Hi everyone — apologies that it took so long to upload these, but what with the house closing date bearing down on us we’ve been understandably preoccupied. Nevertheless, I just recently uploaded Karin’s photographs of the engagement party. Check them out in the Photo Gallery section!
…that is, if you consider renting out an Italian restaurant in western Nassau County, packing in 75 of our closest family members and friends, and stuffing our faces with food and booze for 4+ hours a “regular old Sunday afternoon”!
That’s right, this past Sunday Dan’s parents threw an engagement party for us at Fianona, a wonderful little Italian spot in New Hyde Park. My mother and I used the party as an opportunity to test out some wedding hairdos and makeup at Paul Anthony Salon in Manhasset, which was recommended to her by a co-worker. We LOVED what they did for both of us, and will definitely be using them on my wedding day. I barely recognized myself!
The party itself was fantastic. Dan’s parents pulled out all the stops for us, presenting Dan and me with an arsenal of meaningful gifts (including the bonnet Dan wore home from the hospital shortly after his birth, Dan’s grandfather’s pocketwatch and bracelet, and a personalized fleece jacket reading “The Future Mrs. Fedele” for me!) and plowing us all with enough wine, beer and liquor to keep everyone smiling all afternoon long. Members of our families also got to meet each other for the first time, and I was finally introduced to some of Dan’s father’s relatives, all of whom were very sweet and gracious.
A cute shot of us:
And one of me with my bridesmaids (unfortunately minus the Oregon-based Christina, who couldn’t make the cross-country trip):
There are more great shots in the Photos section, although I must warn you that there’s a strong bias toward select members of my family and my bridesmaid party. If you attended the fiesta and have any of your own photos to add, please email them to us ASAP.
The moral of the story? Sunday’s party reminded Dan and me of how lucky we are to have families and friends who are so supportive and who care about us so deeply. We had a great time and it made us even more excited for November 14! Oh, and the truckload of presents we received didn’t hurt either. It took us nearly two hours to open everything after the party, and we’re still in awe of how much we got. Suffice to say our house-to-be is going to be filled with beautiful new things. (Thank-you notes are coming soon, I promise!)
It’s been a crazy couple of weeks at work for both of us, not to mention that Dan is 12 hours away from officially owning a new car and we’re gearing up for an engagement party being thrown for us by Dan’s parents on Sunday, so we’ve been remiss in updating the blog as of late. Apologies.
The latest news is that our wedding will now have music. Whoo hoo! We’ve hired Dancejock Productions, the “recommended” DJ and entertainment company of the Royalton Mansion (not to fear, we took the recommendation with a grain of salt and did plenty of independent online research before electing to meet with them — the reviews were almost unanimously positive). Hate the name, love the company. We were very impressed by the women we met, whose name is failing me at the moment. She put my whole family at ease and didn’t try to sell us anything we clearly didn’t need.
Enjoying some family time at the Dancejock office.
So here’s the musical lowdown. It’s been my dream for many years to have a string quartet play at my ceremony (rather than the traditional organist), and Dancejock is going to do that for us since they employ a network of local musicians. During the cocktail hour, guests will enjoy a jazz trio complete with keyboard, saxophone and stand-up string bass. The reception will feature a standard DJ with an MC, not to mention a smorgasboard of multimedia treats that I’ll keep under wraps for now. Suffice to say, all the parents will be crying.
Now, time to steal a few hours of sleep before picking up Dan’s beautiful new Honda Accord coupe (which I’ll let him ramble more about in a future post) and getting a pre-party manicure/pedicure with my mother. Good night!
As I sit in our living room on this wintery Monday afternoon, NOT at work due to the foot of snow blanketing the roads, I figure it’s a good time to post a quick update about the bridesmaids dresses.
I met three out of four of my bridesmaids (Kirsten, Maggie, and Kristen) at David’s Bridal in Westbury yesterday, where everyone tried on dresses as my mother, Dan and Kristen’s mother, Maggie’s mother and sister, and I looked on. I’d already narrowed it down to two styles I liked the most, as well as two colors. Well, one particular dress and color (“wine”) looked fabulous on everyone, so it was an easy choice. Without further ado, may I present the dress my bridesmaids will don on November 14…
What you can’t see in this image are the beautiful beadwork across the chest area and the matching shawl that comes with the dress. We also picked out a pretty red-and-burgundy necklace that complements the dress perfectly.
Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go enjoy the rest of my snow day.
This morning we met with Pastor Ray Ormand at Church of Our Saviour Lutheran to discuss the results of our “couple inventory” (NOT test, as Pastor Ray kept reminding me!), which Dan and I each took online last month. The long and the short of it: we’re a fantastic couple. 
All egotistical kidding aside, the vast majority of our answers matched perfectly, and the test (er, inventory) categorized us as a “Vitalized Couple,” which is the highest possible rating we could have achieved. Pastor Ray said over and over again that he thinks we’re wonderfully matched and that we’re going to enjoy a long and happy marriage. Not that we had any doubt, but it’s nice to hear it from an outside party!
In other news, last weekend we booked our limos at Royalty Limousines in Franklin Square, which is our venue’s recommended transportion company. Dan and I will be taking a classic 12-14 person limo to the church and the reception along with our bridesmaids and groomsmen. We decided against the “newlyweds only” Rolls Royce because it’s just not our style, and we wanted the opportunity to spend a bit of time with our closest friends. Personally, I’m looking forward to the complimentary champagne…
Today Dan and I spent five hours in Bed Bath & Beyond, traversing every inch of the store with our amazingly patient and knowledgeable store adviser, Todd. The end result? We have a registry! We’ve got everything from “casual china” and crystal wine glasses to bedsheets for our yet-to-be-purchased king-size bed, a beer dispenser, and a mango cutter (yes, you read that correctly). Despite some sore legs now, we had a lot of fun!
