Wedding Week: Day, 3,4, and 5

Wedding rings: check

Microphone pick up: check

OOT bags: check

Wrap attendant gifts: check

Take bud vases to florist: check

Make and print photo sharing cards: check

I'm sure there is more I'm forgetting, but the point is wedding headquarters are bustling with activity. My parents got in town Sunday night and have been amazingly helpful with the last minute preparations. I'm sure most people would complain about having their parents around for the full week before the wedding, but I know we could not have gotten everything done without them. The H's arrive today and we'll be heading out for a nice dinner with both sets of parents, Mr. H and me.

Here are a few of my lessons learned from this week.

OOT bags take way longer than they should. Or maybe that's just because we had to put together 40 OOT bags and anything multiplied by 40 is going to be time consuming. This number could have been much hire, but we have lots of budget-conscious guests who are sharing rooms. Hooray for that! And hooray for saving money!

Not all sunscreen is created equally. Back to lesson #1, plan ahead if you decide to fill tiny bottles with sunscreen to keep your guests sunburn free. We waited until Monday to buy our sunscreen. Most stores are out. Which leads me to another post for another day about why the hell fall clothes hit Austin retailers in August (despite the reading on the calendar, we still have 2 more months of summer). Back to the sunscreen though, we bought some really thick sunscreen that try as we might would not go into the bottle, but rather would sit in a bubble on top of the bottle's mouth teasing us. My ever-resourceful Dad took a trip to Walgreen's and came back with a child's medicine shooter and it worked perfectly.

Relax. There is only so much you can do each day. Don't add new things to the list a week before the wedding. If you didn't think of it in the last 8 months, you don't need to have it. Be productive in the mornings and afternoon and you too an enjoy a mexican martini or half bottle of wine when the day's work is done.

So how am I feeling? First, this doesn't seem real. At all. Yes my parents are in town and guests start arriving today, but it certainly doesn't feel like they are here to celebrate Mr. H and me. I'm excited and happy (obvi). I've known for 3 years that I would marry Mr. H and I've dreamt of what that would feel like. Honestly, it feels pretty great. I can't wait to see what the coming years hold for us. But as far as the actual wedding goes, I just hope that I can step back, take it all in, and enjoy it. Oh, and that I achieve the overarching theme I've been pouring hours upon hours into every week.

I'll probably be back one (or a couple) more time(s) before I become a Mrs. Expect some 3 a.m. blog posts if I can't sleep!