We Did It!

So, I was a bit bad about putting up a final post (I had these ridiculously long, hard exams 3 weeks after the wedding that I had to study for...), but Friday we got the disk from our photographer, so I thought I should put up a few photos so everyone can see what $3000 and a do-it-yourself attitude can get you in terms of a wedding.  The day of our wedding was absolutely perfect- 75 and sunny, with just a few clouds in the sky.  We got really, really lucky!

Our ceremony was short, sweet, and to the point (and dinosaurs played a prominent role):

We did a BBQ buffet, which went over really well!  Chuck's was right on time, and we ended up with way more food leftover than we thought, despite most people having seconds (and thirds)!

If you are going to do an outdoor wedding in a budget location, cupcakes are the way to go.  No need for plates or forks, and people can grab and go as they want.  They were a hit!  Aracely's Bakery, you rock!

Yes, we had bags (corn hole) at our wedding.  Great idea for a chill wedding!  Jason actually built the boards himself :)

Even though it was only like, 4:30pm, we still got our dance on!  We used the forest side "patio" for dancing, while the side adjacent the parking we used for bags and as a place to chill quietly.

If you have any questions about how we pulled this off, about our vendors, or anything else, feel free to leave a comment!

All photography by LK Captures.  

The Home Stretch

Okay, I've been quite bad about updating this, but we've been so busy.  We're just five days out to the wedding (yikes!) and things are just a bit crazy right now.  This is sort of a stream-of-consciousness update.

First of all, I did in fact book the caterer- Chuck's Southern Comfort Cafe.  It's going to cost us about $600 for food for 60 people, which is pretty damn fantastic.  We're having pulled pork, pasta, and smoked chicken, plus veggies and salad as sides.  They are even including the plates/forks/knives, AND delivery is only $20.  Their food is fantastic (and cheap)!

We had also had a photography crisis- the student we had booked to do the photography cancelled on us last week. Thankfully, one Facebook post later, I was inundated with photographer contact information.  (My friends are awesome!)  We ended up booking a friend of one of my bridesmaid's, who does absolutely beautiful photos (see some of her photos as http://lkcaptures.com).  We are really grateful to her for doing this last minute!  (We also have the same name, which is cool.  I haven't known another person with my name since elementary school.)

I did my hair trial as well- I timed it for the same day as a friend's wedding.  We're all getting our hair done at the Aveda Institute Chicago- it's a school, so it takes a little longer, but it's way cheaper- $34 for hair, $29 for makeup.  The salons we were looking at closer to the wedding site were approximately $120- and that was just for me!  I like the girl who will be my stylist, she did a wonderful job on Saturday.

There are ten million things to do this week, but most of it small- like buying bug spray and toilet paper, organizing the purchasing of alcohol, buying the other drinks and bottled water, etc.  Thursday is our "rehearsal"- by rehearsal I mean where we spend 5 minutes going over timing and then the rest trying to kill all the spiders and wasps in the grove.  Friday is when my mom comes in, and we're going out to meet her at the hotel.  She has generously agreed to store the bridesmaid's dresses, my wedding dress, and the bouquets the night before so that we don't have to fit 4 girls and 4 dresses in a VW Bug on the morning of the wedding.

I've also been obsessively checking the weather report for the past few days for Saturday.  According to weather.com, it will be a high of 71 (I think I might need a jacket!), mostly sunny, with a 10% chance of rain. Things are looking good!  I'm so excited!!!

The Good News: Etsy is Awesome (The Bad News: David's Bridal alterations, not so awesome)

One of my bridesmaid's introduced me to Etsy.  I'd never used the site, but it is addictive and is full of fantastic wedding items.  I'd been trying to decide what to do about the Guest Book- do we do a traditional one or Wedding Mad-Libs?  I'd been looking on Amazon.com for guest books, but most were fairly plain or covered in white satin (which isn't really our thing). However, I found tons of "rustic" guest book options on Etsy, many of which were under $40:

I won't tell you which one we chose, because we want it to be a surprise.  We also found lots of cake topper options.  I'd always thought I'd want this cake topper:

BUT it doesn't really go with cupcakes, and frankly, the characters could use some modernization. Etsy to the rescue (I won't say which one we picked, but there is obviously a theme going on here):

