Choosing a Caterer (and a menu!)

Before we decided on a venue, I looked around at caterers in the area and got majorly discouraged. Either the prices were way too high for our budget—or the sites were hard to navigate and uninformative. I didn't know if I could find anything to fit our vision, which has slowly evolved into...

A casual morning wedding and brunch reception celebrating family and love.

Then we finally found our venue. *cue sigh of relief*

Along with the venue came the options to use the venue's caterer, do our own catering (although we would have to pay for the use of the kitchen), or bring in an outside caterer. Here's where I need to make a confession: food is not a big deal to me. I like simple food. I eat cereal for breakfast, rice for lunch, and pasta for dinner—with extra veggies. But at the same time, I want to provide our guests with plenty of healthy (ish), good-tasting food.

I finally got in contact with our caterer (a mix-up that was partly my fault and partly our venue's fault) about three weeks after first touring our venue. I talked to her on the phone and walked away from our conversation feeling SO good about it! She was a sweet older lady with a southern accent and a willingness to do whatever—but she also had her own ideas and direction, which was great since I still don't know exactly what I want.

Best part of it all: her prices are totally reasonable and scaleable. We'd be paying her per item, so we can choose how much we want to spend per person by choosing how many items we want to have out. I think we've struck a good balance between being money-conscious and providing a good meal. We have a tasting with her soon and as long as her food is edible (just kidding—it has to be at least semi-delicious too!), we're definitely booking her for the reception.

Enough words—let's look at some inspiration pictures. Well... about that. It's overwhelming. I typed "brunch reception" into Google images, thinking I'd get a few cute pictures I could draw from. Instead, I got this:

Umm, it's overwhelming. Where to even start? Also, apparently brunch doesn't mean breakfast + lunch—it just means breakfast at lunch time. My original thought had been to include both breakfast and lunch foods in the same meal. A true "breakfast + lunch." Now I feel like that is too weird...

What do you think? Is it ok to do half breakfast items and half lunch items? What would you want to see in a "brunch" menu?

Flashback Friday: "Official"

I'm going to drag this series out as long as I possibly can because I love it. Well maybe not as long as I possibly can—I don't hate you that much! But really, these were really great days, and I think back on them with a huge smile. Granted, I have no interest in going back to these days now! I am more than happy to be in a comfortable long-term relationship—no more of the questioning and second-guessing.

Nathan and I continued to hang out and see each other a few times a week, and of course text each other. A lot. Maybe the title of this post should have been Flashback Friday: We Love to Text. To be honest, that's still true today! Even when we're on the same campus, whenever we're not together my phone is essentially an extension of my hand. Neither of us are big on talking on the phone, but sending 15,000 text messages a month? Piece of cake.

In my family, my dad has a rule that before anyone can date one of his daughters (he has three), the guy has to call him and ask permission. No big deal right? Ahem. Apparently (at least according to Nathan and my sister's boyfriend) this is TERRIFYING. As in, my dad is the Scariest. Man. In. The. World. Really, he's just a nice guy who enjoys the outdoors and is lovingly protective of his family.

Personal photo. This is a great spot for a picture of my family. From left to right: my dad, my mom, my youngest sister Abigail, my next sister Emily, Emily's boyfriend Dillon, me, Nathan, and my brother David (the baby of the family). We love hiking!

Back to the story, though—Nathan finally mustered up the courage to call my dad and chat with him, which he did for about twenty minutes or so. After he hung up the phone, however, he realized he hadn't actually asked him if we could start dating, leading to the following conversation...

Me: "How did the conversation with my dad go?"
Nathan: "Good, except..."
Me: "Yes?"
Nathan: "I kinda didn't actually ask him if we could date..."
Me: "Are you serious?"
Nathan: "Can you just call him, and, you know, ask him if I have to call him again?"

Good news: everything was all fine and Nathan and I started "officially" dating the next Monday, after exactly five weeks of casually talking and going out on dates. And now—almost two years later—we're still together and planning our wedding! But I'll leave more on that for future posts.

Original Inspiration

I know I'm already several weeks (months?) into planning, but I wanted to share my "original" inspiration—we won't say when I started looking at pictures and coming up with ideas. I could do an inspiration board for where I am now, but I feel like the pictures would too closely relate to reality, and I want to be able to reflect on the entire planning progress at the end. So here we go!

Floating flowers, I Spy, music paper flowers, ivory dress, mismatched bridesmaid dresses, engagement ring, wedding cupcakes, guy wedding ring, cake table, color inspiration.

Even I know a few of these pictures already don't match up (doing several cakes, not cupcakes!), it's neat to look back at my original vision and see elements I still love and am including. Sometime soon I want to compare this to my current inspiration!

Engagement Pictures Preview

If you remember from a previous post, we chose to go with Niki Marie Photography for our engagement pictures. Niki helped us decide on outfits and locations and two weeks ago we drove to downtown Detroit for our engagement shoot.

A few days later she posted this sneak peek!

Photo credit.

A few things:

1. I LOVE this picture! I look just like I feel—relaxed and happy—and Nathan is actually smiling for real! Of course, after all of my dilemma about what to wear and not wearing black... I'm wearing black. In my defense, I had a colored shirt on, but it was getting chilly by the end of the day.

