Weddingbee

I found these on Etsy from Nickolya. Just plain awesome. The shapes are cut out of one card.

{image from etsy seller: nickolya}

This is a super informative video by Cindy Ferguson from the blog Scherenschnitte (the blog is full of beautiful paper cutting eye candy!)
Go to the blog for the template she uses in the video.

Paper cuts are functional too! Check out this Tord Boontje Midsummer Shade Light (one of the items I frequently ogle at the MoMA Design Store)

{image from www.momastore.org}

One of my favorite artists, Nikki McClure

She makes some of the most beautiful prints out of paper cuts. Also an Olympia, WA native (a shoutout to another one of the places I’ve lived!) You can purchase Nikki’s prints from Buy Olympia (they also sell other cool handcrafted items from local Olympia designers)

{image from www.buyolympia.com}

And if that’s not enough info, check out The Guild of American Papercutters for more paper-cutting resources!
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My alternative to save money was to do this. Using Photoshop, I cropped and placed 2 copies on one 7X5 sheet. You can do the same in M.Paint if you don’t have Photoshop, but be sure to use good quality photos. Save the file as a JPG.

Then I uploaded the JPG to Shutterfly.

• I ordered 25, 4X6 prints which are 12c/print. Approximately 6 cents/photo. For 50 photos, it’s $3.00! If you wait for one of their “Free 20 prints” offers, that’s even better!

This is what they looked like when the arrived. 2 photos on one 4×6 print.

Using the paper cutter again, I cut the 4X6 photo down the center making 2, 3X4 photos which were perfect for my cards.

Again, using the tombo adhesive, I dotted each corner.

Then just place and press the corners down.

I included an extra photo on the inside of us cutting the cake and it’s going to say “Have a SWEET holiday!” (And another way of incorporating my cheongsam).

Now, I just have 49 more to go! 
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I bought my Romona Keveza gown (it’s actually two pieces) from her Legends Collection at Mark Ingram’s Bridal Atelier in NYC. It was a fantastic experience, from my first appointment, to the day I picked my dress up before my wedding. My sales girl Anju was fantastic — supportive but not pushy in any way. I’d highly recommend making this one of your first stops while searching for a dress in New York.

When it came time to finding a dress for my bridesmaids I started looking very early (like 10-11 months early). I didn’t want my friends to have to break the bank to participate in my wedding and bridesmaid dresses can be outrageously priced! I went to Ann Taylor to look at their celebrations collection with my BM who lives in the city and we found a dress we loved — and score team bridesmaids — it was on sale for $99!! This made my day. I love how our florist was inspired by the roses on their dresses for their bouquets with lavender freesia, purple delphinium, and creamy white roses.

And last but not least, our flower girl. This sweet little girl (who just turned eight a few weeks ago) is very special to me. I also didn’t want to put any financial stress on her parents so I showed her mother the Ann Taylor Flower Girl Dress for inspiration because I didn’t want her to have to spend $128 on a dress she’d outgrow so quickly. She ended up getting her dress on sale around Easter time — so savvy. The one thing I did ask is that she get her the brown sash so she’d complement the bridesmaids’ dresses.

Up next…Attire close-up — the men!
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My ring looks something like this; the diamonds on mine are a little smaller.

I found out later on that Mr. Flamingo asked my father for his permission first before proposing. I thought that was a nice gesture on his part, and by doing that he definitely gained points. The ring was exactly what I wanted, so his good taste deserved some points too. Now, we simply laugh about the whole thing.

What was your initial reaction to your proposal?
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What’s that I see? Thank you cards. We’re on top of this, I swear. I did a whole 5! During our 3 days of activity, I managed to gocco our thank you cards and buy a few more just in case some of the gocco ones looked like our dogs did them. They did, actually, we’ve forced them into slave labor as well.

You can see by how unorganized the living room is that we’re starting to decay as humans. Note the Paper Source bag from the Fillmore store since we’re boycotting the Berkeley one. The Dreamcast, currently right side up, although it doesn’t play unless it’s upside down anymore… and the huge pile of dog toys.

I bought the two on the left from etsy! I adore etsy! We leeched the labeling idea from the most recent MS weddings. And my gocco cards, albeit amateur and less impressive than what the average toddler can do (again, I’m going to claim the dogs did it) is the pattern of our rug. Because I love our rug THAT MUCH.

I bet you were hoping for more photos of the wedding. Me too. Until then, I’m going to go back to pretending I’m dead and shaking my fist at xbox katamari. Why is this one so freakin’ hard?!

*I don’t have mono, nor have I been kissing high school boys. I’ve just been licking the rims of every used cup I see.
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It’s all about teamwork… 

The sixpence cufflinks!  Love this shot.

Can you tell? He’s nervous!

