Who are these people? - Meet the Girls

It can be awkward at any party not knowing who people are. Bunch of strangers milling about and no one to really knowing one another. This can be true for anyone no matter how old or young. Here's a bit of information about each of our lovable 'Bridesbroads'!

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Laura

Fave Colors: Red, Pink, or Black
Fave Movie: Moulin Rouge
Loves: Music, singing, acting, dancing, Chocolate milk, sushi, costuming, video games, photography, musicals and horror movies
Hates: Wearing Shoes
Claim to Fame: Has a magical ability to make milk shoot out of Carrie's nose, and can totally pwn you in Halo.

Laura and Carrie met in Middle school through a mutual friend named Jenny. Originally Laura and Carrie kind of hated each other, though they kept civil for the benefit of Jenny. One fateful night Laura invited Carrie over for a sleepover with Jen and (with a sheepishly presented offering of cold pizza and water) a friendship started. Through middle school and high school French class the two drew funny comics, wrote stories together and passed goofy notes back and forth to amuse one another. Carrie considers Laura one of her oldest and most cherished friends.

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Kat

Fave Colors: Blue
Fave Movies: Indiana Jones, the Harry Potter films, Evolution, the Lord of the Rings Trilogy, The Pagemaster and MANY others!
Loves: Reading, writing, creating things, art, sculpture, movies, cooking, costuming, tabletop & written rpg's, Lord of the Rings, StarWars, Star Trek, Scifi Channel and Food Network.
Hates: Liver and Colds
Claim to Fame: Roleplay Game Enthusiest, and Queen of Awesomely Cheesy Movies.

Kat is actually a friend of both Alan and Carrie. The three of them met during the tour de force at the Art Institute of Atlanta, though a mutual friend Maggie. Actually Carrie had fallen and twisted her ankle walking to the school from parking about half a block away, Maggie pulled over when she saw Alan helping Carrie hobble down a busy, sidewalk-less street and they piled into the car and into friendship. Kat eventually moved into the same apartment complex where Carrie and Alan lived, and the friends kept up the tradition of living in the same area until Summer of last year. Kat makes geek chic. She's an amazingly talented illustrator, sculptor, costumer, propmaker and has awesome taste in shoes! Currently Kat resides in East Lansing Michigan with family and her devilshly delightful fiance Gavin (whom you'll meet later). Recently she's taken up cooking (and making our mouths water with her results), you can see her exploits at her own cooking blog here!

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Maggie

Fave Colors: Purple
Fave Movie: Chicago & Moulin Rouge
Loves: Art, Photography, Reading, Cooking, Jewelry making, Tennis, Dancing, Singing in the car, shoes, chocolate, butterflies, Hello Kitty, Manga/Anime, Food Network, music and Twin Peaks
Hates: Eggs and Most Seafood
Claim to Fame: Her laugh and the pod racer sound her old car used to make.

Another friend through school Maggie met Alan and Carrie. . .well funnily enough neither party can remember exactly when they first met. Originally Maggie was supposed to be a roommate in Carrie's dorm, but that somehow didn't work out through school logistics. Either way, the friendship is there and it's not going away anytime in the foreseeable future. Maggie was always trucking it the two hours back and forth from her home town in northern Georgia to Atlanta for classes. She'd sometimes crash at Kat's appartment during our days at North Chase. Maggie now lives in Atlanta with her husband Louis AKA 'Loopy' (who you will also later meet). Style, humor, and a love of all things cute, being around Maggie tends to bring a smile to anyone she's around.

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Shelley

Fave Colors: Green and Earth tones
Fave Movie: Lord of the Rings, V for Vandetta
Loves: Camping, Reading, Writing, Horseback Riding, Climbing, Video Games (including WoW) miniature food, Nightmare Before Christmas, Music, History, Crime stories
Claim to Fame: Magically vanishing inside bookstores, Tea, and pwning the Alliance in WoW

Shelley and Carrie and Alan met through a mutual friend from school named Brian (another guy you'll meet). Well, eventually Brian figured out he 'liked it' and 'put a ring on it'. Shelley and Carrie share music and books, and good conversation on a regular basis. She's the perfect friend to sit down to a cup of tea (wonderfully brewed by herself) and have an intelligent conversation with. Now this doesn't mean she's not mischievous or playful. Recent proof: filling water balloons and pelting the boys with them. Shelley has a wonderful organic sense of style all of her own. She's a lovely and sometimes quiet girl who really opens up around friends and talk of pwning noobs in WoW.

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More to come soon!

