Saturday, June 30, 2007

Arden Hills Resort Club and Spa

Venue 11:
A local Country Club
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1 of 2 ceremony sites.. I don't have a picture of the second one because it wasn't available when we went there:
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Its a garden behind this villa Inn - which we would get a room at for the night:
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Reception room we like:
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There are two more reception rooms on site.
One has a 200 people minimum.. and a very high food and drink minimum.. but it is really pretty.
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If we did have 200 people, we would hit it pretty easy.. even if we cheaped out on everything.
This is the other one:
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but if the celing has all these huge ugly pipes all over it..
Picture of the ymca? i'm guessing... who knows. but still. its shows a good pic of the celing:
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The few cons of the place is they require that we do all the flowers through them and the cake.. so it will probably end up a little more than normal. I've never seen a place that makes you get the cake through them and still requires a cake cutting fee.. The cake cutting fee is half per person what the cake would cost.

I like the gold room best, but the one with the dark wood is good too. It looks nice decorated

Lake Natoma Inn

Venue 10:
Hotel overlooking a lake
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There are two ceremony sites at venue 10.
First Ceremony Site:
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Photo I found of a ceremony... not great but at least you can kind of imagine
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Second Ceremony Site:
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Pictures by the fountain in the garden. There is also a fountain in the gazebo.
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Us at the arch
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Photo I found of a ceremony at the garden:
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pros and cons
The Gazebo location is next to the ballroom I like - Directly next to it. So it would be more private instead of walking across the hotel.
The Gazebo is quieter than the Garden (the Garden is next to the pool and closer to the road (so you can hear it).
If we do the Garden there would be a wedding taking place a half hour after ours - so there would be a wedding right outside our reception room.
We can still take pictures at the Garden before the wedding because the next wedding won't be there or start until after ours is over.. but we probably won't be able to take pictures after the ceremony.. Unless we wait awhile until the other party clears out..

The reception room I love:
Notice the chandaliers and the draped ceiling
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With just the chandaliers glowing:
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Included in the price is basically the centerpiece - a mirror tile with votive candles.. so basically you just need to add a bigger candle, or a bowl with a flower or something.
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The other smaller ballroom...
Advantages: Bathroom inside the ballroom and an extra hour for the reception. Because there are not hotel rooms around this room - it can go til midnight instead of 11.
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It has tulle with lights on the celing:
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and around the pillars:
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I love this place. The ceremony sites might not be that great... but I LOVE the reception room. The celing and the chandaliers are soo pretty. Plus you get a lot included in the price, like the centerpieces, the colored linens, a suite for aaron and I...etc.

Thursday, June 28, 2007

My mom is annoying me...

My mom is driving me C-R-A-Z-Y!

She is nitpicking and criticizing every little thing about the wedding..

1. Aaron and I haven't chosen a place yet
2. Aaron and I haven't chosen a date yet (we want to find a place first and work around what they have available).. apparently late next summer is not good enough for her.
3. She likes red. She doesn't really like blue or green (the colors Aaron and I were thinking about)
4. She said if i do blue or green, I should do navy for the bridesmaid dresses... also not what I was thinking of. I did consider it, until I saw some wedding pictures with bridesmaids in navy dresses. I didn't like it very much.

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I think the light blue looks much better in the picture than the navy blue.
Besides I haven't seen a navy blue dress where I like the way the color looks.
Maybe I'd use navy as an accent color, but not as the main color.
5. We haven't asked my brother and sister to be in the wedding party... (We haven't really officially asked anyone yet)

What is annoying me is:
1. She doesn't really want to go see any places with me.. unless there is a possibility that we will sign and confirm that day .. before we leave. Basically she wants to go to pay and leave.
2. She doesn't want to go look at dresses with me
3. She doesn't want to really talk about the wedding
If she does talk about the wedding, its always very brief and then she has to get off the phone and/or she is all wedding-ed out.
4. When I do find a place that I like, she starts grilling me about costs etc. Then she'll go into some lecture about how we aren't millionaires.. Well DUH! I know that. It doesn't mean I want to get married in the KMart Parking lot or anything.
5. If she does go some place to look with me - she will try to bargain with the person. Who seriously basically laughs at us and/or gets irritated and starts defending their costs. One person she was trying to get a better deal out of, kept telling her how competitive the rates were (they really weren't, but geez.. if we can't afford it, I'd rathr just leave).. and getting really irritated.

anyways.. so much for my mom wanting to be involved..

I'm so close to just wanting to elope or something. Just to avoid all this crap.

Wine and Roses

Aaron and I went to see a wedding venue in Lodi yesterday..

here are some pictures of us there:

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This place is probably out. The ballroom is twice what our budget is, unless we have a weekday wedding.. and I'm not sure I want to do that...or we can use their smaller room, but it means a strict guest list, and moving things around.

