Mrs. Brooch, Arlington, VAAge and Occupation: 25, Writer/EditorFiance's Age and Occupation: 29, Front Desk ManagerEngagement Date: October 3, 2009Wedding Date: April 2011Venue: Oxon Hill ManorAbout Me: I’m an indecisive girlie-girl with a motor mouth, can-do attitude, and knack for making others laugh. I dream of becoming a best selling novelist like Elizabeth Gilbert or Julie Powell (a girl can dream, right?), and love long road trips, a beautiful countryside, music, blogs, books, and all things vintage/thrift/antique/or homemade. I’m a Virgo, i.e. overly sensitive, emotional, and critical, and there’s no such thing as short and sweet in my world. I want to say and do it all. Mr. Brooch grounds me. I point where to go and he figures out the way. He’s a pragmatic fancy-pants who enjoys video games and movies. We both adore our mutt, Rocky, and spending time with our amazingly supportive family and friends. We’re planning a garden wedding with a formal reception with lots of whimsy and unique, Southern-inspired details.
Mrs. Elephant, Dallas, TXAge and Occupation: 27, Financial Operations AnalystFiance's Age and Occupation: 27, IT Student/Store ManagerEngagement Date: March 29, 2009Wedding Date: April 2011Venue: The Tribute Golf ClubAbout Me: I'm a Philly native creating roots deep in the heart of Texas. I might be a little obsessed capturing those Kodak moments of anything and everything (mainly on vacations). I've become more of a gamer thanks to Mr. Elephant, who I met online and can't wait to spend the rest of my life with. We are planning a wedding based on our favorite colors, blue and green, with a travel theme for 150 of our closest friends and family. Hopefully our long (2-year) engagement won't kill me!
There were a few splurge items for the wedding that I mentally listed as very nice to have if we have room in the budget, but not totally necessary. The first was photography, and I can’t wait for Lynn Michelle to shoot our engagements, rehearsal, and wedding! Another splurge was uplighting for the reception. Read more…
Mrs. Cola, Mountain View, CAAge and Occupation: 27, Product Communications and PromotionsFiance's Age and Occupation: 28, Managing Partner and Senior DesignerEngagement Date: March 5, 2009Wedding Date: June 2010Venue: The Mountain Terrace, Woodside, CAAbout Me: I’m a Washington State native, enjoying life in Silicon Valley California with my fiancé, our three kitties and one leopard gecko. I like reading wedding blogs, Photoshopping wedding design mock ups, making lists, and planning, planning, planning! I’m a bit of an anomaly, on one side I’m a very girlie girl, I collect shoes, I lay out my outfits 4-6 weeks in advance, and I’d never leave the house without my hair curled and makeup on. But on the other side, I’m a total tomboy, I love to go camping and hiking, play drinking games (hey, I’m Irish!) and most of my closest friends are guys. My fiancé and I are planning a DIY-focused wedding with a balance between easygoing (what he wants) and chic and stylish (what I want), and are tying it all together with elements in lavender, sage, butter cream and chocolate.
On Saturday, I woke up around 7 in the morning. Even though on the weekends I regularly enjoy sleeping until noon, there was no sleeping in today. IT WAS OUR WEDDING DAY! Luckily, my sore throat from the night before was completely gone, much to my relief upon waking.
Mr. Cola thought differently about waking early, and probably didn’t appreciate me curling my bangs and eyelashes, and bouncing around the suite, getting things ready for the day. To give him a little more quiet sleep time, I got dressed in my “getting ready outfit”: a white short-sleeve sweatshirt with my initial on it, a purple tank top, and a white skirt, and headed downstairs to the on-site Starbucks.
Down at Starbucks, I ran into one of my bridesmaids, and we stocked up on caffeine for the day. I knew I couldn’t get through a long day without my usual quad shot iced latte, and I picked up a Double Shot can too, just in case I needed it later! Read more…
Mrs. Barrettes, Tumon, Guam/Napa, CAAge and Occupation: 29, DancerFiance's Age and Occupation: 31, Licensed Building ContractorEngagement Date: November 16, 2008Wedding Date: October 2010Venue: V. Sattui WineryAbout Me: I'm an East Coast girl, living on a tiny little island in the Pacific, twirling, leaping, and shimmy-ing my way through life, and now, wedding planning! I'm equal parts nerdy and cool... okay, mostly nerdy. I love satin bows, red lipstick, black & white graphic anything, the shine of sequins and the sound of a champagne "pop". My favorite books are The Portrait of a Lady, by Henry James, and Tender is the Night, by F. Scott Fitzgerald. I can also conjure a pretty good Patronus Charm. I started my appreciation for good red wine while traveling on the high seas, and it's only fitting that my passion for wine drinking led me to my Napa-bred honey. We bonded over bottles of Cabernet on my oceanfront porch and haven't looked back since. We're sealing the deal at a winery in the Napa Valley on a 'perfect ten' of a day!
