meldan

Thank you all

2007-08-29T18:36:00.000-07:00

I just decided to go and check on our charity registry, and the donation/percentage total is rather pleasing. I'm sure it's been long enough now for everything to filter through, and the combined total of donations you gave and percentages paid by vendors you used comes to $5078.13. I am absolutely thrilled that so much was raised for a group of worthy causes, in our names.

Thank you.

Back from honeymoon

2006-09-20T21:55:00.000-07:00

We got back yesterday. The honeymoon was fantastic, but so far I think we're both too tired and jetlagged to actually sit down and write about it. The first of several batches of photos should go up tonight, because that's about as much as I have the intellectual capacity for right now.

public humiliation!

2006-08-30T16:48:00.000-07:00

Eldan's bachelor party

Photos

2006-08-23T23:42:00.000-07:00

I've just set up a Flickr group for our wedding:

http://flickr.com/groups/meldan/

If you take any digital photos (or film photos if you feel like scanning them) at or around the wedding, please consider joining this group and sharing them. It will be a nice thing for us to keep and to show people who weren't able to be there with us.

As a target for the group, we'd really like it if we could manage to get in at least one photo of each person who comes to the wedding. Also feel free to include things that are tangential to the wedding itself, like tourist photos from the people who've come a long way to be with us.

Local news

2006-08-22T13:34:00.000-07:00

A few things that visitors to Seattle should be aware of:

The monorail probably won't be running while our guests are in town.
You'd be well advised not to eat raw oysters just now, due to contamination in the local oyster beds. Places that serve raw oysters are supposed to switch to other suppliers, but the reason they're normally so good here is that they are from so nearby. Meanwhile cooking does seem to effectively kill the bacteria in question, so there doesn't seem to be any reason to worry about cooked shellfish.
10 day weather forecast. Obviously that gets less reliable after the first couple of days, but it should give you some sort of packing guidance.
Airport security restrictions:
- General rules at Seattle-Tacoma airport. As far as I know, the same rules apply at all other US airports, but it's worth checking locally.
- British Airways' rules. These cover people flying from Seattle directly to London; they probably also cover all other flights to the UK, but it's worth checking with the particular airline.
- For flights from the UK to the US.
It's forest fire season. We're not likely to be affected in or around Seattle (including the hiking trails that are accessible by bus from here), but it does pay to check the local news or ask around before heading out to any forest area. Right now one of the access roads to Mount Rainier is closed to most traffic because of a fire in that area; I'll be keeping track of that for those who are planning on visiting there (don't worry - the other two routes are unaffected).

And finally: I am very glad that we didn't decide to take the risk of using the Olympic Sculpture Park for our wedding.

Rough Planet addenda

2006-08-04T18:55:00.000-07:00

We could have gone on for many more pages in that Rough Planet Guide, but we had to stop somewhere to remain sane and not make the thing too long for anyone to want to bother reading it. Of course, that means we ended up missing some things out that are worth mentioning:

One more restaurant that stands out: Marjorie. The food is great and very varied, the tiny patio is adorable, and the indoors is very welcoming. The best thing here is the chef's whimsical tasting menu: an assortment of whatever the chef feels like sending you, available with meat or in a vegetarian version on request.

Places worth seeing the inside of: the Central Library and the aquarium. I often go to the library to get away from my computer and read, and the more I use it the more I appreciate the inside, while liking the outside progressively less. In any case, it's interesting architecture, and on the interior I mean that in a good way. The aquarium has a distinct focus on local waters, which is what I think makes it worth a visit even though most cities have a decent aquarium. It's being largely rebuilt, which makes it look very uninviting from the outside, but they've managed to do this in such a way that the inside is not disrupted.

Harbour Cruises: of all the really made-for-tourists things in Seattle, the one that we think very highly of is Argosy Cruises. They offer various options; I'd recommend any that include the sea (as opposed to the lakes-only cruise, because the harbour is interesting and the view of downtown from out in the bay is to die for.

