Tee-ing Off

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Sometime in the last two weeks before the wedding,  I decided that I wanted one of those bridal T-shirts that I had spent months calling stupid and rolling my eyes at. Nothing like the last minute, eh? Thing was, I didn't want any of the ones I had seen online--I wanted something custom!

Luckily, Daddy Goodlaff knows a guy that happens to work in screen printing, so after a frantic search through Impact Industries'  shirt catalog and a few urgent texts between me and my bridesmaids (because if I was going to get one, they were too), I had shirt sizes and was ready to order. I found a font I liked on dafont.com (Jellyka Western Princess), picked a t-shirt hue, passed the design along, and within a week, I had shirts!

I must confess, I totally dropped the ball on photos of the shirts. My mind was gone that week! I only have mine to show you:

I loved the swirly script, and thought it added a bit of class to something that is, by nature, a bit cheesy.

I Saw the Sign, Part II

Sign number two on my pre-wedding week to-do list was the photo booth sign. 

Once upon a wedding dream I had a vision of a detailed, scroll-y, old-fashioned, square picture frame painted in a bright, shocking color.  Something like this:

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I searched for months for a frame that I could spray paint into my vision, but these frame-sellers knew what they had was precious and priced it accordingly.  I was not going to spend $40 bucks on something I would be shellacking with yellow paint.

Eventually I found this:

It was not scrolled, nor was it square, but it was $3.99 and the most promising prospect I'd seen in a while.  So, I bought it. 

Then I sprayed it,

You Got Blogged!

We are waiting for the CD of our wedding photos to come from our fabulous photographer, Niki Ross, but in the meantime, we've been blogged!  Niki has posted a few teaser pictures from our wedding on her blog, and all I can say is that I can't wait to get my hot little hands on them! 

Here's a few I snagged from her to whet your appetite for the Goodlaff wedding recaps:

All photos by Niki Ross Photography.

Want a little more?  Check out Niki's blog post, here!

Yay!

I Saw The Sign, Part I

Two signs were on my project list during pre-wedding week. One was for ceremony seating instructions, and the other was to sit next to the photo booth and guestbook and give our guests a few tips and little bit of encouragement. 

First up, the ceremony seating sign!

Last October, Miss Hippo on Weddingbee posted a sign that I thought was just about the greatest idea ever:

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It made perfect sense to me.  No "bride's side" or "groom's side," just a bunch of seats for our friends and family to choose from.  Get there early?  You get a better seat. 

Ch-Ch-Ch Changes

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5/13/2011
 I'm sitting in the Social Security office right now (it's been almost an hour), waiting to change my identity with the US Government. The whole drive down here, I was practically in tears, mourning the loss of my maiden name. Ultimately I'm not feminist enough to keep my maiden name, and not traditional enough to do away with my maiden name altogether and unceremoniously replace it with Mr. Goodlaff's surname.  Though I was really leaning towards hyphenating, I decided to err on the side of laziness--a sixteen letter last name is really a little ridiculous, and I knew at some point, I'd get sick of signing it. Instead, I've added my last name to my middle name, and am taking Mr. Goodlaff's name as my new surname; henceforth, I shall be known as Elizabeth Middle Maiden Goodlaff. It's both a nod to the past and an acceptance of my new role as Mrs. Mister Goodlaff (=P).

It was a long road to that decision, but who would have known that when the time came to change it, I would get so damn sentimental?

When Ten Years Still Isn't Enough

I'm old!

My ten year high school reunion is coming up this summer, and this has me less-than-thrilled.

I won't sit here and tell you that high school was hell and I never want to go back, because that's not true. For me high school was, well, fine. I learned what I was supposed to; I was involved in track and field; I sang in the choir for four years, participated in color guard, joined a few clubs. I had good friends. I didn't get invited to the crazy parties because I wasn't, no matter how much I sometimes wanted to be, one of those girls.

By senior year, I was so ready for college, where I knew I'd bloom and find my niche, but I resolved at the beginning of my last year of high school to be more involved, and be who I was. When my friends didn't want to go to dances or dress up on spirit days, I made new friends who did and would. Senior year was better, but not the grand entrance into society that I had imagined.

I can say with absolute certainty that--thank God--my high school years were not the best years of my life. So while my high school experience doesn't exactly bring back warm fuzzies, it wasn't awful either.

Fancy Tissues

We've established by now that I just can't help myself when it comes to projects, so naturally, during the week before the wedding, I decided to throw another one on my project list.

This time, it was fancy tissues.  Once upon a time I saw the fancy embroidered handkerchiefs that you can buy for parents as wedding gifts.  Something like this:

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Now, Mama Goodlaff is a sap.  Always has been, always will be.  She cries at commercials--really, she does.  Years ago we used to watch Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, and everytime the family came home to see the new house, she was in tears.  Knowing her as I do, I thought that she would be in need of a fancy handkerchief to blubber into on my wedding day, and I thought, "Hey, what the hell?  My embroidery skills are seriously lacking, but has incompetence or a lack of understanding of the scope of a project ever stopped me before?  No!"

