The Venue

So, we officially have a church, a venue and a wedding party.  Woo hoo!  We will be getting married on October 6th, 2012 (plenty of time to be wedding dress ready and lose weight).  We are thrilled that we got the church of our dreams and that everyone we asked to be a part of the wedding said yes!  

This is the front of our venue.

This is the entrance to the ballroom as seen from inside the ballroom.

I hate the carpet in this venue, but when all the tables are up you wont see it too much.

This is where the head table will be set up.  Outside the windows is a veranda

that people can go out on during the reception.

This is the whole length of the ballroom.

This is where we will set up our escort cards and welcome table.

Stairs leading up to the bridal suite.

Front door area.

Door area leaving the cocktail room going towards the main entrance.

Large cocktail area.  Through the doors is another cocktail area that has huge picture windows that overlook the beautiful golf course.

So, moving on from wedding stuff for now and onto the new and exciting things coming to my blog!!!  I decided to discontinue Saturday Sessions because it just seems like I am focusing too much on the short term and not enough on bigger goals.  I am going to start doing a monthly session on the first day of every month rather than something every Saturday.  My hope is that this will mean that I make bigger goals and have longer time to accomplish them. It seems like when I was making goals for SS before they were so short term and I was finding that it wasn't having the lasting impact that I hoped it would have.  So the new thing will be called Monthly Sessions and I am starting it today!  I am one day late, so I apologize for that!


Goals of the month are...


1. Lose 10 pounds. 
This may seem slightly aggressive and it might be.  I feel like I need to kick it in and really set a high goal.  I want to lose 10 pounds a month leading up to my wedding, which is a little over 2 pounds a week, so we will see how it goes!
2. Donate my over-sized clothes
I don't want to keep my fat clothes as a crutch.  When they don't fit they are going to be donated.  I just can't have them sitting around telling me that it is okay when my jeans don't fit and encouraging me to grab the fat jeans and then when they dont fit going a size up and a size up.  It is a slippery slope.  A slope that I have slipped on before and I WON'T do it again!
3. Take a group fitness class at Lifetime 20 of the 28 days of the month.

The group fitness classes really help me lose weight. I push myself harder and go for longer.  I sweat more and I actually enjoy it!  I am not saying that I am taking the other 8 days off, but I am going to go to the gym and take a group class 20 days this month and I am very excited about it!  I promise to post my sweat proof this time so that you don't think I am all talk! :)

I weighed in last Sunday and I was down 2.6 pounds.  A loss is a loss and I am not complaining about it.  I am just aware that I have a timeline that I would like to get to my goal and I can't wait to finally get there.  I am starting to be able to imagine what my thin and helthy life will be like!  This week I weighed in down 1.2 pounds only.  I know this is because I didn't make the best choices, but after grocery shopping today for all healthy items and getting everything cleaned and cut up I feel ready to tackle the week being healthy.

Wedding Planning

So, as most of you know I got engaged on December 3rd and my fiance and I are now in the early phases of planning our wedding.  I have always wanted a fall wedding and after making some phone calls it looked like Fall 2011 was out of the picture.  That was more than okay with me because I want more time to lose weight and more time to plan, so we decided on October 6th, 2012.


We actually just booked our church last night!  It is the chapel at the University of St. Thomas where I went to college.  There is a long waiting list, but we finally booked it yesterday and we are thrilled!

Inside of the church.

I went to a weding fair with a friend a few weeks ago just to look around and get ideas mostly.  She is getting married in October of this year and needed to get some of her final things lined up.  As we were walking around and talking with people I started to realize that they are starting to book for Fall 2012 already.  Here I was thinking I have 20 months that is more than enough time.  Well, apparently it is not and I needed to really strat looking for a venue.


After looking online at like every venue in the area I made an appointment last Monday at two VERY different places.  The first one is in a historic building in downtown St. Paul and is very romantic and intimate.  It is kind of like a wine cellar with exposed limestone and wood.  The color palette is wine and gold, which goes fairly well with our theme.  It is lovely and romantic and went very well with my Tuscan Couture theme.  Some of the negatives were that there is not much parking, no bathrooms on the floor that the recpetion room is on and it is pretty pricey to reserve the space.

This was a nice little private sitting area.  I wanted to show the color palette. 

Bar area.  Original exposed limestone.

A look at the room.  I promise it isn't this dark.

Small sitting area in the reception room.

The second venue is located in Minneapolis in an area that is known as Uptown, which is where many of the trendy twenty-something's live.  So, this venue was more like a trendy bar, with booth style seating and bright vibrant colors.  They had two very cool built in bars, a hige dance floor and no need to decorate too much because it was already so unique.  This space also has limited parking, it is not exactly easy to get to, it is also pricey to reserve the spot and it feels like a night club.

Booths lining the outer walls.  Very fun and unique table arrangements.

Curved booth that most people use as the head table.

Huge dance floor and area for a band or DJ.

Staircase area.

The bar on the main floor.

So, after looking at the venues with our families we went out to dinner and had a very lovely time.  We were all able to express our concerns and lay everything out on the table.  It was really nice for us to all get on the same page.  After taking the night and the next day to think everything over I decided to pass on both of the venues.  Ultimately we want something that is easier for our guests to get to, with ample parking and for me something that is classic and elegant.  I don't want to have my wedding at either of these places, I want to go somewhere without the expensive rental fee and with more space and more elegance.


So, back to the drawing board.  I know that we will find somewhere that we love and it will fit our vision and plan perfectly, I just hate spending so much time looking for something.  Don't get me wrong, I love wedding planning, but I will feel better once we have some of the big items figured out.