Since my sister and I are both getting married this September, so we decided have our bachelorette parties in the same month too! My sister celebrated her bachelorette party two weeks ago with a beautiful dinner at Jo’s in the East Village of NYC, sake cocktails at another East Village bar, and dancing until the wee hours of the morning at The Anchor a small bar/dance club in the West Village where there is no velvet rope and the music is fantastic. The DJ even took requests! It was wonderful to be able to celebrate with my sister and her friends, some of whom I’ve known since they were 10 years old.

Me and my sister at her bachelorette party

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Last week, my fiancé Jake and I had our engagement photo session with our wedding photographer Agaton Strom. I was really nervous, as I had never done a professional photo session before and really wanted our photos to come out fantastic. (The perfectionist in me has really come out during the planning of this wedding!) I occasionally watch America’s Next Top Model and when it came time for my engagement photos, I actually paid attention to Tyra and Ms. Jay’s advice. I even practiced posing in front of the mirror! I knew it was a bit much, but I became obsessed. I spent two weeks figuring out what we should wear.  Jake and I decided to do a wardrobe change–for the first set of pictures we would wear nice formal clothing, and for second half of the photo session we would wear casual shorts and t-shirts.

We decided to have the photo session take place on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, where I lived for 15 years throughout college and post-college. We met our photographer on the 70th street pier, where Jake and I spent many evenings chilling by the bar and watching the water and boats from the pier.

This was one of the first few pictures we took that day as the sun was setting. I love the light in this picture. The only direction Agaton gave us was take a walk on the pier. [Read more →]

My cousin’s daughter – the life of the party!

Last weekend my mom and sister threw me a surprise bridal shower. Even after helping my mom plan my sister’s surprise bridal shower a few weeks back, I was still surprised by my own!

It all started three months ago when my fiancé Jake told me we were invited to his friend’s BBQ on July 25^th and that I should save the date. For weeks leading up to the shower, Jake talked about how excited he was to see his friend because they hadn’t seen each other in a really long time.  Little did I know that the “BBQ” was the day of my bridal shower, and they were just setting the stage for the surprise.

My mom called me a few days before the ”BBQ” and said that I had to come over to her house on July 25^th to be fitted for a bridesmaids dress for my sisters wedding, which is a few weeks before mine.  She said the seamstress was not available any other day.  Jake heard the conversation and suggested we stop by my parent’s in the early afternoon and then make the  BBBQ later in the day. That sounded logical, and I didn’t suspect a thing. [Read more →]

All of my married friends have told me that every wedding includes at least one mishap. Well…

My fiancé Jake and I had a very productive evening last Friday, stuffing our wedding invitation envelopes, addressing them and finally sending them out on Saturday morning. We were at the post-office check out window at 9:00AM as soon as they opened. The attendant at the window was so nice and wished us a hearty congratulations on our wedding. Everything was perfect. My fiancé and I both felt a huge sense of relief once we sent off the invites we did not give them another thought until…

Sunday 7:30 AM:

Jake wakes up and says “Oh crap we f’ed up.” I turn to him and groggily say “What are you talking about, we sent out all the invites?” And then he says, “Yeah but we forgot to put stamps on the response cards.” My heart stopped. “What did you say?” The only thought in mind head was “OY I am really going to hear it from my mother.” I didn’t really panic, I just thought how in the world could I have forgotten to put stamps on the response cards? I have been a bridesmaid in seven weddings, maid-of-honor in two, and attended hundreds of nuptials in my 33 years. “Oh well, it could be worse,” I thought–if this is the only screw up, then I’ll be happy.

Thankfully, we have a wedding website and at 7:45 am on Sunday morning Jake and I set up an online RSVP section on our wedding website. I highly recommend WeddingWindow.com there is a small fee but its worth it, as I’ve found the site to be a great wedding organizing tool for me.

Monday 4:30 PM:

I sent the RSVP link from our wedding website to all of our wedding attendees via email with a cute little note :

We hope you’ve been having a great summer. Our production staff certainly has, therefore our wedding invitations have been sent, without a return stamp on the response card :)
The email also included a link to RSVP online.

Its only been a day but we already have a bunch of people RSVP’s through the online link. I also got some cute emails back from friends and family saying that they want to respond to our wedding the old fashion way, and will buy their own stamps.

