Weddingbee Blog

Mr. Grasshopper and I cannot decide where to go for our honeymoon. We’ve been doing research all weekend and just don’t know which is the best location for us. Before we look at one more villa or beach web site, I am reaching out to the weddingbee readers to ask, “Where do you think we should go for our honeymoon?”

We are looking to go right after the wedding for about 10 days in mid-September. Here is what I can tell you we are looking for:

• Sandy beaches to relax on after 11 months of planning this wedding
• Fun activities (surfing, kayaking, hiking, exploring, people watching, not clubbing)
• Culture
• Delicious food and drinks
• A location that does not take more than a day to get to (Australia and Fiji)
• A place that isn’t mired in rainy/hurricane season (Mexico and the Caribbean)

Here is what we have considered:

Hawaii (Kauai and Maui). What we like about Hawaii is the idea of sitting on a sandy beach and relaxing, but also having some activities to pursue, like kite surfing, kayaking, and hiking. And, maybe we will get picked to play extras on Lost!

The Amalfi Coast (Capri and Positano). The thought of going to the Italian Coast is appealing to us because we would be near a beach (though maybe too rocky?), we could enjoy delicious Italian cuisine (gelato!), and the old world culture would balance out the beach vacation with something interesting if we need a break from the waves.

So what do y’all think? Hawaii or Italy? Other suggestions?

Guess who’s bridesmaids are buying $500 bridesmaid dresses?

Yes, that’s right, mine.

But, before anyone takes me to task, I would like to say that this was not my idea. The parameters for the Mr. & Miss Caterpillar wedding were: wear what you want, and it would be nice if it were light blue. I didn’t want the girls stuck with dresses that they couldn’t wear again, or dresses that they just didn’t like. I figured they would just go to Anthropologie or Bergdorf or the Salvation Army and buy whatever they wanted.

I was totally, totally wrong. They are SO INTO BEING BRIDESMAIDS! They wanted the entire bridesmaid experience — matching gowns and everything. So, we went to Thread.

I think they tried on every gown in the place, and then decided on these:

They’re going for the blue bell chiffon. I tried to steer them towards the seersucker, or the shorter cuts, pointing out that seersucker and tea length dresses could be worn again. They shoo’d me away. They told me that it really didn’t matter if they wore them again; they just want to look like bridesmaids.

Unbelievable. They are just so cute.

PS: the dresses at Thread are all totally adorable, and they have a great cocktail collection in slinky satins and fancy chiffons shot with gold thread. But, they have some surly-ass salespeople there. In spite of our appointment, no one helped us — I even rehung all the dresses on hangers and put them back on the rack! I wonder if I should call back and tell the manager I think their service is really poor. But does it matter? We’re going to buy dresses there anyway. Sheesh.

Vera Wang Sample Sale
Penn Plaza Pavilion
7th Ave and 33rd St.
June 17th, 8am-5pm

I have a confession to make. I’ve known about the Vera Wang sample sale for more than a week and I didn’t blog about it. And when news finally hit weddingbee, I prayed that people wouldn’t see it. Why? Well shit, it’s a bridezilla eat bridezilla world out there and every little advantage is just that - an advantage.

This is my “I’m a BRIDEZILLA too bad for you” pic.

My BM Christine told me about it last week but I didn’t believe her because it seemed no one in the wedding world (blogs, forums, not even sample sale websites like Daily Candy or Top Button ) listed it. So she took a picture of the flyer she saw with her cell phone and texted it to me. That’s when the planning began.

I assembled my team of BMs and set a start time of 5:30am (minus Dr. Flo who couldn’t make it because she was busy “saving people”- if I had a penny for every time I’ve heard that excuse right? I mean come on, it’s Vera effing Wang). That’s right, we were in line at the sale by 6:20am behind 40 or so people, some of whom apparently had started camping out the night before. Here are some pics I took before I closely read the rules.

There at the crack of dawn.

These people camped out all night.

The people ahead of us - not so bad.

I wanted to reach out and stroke the dresses~!

The rules of the GAME.

No. 7: No photographs are permitted - oops.

No. 3: Each prospective bride is allowed to hold 3 dresses (no one followed this rule). My sister Kat volunteered to count people’s dresses and scream out things like “OMG, we got a SEVEN here people.”

The prices - so friggin awesome~!