I’m currently tackling our wine charms. It’s an easy enough project to get my feet wet since I’m not a super-crafty bee, but I’m running into a roadblock. In my mind I would personalize little satin bows and hang them from wire fastened around a wine glass. But lo and behold, I can’t figure out a way to write on satin without the ink bleeding. Do you have any ideas, hive?
Mrs. Sand Dollar, HoustonAge and Occupation: 24, Graphic DesignerFiance's Age and Occupation: 22, Electrical TechnicianEngagement Date: January 8, 2010Wedding Date: September 2010Venue: MacLean ParkAbout Me: I'm a domestic diva down to the core. I heart cooking, sewing, baking, decorating and making sure we have a hand-crafted home. The best part about the wedding is I get to incorporate it all! I make sure I put my art degree to good use by screen printing, craft knife cutting, and a whole lotta graphic design. We're having a big-time party on a small-time budget, and I promise to show you a boot-scootin', barbecue-eatin', finger-lickin' good time! Mr. Sand Dollar and I spend most of our time on DIY projects or traipsing around the outdoors with our two pooches Rory and Juno. I'm looking forward to sharing our journey with all of you!
When you get to the end of things, you start remembering how they began. It seems I haven’t posted about our engagement story, so for all you romantics out there, here it is.
After dating for just under a year, Mr. Sand Dollar decided it was just about time to pop the question. Read more…
Mrs. Knitting, TorontoAge and Occupation: 24, Student Recruitment Assistant
Fiance's Age and Occupation: 24, Neuroscience PhD CandidateEngagement Date: October 2009Wedding Date: December 2010Venue: University of Toronto Faculty Club
About Me: I'm a pearl wearing, etiquette book reading Toronto girl who loves cooking and baking, museums, charm bracelets, and collecting books on Jackie Kennedy (a lot). I've been known to spend Sunday mornings at the antique market, Wednesday evenings at sister sushi dinners, and any bit of spare time reading. After six and a half years of many late night walks, watching DVDs together in bed, travelling to places like New York, and Tobermory, doing Sudokus together on the couch, lots of Indian food, the occasional yoga class, moving in together and so much more, Mr. Knitting and I are planning a cozy Christmasy (it's a word!), vintage wedding in Toronto complete with many DIY projects (eek!) and lots of help from our amazing group of family and friends.
As I’ve mentioned before, Mr. Knitting moved here from Poland when he was four. While he is proud of his heritage, he is really much more Canadian than Polish and this is definitely reflected in our wedding. Pretty much anything Polish in our wedding is there because I pushed for it (except for the mushroom dumplings).
However, his parents are still very Polish and haven’t been assimilated in the same way, which is understandable as they were a lot older when they came to Canada. At first, they seemed to expect that we’d be having a very traditional Polish wedding complete with a Catholic church ceremony. I think our heathen Christmas wedding complete with grown up flower girls, a groomswoman, and a first look (we haven’t mentioned any of this to them yet!) is very much outside of their understanding of what a wedding should be.
I think our wedding is also somewhat difficult for them because we will be doing things that are a bit socially awkward for them. For example, we limited our guest list to 100 people, which means they aren’t able to invite as many people as they would like. They’re getting to invite a lot more people than my parents, but they aren’t able to invite all their friends and every single member of their friends’ families. For Mr. K, me, and my parents, it’s not difficult to explain to some people that space is limited so we have to be really selective, but for Mr. K’s parents, I think it is. Read more…
Mrs. Zebra, Providence, RIAge and Occupation: 24 Marketing/Costume DesignerFiance's Age and Occupation: 26 Management/Firefighter Engagement Date: December 12, 2008Wedding Date: March 2011Venue: The Providence BiltmoreAbout Me: I'm a small town New England girl with an affinity for procrastination, crossing the proverbial line, and putting her foot in her mouth. I'm a lover of history, all seasons, sewing and Incubus. I design costumes on the side for my old high school's theatre department, which is where I met my sexy man. Our motto for our Big Fat Lebanese/Portuguese/Irish near-300 person wedding is "the more the merrier"! We are marrying in a Catholic ceremony and are hammering out the details of our Victorian-inspired reception.
So we’ve finally decided on our honeymoon destination. Woot woot! Zeb wanted over-water bungalows in Bora Bora, and I wanted Kona Village in Hawaii. In the end, the allure of an all-inclusive package with a short flight won out. I told Zeb he was crazy because a 20-hour flight sa-huuuucks!
