Weddingbee Blog

Two weeks ago I was able to visit North Carolina and, of course, had to swing by the Blueberry Villa and Winery, where the wedding and reception will take place. I was a little nervous about heading there, as I had only been one time before, and the dead of winter can sometimes be tough in the mountains. I was pleasantly surprised by how amazingly beautiful the site was even in the dead of winter. I met with my florist for the first time (more on that to come) and met with the winery owner. My mom and one of my BMs, Morgann, came along.

(Here is mom AC and I being dorky! Don’t you love our coordinating colors?)

I wanted to snap a picture of the gorgeous arbor that we plan to use. My mind is already a flutter thinking of ways to “snazz” it up. I don’t want to take away from the beautiful background, but definitely want to complement it.

Read more…

Today’s wiki is Photographer. Hiring a photographer is one of the most important steps in planning a wedding. So, where should you begin?

• Where do you go on the web to find a reputable photographer in your area?
• How do you go about finding new and up-and-coming photographers?
• What are some questions that you should ask potential photographers?
• What are some warning signs that may alert you to a less-than-desirable photographer?

Help fellow brides out by adding your tips to hiring the perfect photographer in the Photographer wiki:

• http://wiki.weddingbee.com/Photographer

If you’re unsure how you can contribute to the wiki, take a peek at this wiki article on how to edit a wiki. Check it out and share your expertise! Or, if you’re shy, just leave your tips in the comments, and we can add them to the wiki for you!

Two of the most important people in Mr. HC’s life, his father’s father (Zadie) and his mother’s mother (Bubbe F) passed away before they could see their grandson get married. Although they can’t be there in person, they are very much a part of our lives in that they have both played such a significant role in shaping Mr. HC’s values and outlook.

To honor them, I am surprising Mr. HC with a small locket that our florist is going to attach to his boutonniere. It means a lot to me for Mr. HC to walk down the aisle with his grandparents figuratively and literally close to his heart.

Read more…

Mr. P is a wine enthusiast. So much so he had this cellar-cooler-thing built into a hall space in our home…

… and that’s in addition to this old industrial refrigeration unit that he purchased from a restaurant supply company years ago.
Read more…

Two months before Sister Bruschetta’s November 2007 wedding, I decided she needed a fun card box. I still don’t know what inspired that thought; I just woke up one day and told her I’d take over this detail, if she trusted me with it.

Crafty Miss Bruschetta emerged — remember her? — and despite the fact that she (um, I) had no idea how to go about creating it, I settled on a papier-mache tree. Google led me to my inspiration photos and my inherently stubborn nature spurred me onward.

(source)

Read more…

Reader yellowapron is selling a brand new Cuttlebug machine. She purchased it but never used it. It is unopened, and includes a 2 pack of embossing folders (4 folders on each), which are also new and unopened. She is asking for $60 for the lot.

Have a wedding item for sale? Post it with pictures in the Weddingbee classifieds and you might see it featured on the blog!

Other great items for sale:
Read more…

This time it was a party of one to complete this task, but I will say that it was pretty darn easy. I borrowed the idea of Goccoing napkins from Mrs. Cupcake who got the idea from Mrs. Cream Puff. The only difference is that I don’t think we have fun facts, like they did. I’m a little lame . So, I designed some generic napkins and printed them on teal and brown napkins.

Something I noticed on the Gocco is that lint gets stuck to the sticky pad, so for you to keep the stickiness going, you need to wipe the lint off. A little bit of screen cleaner can do this for you. In fact, if you ever notice that your sticky pad needs to be stickier like it originally was, just use a little bit of screen cleaner and a paper towel.
Read more…

I’ve been very honest and direct about a) my cheapness (which I prefer to call financial efficiency), b) my desire to keep our wedding from turning into an “event”, and c) the tininess (extremeness?) of our budget. What I haven’t been up front about is whether or not that tiny budget is really by necessity.

In terms of salaries, we do pretty well. In fact, together we make more than our parents, most of our friends, and most people in general. Now, don’t get me wrong, we aren’t rich (by either political party’s definition!), but we do pretty well.

