This is newfiebride's Blue Wedding!

Hey all... I need some help!! Because of where I live I am forced to travel to another province if I EVER want to find the dress of my dreams so this summer FH and I are heading to Toronto for a vacation/dress hunt. I was just wondering what bridal shops I should check out as I will have a limited amount of time to find the dress while I'm visiting. My budget is about 2000-2500 so a boutique within this range is what I'm looking for.

Thanks so much for your help!!

So we DID book my dream venue... the Woody Point Heritage Theatre in Gros Morne National Park. My next step is to book EVERY accomodation in the area to ensure all my guests have somewhere to stay.
We have the venue for both the ceremony and the reception... for the ceremony we are going to actually so with a vintage theatre theme and for the reception we will carry over the vintage theme but have it more "candy shoppe".
The place is over an hour away from where ANYONE lives but I didn't think this was too much to ask. It's in one of the most beautiful places in the world so they should be happy I am giving them a vacation instead of just a wedding! Haha. It's also "Bring your Own Boos" (which I know is tacky everywhere else in the world, but here in Newfoundland it's usually eithier cash bar or BYOB, so people enjoy bringing what they want instead of buying it).
Yay! So excited!

I'm so excited right now that I have found something other than a hotel to look at... though I haven't even brought this up to FH yet but I wanted to know what you think about it.

It's an old heritage theatre that's located in one of the small Newfoundland outport communities in Gros Morne National Park. The whole water front of the town has remained like the old traditional Newfoundland, enabling tourists to witness that part of our heritage, and the theatre was restore a few years ago to add to this. A co-worker said she knew of a couple who had their wedding there... ceremony downstairs in the theatre and reception upstairs in the studio. I think you might even be able to BYOB (trust me... brings your own boos is a tradition in Newfoundland that is highly valued by most... and an open bar is essentially unheard of), for the after party.

This venue is about two hours away from my home and about 1 1/2 hours from the "city" in which I would probably be getting my hair don eand the cake would be coming from etc. Here in Newfoundland we aren't used to long commutes to anywhere (regularly) and I was wondering if you find this a long way away or not. Being a National Park, they do have many summer accomodations that I hope would work out for all of our guests. Most of our guests were from out of town as it was.

You can see a walk-through video of the place at

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uNLWxb8sAXM

Let me know what you think... does it seem like a winner or too much hassle being a bit farther away?

Just to let you know a little about us.... I am a 23 year old elementary school teacher who is currently substituting on the West Coast of Newfoundland. I graduated with my BEd in April last year from Memorial University in St. John's. FH and I lived in St. John's for 4 years but moved back West, close to the two communities we grew up in, when he landed a job researching caribou (he is a biologist/GIS teachnician). The move has been kind of hard on me because I am living so close to where I grew up, we have to juggle our families again after being on our own so long and there is absolutly no decent SHOPPING to be done here. Seriously, I get excited to go to Walmart it's so bad.

FH and I have been together for five years and have lived together for three. We talked about engagment and marriage for a while before it happened... we haven't been out of school long so we wanted to know we could afford it before we did it. We will be paying for most of the wedding ourself... but getting married here is sooo in our favor economically because $30 a plate for a meal is about as high class as it gets. There is no bridal boutiques, no MICHAELS and no wedding shops of any kind, so it's DIY for me unless I want everything trimmed with lace or yellow gold.

When we get married I will be 24 and FH will be 25... wish me luck in my planning. I will be starting as SOON as FH gets back from his current business trip!!

The proposal. Was it a surprize? Yes and no I guess. I knew it was coming because FH and I had gotten the ring custom made months before but I guess I didn't know exactly when or where it would be. A couple weekends ago we traveled to the city (St. John's) where we used to live to visit some close friends before they all leave the island and move to Ottawa (booooooo), but Jonathan said we were going to have a together night our first day down there. The first place we went was Bowring Park.... which is one of my favorite places on earth (I would drag him here for walks and picnics time and time again). The only issue was that I was wearing a dress and Bowring park loses its flair during a Newfoundland winter. None the less we walked to the front of the bungalo and asked me in the middle of the snow bank. He said he knew I always wanted to have my wedding in the park but since we moved back to the West Coast of the island he thought that an engagment there would be the next best thing. He also said he pictured it as being warm and summery when he planned it... hahahaha.

It was definitly the best place he could've asked me. Afterwards we went to "The Gypsy Tearoom" for supper and rented a suite on the beach in Portugal Cove. It was awesome!