On Sunday we were at my uncle’s (who also happens to be a rabbi and our wedding officiant) house for lunch. I told everyone about our “funny” screw up and everyone had a good laugh. My uncle suggested that as a joke we give out stamps as wedding favors. I’m considering it :)

This is a really busy summer for me and my family. Not only am I planning my wedding, but my sister is planning her September wedding as well. The first of our wedding related events took place this past weekend, when we held my sister’s bridal shower. My mom worked so hard–decorating the house, inviting all the guests and cooking up a storm. And you wouldn’t believe how many bridal shower decorations you can find at Michaels, that store has lots of DIY decorations! We got an awesome cake from Bruno’s, our local bakery. If you are ever in Staten Island, New York and are in need of something sweet check out Bruno’s!

My mom and I tried to think of something cool to do at the bridal shower rather than the regular games, and my fiancé Jake gave us a great idea–he suggested that we hire a sushi chef to teach the guests how to make sushi. After many phone calls to multiple culinary schools and restaurants in Manhattan, we finally found a sushi chef who would come to Staten Island. The only problem we ran in to was that his English was not that great! Despite that, he was still a big hit. He made us fresh sushi and demonstrated various sushi making techniques, and all the guests received a gift bag with sushi making utensils.

What really made my sister‘s shower special was that her very best friends from sleep way camp wrote songs and toasts for her and serenaded her during the shower. They took all their favorite camp songs and made up cute lyrics that represented my sister and her fiancé. It was so touching. It really was a beautiful shower and my sister really appreciated it. And yes, towards the end of the shower we opened gifts and everyone oohed and ahhed :)

My sister and me at her bridal shower

My fiancé and I just got back from a great vacation in Florida. We went to Key Largo, Key West and Del Ray Beach where we stayed with his brother.  It was so relaxing; we went swimming, snorkeling and ate amazing seafood.  I would highly recommend the Florida keys if you need a short, relaxing vacation and you like water sports related activities.

On the way back from vacation my fiancé says, “You know where I really want to go on my honeymoon? Brazil! Its so exotic and romantic.” Brazil?!?! We had been discussing the honeymoon prior to our vacation and had a few options selected: Hawaii, Costa Rica, Brazil. I thought Brazil was just thrown in there for the mix. I did not think he was really serious about it when he first mentioned it. I am a little nervous about traveling to Brazil, as I hear its not the safest country.  I am also not sure how much time we have for the honeymoon. I start a new job in a few weeks and I have ten days of vacation for this year, so I’m not sure if I can take off for more than one week or two weeks in a row. How much time does one really need to explore Brazil?

In my head, I picture a honeymoon to be very romantic with moonlight walks on the beach, candlelight dinners, hiking in beautiful nature and lots of relaxing. Can I do this in Brazil? I have been doing some research, but the country seems really huge, and I’m not sure where we would go in the given time frame and what we could do there.

Has anyone been to Brazil and have any suggestions on where we could stay and what we could do if we were to honeymoon there?

We met with our Rabbi yesterday, who just happens to be my Uncle Mark who also officiated my Bat Mitzvah. Jake and I  had a lovely time in his office talking about how we met. Mark collected funny anecdotes to recount under the chuppah and then we started talking about the ceremony. There are so many options of rituals and traditions in the Conservative Jewish wedding ceremony that Jake and I walked away with more questions than answers. For example do I circle Jake? Do we circle each other? There is a tradition of circling beneath the chuppah seven times.  Circling symbolizes many things, among them the seven days of creation. So my question is: If I don’t circle Jake will I feel like I am missing out on something? I have seen it done many times at other weddings and it’s a beautiful tradition, but I’m just not sure I identify with it personally.  Jake comes from a Secular Israeli family and I’m a Conservative Jew, and I view it more as an Orthodox tradition. Anyone out there have stories about circling?

Another tradition that we are debating is the Sephardic tallit wrap. We are not Sephardic, but there is a wonderful tradition that comes from the Sephardic Jewish community that takes place during the 2nd part of the ceremony, where the couple is en-wrapped in a tallit. The tallit symbolizes the mitzvot and brings the couple together in their first symbolic home -  the chuppah. I really like this ritual in that the bride and groom are often standing apart under the chuppah and the tallit brings them close together.

