Mini Bottle Mania

As many of you know, Rhys and I took a long weekend in Gatlinburg, Tennessee with his brothers and sister and their spouses.  We had an absolute blast!  Brandon's birthday (we won't mention which one) was this past Monday, so we all took a mini-vacation to celebrate.  We played Cranium and Marcus somehow went straight from amoeba to triceratops when Brandon attempted to sculpt during their turn.  Sounds fishy to me... :-)  We played Euchre, took a ski lift to the top of a mountain (yes, I went as well), relaxed in the hot tub, and went to a murder-mystery dinner.  We all met at the farm and decided on Cracker Barrel for breakfast on Friday morning.  While we were there, a few of us ordered pancakes and an idea was born.  

We had already decided to make some out-of-town packages for those traveling to attend our wedding.  I had the idea to put together a "wine tasting", but wine isn't sold in mini-bottles like liquor is.  I was having trouble finding mini-bottles online even, so we were thinking about canning the idea, but I didn't want to take away all Mom and Charlene's winery trips (a perfect task for the two of them).  Mom talked to Carousel Winery in Bedford and they said they had mini-bottles pre-packaged, but their idea of mini and mine are completely different.  Mom and Sue picked them up last week and I saw them on Sunday.  I was picturing a bottle about 4" in height.  These are mini in comparison to a full bottle of wine, but are about 12"!!!  They won't fit in the packages, but they'll be a great addition and will give them a full 2-3 glasses I think.

So while we were at Cracker Barrel, Stacy and I realized that the mini-bottles of pancake syrup were the perfect size for my "tasting".  We scooped up all the bottles that we'd used and rinsed them out in the bathroom.  When we got back to the table, I mentioned to the waitress that we were collecting them for a wedding project and that if there were any empties, we'd take them.  I love this lady!  She came back with not only about 6 or 7 full bottles of syrup, but also gave me a couple of the little jelly jars.  I'm not sure if we can use these yet, but we may be able to come up with something.  We ended up with 11 jars that morning.

The next morning, we didn't go to breakfast until about 11AM and some of us wanted breakfast and some lunch, so we ended up at...Cracker Barrel again!  Of course, we snagged the couple syrup bottles from our table, but right behind us was the jackpot!  After a table of about 10 people left, Stacy and I went over and grabbed all of the bottles from the table and headed back to the bathroom to rinse them out.  We ended up with 16 that day.  So in all, we had 27 mini-bottles, of which we only needed 25, so our "wine tasting" is on!!

When I went to look for them tonight, we realized that we actually lost the first round.  We think we left them at the cabin, so it's back to Cracker Barrel for us again. :-)

UPDATE: Shalee rescued our other set of bottles!!!  Picking them up on Saturday and will start re-labeling. :-)

Crafty Card Box

My shoes finally came in yesterday, so of course, we bedazzled them last night with my something blue. Since this only took a few minutes and we were feeling productive, we moved on to the card box.  My mom brought this to me over the weekend and it looks AWESOME!  I never could've gotten the corners of the fabric to lay nearly as well as the fabric queen!  It looks like it was store-bought and she even brought a few finishing touches that we hadn't planned on, but were absolutely adorable.  The little flowers are so cute and, to top it off, we had half the package left and that's going into my scrapbook haven.  When I get around to making the wedding album, they'll fit in perfectly!  So we glue-gunned everything on last night, used the Sizzix for some letters, and voila!

I LOVE that he takes my crazy in stride!

As we are nearing October, my obsessive side is coming out.  There are so many things left to do. 103 things to be exact.  Many of those are on my "make" list, which means they take time and that's a luxury most of enough don't have enough of.  Between working and cleaning and laundry and grocery shopping, I'm refereeing fights between the kids, running them here and there, or having "cuddle time".  Breanna just posted a little bit ago the following conversation between the boys:
                                   Cade: "I'm gonna kick your butt!"
                                   Christian: "Oh yeah, say that to my needle!"

Where do these kids come up with this stuff?  Well, we are almost 100 days out with about 100 things left to do, and as my super-optimistic mom says, that's just one thing a day!  Since I know my level of freak out is going to drastically increase in about a month if everything isn't made, I figure I better get on the ball and start working now.  The good news is that I have found my shoes and my veil and I'm awaiting shipment on both.

The vases that will hold the bridal party bouquets are now finished.--Bre's design!!

I also finished the vases for our deceased grandparents that will be going on the altar next us when we say our vows. :-)  Finally found the last vase we needed (I ordered us one less vase than we needed).

