Honeymoon

I will post some more wedding stuff soon, but I have been posting a bunch of honeymoon posts on our everyday blog. So stop by suzanneandlance.blogspot.com to check out what we've been doing! You can also see a bunch of pictures from Tracy and Jesse's wedding!

Love, Suzanne

The Friday before our wedding...

So, Friday morning after a few hours of sleep, I got up and made a list of everything I needed to do. Lance was off playing golf with his groomsman so I was not able to delegate anything off to him. I totally understand now when brides say they don't eat. There is seriously no time for eating. These last few days leading up to the wedding I literally had one meal per day. And that was only because it was something already scheduled. Like the rehearsal dinner, or dinner with his family. It's probably a good thing those meals were scheduled because I may have never had a meal! It wasn't even a, oh my goodness I'm so nervous I can't eat thing. It was a, I have too much to do I can't stop to pick anything up thing!

As I was running errands on Friday, I realized my maid of honor Tracy would be off work so I called her and started having her pick something up for me. She graciously did, and saved me from freaking out! When I got home, it was time to start getting ready to head to the hotel for the rehearsal. I had to get all the gifts ready because they were being given out at the dinner and I had to pack everything we needed for the ceremony and reception. I could not believe how much stuff we were bringing to the hotel. I told Tracy it looked like we were moving out and into the hotel. We had boxes of programs, and our sand ceremony stuff, a projector, a computer, our picture frame, all of the presents and so much more. As I was getting ready I realized that I still needed to pack for a weekend away at the hotel! There was so much commotion going on in the apartment with me and Tracy getting ready and packing everything up, that Murphy had a meltdown. For those of you who don't know Murphy, she is the queen of this house. She likes order and routine. There was definitely no order, or routine on Friday. Lance came home from golfing to quickly change and get ready before we had to go and I hear him yell from the bedroom, Murphy threw up...... twice. I'm like are you freaking kidding me. This is like having a child. There was no time for this! Leave it to Murphy to remind you that she's in charge, and that she doesn't appreciate the craziness going on! hahaha

We headed off to the hotel for the rehearsal and had a great time. Now I know why rehearsals are so valuable! The whole thing went fast, but it was very much required for all of to figure out what the heck we were doing!

Here are some pictures from the rehearsal and rehearsal dinner.

This is Patrick. He is the cutest, most well behaved kid ever. He's 6, and I just want to hug and kiss him all day long! He's got the coolest Mom and Dad too! I hope when he's a teenager he remembers that!! (Oh and please disregard the date on all these pictures. They are from Cat and she had the wrong date on her camera. Now all the ones from our wedding day say April 26, 2009. Oops!)

Grandma, Grandpa and Dad getting ready to rehearse.
This is the only picture I have of Lance and I during the rehearsal. And Cat had it on some funky color thing. So, if anyone else who was there took any cute rehearsal pictures, can you please send them to me! Oh, and look how cute Chip is talking to Patrick behind Lance! So cute!!!

The future Mr. and Mrs. Lance and Suzanne Nowell! Only a few more hours to go at this point!

My little Becca Boo. Look at this mischievous smile! She knew all along what she was going to do when the doors opened for her to walk down the isle......and I'll let you in on a little secret.....it sure wasn't walking down the isle!! hahaha

The next sequence of pictures speaks for themselves.

We got everybody in our wedding party presents, but the kids were the cutest (no offense) so I'll just show them!

If you are still reading, you can check out my other blog suzanneandlance.blogspot.com if you want to see how our honeymoon is going. That's where we are now!!!

Love, Suzanne

Finally!

We did it! We are finally married! I'm sure a lot of you who read where wondering what the heck happened to me before and after the wedding. Well, before the wedding, I was just too darn busy to do anything but wedding stuff. After the wedding, well, I'm still trying to recover from my wedding coma.

Our wedding was absolutely perfect! I can't stop gushing about how perfect everything went and how much fun we both had. We have asked each other if we would have changed anything and our answer was a big NO! These next few blog posts are going to be pictures and stories from the last few days. I would love to share with everyone how everything came together and all the funny little moments we had during our wedding weekend.

