Flor Rodriguez and Brian Mounts

Our Honeymoon - Day 1

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 02:57:00 +0000

It has been a full 30 days since Flor and I got married. Unbelievable! Anyway, as we have settled into our day-to-day lives I have started combing through all of our video from the honeymoon... among many other tasks... and I have put together this nice little ditty of clips from the first day of our honeymoon. I started the video off with a little vow to my new wife which was actually taken the night of the wedding. I almost made her cry. It's pretty cool; I didn't know I could be so moving. The rest of the video is a nice fun summary of day 1. Enjoy, and stay tuned for more to come!

Honeymoon Cruise Video - Day 1 from Brian Mounts on Vimeo.

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The Wedding Rehearsal - A Recap

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Sat, 05 Jan 2008 00:01:00 +0000

Saturday December 15, 2007 came and went. Man, it's been almost 3 weeks since then and it seems like just yesterday. Flor and I got up Saturday morning to a whirlwind of last minute tasks associated with the wedding and a ton of friends and family showing up from out of town.

The morning consisted of picking up flowers, getting nails done, etc., making arrangements, bouquets, boutonnieres, finalizing music play lists, last minute shopping, picking people up from the airport, running rehearsals and finally doing dinner with family... both of our families.. all of them.

The day was long and arduous and extremely productive. I think both Flor and I were up until around 2:30am and had virtually exhausted ourselves just before the wedding day. This of course didn't help the colds that both of us had picked up on Thursday and really probably made the colds much worse than they would have been otherwise. We both ended up taking medicine all the way past Christmas to fight them and I, even now as I write this, am still battling congestion and a cough, the last remnants of the cold.

Definitely the highlights of the day included the two things that were not really work related. It was the rehearsal and the rehearsal dinner. Most of our families were there and some of our close friends that helped out with the ceremony. We did a little run through of the ceremony on site just before sun down and then hit dinner at 6 over at El Salvadoreno. Man, that was the biggest dinner party I've ever been a part of. I'd take a guess that we had about 30 people there. It was definitely good food and good company.

The rehearsal earlier in the day was a lot of fun although quite cold. It really wasn't much cooler than the wedding day but it felt worse. I think there was a strong wind coming off the water. Anyway, I gave a lot of instruction and received some fine guidance from Flor, Ken (Our Minister), and Nicole (Our Coordinator) and in the end we had a fine time.

I'm not sure who took pictures on that day because I know I didn't notice anyone taking pictures but Rich & Nicole obviously took some sneaky pictures behind my back and they were good enough to send them to me after we got home last week. Check out the nice selection from the few I've highlighted below.

On that note, if you or someone you know of took additional pictures of any portion of the wedding weekend please be proactive and send them our way. You can email them to us, snail mail a CD, or upload them online for us to download. Our contact info can be found here. Whatever works for you we will take. Thanks a lot and check back later for pictures and video of the wedding day itself followed by the honeymoon and the holidays. We've now been married for 19 days and we've been back in the routine of normal life for three days. Here's to many more years to come.

A Select Few From The Wedding Rehearsal

And A Random Picture Of Our Cake In It's Earliest Form

We're Back... And We're Married!

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Thu, 27 Dec 2007 23:51:00 +0000

Ohh my goodness! What did we just do?!? Looking back on the last two weeks Flor and I have looked into each others eyes a couple times now and thought to ourselves that very question because it hardly seems possible that we did it. Just 4 months ago we were simply dating. We had been together for more than a year but we were just dating. Now things are set. We are committed for a lifetime and all it took was 3 1/2 months.

Despite our amazement at the obvious we couldn't be happier. We nearly stressed ourselves to the limit that last week but somehow I got things cleaned up enough at work to step away for 10 days and Flor passed both of her Finals and finished out her first of 8 semesters of medical school. I have no idea how she did so well with so much going on at home but she did great.