Hair Today, Gone Tomorrow!

Finally! 

Wedding day may have been the happiest day of my life so far, but last Saturday was probably the second happiest day of my life.  Why, you may ask?

POST. WEDDING. CHOP.

Chop, chop, choppity chop!  It was time for all of the hair I'd been growing out for over a year to go!

Before:

Gifts for the 'Men

*My apologies for those of you who have already read this one.  Apparently Blogger threw a hissy fit and this post came down and never went back up...

From what I was able to deduce from the wedding catalogs I got, the only real appropriate gifts for Groomsmen standing by your side on your wedding day are a beer stein or an engraved flask--what I term the "thanks for being up there with me, but you are probably going to be needing some alcohol later" gift. This is all well and good if your groomsmen are your drinking buddies, but Mr. Goodlaff's Groomsmen aren't exactly beer stein or flask kinda guys, so finding Groomsmen gifts was a bit of a challenge for him (us).

What to do?  What to do?  He debated and searched for months, but eventually, Mr. Goodlaff decided to go with an old standby: the day-of outfit completion package.

Behold: Mr. Goodlaff's Groomsmen gifts.

Gifts for the 'Maids

I couldn't talk about it before the wedding, because a few of my bridesmaids read my blog, but now that they have gifts in hand, I wanted to share with you the gifts I gave my bridesmaids.

Now, a few people are of the opinion that I have spoiled my bridesmaids with these gifts, but as a bride and friend, I am of the opinion that I could never spoil these fabulous girls enough. In fact, I wish I could do more for them; I wish I was in a position to get them all fabulously expensive handbags and trips to Aruba, but alas, I've still not won the lottery.

In any case, here's what the Goodlaff Bridesmaids got:

Beginning of the End...

Where to start? So much has happened in the last few weeks, and with so much to tell you, I hardly know where to begin.  Then again, I suppose I shall begin, as most stories do, at the beginning. 

There is only one word to describe the week before the wedding: mayhem.  It was complete and total mayhem (and sometimes it felt like a cluster-you-know-what).  My To-Do list had grown longer and longer and I even threw in a few last-minute projects because I happen to be totally insane.

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For my bride friends out there that haven't yet gotten married, my advice is this: at the very least, take off the week before the wedding.  Trust me--you'll need it. 

 See, I thought I'd have a lovely, relaxing week of sleeping in a bit and resting up in anticipation of the big day. Not so much.  The Monday of my wedding prep week began with me waking up to construction workers out on the deck, using chainsaws and hammers to tear down our rotting porches. Hearing construction noise all day only makes you want to destroy something, and with all the banging and sawing and screeching tools, more than once I was tempted to break the window and tell them to stop working so that I could zen out on my West Wing DVD's.

My week, in a nutshell: Monday night, Mr. Goodlaff and I finally wrote our ceremony (everything except our vows) and sent it off to Houdini for approval and preparation.  Tuesday we decided we wanted to have wedding programs (add it to the list...).  On Wednesday I realized that we had forgotten to buy champagne and soda (add it to the list).  Thursday we had to buy dirt, went to Home Depot, discovered they were sold out, and had to drive 45 minutes to the next store to get grass for the pinwheel escort card display.  Friday was all about flower arranging and my Bachelorette party, and by that time, I would have welcomed a lobotomy.  We didn't decide to rehearse on Saturday night until late Saturday morning...

Mini-Mooning...

Mr. Goodlaff and I are taking our honeymoon in October, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't be able to get away for a while and de-weddingify!

We'll be taking a mini-moon this week, which is just what it sounds like--a mini-honeymoon.  We'll be driving up the California coast, taking in the sights, sleeping, and relaxing.

This means that all will be quiet on the blog front here for a few days.  Rest assured that I will be back in a week or so!  I can't wait to share with you how everything turned out!

I'm Getting Married in the Morning...

Technically it is morning.  Technically it's my wedding day.  I should be curled up in bed right now, trying to get what little sleep will come my way this evening (morning).  But I'm here, finishing up one stage of my blogging journey, typing up one last blog as Miss Goodlaff. 

Our wedding is tomorrow, and I can't wait.  These last few days have been big balls of stress piled with indecision and last-minute frenzy.  There's been so much to do these past few days, and I will confess that I'm really glad wedding day is finally here.

I finished writing my vows about two seconds ago, and although stressful to have to complete them RIGHTTHISMINUTE, I'm almost glad in a way that this was my last wedding task because it has brought me full circle to what got us here in the first place: love.

Mr. Goodlaff, I love you.  I can't wait to marry you tomorrow (today), and I can't wait to be your wife.  It's been a journey, but here we are, end of the wedding marathon, still as much in love as ever and stronger for having dealt with all the challenges planning a wedding threw our way. 

I'll see you all on the other side!

For the last time,
Miss Goodlaff