And finally, Snoqualmie. This one's only likely to interest people who are Twin Peaks fans, but for those who are: many of the location shots that constitute the fictional town of Twin Peaks were actually filmed in the Fall City - Snoqualmie - North Bend area. You'll have to do some research to figure out what is where, but this site looks like a promising start. You may decide you need a car to get between locations, but if not then you don't need a car to get to the area from downtown Seattle: it's just a matter of taking two buses. The 554 will get you to the Issaquah Park & Ride in about ¾ of an hour, and the 209 takes you through Fall City, Snoqualmie and North Bend. Do check timetables though, because the 209 only runs once an hour.

Rough Planet Guide: multimedia special section!!!

2006-08-01T13:37:00.000-07:00

We're about to start sending our custom guide to Seattle to guests who have told us they are coming. So if you've told us you're coming, and don't receive this soon, then please RSVP again because it probably means your first reply didn't get through. If you haven't replied yet, please do because knowing exactly how many people will be here will help us finalise arrangements.

The guide contains a lot of www addresses, which obviously are not all that useful on paper, so here they all are as links you can follow to save some typing (we didn't want to put the guide itself online because we prefer not to publish our address together with details of when we'll be out of the country...):

Getting here
Airporter bus information and bookings
map from bus stop to Ramada Inn
map from bus stop to Sixth Avenue Inn

General information on the web
http://www.cityofseattle.net/tour/intro.htm
http://del.icio.us/eldan/Seattle
http://lostinseattle.com
http://seattle.metblogs.com/
http://seattlest.com/
http://www.thestranger.com/seattle/Home
http://www.thestranger.com/seattle/Suggests
http://seattle.citysearch.com/

Getting around
über-nerdy guide to Seattle's street layout
Neighbourhoods & parks map
region map
Bus trip planner
Bike rentals
location of the Black Bottle
location of the Edgewater

Restaurants
Cascadia
The Holy Tom Douglas Empire
Wasabi Bistro
Teapot Vegetarian House
Bamboo Garden
where to find cheap and tasty Ethiopian and Vietnamese food

Bars
The Viceroy
The Elysian Brewing Company
The Six Arms

Coffee
Caffe Vita
Espresso Vivace
Coffee shop with wireless internet access locator

Tourist stuff
Underground Tour
Seattle Art Museum
Klondike Gold Rush Museum
Moss Bay Kayaks
Seattle parks
Ballard Locks
Hikes accessible by bus
Mount Rainier (see also my attempt at getting a tour group together for Mt. Rainier - let me know if you're interested)
Olympic Peninsula

Questions or suggestions? Please comment on this post.

Mount Rainier

2006-07-17T19:59:00.000-07:00

Seattle is a fairly easy place to get around by car, and it probably isn't worth guests hiring one while here. However, there is one unmissable activity that is a lot of hassle without driving: hiking on Mount Rainier. It's too far to get to by bike, there's no public transport from Seattle, and the only private bus tour we know of charges a lot of money for a trip that involves several short photo stops where you won't be able to get away from everyone else who was on the bus. So I had a better idea.

Even between only two people, it's cheaper to rent a car for the day and drive to Mount Rainier, plus that way you get to spend as long as you like hiking, and it will be much easier to get away from the crowds. If we arrange it such that there are 3 or 4 people per car, the whole trip works out pretty cheap (about $30 for the car plus $25 or so for fuel). I can organise the car hire and can probably also come along myself (bringing a car). If I can come (it depends on whether there is much last minute fire-fighting to do for the wedding) it would either be Monday August 28^th or Wednesday the 30^th; the Monday would suit me better but I think fewer guests will have arrived by then.

If you would be interested in coming along, please comment on this post, and also mention which day would suit you better and whether you'd be up for driving. There's no hard deadline, but it would be better to reply sooner rather than later because car rental costs might go up if we leave it too late to book.

