Hunting for Real Estate (Part 2)...South of the Border and Back

Soooooo here we go again only this time we decided to trade in our backwards moving freeway caravan (or in our case Sheri's purple Kia and my white 4Runner) for our laptops and incessant need for a constant excuse to go on vacation. Seeing as how I (Sarah) was on the verge of a complete and utter psychotic breakdown, Ryan, in attempt to ensure that his new "pre-wife" wouldn't have to be in checked into an institution where it's inhabitants think they are choochoo trains, thought maybe we should reconsider our previously shunned idea of having a destination wedding. Remembering that my parents went to this beautiful resort owned by their very good friends in Hualtulco, Mexico for Thanksgiving one year, I decided to give my mom a call and get more information, not that we needed any since the pictures spoke for themselves. (for more pictures and rental information go to: http://mexicanoceanfrontvillas.com/)

We liked the simplicity of somewhere else and I (Sarah) felt less and less like a drooling choochoo train at the thought of having someone else do everything and I could just show up (and let me just say there must be diabolically opposing forces working at the inner depths of my core for this "Type A/OCD" soul to give up such control). Given the IMPLOSION in our economy we wanted to be as sensitive as possible to the intracacies of having a wedding in unfamiliar and potentially pricey territory. Despite the intimacy of a destination wedding we both still very much wanted the party so it was still important for us to make it possible for friends and family to be there. The owner's of the resort gave us a fantastic deal for the entire resort that could potentially house 60 people and a 10% discount on any flight reservations made in relation to our wedding....Could it be that this was IT, THE PLACE, DESTINY?!?!?!?! Alas...NOPE but this time with the most amazingly flattering reason ever! I must say we both have THE MOST incredible friends and family EVER. We had over 70 "YES" preliminary rsvp's. We can't begin to describe how blessed we feel to have so many people that love us so much (and due for a MUCH needed vacation) say that they, "wouldn't have missed the big day for anything." Seeing as how we wouldn't be able to house everyone at the resort and not being familiar with the area we didn't want to risk everyone not being in the same location...so here we go again...What round of searching is this now??? Elventy?

Some of our other destination searches:

St. Lucia

Bermuda
Turks & Caicos

Then this thought blind sided us with a meteroligical 2x4...August + Caribbean = HURRICANE... NOPE!!!

Next stop: Manhattan Beach..."All Aboard." CHOOCHOO!!

All throughout this process we keep getting asked the same question, which leads me to believe it must be important. Well it's certainly a good thing we know how to answer it then, or perhaps it's that WE HAVE NO IDEA HOW TO ANSWER THAT QUESTION!!! This question was developed in the bowels of Hades and takes the form of, "What do you envision?". Sarah's short answer, "I envision that I get a phone call telling me its all ready and I just need to show up, oh and that it's free...does that help?" Ryan's response is not as much verbal as is it is a slow terrified look in my direction hoping to find that his future wife's head hasn't exploded at hearing the firey mouth of the "Dark One" yet again opening it's "trap-0-auditory poison" to spew verbal fire one more time. So imagine my delight when my night in "wedding planning" armor calls me and says, "I talked the Event Director of a place in Manhattan Beach and she gave me a price list that it looks to be within our budget. She will be there til 7 tonight. Can you get off a little early so we can check it out?" I think Ryan wears the armor to protect himself from shrapnel wounds of inevitable spontanious "pre-wife" combustion. We have walked by this hotel many times before seeing as how we LOVE Manhattan beach and hope to one day live there, however we had never been inside until this night. At first glance it seemed perfect, it had the modern, clean-lined South Beach chic appeal that we tended to gravitate towards (mind you we still can't answer the "question that shall not be named"). The rooms are AWESOME, the food and drink is phenominal, it was centrally located to major areas of entertainment, accomodations and transporation, plus the venue only performed one wedding a day and seemed to have all the amenities and privacy we needed to ensure everyone had a great time.

Sounds great right?!?!?!?! Oh...wait...here it comes...

"THE CATCH"

Even though this beautiful hotel is basically across the street from the beach and the pier, they don't perform ceremonies on either one. What they do is have the ceremony in their enclosed courtyard and when the ceremony is over they herd everyone into the bar area for cocktail hour so they can turn everything over to create the reception area where the ceremony was held. This doesn't bode well for "mixing things up" more importantly we would have to skyrocket to the outer perimeters of our budget in order for us to either make the place look and feel varied and less monochromatic or go through all the "rigamorrow" of renting chairs and getting permits to hold it at the beach. So here I shall say it yet one more time... NOPE (but with this caveat: We would highly recommend this place, great Mojito's, sliders and all around feel)

CHOOCHOOO...and onwards to "Hunting for Real Estate Part 3" ...CHOOCHOO, let the drooling and head voices begin...CHOOCHOO, is that steam coming out of Sarah's ears?!?!...CHOOCHOO, is that Ryan putting on his armor again?....

