Weddingbee Blog

Approximately one year ago, I first started blogging here, and I gotta tell you, I was a mess. I didn’t know how to be engaged, wasn’t sure how to have fun! And productive conversations with my fiancé about big things like money and families and his attire. (C’mon, you know that’s a big thing!) We tried, but every little decision seemed to dissolve into frustration and silence.

Have you ever watched well-socialized puppies play? When they start to get overwhelmed and over-stimulated, they stop. They take a break, stand very still, and get themselves under control, then they resume playing. Dogs who don’t speak “dog” well don’t do this and their play deteriorates into real aggression.

That was us. We’d start a benign conversation about tents and before we knew it, be arguing about who cared more and did more and loved more and… you get the picture. I wondered, often, how people managed to so easily discuss such big things.

“We talked about when to have kids.”

“We were chatting about our budget.”

“We decided that our dream wedding would be modern yet sentimental, light and funny, but classy. And we want gold-rimmed stemware.”

You may as well have been saying that you and your beloved, wearing period-appropriate attire, were laid out in a field of freaking wildflowers surrounded by chirping birds and scented breezes and being massaged by magical hands. Without allergies or bugs or the need to pee.

But we kept trying. We had Wedding Wednesdays complete with agendas and action items. I badgered, cajoled, harassed, gave up, gave in…

… and then we got married. It was a fabulous and overwhelmingly loving kind of day. Turns out you can have a rocky engagement and still have a great wedding.

More importantly, you can have a rocky engagement and great wedding and rough first few months of marriage and still have a great marriage. Four months in, we’ve figured it out. Well, mostly. A lot of it had to do with the usual culprits: expectations, trust, sharing, and housework. But then I realized that I have a choice every day to live happily or make a change, and I choose to live happily. I focused on the bright side during the month of September and it paid off.

So if you read blogs with couples who have found their joint vision and never spend big money without consensus – and you find that both awesome and horribly depressing because you can’t imagine getting there – take heart. You can. Take a deep breath, have faith even if you don’t know in what, and believe. You love and are loved and you will be okay. Cut your man some slack for being male, don’t feel bad about deciding things he doesn’t care about anyway, and love your people.

Okay, back to my wedding!

I waffled and debated and had entirely too many free makeup trials, then decided I would do my own. Was it cheaper? No. I spent more on cosmetic items than I would have paid a makeup artist. Was it worth it? Absolutely.

Look, we brides often get ridiculed for paying attention to little things that non-brides think are narcissistic at best and evidence of a controlling maniac at worst. The quickest way to bore a non-bride to tears is to talk about your makeup; somehow hair debates are less annoying, don’t ask me why.

But it’s my face on pictures I will be showing my grandchildren, and while makeup issues are certainly not on par with things like vows and chairs and rings, let’s not minimize them. In the end, having practiced by bothering to put on makeup every day for months, I was confident in my skills, tools, and products.

My fake picture smile, not so much.

But handling my own makeup made for moments like this one:

And this one:

And diva-ish pictures like this one:

Add that to the fact that I can put on flattering and long-lasting makeup in 15 minutes just in time to throw on heels and run to a business meeting, and I’ll call this one a success.

Here’s my product list (no links because I have faith in your Google skills… all costs are approximate and based on my faulty memory):

• Aveda Inner Light Liquid Foundation: $22, Aveda
• Physician’s Formula Powder Palette in Translucent to set the foundation: $10, Walgreens
• Nars Blush/ Bronzer duo in Orgasm and Laguna: $37, Sephora. Love. Love, love, love. How they devised one color that works on so many skin tones is beyond me.
• Smashbox Photo Op Under Eye Brightener: $18, Sephora
• Sonia Kashuk concealer in Dusk 21: $10, Target
• Sonia Kashuk eyeshadow palette: $14, Target
• Maybelline Unstoppable eyeliner in Espresso, set with dark brown eyeshadow: $7, Walgreens
• Maybelline Intense XXL Waterproof mascara in Blackest Black: $10. Wore it to a therapy appointment to try it out and then didn’t cry one. single. time. A day later, I made an emergency trip to buy eye makeup remover because the stuff would not come off. This was a good thing on our wedding day. Not so good on our wedding night. Or the next morning.
• Prestige lip liner in Natural: $3, Walgreens.
• Bloom lipstick in Indulge: $10, Dillards.
• Sally Hansen Diamond Lip Treatment (gloss) in Royal Romance: $10, Walgreens.

Next up: hair, dress, veil and other attire-related details!

All photography by Angela Herzog of Angela Herzog Photography (www.angelaherzogphotography.com) unless otherwise noted. Asterisks (*) indicate that post-processing was done by me, and thus, should not be held against her. See this post for more details.

Late to the party? See previous recaps here:

Part I: And It Begins
Part II: My People, Part I
Part III: It’s Time
Part IV: Our Ceremony
Part V: My People, Part II
Part VI: Celebrate Good Times, COME ON ALREADY!
Part VII: Yummy Yummy For My Tummy
Part VIII: And We Danced
Part IX: The Cheesy, Cheesy Details… with a Little Bit of Sentimentality Thrown In