the dreaded invitation list.

with this post, i do believe i have surpassed the number of all posts i have ever posted on my previous blogs....combined. ha! so let this be a testament to my tireless devotion to bringing my peeps one hell of a party next fall. "hold on to your butts!" {i love saying that. can you name that movie??}

ok, my sentiments about the invitation list = shoot me. right now. please? yeah.

i am told that this is hands down THE HARDEST THING a couple has to do for their wedding.

we don't want to exclude anyone, but there is a finite number of invitations we can afford to send for a number of reasons.

when we break it down to the cost per person for food and bevies at the reception, it's easy to say we will have X number of people. but then when looking back at the list at names and thinking about how great it would be to have so-and-so come, or how happy this or that person would be to get an invite, it's not so easy. maybe we'll just go to costco and buy a crap ton of hot pockets and capri sun.

luckily the space issue is now resolved by booking st. francis hall, but finding a venue that can fit 100+ people for a ceremony and reception in the dc area for less than $2500 was crazy frustrating.

{with no particular persons in mind} what do you do about a relative whom you haven't seen or spoken with since you were 10, but is within a close circle of your family? or what about the friend whom you used to be ace-boon-coons with, and you may have even talked extensively with about going to each others weddings one day, but life happened, and you haven't really been in touch for a while? what about friends who aren't BFFs but might feel excluded if you invite everyone else in the circle? or what about really new, fun and fresh friends who you just met and feel close with, but can't confirm what your relationship will be in a year? the questions go on.... see? this part is not always fun.

i also want to be sensitive to the bride-groom invite ratio. where polotek is much more selective about his circle of friends, i feel that i have so many that would love to be apart of our special day. so the ratio currently stands at 2:1, but i don't want to dominate the event with all of my people! what to do?

right now the number is fluctuating between 150-200 people, and that is a very large group of people. huge, in fact.

a few people have mentioned that i should consider implementing "the single rule", where my friends that are not married, engaged, or in a serious long-term relationship should be asked to come alone. a few other people have told me they are less crazy about the idea. at this point, i have no clue what is the best thing to do.

because of these overwhelming factors, and my huge desire to make sure everyone is happy, i thank the heavens for schniz. my wedding goddess. we can rest assured that in the end, things will come together with her on our side.

i know, somewhat unrelated to this post, but so cute!

so yeah, it's a balancing act. some of you may be thinking that we should not worry about any of this, and that we should just let the cards fall where they will. but to me, it's not that easy. polotek and i are all about "the more, the merrier" and we want to be as inclusive as possible. we are having this wedding for all our friends and family because it IS a momentous occasion in our lives and the lives of our loved ones. so i say, go big or go home! that is, within the reasonable confines of our budget, of course. ;)

please feel free to share your thoughts and/or invitation list woes.

preliminary decisions.

we've been engaged for a little less than a month, and i am already totally obsessed and consumed with wedding fever.

let me say that i was not one of those little girls who started planning this thing when she was five. in fact, pre-engagement, all i wanted was for someone to tell me when and where to show up -- with the idea being that there would be a party all day and all night, and somewhere along the way, we'd exchange some rings and say some stuff.

polotek and i are obviously very serious people. see exhibit A below.

see? so cereal.

ha, but really. while i'd like to think that i haven't strayed too far from my free-loving idea, something did indeed happen when polotek put this two-carat beauty on my left hand. some kind of bridal magic spell came over me and convinced me that i must make this an affair to remember.

all kidding aside, i do consider this an important event for our families and friends. and i'm not going to get all "fight the power" on this blog, but i will say that it makes us proud to know that we are defying the odds and statistics that overwhelmingly show the stable black relationship as some elusive thing. like a double rainbow. or michelle bachmann's common sense.

offbeat. unique. cool. fun. all words i want people to use when they are raving to their peeps about the awesome time they had at our wedding. hellmuthafreakinyeah.

that's literally what i said, by the way. when polotek asked me to marry him. except it was the actual expletive. obviously.

preliminary decisions are the hard part. at least that's what they tell me. i sure as hell hope it gets easier after this. there's a lot of moving parts right now -- budget, venue, invite list. stress? check.

the numbers estimate is floating somewhere between 120-200. that is a large gap. we have to work that out. but part of that depends on what venue we land, which feels like we are playing a game of craps. we've decided to have the wedding in the dc area (even though we recently moved across this big country to san francisco) so we can have as many of our special people attend as possible. but scoring a low-cost venue in the dc metro area is no small feat. so i am learning.

honestly, i don't know what i'd do without schniz to pull more and more options out of her hat. its only been a few weeks, and she has already sent countless emails to places, and pulled me back from the brink of craycray at least twice. she is a wedding goddess. working tirelessly for us to find a venue that we love for less than $2,500.

does that sound like a lot of money to you? because it initially did to me. i'm learning a lot during this process, and let me impart the first lesson: weddings are not cheap. putting numbers on paper for a wedding will hurt your soul. unless you are rich. then the possibilities are endless! however, we are not rich. we are forking up $15K from our pockets to bring this lovely (and not so) little affair to fruition. there have been weddings pulled off with less, and definitely with more. but in the realm of wedding planning, we're looking at smallish peas, people.

and we are doing this the debt-free way, so that means budget, budget budget! lucky for me, i am marrying a money management master.

but still -- this wedding ish ain't cheap.