Sometimes you just know.

THE DRESS

Sometimes you see a dress or cute pair of shoes and just know you won't find anything else even remotely close. And you have to buy them immediately, knowing you won't even have buyers remorse. That is how I felt as soon as I saw this dress on Etsy (You will begin to notice that Etsy is my savior), by the ultra-talented Tatyana Merenyuk. I will try on other dresses, just for fun though. Because I know that this is the dress, and I will not find anything even half as perfect. 


Perfect right? Yes! Except... I need to loose weight so that I can get a breast reduction. TMI time people! I am a 34/36 F. It's just way too large. Even when I am slimmer, I still am a 34 DD or larger. Finding clothes that fit, and I don't burst out of is extremely difficult. I have back pain all the time, and after 5-6 hours of standing at work it gets much, much worse. You know that feeling you get when you have a really great workout, and you muscles are all hot, and spicy? That is how my entire lower back feels, unrelentingly for hours at a time. I also have knee and hip pain, grooves in my shoulders from my bra straps and broken blood vessels all the time from the underwire in my bras. All in all, these ladies need a serious slimdown. But to do it correctly I need to be in better shape. Plus I just want to get back into the same shape I was in 2010 when Ryan and I started dating. 


Sorry about that; did not mean for that to turn into a weight entry. 


Back on track... the dress is perfect and I plan on having it altered into a hi-lo or tea length dress after a Trash the Dress session. I'm stuck on if I want a train at all though. Tatyana sent me photos of another bride she made the dress for recently and that bride had a train, a short one, and it was perfect. Something to think about, that I don't have to worry about now thankfully!

How georgous is the back too?!

The event location.

REWIND
In my last entry I mentioned that I had found the dress and event location. We have done that, but I want to blog about it anyway. So pretend we're hanging with Marty McFly and bouncing around time. It'll be fine, just trust me.

THE EVEN LOCATION
Ryan, the amazing man that he is, spent two days looking online to find the location that I found in a photo, but without mention of where it was taken. He found it magically (I'm convinced he somehow missed his owl letter), and unfortunately it was incredibly expensive. The next day he sent me a text message telling me to look at his open tabs on his computer when I got home from work. The first one was The Codman Estate. 
Their package includes the following:

• Exclusive use of Carriage House function room measuring 31’ x 31’ plus two 10’ x 15’ alcoves

• Use of the grounds, including Italian Garden and Dorothy Codman Garden

• Fully equipped catering kitchen

• Use of sixty-five folding brown chairs and 125 white garden chairs

• Thirteen 60" tables (seats 8-10 guests)

• Five 36" round cocktail tables (seats 4-5 guests)

• Three 48" round tables (seats 6-8 guests)

• Six 8' serving tables

• Four high-top cocktail tables

• On-site baby grand piano

• Expert planning guidance by Codman event staff

• One hour on-site planning meeting with your caterer

• Event Supervisor for the day

• Assistance with on-site ceremonies

• Coordination of deliveries

• One year Associate Membership to Historic New England

All of this for... $1,000!! That is INSANELY cheap. We made an appointment and went to see it. It's beautiful, even with the dead grass and sad winter trees. We knew at once that this was the place. 

BUT there are always downsides, however small they may be. 

• You MUST choose from their approved caterers
• AND tent providers, which there are only two of and both are over $2,600
• Lincoln Town ordinance requires a police presence after sundown, for $75 per hour

These are work-aroundable for the most part. I'll get into the tent issue in another post. Reading the fine print on the contract for the location was very helpful to us. If we had just signed, we would have missed a lot of pertinent information. It's still THE place, and a great deal, but we will have to make some budget adjustments to make it work. 

June 7th, 2013, at the Codman Estate in Lincoln, MA. Done!

A little about us

ABOUT CAYSË
Caysë grew up in a small town in Vermont, on a dirt road and with one television station. For the first time off of a dirt road and thriving on a major culture shock, she moved to "The Fens" area of Boston to attend college at The New England Institute of Art in 2001. Though she graduated with a degree in Audio Engineering, Caysëcontinued to work in women's clothing retail, and transferred to Orlando, Florida with BCBG. After some great and some not so great, experiences with various companies,Caysë has found a great fit with Juicy Couture. She loves all things girly (dresses, makeup, glitter), crafting and playing with power tools.


ABOUT RYAN
Ryan grew up between Maine, a short stint in Texas and then Stuart, Florida. He moved to Orlando to attend the University of Central Florida and obtain a BS in Mechanical Engineering. Then in 2010 Ryan decided that Engineering wouldn't make him happy in his life, and instead enrolled in the Le Cordon Bleu Culinary School, in Cambridge, MA. His love of cooking, mixed with his engineering background, give him a different outlook on food and presentation. This April he will graduate, and until then he'll be finishing his externship at Eastern Standard, in Kenmore Square. Ryan is an exceptional drummer, and loves cooking, music, and Fifa.


