Uhlease asked a question on my "stress" topic thread but I figured I'd make a seperate one so we can keep track.

My rehearsal dinner will just be at Olive Garden. We don't really have nice restaurants in our town so this is one of the nicer ones. Plus we all love Italian food! Our rehearsal is scheduled for 4pm at our location. We'll also be dropping everything off to decorate so our coordinator and venue manager can do all of that for us. We're making the reservation for 5:30 or 6 to make sure we don't rush through the rehearsal and have time to drive from point A to point B. At the rehearsal dinner I'm expecting speeches and I'll also hand out a detailed itinerary for the rest of the weekend, along with contact information for everyone. We aren't doing gifts until we're back at the hotel. The guys will be having guy time at our house so they'll get their gifts then and the girls will be at the hotel with me and will get their gifts.

What are your plans??

Nice!

So your rehearsal is Saturday at 4? Our venue has another wedding that night, so we have do our stupid rehearsal Friday night. It's not super close for some of the bridal party, so we are just going to say whoever can come Friday night at 6 for the actual rehearsal should come...and our "rehearsal lunch" is Saturday at 1pm.

It's funny b/c every time I've been in a wedding I've basically had to do whatever, take time off, etc, but I feel so bad asking people to come up to me 3-4 days in a row that its kind of ruining the experience for me a little. It's like I should just get over it, but I can't. So we are doing things to try to appease other people which is annoying. Oh well.

This is going to be a long post. lol.

There is only one legit good restaurant in Lodi (and none in the actual town the venue is in). And we contacted them a couple weeks ago, and Sept 1st dinner space was already all booked. I was CRUSHED!! Then we were going to do it at a crappier restaurant, then finally decided to do a lunch rehearsal so then people could go back home IF they wanted.

That night, though, theres wineries in the area, and there's one that has live music! So we are going to go wine tasting and hear live music and bring picnics. Anybody who is staying at the hotel is invited to this b.c its a public event so I put it on our website.

I think it will be awesome! I'm just a little nervous on how it's all going to go, but as long as FI and I are having fun together that's all the matters. :)

Oh, and I still don't know what we're doing for accomodations the night before the wedding...ughhhhhhhh

The wine tasting sounds amazing!!!

Yea our rehearsal is on Saturday at 4pm. We're getting married on a golf course and they only have a golf outing Saturday til 3pm then it's open for us.

I get what you mean by feeling bad for asking people to do stuff for your wedding. I'm the same way. I actually had my MOH and her mom come visit a few weeks back, and the major reason for the visit was to help with wedding stuff...well then when they were I felt so bad for asking them to do things we only did a couple things. I felt like a slave-driver! lol

But, I'm with you on having people be out of town. Nobody lives in our town so everyone is coming about 1-2 hours to be at the wedding. We saved a block of rooms at a discount for everyone so hopefully that will help them. We've tried to offset the long trip with things to do - Friday night we are having a bbq at our house for anyone who comes to town early. Saturday we might go to a place in town that has go carts, putt putt and laser tag then of course the rehearsal. Then monday we are having brunch at the hotel and lunch/gift opening for close relatives that are still in town bakc at our house. But really, these were things FI and I would be doing anyway. Try not to feel bad asking your bridal party to come into town for your wedding. They agreed to be part of your day and most people know what's involved in being in a wedding, plus they're doing it because they care about you!

I know, it's good to hear from other people, so I will definitely try and see what I can do about having the bridal party there for the rehearsal friday night.

That's nice you're having things like that. We will probably do a brunch the day after, but none of our houses are that closet o the venue, so I'm not sure when we'll open our gifts. No room in our apt either. We've gotten three gifts in the mail and they're just sitting in our living room still! Boo. These last two months will be interesting.

our rehersal is actually the tuesday (9/4) before our saturday wedding (9/8). tuesdays were the night that worked the best for my BMs bc they all live and work at opposite ends of the universe from me, so i went with what worked for them! there is a very cute little italian resturaunt that just opened around the corner from our apt, that i am hopingggg we can talk FIs parents into having it at! their food is amazing! we are going there next week to have dinner with them, and book it. so my fingers are crossed that they like it as much as we do! our church rehersal is at 530-6pm, then we'll probably have dinner by 730 (rehersals at our church take ATLEAST and hour and a half) during dinner, we will say a quick little thankyou, and give our bridal party their gifts there. everyone lives far from us, and its a work night, so we wont be hanging out long after dinner is over. then it will be the longest 4 days of my life until i can walk down the aisle for real! ahhhh.

Oh wow kplusd I agree, that would be a really long 4 days! I wish we had a cute little Italian restaurant. Sounds like you have a really nice RD planned though :)