Sentimental vs Practical?

Aaron and I went to look at wedding bands last weekend. I kept picking diamond bands that look almost like what I already have.. Its not my fault that I like the diamond bands.. but I dont really want to use the one I already have because it was my birthday present in 2006. I think that if Aaron wants to use my birthday present, he owes me a birthday present.

For the record this is what my engagement ring and birthday present looks like together:




So instead of getting another band that is almost identical.. I could get something else I could wear at the wedding? pearl necklace? diamond studs? Maybe I could talk Aaron into getting me a simple white gold band AND a pearl necklace. That way I actually have a wedding band, instead of a repurposed birthday present.

Which would you choose to be?
Practical? (getting something else instead of a band when I can use the one I have?)
or
Sentimental? (getting a band thats presented to me when we get married as a symbol of our marriage?)

Only nice in person

As everyone knows.. I'm not inviting my mom to my wedding.

There are a variety of reasons... One is that we've never really gotten along anyway. Then she decides to start pissing me off. First by not even seeming interested in my wedding. She would get "wedding-ed" out frequently and I could only talk to her about the wedding for an hour a week - and that included any time to go look at venues. Ugh.
Second by cutting me off financially when she knows I don't have a job or any money. Putting a strain on me and Aaron after she knew we didn't have any more money after putting down several deposits.
Then she decided that she didn't want to come to the wedding if all 50 of her friends couldn't come. Thus eating up all of her money she was giving us towards the wedding. She was being unreasonable. I told her she could invite 10-15 people max and that if anyone else came, she could pay extra for them. Especially all the grown adult children of her friends and their dates she was inviting. I can understand her friends, but their 35 year old children and their girlfriends? um. no.
So she said she wasn't going to come unless I changed my mind.

So I stopped talking to her and uninvited her to my wedding.

Then she decided to play "oh poor me" with my family and get half of them including my grandma and brother to say they wouldnt come if she didn't come... oh well. whatever. don't come.

Anyway. I've been sick all week. My grandma called me today to see how I was doing, and I told her I was feeling better. I hadn't been feeling well these past few days. My mom picks up the phone because she doesn't realize someone is on it. My grandma said that I was feeling better. My mom just grunted and hung up.

If she really cared and wanted to make up with me, she would have made some comment like, I'm glad to hear that or something. Not a grunt.

She only really seems like she cares in public and doesn't make an effort to mend bridges when she is in private... ugh.

My dress is in

My wedding dress came in ... again. So I need to go down sometime to pick it up and make sure its not full of holes like the last one.

David's Bridal Pictures

My ex-dress with the hole that is being returned and Rachel's actual dress. She is my maid of honor.





Better picture of the bridesmaid dresses:

I really like the blue color I picked out. I just wish my dress wasn't all messed up. Good thing they are fixing it.

New pictures of Harmony

I was checking out herecometheguide.com and noticed there are new pictures for Harmony up on the website:

Pretty!
We are getting married under this arch..


I don't know why they have this picture, because the roses are no longer there.

Inspecting the dresses

My cousin Donna and my maid of honor Rachel went with me today to "inspect" the dresses... We met Rachel at Starbucks in manteca. When we got down there we wanted to try the dresses on and make sure they fit etc. I also wanted to check them over..etc.
Rachel and Kerry's dress was fine. Donna's dress had a zipper problem and mine had a big hole. Yay. Plus some beading was falling off. woo hoo.
So they are ordering me a new dress. They didn't have an attitude because I just spoke with the manager the whole time, but they kept harassing us to sign the papers saying we got them. I told them I'd sign them when we were ready to leave... geez.
When I pointed out the problems with the dress, they said that if I came in 2 weeks before the wedding, they would do a bead check..etc. I said they needed to do it now because beading was falling off and there was a hole. There was also several spots where the fabric was stretched at the seams.

I don't see why they want to wait til 2 weeks before the wedding, when there is nothing they can do about it then.

Who comes up with these dumb policies?

so now my dress is scheduled to come in around beginning of July... that means it will be here in a couple of weeks. Or at least thats how its always been.

*headdesk*

Crate and Barrel and Pottery Barn

I talked with Aaron and we decided we didn't like the dishes we registered for, plus we couldn't find any everyday glasses at Macys. The bedding wasn't really anything we liked either. I knew we had to register somewhere else. So I talked him into Pottery Barn. I said there is one near the out of town guests in San Jose and Sacramento. So what if there isn't one near Stockton.

