Bathroom fun!

Ambiguous title maybe? Yeah, but I swear this is just about decor. A couple weeks ago, Brian's family's contractor came to help us with some house stuff. A lot of this work was in the bathroom, mostly a new fan and light, and GFI outlets. Yay meeting building codes!

It's very quiet, and ads a lot of extra light (when it's on) as well. All in all one of those nice additions that you end up noticing/liking more then is probably necessary.

Another big change came in decor. We got a beautiful dark copper piece of wall art from my cousin Chelsea for our wedding. The little alcove the toilet resides in was just screaming for some focal-art. Especially since it's visible from the master bedroom. Buuuut, it was much classier then our polka-dot ikea shower curtain and mis-matched bathmat. Off to Target I went!

 

We went with a combination of Asian textures and a little 'fussy-french' thrown in in the shower curtain. I think it works.

 

The curtain is blue and white woven flowers (with a separate liner). I like it because it covers the whole shower which still desperately needs to be retiled... The mat is actually a bunch of wooden hexagons. You'd think that would be a weird bathmat, but I really like it against the fabric curtain:

 

I also got new curtain hooks that match the ginko wall art:

We've definitely made some big changes in this little room! More than any other room in the house...

Also, a HAPPY THANKSGIVING to all! I know a bathroom update isn't really thematically correct, but I'm thankful to have this nice bathroom!

Wedding Recap 3: The Ceremony

I swear we're almost done with these... I have some fun stuff we did to our bathroom last week to post once I find my camera cord! For now though, lets continue the wedding recap before I forget everything that happened.

When Betty motioned for the girls to come upstairs I was so nervous! But we walked up the steps and got in line and I could see through the mullioned glass that everyone was seated in the church and it looked beautiful. I saw a few people sneak in late too at this point. But this is when everything became ok, I just wasn't nervous anymore! It's go time!

Here are some pictures of the gorgeous church taken by my oh-so-talented friend Samara:

Inside, and then outside:

The ceremony was short, sweet, and beautiful. And nothing went wrong. I'm sure we didn't step at all the right points, but I doubt you could tell.  Here is my dad walking me down the aisle:

The minister (who we LOVE btw) did a great piece. It was about your 'marriage box'. You can only get out of marriage what you put into it. It stuck with out guests as well because several people told me at the reception how much they liked that message. We lit our beautiful unity candle, and suddenly after only 20 or so short minutes he was pronouncing us married and I got to kiss my new husband!

Back out we go:

Then our parents and us stood near the door and had our receiving line. Brian and I laughed about it later because we both got skipped by a few people. Then we went back up to the alter to sign the license and take our family photos. Our photographer was the amazing Amanda Williams, and she is a goddess! She was so efficient! After those pictures we went to take our more fun/artsy shots with our wedding party while everyone else headed off to the cocktail hour.

We don't have our professional shots back yet, but she did send us a couple sneak peaks from the after-ceremony pictures! Midway through we had to take a time-out to take off my cathedral veil and bustle up my giant dress! Neither were easy tasks...

(I made my bolero, you like?)

I'm really excited to get the rest back. After that it was up to the reception, which we could see through the windows of the Michigan Union, was going to be awesome!

Wedding Recap 2: Getting Ready!

Let's continue the wedding day saga... I swear there will eventually be more pictures. I haven't gotten them back from the photographer yet!

About 8 am on October 23rd I snapped awake when there was a sharp knocking on my hotel room door. I ran to answer it and my mom and little sister were standing in the hall. They cheered "Happy Wedding Day!!!" And I officially started to freak out.

We started the day with a big family breakfast at Angelos, an Ann Arbor breakfast staple! And by we I mean me and my family and grandparents. Brian was noooowhere near! I totally did not do what you're supposed to on your wedding day and avoid grease (I guess it helps a nervous stomach to avoid that stuff?). Nope, eggs, bacon, toast and home fries were on the agenda! I was so excited it was hard to sit still. After a nice breakfast we went back to the hotel. I didn't need to be at the hair salon until 11, but the girls were arriving there, and I didn't want to sit still!

