Meg{Moir}

Whew. I am still recovering from the weekend. It was fun, exhausing, relaxing, and completely overwhelming.

Hello loves.

It’s early Monday morning, and while I’d love nothing more than to crawl back in bed, I suppose it’s off to start another week in the working world. But first, let’s relive the weekend! Shall we?

Friday afternoon I left work a little early and went to pick up my parents from the airport. They had just got back from a fishing trip down in the Lousiana bayou. My gift for being their chaffeur was a bag of trout and a bag of red fish. Yum!

For dinner that night, I cooked Patrick and I fried trout, potatoes fried in olive oil with vidalia onions and caesar salad. It was very very yummy. After working on invitations for a few hours, I was zonked out on the couch.

Up early-ish on Saturday for the beginning of a very busy day. Patrick and I met our “church lady,” Lib at Hayes Barton at 11 to go over ceremony details. After that, we picked up Cook-Out trays (with milkshakes, no less) and headed over to Jared’s to pick up Patrick’s wedding band. We’ve been trying on our bands all weekend and looking at them in this shell-shocked amazement, like, “are we really doing this?” Heck yes we are!

After a few more errands around town, it was back home to really settle in and finish up invitations. We decided to close them with wax seals, which looks sweet but takes forever. Patrick was on wax seal duty while I assembled the last parts on the invites and stuffed them in the envelopes when we were finished with them.

We could have finished them all that night, but we got a call from some friends asking if we wanted to go out for putt putt and go-karts. How could we refuse? It was an awesome night, we rode go-karts, got almost the full time and then they brought us in a little early because of thunder and lightening, so we got a rain check. Next we shot each other up in laser tag. Finally, we headed out to the putt putt course and got all the way to hole 15 before the rain really started coming down…so we got another rain check! Not too bad, paying for 3 activities and getting 5. We couldn’t figure out a way to rain out laser tag though. Oh well.

Church was Sunday morning followed by a quick lunch and FINALLY finishing those stinkin invitations. You better enjoy them! After some time in the sunshine, Patrick headed home and I was extremely lazy. It was awesome.

Hope you guys had a great weekend too!

After making 250 quarter inch cuts with my new paper cutter, I ended up with 500 strips of green paper. It was just kind of sitting in a pile on my table. One night I absentmindedly picked up a few and started folding them together, like I used to do with the edges of paper from the old dot-matrix printers. Before I knew it, I had this:

Still not sure what I’m going to do with it, I half about half of the pile left and I figure that since I’ve started it I might as well finish. Maybe as filler in the bathroom baskets? I can see it now, bobby pins and tampons nestled amongst 500 hand crinkled strips, perfectly coordinated with the invitations.

Eat your heart out Martha, and someone, please give me my sanity back.

One year ago today, I was walking along the top of Jockey’s Ridge, buring my feet off, struggling to keep up with Patrick and trying hard not to cry or throw up because I was so hot.

Mintues later, I found myself standing in front of Patrick, who was now down on one knee, trying hard not to cry or throw up because I was so excited, so surprised and so incredibly happy. We were engaged.

I remember how excited I was to buy my first bridal magazine, check out venues online, and yes, even set up my account on The Knot.

I remember how hard it was to come up with a budget, to gather ideas and organize my thoughts, to think concretely about an event that had never seemed like something more than a distant dream.

I remember the ease with which I chose my bridesmaids. These girls are my best friends and there is no one else I would rather have standing up there beside me.

As we are closing in on the two month mark until our wedding day, I don’t think so much about the pretty dresses, the reception halls, the fabric swatches or the fancy flowers.

I think about how at ease I am around him. How he doesn’t mind when I’m silly, or unreasonable, or hard-headed (and I am often all three). How he always cooks the chicken, because I always messed it up. How we used to write each other the longest letters. How one rainy day in England, I just knew it was him.

I imagine how I will feel on that day in September. I will be surrounded by friends and family, and yet there he will be, standing at the end of the aisle, the only thing I see. I imagine us saying our vows to each other, accepting each other, just as we are, as husband and wife.

Photo Credit: Patrick

I’ve always been a pretty simple girl. In middle school, I was in love with Courier New (bonus, it made your papers longer due to the wide spacing), and settled into a comfortable relationship with Times New Romans during the many papers churned out during high school and college.