How did we land at this decision? Definitely not by over thinking it, naturally. My cousin had mentioned that she loved her honeymoon destination in the Mayan Riviera (Riviera Maya? IDK!), and our travel agent only goes there. The travel agent showed us a brochure, and Zeb came across the El Dorado Royale. Hellllllooooo, lover! All pictures are courtesy of the El Dorado Royale website. You ready to be jelly?
Mrs. Seashell, Chicago, IL / Providence, RIAge and Occupation: 28, Marriage and Family TherapistFiance's Age and Occupation: 31, Electrical EngineerEngagement Date: September 3, 2009Wedding Date: September 2010Venue: The Glen Manor HouseAbout Me: Fonts and fashion, stationery and Sundays, photography and french toast... the beauty is in the details for this fun-loving Chicagoan who loves to plan plan plan! The soon-to-be hubs plays "Mr. Fix-It" in our new condo while I swoon over beautiful, personalized stationery and choose shades of aubergine for my bridesmaids' dresses... and thus begins my new fairy tale! Skirting to the East Coast for our September nuptials where my home state of Rhode Island awaits with fall foliage, I'm just a few dress fittings and bachelorette party away from saying "I Do" to a very happy ending!
Family photos have been collected, oval shapes have been Cricut-ed, and another DIY is (almost) complete!
…and just in case our wedding guests wonder whom they’re looking at, we even labeled the backs of our photos! Read more…
Mrs. Lioness, AtlantaAge and Occupation: 25, Physical TherapistFiance's Age and Occupation: 25, AttorneyEngagement Date: August 29, 2009Wedding Date: April 2011Venue: Anthony’s Fine DiningAbout Me: I’m a Southern girl with New England roots. I say "wicked" and "y’all" in the same sentence and I like to drink sweet tea with my lobster. Mr. Lion and I are both former Floridians now living in Atlanta, which fortunately is still SEC country...Go Gators! We both love baseball, coffee, traveling, cooking, and playing Words with Friends with each other on our iPhones all day long. I’m very passionate about the things and the people I love, and I tend to plan things with all of my heart...our wedding, of course, is no different! Oh, and also Mr. Lion is a first generation American of Cuban descent. I may look more like Lucy than Ricky, but I’m doing my best to incorporate some Latin elements into our vintage-garden-Southern wedding!
One of the other ways I tried to incorporate Mama Lioness’s creativity was by having her host our engagement party. I love seeing an inspiration board featuring an engagement party that could rival a wedding. I didn’t want all of that, though. I wanted something low-key, inexpensive, and casual. Also, I didn’t want people to bring presents, as we hadn’t had a chance to register yet. We decided to have it at Mama Lioness’s townhouse on December 26th, 2009. We were in South Florida visiting three of our four divorced parents for the holidays, so it was a perfect opportunity to take advantage of already having many of our favorite people in the same place at the same time. Five of my six bridesmaids are also from South Florida, so they were home visiting family as well.
Mama Lioness sent out e-vites (did I mention how casual I wanted this to be?) and started brainstorming with Sister Lioness. They decided on afternoon cupcakes and champagne with DIY decor. They got mini-cupcakes from Allegria at the Promenade in Coconut Creek. (They sell fro yo and cupcakes…who could ask for anything more?) These are the flavors they decided on: Read more…
Mrs. Moonbeam, Los Angeles/San AntonioAge and Occupation: 26, Intern ArchitectFiance's Age and Occupation: 26, Studio Analyst, aspiring ScreenwriterEngagement Date: May 20, 2009Wedding Date: November 2009Venue: Our Lady of Grace Catholic Church (LaCoste, TX) and Mary Gray Events Center (Castroville, TX)About Me: I was born and raised in Texas, but after college I moved to Seattle for a couple of years and loved it. Then I followed my beau out here to LA and we're getting settled in. I've been making things since I can remember. I was raised by crafters. I love to sew, draw, paint, build, cook, bake (anything with a tangible end result is fair game). In that same spirit, I've been hosting since I was old enough to cook and set a fancy table. I kind of take after my grandmother, who believes that your morning OJ always tastes better out of the good crystal.
Hello there hive! I’m finally going to start my recaps. For those of you who don’t remember me, I married Mr. Moonbeam (for the second time) in November of 2009 in our large, Texas, family-oriented ceremony. We were married (the first time) in July of 2009 in a small civil ceremony in Malibu (for oh-so-romantic health insurance reasons). Both were great days for the two of us, but the stresses of our big ceremony have definitely contributed to my recap hiatus.
Confession: I really dislike our pro pics from our November ceremony. I will be forever grateful to our shutterbug relatives (Aunt Annie and Uncle Chris) who took some of my favorite pictures from our big day.