My mom is driving me crazy

My mom is soo frustrating

So I call her and tell her that I made another appointment on Sunday to see another place in Sacramento. So we'll be seeing two places instead of just the one.

So all of a sudden, she doesnt want to go anymore because "we are getting too far away from home". Plus she goes on and on about how we are seeing bunches of places and etc.. and why can't we just narrow it down already?

Then she starts on about how much these places cost etc...

and how much more it will be if people have to drive up there and back or get hotel rooms etc.
and how we should at least save $1000 for the rehersal dinner..

first of all $1000 for dinner? WHAT?!?! Its not like everyone is going to be having filet mignon and lobster.

I was thinking we'd just have something at our house... like a barbeque or something simple. Not some fancy dinner at some fancy place.

Then she's like well if you start pissing off the family and are planning a disaster of a wedding like jennifer's (my sister) then I'm not paying for any of it.

Firehouse in Sacramento

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Courtyard
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Dining Room
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Other Dining Room
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Bar
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We could have the wedding ceremony and reception at this resteraunt and all we'd have to pay for is a food/drink minimum with tax and gratuity.

I love the courtyard. They would set it up like it is in the picture. The only cost would be to customize the space, but I really think it looks nice the way it is. It costs about the same as the vineyard in Lodi.. but the food and drinks would be upgraded. Like instead of tri-tip and grilled chicken.. we could have filet mignon, salmon, turkey or chicken marsala (we'd choose two), plus 1 selection of vegetarian entrees for the same price. Plus we'd have an full bar with wine, etc. I think enough of the food and drink minimum would be left over to cover drinks at the bar..and we could add a salad as an appetizer for an additional cost.

So pros: everything in one place, better food, better drinks
Cons: you basically have to prepay for a lot of the food.

Wednesday, June 27, 2007

My kittens

My boys
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The search is on again

I talked to the wedding coordinator at the mansion place we saw this weekend and I found it is waay too much. I HATE hidden fees. Why? Because we'd have to rent the whole place out - all the rooms - for the night. At over $200 a night... that makes it way unaffordable. Unless we can get people to stay in those rooms and reimburse us the $200 dollars. It is a nice place, but we are within 30 minutes from town so who would really stay with us? Especially at that price. Basically it would be $100 a person. It would be neat to stay in overnight. It has a bowling alley, pool table, pool..etc.

So Aaron and I talked about it tonight and I thought we had just decided to go with the vineyard. However, a few hours later, Aaron calls me to tell me he's found a bunch more places and to check my email. He sent me a list of 20 places. ugh. So now he wants me to call all of these places tomorrow to see how much they are. Half of them, he has added notations such as "seems pricey".

So if it sounds pricey, why am I even wasting my time? It just sounds like a wild goose chase.

Sunday, June 24, 2007

Delta venues

Another venue

When I went today, I forgot my camera. So these are pictures from the website. Some are kind of old because stuff has been changed.
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Pool picture
This is different because it has some cabanas and a gate around it. Plus it has couch like seating all around the pool. So it would be a fun place to hang out.
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Front entrance:
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Where a buffet would be set up:
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One of two dining rooms:
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Second dining room - overlooks the backyard
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Outside ceremony location:
On the front yard by the fountain nestled in a grove of trees under a gazebo:
If you can see the two pole things on the grass area thats where it would be
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This is the gazebo:
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You can kind of see it in this picture:
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You'd walk down these stairs, past the fountain (there is a walkway now), and down towards the end of the lawn where there is a gazebo:
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I found a picture online of the lawn with the walkway:
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This is the main ballroom where the non-eating reception will be held:
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Or you can have a wedding in here:
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I wish I had taken pictures myself, because a lot has changed.

However, this place is by far the nicest place we have seen. It is also about a couple thousand dollars more because the food is a little more expensive. However, we don't have to have alcohol.. we can do a cheaper non-alcoholic plan. Also Aaron and I would get the night for free. We can have 14 other couples stay the night out there for $220 for the night or for 7 couples $285 for the night.. Did I mention this was each.
There is another hotel nearby that does weddings that is 85-150 a night for rooms. That place was really shabby and wasn't in good condition. In fact we saw that place first and didn't have high hopes for the place we ended up liking... here that one is (again no personal pics, just ones from their website:

Front of the hotel - overlooking the water (the water is actually across the street (highway).
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Setup for a wedding by the gazebo:
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Notice the brown patchy grass:
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This is the reception room:
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The hardwood floor looks like its seen better days. It had tons of scuff marks, wasn't shiny, was several different colors...etc

Anyways, I just didn't like it. If it was fixed up better, then I'd like it better...
Plus its like 100 per person. For 100 per person, it should look nicer... a lot nicer. The gazebo was rickety. The grass was dying. The backyard where the gazebo was, was down a really steep hill.. anyways, we left without asking many questions.