Do you think our tiny budget is less charming and more tightwad now? I sometimes wonder if we have some unspoken obligation to our friends and family to spend more on our wedding. It’s one thing to ask people for help in lieu of hiring a vendor because that’s your only option; it’s another to do it because you just don’t want to spend the money on something you can collectively do yourselves.

Now, don’t get me wrong, we don’t have piles of cash laying around or anything.
Read more…

Due to the fact that my mom, sisters, and I are all very busy gals, the only weekend we could all work out for my Ohio Wedding Weekend was at the end of February. And what a weekend it was!

Miss Quiche the Cannibal!

My aunt and cousin are unable to travel to Jamaica for our wedding, so they graciously offered to host my wedding shower as a gift to us. Lisa and I were very close growing up, and it meant so much to me.
Read more…

Almost 5 months after Mr. Gloss popped that bling on my finger we FINALLY secured our venue… and have a date! We are getting married in Greenville, Maine in the middle of Moosehead Lake on the 100-year-old steamship Katahdin, affectionately nicknamed, ’the Kate’.

Our venue (if I can call it that) doesn’t typically do weddings, although they have done a few in the past. When I ‘toured’ the boat I spoke to the captain who was EXTREMELY helpful, since his daughter was married on the ship two summers ago. There were also a few surprises (good and bad).
Read more…

What does this:

have in common with these?

Read more…

I was just on the verge of creating (or hiring someone to create) a monogram of my fiance’s last initial with both of our first initials for our invitation… then I realized this may be poor etiquette.
My parents are paying for the majority of our wedding and they are the ones formally inviting our guests. Does this mean that their initial should be on there? (We’re doing some sort of monogram/initial to seal our pocketfolds.)

Is it too early to have our married monogram on an invitation not technically from the two of us? What are etiquette rules on this?

LatteLove

~~~

Please comment on the thread here.

Wine country may not be my hometown, but Mr. Peep lived in Sonoma and Napa County for about nine years. He was living in Napa for the first 1.5 years of our relationship, so I’ve spent a fair amount of weekends with various visitors traipsing through Wine Country. For all of you wanting to get out of the city and explore Wine Country, consider this post to be written with heavy consultation from Mr. Peep, an almost native.

I also must preface this post: Mr. Peep isn’t a fan of big built-up wineries, so you won’t see any of those on the list. We also love finding a wine that is a great deal for the money. As Mr. PT says, anyone can make a great $100 bottle of wine, but can they make a good $20 bottle, too?

And finally, our #1 rule of wine tasting: if you like it, great!! There are no rules as to who says a wine is good or bad. All that matters is that you enjoy drinking it!

Read more…

Good news! We met with the priest this weekend to go over our test results (one of the perks of getting married in a Catholic church… you have to take a test) and guess what? We passed. We are officially compatible. I’m glad I know that now after being together for almost 7 years.

Anyway, I wanted to post some pictures of the church we’ll be getting married at. It’s called Immaculate Conception Church, located on the north side of IM. It’s the church I have gone to my whole life. They just put new landscaping in around the church, so it should be great for pictures at our wedding! Actually it’s part of the reason Shari decided she wanted to photograph our wedding (thanks Shari!).

Read more…

It May Sound Corny: Part I

Everything was coming together for our one-year countdown party. We tracked down all our RSVPs, wrote shopping lists, and rented the items necessary to make it a proper backyard bash.

Fast-forward to the afternoon of the party. I’m in the kitchen, putting the finishing touches on one of our two desserts, when Daddy Bruschetta calls me outside. He’s already been joined by Mr. Bruschetta and Sister Bruschetta, each of whom is dubiously holding one of the poles that supposedly supports the rented 16-by-16 tent.

I’ll spare you all the boring details – which included one frustrating phone call to the rental company, begging for assistance, four (mine and Sister Bruschetta’s) severely bug-bitten legs, 60 minutes of high school mathematics (What’s 16 squared? The square root of 20?), and tape-measure verifying – that eventually led to the festive atmosphere we had hoped to achieve.

Read more…