The guestbook pages are almost done; if I could just swing by Walgreen's and pick up the photos I need to complete it.  Mom has made great progress on the card box, but no pics yet.  I stopped at Archiver's last night and got some paper and ink to work on cards.  I'm still working on the kids' tables, the out-of-town packages, and the day of "survival" kits.  All this flurry of activity going on and Rhys just kisses me and says, "Relax."  The man can really take my crazy in stride and I love and adore him for that!

Jewelry Update

I found an artist on Etsy and she totally created Android earrings for us!  I am so excited!  She shipped them this morning and I am eagerly awaiting them, but in the meantime, here's a pic:

How flippin cute are these?!?!  I LOVE, LOVE LOVE, THEM!

T - 128 days!!!

Who else thinks that 128 days doesn't sound like very long???  I had a minor freak out on day 130 when I noticed the counter on my phone.  I wanted it on my home screen, but there was no room and now I'm so glad! Thank heavens for the WeatherBug widget that takes up 1/2 my screen!  I opened my to-do list and there are 113 things left to do before the big day.  Mom, being ever so rational, says, "Well that's about one thing each day and some things you can do more than one at a time."  Now the left side of my brain agrees with her and says, "We've got this."  The right, and very creative, side of my brain is simultaneously saying, "That is not near enough time to glass etch champagne glasses with handmade wine tags!

Oh, and what about those cute Swarovski crystal heels I saw and wanted to try my hand at?  

And damn it all to hell, but the there's no way I'll have time to finish the quilling for the marriage certificate in this time frame!"

Yes I'm realize that I'm completely crazy, but I prefer to think of it as an issue of over-creativity without an appropriate outlet.  I want to make EVERYTHING!  And heaven forbid I delegate any of the crafty stuff to my ladies.  It's no fun unless I get to make it. :-)  So Mom and I have decided that we're going to look at it as 4 months away instead of 128 days.  Months make it sound soooo much longer, am I right?  I personally think that she doesn't want to think of it in days, because she is making the bridesmaid dresses, so she's on a time crunch as well.  Either way, I'm going to make a conscious effort to think about the months instead of days from here on.

Album Plus: Our Collaborative Wedding Gallery

Take pictures at the wedding and reception?

Check!

Auto-upload the pictures to an online gallery?

Check!

Visit the site afterward to view the photos and print?

Check!

I came across someone who is creating an app that will allow our wedding guests to check in at the wedding and then as you take pictures during the ceremony and reception, they'll be posted to an online gallery.  Not only do I love this feature because we have many friends with great hi-def cameras on their phones, but we will have a live feed to our gallery during the reception.  We are planning to have a projector that we'll connect to our personal gallery so that our guests will be able to view the pictures as they are being taken.  As a scrapbooker, I love this, because I will have so many candids to crop for the wedding album. So many people take pictures at weddings, but you generally don't get copies of them unless the person taking them wants to forward, and then it's only a few usually.  Instead of having to hunt down all the great photos, we're going to use this new app to gather ours in one place for everyone to view and for me to print!

In my conversations with one of the creators of this app, he mentioned that several people who had contacted him were getting married on 10-01-11.  I explained that we are tech geeks and the reason that we chose it was because it's binary.  I shared our Android wedding plans with him and they have now mentioned us on their blog!  Check it out here: http://blog.albumpl.us/post/5594524569/free-premium-codes-if-your-wedding-is-on

They have an iPhone app already done and Android is coming shortly!  All you have to do is download the app and check in to our location the day of.  We'll make sure everyone has the correct access information prior to the wedding, because we can't wait to see the pictures that you take!

Busy Week(end)

I haven't blogged since last Tuesday, but in my defense, it has been busy around here for the last week.  First, Charlene and I worked on the coasters Tuesday night and finished the final coats.  We are now waiting four weeks for them to cure and then we can put the feet on them and wrap them up.

On Wednesday night, my wonderful SIL, Cara, came up and we attempted to curl my hair...and I mean attempted as in we tried and my hair resisted.  She got the softest, most beautiful curls with a curling iron...and then they were gone in an hour, even though we sprayed the heck out of them.  I know that those stylists have all kinds of secrets, but I figured we could do a half decent job of curling it on our own.

Thursday I worked on our little registry inserts for a little bit, but they take forever to cut out, so they aren't even close to being finished yet.  Pictures to follow.

Over the weekend, I decided to take a stab at making earrings.  I've only made some minor jewelry before, but I love the look of chandelier earrings, so I figured why not.

I gathered up some supplies and I'll be starting to work on those in the next few days in between cutting out more of the registry Androids.

Last night, Kat and I played with my hair again.  She used hot rollers instead of a curling iron and the curls were great, but we decided rather than try to do that the morning of, we should probably hire a professional to just take care of hair and makeup.  Here is the shot from last night next to the pic we were trying to emulate.  How did we do?