Who needs a wedding planner!?

I'm on the right track. I just know I am. Things are just falling into place and one thing leads me right on to the next thing effortlessly. I'll explain...

This morning my cousin called us from her work and asked us to meet her at Starbucks because she had some free time to hang out. So we got coffee and sat at a table outside and started talking about what we needed to get done on this trip. One of those things is to find a photographer. Jane (my cousin) suggested Ben, a friend of hers who is an AMAZING underwater photographer and also a great guy. Turns out the person sitting next to us overheard us talking and introduced himself as Nante. As it turns out Nante happened to be Jane's neighbor and the guy Ben helps to teach young kids to box. The next thing we know, Nante is at our table helping us to plan our wedding and then this man comes out of Starbucks with a large portrait photo of a cute family all dressed in white on the beach. Nante knows him and introduces us and it turns out that he and his wife are well-known wedding photographers on the island. The husband, James, shows us some of his recent photos and then his wife comes out and offers her wedding planning services to us for free! As long as we hire them to take the photos.

So i mean, in MINUTES of starting our task we already met several people who have offered us help! But the coincidences didn't stop there...

Mom and I went next door to the grocery store to pick up a few things and at the checkout isle I noticed an Hawaiian Bridal magazine. It was the ONLY ONE on the rack and I've never seen it anywhere before. So I grabbed it. I was reading in the car heading back to the house when I saw an ad for a bridal store- Tamara Catz- on Maui with a dress i LOVED. It also was the only bridal store that got any mention on Maui at all in that magazine. It's located in Paia- a small town that has the most AMAZING flat bread pizza place. So we decided to get lunch at the pizza place and then look at dresses. Only I didn't know where that dress store was. I had the address in the magazine to go off of, but I still wasn't sure how we'd find it. But that wasn't going to be a problem as it turned out to be RIGHT NEXT DOOR to the pizza place.

We at and then shopped. And i found SOOOOOOOOOOOOO many perfect dresses. But only ONE fit like a glove and the price was right and so... we bought it! The best part about the dress is that the designer lives on Maui so we're keeping it local. :) The dress is raw silk and I'm just the 3rd person to buy that dress so it's pretty unique. I'm so excited.  I met the designer's husband while we were shopping, Fransisco Goya who's apparently a wind surfing champion, and talked to him about Aaron's shark attack. He remembered the attack and was excited to hear the update. In fact, most people remember Aaron around here and care very deeply about hearing how he's been doing.

The girl who helped us at the dress store- Crystal- was a sweetheart. She skipped lunch to stay and help us with the dresses and it turns out that she's from Coto de Caza, where my parents used to live in South Orange County and that her dad contracted Polio around the same time my mom did! Things were just so coincidence-y that day it was strange but wonderful.

Before I left for Maui people (like my dad and future husband) kept asking "why do you need to go to Maui to plan this wedding? Don't people plan destination weddings from their home all the time?" And they're right, people do, but I just knew that I needed to be here. I knew that I needed to get to Maui to be IN Maui for this wedding to get done. And, sure enough, after being here less than 24 hours I've accomplished more than I ever have in LA. I had to BE here to to meet these people and to make these connections. 

So tomorrow I'm hoping to have as much luck with all of that as I've had with everything else so far.
I LOVE MAUI!!!!