Wasn't so bad....
Well, it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be last night.
Brian's mom did beat me to the reception hall and had already begun taking measurements. I tried to help show her the general way the room would be set up, but often she lost her concentration or just wasn't listening to me. Thankfully Brian showed up and then his sister.
After what seemed like hours of wandering and him-hawing the ideas she threw out, we all came up with a great one. The room has a balcony which wraps the North, West & East walls of the room. At the edge of each overhang, linked flourescent are flush mounted (very ugly). B's mom came up with the idea to hook bunched white tulle scalloped along the bottom section of the balcony. It'll cut the sharpness of the architecture and sort of hide the flourescent light fixtures. Then, the walls on the east & west are brick with 4 cream colored support beams spaced evenly along the walls. We're planning to make 8 (4 for each side) fake flower arrangements to hook on those support beams. It'll draw their attention rather than the brick. Fab ideas. I was grateful.
The table linens B's mom is pushing, I'm not thrilled about. I need to come up with an idea that's simple and that she'll like. Right now she wants to make 60 blue panels to put in a criss cross pattern on top of the white table cloths (because the squares I thought to rent aren't large enough). I don't really love the idea plus I think it's WAAAAY to time consuming to hem all those panels even if we use the iron and stich-witchery (sp?). I told her I thought it would be too large of a project (after all I still have invitations, gifts, favors and a cigar bar to set up). Her response: "Well, we have 5 months."
When we had a good handle on things we headed to dinner. B's mom made reservations at Daniel's on Lake Union. (YAY! Lemon drop for me.) Going through more ideas at the table was tough. There were definitely times where she told me things weren't going to look right, and I "had" to do this or I "had" to do that. B's sister kept asking me if I was doing okay. She could tell I was stressed and overwhelmed by B's mom. I love that she was sensitive to what I was feeling, but at the same time she talks about how she'll be involved in the wedding when I haven't asked her to do those things. We're planning a slide show and she expects to be featured in it. She also mentioned last night that she's nervous about the speech she'll be giving at the reception. Um, Hello? Isn't that reserved for the MOH & Best Man & Dads? How am I going to break this to her?
I finally was able to say to B's mom that I hated bows - she keeps suggesting huge bows everywhere. UGH! But, I was proud of myself for saying it. B piped up at the end and reminded his mom that she needed to respect and listen to my ideas. She then followed with, "Emily knows it's her decision. Emily knows these are just ideas." Okay, right, Pushy. B's sister concurred with B and things were okay. No blow ups. Phew!
I cried a lot in the car. On the way there, on the way home, & the day before yesterday. I'm afraid it's going to be worse next week when I have PMS.
Oh, and we came to a compromise on the flowers for the church pews. B's mom going to check with the gals down at the Market to see if they'll do kissing balls. If they are around the same price as the florist, we may alternate moss covered balls with our floral balls in order to carry the look down the whole aisle of pews (alternating every other pew). Does this make sense? And she asked if she could investigate the gals down at the market. It's totally not something I want to do, nor do I have the time....so there you go.
I felt a little better about speaking my mind without sounding like a brat (my fear).
More to come.
Tonight is one of the only free nights I have this week. I'm planning to work out and then hit the PC at home to get some of our deadlines for this week crossed off the list.
Brian's mom did beat me to the reception hall and had already begun taking measurements. I tried to help show her the general way the room would be set up, but often she lost her concentration or just wasn't listening to me. Thankfully Brian showed up and then his sister.
After what seemed like hours of wandering and him-hawing the ideas she threw out, we all came up with a great one. The room has a balcony which wraps the North, West & East walls of the room. At the edge of each overhang, linked flourescent are flush mounted (very ugly). B's mom came up with the idea to hook bunched white tulle scalloped along the bottom section of the balcony. It'll cut the sharpness of the architecture and sort of hide the flourescent light fixtures. Then, the walls on the east & west are brick with 4 cream colored support beams spaced evenly along the walls. We're planning to make 8 (4 for each side) fake flower arrangements to hook on those support beams. It'll draw their attention rather than the brick. Fab ideas. I was grateful.
The table linens B's mom is pushing, I'm not thrilled about. I need to come up with an idea that's simple and that she'll like. Right now she wants to make 60 blue panels to put in a criss cross pattern on top of the white table cloths (because the squares I thought to rent aren't large enough). I don't really love the idea plus I think it's WAAAAY to time consuming to hem all those panels even if we use the iron and stich-witchery (sp?). I told her I thought it would be too large of a project (after all I still have invitations, gifts, favors and a cigar bar to set up). Her response: "Well, we have 5 months."
When we had a good handle on things we headed to dinner. B's mom made reservations at Daniel's on Lake Union. (YAY! Lemon drop for me.) Going through more ideas at the table was tough. There were definitely times where she told me things weren't going to look right, and I "had" to do this or I "had" to do that. B's sister kept asking me if I was doing okay. She could tell I was stressed and overwhelmed by B's mom. I love that she was sensitive to what I was feeling, but at the same time she talks about how she'll be involved in the wedding when I haven't asked her to do those things. We're planning a slide show and she expects to be featured in it. She also mentioned last night that she's nervous about the speech she'll be giving at the reception. Um, Hello? Isn't that reserved for the MOH & Best Man & Dads? How am I going to break this to her?
I finally was able to say to B's mom that I hated bows - she keeps suggesting huge bows everywhere. UGH! But, I was proud of myself for saying it. B piped up at the end and reminded his mom that she needed to respect and listen to my ideas. She then followed with, "Emily knows it's her decision. Emily knows these are just ideas." Okay, right, Pushy. B's sister concurred with B and things were okay. No blow ups. Phew!
I cried a lot in the car. On the way there, on the way home, & the day before yesterday. I'm afraid it's going to be worse next week when I have PMS.
Oh, and we came to a compromise on the flowers for the church pews. B's mom going to check with the gals down at the Market to see if they'll do kissing balls. If they are around the same price as the florist, we may alternate moss covered balls with our floral balls in order to carry the look down the whole aisle of pews (alternating every other pew). Does this make sense? And she asked if she could investigate the gals down at the market. It's totally not something I want to do, nor do I have the time....so there you go.
I felt a little better about speaking my mind without sounding like a brat (my fear).
More to come.
Tonight is one of the only free nights I have this week. I'm planning to work out and then hit the PC at home to get some of our deadlines for this week crossed off the list.