When I got there my bridesmaid Emily was just finishing up, and she looked like a total rockstar. My maid of honor was supposed to be there, but we couldn't find her. So we decided to try the beauty school down the street (they are the same company, but one is a school, the other is the official salon, it's a little confusing). Sure enough, she'd made her appointment at the wrong place! It was a little tight in there, so Em and I went for hot apple cider at Biggby. We wandered around town until it was time to go back to the salon.

I loved my hair and makeup! They did such a great job, and it was a lot of fun. They even gave me a hand massage! When we were all pretty my mom and sister went back to the hotel while my girls and I went to get some lunch. We went to Potbelly's on the corner of State and Liberty. Like they often do, they had live music, so it was a great lunch. And did I mention I was doing all this while wearing a cathedral length veil? Those aren't easy to get around in!

After picking up my dress at the hotel we went on to the church! There the girls did their makeup and got dressed, and I jittered around the room nervously. The flowers arrived (they were perfect!) and so did the photographer and videographer. I wasn't allowed to get dressed until the last minute. So pictures were taken and my parents showed up. The guys were upstairs, and I was jumping out of my skin.

My girl Katie and I as we were getting ready!

While we waited for the go-ahead to get me dressed we played old games like 'telephone' and 'down by the banks of the hanky panky' to pass the time. Then suddenly it was time and I was dressed and ready to go! We took a few portrait photos and then it was time for the ceremony. While we waited downstairs I felt like I was going to throw up, and my dad looked like he felt just the same!

Wedding Recap 1: Pre-Wedding

Ah the wedding, seriously it could not have been more wonderful. My grandparents have said that the entire weekend was great, from the moment they arrived on Friday. So that's where I'll start, with the pre-wedding wind up.

I started a brand new job the Monday before the wedding. Crazy? Yes. A teensy bit maochistic? Probably. Worth it? YES. I looooove my new job. I've only been here about 3 weeks but it's been a great change. Anyway I was able to get Friday and Monday around the wedding as unpaid vacation, which was wonderful for getting everything taken care of.

Thursday night I stayed at my parent's house, and my mom, sister, and I got mani/pedis. Then Friday morning I came back to Ann Arbor for final preparations. I cleaned the house and finished wrapping the wedding party gifts. Then around 2 people started to arrive! My family showed up with my grandparents, who had never seen the house, as did several of my bridesmaids, so several tours were in order. Everyone was so excited! It was totally infectious. After tours, and gift-giving and lots of hugs we all headed off to the hotel.

We stayed at the Bell Tower Hotel in Ann Arbor. It was so nice! The elevator was the slowest thing on the planet though, so we took a lot of stairs. It kind of looks like the shining in that there are a ton of long narrow hallways. My parents got a suite on the 3rd floor, so that was kind of the 'base of operations'. We had my dress, veil, the tuxes, hats, everything in there. It was a little tight.

Then before we knew it it was time for the rehearsal! We took 2 cars over (we could have walked, but we had to drive to the dinner after anyway). My parents, sister, and grandparents in one and my brother, me and grandparents part 2 in another. It took the valet so long to bring the car around I was starting to get worried. Then of course it took us 15 minutes to go 3 blocks and find parking! I was wringing my hands and panicking in the back seat, picturing the minister refusing to marry us tomorrow because I made the rehearsal late!

Of course that didn't happen. The rehearsal was orchestrated by the minister and the church's wedding coordinator 'Betty'. Betty was like a drill sergeant! The rehearsal actually made me more nervous, there were so many times to step or not step or turn around, or hand my bouquet off, etc etc etc. Oh well, just hope for the best!