Hotel availability

2006-07-12T15:25:00.000-07:00

Just a quick note to warn guests that the Ramada has no rooms left for the weekend before our wedding (Friday August 25th at least). We have a large block booked starting the following Sunday (August 27th), but if you're coming earlier than that, you may run into trouble. For the moment, the Sixth Avenue Inn still has availability then, but it probably means they won't for much longer, as they are very similar hotels located very close to each other. If you have any trouble finding rooms either there or nearby, please get in touch with us and we'll sort something out.

Also, for guests wanting a budget option, the HI Hostel at Pike Place Market is apparently quite good, and is very conveniently located. We didn't mention it earlier because we don't have a block booking organised or anything, but a colleague just stayed there for a conference so now that it's been vetted I feel comfortable directing people there.

Coming to Seattle

2006-07-10T09:13:00.000-07:00

I want to mention a few things.

- Some of you already know this, but if you're interested in sharing a room with someone and you want us to set it up, email us and let us know. Be sure to include things like "I only want to room with a female, non-smoking person who hates cucumbers", and we'll do our best to match you.

- We'll be writing a guide for you out of towners shortly. If there's anything in particular you want us to mention, please let us know. It'll mostly be full of things we think are cool. I have promised to keep the "coffee" section as concise as possible.

- The Bumbershoot festival is taking place that weekend, and the lineup has been announced! I would highly recommend going for a day, even if you don't like any of the musicians featured, because there's also a lot of interesting art to look at and people-watching to be had. Also, the majority of you are staying pretty close to it.

Dress, part 3

2006-07-03T10:08:00.000-07:00

Of course, if anybody wants to show up in one of these, that would make our day.

Invitations

2006-06-28T23:50:00.000-07:00

This week, we are sending out invitations. Just a few quick things to say about them:

Please do reply, even if we already know whether or not you're coming. It just makes it easier for us to keep track if we compile all the responses we get now into one big list.
If you use the email address on the invitations, that goes to both of us, which is helpful.
If there's anything unclear about arrangements, please comment here, because that way anyone else who has the same question might be able to get the answer from the comments.
Yes, we did manage to fall foul of a non-obvious USPS rule again, this time about the apparent inability of sorting machines to deal with square envelopes.

Dress for women

2006-06-28T23:49:00.000-07:00

It has been suggested that I elaborate on the concept of "cocktail dress" for the women who are attending our wedding.

First of all, there are practical considerations for the ladies who will be present:

It's going to be outside, standing, on the grass.

The weather will likely be in the 60s, and will cool as the sun sets.

It may be breezy, as the park is on sort of a bluff overlooking Puget Sound.

It is likely to be quite sunny outside.

Though my dress is about as formal as a dress can get, I'm with Eldan in that whatever you wear is probably going to be fine by me. As far as the dress code on the invitation goes, "cocktail dress" just seems like the easiest way of saying "show up in some nice clothes and bathe, but you don't need to put on a ball gown or anything like that".

Dress

2006-05-07T16:10:00.000-07:00

I've had a few people asking about dress codes for the wedding and reception. The invitations will say cocktail dress, but I'm never sure exactly what these shorthands mean—we actually spent a while reading through etiquette stuff on the internets to figure out what fit best—and I'm sure I'm not the only one. So we thought it would be best to actually describe things in more detail; I'll start and Melinda can add to this later.

I'll be wearing what the tailor describes as a Nehru suit, in deep blue, with no tie; it has raised 'mandarin' collars instead. I think that's probably a good guide for the men present. A couple of people have asked if it's OK to wear a tie, worrying that I'll be offended if they do, so I should make one thing clear: I dislike ties because I don't like how it feels to wear one, not because I have any objection to people wearing ties. We're really just giving you a dress code so you know what to expect - we're not going to be offended if you show up looking different from that.

