Progress to our goal has been made again this weekend. We had dress alterations on Wednesday and then a hair trim and trial run Thursday. Dress alterations went well. Miss Butterfly’s dress now fits properly at the bottom and she’s got some little anchors to help her bra straps stay in place. Mine was a bit trickier, as wedding dresses always are. A little more trimming was needed on the top two layers. Then, once bustled, I didn’t like the way the bottom two layers of dress were pulling in the front. So, the bustle sides had to be undone and recreated. But, we are in much better shape than we were. We’ve got one more fitting the first week in April and then we are done!

As for my hair, that was really fun. Here’s the thing. I’ve never had a pro do a proper updo on me before. It was fascinating! Much like architecture, it is built carefully from the base up. Despite the fact that I didn’t really know as I went in what I wanted, she was able to perfectly create the type of look I thought would go best with my dress and jewelry. Here are some photos of the front:

I asked her to show off my grey hair, as it is a feature I really love. I think she did a great job with that!

When I got home with my hair did it was late and Miss Butterfly was in bed. I woke her up anyhow for her approval. But the best part was Mr. Ink who kept looking at me and looking at me. That’s definitely when I knew I had a win.

With that done, we now headed into the weekend. Miss Marja came over Saturday morning and we spent our morning ironing vintage linens and tying recycled sari silk bows on mason jars to use as vases.

We didn’t completely finish as we then got distracted with some planning questions, got involved in looking at the layout of the venue and discussing the best ways to use the space, then carefully planned out where most of the linens were to go as well as how to have the venue set up. This was an extremely necessary distraction and now all I need to do is get those ideas down on graph paper and communicate with the venue as to which items need to be removed prior to our event.

So this morning I continued. I got a few more bows on jars which had been recently cleaned. Then I finished ironing the linens, stacked them like with like, and used tiny little tags to indicate how I hoped these linens would be used during set up. This was an extremely pleasing task as it made me feel like I was going to be communicating my expectations in the best way possible in order to make life easy for those working on set up.

Some are tagged as “Use for this certain thing” and others are tagged as “No specific use, use it to decorate as you see fit.”

Then I grabbed a plastic unused bin from the basement and loaded them in. I took a notebook and set it to the side. Then, I packed that bin with other items needing to go to the venue. Each item that went in the bin also got written on the notebook page, sometimes with instructions. This way when the bin is full I can add the paper to the top and whoever on set up opens the bin will immediately know what happens with the items in the bin.

I feel so clever.

Friday and Saturday I put away my deep winter clothing and pulled out my spring/summer clothing. Also, do you remember the Konmari-ing I gave my wardrobe recently? I hadn’t ended up getting rid of any of those huge bins of clothing because I’d been contemplating a garage sale. Then the engagement and wedding planning happened and I didn’t have time. And then I lost a bunch of weight, making a good portion of those clothes now fit, and the clothes I had kept in my wardrobe no longer fit. So, I went through all that again. I let go of anything I didn’t like whether it fits or not and those went directly into my car. I tried everything else on and got a pile of clothes I can wear now and a second pile of clothing I may be able to wear in the future if I keep on losing. I then removed anything from my closet that was now too big and added those to another storage bin. I felt pretty darn good about all of that!

I had a bike ride planned today but woke up with what seems like a touch of a stomach bug. I canceled the bike ride and worked on wedding stuff instead. While I am not as quick about it today as I was yesterday, it’s good to still be moving in that direction.

Tomorrow I am hoping Miss Butterfly and I will get to a shop or two. Miss Marja found a really cute salt and pepper shaker deeply on sale and we only need one more fun set to add to our plans. I want to pick up some more paper products and get those packed away as well. I also promised myself I’d get a deep clean of the craft room done today. It may not happen today but it MUST happen by the end of the week so I may have to just get a bit done at it each night. But, if I could get some done today that would be awesome.

And that’s about it in the life of this wedding planner. Less than a month away and I am feeling pretty good about progress. At least, I am now confident that it’ll all come together.