In other news, David's Bridal alterations screwed up my dress.  Nothing that isn't fixable, but definitely annoying.  I had asked to have it hemmed, and when I went in for my fitting today, I found that their hem of the lower layers of my dress (which they did by pulling up the center rather than just hemming at the bottom) left a lovely line across my bum.  It was like they had just rolled up part of the lining and sewn it there, leaving a lump which was plainly visible beneath the outer layer of my dress.  At least the really nice alterations lady noticed it even before I did and was very annoyed at the person who had done the alterations.  She told me they would have it fixed by the 8th, 10 days before my wedding.  I'm in no way a Bridezilla, but if it isn't done right next time, I may get a bit upset- I paid $120 for a simple hem, and frankly, since all they do is alter wedding dresses, they should be able to do a simple hem correctly. 

DIY Centerpieces

Look at all the pretties!

You can in fact do DIY centerpieces for under $150 and with only about three hours of work- IF you have some good friends willing to help you.  Last night my bridesmaid and maid of honor helped me put together all the centerpieces, bouquets/boutonnieres, and other decorations.  Everything we are using to decorate with was purchased on sale from either Michael's or Jo-Ann Fabrics.  We used fake flowers because a) fake flowers can be made well in advance of an event and stored in less than favorable conditions (like jammed in a box) and survive well and b)  flowers are expensive, and florists even more so.  

Our centerpieces are made from:

- "rustic" cans purchased at $0.30 each from Michael's clearance section

- silk gerbera daisies in "bunches" ($1.11 each) cut apart with wire cutters

- gravel (to weight down the cans and keep the flowers upright) purchased from Home Depot for $2.50 (for 30 lbs!)

- Chalkboard table picks, $12.99 for 12 from Michael's (we only used 7, since we only have 7 tables)

We made slightly more expensive centerpieces for the head table, which were made the same way only with two large watering cans ($7.99 each), a larger set of silk flowers ($2.99 each), and raffia bows. 

Janelle, my bridesmaid who is a DIY goddess, also figured out to make the bouquets using floral tape, white ribbon, and raffia to hold it all together.  She also figured out how to make boutonnieres for the two guys. We had a slight problem with what to do for our "groomsperson", Laurel.  Luckily, she is wearing a gray version of the bridesmaid's dress, which includes a pocket, so we just tucked a flower in there, and voila! 

DIY Wedding Favors

Well, mostly DIY.  I bought the favors off of a bulk candy online store, as mentioned a few days ago, and had planned to put stickers on them with names and tables, or maybe puff paint on the ribbons.  Neither looked very good.  Then I hit upon a brilliant idea- why not use the rest of the paper from the wedding invitation kit?  I have about 25 pieces of green paper, which is definitely enough for 64 tags, and I have a calligraphy pen.  My handwriting isn't very pretty, but I think it works.  Here's what I made:

This came to me at 10pm tonight, while sick no less.

Not too shabby, if I do say so myself.

In other news, is there a law that 1/4 of your guest list will just refuse to RSVP on time?  Jason and I have almost 20 people we need to call about their RSVP.  (We made the RSVPs due the 15th- about a month before the wedding.)  I want to get everything for the wedding done in the next week so that I can study for my exams without being distracted by (more fun) wedding things to do!

Cupcakes! (And spiders?)

Our cake tasting!

It's official- we're doing cupcakes!  Today the MOH and I went out to the burbs to try a cupcake place, and they were fantastic.  The bakery is called Aracely's, and it's a lovely little shop in downtown LaGrange (in the words of my MOH, "it's like a small town on a post card!").  The owner's husband met us with a plate of cupcakes to try- Carrot Cake, Red Velvet, Strawberry, Vanilla, and Chocolate.  They were all fantastic, but we choose two (if you know me well enough you can probably guess which two I picked).  He walked us through the options and helped us come up with a few ways to personalize them- Jason's will be Chicago Bears themed, and mine will have flowers.  We were going to try to do something archaeology related, but the best we could come up with that they could do would be a whip like Indiana Jones, and we thought that just might send the wrong message.  Aracely's even sent us home with a few for Jason, since he couldn't be there to try them (he just had them for dinner).

The cost for the cupcakes was a bit of a splurge (around $250), BUT it eliminates a lot of hassle on the day of the wedding transporting cakes/cupcakes from Chicago to Willow Springs.  We also took care of mapping out the table arrangement at the site, as well as making a rather unfortunate discovery at the picnic grove- spiders and wasps.  I think we'll have to go the night before and spray some Raid.

