Weddingbee Blog

Several weeks ago I received our envelopes from our awesome invitation designer. She had them ready so she sent them to me while she was working on printing the invites. This was great for me because it gave me some time to decorate them before the invitations arrived.

I decided long ago never to walk in anyone’s shadow… er… sorry, any Whitney Houston fans? Anyway, I decided long ago that I was going to do something to decorate the envelopes, but I was really nervous about making my own envelope liners. Primarily because I’d seen so many amazing ones around the hive; I was worried mine wouldn’t measure up and that I wouldn’t be able to pull it off. Well, I’m here to tell you that seriously, anyone can do this, even the non-crafty bride.

So, I went to Michaels and picked up some supplies. I got some scrapbook paper for my liners (I’m not sure what anyone else uses, but it was cheap, big and the right color), a glue stick, and double sided tape.

I went home and made myself a template to use for all the other liners:

(not the pattern I used… this was scrap paper)

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Hi bees! Hope you all had a great holiday - the Mister and I spent some long-needed vacation time cruisin’ in the Caribbean aboard this:

While it was tons of fun:
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Kidoss is selling a black and ivory chiffon wedding dress. She’s asking $165 for the size 20 dress.

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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Things started normally enough - I had one cat, Mr. Guinea Pig had two. Then we moved in together, and now we have three! If you thought, ‘Psh, three’s not that many,’ then you obviously haven’t met our cats (well, I guess you were introduced to Buster in my introductory post)!

(Six loves to lay on anything)

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I’ve had something on my mind that I always think about when I go on vacation. To most people, it doesn’t sound like a scary prospect, but bear with me here. I am one of those girls that always wears makeup. I promise, it’s not a vanity thing for me, it’s more of a ‘I’ve been wearing makeup for so long that I don’t think people would recognize me if I didn’t’-thing. I think a lot of it also has to do with the warping of my mind after working in salons for so long, where you are expected to have a certain image. The salon mentality has always been: if you don’t look presentable, your client will not trust that you can make them look presentable. Hence, for 9 years now, I’ve been surrounded by makeup, hair products, perfume, pretty much anything related to making yourself look and feel and smell good.

I also have a little secret. I can’t believe I’m posting this for all of you to see, but this was my 8th grade picture…

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… a beer tasting…

and walk out with a catering contact for a wedding they haven’t started planning yet. Easy-peasy-done. Sometimes it seems too easy—but really, that was the extent of our search for a caterer.

One of our ushers invested in a local micro-brewery, Two Beers. A complete shocker, I know! Around May of last year he invited us to a beer tasting. We arrived at the location, which happened to be the City Catering Company’s Little City space. The tasting was part of a series where City Catering teams up with a local micro-brewery and pairs the brewery’s beer with complimentary food.
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Or, How I Used Hot Rollers. Or, How Hair and Makeup Overtook My Shoe Nightmare.

Well, color me pink and call me a hot roller. After hair trials 1, 2, and 3, I rolled and teased my way through 3 more trials at home.
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Two years ago, before I started reading wedding blogs, I never even would have known that this item existed. It is totally unnecessary, but absolutely, incredibly beautiful nonetheless. It is elegant, classic, and architectural, yet soft. It comes in a variety of wonderful colors. It makes me swoon.

However, it is also expensive. Very expensive. And probably will have much less of an impact on the look of the reception than, say, the addition of lighting. Oh and did I mention that it’s unnecessary?

What is this amazing item?

It’s a chair.

Yes, a chair.

A chivari chair, to be specific. Take a gander at this beauty:

(source)

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Wow. For as verbose as I typically am, I’m officially at a loss for words. This is just ridiculous!

Well, let’s start off with something simple: HELLO hive! I am so incredibly overjoyed to be here, words can’t even explain! And honestly, this could not have come at a better time. I was already excited about this past week (who doesn’t love some holiday cheer?), but this was the Christmas present I was secretly hoping Santa would bring me! Well, OK, so it was Mrs. Penguin who actually did the gift giving, and if you want to be technical about it, penguins are only native to the south… I’m just going to consider her my South Pole Santa this year!

So, I suppose you’d like to know a little bit about me, perhaps? To start, I’m a professional nomad… I feel like I’ve lost track of the number of times I’ve moved, but it is around 15-ish…
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Warning, this post contains A LOT of pictures of me, including an unsightly one of me without any makeup on or my hair curled. You’ve been warned!

Alright, now if any of you are still reading, I’m ready to share my hair and makeup trial with you! I first started researching stylists and MUAs around the 10 months until the wedding-mark. I knew this was going to be very important since I was going to be the center of attention all day (along with Mr. Cola, of course). My hair and makeup are super important to me on a daily basis, so the wedding day has to be extra special!

Enter Yelp, OnceWed, Project Wedding, Weddingbee, The Knot, and every site I could think of to find reviews of bridal stylists in the area. I contacted several for their prices, and to find out if they’re good with working with long hair, and one stuck out to me: Aimee Lam. At the time I contacted her she had 29 reviews on on Yelp, of which 27 were five stars, and the other two, four stars. And all the reviews were so glowing, I just had to have a trial with her!
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Mr. S asked my father for permission to marry me in September of 2008, and then began the Great Ring Search of 2k8. We researched, we looked, we obsessed, I cried about 100 times, and just generally stressed the hell out about it.

I didn’t want him to have to take a loan out to get the ring. We are both college students. We don’t need more loans. Also, it was important to him that he pay for it himself, that is with money he earned and no parental involvement. I also liked this.

We soon found out that we were pretty “meh” when it came to most engagement rings during our search. Or, if we really liked it, it was ridiculously out of our price range. Plus, there was nothing we really *loved*. More frustration and tears followed.
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In order to rival the ridiculous number of my posts re: paper, I am posting yet again about wedding dresses, so that you all know just how truly obsessed I am.

Gather ’round, kids, so I can tell you about my big revelation during dress shopping.

Is there “the one”? You know, “the one” dress that captivates your heart, the one that you must have, the one you feel like you wore every day in a past life and you were just meant to be together? I certainly thought there would be.

Would I just “know”?

Source (Kate looks like she knew, at least about the dress)

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Yup, the title of this post says it all. Trying to train for any type of running event during the winter months can be a pretty demoralizing experience. Add in a few weeks of holiday craziness and we’ve got a recipe for becoming a total slacker on marathon-training right here.

First of all, may I just say to all you readers who live in warm climates, where snow, ice, wind and -15 degree temperatures are non-existent, I am tres, tres jealous! I am genuinely envious of being able to go outside without donning 20 million layers of clothing beforehand. Also, this post probably won’t be that interesting, so go soak up some sun or wear flip flops outside or something.

What are the perils to training outside in the winter weather? Let’s talk about a few…

1. Cold. This one is a no-brainer but it’s still important to consider! I only wear wicking fabrics (i.e. not cotton) that keep my body from getting too cold while running and sweating. Personally, I love these socks-

(Source)

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One item I never included in our more detailed wedding budget was my veil. I didn’t need to—I have a hand-me-down! It’s an ivory, elbow-length veil that my mom wore at her wedding to my stepfather this past summer.

Photograph by Ken Portnoy

(I’d only use the back veil, not the blusher.) It’s perfect for me since it doesn’t have any additional embellishments—I feel like my dress is embellished enough!

Still, when I saw these mantilla veil photos at The Sari-Clad Bride, I had to reconsider my commitment to the simple veil.
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Jill Thomas Photography captured this playful couple in San Francisco’s Haight-Ashbury district.

Keep on loading your inspirational wedding pics to the gallery to see them featured here on the blog! Remember, your images must be under 1MB in size, or they won’t load.