Weddingbee Blog

We’re excited to feature the top boards in the Kathlin Argiro Bridesmaid/Rehearsal Dress Giveaway Contest! Because we didn’t specify the end of the contest being in PST or EST, we’ve included the board that was winning at 12am PST and 12am EST in Round One of our voting.

Without further ado, here are our finalists!

Board 1, “Caribbean Blue and Apple” by Katie D.:

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I want to attempt to lessen the stereotype that the groom/better half/significant other’s involvement in wedding planning is little more than silent consent to the bride’s demands and a general lack of helpfulness. Also why, as brides, do we sometimes fall victim to having such feeble expectations of our grooms? Just last week, an incident with Mr. G reminded me (again) not to sell him short on the planning front.

By accident, I found out Mr. G is plotting a wedding-related surprise. I was complaining about wedding stuff (a common activity of mine these days). In particular, I was trying to figure out what we should do about addressing the invitation envelopes. Should we do it ourselves? Should we get a friend with good handwriting to address them? Then Mr. G chimed in with, “Let me ask my calligrapher.”

“Who? Wait, wha? You have a calligrapher?” Seriously, I think that was my response.
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My culinary to-do list is embarrassingly long. With monthly subscriptions to several cooking magazines, I have more delicious-sounding recipes than time to make them all!

Biscotti had a long tenure on this list, but found its way off in time for the recent Philly Weddingbee Meet Up. I was looking for a recipe that could keep for several days (so I could make them ahead of time) and would be a cute food favor (because presentation is key!); I picked a chocolate-packed treat to try out.

I tweaked the recipe slightly — no change in the ingredients, just how I shaped the dough before baking — to make mini biscotti. And while my current kitchen set-up isn’t ideal (the much-coveted KitchenAid stand mixer is waiting patiently on our registry, so I borrowed Mama Bruschetta’s oh-so-’70s hand mixer), our motley assortment of hand-me-down kitchen tools was more than up to the task.

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We won’t have a ring bearer, lacking boys of the appropriate age in our circle of friends and family. We will, however, have the world’s best Junior Bridesmaid in my 12 year old niece, L. She’s too grown up to be a flower girl, and too young to be a bridesmaid, so we decided that Junior Bridesmaid was the perfect role.

But what responsibilities to give her? My stepsister, as flower girl, will be charged with scattering rose petals along the path, but since L isn’t a flower girl (an important distinction when you’re 12), what will she be doing? Why, carrying the rings! Yes, the real rings… but not on a pillow, no sirree. She’ll be sporting a finger posy. Behold.

(Again, excuse the quality of the cell phone picture… we’re working on a deadline here.}
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Last week was one crazy week, BUT, thanks to the hive’s suggestions, I survived. I got over my cold with tons of rest, Emergen-C, Zicam, and lozenges. I was able to hop into my boss’ office Thursday afternoon and hand in my work report, skip on over to my dress fitting, and then jump on a plane to Seattle for my bachelorette on Friday morning! Before I tell you about the best girls’ weekend EVER, I finally have decent pictures of me in my DRESS!!! But please don’t mind my facial expressions, as I was just getting over my cold.

Mr. Peep, step away from the computer. Far, far, away!!!
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Where did we leave off? Oh yes…

I was getting my makeup done.

So, my makeup is on, and I mentioned that my Dad had a surprise for me (okay, us…). My dad is a vintage car collector, and he has about 10 vintage cars, some tractors, and a few vintage fire trucks that are completely restored. He’s sort of a work-a-holic, so getting a junky car and then having it restored (by someone else) is like a vacation for him. After they’re all restored and shiny again, he either puts them in his little car museum, or he pimps them out with SIRIUS radio and drives cross-country. He actually drove one of the new ones all the way from Georgia to Vegas, but he wanted to get his baby girl something special.
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It has been so long since my last update! I know I promised recaps, but I’ve been so busy lately. Mr. Martini and I agreed to stay at our current apartment for about 4-6 months so that we could take the time to get rid of some things and eventually move to a smaller place, but just a couple of weeks ago we found an awesome apartment and decided to take the plunge and move now. So, just shortly after unpacking my things, we’re suddenly re-packing everything for our move this coming weekend.

