Rehearsal Dinner

check!

It has been a pretty productive weekend!  We have exactly 48 days until the big day, so I am really starting to feel under the gun about all the unfinished plans that need planning.  But I got some big things knocked out this weekend, so that is awesome.

The biggest accomplishment is booking rehearsal dinner!

Since we are having an elegant chicken oscar-esque event for the reception, we wanted a low-key fajitas and margaritas type dinner.  That would seem easy enough, especially in Houston of all places.

Well here is the thing.  Our rehearsal is Friday night, and Friday night is the absolute WORST time to be driving around in Houston.  The traffic is nightmarish, and this is coming from the gal that commutes an hour to her workplace that is 17 miles away.  That being said, we didn't want our rehearsal dinner attendees to have to deal with that, as they will already be in a foreign city.

true story.

 The second thing is that the closest Mexican restaurants to our church either don't have the space to fit our needs (we have about 40-50 on the guest list) or the food is mediocre and overpriced.  It is sad, but you go into these places and you don't see one Mexican dining in there.  That is your first clue that it isn't that good.  No one wants to celebrate with sub-par fajitas.

So we did a compromise, and are having the crew drive a little bit more than I would have liked, but for really good food that is good priced as well.  Plus we get our own little area away from the regular restaurant patrons.

My Mom and Jeff went for lunch there Saturday and we got to talk to the manager and get it all reserved, win!

 Ayi yi yi!

And as soon as I got home, I ordered our invites from Pear Tree Greetings:

Big weight off my shoulders getting that set up!  Now I only have about 499 things to do :)  

48 days away, eep!

Fiesta Fun!

<3 <3 <3

I am back!  So sorry I haven't had a minute to post, I have been busy moving back to Katy and getting settled, and I just now dug my laptop charger out of one of the boxes!  Due to busyness I haven't done one bit of wedding planning, but last Saturday Aaron and I had the pleasure of attending the wedding of our friends Chris and Judy.  They are totally fun and such an awesome pair!  Chris and Judy exchanged vows at Agave Road in Katy.  Let me just tell you guys, this place is gorgeous!  The place is in the style of old Mexico, so naturally a fiesta theme was the clear choice - and Judy pulled it off flawlessly!

Party Space!

The place was so festive and brightly colored!  We had delicious quesadilla and flauta hors d'oeuvres, a fajita buffet, and cake and drinks and dancing.  We had such a good time! :)  And let me tell you about the cutest/fun thing they had:

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These super cute pages that we filled out, they turned it into their guest book!  It was a really creative alternative to the normal guestbook, and we all had tons of fun filling them out.

Aaron wished the newlyweds many blessed years, and I wished them rainbows and unicorns and fireworks and sunshine :)  

Below is the happy couple and Judy's little girl (who is just precious!) at the end of the ceremony.

So happy!  And don't you just love the dress?!

And now those two love birds are en route to Maui, luckies!  Many years, Chris and Judy!!!

Updates and things

Phew, I am taking a break from my endless to-do list to write a blog.  So things have been coming right along, I just feel like everything has a deadline of last week (which isn't really the case) so I am freaking out a little bit.  I could also be freaking out because in a mere 3 days Aaron and I are roadtripping to Las Vegas so I can meet his Mom and their family.  EEK.  I have never been super nervous about meeting parents of guys I have dated, I can be personable and friendly when I try ;), but never has it been more crucial for me to need to be liked (and I have never met parents of someone I was engaged to...).  I mean, I guess if they hate me I will just have to deal with that, but I really want them to think I am the best thing that has ever happened to Aaron, lol.  No pressure.  I think it will be fine though - but I will tell you guys all about it!  And in addition to the trip being to meeting the folks, I am co-hosting a bridal shower for my super awesome friend Angela, and Aaron is turning 30 (OMG, old.) that Saturday!  So I have been put in charge of decor and games for the shower - I don't want to ruin the surprise, so I will have to blog about these things after the fact.  And I am not certain what we are doing for Aaron's birthday yet either. I should probably add that to the to-do list for today.  