Photos of the Invitation Making Process

Because I'm a photo dork, I played ~photographer~ while other people helped us out making the invitations (yeah I know taking pictures while other people work, I'm such a slave driver). For some of you this might be a first look, for others you already know all the goodness that's inside them! Anyway PICTURES!

Maggie tells me, "This better not end up on your blog. . ." She never said which one. She's helping me glue the main invitation sheet to the inside of the cards. We went through quite a bit of glue that night!

". . .and then you just smooth it out, like this!" Maggie shows me her epic graphic-designer-mounting-paper skills. Maggie got just about all of the invitations mounted in nearly 2 hours of work! I wasn't even there for most of it because I was in a meeting, which makes me lame :/
She kept working until she ran out of glue. The next morning I woke up to find Alan had bought me more glue to finish up with. It was like getting a visit from the glue-fairy~

Once everything was glued down, we stuffed everything inside of them and broke out the hemp and scissors.

So you just tie it in a pretty knot, like Alan's doing here. . .

No, that's no where NEAR all of them. . .

. . .and you keep tying until you have followed these steps of invitation crafting acceptance:

1. Denial - Of course we have enough string, and the cat's so passive there's no way she'll pounce after this stuff, it's too stiff for her to play with anyway. I mean she wasn't even interested in a laser pointer, why would she go crazy for this stuff?

2. Anger - The cat has tangled up all the string you've spent the past hour cutting. You don't have enough string either. Thumbs are now pink from 'string-burn'.

3. Bargaining - "If you get more string on the way home, I won't kill the cat."

4. Depression - There's no way we'll get these things done in time. If we don't have enough string whose to say we have enough of the other supplies? It's all too much to do in too little time!! *BAW*

5. Acceptance - It'll get done when it gets done. Oh Look! Last one!

And now it's time to play with fire and hot wax!

Brian (otherwise known among friends as 'Dimitri') is showing Shelley, his wife, proper wax dripping technique. Drip the wax in a circle pattern and then fill it in. You want a good dime or penny sized puddle-o-wax.

And then you stamp! Alan and I found a ring with a fler-de-lis on it for our stamper. A tip of the hat to part of Alan's family line, and the fact I took French for three years in High School and can only remember how to say "I am the cheese!"

"Je suis la fromage!"

So you wait about 30 seconds and then slowly rock your seal off the now cooled wax. Voila! A wax seal!

Once a few of them were done I played around making a layout which showed all the components of what our invitations are made out of. This is a layout I've found helpful in putting together a graphic design portfolio. Now if only I could get a better shot. . .

That's a bit better.

Hope you guys will get a smile out of the invites!

- Carrie

Hotel/CarrieFAIL & Invites!

Funny thing happened Yesterday (don't all the best stories start out that way?).

I got an e-mail from one of the hotels I've booked blocks for you guys telling me 'Time is running out' to book rooms. I was a little perplexed by this seeing that the wedding isn't for another few months.

Turns out there's deadline. If those rooms don't get rented, then they're skipping off to the next person who wants one. Seeing as Columbus day weekend is a pretty BIG weekend for tourists, I'm not sure how quickly those rooms are going to get snapped up.

So to make sure you aren't stranded for rooms that weekend I'm going to go ahead and post all the accommodation information NOW. If you know people who plan to come but have yet to book rooms for the weekend please point them to this posting! All blocks are saved for October 9th and 10th, under the names Tupper or Whittier.

Parkwood Inn
71 Gurnet Rd
Brunswick, ME 04011
207.725.5251
Book by August 9th(!!!) for a guaranteed room!
10% discount Available for Guests.

Comfort Inn
199 Pleasant St
Brunswick, ME 04011
207.729.1129
Book by September 9th for a guaranteed room!
15% discount Available for Guests.

Days Inn
224 Bath Rd
Brunswick ME 04011
207.725.8883
Book by September 4th for a guaranteed room!
No discount Available.

There IS a Fairfield Inn in the area as well but I haven't been successful in getting them to pull a block for the wedding. Here's their info though if you need it.

Fairfield Inn & Suites
36 Old Portland Road
Brunswick, Maine 04011
207.721.0300

Again, please don't get stranded that weekend with no place to stay! Make those reservations ASAP and I'm so sorry for this fiasco of hotel/CarrieFAIL. The same information (sans Fairfield) will be in the accommodation information on the Invites when we send them out!

And speaking of which. . .

The invite designs are FINISHED! Here's a teaser for you to oogle at!

Yeah that's all you're getting for now!

Just have to print and assemble!

*sing song* Scissors and Glue, Scissors and Glue! What can we do with Scissors and Glue!

~ Carrie