Tuesday, July 16

The Wedding Process

2022

Ben has been wanting to propose for several years now, starting the process in 2016
Bought a ring and hid it in three different houses 

Ben proposed in July 2022 in Leavenworth, Wash. through an adventure lab he created with several geocachers, the town historian

July 27th - started writing down things we needed to do on the large easel, that easel stayed in our living room for almost two years

Early August started constructing a guest list, we knew a lot of people

August 17th - visited Silo on 74th off of Rich Road in East Oly

September 1st - toured Creekside and then ate dinner at Flood Valley


September 16th - visited Barn on Jackson at dinner at Fliers


Ben paid a refundable deposit to the Barn on Jackson on November 11th

December 13th - Ben connected with Kari on Venmo

Ben booked Airbnb on site (July 12-14th)

2023

January 1st - booked Nicole's stepdad Darin as a DJ

January 3rd - Ben paid Kari a non-refundable deposit

February 18th - Ben asked Michael to be a groomsman, he accepted

Shopped hopped with Mom, Grandma and Janice, I bought some tree fabric to make a table runner

June 22nd - asked Willmarth to be our officiant, he accepted

June 23rd - Ben and I worked on some wedding stuff at BWW during date night in Kennewick

Most of the fall I gathered up addresses we needed, Mom, Bev and Trish helped

October 23rd - ordered invites from Walmart

October 24th - picked invites up from Walmart

November 11th - went to Costco and bought stamps 

October 28th - went into WSECU to create a joint bank account, started putting money into it.

November 26th - went to Costco and bought stamps

November 30th - bought new stamp since our one from Amazon didn't come

December 10th - venue visit with Mom, Trish and our DJ Darin

2024

January and February we spent some time looking for a photographer, having skype calls with them and settled on PNW Nemeths (out of Portland, Ore.) on February 5th

I spent some of January assembling invites and was done on January 20th




January 22nd - I mailed out all of the invites at the PO, bought two international stamps 

February 17th - I created, purchased and approved a sticker for our wedding through the Sticky Brand out of Vermont, it arrived on February 28th (200)


February 25th - ordered the Funko Pop Dolls from the internet and they arrived on March 1, 2024

February 11th - paid half the photographer

March 1st - was our date to have the RSVP cards in by, most of them came in after this date

March 7th - I had to change my bridesmaid from Lindsay to Megan 

March got our food venue situated and was sent our invoice on March 9th, Ben paid part of it
pulled pork and chicken, beans, bacon cheddar ranch potato salad, dinner rolls, mixed green salad with ranch and Italian dressing

March 23rd - we went to the mall and bought our wedding shoes 

April 19-21st: Val's bachelorette party in Oregon with Erika, Fitzy, Megan, Nicole and Celeste

April 25th - worked on bride and groom trivia questions

April 27th - went with Erika to Hobby Lobby to get fake flowers for bouquets.  Erika said she would make four bouquets and hair crowns.

April 27th - went with Mom and Grandma to JoAnne's to get rest of fabric for the table runner

May 5th - Ben went with his groomsmen to Men's Warehouse in Olympia to purchase suits.  He bought his groomsmen suits.  Ben was able to pick them up after a tie fiasco on June 7th.

May 10th - bought my dress at Macy's for $40.00



Gave dress to Grandma to put part of mom's dress on it.  Erika gave me her dress and vail. 

June 9th - bought 7 cases of water and one package of solo cups at Costco

June 11th - I went over to Celeste's house to do a trial run on my hair and make-up, we had pizza for dinner.

June 12th -we went to Hobby Lobby for some wood rounds for a cupcake tree and a couple more flowers for Eika's project since they were 40% off used joint account.

June 15th - we went and tasted beer at Dick's in Centralia and picked out two beers to serve.  Ordered the kegs.  Need to pick them up on July 12th. 

June 15th - created a Facebook group with the suggestion by Megan. Ben's friend Svend has season tickets to the Seahawks and decided to gift us a game and a parking pass.  We will be going to the Bills game on October 27th.

June 16th - received my dress and table runner from Grandma, I pad her for the alteration and the creation of the table runner, and I created a Facebook group for the wedding.  Megan is going to make everyone breakfast on the Saturday morning.

June 18th - went to Costco and purchased the alcoholic seltzer.

June 21st - gave the list of day's events to the photographers.

June 23rd - got scarfs from Value Village and a pillow for Rose's pillowcase.

June 25th - tried on Erika's shape wear, ordered a set of my own through Amazon

June 26th - finished process for wedding license, got socks, Erika bought a dress, got the pop from Costco

June 27th-29th: Ben's bachelor party with his friends in southwest Washington and Portland, Oregon.

June 28th - hair appointment with Celeste at the salon




June 29th - Mom finished the trivia's and gave them to me

June 30th - we went to the venue to check out the decorations and get ideas, Ben paid the rest of the cupcakes, venue, bought a shirt from Amazon, we got our songs to Darin, Trish purchased the white wine from Total Wine, got some pictures made at Walmart

July 1st - Trish is getting the other wine from her friend Laura who works at the Westport Winery, she will be purchasing 36 bottles of wine.  We met up with her and she gave them to us to take home.

July 2nd - bought ribbon for scrolls, Ben received guest book from Jericho and he went over there to make the cake stand.

July 5th - bought some of the wine glasses from The Dollar Tree

July 6th - stenciled the geocaches and Ben made the wedding rehearsal game

July 7th - bought dad a tie, Ben paid the rest of the food, Airbnb, got the rest of the wine glasses at The Dollar Tree. Bought some decorations from Amazon for the arch.

July 8th - got the Swedish Fish from Winco and the hatchet from Harbor Freight.  I added stickers to the handle. 

July 9th - gave Dad his tie, worked on dance

July 10th - Ben's hair appointment with Celeste, Erika finished bouquets, worked on bridesmaid's gifts

July 11th - Mani's with Erika, got bouquets from Erika, Trish comes and spends the night and helps us with some stuff, did inventory with Mom, did some of the scrolls before we ran out of ribbon, worked on dance, and a lot of little things.

July 12th - packing, driving down and decorating, getting organized, walk through (see blog)

July 13th - the big day! (see blog)

Rest of the month - deposited money, wrote out thank you cards and tried eating all the leftovers as quickly as we could.

Notes:

Ben's Mom and sister have been paying us $100 a month since July 2022

Our wedding guests were super generous.

Next Adventure:  Vance Creek Railriders and Rocky Horror Picture Show at the Drive In

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