Having an Anne Barge moment...

Love.

The (Reception) Site Seer...

I'm going to be quite the busy little bee this weekend. On the schedule: The Lighthouse, New York Botanical Gardens, the Puck Building, Angel Orensanz, Loft 11 and Westside Loft. Whew! I'm actually kind of dreading it. This is harder and less fun than I expected it to be. I suppose this is where a wedding planner would come in handy. Oh well... Full report to come...

Celebrities need griddle pans too...

I'm not sure why I get such a kick out of this, but I am loving finding star wedding web pages and registries. Enjoy...

One Tree Hill's Chad Michael Murray and Sophia Bush's Crate and Barrel registry. Haven't bought them a gift yet? They still need six Staccato Salad Plates.

Mariska Hargitay registered for cookbooks and cereal bowls at Williams-Sonoma.

Sarah Wynter still needs her hamper from Crate and Barrel. Best of all? She registered at Target (password required.)

Star Jones registered at Tiffany's. (But of course...) Digging the $195 Elsa Peretti ice cream scoop. Also, loving that the only item that wasn't purchased was an $11,500 (no, that's no typo) George IV tray. Who wants to go in on it with me?

I'm loving Angels instead...

I have become certifiably obsessed with the Angel Orensanz Foundation. It seems to be exactly what I want my location to be: amazing, stunning, gorgeous and so incredibly different. Plus, Sarah Jessica Parker and Matthew Broderick got married there. 'Nuff said.

So, here's the rub: It's $13,500 to rent the space for a Saturday night. And, while that includes the beautiful space, the tables and chairs and a lighting designer, it does not include FOOD, alcohol and, according to one person I talked to, ovens or fridges. So, basically you find yourself starting out $14,000 in the hole. This is a problem because, while I seem to share S.J.P's taste, I don't, sadly, share her bank account.

Still, I can't bear not to see it (I'm a marriage masochist, it seems) so I'm going to visit it this week. It could happen, right? I may just have to end up having it catered by White Castle...

Newport's New Allure

Last week when I was feeling especially desperate and hopeless about ever finding a wedding location in NYC for less than the price of a Lexus, I shot off an email to a gorgeous hotel in Newport, Rhode Island inquiring about their rates. (My fiance and I spent a weekend there early in our relationship chowing on lobster bisque, frequenting boutiques that sold scarily impressive selections of pastel accessories emblazoned with little whales, crabs and pineapples, and gawking at the mansions. Loved it.) And, while the beautiful location was definitely a bit (just a bit!) more affordable, it was booked into oblivion. Apparently event spaces there are going like hot (crab) cakes. When she called me up yesterday, I told her we were looking at September '06. Booked. I asked about August. Booked. She asked if I might consider doing the Sunday night of COLUMBUS DAY WEEKEND. That would be a no. Then she actually asked: "Are you and your fiance set on getting married next year? Would you consider '07?"

Newport is apparently so happening now that, for me, it's not happening. Guess it's back to the drawing board...in New York.

Budget living

Breaking news from Christian Science Monitor: Weddings are expensive.

Now, to be fair, there are a few useful, interesting money-saving tips in here (have a square cake instead of a round one, consider J.Crew's new wedding line, stick to flowers that are in season, etc.) And, then there are the suggestions that fall into the "Not In This Lifetime" category:

-Decorating with silk flowers in lieu of real

-Using paper plates and plastic utensils

-Having music from a boombox

Riiiight.

Wedding photogs of the rich and famous

Kate Moss is reportedly getting married and has hired photographer Mario Testino to take the photos. Yeah, I was considering him too. Either Mario or Patrick Demarchelier. I'll have to see their books... (File this in the "Must be nice" category, please.)

Saved by the (wedding) bell

Tiffani (Amber) Thiessen just got married. And, proving stars really are just like us, she has a wedding web page on The Knot.com. The guestbook is password-protected so you won't get to read any gushings from her "Matron of Honor--My best friend" Jennie Garth, but we still get to peek at the former Kelly Kapowski/90210-er's proposal story:

"BRADY TURNED OUR NEW YARD INTO THE MOST BEAUTIFUL ROMANTIC PICNIC FILLED WITH CANDLES AND FLOWERS. HE MADE A TIFFANI & BRADY CHRONICLE COMPLETE WITH EVERY SPECIAL MOMENT IN THE LAST YEAR OF OUR LIFE TOGETHER. THEN THE LAST PAGE OF THE BOOK WAS A DRAWING OF BRADY ON ONE KNEE PROPOSING TO TIFFANI! OH AND SHE SAID YES!!!!"