Side Note...

First let me (Sarah) start off my apologizing for taking so long to post a new blog...It seems as though there actually IS life outside of wedding planning and if you ignore it, it comes CHARGING at you like a pissed off bull in a Spanish Bull Fighting Exhibition.

Second...
I would just like to thank my RAD parents and FANTABULOUS "Pre-Husband" who apparently agreed with my tactics of "calming nerves and promoting tranquil serenity amidst times of turmoil" as mentioned in my previous post (and at 6.3 frames/second I will be like a 24 hour zen garden of sorts). On the evening of February 4th, I came home to this little wrapped treasure. This little nugget of fantasticness is guaranteed ensure rapid advancements in world peace...or quite possibly a sense of shear terror in my photographer that I will stalk her even more than I already do now (sorry Natalie, I will try my hardest to avoid having you file a restraining order against me :)!). Not to mention generate complete and total annoyance to Ryan as I take pictures of his every basic movement, which he HAS to be ok with because it's part of that whole "will you marry me" deal he signed! If anyone would like a visual as to my excitement upon opening this golden piece of extacy, Ryan harkens it to something like this (next to Kandee's video's, hands down THE BEST video on youtube):

In any event there is a point to this little side bar as it relates to wedding planning because I am so super excited to learn how to use it to record every moment of this little adventure. When I hold it and as I learn more about it is sparks a passion within me, like some how this is something that I was meant to do (even if all it ever becomes is a hobby). Within weeks of getting my new gift I recieved these two little pieces of encouragement.

Not that I take stock in fortune cookie messages, I just found them ironic given the fact that I don't really even like Chinese food but I found myself at PF Chang's twice in one week and these were my fortunes. In any event something come's alive inside knowing that I now have the opportunity to learn and hopefully one day share something that I have always loved. Classes don't seem like a painful induction to an educational coma and with each picture I take I am super excited to learn more. I actually have withdrawls if I go long periods of time (and by long periods, I mean days) without using it (the fact that I have NO IDEA how to use it irrelevant). So thanks again Mom, Dad and Ryan for not only the camera but the joy it brings to my soul!

Ok now on with "Searching for Real Estate...Part 2"

Hunting for Real Estate

Wedding planners are a lot like Real Estate Agents. They drive around in unknown areas with perfect strangers in hopes that their clients will have this "Heavenly Awakening" where the looming clouds of wedding planning will open and the trumpets will sound as they walk the "blissful couple" (and by blissful I mean dark circle eyed and exhausted) through the doors (or in some cases drive them around on electric golf carts that catapult you out of your seat upon ignition) of some vast undecorated space. Ideally in this moment, as they look at this blank canvas, their imaginations will spring to life from their sleep deprived, coffee and Red Bull dependent brains and all of their visions of wedding wonder will come flooding in like the waters of the Red Sea after partition. We have traveled to the ends of the earth, and by that I mean from Santa Barbara to San Diego, unless you count our internet research then we have escapaded through the lush rainforests of the Caribbean and the blue waters of the Mexican Pacific, in search of our own trumpeted serenade. Countless weekends (ok maybe 4 weekends) at negative 5 miles per hour have been spent on the 6 lane neverending parking lots otherwise known as the 5, 405 and 101 freeways. Ryan and I have made enumerous friends (or at least summonded some crazy looks) with our parking lot neighbors as we essentially drive at a backwards pace. In those moments of silent lull when frustrations of non-forward moving progress begin to embed at the depths of your gut and you begin to secretly (or in my case outwardly) wish you owned a monster truck and an automatic weapon, I (Sarah) break out my camera and do this...

Because there is nothing like someone snapping multiple pictures of you amidst times of turmoil and angst (and YES TRAFFIC DOES CAUSE THESE!!!) to calm the nerves and promote tranquil serenity (just think of all the good I could do if I had my Cannon 50D digitial SLR and multiple lenses). Onward with the JOURNEY...

Now keep in mind when I (Sarah) look at a venue I try to look at it as if I were looking through a camera lens because ultimately your photo's are what you are going to have to remember your wedding by. I want our photo's to have the photojournalistic, candid shot appeal to them and since I have already booked THE BEST photographer on the face of the planet I tend to try and take into consideration what she could "do with the place".