In line we met Jennifer, the sweetest ballerina ever, whose wedding is a year away. (Ok so I don’t know for sure that she’s a ballerina but she looked like one. Actually she looked like a model who looked like a ballerina. Either quality would automatically qualify you special rights to wear a Vera Wang gown at your wedding, so you can imagine just how worthy this chick was). She is planning on getting married in some corn fields at her boss’ country house in Pennsylvania - how MARTHA STEWART WEDDINGS is that? But more on Jennifer later…

After a few rotations of 10-15 people, my 5 BMs and I were in. I was actually able to suppress my urge to try on every single gown there since I already have a gown, but by the end of the 2 hours we spent in the sale, nearly everyone else had tried on at least 2 weddings gowns. Although our goal was to walk out of there with dirt cheap bridesmaids dresses, it didn’t happen. We tried to love what was there and even found 6 matching purple dresses with lace bodices, but it just didn’t feel right even though they were 5 for $100 (or $25 each). However, we did not completely walk out of there empty handed, check out what I scored:

OMG what did Miss Spider buy?

$50 bucks (originally $640) and my size. They only had two pairs one in 5 1/2 and one in 6 (my size) hahahaha yes. Just the perfect height for a shrimp like me.

Come on, I know you’re drooling.

$25 - When will I ever wear a red dress again? I got this for the end of the reception when I thank the guests for coming. It needs to be taken in a bit.

Insane.

Total price $75 (no tax) - truly, truly outrageous~!

After we were sufficiently satisfied with trying on dresses, we took on roles as Jennifer’s temporary entourage. She had learned about the sale the day prior and actually had an appointment with Vera Wang later in the day, so had stopped by solo just to check out the goods. Well angels were sitting on her shoulder because she scored three brand-new-with-tags dresses in her perfect size 0, and each was more breathtaking than the last. Her final two contenders were both $10,000 dresses marked down to $2,000. I won’t post pictures of the gown since I told her to check out my blog and she might want her dress to be a surprise. But let me say this, both dresses made us want to cry and seriously if the devil himself had appeared and asked me for my soul in exchange for her body, I would’ve signed that contract with my own blood. THAT’S how good she looked and that my friends is a true triumph of the bridal spirit story.

Congrats Jennifer, thanks for letting us share in your bridal gown experience, and good luck with the rest of planning.

Everyone has a rough time paring down their guest list, but for one potential guest, I just don’t know if she will get an invitation. She is super sweet and loving, but she can also be a bit exuberant at times, is known to voice her opinion when not happy, and enjoys offering people a hearty jump when greeting them. “Who is this freak?!” you ask?

Meet Sasha, our two year old puppy.

She tends to go everywhere with us, seriously, she does. We are those people. She comes to the bar with us for happy hour, she goes hiking with us when we head to the mountains and soon she will even be working part-time with Mr. Grasshopper. His officemates should love that. It is hard to imagine her not coming to the wedding.

Mr. Grasshopper wants her at the wedding, no questions asked. So do I, sort of. I think she might bark if no one pays attention to her during the ceremony though. On the other hand, I also think some of the dog-at-the-wedding photos are pretty cute.

Jcrew puppy

Knottie puppy

To be clear, I have no intentions of dressing her up or asking her to play any specific wedding party role. We’re not that insane. Yet. Maybe she’ll just get one of the collars and leashes Mrs. Bee posted about a few weeks ago.

So how do we handle this? I don’t think she should be there the whole night-she just needs to meet and greet, take a few photos and then head home. I think we’ll ask our dog walker to bring her after the ceremony, watch over her at the reception for a bit (to make sure she doesn’t do her jumping hello), and then bring her home for the evening. I hope the dog walker is down with this idea. I think this could be a booming side business for dog walkers!

Ok, so honestly, are we the only nutty people out there who are thinking of inviting their dog to the wedding? C’mon people! Who’s with me?!

Grey’s Anatomy star Katherine Heigl is engaged to her musician boyfriend, Josh Kelley.

She’s going to make a beautiful bride!

(source: people)

Ladies, so sorry to go MIA. I am getting married this weekend! So lots and lots to do and not enough time to do it. I will leave you with some details…

Out-of-town guest bags:

Programs all in a row …

Ringbearer pillows (and one for the flower girl so she’s not jealous)

I think the flowers in the hair are really sweet.

(image via theartistrygroup)

A reader emailed me on Monday asking where she could rent a specific type of candelabra. Now we usually don’t answer questions like this because they are so specific; we try to focus on questions that can help a broader audience and that we can post on weddingbee.

But I decided to help her out, and forwarded her question to one of my wedding planner friends. He asked whether or not she was working with a florist, so that same day I emailed the reader and we hashed that out.

The following day, the reader emailed again asking if we were going to help her find candelabras. I was still waiting to hear back from the planner, so I thought I’d wait a bit longer before responding. But then the next morning, I received the following email from the reader:

I have now sent about 3 emails asking about suggestions for where I can rent candelabra centerpieces from in nyc. After telling you I already have a florist I found, you have not responded to my email. I guess you guys can’t give suggestions unless you are being paid to by a sponsor. I will no longer refer my many engaged friends to read you site. Thanks for nothing!