Die wasps, DIE!

Rentals, Cakes, and Other Things I Don't Want To Deal With

I'm sure that I'm not the first person, and certainly won't be the last, to say "I'll be glad when this wedding thing is over."  If you want to save money, every single decision requires monumental research on multiple companies, phone calls, etc.  I'm so tired of it.  But, at least a few things I have been sorted out.

First off, I finally found a rental company.  We had originally planned on borrowing chairs/tables from Jason's work, but they couldn't supply enough of them AND we'd have to rent a truck to move them out to Willow Springs, it just became a better idea to rent.  A few weeks of research later I found Ultimate Rental Services.  In terms of prices for each thing, I've found better, but they cut me a break on the delivery/set-up/pick-up.  Our total for 64 chairs, 11 tables, and a generator, including delivery, set-up, and pick-up was $468.  They'll have everything set up by 9am the morning of the wedding (they'll even handle tear-down!), and the guy I spoke with, Martin, was fantastic.

This cake is exactly what I would want if
I could have anything I wanted for my wedding.

In our plan to save money, Jason came up with the idea of baking our own cakes.  His idea was to bake 5 9x13 sheet cakes, each decorated with something to represent an aspect of our relationship.  For example, there would be a cake decorated with fish, because we met at the aquarium.  There would even be a Tardis cake, because we both love Doctor Who (okay, honestly, Jason just loves Amy Pond).  However, the logistics of this are very difficult.  When do we bake the cakes?  How do we transport them? Where do we store them the day before the wedding?  The hotel?  Etc, etc. So now I'm thinking of going back to the cupcake route, and buying them from a local bakery.  I really do love the idea of incorporating into the wedding things about our relationship, but cupcakes are just easier.  If I could have anything I want, the Doctor Who cake on the left would be it, but it would be pricey.

In keeping with our "theme" of nature...

We did manage to purchase favors which are cute, practical, and cheap.  We ordered them from the Bulk Candy Store online, and they came out in total, including delivery, to $124 for 72 of them.  We are going to tie white bows on them, and then put stickers on one side that have the name of the guest and what table they are seated. I really hope they taste good!

So basically, as the wedding stands now we have a few of the major things taken care of (catering and alcohol being the 'big' things we still need to do), and 10,000 small things which I just don't want to deal with (like bug control, decorative elements, readings for the ceremony, the bachelorette party, rehearsal dinner, actually making all of the centerpieces...).  I now have so much more appreciation for wedding planners. 

Ceremony Music

I'm endeavoring to be as non-traditional a bride as possible: while I've attended some fabulous traditional weddings for family and friends, for our wedding we want to be more casual and fun.  We understand marriage is a serious commitment, but we want to start our marriage off in a way that fits our personalities.  To that end, I've been trying to come up with ceremony music which will convey that sense of fun from the moment guests arrive, while still appeasing the more traditional members of our families.

A quick internet search will find you lots of websites which list non-traditional ceremony music options (some of which are still incredibly traditional).  One wedding site I really like is Offbeat Bride, which has a great list of "Here Comes the Bride" alternatives. It was through them that I decided on the Vitamin String Quartet for our pre-ceremony music.  Since we're just using an iPod and some speakers, we have lots of options. VSQ does string renditions of pop songs, which gives us just enough quirk to make us (and the more pop-culture-savvy attendees) giggle:

 

For the bride's entrance, I've got a few options.  One that I think is nearly perfect is "Once Upon a Time...Storybook Love" (imagine me entering where the music changes at 1:06).  I thought it might be possible to also have the bridesmaids walk in during the first minute of the song, but I'm not sure that's enough time for the two of them.

We also considered music from Doctor Who- in particular, Amy's Theme. It's a bit more dramatic/melancholy, but Jason absolutely LOVES Amy Pond, and we're both big Doctor Who fans (my Tardis cookie jar will definitely be making an appearance at the wedding).  As much as I love the piece, it isn't quite right for our ceremony.

I still have no clue what to do for the bridesmaids- I only have two, so it shouldn't take long to get them down the aisle, but if I do choose the song from Princess Bride, I need to pick something that will mesh well with it.  If anyone has suggestions, feel free to let me know!