Weekend 1...Santa Barbara:

Our original thought was to rent a big estate somewhere with "sprawling grounds" (you think I am wordy, you should see some these property descriptions, it's like the writers carry around a "Thesaurus O' Exaggerated BS") where our families could come from far and wide and have a place to stay, hang out and end the week with a giant party. Now mind you most of the members of our two families have never met each other and if it's ANYTHING like the Christmas Ryan's parents came to my parents house and met for the first time, Ryan and I knew we were in for some great future "leverage/blackmail" opportunites. Think the Griswold Family movies times a Gagoolian (yes that's a word where do you think Google came from). So being it was the holiday's and Ryan's parents were in town we thought we would all check out this beautiful estate:At first we were STOKED!! The price seemed right, it was in a BEAUTIFUL neighborhood, near the beach on some bluffs. Then all of a sudden they tacked on this bogus fee that didn't include ANYTHING!!! So... NOPE!!! (besides who really finds their venue on the first try and if they exist, where are they so I can take my monster truck, run them over and then shoot them!)

Weekend Two(one month later)...Simi Valley:

Despite blustery arrid winds and the smell of the "East Valley" we braved the Simi Valley natives (think Sparks with money, you Nevadan's know what I am talking about) and made it to our first REAL venue stop:

This place was very SPACIOUS, had a lot of eclectic rustic appeal and we loved the rowboat on the lake. However, it somewhat reminded me (Sarah) of Stephen King's book and movie "The Shining"..."All Work and No Play Makes Jack a Dull Boy"...where Jack Nicholson plays and ax toting, eyebrow lifting pyschopath set on chopping up his family to bits...yeah that movie. We thought perhaps that probably wasn't the best reference to have when picking a place to begin our lives together. So after much deliberation and careful thought, almost getting launched out of a golf cart on multiple occasions, consideration of HADES like heat in August and the final straw (which was the real deal breaker)...told that the bathrooms would cost extra (yes you read that right), our collective agreement was a resounding NOPE!!! Since this was our first venue search attempt and it had pretty much sucked the life out of us we decided we needed some booze and some time to regroup and come up with a different tactical approach. It's like strategic war, I am not kidding!

Weekend 3...Camarillo & Westlake Village:

After a week of more caffine induced recovery, we decided to hit the ground running and by that I mean we went to TWO places, to our credit one was in Camarillo and the other in Westlake Village (please refer to aforemention time regressing avenues of required travel).

First stop...CamarilloThis place was so charming, set on a vineyard with a REAL LIFE TROLLEY that would take guests back and forth from the parking lot to the venue...This could have been a very bad thing because I may have just spent the whole time on the trolley hoping for a chance to drive it...I could just see the headlines now, "Man get's stood up at his own wedding for a Trolley." Ryan was pretty stoked they had a wood fire pizza oven and we could just imagine how pretty it would be at night all lit up. The downside, in the brochure it showed that the bathrooms (they were included in the price IMAGINE THAT!) were painted with these FABULOUS BRIGHT RED DOORS (remember I am in picture mode) but when we saw the place they had painted them maroon, talk about a let down!!! (yes it's the little things that excite me). The deal breaker, however, was that the venue required lights out at 10 PM and while we know that most places make you shut off the music at 10, they at the very least let you mull around and soak in the events of the evening before you get the ol' "GET OUT" boot crammed into your backside. This OBVIOUSLY wouldn't work for our group because as anyone can tell you with our friends and family if someone doesn't get arrested then it just isn't a party...Just kidding mom! Another downfall, while Camarillo is beautiful it is a "Suburban sporting, curfew having, soccor mom" heaven (I think even the 7-11's in that area close at night) so referring back to my previous comment, our guests would have nowhere to go give themselves the opportunity to get arrested after they left the reception...Just kidding again mom. So yep, you guessed it...NOPE!

Stop 2...Westlake Village:

We are not even going to dignify this place with a paragraph. The coordinator was about as personable as a cactus plant and the place smelled like a musty old retirement home....NOPE!!!