We had our bachelor/ette parties on the night of the 14th, I've got a few pictures posted from my party posted over here and there is no record of Flor's party so aside from the pictures with the big pink flamingo we'd like to say we had a good time and leave it at that. :)

Saturday the last of our families arrived into town and we did the rehearsal and dinner and did the last minute preparations for the wedding day itself. Big thanks goes to the Trager's for spending their entire weekend making our cake and decorating the wedding site. Many more thanks goes to Brian's mom and sister for all of their help making bows and ribbon and decorations, etc, Flor's grandma and sisters and brother for the same, along with Brian's aunt Beth for her general work on just about everything, Deanna for playing at the wedding, Aaron for his photography, Sarah and Chad for their videography, Geno for the food, Flor's parents for all their efforts getting ceremony materials made and for all those that helped decorate the site on Sunday morning. Ken also did a great job with the ceremony, and Wine Steals catered the greatest after-party I could have asked for.

Man, now that I think about it I'm thinking of countless other little tasks that so many people did for us that the list will get out of control real fast. Thanks to everybody. You all made us so happy and we will never forget the day as long as we live. We would've gotten married without you but we wouldn't have the same rich memories of our friends and family supporting us had you not been there. Thank you.

Later this week I will begin posting some pictures and video from the wedding and the honeymoon but for now I'll attach a few pictures that highlight the day. Thanks to those that took them and thanks to those that have given us copies of their pictures from our wedding day. I'd like to take this time while I'm on the subject to ask you to send us copies of your pictures however is easiest for you. CD, email, web, watercolor, whatever, we'd love to have them all. If you need our mailing address or email address please see our Contact Us page. It's all there.

Lastly thanks to all for the gifts given. In moments like these realistically you expect to receive some gifts and plan to receive none. The gifts that were given were so generous and we thank everyone for the love they represent. Keep checking out the blog here on our site as we will continue adding pictures, video, and information on our newly devoted lives. Just click on the subscribe button in the upper right portion of the web page.

Christmas is coming...

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 00:51:00 +0000

...and so is the wedding. Ohh my goodness, the last few days have been crazy and it's only going to get wackier. The weekend was particularly busy for a time that we had decided would be a break for us. It was to be a time for Flor to study up for her last finals of the year and for me to get a lot of menial tasks done at home in preparation for the wedding. Items such as music playlists, party favor preparation, bow creation, itinerary formulation, etc. In the end we did some dance lessons, some church, some movie watching, and some visiting with Flor's little sister Ada. We ended the weekend with an impromptu trip to Fountain Valley where I bowled in a little tournament while Flor watched and casually studied. I even made $20 on the trip. :)

Anyway, all this is to say that there's a lot of little things coming together these last few days and we're getting tired but we're really excited too. Not too tired though. Last week Flor and I put our first Christmas tree up together. We did a little Christmas decorating and had a great time together. I can't help looking forward to the many more holiday's we'll spend together.

Here's some picture from our decorating last Thursday evening the 6th.

10 Days And Counting...

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 19:27:00 +0000

So it's been entirely too long since we made an update on the wedding plans so I'll do a quick synopsis of the last 3 weeks.

Flor and I have both been very busy putting together the details of the wedding between our already busy schedules. We had our wedding shower up in LA with Flor's family and church on the 24th of November. Unfortunately neither Flor or I brought our cameras so we don't really have any pictures of it but we're working on obtaining some pictures from Flor's pastor.

That of course was the weekend of Thanksgiving too and Flor and I had some good times spent with both families. We did catch some pictures from Thanksgiving with Flor's family although they were just on a camera phone. but here they are anyway:

Regarding wedding stuff, we've got our equipment booked through Party Production Rentals, our marriage counseling started with the San Diego Institute for Couples, we're back into swing dance classes to dust the cobwebs off for our first dance together. We've been madly cleaning up the apartment, decorating our first Christmas Tree together, putting together out Guestbook Picture Album for the wedding day, music playlists, bachelor/bachelorette party plans, transportation plans... man, it's been a busy time.

