I like to think I'm creative.  But, let's be honest-- the creative thoughts may be floating around in my noggin, but actually pulling through with amazing DIY projects?  Not so much.  At least, not yet.  I've had bags of ribbon, tissue paper, and other cheap and fun materials to make amazing ribbon pomanders a la Martha Stewart, but they're now just collecting dust in the corner of my bedroom.  With the wedding right around the corner (2.5 months-- freaking.out.) and precisely zero DIY projects, I've decided it's go-time.  Here's a list of DIY projects I want to get done BY AUGUST 31:

1.  Decorative chalkboards -- for the escort card/favor table
2.  Cute rustic-chic ceremony sign -- something like this (by doing this):

3.  "Bride" and "Groom" chair signs
4.  OOT guest boxes or bags created, including letters to guests with a timeline
5.  Wedding programs (this scares me the most-- sounds a bit tricky!!)
6.  Birdcage card box
7.  Table numbers (featured on PW, among others!): 

8.  A bunch of blue-green tinted jam jars as part of our centerpiece (to complement the wheat!!) so they look like this (but much much smaller-- the plan is to put tea lights in them):

Whew.... this is daunting but exciting!!  Wish me luck... and please advise me on ANYTHING-- i need all the help i can get!!

I'm envisioning tying in little details from both Jarrod's and my backgrounds/heritage into our wedding-- from the wheat centerpeices (Jarrod's family grew up in the wheat fields of South Dakota) to the paper crane aisle garlands. 

By sarahmoto on photobucket.

By greenweddingshoes.com

I'm having my mom, grandmother, and my two foster sisters help me make the paper cranes out of various heavy-weight origiami paper in shades of yellows, golds, and ivory.  I'm hoping to do something like this, but with paper crane garlands:

We have an appointment set up to meet Melinda of Les Bouquets in St. Louis in a couple of weeks.  We're supposed to bring ideas/samples/anything helpful to hash out some possibilities with Melinda.  I know nothing about flowers except that i heart peonies (which will be out-of-season for an October wedding... not to mention, very pricey!).  Sooo, some options....

I also want to incorporate blue, i think... love love love this bouquet featured on Real Simple:

and this one!

oooh, this too:

ok, i'll stop!  But aren't these bouquets just lovely??

So, now that the venues are decided on, next on the list are colors!  The first picture that absolutely blew my mind was in a Martha Steward Weddings magazine a few months back:

I LOVE this teal/white/ivory look-- it's classic and gorgeous!  To add to this color palette, we're also incorporating some yellow and gold.  Here's my inspiration board:

I keep going back and forth about yellow or gold, and have decided that both sound good!  So really, we have a deep teal, a marigold-ish yellow, gold, and ivory.  What do you think?

Okay, so it turns out I am the worst p-dubber.  We're 5 months away from the big day, so it's time to seriously update everyone.  Part I, venues!

Butterfly House at Faust Park:  Ceremony Site! We're all booked and ready to go with this!  Here's what the area where we'lll be getting married looks like:

Next up, cocktail hour.  We're doing cocktail hour in a different location than our reception site, which is kind of stressful and I don't even know why we decided to go that route.....

oh right.  The amazing drinks that look like pure chocolate love.  Yes, please!  Bailey's Chocolate Bar is a couple of (long) blocks away from our reception site, so we're having a trolley transport guests between Chocolate Bar and reception site so that no one is driving around tipsy!  Great excuse for a trolley ;)

Here's our reception site, Moulin Events:

The website doesn't really have many great photos of the outside and each of the rooms in the building, but Moulin is housed in an old microbrewery, so there is a ton of character here.  The exterior is all brick, and with all the exposed beams and such in each of the rooms, it's a pretty awesome space!  We're excited, at least!  Hmm, next question-- how to decorate..... hmmmmm....

Well, those are our three venues that we've booked!  We're super-excited to have gotten the 'big' things taken care of.  Now we're moving onto the details to complete the weekend-- booking a florist, figuring out cupcake flavors, picking songs for the string quartet to play during our ceremony. It all seems fun and overwhelming at the same time.... eeek!

one word: hooray!! 

We just received a DVD of all of our e-pics, and although there are some awkward ones (ok, so maybe this was the only really *awkward* photo.... this is what happens when you decide to incorporate your dog into your e-pics):

There are also a bunch of fun ones in the mix, too! 

Enjoy!  All credit goes to our friends and photographers, S&J Photography

(we're getting married in St. Louis, and thought it'd be fun to have the marquee at the local movie theater read a slightly-altered version of the classic movie title :)  )

(we're using this as our STD's!!)

(my absolute favorite shot of all!  juni the dog looks pretty darn cute.  and Jarrod's jeans look very snazzy)

(oh, why thank you for offering your human food to me.  don't mind if i have a lick... or try to later devour the whole waffle cone.)

(note: Jarrod developed a weird rash after this e-session... hmmm. somehow, not surprised...)

(this is another favorite-- late afternoon/early evening lighting is apparently, amazing.  who knew??)

(and to end with, a more traditional photo :)  )

so, as it turns out, i'm not very good at this wedding planning thing.  it's true.  take, for example, the order in which i've worked on planning:

1) got engaged (end of may)

2) told parents beginning of june (oops-- sorry, parents-- it was a busy last weekend in may!  we got engaged, then rushed to grab some sandwiches before a where's waldo party, then rushed off to michigan for a friend's weekend wedding!  ah!)  There is proof of this:

(see that ring on my finger?  see the waldo attire?  that was an hour after the proposal.  true story.)

3) bought wedding dress (a little tipsy) in boston, where i don't even live-- while visiting my besties.  also photodocumented:

.... so yes, i bought a dress... before we even had a date set.  a little tipsy (i can't help that my friend wanted to do happy hour before our appointment at the store.  mango margarita? yes please!  nor can i help that i'm asian and have the world's lowest tolerance.)

Since then, I've been a little better-- we've locked down a date (10/9/10!  whoot!), a venue (Butterfly House for ceremony, Moulin for reception), and we've been working on our save-the-dates and invites (love etsy!).  But, in true Yuri fashion, i present to you.... the shoes.  Obviously the most important aspect of the wedding day ;)

Many of you wonderful ladies helped me out when i posted about my shoe dilemma, and i finally picked a pair and dyed them BLUE!  Here they are:

BEFORE: (please excuse the weird footies... i'm so uncool)

After:

These aren't the best shots of my shoes, but they're mildly entertaining (notice a common theme in the photos???  what is it what is it what is it????) 

... you're posting for the whole internet world to see:  I'm getting married!  AHHH.

My name is Yuri, and I'm a graduate student working on my doctorate in school psychology in good ol' Bloomington, IN (i.e. i can now call myself a Hoosier-- not that I particularly want to.... :)  ).  I'm kind of a procrastinator when it comes to planning anything, so I'm hoping to start a little early with wedding planning so I'm not panicking come summer!  My fiance Jarrod and I are getting married in St. Louis in October.  This is a little tricky, since neither one of us are from St. Louis, have family there, or anything.  It's just a major city that's between us (we're currently doing the long-distance thing, boo), that we fell in love with. 

I'm excited to be an active member on PW!!  And, congrats to everyone on here, too, btw!!