2. The whole photo shoot was SO much fun. Nathan & I relaxed and interacted easily while Niki snapped pictures. She would put us in a basic location and pose and then let us laugh and talk while she took pictures. Occasionally she would give us some direction like  "Laura, look at Nathan" or "Nathan, make Laura laugh!"

3. There is a hilarious story behind this picture. We were actually done with the photo shoot—it was 5:00 and we were driving away from downtown Detroit towards I-75. All of a sudden Niki goes "pull down one of these streets, the sun is perfect!" Nathan pulls an illegal u-turn in an intersection on a red light (good thing there were no cars around) and heads down a street with ZERO parking spots. So we keep going and going, and the sun keeps getting lower and lower! Finally he parks in a no parking zone, we hop out of the car, and we all run back two blocks to get the sun at the perfect angle. We stand in the middle of the street as Niki snaps away and I say "These pictures better be good for all of this!" And they were.

I can't wait to see the rest! We've also decided to book Niki for our wedding pictures. I'm thrilled! Not only are we getting great pictures at a great price, I also feel completely comfortable with her. I did not feel rushed or unnatural during the engagement shoot—and I'm sure working with her on our wedding day will be the same way.

Countdown: Five Months

Now that we're five months out from the wedding (crazy!), it's time to take stock of where we are now and what goals we have for the next month! From the very beginning I discarded the checklists on The Knot—umm research lighting? book a calligrapher? buy wedding insurance? According to this check list I am way behind.

Good news. It doesn't have to be like that. With a little help from A Practical Wedding—great blog, book, & resource!—I came to realize that this is my wedding, and I don't have to finish all of the 179 uncompleted tasks on The Knot. 

So let's recap.

Things that are completed:

Venue: Pleasant Ridge Camp & Retreat Center

Photo credit.

Caterer: Sammie Daigle from the Pleasant Ridge Camp & Retreat Center

Photographer: Niki Marie Photography

Dress: Can't tell you yet! Coming up... check out the wedding dress post to make a guess.

Programs: Crossword puzzles & I Spy in progress!

Personal photo.

Things I'd like to start on this month:

Invitations: We need to finalize our guest list, begin collecting addresses, & come up with a rough mock-up of our invitations.

Flowers & Decorations: I need to start making flowers, continue looking for books, and work on Scrabble letters.

Caterer: Hopefully having a tasting this month and deciding on our menu & cakes!

Registry: Decide where to register & start scanning.

Hmm... anything I'm forgetting??

Tangent Tuesday: Meeting My Goals

The week of the 5k started out just as badly as it possibly could—with me sick and unable to talk or breathe well. I forced myself to lower my expectations and kept telling myself "just do your best!" Inside, I always wanted to hit my three goals, but I began to realize they were less and less likely. Add a stressful semester and limited time to train to a massive head cold, and that's hardly a recipe for a personal best run.

But I still woke up that morning, ate my best "running" breakfast, dressed in my favorite outfit, and headed out to the starting line ready to race. I stood next to my sister and her friend—who talked about running a sub 20:00 race and starting out at 6:30 pace. Not happening! I knew I had to let them go out and start conservatively.

Personal photo. Me with my two sisters after the race.

Conservatively for me turned out to be a 7:18 first mile, which was perfect for this race under these conditions. At this point I estimate that there were about ten girls in front of me. The second mile contained the largest hill—but I powered through it with a second mile time of 6:58 and passed four or five girls, including my sister's friend. I yelled encouragement at her and started the third mile.

Ouch. This one hurt. I rounded the corner to last big stretch and my grandpa shouted "You're in fourth!" Knowing I was so close to my "A" Goal, I tried to push it. However, there were winds gusting up to 25mph and a full half mile of the section was directly into the wind. Finally, with less than a half mile to go, I passed the third place girl and settled in about ten yards behind the second place girl.

I tried to kick, but it just wasn't there. Finally I could see the clock ticking closer and closer to 22:00 and finished strong, just ten steps behind the second place girl for a time of 21:53! I was absolutely thrilled. I had no regrets in this race—I ran the best race I could, met all my goals, and set myself up for success in the future!

Personal photo. First, second, and third place girls overall. My sister took first!

So what do you do when you run your best possible race and meet all your goals? Set new goals of course!

Wedding Dress Nightmares

Alternative title: How to Get Out of Going Dress Shopping.

Most brides look forward to dress shopping, right? Ehh. Me not so much. In fact, the idea of going shopping with a group of females and trying on dresses which will most likely not be flattering OR in my price range is pretty terrifying. Which is why I immediately turned to buying my dress online.

One of the first places I looked was J. CREW, for two reasons.

1. J. CREW has the kind of simple understated elegance I was looking for in a wedding dress.
2. The prices weren't more than my entire budget combined.

Here are some of my favorites:

Clockwise from top left: Bettina, Sararose, Sophia, Sinclair, Lyden, & Larissa.

You'll probably notice a theme in the dresses above: straight, simple, not strapless, and under $1000. In fact, I probably would wear any of the dresses above. I had a preference from the beginning (and Nathan vetoed some of them), but I started looking around online to see if I could find any of them cheaper.

I did in fact buy one of the dresses above online (not from the J. CREW website though). Which one do you think it was?