HOW WE MET
In June of 2009, Caysë was attending a ladies' night of Arrested Development, bacon and Mad Dog 40/40 in Orlando. Meanwhile Ryan was with friends around a camp fire in the North Carolina Woods. She said to her friends "I want to meet a nice guy, who will hold my hand and be sweet to me." Her friend text messaged Ryan about a girl that wanted to kiss him, and was assured she was cute. He responded with "She better be!" Caysë rolled her eyes and assumed he was NOT going to be the nice guy she was looking for. 


A week later they were introduced by a mutual friend and went out to a group dinner. She actually was surprised about how cute Ryan was and attempted to make conversation through dinner. The next day, Caysë voiced her concern that she was sure Ryan wasn't interested, due to the fact that he just ate and didn't talk much (later she would come to find out he just really likes eating!). But in fact, at the moment she had been expressing her disappointment, Ryan had just been asking a friend for Caysë's phone number. He took her to Seasons 52 and they totally fell for each other. 


They dated for 2 months (months full of ribbing from both sides' friends), before becoming "official". After dating for a year, Caysë wanted to move back to Boston, but was afraid of losing Ryan. Little did she know he had already applied to Le Cordon Bleu in Cambridge, MA, which he revealed while in line for the Toy Story ride at Disney. In July 2010 the couple packed up their lives, and their furry friend Houdini, then drove the 1,300 miles to start their new life in Boston.


ABOUT US & THE WEDDING
As for the wedding, it's very DIY (we are paying for it ourselves and are not independently wealthy haha!) and we are doing an outdoor, rustic-y feeling. Maaaaaybe because Briar Rose was my idol as a child, and maybe now still, with all of the singing and dancing in the woods. Neither of us follow any sort of religious path, and our ceremony is looking like it'll be about 10 minutes long. We've reserved June 7th, 2013 at The Codman Estate in Lincoln, MA. 

Check out my wedding centric boards at http://pinterest.com/pantsfree_cayse/ (this is NOT porn, I just avoid pants and freaquently wear dresses/skirts), Reception Ideas has the most solid interpretation of what we're envisioning. Mason jars, flameless candles, raw wood, etc...  This is my dress, all soft and flowy without being all overdone ball gown. 

We are super simple, kind of boring people. Ryan is a Chef and I am a retail manager at Juicy Couture. I have tattoos, he doesn't. I not so secretly believe I am a pretty, pretty princess, and Ryan is outwardly emotionally defunct. For example, "Ryan the house is on fire!" "... okay. Get the dog. Are we going for brunch still?". We spend most nights in, playing scrabble and drinking craft beers or cheap wine. Okay I drink cheap wine. We have a dog, a small Labrador named Harold Houdini Jr, who's our best friend in the entire world and is going to be our ring bearer. Yes, we are totally those people! 

 (We don't smoke, but we do make the perfect Blake Fielder-civil and Amy Winehouse doubles.)

We're engaged!

Here's what happened:

On Valentine's Day 2012 Caysë and Ryan woke up together at 7:30am, since Ryan had class and Caysë had to open at 9am at work. She gave him his Valentine Card and then got ready for work. Ryan skipped school "because he was sleepy" but really because he wanted to be home to sign for THE ring when it arrived in the mail.

He called Caysë at work and when she hung up with him, he surprised her by walking into her store. He'd taken a cab for $30, just to meet up and have her help him buy new clothes. Of course Caysë thought he was crazy and being wasteful, since she could have picked him up after work. 
Ryan waited for her until she finished work and then they went to the car to drop off his purchases. When they got to the car he told her he had a gift for her, that she could have right now. He pulled a little red box out and opened it up.

"What is that?!"

"It's an engagement ring."

"OMG, really?!"

Caysë tore off the ring she was wearing on her ring finger "GET THIS OUTTA HERE" and put on the beautiful engagement ring, gave Ryan approximately 1.4 million kisses, and proceeded to jump up & down, yelling "we're getting married! we're getting married!" Then stopped, got serious business face and said "whoa, we're getting married." Ryan laughed.

That's pretty much what happened.
He totally forgot to ask, and she forgot to say yes, but the sentiment was understood on both parties haha
Now we're planning, planning, planning and on a budget (that just seems to be getting bigger and bigger UGH), and doing as much DIY as we can. DIYing the things that make sense, gifts, decorations, flowers, etc.. but we are getting a caterer, photographer and DJ. 

ps - BAM!