Oh yeah, so Friday, I had an appointment with Distinctive Details, so I brought my mom along and we looked at dozens of options for table linens, and the best chairs ever.  I really liked the owner and her assistant who helped us, and they have lots of experience outfitting the Petroleum Club, which was good.  I did feel nervous though, that not one word of price was mentioned.  I like setting my parameters before hand, so I don't fall in love with something I totally can't afford.  I think that is a wedding biz trick - they want you to fall in love with the thing, then they ask you to empty your wallet.  I see it on Say Yes to the Dress like every episode.  But I mean, it is a table cloth.  I am not going to fall in love with something so not that important.  My equation for loving inanimate objects is:

Love = Fabulousness x (The price I estimate it to cost - the price I actually pay for it)

Therefore, there is no love without a sense of a bargain in my book, no matter how high the fabulousness is.  Wedding vendors try to knock out that half of the equation.  I am on to you!!!

Anyway, after we had our appointment I took my Mom by the club to check it out, since she hadn't been.  She liked it, and I think the creativity wheels were a turning in her head of ideas to set up the space.  

Saturday night Aaron and I had fancy date night pt 2.  We went to *17 for dinner.  If you think you are experiencing deja vu, you are - this is the restaurant of one of the wedding reception hotel prospects I visited earlier this year.  The food was absolutely fantastic and tt is literally down the street from Jones Hall, where we caught the season closer - Dvorak's Cello Concerto.  They had a guest Cellist - Alisa Weilerstein, and she was incredible.  The whole performance was beautifully performed, as per usual.  Musical Fireworks, Indeed!

As you can see by his plate, Aaron thought the food was terrible

That is about all going on over here, break time is over!

Houston, We Have a Venue!!!!

Contracts have been signed, non-refundable deposits have been made.

Post - wedding ceremony, we will be partying at...

The Petroleum Club of Houston

!!!!!!!

The price is right, the place is big enough, and the view is amazing!
You can read about the tour here, incase you missed it.

I am beyond delighted with our decision, and it feels like a humongous weight off my shoulders! 

Here are lots of photos of other people's weddings!

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YAY!

The Petroleum Club of Houston

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Holy 43rd story view, Batman.

I took a quick tour of The Petroleum Club of Houston on Wednesday before class.  I was pleasantly surprised by this venue.  At first, I thought country club in a skyscraper.  A and I aren't country club people, so that already had me thinking - meh.  Then Petroleum Club - though very 'Houston' - sounded funny to me.  Like I am a Texas Tycoon, eating some steak in a country club in the sky across from a man with a big mustache wearing a suit with boots and a cowboy hat.  Much like this gentleman:

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But part of me thought that it might be sort of kitschy or something, I dunno.  The only reason I was giving it a chance was that it fit the location criteria and holds 200+ people.  I almost canceled my appointment because I don't like feeling rushed and I had already gotten out of work later than I had planned and I needed to get to school to finish a quiz that was only partially done.  Plus it is downtown, so I thought the traffic would be a nightmare at 4:30pm and if I had to park in one of those underground tunnels that would be a total deal breaker because they scare the tar out of me.  It is about 4pm when I am talking myself out of this tour, but I decided to not be a jerk to the event manager and just go.  So I pull up to the ExxonMobil building downtown and find convenient street parking right in front of the place and head to the 43rd floor.  As I enter, I think - wow, this place is nicer than I thought it would be.  I'm not even sure how to describe the feel of the place.  It isn't trendy, but it isn't untrendy.  It is very nice without seeming overly fancy.  The carpet is like an eye-pleasing take on ugly hotel carpet.  The space is the perfect size and the setup is good too - no dance floors shoved in a corner or anything.  And while all of those things are swell, holy cow that view is incredible!  I can see Russia from my house up there.  AND (yes, there is more!!!) it is very reasonably priced compared to what we have been looking at.  Only downside is that our date is already booked, so we'd have to move to the 28th.  And 2 other brides want the 28th also, so I need to decide yay or nay kind of quickly.  So I don't know what to do.  I feel very weird that I even like this venue at all, because that is not what I mentally prepared for.  I need to figure out what other places I need to look at and crunch some numbers for this place and see where we are at.  But PCOH is looking really good...

The Parador

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The problem with the Parador is that we toured it right after Hotel Zaza.  So when you test drive a Toyota Camry right after a Porsche, it just isn't fair to the Camry.

Toyota Camry's are nice cars.  They are practical, they get the job done.  Roomy and have quality craftsmanship.  I mean, they aren't a Geo Metro or anything by a long shot.  But that Porsche was flipping sweet.