While I'm on the subject, I've been really enjoying the tailor experience. I think it helps that the guy bears a strong resemblance to Peter Hook (though I have as yet to catch him doing the dance), but it's not just that. There's something utterly charming about getting this kind of personalised service, as compared to the mass-produced everything I would buy for most day-to-day purposes.

Ceremony venue

2006-05-01T21:37:00.000-07:00

We actually decided on this and reserved it a while ago, but for some reason never got around to blogging about it. We have a confirmed ceremony venue: Magnolia Park. It's a fairly small, suburban park up on a cliff with views across Elliott Bay to West Seattle and the port. On a really good day (like yesterday, when we biked up there to get an idea of where exactly we want to be for the ceremony) you can see Mount Rainier looming dramatically in the distance. There's no guarantee it will be that clear—the mountain is over 50 miles away, after all—but the chances are at that time of year it will be sunny and pleasantly warm, and there will at least be views over the water.

Practicalities

Although it's not a huge distance from downtown or the reception venue (map), it's too far to walk (we were hoping to use a park a few blocks from the Edgewater, but because it's still under construction they aren't issuing ceremony permits for it yet). A large proportion of our guests are going to be from out of town, and we neither want to encourage you to rent cars (which you definitely don't need to do for Seattle area tourism), nor make the evening complicated for you, so we're organising transport from and back to the reception venue. We haven't worked out the details yet, because we're trying to find a provider who won't rip us off by charging a half-day coach hire rate for the 6 mile round trip, but the important thing is that you don't need to worry about it. Guests will just have to get to the Edgewater, which is within ¾ mile of the hotels we have block bookings at, and a carriage of some sort will whisk you to the park, and whisk you back after the ceremony and a little time to chill out and wander around in the park.

There is one other thing, which is that everyone should wear shoes that you can stand on a grassy hill in. The walk to the Seattle waterfront (any part of it) involves 3 or 4 blocks of fairly steep downhill, and in the park we'll all be standing on uneven grass. So please don't torture yourselves.

Hotel information

2006-01-31T11:58:00.000-08:00

It seems like a good idea to have most of our guests staying close to each other, our place, and to the interesting tourist stuff. As of right now, we have block booking arrangements with three area hotels: the Edgewater, the Ramada, and the Sixth Avenue Inn.

Note to people involved with the ceremony (parents, attendants, etc): please check with us before you book anything, because we may have already made arrangements for you.

All three of the hotels are quite close to downtown, Seattle Center, our place, the reception venue, and are within the special area in which you can take the bus for free for much of the day. We went and had a look at them, and didn't see anything alarming. All of the prices below are before hotel tax, which is an alarming 15.6%.

Ramada Inn Seattle
The Ramada is about midway between downtown and our place- here's a map to the reception venue from it. The rate for a non-smoking double room is $99.00 per night, and you must reserve the room by the 14th of August to get that rate. It has a restaurant attached, and is a short stumble from what Eldan and I have affectionately termed the Tom Douglas District. It is also next door to Top Pot Doughnuts, which is a tasty Seattle institution. You can book a room by calling +1 (206)441-9785 and saying that you're with the Minch-Goldenberg wedding.
Sixth Avenue Inn
This is one or two blocks further from downtown, our place and the reception venue than the Ramada (map to the reception venue), but the attached restaurant looked a little nicer, and they made us a special website where you can book your room. The rate that they gave us is $109.00 per night, for a non-smoking room double room, and is good until July 29th, so it's to your advantage to make a reservation before then. You can book it on this website, or by calling +1 (206)441-8300 and saying you're with the Minch-Goldenberg wedding.
The Edgewater
This is the place where the reception will happen, and it's also two blocks from our building. We have a block of rooms guaranteed for the evening of the reception, for $209 per night. It's a very nice hotel, but as it's quite expensive, most of our guests probably don't want to stay there. You can make reservations online, but we haven't gotten the groupID or whatever it is we need to have to make sure that you get the group rate, so the best thing to do would be to call them up and say that you're in town with the Minch-Goldenberg wedding. Their number is 1 (800)624-0670 inside the US, and +1 (206)728-7000 everywhere else. Or, you can let us know that you'd like a room, and we can deal with it for you.

