Rabbit rabbit! June is here. I'm hoping this month will be very sweet, expectant, and celebratory. There are SO many things going on: Pride. My birthday. Also, marking a year since Casper died. Taking a trip to the East Coast to celebrate with some of my bridesmaids before the wedding. And in a way, June feels like the last *full* month before the wedding, because our wedding is at the very beginning of August, so the first half of our wedding week is actually in July.
Though there are still things to do, I have to say, we feel ready for our wedding day. During these months of planning, I have really really wanted to avoid feeling stressed in the few weeks leading up to the wedding. I don't want to be DIY-ing late into the night right before, or being nervous if shipments will come in time. I think some online vendors have thought I'm a little over the top with placing orders in February for things for our August wedding, but now that I have everything in-hand, it just puts me at so much peace. There are a few little things we're still waiting on (an engraved cake cutting set, a special vintage of champagne for our toast with cake cutting, and other tiny details like that), but nothing that our wedding would be incomplete without at this point. I have outfits planned out for my bridesmaids luncheon, rehearsal dinner, wedding morning, and day-after-the-wedding, and if you know me, you know that this makes my heart SO full. I'm a planner through and through, so this wedding has been like my Olympics!
My goals for June are still mostly focused on getting ready for the wedding, but I also want to slow down and celebrate all the good things happening this month. Lord willing, Grace and I will be celebrating our fifth West Hollywood Pride together, then the next weekend we'll go away for my birthday, then the next weekend I'll fly to my favorite place on earth to be with some of my favorite people on earth. So one of my overarching, big goals is just to celebrate and truly soak it all in.
So how did I do on my May goals? I had an incredibly busy month work-wise and was lagging on many of my May goals, but in the last few days I turned it out and made several happen! That's one of the things I love about monthly goals--having that "deadline" of the end of the month helps me knock things out even though there isn't really any consequence to not completing them on time. Mainly, I like to get it all done to make way for the next month's goals, so I don't have to roll things over (though there are a couple of roll-overs this month).
To recap May:
- Meet with Rev. Ed (our officiant and dear friend) to plan our ceremony--yes. I think our ceremony is going to be so, so good. It's a very traditional Episcopal ceremony, which I think might be a surprise to some, but we've written it in a way where people don't need to have familiarity with Episcopalianism to follow along.
- Order and design ceremony programs--somewhat; I figured out what I want the programs to say and where I'm going to order them, but I need to confirm all the details of the ceremony are correct with Rev. Ed before sending it to print (so this is a roll-over goal)
- Send out our wedding invitations--yes! It's been SO fun getting response cards every day in the mail!
- Decide on all music and give notes to our band about what types of music we want played at our reception--yes, I'm suuuuper excited about the music. We have a 9-piece band for our reception that I think is going to be so energetic and fun.
- Decide on and purchase all details for reception (little things like cake toppers, decorative ribbon, etc.)--yep! Our guest room is filled with them right now, haha! Our custom cake toppers might be one of my favorite details of our wedding.
- Shop for and purchase our wedding rings (!!)--yes and omg, I am SO EXCITED for us to wear our wedding rings. Grace knows, I look at photos of my wedding ring every.single.day. (I don't have it currently because it's getting sized, and Grace's is getting custom made). My engagement ring is a 4+ generations-old family heirloom from Grace's family, and my wedding ring goes so perfectly with it, it's like they're long-lost twins.
- Catch up on thank-you cards I need to write--woefully behind on this. Working on it today, though!
- Blog a home tour--yes! This is one of those goals I wasn't sure would get done this month, but in the last few days of May I pulled it off. You can find that post here.
- Decide on some additional honeymoon details and gather recommendations--booked a couple things, but need to make a list of recommendations for each island.
- Shop for and purchase my wedding shoes--yes, I'm obsessed. I had a VERY specific vision in mind and I found exactly what I wanted. They also couldn't be more comfortable!
- Really soak in being engaged. Only 3 months left!--yeah, feeling very sweet on each other :) Now it's technically June, but we are going on a cute date night tonight continuing the theme of soaking in being engaged.
And now, my June goals:
- Get our marriage license (in California, you can get one starting 90 days out from your wedding, and we're well within that now)
- Make all wedding-related playlists (as I said above, we have a live band, but we need playlists for getting-ready music in the morning, and also for times when the band takes breaks throughout the reception)
- Touch base with all vendors and schedule meetings as necessary
- Decide on our alcohol order for our reception
- Check in with our wedding party to make sure everyone has their attire and give wedding weekend details
- Order ceremony programs
- Put together some final DIY projects (that I'm keeping a surprise for now)
- Update our wedding website with a couple of details
- Make a payments schedule for remaining vendor payments
- Finalize honeymoon details + recommendations
- Enjoy my weekend in Virginia with half of my bridesmaids! (I'm spending a special weekend with the other half in July)
- Close the chapter on my 101 in 1001 goal list and create a new one: 60 Before 30
I hope you have a super sweet June! Thanks for reading.