In all actuality, The Parador is much more A and I's speed, because we aren't ultra glam gals about town all the time, we are just average Joes.  The Parador is actually kind of cool in an opposite of boutique hotels way.  It was an old church back in the 1920s, so the building is very vintage style hip, and it has a really awesome domed ceiling.  And the space is really good.  Perfect for the amount of people we want, it isn't nearly as annoying to get to as somewhere downtown.  And it is just one building, and it is all yours.  No other hotel patrons or other parties going on, so that gives it a cool intimate feel.  And the dress I have in my mind that I thought I would like to wear would fit in the setting nicely.  And the location is down the street a little further than Zaza, therefore in second place perfect.  My Mom was ready to put a deposit down on this place after the tour because it is very reasonable price wise in comparison to other places we were looking at.  And really, it is very 'us'. 

On the other hand, the Parador is just about in the scary ghetto: see the map below.



So we don't want to be like 'Welcome to Houston everyone, hope you are packin'...'  (It really isn't that bad, but still)  Location is really the only downside I could come up with.

AND

Stop me if this is so so dumb.  No wait, don't because then I can't say it.  So on Friday when I was at work and talking to my co-workers about our weekend plans, I learn that my co-worker is going to a wedding at the Parador in a couple of months.  So dumb right.  Like 8000 people don't get married everywhere all the time!  But it is like 2 degrees of separation, and I don't like doing stuff that other people do, lol.  I am sure I could get over it just fine, and I know I am being ridiculous, but that sort of made me not want to like it a little bit, so that I could be original.  So dumb.  

But in closing, the Parador is a very nice venue, and I like the style of it a lot.  And I like the price of it a whole lot.  And there are many things about the place that would make life so much easier and conducive to having a great and fun time.  So I suppose we shall see.

Hotel Zaza

Want.  OMG Want.
I know I said I thought I was in love with the Magnolia Hotel, but the Magnolia is like the ex boyfriend who you thought was the one until you really meet the one and realize that before, you had no idea what you were talking about.  I don't know what it is about Hotel Zaza, but that place has got a spell on me.  I can't get it out of my head.  Before I had ever even stepped foot in that place I had already deemed it my dream wedding spot.  And that decision was made well before I was ever engaged. 

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It is so... unforgettable, over the top, trendy, chandaliers out the wazoo, edgy, extravagant, and I could go on for days.  I feel like I could die happy if I had my wedding reception at Zaza.  Dramatic much? lol

Hotel Zaza is in the most perfect and ideal location because it is literally down the street from our church.  And the views are breathtaking.  If we go with the downstairs ballroom we get a view of the fancy fountain, and if we go with the 11th floor ballroom we get an incredible view of Herman Park and downtown.  

Part of me feels like I am not cool enough to have a reception there, lol. 

A sort of poo poo-ed the idea of Zaza at one point because he was under the impression that it was more fancy-trashy with like photos of naked people hanging up and all that animal print.  But when I toured there with my Mom on Saturday, the only weird thing we saw was a painting of a girl and she had a goat's head instead of a little girl head.  I don't know, the decor is very Andy Warhol does Victorian Era.  I just totally am in love with all the chandaliers everywhere.  And the space is big enough for everyone comfortably, which my other favorites haven't been able to provide from what I can tell.  When I told A how amazing the place was, he had a change of heart and switched his No to a Maybe.  He's a good man ;)  So much for that $2000 wedding idea...

Veranda by *17

Don't things with funky characters in the title (*) just seem so cool??
My Mom and I began our Saturday at The Alden Hotel's Veranda by *17
Luckily we got there without too many problems because all of downtown was rerouted everywhere for the Chevron Marathon that was happening Sunday.  Note to self, make sure that isn't happening on the same weekend as the wedding next year...but anyway.

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The Alden Hotel is very cool.  I really need to think of some better adjectives too.  The downstairs lobby is all dark wood and reds - very spicy indeed.  Then you head upstairs to the second floor to the patio/ballroom known as Veranda by *17.  It is basically a giant patio that is enclosed with clear plastic, so you get the feel of outdoors in a climate controlled space.  Perfect for Houston!  There is a really pretty wall with greenery growing through it on one side, and the other side is a tan brick and the tent roof as you can see is all white.  I think it could be done up really nicely in a winter theme with all of that white.  The view is nice as well, but we are only on the second floor, so it isn't like you can see the whole skyline or anything.  Also at The Alden, the food and beverage minimum is much more reasonable than the Magnolia Hotel which is right across the street. 