If none of these strike your fancy, let us know, and we can recommend something.

Special thanks goes to my mom, for making the arrangements with the Ramada and the Sixth Avenue Inn.

Bumbershoot

2006-01-28T10:45:00.000-08:00

As both of our mothers have noticed in the past couple of weeks, Seattle's annual music and arts festival—Bumbershoot—has been inconsiderate enough to pick our wedding day for its start date. This is actually both good and bad news.

The bad news is that once tickets go on sale, it might become hard to find hotel rooms in town. Last year the tickets didn't go on sale till mid-June, the line-up wasn't announced until July, and publicity didn't start in earnest until the summer, so it's no cause for panic, but it's another reason that it would be better to book rooms sooner rather than later. We have a block of rooms at the Edgewater, and Melinda's mum is kindly organising a block for us in another hotel about half a mile away, so please get in touch with us when you want to make arrangements.

The good news is that it's likely to be a good festival, with an impressive line-up, so you might want to go. I've never actually been, but Melinda had fun last year, and here's a review from a few years earlier. They will be selling one- and two-day tickets, and because the festival venue is really close to our reception venue, it would work well to stay in one place and spend Friday with us and the weekend at Bumbershoot.

Greater Seattle orientation

2006-01-06T14:22:00.000-08:00

We've had some people asking whether they should stay in Seattle or elsewhere in the greater Seattle area when they come for the wedding. We would strongly recommend Seattle itself (either downtown or Belltown), for two main reasons:

The reception venue is in Belltown and very close to downtown; we live in the same area, and we're likely to have the ceremony itself close by too.
Personal bias: we think downtown Seattle is much more interesting than the rest of the metropolitan area; so much so that we chose to live near it even though it gives Melinda a fairly long commute to work.

The main thing is that if you stay on the west side (looking back at that map, the ribbon lake in the middle is Lake Washington, and eastside and westside are relative to that) you'll have a much easier time getting to everything. The two bridges across the lake create a significant traffic bottleneck, whereas once you're on the west side most things you might want to go to can be walked between.

More on flights

2005-12-20T11:17:00.000-08:00

For people coming from outside the US

I've just noticed that SEA-TAC airport has a map and list of non-stop international flights. The list includes links to the airlines that fly each route; in most cases it's a monopoly, which is why it can be rather expensive.

You can definitely save some money by flying an indirect route (via New York seems to often be the cheapest way), but how big a saving seems to vary dramatically each time I check. It can be between a few dollars and a couple of hundred. If you try this, there are a couple of important things to bear in mind.

Firstly, make sure you compare all-included prices. Flying via NYC can add a significant amount of taxes relative to going direct, so if you compare ticket-only prices that may dramatically overstate the amount of money that you'll save.

Secondly, for the westbound trip remember that you will have to clear customs and immigration in the first airport you land at (I'm not 100% sure this is true if you fly via Canada, but it definitely is if you transfer within the US). This process can take 2 hours at the busiest airports (such as Chicago O'Hare and all of New York's international airports), and don't expect the slightest sympathy or practical assistance from the goons in uniform if you are in danger of missing your connection. It doesn't mean that the transfer is necessarily a bad idea, it's just that you should give yourself at least 2½ hours to make it.

Finally, and I realise this is me getting petty now, you'll be able to sleep better on the eastbound trip if you take one long direct flight than if you have to change. This seems to make much more difference to some people than others, so you'll have to decide whether it matters to you.

For people flying from Cleveland

There are quite a few ways to get between Cleveland and Seattle. I've tried several of the options, and so far I'd have to say that none are great and none are horrible. The only practical advice I can really give is that the direct night flight that Continental sometimes (on a very strange schedule) offers from Seattle to Cleveland is difficult to sleep on because they use the PA far too much, including playing a trailer for the movie some time after take-off. As above, this probably bothers some people a lot less than it bothers me, but since discovering this I've been opting to fly during the day, even though it often means having to transfer somewhere.