Weekend 4...Back to Santa Barbara

Unfortunately we don't have any photo's of our little weekend outing because of the nature of our visit. My mom (Sarah) was put in contact with the most delightful of people that graciously offered their beautiful estate to us to hold our wedding. While we don't feel it is right to post photo's of the place they live in, we felt it necessary to tell you how touched we both were that this couple was willing to open up their home and their lives for two people, their families and their friends whom they don't even know. Not only that, but they were willing to rearrange furniture, bring in their housekeeper to maintain proper care of the common areas, wanted to HELP during the event, and even (and I think this touches me the most) offered the use of their BEAUTIFUL grand piano in case we wanted to wind things down with a bit of classical music after the reception. I must say it isn't very often that we come across people that we know in our own lives that are willing to open what is most precious to them and share it with people they know, let alone perfect strangers...So to them, we say thank you from the very bottom of our hearts!

In any event, it turns out that the weekend we are planning to have the wedding is the big "FIESTA" in Santa Barbara. We are not sure what this all entails, but at the wisdom of our gracious new friends we heeded their advice that the possibility of hotel rooms in the area for out of towners is NIL and anyone thinking about traveling from anywhere north of Ventura can count on a 3 to 6 hour drive, which means they would be driving negative 10 miles on said freeways (unless of course they monster trucks and automatic weapons).

So, we will end our journey here for now...More wild and wacky adventures, Redbull, booze and coffee and we will even have a new addition to our venue hunting expedition...Stay tuned for part 2 of Hunting for Real Estate...

Sunday Wedding Planning...Groom Style

Ryan was REALLY REALLY excited to board the "Planning Train" today... You can see the complete and total concentration in his every movement and facial expressions...

As he intensely studies the options laid out before him, he decisively ponders the best course of action...

using his cat like agility...

For the most optimal outcome...

Ahhh...the rewards of sweet sweet wedding planning victory!!!

When Type A meets OCD and Decide to Marry...

Just in case you were wondering...Yes those are torn out pages of bridal magazines (non of which are "Six Steps or Less" articles) placed into individual piles categorized "post-it" style by the undefinable terms previously mentioned...and that is just Stage 1...

Stage 2...The Label Maker:

A while back when we moved into our apartment, I came home from work to find Ryan amidst a heap of what looked like confetti grinning like a school boy who just won the playground kickball tournament. Apparently he had taken a little field trip to an office supply store and purchased a label maker. He spent the rest of the afternoon "making sure it worked" labeling everything from staplers to plastic containers. Ladies and Gentlemen, meet "Mr. Type A." At the time I just set down my purse, rolled my eyes and proceeded to let him have his cheap thrills so it would give me something to make fun of him for years to come. Turns out that it has been a little piece of wedding planning heaven. The aforementioned "post-it" piles have now been transformed into a "binder-o-bliss" neatly labeled into general categories. Each pile will find themselves neatly placed in a manila folder labeled according to their specifically assigned "sub-category" and will then be housed in their specific "general" category within the "binder-o-bliss". But we will save that excitement for Step 3...I am sure it comes as a complete shock to everyone that I would be the OCD in the marrying equation.

Looks like I won a little kickball tournament of my own :), good thing Ryan doesn't have a purse to set down, although I did catch him rolling his eyes...

HURRICANE O' PLANNING!!!!

"Enjoy this weekend, because come Monday the flood gates of wedding planning hell will gloriously open up and welcome you in with the brute force of a category 5 hurricane!" These were the words of our neighbors who we shared the engagement news the morning after the proposal...At the time we didn't think much of it. As the words were coming out of her mouth, I thought to myself, "Eh it won't be so bad, we are easy going people with simple taste who just want to plan a nice party for our closest friends and family." Flash forward three weeks to today... The winds have come from every which direction in a full force planning attack hurling things at us in a language that I don't think they have a translation book for. And if you think those bridal magazines are a help...THINK AGAIN, if fact I am convinced they are designed to confuse you so that you go out and buy more of them hoping to get some glimpse of clarification! Words like venue, uplighting and save-the-dates, as well as questions like, "Are you looking for a A-line, ballgown, or Sweetheart shape?" are being hurled at me with projectile force.....One word I am beginning to understand though is ELOPE!!! Is this what the 350 pounds of bridal magazines that are rapidly claiming their own corner of our apartment mean when they write uninterpretable articles using aforementioned words and questions with the titles like "Six Easy Steps to Wedding Planning Bliss."....

How it Happened

It really was perfect because it wasn't all Hollywood "Scoreboard at a basketball game, write it in the sky, have the waiter slip it in my champagne" cheesy. Although those things aren't bad, they just aren't me and Ryan knew that just because he knows me.

