- Blog
- Bios
- Boards
- Classifieds
- DIY
- Gallery
- Vendor Reviews
- Shop Weddingbee
Weddingbee Blog
Welp, I’m officially broke (almost). I visited my bank accounts today to see where I should charge the honeymoon plane tickets and realized I am pretty much out of cash!
A bevy of last minute purchases during the past month — including Mr. Bunny’s ring — have completely exhausted my cash reserves.
It’s not as though I don’t have two pennies to my name. I’ve just officially reached my limit for wedding spending. After I plunk down $200 to get to Boston, I’m done with wedding spending until the honeymoon … that is, if I want to be able to actually DO anything while we’re in Cape Cod.
It’s the end of the line for my spending, folks.
I guess it’s time to look around and make do with the things I already have. I’ve stocked up a lot of craft supplies over the past six months, and I always seem to spot random objects that might work well for decor.
Time for me to toss out the credit card, kick my brain in gear and start thinking like a Junk Queen!
This is Junkerella, the official mascot of Junk Camp, blog home of Ki Nassauer. Ki is an absolute goddess whose primary purpose in life is turning trash into treasure. This chick has some mad skillz.
Thanks to everyone who looked at our save-the-date choices and gave their input! Although the consensus seemed to be for Design #1, the Dude and I really liked the mix tapes, so we decided to go with #3. I realize the design does not “match” our English garden wedding theme, but these STDs are really an opportunity for us to do something funky and fun. I promise our actual invites will be vintage-y, floral, and full of English garden goodness.
We had our designer/friend (I guess he’s a friendor!) move some of the text around, as well as give us some more color options. He also used a couple of different fonts for the text at the very top. Take a look at our new choices!
Color choice #1
Mrs. Penguin here, and I hope you’ve gotten a chance to check out how easy it is to create a bio to share details about you, your FI, and your wedding! I can’t believe I actually taught myself how to use Dreamweaver when I wanted to make my own wedding bio wayyyy back in the day (uh… hard for the computard here).
BIL Bee has done all the hard work for you, so now all you have to do is choose the category that you want to post about, and in no time at all, your own bio will be up and running, under http://bios.weddingbee.com/profile/yourscreenname. I used my bio to share with my Step MIL ideas I had for centerpieces, bridesmaid dresses, flowers, and more. It was an easy place to organize my vision and story, and share it with one click (rather than send emails upon emails of attachments).
Today we’re featuring some of the great bridesmaids’ dresses that hive members have picked out for their weddings! Check out all this drool-worthy lovelyness…
JeniRae’s bridesmaids wore gray dresses of their choosing!
After we finished our first dance, we made our way to our seats and heard a little “ching ching”. I looked around and saw my father standing up, sweating bullets and trying to keep his cool. I knew from that nervous smile of his, it was time… he was ready to give his speech.
“I want my speech to be perfect,” he had told me earlier that week. “Perfect, because you deserve no less.”
I started tearing up. Who wouldn’t after those heartfelt words?
I looked at my daddy, and instantly, all the memories of my childhood, of him and me, flashed before my eyes… and I smiled. I took a deep breath, just as he did, and tried to keep the lump in my throat under control.
Read more…
Featured on Weddingbee
All-Inclusion Invitation Suites
“Make an elegant invitation statement without the fuss. Stylish invitation sets with matching envelopes, reception and response cards included.”
The venue decision has been one of the most difficult tasks I’ve encountered in wedding planning, by far. Our problem was that there were too many options in New York City and too many places we loved that were so far out of our budget that I got a little sick to my stomach when I got the quotes.
So what’s a 2009 bride who needs help finding something affordable and perfect to do but put out an ad on Craigslist? 
I know, I know, it sounds SO tacky, but I’ve had great luck posting requests for wedding stuff in the events section.
We started out with The Soho Loft in the heart of Soho as our beautiful reception venue. It was a little small and I was slightly worried about that, but it was really nice and very affordable. I scoured the internet to find a ceremony site that was within walking distance of the loft and FINALLY found one that we loved. We booked it immediately and paid the small fee in full, just days before we were to sign a contract with the loft, only to have the Soho Loft manager mysteriously stop returning my phone calls or emails for almost a month, at which point we decided that for some reason, they no longer wanted our business. I’m still not sure what changed.
Then, we went to the backup option from my Craigslist search, the Howard Baden Loft, which was also in Soho:
I’m not sure I can top the Mister’s awesome gift to me, however, here it goes…
For our paper anniversary, I stuck to the theme and bought The Mister 1 share of Disney Stock from FrameAStock.com. FrameAStock.com allows you to purchase a single share of stock and an actual stock certificate that can be framed as a gift.
I had the one share of Disney framed along with a little plaque that read, “Happy 1st Anniversary. Thanks for all the magical memories, and may there be many more to come!” I think he really liked it!
Create the honeymoon of your dreams.
I learned an important lesson this weekend: Ask for advice more than five minutes ahead of time. Even if you think you’re prepared.