We will be leaving for our honeymoon on Thursday, and I'll be bringing my personal laptop with me so we will be able to blog while in Hawaii too! Tracy's wedding is only 10 days away and I'm excited I finally have time to think about it! hahaha

Let's see where should I begin? Originally I wasn't going to take Thursday off of work, but as the days drew closer to our wedding I realized Thursday was a "must have" day off! My boss graciously gave me the day off and if I can give one piece of advice to brides out there, take Thursday and Friday off before your wedding!! I do not know how I would have been able to do everything without those days!

Thursday I had my mani/pedi appointment, made a last minute run to Michael's, purchased our "thank you" gifts for our fathers and groomsmen, finally went out and bought my undergarments for my dress (T.M.I. I know, but seriously, why did I wait until the last moment??) made a billion and a half phone calls, spent way too much time at the mall, bought my super cute purple vans for under my wedding dress (again why wait until the last minute??) met up with Lance's family for dinner down by the hotel, and then finally heading over to Jared's house to view our slide show. I started running my errands on Thursday at 9am, and we didn't get back home until 10pm. I'm talking a solid 13 hour day of non stop go go go. I felt good about everything I had done that day, but still was sick to my stomach when I thought of how much I still had left to do. I seriously needed more hours in the day! hahahaha

Like I said, we got home that night at 10pm. When we got home, I got into my pj's and was heading out to the living room to start finishing up the programs for the wedding. Me and my brilliant self decided to make labor intensive programs, which turned out cute, but was SO much work! At 10:25pm on Thursday evening, 2 days before our wedding the freaking power went out. I couldn't believe it. We were all standing there in the dark. Jesse had just put food in the microwave to heat up. He wasn't even able to push start before the power went out. It was really funny until I realized I wouldn't be able to get any of the work done I needed too.

We decided to just go to bed (well Jesse went out to get food since he didn't want to eat the cold food in the microwave!) but I couldn't really sleep. My mind was going over the millions of things I still needed to do. Finally at 2am the power came back on. I got out of bed and started working. I hadn't slept a wink. I couldn't, things had to be done. I cut those programs until 7am when I couldn't see straight any longer. Some of those toward the end started looking bad. If your program was all jacked up sorry. Those must have been the ones I did on no sleep! ;-)

At 7am, I had to lay down. I couldn't even function anymore. I only slept until 10am, but man was I mad at myself. When I woke up I completely felt like I had slept too long (you know 3 hours is to long to a bride to be!!! hahaha) and now I was behind! I'll continue on with Friday's festivities tomorrow. I think this blog post is long enough for now, and probably boring to everyone but me! ;-)

Love,
Suzanne

Bachelorette Party

A few weeks ago, the girls and I headed off to Arizona for the weekend to catch some spring training baseball and some sun! The girls from my wedding party packed up on a Friday and we caught a plane right out of town.

The flight over to Phoenix was so cool because the flight was full of Angel fans! We had a delightful flight there and only some minor hold ups getting our rental car. You should have seen 6 girls and their luggage packed into an SUV! It was quite interesting, but we got it all to fit!! hahaha Oh, let me introduce you to everyone. My good friend Suzy is in the back row on the left, my twin sister and bridesmaid is in the back row in the middle. My bridesmaid and sister Rachel is in the back row on the right. My bridesmaid and one of my BFF's Wendy is in the bottom row to the left. My other BFF and maid of honor Tracy is in the bottom row in the middle. And there I am on the right. I love all of these girls so much!

Once we got to our hotel and checked in we headed over to the spa.This pictrue was taken pre-spa. Post spa, we all looked completely torn up. I would never post that picture! They would kill me! The spa was really nice, and we all really liked the treatements we got! I'm really glad we added this stop to our itinerary!

After the spa we headed back to the hotel and got ready to go out that night. Cat and I love the Spaghetti Factory and any state we visit that has one we always stop and check it out. We have both been to the two in Orange County, the one in Seattle and the one in Oahu. Somehow I haven't been to the one in Portland even though I have been to Oregon a bunch of times. I'm going to have to make it a point to stop there the next time we come and visit!!! So, since we want to visit all the Spaghetti Factory's out there, we had to be total tourists and take a picture in front of the sign!

It's a horrible picture I know sorry! It really is better than the other ones the person tried to take for us! LOL This Spag. Factory building here in Phoenix was so neat. Here are some better pictures from that night!

I'll post more later, but I'm heading off to work now!