Wedding Favors & Other Updates

We've less than two months to our wedding, and Jason and I have been terrible about doing ANYTHING for the wedding.  I think we are just hesitant to spend money or something.  But here are a few updates/tips we've learned:

- Rentals can be really cheap if you opt for non-traditional chairs and tables.  We're looking at having 80 chairs in "neutral brown" ($0.99 a chair) as opposed to wedding white ($1.50 a chair), for a total of $80, plus plain brown tables ($7 a table, 9 tables) for $63.  Plus $50 delivery and pick-up.  This is more expensive than our original plan of borrowing tables and chairs from Jason's work, BUT it saves us $100 on a truck rental, and the time in the morning of going there, loading tables and chairs, driving to the wedding site, unloading, etc.  The company will even do set-up for an additional fee, but I think we can handle that ourselves.

- Alterations at David's Bridal are ridiculously expensive. $120 for a hem! Seriously?  However I did save money on having the dress taken in by buying a ridiculous bra from Victoria's secret which makes you "two bust sizes larger".  Victoria's Secret: False Advertising Since 1977.

- Ebay is the way to go for bridal hairpieces, jewelry, etc.  You can easily find stuff there for a quarter of the cost at a salon.  For example, a bird cage hair piece at David's Bridal is $49.99- I found several on Ebay for $10.  Same thing with veils.

- Deciding on favors to give gifts is really hard.  However, there is so much available online for cheap, it's amazing.  These cupcake mixes are probably my favorite, but we really can't afford to get them- they are $2.29 each.  I found these flower wine stoppers though, which at $1.42 each, are pretty awesome, and really cute too.

.We had originally thought to do monogrammed lollipops, but I feel like we should give guests something more substantial than a lollipop that cost us $0.50.

I just realized- it's July, and our wedding is next month. Yikes!  We'd better get on that!

The Shoe Fiasco

These have this perfect retro
flair I was going for.

I'm pretty tall for a girl- 5'8 or maybe a little under.  Jason is only about an inch taller than me.  This poses problems whenever we go out and I wear heels- even in two inch heels, which are pretty much the minimum height for heels that are easily available, I'm taller than him.  Jason's one request regarding my wedding attire was that I not be taller than him.  This was an immensely difficult task.  I had originally intended to wear ballet flats, except, upon trying a bunch on, I discovered that no matter what sized I picked, they did not fit. Eventually, at Macy's the MOH and I came upon these fantastic shoes to the right.  They fit perfectly with the style of my dress, and they were only $80 (for women's shoes, that's a steal!).  I thought the heel was about 2 inches in height, and figured that if Jason wore dress shoes, we'd be about equal in height and it would all be fine.

Not so much. I was trying on the shoes at home because I was planning on breaking them in at a gala event I was working, and Jason was very unhappy with them.  We argued about them for about two days- the bridesmaids had already bought their shoes to compliment mine!  Finally I caved and decided to look for something else, since Jason was right, it would look weird in the pictures if I was taller than him.  It is ridiculously hard to find shoes with under a 2 inch heel, even online, because what you often get is this:

1987 called and it wants its shoes back.

I tried Zappos, Macy's, Nordstrom, Payless, DSW, everything.  Finally, I went through Amazon and several hours of searching later, I found the shoes below.  They are basic, low heeled, and a bit boring, but I think they'll do.  They also cost only $60, so at least I'm saving some money.  And anyways, we all know I'll probably end up in flip flops halfway through the reception anyways.  

Invitation Madness

We finally got our invitations done.  Total cost (including postage!): $62.50

Our completed invites. Yes, we are sending one to
President Obama.  Just because.

To the right is our completed invites.  Printing took about 3 hours over a few days.  My HP printer didn't like the size of the reply cards, so we had a lot of trial and error before we got them situated correctly, and we had the same problem with both sets of envelopes.  So I can definitely see why some brides would choose to just pay someone to do this for them.  We also printed all the addresses with the printer rather than hand-printing them, which according to theknot.com is a huge no-no.  Frankly, having grown up in the digital age, I think that is kind of ridiculous.  My handwriting is not nearly nice enough to look good on a wedding invitation, so why not go with a printer?  If I had handwritten them, I probably would have gotten calls from family about how terrible my handwriting is- so it's a lose-lose situation for me. I might as well just use the printer and save myself some time (and carpal tunnel).