We're really close to the end now and Flor and I are in agreement, we can't wait for Wine Steals the evening of the 16th because we'll finally not have to think about anything else... including travel plans. That is of course the beauty of the cruise, you just go there and they do everything for you. The only thing we'll have to worry about after the reception is just getting to the airport on time. We even look forward to getting back to town and having nothing to worry about other than thank you cards and getting back to a normal routine.

The next 10 days are still filled with tasks though. I've got to finalize the music playlists for the reception and party, make itineraries for those helping with wedding functions, pick up flowers and make centerpieces and bouquets, and some other small tasks that add up quite a bit. Tonight however is dance class and dance class is fun. Cheers to fun tasks!

See you all in a little more than a week!

One Month To Go!!!

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 20:25:00 +0000

Just one more month to go and we're married! These are exciting times we're living in.

We Have Wedding Bands!

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 19:00:00 +0000

OK, so they're not in our possession yet but they're coming in the mail. We should have them in hand by the weekend but we OWN our rings now! It's awesome! Anyway, I know many people like seeing rings and it's almost the first things asked after what is the date, they ask, let me see the ring. So I will take some time now to show off our rings.

Our Wedding Bands:

And Flor's Engagement Ring:

Anyway, we're really excited about our progress and amazed that we're down to roughly 5 weeks. Next on our agenda is Brian's suit, as Flor has already bought and altered her dress, and reserving all our rental equipment.

Keep checking back often for more blog updates or just subscribe to our blog via Email updates or subscribe to the blog's RSS Feed. Thanks for reading!

Cake and Food... And Wedding Bands!

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Fri, 09 Nov 2007 20:12:00 +0000

Wow, another week has come and gone and we are now only... counting... 37 days away to our wedding! Many, that's crazy! Anyway, to give a quick update on things it dawned on us that we hadn't given out any love to our amazing friends that are making our cake for us. Nicole and Richard Trager! Thanks guys!

The Trager's are "gifting" us the cake for our wedding and we couldn't thank them enough. We even had a taste test this past weekend on Saturday and it was most delicious.

Along with the cake comes thoughts of food and we had a taste test of the food we'll be having at the reception this past Monday evening. Geno of CaterDiego.com came out with his special BBQ sauces, meats, fruits, and sides and blew us away with the delicious meal. The Trager's were also over and they got to partake as well and we all decided that the food was delicious so naturally we decided to book Geno for the event. Not only is the food good but he'll be coming with his truck to the site to cook on location with a staff and a very reasonable price tag! Thanks Geno! I recommend to everybody to take a look at Geno's catering site CaterDiego.com and check out his sauces at your local Henry's market or online at sauce4u.com.

Now the only thing left to do is to check out Wine Steals selection for mid-December and set aside some selections for the party that evening. We'll be doing that next Sunday afternoon so check back for our Wine Steals report in about 10 days.

Anyway, I'm (Brian) on break at work right now so I better get back soon but I will leave you with this piece of awesomness that is on my mind right now: My soon to be bride is currently, at this very moment, trying on wedding dresses. I can't wait to see her in her final selection. :) And tonight we go shopping for our wedding bands! Can't wait!

Marriage Counseling - Our First Tasks

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Mon, 29 Oct 2007 23:19:00 +0000

So Flor and I decided about a month ago that we should do a little marriage counseling before we tie the knot. This has been a standard practice that many couples go through to just get a feel for possible problem spots that a new marriage might find friction in down the road.

We finally got around to making our first appointment about two weeks ago in mid-October with our pastor at Mission Valley Church of the Nazarene. We talked with Pastor Scott for about an hour and got a lot of positive feedback and advise from him. In the end we walked away feeling really good about ourselves. We also walked away with two tasks in hand. One was to schedule at least one more appointment with a professional counselor to get one more intelligent mind guiding us in the right direction and the other was to get our hands on a few books for engaged and newlyweds to read to better understand what we are getting ourselves into and how to cope with the inevitable friction that will occur from time to time.