Me (center) and my cousins

One component of our ceremony that we are sure about including is the Sheva Brachot. Sheva Brachot (Hebrew: שבע ברכות‎) literally “the seven blessings” are blessings that are recited for the bride and the groom under the chuppah over a second cup of wine.  Instead of having our Rabbi recite the blessings, we are asking family members to recite the blessings in both Hebrew and English. I have 5 first cousins and we are all really close. In addition, we have family flying in from Israel, Germany, St. Petersburg and Canada. We thought this would be a special way to recognize, honor, and include those who have traveled from near and far to make it to our wedding.

While my fiancé and I have checked most of the big things off of our to-do list like the wedding dress, caterer, photographer, and videographer, we’re really stuck on the  invitations.  My fiance and I have been thinking – are conventional invitations all that important? In the age of Evite and Facebook, do we really need printed paper invitations? And if we use printed invitations, how can avoid spending a bunch of money on invitations that will end up in people’s waste baskets?

We’ve already set up a wedding website via WeddingWindow.com, where we can conveniently manage our guest lists, send out electronic Save the Date emails and even have people rsvp for the wedding online.  We feel that invitations are an area that we could save money on, but at the same time I’ve seen some beautiful printed invitations.

Our wedding invitations must also be sent out by mid-June, since our wedding is in late September,  so we have to make a decision soon! Do we do the traditional paper invitation? Or should we go the nontraditional route and use our wedding website to send out our invitations via email?

This past week was devoted to securing a great photographer to capture our special day. My fiancé and I met with a photographer who we loved. Here is a sampling of some questions that we asked the photographer before making the decision to hire him:

1. What’s your photographic style for weddings? Posed and formal, relaxed, photojournalistic, creative, artistic, candid, traditional?
2. Do you shoot in color or black and white? Or both? Do you shoot in a digital format that can create both color and b/w versions of the same picture?
3. Can we have input on the direction of the shots? Can we give you a list of shots to work with?
4. How many other events will you be photographing the weekend of our?
5. What kind of equipment will you bring with you? How intrusive will lighting, tripods, other equipment or assistants be?
6. How long after the event will the proofs be ready?
7. Will you provide an album or photo book?
8. Do you have liability insurance?

One of the main reasons why we’re planning to hire him is his great photo style and attitude. We felt really comfortable with him during our meeting, and also liked that he had a lot of creative ideas for our wedding pictures. Additionally, I did a lot of background research on him online and found many positive quotes about his professionalism and photojournalistic style, which we also really like. We don’t want posed shots at the wedding. We’d like the photographer to blend in and take lots of action and emotion shots. It’s important to us that our pictures to capture what happened at our wedding, not just who was there. All in all, we were impressed with his other work and are looking forward to our wedding and seeing the final product!

My fiancé and I met 8 months ago on JDate, moved in together 2 months ago, and got engaged a little over a week ago. It’s been a whirlwind romance!

Our wedding date is set for September 26th, 2009. That leaves only 5 months to plan our wedding.  So much to do and so little time! In the first week of wedding planning I found a venue, booked a band, picked out a dress, secured a photographer, and found a florist. I guess all those years of  working as a corporate project planner finally paid off!  How was I able to do so much in one week? Well, it just so happens that my sister is getting married this year as well. In fact her wedding date is just 3 weeks before mine. I’m lucky enough to have been able to benefit from all of the hard work and research she’s done for her own wedding.   Additionally, I’m the maid-of-honor at her wedding and she’s the maid-of-honor at mine. So not only are we planning our own weddings, but we’re also helping to plan one  another’s. As they say in the Jewish tradition “simchas” (celebrations) come in multiples.

I know that not every wedding is perfect, and that with every event little things tend to go wrong. But my goal is to be a chill bride and not stress too much about this wedding. I know there are a lot of details that go into wedding planning, but I also want to maintain my sense of balance and not let the wedding take over my whole summer. My fiance and I are very active and into hiking, biking, and kayaking. We’ve been to almost every museum in New York and love going to fun outdoor city events like movies under the Brooklyn Bridge. We’ve been planning fun stuff like this to do in the next few weeks so that we don’t spend all our free time wedding planning!