Ok so I will try to make this short and sweet (It is definitely sweet but if it's not short then don't get mad because you asked!!!): It was Friday, December 5th. Ryan had told me that he had an early meeting that morning so he left way before I did. This is the ONLY night I am not it school till 10:00 pm so I actually get to come home at a decent hour. I got home from work and I walk into the apartment which is covered in flowers and a tea-light candle holder with about 20 tea lights all lit up (which he made the night before while I was at class).

As most of you know I am in paralegal school and I am studying for the LSAT and applying to law schools, so with all of that on my plate there was NO WAY I would have figured a proposal into the equation. I just thought all this ambience was created because we hadn't had much of a chance to spend any real time with each other. He was in the kitchen cooking dinner and said, "Hi welcome to date night!" Me being the smart ass that I am said, "Wow, we are at the old married couple date night stage already...FABULOUS?" and then quickly followed with, "Everything looks great, thank you." (don't worry he laughed at the smartass comment). Turns out he didn't have an early morning meeting he left really early to go to the Downtown LA flower mart. So we sat down and had dinner, followed by about a half hour of conversation, when I finally get up to go to the bathroom. When I got back to the table we sat for about another half hour just talking when I had realized that vase of roses on the table had been rearranged and there was a card sticking out of it (come to find out it was there the whole time I just didn't notice it).
So I say, "I thought you got these flowers at the flower mart?" and he says, "I did" to which I reply, "Then why is there one of those cheesy cards in the flowers like you get at a flower store?" "I put it in there," he replies, "Oh well I guess I better read it then," I say. So I open up the card and it says, "If you can find it..." So I looked at him with a classic "Sarah smirk" and the following dialogue takes place:

Me: "What are you up to (mind you I still didn't even think that is was a proposal)".
Ryan: "I don't know, why don't you find it?"
Me: "Find what?"
Ryan: "It"
Me: "Well since I have NO IDEA what I am looking for and you are SO GOOD at giving clues, I guess I will just start looking in all the flower vases (there were about 15), since that is were the "clue" is."

I then proceeded to get up and look through all the vases (he is still at the kitchen table). I get to our bedroom and there was a vase of white roses next to some lit candles on top of our dresser, where I see a little orange box.
Now here is the point in the story, where you say, "C'mon Sarah you had to have known NOW!!!" Well the answer to that is NO I didn't and here is why: For my birthday earlier this year he got me a pair of diamond earrings from Costco and the box that their jewelry comes in is an orange wooden box, just like the one in the flowers. So at this point here is what is going through my head (mind you I didn't verbalize it, shocking I know!!), "You BIG JERK, you went out an bought me some expensive jewelry for Christmas when we explicitly said we wouldn't buy each other anything and I didn't get you anything THANKS ALOT PAL!!!" Instead what came out of my mouth was, "Ok I found something in the flowers, now what?" He proceeded to come into the bedroom and pull the box from the flowers and open it and say, "I wanted to know if you will marry me?"...TALK ABOUT DEER IN HEADLIGHTS!!!!! If any of you remember the look I had on my face at my surprise 30th birthday he and my family threw for me earlier this year, multiply that exponentially. When I am surprised I tend not to show too much emotion, rather I stand there for a few seconds with a totally confused look trying to asses the situation, so after what I am sure seemed like a lifetime to him a big smile appeared on my face and I started laughing uncontrollably while saying, "Yes, I would love nothing more than to marry you."
So that is the "Proposal Story".

If you are wondering about the "preparation" details, he asked my parents permission at the beginning of September when we went to Tahoe for a wedding. He knew about the ring because he talked to my sisters. About 4 years ago (I didn't even know Ryan) my brother-in-law asked my youngest sister and I our opinions on a ring that he wanted to propose to our middle sister with. My sisters and I then decided to exchange emails of rings we liked in "THE EVENT" we ever got asked, turns out my sisters kept that email. He knew my ring size (which I don't even know) because I was playing with his niece at some point in our 2 year relationship (I don't remember to particular play time incident) and we were playing with her jewelry. Apparently I put on a ring that fit my ring finger and he saw it, so he took that ring kept it with him (for I don't know how long) and had it sized so that he would know my size. The ring came to his office on Friday, which he later told me that is the only reason he went to work. However, he did keep the facade that he was at work because he was continually IM'ing throughout the day, which is how we talk to each other while we are at work. At about 5:00 PM he IM'ed me saying, "I am getting out of here. What time do you think you will be getting out of there?" so that he could guage how much time he had until I got home. At this point he had been home for hours setting up, he had just turned on our home computer and signed in to make it look like he was still at work. So there you have it!