We have not yet made that appointment but we did purchase the books and today the first came in the mail: Personality Plus for Couples. The second: Saving Your Marriage Before It Starts has yet to arrive but you can be sure that when it does you'll probably find Flor and myself diligently working our way through these books discussing them from front to back. I think they'll be interesting reads at least and I'll have to report back on them as we get a grasp on their content.

That's it for now. We hope you'll check back often to our wedding blog for more wedding updates. Once again you can subscribe to the blog via Email updates or subscribe to the blog's RSS Feed or you can just check back in to the site from time to time.

Our Love's On Fire

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Tue, 23 Oct 2007 20:17:00 +0000

The past few days have been an interesting time here in San Diego. It seems our love has sparked a fire here in San Diego that is blazing across outer edges of our great city touching the lives of thousands.

Seriously though we've heard from many of our distant friends and family regarding the current San Diego fires. They all have been asking how we are doing and we appreciate the thoughts and prayers. It would seem that we personally haven't been effected much. We live in the city center and the fires are to the North East and the South East of the city suburbs. The air quality is pretty bad but it is tolerable without masks and we'll just be waiting for the winds to turn back to the East so that the city can get back to normal.

Flor has had a welcomed break with the fires as UCSD has closed down due to the air quality and the sheer amount of people temporarily displaced by the fires and Brian has put in some shortened days at the office so far this week. Overall, we are fortunate to be relatively unaffected by the flames. We are also fortunate that our wedding facilities have not been affected and all plans are continuing forward unchanged.

Thanks again for all your thoughts and prayers and check back often to our wedding blog for more updates. Once again you can subscribe to the blog via Email updates or subscribing to the blog's RSS Feed or just check back in to the site from time to time.

Make Some Money And Help Us Out In The Process

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Sun, 21 Oct 2007 19:07:00 +0000

Over the past few weeks a few people have offered help with the wedding. They have told us to ask if we need anything and we figured we would take a minute to ask of all of our guests the simplest thing you could do to help us out. This blog post is related squarely with our Help Needed page on the left hand side of your screen.

(Pretty please...)

First of all, we are a young couple that has little money and only one source of income so we're trying to fund this wedding as best as we can. So we figured out a couple ways that you could help us without giving us money. The first is by opening a savings account up with VirtualBank online. The only catch here is that we need to refer you in. Meaning, you must ask us for a referral link before you sign up. Once we provide you with a referral link you can then open a saving account with $100 and VirtualBank will give you a $20 opening bonus and us a $20 referral bonus. The account has no fees and no minimum balance requirements; if you don't want to use the account you don't have to. The terms and conditions of the account can be found on the Virtual Bank website here.

The second option is even less of a commitment on your part. It is using our referral link and signing up with Ebates online. Ebates is a cash back shopping site. They give you a percentage of money back from most any online store you buy at just by clicking through to that store from the Ebates site. It's a great website and I couldn't imagine shopping online without using it. Like VirtualBank Ebates will give you $10 in your account for free and they will give us $10 for free as well.

The referral link is: www.ebates.com/doublebonusoffer/index.htm?id=30034567 and my referral email address is: email at brian mounts dot com.

This ends up being another easy way for you to help us out financially without giving us any of your own money and without us having to build up too much debt. We hope you will consider one or both of the above options as doing this would mean a lot to us. Thanks.

100 Visitors!

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Wed, 17 Oct 2007 17:13:00 +0000

Well I just took a glance at our site stats for this wedding website an noticed that we just crossed over the 100th visitor milestone! Obviously this isn't a huge amount of people but I think it is very significant. :) We're excited to have our friends and family check in on us and see how our wedding plans are coming. I hope our visitors will return as more information for the weekend solidifies we'd like for everyone to be in the loop.

Anyway we don't really have a lot to add to the site today but we do have some things in the works. We've gotten some quotes from caterers and will be selecting one soon and today we start our first day of marriage counseling! That should be interesting; I really have no idea what to expect so I guess we'll have to go in with an open mind and just roll with it.