I went with my friend Jennifer to sacramento. She had to go to a study group thing, but afterwards we went to Roseville Galleria. We walked around and eventually ended up at Pottery Barn.

We decided to register there. It was rather easy. I filled out a form. Then they just gave us a gun. I have to say it was a lot harder than I thought it would be. Some of the items were rather heavy and we had to pick them up and turn them around to get to the barcode on the bottom. Some items didn't have a barcode at all. It was getting kind of frustrating and taking a long time. Especially for items that were stacked on top of each other. So you had to remove some items to get to the item you wanted. So I just registered for what I could. I thought I'd change it later when I go online. We gave the gun back and she gave us our registration papers and a gift. It was a little box with some wedding advice and tips.

So we were walking along and decided to go into Crate and Barrel. I hadn't been in one since my sister registered there two years ago. It was really nice. They had a really big selection. I loved a lot of the stuff. I was beginning to regret registering at pottery barn. So Jennifer said, why not just register here and don't tell anyone about Pottery Barn. So I decided to do that.

Crate and Barrel was super easy to register at. Even more so than Macy's. Macy's required us to make an appointment and we had to fill out tons of paperwork. Crate and Barrel just required us to leave our drivers license, fill out a quick paper, gave us the registry gun and told us to have fun. They said to let them know if we had any questions. They were easy to find, we just walked around and registered. When we were done, we gave them a password and left. Easy.

All the items were placed so you didnt even have to pick them up. You just scan the barcode on the tag next to it. I think I scanned everything because it was so effortless. I really like a lot of the stuff from Crate and Barrel. So much that I purged my Macy's registry of duplicates.

Crate and Barrel gave me this super cute heart bowl as a gift for registering with them today:

Inspect the dresses

I got a message today from David's Bridal from one of the consultants.

She was rather rude.

She said that our new dresses are in and we should come "inspect" them to make sure they are up to our "high standards".

I'm sorry but I thought that was a little off and unwarranted.

So I told Rachel about it and she got upset and said that she would drive up and we would go "inspect" the dresses together. She said they better not be mean or rude. Its not our fault the dresses were damaged when they came in.

I also talked my cousin Donna into going because after all it was her dress that was the worst. I wanted them to try them on to make sure they were okay.

So we decided to go in a few days.

Registering at Macy's

So we registered at Macy's at Downtown Plaza in Sacramento.

Macy's didn't really have as big of a selection as we had thought. They are good if you want fine china and crystal. Which we didn't. They did have a large cookware selection. If you go on the weekends, they have specialists from the company walking around available to answer any questions. The woman from calphalon was immensely helpful.

Our consultant Nancy walked around and checked on us often. She was helpful without being annoying. She always seemed to show up at the right time.

We ended up not really finding any dishes we loved. The selection of appliances was not great. We did get all the utensils, silverware and some dishes picked out. We couldn't find any everyday glasses and the selection of everyday dishes was even smaller.

Aaron really liked pointing the gun at everything. However, he was being really cautious with price ranges. He said that no one would buy us things like the LeCreuset Dutch Oven and the Kitchen Aide mixer. I don't see why we couldn't register for them and see.

I'm not sure about the stainless steel pots and pans we registered for. I usually cook with non-stick. The consultant that was there said its not that different.. just more oil or butter to make a non-stick surface. So I hope she is right. Aaron has always wanted some stainless steel pots. I'm just a little wary of what is unfamiliar.

I must say that I did register for things without discussing them with Aaron. We did go down a list of everything we would need/want and we got most of it. I think we might have to register elsewhere. We hadn't planned on it. I wish Target was more dependable/less screwed up. I hope they fix the new receipt policy that makes it really hard for gifts. I would be less wary if I hadn't experienced issued firsthand. Like my friend's baby shower where I gave the same gift as someone else. Same thing happened to my cousin. Now if I couldn't return those gifts, I wouldn't want duplicates.. and what would I do with them. :(

Afterwards we met my Matron of Honor Kerry and her husband Mike for dinner at a taqueria near her house. It was nice to see them and to talk about things. they had registered at Macy's for their wedding a few years ago.