Postal Pettiness

2005-12-05T13:17:00.000-08:00

There is a small chance that couple of you [US addresses only] will have been asked by the Postal Service to pay 12 or 14 cents to receive our card. This was due to a mistake for which I can not apologise enough; it's not that we think we're so important that people should pay to receive mail from us.

Here's what happened: there is a special postcard postage rate that is lower than the rate for the lightest letters, but subject to certain conditions. I knew there was a rule about dimensions, and checked that our cards were in fact small enough before buying a sheet of postcard rate stamps. However, I had not realised that there was also a rule that the address must be written in landscape format. Because the stamps we're using are quite large, and because the design on the cards is in portrait format, we wrote the addresses in portrait format. Apparently this makes the postcard rate no longer apply.

Fortunately, our mailman is helpful, and noticed this when he collected the outgoing mail from this building, so the cards found their way back to us with an explanation. I'll be taking the stack of them to the post office tomorrow to buy the extra postage and re-send them, but I'm not 100% sure that all the cards were caught, because we sent some on Friday and only heard from the mailman today. So if yours was one that didn't get caught, please accept our humble apologies, and be flattered that at least you were one of the first people we sent a card to.

The Sending of Cards

2005-12-04T00:51:00.000-08:00

Over the past couple of days we've been busy addressing and mailing those save-the-date cards that we had printed over a month ago. For the handful of people who read this blog already I would have liked to have kept this some kind of surprise, but the cards refer recipients to this site, and we need to put some more information up.

There are two important things to tell our intended guests right now, so I'll start with those.

Dates

The wedding itself is on the 1^st of September next year. This is a Friday; don't worry, you aren't getting confused. The venue was already booked for the 2^nd, and we couldn't think of any over-riding reason why it had to be on the Saturday, so we went for the Friday. It is also the Labor Day weekend (clarification for non-Americans: Labor Day is a public holiday that falls on Monday the 4^th of September next year)

For everyone who doesn't live in or near Seattle—most of our guests, in other words—I would strongly recommend taking a week or two of holiday and spending it in the Pacific Northwest. This is a really cool area, with interesting cities, beautiful countryside, and no shortage of things to do, and typical end-of-August weather here is comfortably warm and not as rainy as Seattle's reputation would imply. Also, even if you're only coming from the Great Lakes it's already quite a long journey, and London is 9½ hours away. Doing a trip like that for just a couple of days is plain silly. I should know; I did exactly that last week.

Anyway, whether you just want to come for a couple of days or make a long trip of it, it would probably help you to know some of our plans. There will be a bachelor/bachelorette/stag/hen/whateveryouwanttocallit party on Wednesday the 30^th of August, to which all of our friends will be invited. Then on the Thursday night there will be a rehearsal dinner, to which all of our relatives will be invited. We haven't yet made any arrangements for these; just decided on the dates so everyone who would like to be there can be. After the wedding we'll have a day to chill and pack, and then be leaving for our honeymoon at a painful hour of Sunday morning; the 3^rd of September. And finally, I haven't made up my mind yet, but I will probably 'officially' take the last 4 days of August off work, because I know that realistically I won't be able to get much done that week anyway.

What this means for our guests is that you'd be better off arriving earlier rather than leaving later. If you're around for the week before the wedding, we'll be able to spend a lot of time together, and you'll be over the jetlag by the wedding night. Meanwhile, there's no reason why you shouldn't stick around for another week after the wedding, but just be warned that we won't be around to spend time with you.

For those who live outside the US, I would advise booking the flights relatively soon. There is only one flight between London and Seattle each day (BA 48/49), and being a holiday weekend there is a risk that the return trip will sell out early, not to mention that last-minute tickets can get seriously expensive.