Thank you for visiting the site and thanks for reading our wedding blog. I hope if you're not already you'll become subscribers to the blog and the website by signing up for the Email updates or subscribing to the RSS Feed. (We use Google Reader as our RSS Reader and recommend it to new users.)

Lastly we want to encourage our visitors to this wedding website to visit our RSVP Page and use it. Even if you aren't going to be able to make it to the wedding or any other activities that day we'd like to know for planning purposes at the very least what your plans are. And even if you are merely thinking about coming or are undecided whether or not you can come then please let us know in the comments box as well. Thanks everyone.

Our Honeymoon Plans Are Set!!!

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Thu, 11 Oct 2007 18:06:00 +0000

We are both really excited today! It's been about a week since our last blog post on this site and since then we've made some tweaks to a number of pages on the site. We added information to our Location & Directions page. It now includes information for Mission Valley Church of the Nazarene and it also includes information for our after-reception party at Wine Steals. We've added an FYI Page for a lot of the misc. details of the wedding weekend and we've sent out just about all of the remaining invitations. I think we have about 10 more mailings to go.

What we are really excited about though is that we finally formalized and booked our Honeymoon last night! We had toiled for a while about how much to spend on our week of fun together and we finally decided to take a Hawaiian cruise due to an unexpected sale that Hawaiian Air has going. We saved about $450 bucks on the airfare so we figured we'd splurge for the rest of the trip. We've only got one honeymoon to spend together after all. We've even received a little help from some friends and family already so that helped us finally hit the purchase button too. :)

Anyway, I've added some tweaks to our RSVP Page and I'd like to take this opportunity again to encourage you to RSVP with us even if you cannot make it. This will help us solidify a number for our BBQ Caterer, which by the way, we are finally in talks with. Things are coming along that's for sure.

Keep checking back with our blog for more updates on things or simply subscribe to the blog feed via RSS Reader or Email.

FYI

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Fri, 05 Oct 2007 22:52:00 +0000

We thought we'd make a space on this site to list off all the important information that our guests should know about the wedding . So here we go!

General Info

December in San Diego on the beach is not very cold! Our wedding will be at the hottest part of the day and it should top out in the mid to upper 60s. The average low temperature for this time of the year (in the middle of the night) is 49 degrees. The wedding will be outside but we need not fear of rain. La Nina is in effect and the climate should be very dry. San Diego is also a very large tourist destination and there are more hotels than one could ever imagine. Check Expedia.com and you'll be overwhelmed with lodging options.

Bachelor & Bachelorette Parties

Both of us will be having our parties at essentially the same time on Friday night the 14th of December. Flor will have finished some major tests for her school earlier that day and Brian will have finished up a full day of work so both of us will be unavailable most of the day. Flor's sister Barbara will be organizing the bachelorette party and Brian's best friend Aaron will be organizing his party. If you are interested in attending the parties please get in touch with Barbara or Aaron. Email us for their contact info.

Saturday December 15, 2007

Saturday morning we will be finishing up last minute details for the wedding and such. By 1pm we would like to go to Sail Ho Golf Course for a 9-hole round of golf. This is also the site of Wine Steals for those unfamiliar with the area. The course is pretty cheap and it's short too. Lots of fun! Later in the afternoon will be the rehearsal and the rehearsal dinner. I'm sure the evening will be busy.

The Wedding Day

The wedding party and families will be attending church in the morning at Mission Valley Church af the Nazarene at 9:15am. We invite all of our friends and extended families who are interested to attend with us. After church at 10:30 Flor will get her hair and makeup done and the pre-ceremony social will begin around 12:30pm at Mission Bay Park. The afternoon will be the ceremony and BBQ reception and we ask only those who were invited through the mail to attend. We are looking to keep the number to 80 for this part of the day. Thanks. By sundown, however, the party will shift to Wine Steals for an even less formal celebration and we hope that everyone we know will be there. :) Everyone is invited! Finally, the Bride and Groom will leave the party around 8:30pm for the start to their honeymoon. Guests may remain at Wine Steals until closing if they wish.