9021-Barf-o.

Handy

One thing no one ever tells you before you get engaged: You're going to be looking at your own hand. A lot. Quite simply, you can't stop. At least I can't. I catch myself walking to the deli or to lunch or to the bathroom at work, my eyes pointed downwards, staring at my ring finger. Constantly. Since I cross streets like this, navigating my way through Manhattan with my eyes affixed firmly to my own finger, it's bordering on dangerous. And it's certainly crossed the line over to obnoxious. A friend even caught me in mid-stare the other day. Tres embarrassing. But I can't help it! Maybe it's that I've haven't been engaged for even two weeks yet. Maybe it's that I'm not used to seeing anything on my fingers fancier than Essie Mademoiselle polish and the occasional Banana Republic bauble. Maybe it's that I've become a materialistic, egocentric, bling-obsessed bitch. Whatever the reason, it's clear that I am now a certified self-starer, a diamond-doter. Talk about giving myself a hand.

Holy Hudson!

So, The Hudson Hotel charges $255 per person which is fine and good except that that lofty pricetag includes NO cocktail hour stations, NO wedding cake and a paltry six passed hor d'oeuvres (standard app count in this city seems to be eight). The worst? You only get ONE entree selection--non-red meat-eaters be damned. (Well, you can give guests the gift of choice, but that's an extra $15/pp...) Geez! I thought it would be slightly more reasonable since the hotel itself (while certainly chic) is definitely inching towards so-five-minutes-ago-ness. That tented Apartment terrace is pretty gorg though. Oh well.

Location, location, location...

So I visited my first two locations yesterday: Bridgewaters and Tribeca Rooftop. Loved and disliked things about both...

Bridgewater Pros: Great terrace on the smaller room. Larger room has amazing views of the Brooklyn Bridge. Pricey but doable. Staff seems super sweet and very willing to work with you.

Bridgewater Cons: The smaller room has boats hanging from the ceiling. Big, wooden boats. I'm into seeing boats on the water outside--but not above my head. It all seems a bit too "Ahoy, matey!"

Tribeca Rooftop Pros: Un-freaking-believable roof. To-die-for views. Ginormous. Super chic.

Tribeca Rooftop Cons: Saturday night minimum is 200 guests (they refuse to budge on this) and, since we're going to have about 150, we would have to pay for 50 phantom people. Price is more than my entire budget so we would either have to 1) win the lottery 2) come up with more $$ or 3) have no flowers, e-vites instead of invitations and I would have to shop at Target for my dress. Also the rooftop is really the draw here, so I would probably give myself an ulcer worrying about bad weather. If it rains that day, you probably literally want to throw yourself off the roof...

Next on the list: The Lighthouse/Pier Sixty, Loft 11/Westside Loft, Central Park Boathouse, Orsanz Foundation, eloping...

Hair scare

The dreams haves started. Last night I dreamt that it was a few hours before my wedding and I realized that I had forgotten to book an appointment for a blowout. If you knew my hair, you'd know what a nightmare that really is...

Celebrity Wedding News

Let's get it started: Black Eyed Peas frontwoman Fergie and Las Vegas cutie Josh Duhamel are engaged. I'm guessing they can probably afford a wedding in New York...

Today in Tomkat-land: Katie Holmes will be appearing, appropriately enough, in a wedding dress in the August issue of W magazine. Katie poses prettily and waxes poetic about her soon-to-be hubby (the increasingly scary Tom Cruise, if you've been living under a rock where they won't deliver Us Weekly) and her impending nuptials. (Yes, but does she KNOW the history of marriage? I do.) And another thing: First W snags Brangelina playing house for the July issue. Now it's the future Mrs. Cruise glamming it up in white Comme des Garcons tulle. Is someone over there psychic or just frighteningly lucky? Either way, their celebrity wrangler deserves a promotion.

Here we go...

So I am going to see my first two possible wedding locations tomorrow. One is pretty much definitely out of my price range, so basically I'm just visiting it to torture myself. The other is still kind of a reach, but potentially doable. Hmmm...I just realized that the search for a wedding location is kind of like applying to colleges. You have your reaches that you'd KILL to get into. Then, you have your pool of realistic choices that could go either way. And finally you have your safeties--the ones that you would want to die if they were all you ended up getting, but on the chance nothing else works out, you have to have them in your back pocket. (And, while I'm working the school analogy, it would be nice if they had student loan-esque grants for brides-to-be. Hello...Sallie Mae?)