddingbee. There was a woman talking about ties they'd ordered from a website called Cyberoptix; the description intrigued me so away I went to browse around.

They have some pretty cool looking ties that I can't figure out how to save pictures of.  So, you have to click through & check them out.  They're so cool; I love how they have fun with the ties like this and this. There are a few darker ones too, like this.

They also make scarves that I think are big enough to double as wraps. They're gorgeous too, check out this.

So, as I was nosing around I came across this tie; and I totally fell in love with the picture with the browns & coppers. I sent it to K and he was totally crazy about them to.

We ordered a sample tie & scarf to see what they look like. They are incredible; so we decided to get them for the wedding party. They look great, fit with the color scheme and we'll be supporting a growing business.  One of the coolest things was when I got my order confirmation email, it said something along the lines of "This isn't an automated email. There's a real person sitting on the other end of this address, so if you have any questions at all, respond & we'll get right back to you"

For the wedding, we'll give all of the grooms/brides men, plus some of our family members, ties that look like the one above.  K will have one color (maybe orange?), the groomsmen will have another color (maybe brown?), my bridesman M will have a color that closely matches the dresses & our family members will have a 4th color.  Oy.  We haven't exactly figured out the colors yet, but Bethany from Cyberoptix sent us a swatch card with a bunch of options and we just need to make a decision.

We'll also be getting the women in our lives (brides/grooms maids, family, etc) scarves that match as well. I think they'll use them as wraps & hopefully that will help keep them warm.  March in Seattle is pretty unpredictable; it may be beautiful or it may be cold & rainy. (Clearly, I'm hoping for - but not planning on - beautiful)

What do you think? Would you wear any of the Cyberoptix ties?

It Suits Him Perfectly

Hi everyone!

Sorry it's been so incredibly long since I blogged.  Work has been more insane than usual & so we haven't been doing too much wedding work.  That's no excuse, though, because there are tons of things to catch you up on.

So, now I'm back!  Watch out. ;-)

When I left you, I'd outlined what the bridesmaids are going to wear, and teased about what we're going to do for the groomsmen & bridesmen.

This was a really tough one for us. We originally wanted a navy pinstripe suit. We thought the stripe would play well with the lighter colors of the bridesmaid dresses and a suit would fit the mood we are going for better than a tux would.

Well, it turns out (and this probably won't surprise most of you) - you can't rent suits.  So, there went that idea.

Then we started looking for pinstriped tuxes....nada.  All we could find were zoot suits or something that looked like P-Diddy (is that the name he's going by right now?) would wear it. Like this...

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or this...

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Finally, I emailed a tux store asking about options and the owner pointed me to a navy tux that was cut very much like a suit.  I'd actually found it when I was first looking, but we wanted the pin stripes so badly that I forgot about it.

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Tada!  That's it!
 
K &  I ended up working with the rental place pointed me in that direction, Wall Street Custom Clothiers. We really liked the owner and the store when we went to visit. One of the big perks is that they'll deliver the tuxes to the hotel & pick them up after the wedding. So, all we have to do is make sure the guys get us their tuxes the day after the wedding and it will be taken care of. How wonderful is that?

Another perk is that they also do alterations, so I'll be getting my wedding dress altered there.  The owner recommended that we look at having a custom shirt made for K as well. I think that would be neat - seeing as how I get a whole dress made for me. ;-)

So, that's it - our tux decision.  What do you think?  Anyone who knows me surprised that they're blue? ;-)

Next up, I'll give you some of our thoughts about how we'll finish out the outfits for our parties.