So, if you’re visiting our website in the hopes of finding our registry, look no further. Just click here (or on the “Registry” link above). And thanks in advance for helping to furnish our new house!
Last weekend my mother and I hit the town in search of the ever-elusive Perfect Wedding Undergarments and Perfect Wedding Shoes. I’d be trying for weeks to track down these items so that I could head back to Macy’s for my follow-up dress fitting, and I was taken aback by how difficult it proved to find either one. Most of the corsets I tried on simply weren’t designed to fit the human body, and they don’t make too many attractive, not-too-high-heeled shoes for size 9.5-10 feet.
My lingering lingerie woes were at last put to rest after arriving at Blum’s in Patchogue village. I had to wait on a ridiculously long line to even get into the fitting room, but the wait was worth it — within two minutes the saleswoman sized me up (quite literally) and brought me exactly what I needed. Now I can feel confident that I will be appropriately pushed up and sucked in on my wedding day. 
Next we headed to Craft Shoes in Commack (no website, sorry). Talk about a great selection. We were out the door in 15 minutes, my dream shoes in hand — and at quite a reasonable price. Not that anyone is going to be able to see my shoes anyway, but at least I’ll know they look good. And the heel is reasonable enough that I may actually be able to dance in them!
Yes, that’s right — Dan and I are officially house-hunting!
We were planning on sticking it out in our current one-bedroom apartment until after the wedding, but after many discussions with our various sets of parents, we came to the conclusion that the housing market is ripe for the picking RIGHT NOW, and it might not be to our advantage to wait almost a year before we begin looking. So we’ve enlisted the help of Dan’s mother’s realtor friend, Chrissie, and tomorrow we begin scouring Commack, Dix Hills, Deer Park, East Northport, and Smithtown (towns in western Suffolk County, Long Island, for the uninitiated) for The Perfect House. Who knows how quickly we’ll find anything, but we’re certainly going to give it our all. It’s hard to express just how excited we are at the prospect of owning property. Sure, we’ll be pretty broke for awhile, but we’ll know that our hard-earned cash is being invested in something that belongs to us, rather than going to a greedy landlord who can’t even be bothered to ensure that our building’s boiler is properly functioning on any sort of regular basis.
In other news, we’re in the process of piecing together our honeymoon with the help of my aunt Lesley’s travel agency, Syosset Travel (sorry, no website link!). We’ll be flying out to San Francisco a few days after the wedding (probably Tuesday or Wednesday, November 17 or 18), renting a car, and driving to Napa and Sonoma Valleys for a few days of West Coast winetasting — hurray! Then we’ll be driving or flying (yet to be determined) to Los Angeles and boarding the Sapphire Princess for a seven-night cruise down the Mexican Riviera (in a mini-suite with balcony, natch). While flying to Hawaii would have been wonderful, this trip makes a lot more sense financially — especially given the fact that we’re most likely going to be buying a house very soon. I, for one, am looking forward to the honeymoon with every ounce of my being!
It’s hard to imagine that I proposed just over a month ago, and we have so much under our belt already that I struggle to figure out what’s left. We managed to accomplish a lot just this weekend so I figured it was about time to make a new blog post.
First of all, there’s a very good chance that we will be married at Church of Our Saviour Lutheran in Manhasset, assuming of course we pass our whole Pre-Cana Inventory (the pastor, Ray Ormand, was very insistent that we don’t call it a test). Pastor Ormand was very stalwart in saying that we must show we’re compatible enough in the church’s eyes before he will make the commitment to marry us on the date that we stated. Thanks to modern technology, the Pre-Cana Inventory will be taken online, after we both get the link on Tuesday. Once we meet with the pastor a few more times, then we can make a down payment and secure the date for our wedding. In the meantime, here are a few pics taken of the place, thanks to Karin’s ninja-like photography.
The next day we scheduled time with Stefan’s Florist to get the flower settings all squared away. We had been thinking about a wine theme and after visiting a few vineyards recently, we came upon a really cool idea for the table centerpieces that reflects both of our tastes. We discussed it with the good folks at Stefan’s and they seemed to have a few good ideas themselves that they ran past us, and in the end we came to an agreement, making them our official wedding florist! (Don’t you wish we’d tell you more about our brilliant idea? You’ll just have to come to our wedding to see it…). Sadly we don’t have any photos to share, but when we go and visit them again we’ll be sure to take a few of the samples they have to show us.
And to end this blog post on yet another uplifting note, a bunch of people in the wedding party went out to celebrate Marisa’s birthday at Croxley Ales in Farmingdale on Saturday night, and all posed for this great pic:
From left to right: Eric, Dan, Kirsten, Marisa, Alan, Craig
Visit the photo gallery to view full-size versions of these pics.
We’ve officially booked our photographer and videographer: AC Video and Photography. (The photo on the website doesn’t load, but don’t let that fool you.) The company is run by a great guy I know from work, Adam Cooper, who’s done photography for the North Shore-LIJ Health System since roughly the beginning of time. On the side he does wedding and other event photography and works closely with a network of established videographers.
Although I’m familiar with the high quality of Adam’s work considering I’ve worked with him for the past two years, I wanted Dan and my family to see what he could do. Adam came to our apartment (bonus!) and showed us wonderful samples of wedding photo books and DVDs, and everyone was sold pretty quickly. I feel very confident knowing that he’ll be documenting our wedding day from beginning to end!