Planes, Dates and missing my baby.

Well Lots has happened since I last blogged.
1. Our wedding date has been confirmed. March 05, 2009.
2. I booked our plane tickets to Hawaii!
3. Mr Mek will be away for 3 months. He's been gone for 24hrs and I miss him immensely already!

I also contacted my dream photographer about shooting our wedding and I might be getting my wedding dress for $400 less than the store price. More about that in a later post.

Mr. Mek has business to take care of and though he will be busy and away for 3 months it also confirmed that we are able to have our ceremony on our projected date. Which I'm real excited about. So yesterday I was checking flight costs on the internet (which I tend to do every other day), just to see what the prices are at. With gas and oil costs being out the kazoo, I was worried about plane tickets from the east coast to Hawaii being outrageous. I flew to Hawaii in 2005 by myself and paid $605 (after taxes!). In 2006, Mr. Mek and I went to Hawaii for a friend's wedding and I believe we paid $645 each (about $1300 for both of us). Yesterday American Airlines had tickets round trip to Hawaii for $770 (after taxes). They were by far the cheapest. Most flights I saw were $900+ and I know they're only going to go up from there. I was a lil' hesitant to book right now because our trip is 10 months away and because of so many airlines claiming bankruptcy. That would be my luck...to book our tickets then have to rebook and pay extra hundreds of dollars because the airline we book with is bankrupt. Well, I did it. I bought the tickets. $1542 for both of us to fly to Hawaii. So whether we get married or not, we're going to Hawaii.

Wedding Par-tay...or lack there of...

Before Mr. Mek and I got engaged and were just having the "wedding talk", we discussed who we would have stand with us at the alter for support; aka the wedding par-tay. Deciding to have the wedding in Hawaii actually made things a lil' easier for us. Mr. Mek only has a handful of close friends to begin with (like 4), so he had maybe one or two people that immediately stood out to him. But even then the decision wasn't easy to make. For me it was a lil' more difficult. See, I don't have one clique of friends that I hang out with. More like a friend here, a friend there, a few friends who sometimes interact with each other, but all in all close friends in their own way. I don't have a best friend....in PA. I have a few great friends.

Now, to back track a little...I grew up as a military brat, so I moved every 3-4 years growing up. It's really hard to keep in touch with friends and real easy to lose touch with friends. That being said, two of the oldest friends I have are my bestests I met in Hawaii; both of whom I meet at the ripe age of 12-ish. Having a wedding in Hawaii meant not having to chose from my PA friends who to be my bridesmaids but instead letting my PA peeps enjoy their Hawaii vacation (not having to worry them about my wedding poop) and "burdening" my bestests who live or have lived in Hawaii already instead. Or at least, that's how it was going to be.

Mr. Mek's bestest got engaged a couple months after us. Exciting! Now they are in the wedding process also and last time I talked to Mr. Meks bestest's fiancee (did you get all that?!) they were thinking of planning a summer 2009 wedding in Florida. Meaning that they probably will be on a budget themselves and might not make it to our Hawaii shindig. No worries..although I do hope to make it to Florida for their wedding!!

So now we don't know if any of Mr. Mek's close friends will be able to make the trip (or afford to go) to Hawaii. And although I know my bestest's will be able to make it to Hawaii (one lives in Hawaii and the other has family in Hawaii so it's usually no big deal for her to come visit), I couldn't imagine having my 2 girls stand up and support me and Mr. Mek have no one standing with him. So....we nixed the wedding party.

This is actually saving us in many ways.
1. Two less bouquets to buy (if I decide to go the flower bouquet route)
2. In Hawaii, the bride traditionally buys the bridesmaid dresses, shoes, accessories, etc. So that's a few hundred there that I would be saving.
3. Less people usually equals less drama.

Now...question to all of you. I love my girls. And although they won't be wearing the ugly dress and standing next to me at the alter they will still be my honorary bridesmaids helping me get ready and all. So what can I do for them to let them know I appreciate them? Is there a way I can still honor them on my wedding day?

Dress Shopping...Blah!

Let me start by saying I hate clothes shopping. I hate trying on clothes and I'm one of those people that can't buy any article of clothing without trying it on. I'm short, unporportionate, and have no arse.

So I begin shopping for a wedding dress. A task I was dreading. I did the whole internet search and was in awe of these dresses (*sorry for the small images, I'm still new at this whole blogging thing)...