After the rehearsal was over we all piled into cars and headed to the dinner at the Gandy Dancer! The Gandy Dancer is a very nice restaurant in Ann Arbor, it used to be the train station. It's all stonework, and the food is amazing. We had our own room, and it was so elegant (picture below). One family was about an hour late, so we ate later then expected, but it was cool. Everybody got along (and as I anticipated there was some major flirting between a few of the singles in the wedding party...) and it was so nice to have a relaxed evening with everyone before the crazy next day!

A million little fixes

So this weekend a LOT happened on the house! Unfortunately though we can't take credit for doing it... Brian's parents have a totally awesome contractor, and he came out and brought a whole bunch of things up to code!

I don't have pictures of these things, but they aren't really the 'take exciting pictures' type of fixes anyway...

1. All of the sockets at counter-height in the kitchen and both bathrooms are now GFI's! They were regular old plugs before, and not exactly up to code. No bathroom electrocution for us!

2. Installed an exhaust fan in the bathroom! Remember when this happened in our bathroom? Well that was all because we didn't have an exhaust fan!!! So now we do, and it's small and quiet and wonderful.

3. Our front porch light now works. It had never worked right, but it stopped working completely a couple weeks ago. The light switch NEVER worked... well it turns out the last owner completely disconnected the switch. The light was directly hardwired in 'hot'. And it was attached to a crappy timer/motion sensor which had finally quit. So we took the ugly sensor down, and now the switch works! Just as it should!

4. When we bought our house, there was a loose piece of siding up on the second story on the side of the house. The seller fixed it as we requested (after we moved in and had to complain because a raccoon had been up there tearing foam out). Well apparently it wasn't fixed right, and was still close to coming off again. So they fixed that the right way.

5. Checked out our garage electrical (ugly but fine), and our fireplace. We can't use the fireplace yet because the last owner ran the gas line in the wrong spot... coming in the chimney and DOWN THROUGH THE FLU! So the flame gets a little close to the line for comfort, so that needs to be re-run before we use it. Otherwise though our chimney is good, so that's a relief!

We are so so so grateful. It really is a big weight lifted to have those things fixed. We could have possibly done them ourselves, but nowhere near as fast, and they had expertise on what to look for and stuff to fix things. It totally made up for getting up at 6:45am on a Saturday!

Witness Our Spooktacular Return to Blogging!

Whew! Well guess who's baaaack? No, not the McRib Sandwich. It's us!

Our wedding was absolutely the most perfect event we could ever have asked for. So perfect in fact, that I can't decide if I would want to relive it. I think if I were to do that, there's no way it could be that wonderful twice... even though I'd love to have that day again and again and again and.....

I'm collecting pictures from everyone, and I'll do a recap for ya'll next up don't worry.

It's been about a week and a half, (the wedding was on the 23rd of October) and we didn't go on a honeymoon or anything, so what took so long to get back to the blog? Well ya know, LIFE. I've been getting settled in at a new (and totally awesome) job. And we had HALLOWEEN to prepare for!

Halloween is a super big holiday for Brian and I. For several years now we've hosted an annual party. This year was very low key. And the entire week between the wedding and Halloween was spent cleaning up wedding and putting out Halloween! We cheated a little and just shoved some of the wedding mess... what does one do with a bunch of wooden table numbers?

We decorated the crap out of our house, unfortunately there are only a few pictures, and even fewer good ones. I feel like that's what happens when you have to rush things. We made quite a spread though, we only had 8 this year but we had cupcakes, cider, pigs in a blanket (mummy weenies), cookies, chips/salsa, candy, etc etc. And we all ate way too much and imbibed a little too.

Here are a couple of pictures of the food:

 

And our banisters got 'webbed'

And there's a bunch more, but none of the other pictures I took really turned out. Oh well, maybe next year.

Now what's Halloween without some costumes? We had some good ones from guests this year, and Brian and I recycled last year's. Both because of lack of time, and because I really enjoy working with liquid latex...

Yup. Those are some zombie newlyweds. I don't think my faces were quite as believable as last year however. Ah well! Happy Halloween!