But with everything, there are downsides.  I think the space will be too small.  Sure, in theory you could cram 200 people in that area, but I am sure people would like to scoot their chair out without bumping into another person's chair.  Also, the set up of where the dance floor would go in order to maximize the space for people to sit is in the corner of the room, and I am not a big fan of that.  I can just imagine if you have to crawl through a tightly spaced sea of tables to even get to the dance area, you may not even bother.  And people need to dance so that I can hide in the group while I am dancing since I am not very good and sort of spazzy looking. 

Aside from the dancefloor and having to cut down on some guests in order to not have a claustrophobia panic attack, The Alden is pretty good.  I could be happy with a reception at Alden.  It is on the maybe list though, but top of the maybe list.

Is this love?

Next stop on the Open House express: The Magnolia Hotel.
Downtown, and oh so hip.  Who'd have thought I could fall in love twice?!

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We were greeted by super friendly people, had champagne and cake and mini beef wellingtons.  This place would require a little reorganization of the budget, but it would be so worth it.  When you walk in the hotel it is very artsy and bright green, then you head upstairs club level and there is a big open space with all the tables, and a giant bar area, dance floor in the middle.  And there is hip art all over the walls, cool vases all around, and fake tree stumps for cocktail tables.  The wall length window across the back of the room overlooks the Episcopal cathedral next door.  It was just lovely!  My only mini-concern is that with the amount of guest list we are thinking about, we would be pushing the upper limits of the space capacity.  But otherwise, it was so wonderfully great.  There are a few other boutique hotels I want to check out in the downtown area, so I am trying not to get my heart set on anything just yet.  A pretty much thought it was awesome too.  Ladies and Gentlemen, we have our first serious contender!

Let the venue try-outs begin!

A and I went to our first open house of the venue shopping process,  The Houston Museum of Natural Science.

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This venue was really promising at first.  A and I thought that we could totally out-nerd all our friends by having a reception here.  My main concern was if the place was going to be 'us'.  Don't get me wrong, A and I are nerdy more than anything, but not really science nerdy.  I am kind of math nerdy and A is more nerdy in an intellectual way - like he can beat the pants off of you in Jeopardy! sort of nerdy.  Museums are so hot right now as far as wedding venues go - but perhaps maybe art museums moreso.  Science isn't romantic or weddingy.  Plus the science museum always reminds me of fieldtrips in elementary school.  

So we go to the open house and we are handed a bunch of papers and sent on our way.  Now the only areas available to rent are the Dinosaur area (shown above), the hall of Gems, and the museum foyer.  The Dinosaur area was the only place I would consider, because who wouldn't love shaking their booty under some dinosaur bones?  But if you can see from the picture, there is limited space for tables, let alone a buffet line and a dancing area.  And I think for the amount of people we are looking to invite, the area is too small.  And those dinosaurs are all on platforms so I just thought everyone would feel very separated from one another.  The Hall of gems is nice, but there is bright red carpet all through the place so I hope your color scheme goes with it.  And it is just that, halls.  So kind of a weird setup - I think I prefer more of a ballroom feel.  And the foyer is alright I guess.  The space is big, and I am sure you can pay an event designer to turn it into fabulous, but that is an extra cost to consider.  If not, then you are just there in the entryway, with the banners about the pirate exhibit going on, and the closed McDonalds.  Yeah, there is a McDonalds in the foyer.  Maybe they could cater?  Only kidding. 

Also there is something kind of eerie about being in a museum after closing time.  Very quiet and echo-ish.  Not very warm and celebratory feeling to me. 

So the open house was alright, it took a while for someone to come up and ask up if we had questions or anything.  She was very nice and helpful, but I guess I was just expecting something different.  This was my first open house ever so I didn't know what was going to happen, but I figured it would be much like buying a house or renting an apartment.  Someone is going to try and sell you on this place.  That wasn't happening.  So A and I left, and I was a tad discouraged, I wanted it to be way better than it was.  But what can ya do?  And looking back, the only reason I really was considering it was because the museum is in an ideal location for us. 

So the museum is out, but I am certain one of the other 20 something venues I have my eye on will work out ;)