Because the last couple of months of wedding planning was so hectic, and because we haven’t gotten our professional photos from our photographers yet, I did want to catch up and post about a few things that happened before the wedding date in the meantime—especially the bridal shower and bachelorette party.

I truly have the most amazing friends.

That deserved its own line.

I never wanted a bachelorette party. I never wanted a shower. I hate being the center of attention, and I didn’t want to inconvenience anyone. But my MOHs refused to give me that option, so I wanted to make it as painless as possible, with minimal cost. I would’ve been happy with just a low-key dinner with close friends, or maybe even a slumber party with lots of alcohol.
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Yes… you read that correctly. When it’s rainy and I can’t go out for a walks and such, I often get holed up in my room and watch programs like Smallville and Gilmore Girls. Just a reminder, the other options I have here to watch are the British version of Jerry Springer (his name is Jeremy Kyle), and old episodes of Sally Jesse Raphael.

In any case, the episode today was about Sookie’s wedding. What jump-started this post is that Sookie (the bride) has a last minute cancellation, and asks her friend to invite her parents. Her parents realize the wedding is in one week, and call it a pity invite (which it sort of is).

I’ve seen so many bridal websites and magazines promote an A list and a B list, but I had to wonder - what is the true difference between B list guests and “pity invites”, as they called them?

At first I thought the difference would be that pity invites are the “I don’t want to pay for a meal that no one is eating” type of invites, whereas B-listers are people that you really want to come, but because of space or budgetary constraints, you had to place them on the B list. The next choice, of course, is what to do with your B-listers. Do you send out the first round of invites early, wait for the RSVPs to roll in, and when you have enough “nos”, then do you send out the B-lister invites?
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Today’s photo of the day was uploaded by ljcadv. Check out her clever centerpieces that also doubled as table numbers! She adhered numbers to wine carafes, and surrounded her centerpieces with votives.

And check out this week’s prize that will go to one lucky bride who uploads her pics to the gallery!

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I picked my wedding dress trim and it changed everything. I fell in love with this trim. It is AMAZING, but is a grey/blue color.

Sorry the picture isn’t the best, but I don’t want to give too much away to Mr. AC (refer to my dress post from earlier this week to see it more clearly).

The trim will be very small, but after discussion with my bridesmaids and the dress designer, they all thought the purple bridesmaid’s dresses wouldn’t perfectly match. So we decided to make the trek back to David’s Bridal and see what we could find.
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During the course of our wedding planning, Mr. K and I had a really hard time deciding what song we would use for our first dance. The closest thing we have to a “song” would be Such Great Heights (by The Postal Service or Iron and Wine–we love both versions!) but it’s not a great song for dancing (the Postal Service version is too electronic and the Iron and Wine version would put people to sleep!). We also didn’t want to pick a song just because it seemed like a good first dance song. For example, I love the song At Last by Etta James–it’s a beautiful, classic song, and fitting for a couple that has had a 4.5 year courtship, but the song just wasn’t “us” enough to be our first dance song.
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As I mentioned previously, I have been considering making the boutonnieres for the groomsmen. I had bought some flowers last week to have around the apartment, and since they are on their last leg, I thought I’d use them to test out my bout-making skills. I had some fake hydrangeas as well from some of our other wedding projects, so I used a stem of the flowers and a leaf to supplement the real button mums. After about 2 minutes, here’s what I came up with.

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As I mentioned a couple of weeks ago, I was going to make some cupcake pops for my shower hostesses as a part of their thank you gifts.

Pictured Supplies:

• Vanilla flavor Candy Melts
• Milk chocolate Candy Melts
• Sprinkles

Not Pictured:

• Lollipop sticks
• Boxed cake mix and canned frosting (choose your flavors)

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Reader darilinda is selling a pair of Liz Rene Couture shoes. They are style “Saskia” and are a size 10. They feature a 3.5″ heel and are brand new. Make her an offer!

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:
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Two words — Salk Institute.

I know I’m trying to be frugal with our wedding budget and save for the construction of our house, but I would give my right leg, left arm, and donate all my healthy cells to the institute to get married here.

Here a little background:
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