Weddingbee Blog

In the process of blogging about the wedding, it turns out that quite a number of guests have started reading the blog. (Hi everyone- I can’t wait to see you in a few weeks!) As a result, there are a handful of things that I’m super excited about but can’t yet post about, as it will ruin some of the surprise. (Fear not- I will blog about everything in full detail after the wedding.)

I know I’m not the only one who has some things being kept on the down low, but assuming Weddingbee is primarily trafficked by brides to be (and not interested guests), I think it’s safe to ask the following question.

What secret surprises do you have planned for your wedding?

Today Mr. Penguin and I celebrate our 7th anniversary as a couple!

Rose Bowl 2001

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(Back away slowly and calmly Mr. Pineapple and no one will get hurt.)
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Here are some shots of our delish wedding cake, inspired by Mrs. Bell Pepper’s (if not altogether stolen really):

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I’ve got oodles of design experience, but when it came to making our wedding invitations, I had NO idea where to begin. I asked our invitation designer if she had any suggestions. Well, she had more than suggestions… she sent me a series of awesome design mock-ups to use as inspiration!

We had her do some small revisions to the designs we liked best to help us decide on our favorites. For example, the original batch of mock-ups had a yellow color palette, but we changed to burgundy with chocolate brown and khaki accents to match our wedding colors.

I told our designer that we liked botanicals that suggested late summer and fall, but we also wanted to keep our design simple and bold. She definitely got what we were looking for. Here are some of our favorites!
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One thing that most brides hope for on their wedding day is good weather. I am no exception — I want a beautiful, sunny, lightly breezy day that will allow us to take pictures outside and allow our guests to not get soaked as they journey from our ceremony to our reception.

Of course, I can’t predict what the weather will be like on our wedding day, especially 5 months in advance, so I’m preparing myself for rain in the event that our day isn’t dry after all. I guess I can handle a rainy wedding day, as long as it means some cute photo ops:

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It may come as a shock, so you might want to sit down in preparation.

Miss Shortcake? The one with the pink wedding and huge sparkly dress?

Yeah, she’s a GIRLY-GIRL.

I KNOW. SHOCKING.

Despite my frou-frou-prissy-pants nature (least favorite child hood taunt? “I’m going to put [insert gross and messy something] on your dree-essss!”), my younger sister has me beat when it comes to overwhelming knowledge of makeup and hair.

I put on makeup, I do my hair, but Youngest Sister Shortcake?

She not only does both really well, but does it all the time, everyday, without fail. That takes talent, and a dedication that I do not have. And she’s pretty cool:
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I love flowers and one thing I am extremely excited about is my bouquet. I can’t wait to actually hold it… it’s going to be stunning. Apart from the actual flower choice and color combination, another important element to any bouquet is the handle. For me it’s as important as the bouquet itself, so I thought I’d opt for a unique handle.

There are endless possibilities when it comes to dressing the bouquet. Here are just a few examples:

Elegant ribbon bouquet paired with unique looking buttons - source
Unique ribbon ruffle and bow - source

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I’m taking a break from my double-stick-tape-covered invite assembly marathon to finally post these! Now that they’re done, I’m actually a little nervous to show them off… I’ve been working on them for so long! I’m excited to stop thinking about them and just finally get them mailed out.

Drumroll please…

Unassembled
(click to enlarge or scroll down for the grand tour)

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On Friday, I met with our event coordinator again to go through our venue and decide about important things. Namely, we discussed how many tables we would need and where to put them. I’m not very happy about how many tables we will have. Not happy at all.

For some reason, I thought we would be having 10 people at each table. That means 15 tables, if we hit our max of 150, right? So that’s how many drawings I made. 15. As it turns out, we have to have 8 people at each table, because of our chargers (and before you get all excited, I’ve gone through every possibility–even with giant tables, 10 is just not gonna happen). So that means 19 tables. NINETEEN. This means I have to draw SIX MORE DRAWINGS. I am not happy about this. When this topic first came up, I thought, “okay, simple as this: I will shamelessly recycle some drawings I have made for clients. Quick! Let’s go make a memory in a vineyard.” Mr. Cream Puff, however, seems to think this is cheating. Part of me wants to cheat still. The other part of me thinks I should suck it up and do six more drawings, but try to make them simple.
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With the recommendations from a post a bit back for ways to get both my schoolwork and wedding stuff done, I took up the main suggestion to delegate.

First thing to delegate- my veil. I’d originally not wanted a veil, and then thought about a long veil, and then a shorter veil, then a longer veil, then a really short veil. Obviously, this indecisiveness needed to stop. I’d planned to make my own veil (why pay $200 for a veil when Joann Fabrics sells tulle for $1.99/yard?), but decided to scrap that.

After a quick google search, I came across Occansey Designs. Basically, they make veils completely custom- length, width, embellishments- everything. And after a quick price comparison of other online veil shops, I noticed that their prices are extremely competitive.

So what did I do? I thought about the types of veils I’d tried on that I liked.
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The wedding is coming up fast . All decisions that were made should be final, or should they?

I’m thinking about changing my face. Diana Wilcenski, my awesomeness hair and make up artist, totally rocked it out for my trial… except I decided to change the lipstick. Here’s the more classic look for the wedding that we had agreed on:

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I have never had a second thought about changing my maiden name. It is not very easy to pronounce, even I - after 24 years, slur the syllables. I always have to spell it out to strangers and my signature isn’t very pretty. Also, my brother is planning on having upwards of 7 children so I certainly don’t have to worry about passing it on. Using it as a middle or hyphenated name would make my full name epic in length.
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On Saturday, Mr. Toucan’s and my sisters threw us a shower! Though neither have ever even attended a shower, I couldn’t have asked for a better afternoon!

The shower was held at our new place, which ended up being great for a few reasons. First, it was like an open house, and we could show our friends and family the new place!
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Recently, Mr. Cherry Pie and I swung by Tiffany & Co while running errands in Downtown Seattle. I had a necklace I wanted cleaned and a bracelet I’d received that I wanted to exchange for something more “me.”

Mr. Cherry Pie spotted this beautiful bracelet, which he thought complemented my ring in a way that jewelry rarely does:
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