On Saturday, my two MOHs threw me a beautiful bridal shower. Almost twenty of my closest female friends and family were there and it was so amazing to have them all in one place at one time. I couldn’t help but get excited about what the wedding will be like! But, more on the shower later. For now, let’s focus how to appreciate your shower hostesses. Here’s a sneak peek of me and my two MOHs from the shower:
MOH A, Me, And MOH J
Before they came over, I had two gift bags all ready for them. Someone had mentioned that giving them shower products would be a cute way to return the favor and I agreed, so I put together a few products I found and loved. Here’s what was included in each:
Talking budget was the hardest thing when it came to our wedding. After I came off of the high of getting engaged, I realized that there was a very real possibility that my parents would not contribute in a large way to our wedding. Even the least expensive “traditional” weddings cost entirely more than I think either of my parents would have anticipated. When my grandmother passed, she left me a little money that I put away for a very long time; I intended to use it toward my wedding one day in the future. Instead, we bought our condo 2 years prior to the wedding, and that money was gone. I avoided the subject of money entirely. We talked about the details of the wedding with my parents—what kind of wedding we envisioned, how many guests, etc., but we didn’t discuss money. I didn’t have the heart to bring it up, and I figured if my parents never brought it up, then we’d just find a way to pay for it ourselves. I was positive my parents would gift us some amount of money for our wedding, I just wasn’t sure how much. All the while, my parents both made a ton of noise about how in Thailand, it is the responsibility of the groom to pay for the wedding (don’t know how much of this is true, but my parents liked to say it OVER and OVER again). With that, I just decided not to really talk about it.
One day, my dad finally blurted it out: “How much money do you think your wedding is going to cost?” At this point, we were already talking winery wedding. I asked him how much he thought it was going to cost. He guessed $5,000. (Honestly, if I’d never talked about or attended a traditional “bells and whistles” wedding in my adult life at that point in time, I’d have probably guessed the same.)
Read more…
The lovely and talented Mrs. Sea Breeze will be creating a dreamy netted piece that’ll be my second wedding veil, to be worn throughout our reception. But she’s given me her blessing to seek a floral accent elsewhere, if I choose.
So, naturally, I wandered over to Etsy to peruse my options. Which was, of course, the best and worst thing I could have done. I’ve since fallen in love with so many fascinators, and would love some opinions from the bee-nut gallery.
(requisite cute kitty picture to take up space before…)
…the warning for Mr. Bruschetta to not click any further!
Read more…
As our date gets nearer and nearer, it’s time to get all the projects I’ve had floating around in my head for a year into a physical (rather than imaginary) form.
So, this weekend I started a chalkboard welcome word search for the entrance to the tent.
Obviously, it’s not quite done yet. The end needs to be trimmed since it was a little longer than I had planned on. I need to find (or make) a nice frame to go around the outside, and I need to circle the words highlighted in red to start the fun!
Read more…
With an average gestation period of eight months, couples have a lot of time to think about their wedding date - a lot of time to sear it into their minds. That date (that number on a calendar) will forever signify their promise of love. It’s not surprising, then, when brides try to find the “best” date to save.
My personal favorite I’ve seen recently is 10-10-10 (October 10, 2010). 101010 is binary for 42, and if you’re familiar with the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, you’ll know that 42 is the answer. The answer to what? In this case, the answer to love - any couple who gets married on 10-10-10 can rightly claim that their wedding date was the answer to love.
For other couples it might be something more mathematically simple - the anniversary of a grandparents’ wedding, a first date, a first kiss; that sort of thing. At some point, we (as brides) kind of have to let go of the power of choosing a date. The church might be booked on that date for the next 3 years! The perfect reception hall might already be booked when you already have the perfect church date!
Then you’re not so much choosing your date, as your date is choosing you.
We’ve all heard the “do”s and “don’t”s of makeup. These rules — handed down authoritatively from beauty mavens at the mall, the glamour column in your favorite magazine or your mother when you were a teen — can guide a girl’s makeup application for years.
Makeup habits are hard to break because breaking them changes the way you look… and that can be uncomfortable for a lot of people.
Think about it for a second. How many times have you HATED your haircut right after your stylist finished? And how many times did you grow to love it after a few days or a few weeks?
1 week post-hair cut, feeling uncertain about my new ’do
This new feature has been a labor of love, but we’re ecstatic to introduce our new DIY section where you can view tutorials and download templates for DIY projects, all organized by category!
From Miss Daffodil’s organizational forms to Miss Caterpillar’s petal cone template to Miss Lemon’s water bottle label template… we have every kind of DIY project under the sun that you can recreate for your own wedding. We don’t have as many downloadable files as we’d like, so if you have any helpful documents, spreadsheets, and templates you’d like to share, please add your project to our library and share the DIY love!
We’ve seeded the DIY section with over 300 DIY projects by our Bees and PROS, so please check it out and let us know what you think!
A huge thanks to BIL Bee for programming this new feature, and our hardworking interns Michael and Elana for uploading all these templates!
Our friend who agreed to design our save-the-dates for us sent me and the Dude a few choices recently. We asked him to create something that looked like a music poster, and he delivered. I’m so excited! Now all I have to do is pick one and figure out how I’m going to print them. I had originally thought I would use my Gocco to print the STDs, but some of the designs he came up with are pretty intricate, and I’m not sure I trust myself to make them happen on the Gocco. I have a couple other options:
I think option one would be the most economical, and option three would be the most aesthetically pleasing. Maybe I should compromise and go with option two?
At any rate, here are the designs.
Design #1:
When my sister Dani and I were little, we used to spend hours playing tea party with my aunt. She would break out her best English accent and make up ridiculous names for us like “Mrs. Snodgrass” and “Miss Tiddlywink”. I’m pretty sure we were close to having water poisoning… we seriously drank SO much water out of our little pink plastic teacups! Sometimes I miss being a kid.
When I saw this Alice in Wonderland themed bridal shower on Project Wedding, I immediately thought of our days playing tea party. Seriously, how fun would it be to be a guest at this party? Everything is so whimsical and bright!
| Visit our sister sites | eHarmony Online Dating |
eHarmony Advice Dating Advice |
Project Wedding Wedding Songs |
JustMommies Pregnancy Calendar |
| Sun | Mon | Tue | Wed | Thu | Fri | Sat |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 |
| 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 |
| 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 |
| 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 |
| 29 | 30 | 31 |