Love,

Suzanne

Hotel Information Part 2

We are just right around the corner from the big day, and if you want to stay at the hotel we are getting married at you will need to BOOK SOON! To get the hotel room for $99 a night you need to book by April 3, 2009. There is no extension and after April 3, you will have to pay their regular rate. I posted the original blog about the hotel information on January 12, 2009. Click here to get all the info and phone number for the Holiday Inn.

Love,
Suzanne

Countdown....50 days to go!

I'm doing a countdown to our wedding day on our Suzanne + Lance = Suzance blog. Go check it out if you have time! 50 blogs in 50 days, now that's what I call exciting! =)

I can't believe we only have 50 more days!!!

Flower Girl

I just have to brag.........I have the cutest darn flower girl EVER!





She'll be wearing this dress, but in purple (crossing my fingers that it arrives before the wedding!)

Here she is practicing for the first dance! Or practicing to be a ballerina....though I think softball is more in her future!

Here she is saying "I will walk down the isle without crying, I will walk down the isle without crying!"

But, we might be seeing some of this going on......and that's OK too because she's so darn cute!

Maura and Mauricio, thank you so much for letting your beautiful daughter be in our wedding! We are so honored to have her walking (or running or crying or sitting) down the isle in front of us! Cat has already said she's going to teach her how to run and scream down the isle, and I can't wait! =)

Be on the look out for upcoming posts on our wedding party. We can't wait to introduce them to you! And embarrass them too!

Love,
Suzanne

Photo Spot

Since we are having our ceremony and reception at the same hotel, I had been on the hunt for a nice park area to have our wedding pictures taken. In my head I wanted the whole wedding party to be picked up from the hotel and taken over to this wonderful area for our pictures. The problem was I couldn't find this "wonderful area" I was looking for! So in this madness I call wedding planning, I delegated the job to Lance. And boy did he find a beautiful spot! He took me there on Valentine's day to check it out. He actually found 2 other spots that he was going to show me as well, but I didn't want to see them. This spot was everything I was thinking of in my head!

We will have to make sure we aren't set up with the big palm tree coming out of our heads though! =) I'm crossing my fingers and toes that on April 25, we will have a day like we did on Valentine's Day! It was about 65 degrees and no rain, no crowds and beautifully colored water. Some may ask if I have a back up plan in case it rains. Valid question. As of now, I don't have a back up plan......it doesn't rain in Southern California!** =)

Thanks for finding our photo spot Lance! I love it!

Don't forget to read the below post on hotel information. You have until April 3 to book a room for $99 a night!

**We have been trying for a month now to book our photographer for our engagement session. I have tried to book him on my last two off Fridays and it has been raining cats and dogs both Fridays. What luck! And everyone says it doesn't rain in So Cal! I hope we are getting our rain out of the way early. Please mother nature don't rain on my wedding. PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE! =)

Invitations

Well, most of our invitations have been sent out! I'm so happy to finally be done with them! I really didn't want to pay the money that places charge to print invitations, so I decided I would do them myself. Not really myself exactly, it took a village! Thank you so much Mom, Rachel, Cat and Tracy I would have never been able to complete all these invitations with out you! You guys are awesome and the best help a girl could ask for!

Hope you all like them! I can't wait to see everybody in April! Oh, and don't forget to RSVP or you will be getting a mean phone call from me! ;-P Also, make sure you read the hotel information below if you are interested in renting a room. You have until April 3 to get a room for $99!!

Love, Suzanne

Hotel Information

Well, we are getting close to the big day! Here is the hotel information for all out of town guests and also for local guests who just want a place to crash after the wedding. Please email me at SuzyQue31@aol.com if you book a room through the Holiday Inn. That way I can keep track and let them know if I need to hold more rooms.

The Holiday Inn is giving us a rate of $99 a night for Friday, April 24th, Saturday April 25th and also Sunday, April 26th. Make sure when you call them you tell them you want to book a room for the Crist/Nowell wedding. Also make sure that they give you the $99 rate!!! =)

Holiday Inn
25205 LAPAZ RD LAGUNA HILLS, CA 92653
Hotel Front Desk: 1-949-586-5000
Click here for their website.

You must book your reservations before April 3, 2009! After April 3 room rates are subject to go up.

If you are an out of town guest and you plan on staying longer than the weekend, there are other hotels closer to us that you can stay at either before or after the wedding. Email myself or Lance and we will let you know which hotels are good!

Please feel free to email or call if you are having any problems booking! Thanks and I look forward to seeing everyone soon!
Love,
Suzanne