 Alyse and Kevin, dancing at their wedding. If I had written this recap immediately after my wedding, which happened on July 7th, I would have probably told you about how great it was, even though it was crazy hot out, and you would have thought “that’s nice, but what really happened?” I could tell you how much fun I had or how it really was the best day of my life, but what would that mean? Well you are in luck, because for my final post, you’ll get actual testimonials from the real day.
These quotes come from bridesmaids, family and close friends. One of my friends had the great idea to have some people list their favorite moments of the day while I was on my honeymoon. I came home to a thick envelope filled with sweet and funny emails about the Big Day! Below are some of my favorite of the “favorites” with a few comments of my own.
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 Alyse's DIY escort cards: drink stirrers with name tags/table assignments attached. I’ve mentioned before that I love crafts. Despite this love, I knew that taking on too many DIY projects for the wedding would be closer to the crazy side of the crazy/cute scale. My original plans included making the escort cards, table numbers and signs for around the venue, but I recently outsourced the tables numbers and signs to the stationer who did my save-the-dates and invitations. My free time for crafts has been, let’s say, limited, and I knew she would do a great job and that it would match everything else. So that leaves the escort cards for me to DIY.
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 iStockphoto This past week has revolved around getting the RSVP cards back and all of the related tasks that go along with them. What are the related tasks you ask? Well, a big one is tracking down all of those guests who failed to respond. The reasons range from “I never got the invitation,” (also known as “I don’t check my mail”) to “You know I’m coming, do I really need to send the response?” I resist the urge to say things like “YES! That is why I sent it!” or “No, but can I have that stamp back?” or “Fine, you can just tell me what your meal choice is, but it is going to be difficult to make a scrap book out of verbal responses.”
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 Photodisc With only five weeks to go to the Big Day, a popular question I have been receiving is, “So, what else do you have to do?” The short answer is: two more dress fittings, getting a marriage license, confirming details with all of the vendors, buying bridesmaid gifts, writing shower thank-you notes, ordering programs, ordering menus, and making final decisions about hair, make up and accessories. The actual answer I give is usually a blank stare.
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 iStockphoto After a few weeks of only focusing on minor details, I jam-packed this past weekend with some big wedding activities: On Friday I had my first dress fitting, and then on Saturday I had my shower. Good thing I had things to keep me distracted, because while I had a very girly weekend, Kevin was at his bachelor party.
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 Alyse and Kevin's fun response card. This past Sunday marked one year since Kevin and I got engaged! I cannot believe it has been one year since I got up before dawn to make scones for a royal wedding party that turned into an engagement celebration. The “to-do list” note Kevin left as a proposal clue was the first of many lists made in this past year, and I have a feeling there are more where that came from.
We celebrated our engagement anniversary on Friday with some pizza, wine and a long night of invitation assembly. (And no, I did not address them myself using my hard-earned calligraphy skills. But I am going to use them for something for the wedding—more on that later.) For a little bit there I was thinking that fourteen months was way too long to be engaged, and thought that the wedding couldn’t come soon enough. But now that we have officially hit the invitation-sending milestone, I realize just how quickly this year went and want to enjoy every moment.
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 iStockphoto Picking the photographer and the videographer was one of the first things we tackled during the wedding planning process. Recently, I’ve been revisiting those decisions as I piece together the day-of time line—but first, a little bit about how I came to pick those very important vendors.
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 iStockphoto One thing Kevin and I are a little nervous about is our first dance.
It seems like many couples are nervous about the first dance, but for different reasons. Some don’t like the focus being on them, some aren’t sure which song to pick and some just don’t like to dance. Thankfully, we don’t have any issues like that—we are just awful dancers. Early on we decided that we would take dance lessons to hopefully cure our two left feet. We figured that this isn’t just something that will benefit us on our wedding day, but will help in all future-dancing events.
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 Alyse and her little sister/maid of honor. Well, that was fun!
Last weekend I had my bachelorette party. Although I won’t be sharing everything, I think the planners did such a phenomenal job that I need to tell you about all of the details that made it such a memorable night.
Many ideas were floated around in the original planning: weekend trips, big activities, wine tastings—but in the end, I decided that what I really wanted was a big party. So, I invited 23 of my closest friends to New York for one big night out. Friends from childhood to friends I met in the past year traveled from Philly, Boston, DC, Chicago and a few blocks away.
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 Burke/Triolo Productions I think we have entered a significant countdown phase: 100 days to go! All this time I have been privately counting down the days with an app on my phone that today says “100 days until marriage.” You know, because it’s about the marriage, not the wedding, or something. But today I realized that I am not the lone count-downer, because several people have said “Happy 100 Days!” I wondered for a second if they also installed apps to count down the days—but I guess it’s more likely that they looked at the countdown on our wedding website or on the registry sites, which also which also have them.
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