To save money on postage, instead of including traditional response cards for some of our invitees, we included cards with the address of our website, where guests can respond online.  We still sent traditional response cards to the more traditional members of our family, but this saved us $8 or so on postage.  We also hand-delivered invites to our friends we see often (that saved us about $20). Again, we are ignoring traditional wedding etiquette here. But instead of spending the average $659* on invitations, we now have more money to put towards the things that really matter to us with this wedding- food and alcohol!

*For the record, I have no idea where the Bridal Association of America got this number (or their upper end number of $2700 for 100 thermographic and engraved invitations).  That seems outrageous to me.  Did those wedding invitations sing and dance for you too?

I've Taken the Plunge...

... and bought a wedding dress.  That definitely makes this whole "wedding" thing feel so real.  Yesterday I went to David's Bridal with my best friend (and maid of honor) and another friend (and bridesmaid) and my MOH's mom, who kindly played the sane, motherly role for us.  While in the past I have derided the quality of David's Bridal, you can't beat the price and can get some nice dresses for really cheap.  (And some really ugly dresses for lots of money. You have to have balance.) We went during their $99 dress sale, so it was a bit hectic.

Special thanks to Jessica's mom Alison
for buying this for me as a gift!

My consultant, Emma, was fantastic.  Her style of dress- very retro- was very much what I was looking for.  She didn't try to push us into anything, and in general was just a lot of fun.  I tried on maybe six or seven dresses in a few styles, and ended up picking the third dress I tried on, which was one of my top five from their website anyways.  I was done in half the time of a regular appointment- though I think that was because I knew what I wanted, or more accurately, what I didn't want, and that narrowed down my choices.  I had also decided that I was going to buy that day, which helped, and probably made my consultant a little more attentive to me since she does work on commission.  With the sale discount, including tax, my dress was $279.  The best part was that I don't need any alterations- I fit the Size 6 perfectly.  At most I might have to have it hemmed a bit, depending on how much the dress I ordered ends up like the one I tried on.  (I've been told I'm not allowed to post pictures of the dress or me in it so I can "surprise people".  I don't really care if people see it beforehand, but the bridesmaids were fairly adamant about this point, and since they were such good sports about the bridesmaid dress shopping, I'll acquiesce.  But here's a picture of my hair decoration, to give you a hint.)

This is the bridesmaid dress.  Just imagine it
in cornflower blue, not whatever this is.

We made such good time shopping for me, that we decided to look at bridesmaids dresses.  Finding a dress for a busty girl and a not so busty girl was ridiculously difficult.  There were so many dresses that one of them liked but the other hated.  They probably tried on 15 different styles, and of course the very last one we tried on was the one they liked.  It's a bit more formal than I was going for, but looks really cute with my dress, and is the kind of dress you could wear again (though I doubt they will).  The best part was, the dress was $99, but because I bought my wedding dress there, they only paid $79.

 The next thing we have to do is figure out what the groom, best man, and grooms-person will wear.  I think the grooms-person will probably wear the same dress as the bridesmaids, only in silver or black.  But I haven't a clue what the groom will wear.  A tux is just too formal for our wedding.  If anyone has suggestions, let me know!

Craigslist

A few updates:

First off, we managed to finally find an officiant available on our wedding date, for a reasonable price.  I actually found her on Craigslist of all places!  Her name is Anne, and she's the "Rev for Whatev", and she seems pretty cool.  When we told her we are students doing a wedding on tiny budget, she opened up her "elopement" option, which is only $150.  We'll pick from one of her standard ceremonies, and it will be a nice, short secular ceremony.  She's done tons of weddings and civil ceremonies, and seems to be a really accepting and respectful of people's beliefs (or lack therof).

Second, on Craigslist, while browsing the "Events" section, I found a photographer who is building her portfolio, and offered to do photos for free.  We're meeting with her at the end of the month.  Her name is Natallia, and she seems really nice and excited to be shooting a wedding.  I actually found a lot of student photographers or photographers just starting out who were willing to do wedding photography for really cheap.  I know that we might be taking a risk, but I like the idea of helping someone out at the same time they are doing me a service.  And the photos of hers that I have seen are really nice.  

Michael's is a thrifty girl's best friend!

Today, I went with the MOH to look at the wedding site, take measurements (so we could determine how many tables would fit), and think of decorating ideas.  Afterwards we went to Michael's, and we discovered that they are the best place ever for a thrifty girl.  We went in not planning on buying anything at all, just to get a few ideas to compare cost.