Hotels

We would like to make some block-bookings for hotels. We're looking at probably making a block booking at 3 places: the Edgewater (the reception and possibly wedding venue, and quite an expensive place to stay), a hostel if we can book an entire dorm for our guests, and a mid-range hotel where you can have private rooms without breaking the bank.

Hopefully by doing block bookings we can negotiate some sort of discount for the two hotels, and if we organise for as many of our guests as possible to stay in the same few hotels near us [which also happens to be near the venue] it will make logistics easier for everyone.

Obviously we need to know how many people want to stay in what sort of place, before we can make the arrangements. To that end, please let us know as soon as possible if you'd like to be included in this, and what sort of place would suit you. We will probably start talking to hotels about a month from now; hopefully that gives people time to reply. Booking hotels later shouldn't be a problem, and we'll be happy to give recommendations for places that are nearby, but I think if we want a block of rooms all in one place we'll need to reserve that relatively early.

The best way to contact us about anything wedding-related is the email address on the cards, because that goes to both of us simultaneously.

Relations' names

2005-12-03T23:47:00.000-08:00

This is probably one of the less important things to have gone through my head today, but I'll ask anyway. When we get married, my brother will be Melinda's brother-in-law, and her parents will be my parents-in-law, and so on. But does our language have a specific word for their relationship to each other, or are we stuck with my son-in-law's brother and my brother's wife's parents, and so on?

If, as I think is the case, English doesn't have such words, does Turkish? I know Turkish generally has more words to describe peoples' exact relationship with each other....

Go (one mile) west!

2005-11-04T08:41:00.000-08:00

There's no good way to lead up to this, so I'll just come right out and say it: we have a new condo! It's in Belltown, which is the area between downtown Seattle (the part with the famous market) and Seattle Center (the part with the famously wacky architecture).

We closed on Monday, and we plan to be moved in by the middle of the month. It has all the usual amenities (two bedrooms, two bathrooms, awesome kitchen, parking spot) and some unusual ones (gas stove, fireplace, giant-sized bathtub). I am particularly excited about the kitchen and the bathtub, as well as the fact that since it's on the ground floor of the building, we get a small portion of the front courtyard of the building instead of a balcony like everyone else does.

I took some bad pictures, and regrettably left out the building's rooftop deck, which has a spectacular view of Puget Sound. The furniture in the pictures is the previous owner's.

[belated update by Eldan on December 4^th: I've started a Flickr album of photos from this rooftop deck. Man, we live in a beautiful area. Incidentally, the Edgewater is 3 blocks from our new home, and one of the reasons we chose that venue was that the ballroom has a similar view to the sea-facing side of the roof.]

I should also note that our buyer's agent was absolutely fantastic, so if any of you are considering a real estate purchase in the area, I can pass his info along.

Some received advice

2005-10-20T13:47:00.000-07:00

A friend recently told me that she got a quote for a wedding cake, and then the next day went and asked for a price on the same cake without mention that it was for a wedding. The second quote was approximately half of the first. The lesson I take from this is that as much as possible, one should source things for a wedding without mentioning that they are for a wedding. I've taken this to heart; we'll see how well it works.

Right now we're looking for a printer to do our save-the-date cards, and I've approached a number of printers saying only that it's for a short run of postcards. Of course when they get the artwork they'll know it's for a wedding, but I doubt they would suddenly change the price when they see it. Meanwhile, I'm somewhat inclined to submit very similar quote requests using the words save-the-date cards for my wedding to see if it changes the price.

Save that date!

2005-09-08T23:06:00.000-07:00

After looking at just a couple of the venues on Eldan's page, we have decided to have our reception at the Edgewater Hotel.

It'll be on September 1st, 2006. Right after the wedding. Which is at an as-of-yet undecided location somewhere within the City of Seattle.

Man, I guess this means we're going to have to start in with making some "save the date" cards, and writing the ceremony, and tasting cake, and all of that!