Next task was to find which local stores carry them so I may try them on. I find out that Saeyoung Vu Couture was no longer in business. Of course her dresses were my favorite. That's usually my luck. Onward, I went to 2 dress shops in Philly; one supposedly carried the Jenny Yoo line. Only to get there and find out not only do they only have maybe 20 dresses in the whole store (which were yellowed and the lace had holes in it), but they carried the Jenny Yoo catalog. Yea, no dresses to try on. So I moved onto the 2nd bridal store in Philly and loved these on me:

While they were very form flattering on me, I felt that they were a lil' too dressy for my casual Hawaii wedding, so the search continued.

Last month I headed up to New York City with Mr. Mek in tow. I found my dress. No, I didn't have that "it" moment, but it's not too too much more than what I wanted to spend, it was flattering, appropriate for the wedding we're having, lightweight, and Mr. Mek approved. Yep, you heard me right. Mr. Mek saw me in the dress. And while I know most of you are shaking your heads in disapproval, I'm pleading my case.
1. Mr. Mek is a "typical" guy, who in 11mths from now won't remember what that dress looked like or how it looked on me.
2. On said wedding day, I will look totally different with dress on, hair did, makeup done, shoes and accessories.
3. We're nontraditional folk. Why start now?

So here it is...here's the dress I've decided on ::cue music::

Jenny Yoo "Kayla"

I apologize for not showing photos of moi in the dress..could you believe that this photographer totally didn't think of taking photos at the dress shop?!

On a totally different note, watch out for this girl at the 2008 Summer Olympics...She's my cousin! Jamie Beyerle

To PA or to HI

Let me start of by first saying that I think Pennsylvania is the only state that all locals refer to as "PA" instead of Pennsylvania. No one in PA refers to PA as Pennsylvania. Lil' known fact for you guys. :o)

Now, I've already stated that our wedding will be in Hawaii, but before that choice was ultimately made we did have a venue picked out for a PA wedding. So this post is dedicated to ceremony venues. In PA and HI.

Although I've never made the phone call to see if they would even allow weddings to be located at this place...my first choice for ceremony venue in PA was The Pennsylvania Veterans' Memorial at Fort Indiantown Gap Cemetery. Yes, you heard me right, cemetery. I know this would cause some controversy with some of the guests, but this place has some meaning to me. Besides the fact that the memorial is absolutely beautiful; my grandfather, uncle, aunt, dad and myself were/are all military and my grandfather passed away May 2007 and is buried in this cemetery. While I know some people think of cemeteries as morbid and death, this memorial is a celebration of life. Let me just show you the photos and you judge for yourself...

click on image for bigger image

click on image for bigger image

For Hawaii our number one contender is the Byodo-In Temple in Kaneohe. It's a beautiful Buddhist temple and is a replica of the 900-year-old Byodo-In located in Uji, Japan. Very peaceful. Ceremony would be on the grass in front of the Koi pond, so the temple and mountains would be our background. Now, as a logical person without a current contract holding this place as my venue, I am looking at some backups (which I'll post another day). Can you tell I'm going for the dramatics for our wedding ceremony venue?!

Wedding poop and all things "poopie"

While our wedding date is still tentative (we have some personal life situations at the moment that prevents us from knowing when we can get married next year), I have been trying to do as much research and pre-planning as I can, so once we do have an official date I can just call and *hopefully* book all my favorite vendors. This is, of course, hoping that they are still available for our tentative date.

That being said, the reasoning to our hopeful wedding date and location...
Location. We've decided to get married in Hawaii. There are many reasons for this choice.
1. We are planning on paying for the wedding ourselves and it seemed more affordable (believe it or not) to fly to Hawaii and have a small ceremony and dinner than it was to have a wedding in Pennsylvania with 125+ guests.
2. We want a small wedding with family and close friends. Having a destination wedding eliminates the task of explaining why so and so wasn't invited. Most probably won't be able to afford a trip to Hawaii. Although those people will be missed, we know they are there in spirit.
3. I grew up a military brat. Right before my dad retired from the military and moved the whole family to his home town in PA we lived in Hawaii. I've always considered Hawaii home to me and visit friends there every few years. In 2006, Mr. Mek traveled with me to Hawaii for my bestest's wedding and he absolutely loved the islands. When time came to plan for our wedding our choices were Pennsylvania, Hawaii or Vegas. Hawaii won, hands down.

Wedding Date. We hope to be wed March 05, 2009. There is no significance for this date other than my brother will be in his first year of college and March 5th is during his spring break. hehe. Doesn't late February, early March seem early for spring break?! I thought so. Anyways, it is either get married that week or in the summer. Since it's cooler in March in Hawaii we're aiming for that. I'd hate to have my guests bake in the sun during the hottest season of the island.

So that's it. Oahu, Hawaii. March 05, 2009 (tentatively!). Hope to see you there!