I had no idea that there was anything available besides what showed up on the drop-down menu in Microsoft Word. Turns out, there are these things called foundrys that create new fonts every day. I can’t help but imagine a little workshop filled with serifs and ampersands and debates about the differences between Arial and Arial Narrow. Huh.

If only I had broadened my horizons a little early. If the gloriousness that is Weddingbee had entered my life, if I put any effort into this wedding stuff sooner, if I had any artistic capabilities at all…my paper products would be glorious. Angles we have heard on high type stuff.

For all you ladies who are still in the process of designing your invitation suites, here are some examples of the wonders of font.

From DaFont

Imagine sending out your invitations written in Jane Austen’s handwriting. Swoon.

I don’t know what it is about Saint Andrew’s Queen exactly, but I am in love. This is my favorite.

I’m not a huge fan of Chopin, too swirly for me, but I know that lots of people love the fancy.

One Fell Swoop is super cool. It kind of reminds me of Edgar Allen Poe for some reason. Bonus points: It is the name of one of my favorite records.

From 1001 Free Fonts

I love the Albemarle as an alternative to script type. We went with Trajan PRO, but I am a big fan of this one.

From Fonts for Peas

How perfect is Pea Squeaker for a casual summer wedding? Fonts for Peas has a really cool feature where you can send in a sample of your handwriting and they will turn it into a font for you to use. I wish my handwriting was as cute as the Squeaker!

One of my favorite things about doing wedding stuff is getting packages in the mail. A couple of days ago I came home with all this waiting at my door step and I was downright giddy.

So what’s in them? Well, excuse me while I revert to third grade for a minute and tell you, “that’s for me to know and you to find out!”

With Patrick out in Arizona, I spent this weekend all by my lonesome, and it was some kind of awesome. Not that I didn’t miss him, but I am just so content to spend time alone.

Friday night I spent way to much time checking out my favorite new website, WeddingBee. I mean, WAY too much time. A little mindless TV and I was off to bed.

Saturday morning I woke up with the worst headache I’ve had in years. A couple of years ago I got headaches every day, like clockwork, and this one felt just like that. It was like having someone from high school come to visit you, which is great except for the fact that you never liked them that much. After I finally recovered from that it was around noon. I did a quick workout and then went out to run some errands. After dinner I watched a Netflix dvd about Windsor Castle (I know, I’m a nerd) and ended up reading Harry Potter (book 7) until about 2 am. That’s crazy, I never stay up that late anymore. Amos fell asleep hogging the remotes. Typical man.

Sunday morning was church, followed by some walking around at the flea market. I was looking for something specific, a 3 tiered fruit bowl. Something like this, but solid-er.

Luckily, fruit baskets are kinda tall, so I was able to mostly walk by the tables and tables of stuff while scouting. I found a few options, but nothing close enough, so I let it go. Next I rode over to Yates Mill Pond and checked out the location as a possible bridal portrait shoot. I think it will work, the old mill there is really cool.

I spent the rest of the afternoon being lazy and went to meet Jessie at the dog park around 6 to let the boys run. We had a good chat, then it was back home to get to work on invitations. 250 quarter inch paper cuts later, my green mats are ready to go. Thank God for my new paper cutter!

This is the blog I tried to write Friday, but I was so excited I was having trouble writing anything besides OMG OMG OMG I LOVE OUR PICTURES! It is a such a thrill to see yourself on a blog that you stalk um….multiple times a day.

After a few days of cooling off, I still LOVE our pictures, but I think I may be able to write about them slightly more intelligently.

A few weeks ago, Patrick and I spent the evening with our wedding photographer and her husband, Cheyenne & Geoff Schultz. We took pictures all around and in the Free Expression Tunnel at NCSU, and then headed down to City Market downtown. We had so much fun, which I really think you can tell when looking at the pictures.

Cheyenne did a great job capturing us. I can’t wait for my bridal portraits at the end of the month, and of course our wedding! See you soon Cheyenne!

Photo credit: Cheyenne Schultz

Inspired by my love, Hey Mel, I wanted to impart some advice that I have gathered while planning my wedding:

I can’t believe that I forgot to post a sneak peek at the last place Patrick and I will be visiting on our honeymoon.

When we were planning the trip, we batted back and forth the idea of actually visiting Disneyland. It would require an additional flight and we couldn’t see ourselves staying at anywhere else than the Grand Californian. Eventually, we decided to go for it. Really, how could I go all the way across the country and not visit Disneyland?

Here are some pictures of the parks, along with Disney’s Grand Californian Hotel. Enjoy!