FOOOOOOOODDDDD

Score!

Mark, myself,  my parents and Mark's mom & stepdad all went to Vince's for dinner last night.  This place is amazing plus very special to my Shine family and I'm so happy to say it's the official site of our rehearsal dinner.  The food is stellar (if you like to eat baby animals I hear the veal is superb) and it's a ten-minute drive from the church.  It's a good Detroiter experience for anyone that hasn't been there before. 

Last night I had the spinach fettuccine noodles and arriabata sauce. MMMM, so happy I stopped myself and saved some for lunch today.  Topped it off with a delicious dark chocolate and raspberry frozen dessert.  Mark went with pizza; the rest of the meals consisted of two veal marsalas, a spaghetti & meatballs and baked mostaccioli.  And Morettis.  Yum.

Various dating of the ups

I feel organized!  Go us :)

Mark booked us a room for the wedding night and we will also use it to get ready before the wedding.  Who exactly gets to use it is up in the air.  I vote me because I'm the girl.  Sounds totally fair to me.

I also met with our florist (aka Mark's mom) and went over what sort of flowers I like and the look and feel.  I am 100% confident they will be great!!

Invite proofs will arrive this week, then hopefully we have the actual invites by the end of this month. Then time to address and mail.

What else, what else?!?!

Did I tell you about the honeymoon...?  If not, the hotel is amazing, breath-taking and I want to go right now!  Belize.  We're staying here, I almost can't believe how awesome it is!!  Mark spends many moments looking on You Tube for videos people have posted of their vacation to that hotel.  And it looks like we will find that perfect mix of beach/pool time and adventure.

In case you were of the myth that Belize was an island, see below.  The heart is where we are staying, Ambergeis Caye, a Belizean island east of the mainland and south of Mexico, or is it actually an isthmus?

Mark and Sara as Avatars

We went to the movies!! It's seriously been about 6 months since we have gone to the actual movie theater on a date.  So basically Avatar IS as good as everyone says. 

Here I am as an Avatar:

And here's Mark:

**Note the only movie Avatar site I found was McDonald's Europe.  Fortunately my vast and extensive knowledge of German allowed me to figure this out...or all websites are basically the same...either way.

Shine Shower :)

Saturday, January 2 I had my first bridal shower and it was AWESOME!  It's very weird to be the one on the chair opening presents, I quite enjoyed it but I've learned I need to hold and pose with the gifts so my pictures don't all look like this:

Or this:

In all seriousness, everyone was beyond generous!  By the looks of it the entire shower cleared out Crate & Barrel!  It was fun to look at them all again with Mark later that day.

Thanks to DeDe, Sue, Sharon, Peggy & Kim for hosting a beautiful day.  And thanks to my awesome cousins for helping.  Kudos to the rest of the family for traipsing to Grosse Pointe twice in seven days!

Merry Christmas

Just one more Christmas party to go, we've had four amazing ones so far.  The first was a quick weekend in Aurora (Party On Wayne) with Andrew and Jeaninte Zuerner + kids.  Taylor and I flew in late on Friday just before the blizzard and met Mark, Grace and Mike who drove in at varying times on Friday.  Had a great weekend with everyone and hope they move to Michigan next!  I'm so glad to know I'm a skilled Barbie sticker applicator.

Christmas Eve was spent at Mike and Grace's home, we were fed another delicious spread (who made the Caesar salad?!) and got to spend a fun evening with them AND Chris, Alison, Liz, Josh, Maddie, Caroline & Bella.  Taylor got to open her gifts from Mark and I, I'm taking the group bear hug as a positive sign she liked her digital camera!

Even later on Christmas Eve Mark and I decided to open gifts together, I am glad I was able to keep his coat a secret.  We had a rare dinner date at Somerset in October and he spotted this coat:

Then I hid the coat really well!!  Mark would mention it about twice a week and I would say they were sold out when I went back and that it was too much, etc.  Tee-hee. 

I got spoiled big time this year!!  It was fun to spend some quiet minutes together and open presents.  My new earrings are on as I type and I'm impatiently waiting to wear the boots, which I'm still impressed he was able to track down :)

Christmas Day we drove to Allendale to see my brother, parents and Grandma Carol.  It was a rainy day to be on the roads but we rolled in around lunch time.  Ken wasn't too far behind then, more presents!!  I'm blessed to have such a generous family.  Truly blessed.

See all you Shines on Sunday!

dining with the (almost) Mark Zuerners

ooooooooooo-wheee!  That put a chill down my spine and a smile on my face.  I'm going to be a Mrs. Mark Zuerner in like whoa, EXACTLY, three months and one day.  And cue the...oh snap, three months?!!? Time to buckle down.  Or is it four months and one day?  Yeah, four.  Math by Sara: takes you a wrong answer and a redo but you'll get it, eventually!

Next up, really need to get those invites figured out.  Gots to.

But the fun part of registering is about 60% done.  I believe we got all of our dining and kitchen things on the lists (Crate & Barrel, Macy's and Target if you care; if you really care about half our registry is on sale at Macy's).  Next up will be bed/bath pieces.  Phew, time consuming but the advent of online registering is a life saver!! 

Merry almost Christmas,
Sara

Really? I care about banquet chairs?

Well, OK. I think I had an actual bride moment this week; I rented fancy chairs for the reception. Now, I do realize that no one cares about chairs. Unless they are horribly uncomfortable do you even notice? Doubtful. But will mine look pretty? Yes. My true thought process behind this was why on earth spend money for linens when they have free ones and why on earth cover chairs with more linens when it's just a chair. Then I saw pictures. Not going to lie, linens make a big difference. Alas, I'm half Dutch and can't do it. But I'm also half Irish and want to have a sweet party. So the compromise is that I found a great deal on these chairs:

And now I'm skipping the fancy table linens. Cheaper to go this route and I like this look infinitely better than chair covers. Officially a bride now!

Side note: the best pricing on the Chiavari chairs that I found in Detroit is at A Moment Forever. Stacy is very sweet and you can tell she loves the wedding industry (the photo is of the actual chairs they own).  They offer lots of other services as well.