Registry Page Update

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Thu, 04 Oct 2007 16:20:00 +0000

Tuesday evening Flor and I finally made it out to Bed, Bath, & Beyond to register for some items. We hadn't done this until now because it just seemed like we didn't have the time. Well... we still didn't have the time. After doing the paperwork we made it through about a quarter of the store with our little scanner-gun before they started turning the lights out on us. We only scanned a few things and didn't even see half of the departments in the store! That's OK we thought. We'll just go online and finish shopping the registry when we got home. Of course our luck was not about to change and when we logged on we promptly got kicked off the website for "site maintenance".

Long story short, we started our registry but it's incomplete. I decided anyway though to link it to our site since we can just edit or add to it any time online... as long as the site is up. :) In the wake of our getting kicked out of and off of Bed, Bath, and Beyond we decided to open an Amazon.com registry too. They at least didn't kick us out and they have a lot of stuff that BB&B didn't even have... like some of the pieces of the knife set we want among a few other items.

Anyway, that's our registry story so I'll quit writing for now. Thanks for checking in on our engagement!

-Brian

Website is up and running!

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Tue, 02 Oct 2007 00:30:00 +0000

Flor and I have had quite a month! The month of September we saw our first full month of engagement and we jam packed it full of stuff. We had an engagement ring made and shipped to us that we are both in love with! We also:

Set our date
Took our engagement photos
Made our wedding invitations
Created and published our website
Secured our wedding site, reception site, after-reception party site
Formalized our bridal party, coordinators, photographers
And did a whole host of misc. planning

We still have a lot left to do but seriously at this pace we're going to be all ready to go on our cruise without a care in the world.

We're going to try and keep in touch with everybody via this blog for everything wedding related. As we update the website this blog should let you know... but only if you check the address as often as possible or subscribe to the blog's RSS feed via an RSS reader or via email. We hope you'll subscribe and forward this website on to anyone you think would be interested... and stay in touch with us! If something comes up let us know or if you have any questions just ask. And by all means if you want to say hi or send us some love then please do so.

Subscribe via RSS Reader

Subscribe via Email

Check back here often as this site is always changin'. And thanks for visiting in the first place.

Photos

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Tue, 25 Sep 2007 19:53:00 +0000

These are some pictures from some of the the most important days in our relationship. Please enjoy.

Our First Padre Game, June 24, 2006 - The weekend before we started dating.

The Early Days - At The Beach With Friends, July 12, 2006 - Two weeks into our "official" relationship.

Our First Cruise, July 31-August 4, 2006 - Our first vacation... planned before we were even seeing each other.

Our First Christmas, December, 24-25, 2006

Our First Valentine's Day, February 14, 2007 - A day spent together at the zoo and a night of fine dinning.

Flor's White Coat Ceremony, August 31, 2007 - Brian asked Flor to marry him later that night.

Our Engagement Party, September 7, 2007 - The night we announced our engagement to many of our close local friends as a surprise.

Our Engagement Pictures, September 26, 2007 - Photographed by Aaron Riveroll Photography

Contact Us

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 21:50:00 +0000

We have had a great time planning this wedding and we look forward to seeing you either at the wedding or in the near future but we'd love to hear from you right now!

Please send us an email, give us a phone call, or send us a letter. The point being, lets stay in touch! We look forward to hearing from you soon and if you don't have our contact info you can send me an email at:

email at brian mounts dot com

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 17:44:00 +0000

Thank you for considering a donation to our Honeymoon fund. We appreciate the thought and understand if this is not what you want to do.

Please return to our Wedding Website and look around some more. Don't forget to sign the Guest Book! :)

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 17:35:00 +0000

Thank you for your gift of a donation to our Honeymoon fund!

We cannot express our thanks enough! Please do not feel obligated to give us any gifts on our wedding day as you have done more than enough for us already!