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First up, the gentlemen. They walked out to the piano piece Clair de Lune by Claude Debussey.

My very-soon-to-be-hubby making his way down the aisle with his parents

My sister/MOH processing down the aisle. The BMs walked in to the instrumental version of Bittersweet Symphony by the Verve.

Our littlest flower girl… this picture cracks me up. That’s her daddy luring her with a BANANA! Too cute!

Next up, our other flower girl and ring bearer (brother and sister), clutching matching teddy bears. She is also holding a bell, which she was supposed to ring… but I guess she had her hands full and forgot!

Last but not least, Moi. I walked down the aisle to my favorite song, The Prayer, by Charlotte Church and Josh Groban. Don’t my parents look great? It was their day too!!

Passing me along to Mr. E….*sniff sniff* I know it was a very bittersweet day for my mom, but she told me later that she enjoyed every minute of our wedding!

FYI, his dimple had me at “hello” 3 years ago, hehe

Right before we exchanged our vows, we chose to say some “personal words” to each other. We each wrote a brief paragraph about our love for the other. I had a cheat sheet because I knew I would be too nervous and emotional to remember what I wanted to say. This was one of the highlights of the ceremony, and a number of our guests told us afterwards that we made them cry too!

Yes, it’s those darn tears again and the reappearance of the tissue!

Clearly Mr.E had a hard time getting through his personal words as well!! But he actually memorized his, much to my surprise!

“With this ring, I thee wed”

“You may now kiss the bride!”

We recessed to the instrumental version of Clocks by Coldplay.

The moments right after the ceremony were truly emotional for us and our bridal party… hugs and tears all around!!

We asked all our guests to remain in their seats after the ceremony (there was a note in the program and our officiant also made an announcement). We came back out and Dennis quickly snapped this pic. You can’t see EVERYone, but they just couldn’t all fit!

Mr. E’s family and some special guests from Hong Kong

My extended family from all over the country and Taiwan! This was the FIRST time EVER that we had so made relatives together! It was fantastic!

Coming up… Party Time!
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things like:
youandyourfiancee.com
lastnamewedding.com

are typically popular, and really easy for your guests to remember.

Here are the programs/tools used to create our website:
Dreamweaver
Photoshop
SmartFTP
Domain Name Registration from godaddy.com, 2 Years - $20

Here are the results:

Entrance Page:

Homepage:

Attendants:

Did you create your own website? What programs did you use?
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And here’s the final product!

From the side:

From the top:

I thought she did a great job, and I can’t wait to see it on the big day! What do you think?
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I found some official pictures of the dress on Alfred Angelo’s UK site. It is definitely selling in the US too! Here’s my baby:

Alfred Angelo Dress #1645
{Both images from www.alfredangelounitedkingdom.com}

Since I’m paranoid about Mr. C reading this post, I am only going to show snippets of the dress on me. Sorry to be a tease! But I think all you Weddingbee readers have seen enough wedding dresses to figure out what the whole deal with the sash will look like and it’ll be a fun imaginative exercise.

View 1: The sash was added-on and does not come with the dress. I believe it’s an additional $50 for the sash. I may adjust how it is tied in the front. I have a small collection of brooches I’ve amassed, so you readers will have to help me select one soon!

View 2: The actual color of my sash. I plan on getting Mr. C a tie in the same color.

View 3: The va-vavoom back corseting. I’m not sure how we’re going to adjust the sash in the back, but I won’t have to worry about it until alterations. I’d like it to ruche a bit and to have it narrow more at the point of the “V”

And of course, I want to share how much I spent on the dress - it came out to a whopping $535 with the sash and taxes included. I had received an additional 10% discount as an incentive to purchase during the trunk show week. My mother, usually the most vocal critic, was even impressed when the dress arrived. She used to be a seamstress and upon feeling the fabric said that it was of really great quality and couldn’t believe how little I spent.Again, I really have to highlight the impeccable service and communication from Bridget and the rest of the I Do staff. I had my dress shipped from Seattle to New York. My dear, BM Seattle, picked it up for me from the shop, but I Do had packaged everything. Bridget even included a breathable cloth garment bag knowing that I’d have the dress for over a year before the wedding. She included the sweetest note and a little gift… the brooch she had pinned on the sash when I tried on the dress. I had the greatest experience there and I can’t say enough about it!

Oh, and if there isn’t already enough incentive to go, Trophy Cupcakes is about a 3 minute walk away from the shop. After every visit to I Do, BM Seattle and I would head over for one of these sweet sweet red velvets.

Yum… need I say more?

{image from www.trophycupcakes.com}

What do you think? How did you finally decide on your dress? Did you have a great experience at your bridal shop? And a question for any sash brides out there: How did you end up tying/knotting your sash?
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