This email really upset me because I was making a genuine effort to help her. I suppose as the site gets bigger, emails like this will become more commonplace and I’ll need to develop a thicker skin. And for the record, we don’t have sponsors that pay us to blog about or recommend services or products.

We really try to help as many people as we can, but we just can’t answer every single email we receive.

To the reader: We’re sorry we weren’t able to help you with your request and wish you luck in your future wedding planning endeavors.

Best,
Mrs. Bee

I’m going in for my first hair trial at the end of this month. I have no clue as to what I want to do for my hair. Apparently, my hair stylist does, because he gave me a perm a few months ago, and told me to take good care of it because it was my “wedding hair.”

Do I put it up all the way? Sleek, simple and classic?

(image via wedding hairstyles)

Something with a bit more curls?

(image via theartistrygroup)

Half up and half down?

(image via theartistrygroup)

Hair pins? A tiara? I can’t make up my mind!!! I guess I will just have to go see what they have in mind, and hopefully I’ll like it.

Crate and Barrel is having a summer sale. Save up to 50% off select items. You may want to check out their selection of vases and candlelight.

Here’s a bright idea: citronella tealights to ward off bugs at outdoor weddings.

I purchased an issue of Bridal Guide magazine for the first time this week. Perhaps I didn’t notice it at my local newstand before because it was covered in plastic, and I wasn’t able to flip through it. But it’s actually one of the largest national wedding magazines.

At 438 pages, it’s a nice size and chock full of helpful hints for the bride in the beginning stages of planning. It features a lot of information on honeymoons including:

• Feature on the Mexican Riviera
• Recommended things to do/eat/stay in Rome, Dublin, Paris and London
• Review of the Hawaiian islands and the best places for surfing, sunsets, sports, privacy, etc.
• Splurges and steals for honeymoons in French Polynesia, Fiji, and Cook Islands

There’s an overview of everything in the current issue on their website. If you like Brides, you’ll probably like the Bridal Guide - they’re quite similar in style.

I also found an amazing subscription deal for it on Magazine Price Search - $5.91 for three years! Sure you may not need three years worth of bridal magazines, but I sure do!

I had my non-fitting fitting at Mark Ingram on Tuesday, and the dress kind of sort of fits. It needs to be hemmed about 2 inches, and taken in slightly at the bust, waist, and hip. Alright, maybe a little more than slightly in the hip — I think it needs to be about 3 inches smaller. (I always thought I was a pear-shaped kind of girl, but apparently I’m more of a turnip or whatever other kind.)

In any case, Mr. Caterpillar and I are planning on spending the entirety of August in California, so I can’t have my fittings done at Mark Ingram. Alene offered to have the fittings done early; but I have a sneaking suspicion that all this Reservoir running and yoga practicing is going to have some dress embiggening effects. When I mentioned this, everyone was aghast.

Yoga, apparently, widens one’s back to World’s Strongest Man proportions. So, word on the street is: Running = OK; Yoga = Linebacker Body Shape.

I’ll take my chances.

Sasha Souza is a Bay area based wedding planner extraordinaire, who creates the most gorgeous, elegant, and sophisticated events. With an on staff floral team, a partnership with beau-coup favors, and a book in the works, Sasha is definitely a superstar in the wedding planning world. She even offers a 2 day apprenticeship program for wedding planners to bee!

These images are from the beautiful red and white themed nuptuals of Extra host Dayna Devon, coordinated by Sasha of course.

Love those message in a bottle invites but they’re out of your budget?

This company offers an affordable diy kit! Their Tropical Resort Kit pictured below comes with 10 bottles, corks, sand, shells, umbrellas, raffia ties, aged message paper, mailing labels, a funnel and a message rolling pin all for only $23.99.

Everything you need to assemble and mail them, except for postage.

We are getting married in Canada later this year. Do we need to tell any government body or register our marriage in New York once we get back?

Thanks, your site is fantastic!!

Sue

~~~

Dear Sue,

In general, marriages that are performed abroad in countries like Canada are recognized as legally valid by the United States. You won’t need to do anything once you return - unless of course you decide to change your name.

For information about obtaining a Canadian marriage license, please visit this link. And for detailed information about US citizens getting married abroad, please visit here.

Miss Ant (who’s having a destination wedding herself) is considering getting married at City Hall in New York and having her Jamaiican ceremony just for show. This way she doesn’t have to worry about obtaining a foreign marriage license at all. That’s definitely an interesting idea to consider!

Hope this helps!

All the best,

Mrs. Bee