My fiance and I are having an untraditional wedding with just us, his 18 and 11 year old, and his ex-mother-in-law (a dear friend of the family) in Vegas. Within the last two months, he has graduated college, had a surprise graduation party, studied and passed his nursing boards, and found a nursing job all while working full time. His son has also graduated high school (lives with us) and we are planning his graduation party next weekend. On top of planning all that and a wedding in Vegas, I have been working 60-70 hours a week.
Feeling accomplished, here is my list of checks:
*paid off Mandalay Bay for our ceremony in the shark reef
*paid off Todd for photography
*paid off crazy huge rental house for our stay in Vegas (so excited-it looks like a real cool house with a huge pool, spa, and everyone has their own bedroom/bathroom with multiple great rooms/family rooms)
*bought some groupons and restaurant.com coupons for some food options in Vegas
*bought our Cirque du Soleil Ka tickets for our wedding night for the five of us (yes, we are so excited about this and can't wait-untraditional but so much fun)
*bought tickets to Tournament of Kings show at Excalibur (the kids are huge medieval fans who have their own jousting tournaments so we thought this would be a huge surprise for them the day after the wedding)
*booked rental car
*took dress for first fitting and loved the alteration shop.
*bought special items for the kids and ex-mother-in-law (personalized robes and totes for the girl and friend, custom bath sets from Etsy, "in case you get cold feet" socks from Etsy, custom bridesmaid/guest survival cards from Etsy, custom "if I'm a bird" print from Etsy for my groom, personalized jewelry from Etsy, etc-yes, everyone will be surprised and spoiled from me)
Plus-and this is the big one-we told the 11 year old about the wedding. You may remember that the little girl has missed most of the important events in our family because of mystery illnesses or circumstances from her mother around each event. However, as people know and more importantly, her 18 year old half brother knows, we realized we need to do what's right and have some faith. We realized she would be crushed when she found out everyone knew about the wedding but her. So we went to breakfast and told her we had something really important to tell her. Her first question "Are we adopting a kid from Korea?" Not really sure where that came from but then I asked her to be my maid of honor. She got really excited and that was wonderful to see. So we now have to have a little faith and believe that the right thing (her being with us) will happen.
Things to finish this week:
*fax all paperwork back to Mandalay Bay
*order the tiny wedding cake from Retro Bakery
*make wedding lunch reservations at Top of the World since wedding is at 9 am and then 2 hour strip tour right after
*book limo
*do marriage license on line
And then I'm done-for now anyway. Love that everything is completely paid off-with no credit card debt from it either!