Welcome To Our Wedding Website

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 20:39:00 +0000

Welcome To Our Wedding Website

We're so happy that we're getting married and we're thrilled that you, our friends and family support our lives together. Thank you!

On this site you can find all the information you will need to stay up to date on our upcoming ceremony and reception. We intend on getting married on the 16th of December, 2007 in Mission Bay Park, San Diego, CA. Brian's uncle Rev. Ken Chamberlain will officiate the ceremony and the reception will follow immediately on location.

We hope you will be able to share this time with us in spirit and in person. Please take a look around the site and if you have any questions please contact us any time.

Some starting points of interest in this site are:

Other pages can be found in the sidebar to the left of the screen. You can also subscribe to the wedding blog to be updated in real time whenever something new is added to the site.

Registries & Gifts

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Mon, 17 Sep 2007 23:56:00 +0000

We are registered for a small amount of items at the following stores. We do however want to encourage our guests to give the gift of a donation to our Honeymoon fund first and foremost as this is our number one desire, a honeymoon to remember. Please feel free to do whatever you like and remember we appreciate the thought of any gift more than the gift itself. More than anything we would simply like to see you on our wedding day and celebrate with you as we begin the rest of our lives together.

Help Needed

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Mon, 17 Sep 2007 23:54:00 +0000

We are planning on doing things simply. Our wedding will be a unique twist on a simple traditional wedding. We will be going light on the facilities and decorations and the formality of the event focusing primarily on the social aspect of the wedding. We would like the focus of the ceremony and reception to be on the coming together of friends and family. That's pretty much it. We want everything involved to have a personal touch from people and places meaningful to our lives.

We are really looking forward to marriage and we are also looking forward to putting on a fine reception for all of our guests. The wedding planning for this occasion will be expedited as we are setting our date early and will only have about 3 months to plan and save for the wedding. We would encourage anyone who would like to help out to do so by following the below instructions.

Help Finance The Wedding - Without Giving US Money
We certainly don't want to ask for money to finance the wedding costs because we feel that the reception is our gift to our friends and family. We do however offer you a couple ways to help finance the costs without giving cash gifts. If any of you know me well you know that I am a banker and like a good banker I cannot emphasis more the importance of routine personal savings.

First of all you can help us finance the wedding, believe it or not, by opening a high-yield online savings account with Virtual Bank. Both Flor and myself have had these accounts for a couple years and we couldn't be happier with them. They offer much better savings rates than most traditional saving accounts and there are no fees or minimum balances to worry about.

If you let us refer you into a new account you will get an opening bonus from Virtual Bank for $20 and we will get a referral bonus of $20, which we will then set aside to help cover the costs of the wedding. This basically allows you to help finance the wedding without giving us a cash gift! If you are interested in helping in this fashion you should email us or call us before signing up. We will then email you a referral link for you to click through. This would be a huge help as Flor is in school and we will only be living on one source of income for the next 4 years.

The referral link is: www.ebates.com/doublebonusoffer/index.htm?id=30034567 and my referral email address is: email at brian mounts dot com.

Our Honeymoon

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Mon, 17 Sep 2007 23:53:00 +0000

Honeymoon! Yeah! We're flying to Honolulu the day after our wedding and will be circling the Hawaiian Islands for 7 days on Norwegian Cruise Line's Pride Of Hawaii. We'll take lots of pictures and we'll be sure to post them here for all of you to enjoy. Help us out if you can. We'd really appreciate it.

Our Family And Friends

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Mon, 17 Sep 2007 23:52:00 +0000

We would like to thank all of our family and friends for supporting our relationship and most recently our decision to get married. It has been a true blessing to get all kind nods of approval and blunt exclamations of joy from everybody in our lives. We've both had numerous people tell us how they were sure we'd get married, it was just a matter of when and we want to thank them all for their approval.

We'd also like to thank our parents as they both have provided fantastic illustrations of what successful marriages are all about.

Our siblings have also been a great source of strength for our relationship too. Kathleen, Barbara, Ada, and Joshua have made the two of us feel right at home in our new families and we love them for that.