We ended up walking out with a completely full cart.

First off, they were having a sale on wedding invitation kits, and I found one which I liked.  We got 80 invitations and response cards (plus envelopes) for $39.99.

Then, we wandered over to the fake flower aisle.  I've more or less decided fake flowers are going to be the way to go, since a) Gerber daisies are expensive and b) incredibly fragile.  And frankly, everyone knows that we are broke students, so they shouldn't be surprised by the fake flowers (we fully intend everyone be far too drunk to notice the flowers anyways).

Anyways, Michael's is pretty cheap for flower "bundles"- $7.99 for the orange, pink, and yellow bundle.  I didn't buy any though, because I have time to look for even better prices online.  Then we found the discount aisle and made an awesome discovery- these cute little tin cans for $0.80 a piece!  With a little bundle of Gerber daisies, they make perfect centerpieces on the blue and white printed table clothes the MOH's mother is making for me.   We bought out the entire stock of cans, and it cost us $24.  Hopefully we'll be able to find some cheaper fake flowers online and keep the entire centerpiece budget under $200.

We also found cute little rustic tags for favors ($1.00 for 12) and two rustic metal and wood signs that we can write "Guest Book" and "Name Cards" on.  Basically, I think our style is going to be a "rustic" chic, which definitely works with both our budget and the location.

Total for today: $97

Ordering vs. Home-Printing

We realize that by doing this somewhat last minute, we need to get invitations out to at least out-of-town family ASAP.  I looked into the common discount sellers- VistaPrint, 123 Print, etc. and really couldn't find anything below $130 for 80 invites (and that was just the invites!).  Jason and I took a walk over to Office Depot today though, and noticed that even the small store in Hyde Park had a few wedding invitation kits which were fairly cheap- $35 for 50, and that included invitations, envelopes, note cards, etc.  That led us to investigating the whole "kit" option more seriously. I have an inkjet printer that works fairly well (other than it jamming roughly 25% of the time, but I can deal with that to save money!), so we should be able to print them at home.  I looked at Staples and Office Depot online, and most of their stuff was pretty standard- silver/gold borders, hearts, etc.- which didn't appeal to us.  But then I thought, I wonder if Target has anything.  And it turns out they actually have some really pretty designs for good prices.

These are the ones I am currently leaning towards, because for $34 for 30, it includes invitations and response cards, and envelopes for both.  And I feel like the plant theme goes well with our forest BBQ idea.

http://www.target.com/p/Cathy-Botanical-Invitations-Kit-Green-White/-/A-12234732

This one I really like as well, and goes a bit more with the colors I'm thinking (blue being the main one).  It's cheaper- $29.99 for 40, but it doesn't include response cards. 

http://www.target.com/p/Mara-Mi-Floral-Invitation-Kit-Blue-Green/-/A-13957961

Picnic permit approved!

It's official- Jason and I are getting married on August 18.  This summer.  Or I just spent $110 on a permit for the Pulaski Woods for nothing.

Well, we're going for it!

Jason and I have been engaged for a long time- a year and a half already.  I'm a graduate student, and he's still working on finding a teaching job, so paying for a wedding wasn't really in the cards.  But a few weeks ago, I had an idea- what if we made the whole affair into a super-cheap BBQ wedding?  We could do that for under $2500, right?  If we make it into a casual, fun affair, where our friends and family can just hang out, eat, drink, and have a good time, that would be just as good- in our minds at least- as a fancy $15,000 Chicago wedding. So we decided to go for it.

Yesterday we went and looked at some places in the Cook County Forest Preserve.  The nice part about the forest preserve is that most (though not all) picnic groves allow alcohol, and a picnic permit for under 100 people is only $55.  Below is the picnic grove we really like, Pulaski Woods.  It's quiet, overlooks a small lake, and has a nice shelter.  There are enough picnic tables there and in the vicinity that we shouldn't have to rent chairs or tables.  If it rains, there's the shelter which is relatively enclosed, and if not, we have lots of extra space.  The little kids in Jason's family will have plenty of space to run around, and we'll have a great places to take photos.   The only hitch is that we're a bit late in applying for a picnic permit, so we're at the mercy of availability for dates.  And a few of our friends are getting married this summer around the same time frame we're looking at, AND I have comprehensive exams in mid-September, which pretty much blacks out September as a possibility.  We'll see what happens.