Full Disclosure: I found our photographers off of Craigslist, and we paid about $600 for their services. I wasn’t expecting blow-me-away amazingness, but I was expecting competence. Read more…
Mrs. Starfish, Boston/NewportAge and Occupation: 25, Operations AssistantFiance's Age and Occupation: 25, SalesEngagement Date: October 8, 2008Wedding Date: October 2010Venue: The Atlantic Beach ClubAbout Me: I'm a perfectionist who is a planner at heart. I don't do well with surprises. I love planning, crafting, Newport RI, family and friends, and most importantly, Mr. Starfish---all of which will be big components in our October wedding in our favorite little city by the sea.
Do you remember these awesome cookie cutters I mentioned a while back? Well, I got them in the mail and did a test run for the wedding.
The lettering came out pretty good, it’s pretty easy to read, but I wasn’t happy with the overall effect. The cookies above look perfect, but no matter what I tried, my cookies got a line above and below each line of words. Read more…
Mrs. Brooch, Arlington, VAAge and Occupation: 25, Writer/EditorFiance's Age and Occupation: 29, Front Desk ManagerEngagement Date: October 3, 2009Wedding Date: April 2011Venue: Oxon Hill ManorAbout Me: I’m an indecisive girlie-girl with a motor mouth, can-do attitude, and knack for making others laugh. I dream of becoming a best selling novelist like Elizabeth Gilbert or Julie Powell (a girl can dream, right?), and love long road trips, a beautiful countryside, music, blogs, books, and all things vintage/thrift/antique/or homemade. I’m a Virgo, i.e. overly sensitive, emotional, and critical, and there’s no such thing as short and sweet in my world. I want to say and do it all. Mr. Brooch grounds me. I point where to go and he figures out the way. He’s a pragmatic fancy-pants who enjoys video games and movies. We both adore our mutt, Rocky, and spending time with our amazingly supportive family and friends. We’re planning a garden wedding with a formal reception with lots of whimsy and unique, Southern-inspired details.
I know I’m not the first to admit this, but I’m saying it anyway: Before I was in a relationship, I was thinner! I looked my very best and was the smallest I had ever been when I met my future husband (FH). Yet somehow, over the last four years, I gained an upwards of 20 pounds, and I’m not even sure how. It’d be difficult to pinpoint just one reason because it could have been anything from our restaurant excursions to late-night Häagen-Dazs tastings to weekend snacking.
Mrs. Hot Wings, Chicago/San DiegoAge and Occupation: 28, ProfessorFiance's Age and Occupation: 32, InstructorEngagement Date: December 20, 2008Wedding Date: August 2010Venue: Ocean View Villas/Jasmine Seafood RestaurantAbout Me: I am a psychology grad student living in Chicago and planning my wedding to a fellow psych grad student. I am a Sunny So-Cal bred gal who trudged across the country to follow her love of psychology and ended up finding a partner in the process. I am overly passionate about anything I involve myself with. I am an activist, a foodie, a reality TV watching junkie, an over-analyzer, a photography obsesser, and am utterly cheesy to the core. This is a story of what happens when a boy and a girl meet, fall in love over academic dorkiness, and a shared love for life. We (mostly I) are planning our semi-destination wedding in my hometown of San Diego. We are excited to bring our families and friends together from across our lifespans to celebrate our future in a grand 400+ person culturally blended affair!
Remember how I debated about whether or not to wear these “a-tad-too-dark-blue shoes”? Many of you insisted that I find shoes that were a brighter shade, as I had mentioned wanting. But, I couldn’t do it. Look at those shoes! They had me at hello. I’ll be honest, blues were the colors in our wedding but I cared more for the style of the shoe than the actual color of the shoe. I was a bride who had discussed with our DOC if it would be OK to wear bright red shoes even if red wasn’t in our color scheme at all!
So yes, I went with the Nina Elga, in all their 4.25 inch heel and navy blue goodness.
Mrs. Elephant, Dallas, TXAge and Occupation: 27, Financial Operations AnalystFiance's Age and Occupation: 27, IT Student/Store ManagerEngagement Date: March 29, 2009Wedding Date: April 2011Venue: The Tribute Golf ClubAbout Me: I'm a Philly native creating roots deep in the heart of Texas. I might be a little obsessed capturing those Kodak moments of anything and everything (mainly on vacations). I've become more of a gamer thanks to Mr. Elephant, who I met online and can't wait to spend the rest of my life with. We are planning a wedding based on our favorite colors, blue and green, with a travel theme for 150 of our closest friends and family. Hopefully our long (2-year) engagement won't kill me!
Due to lack of space in our venue, we decided to go for a photobooth instead of a candy buffet. But if we were doing a dessert bar and had the time for some homemade goodies, these mini-cheesecakes would be at the top of my list!
I started making these mini pieces of awesomeness when I worked at my first “real world” job out of college. We would have potlucks every month, and this was a way for me to contribute and not kill anyone. I kid. I’m really not that bad of a cook, but I hated to make something and then have to reheat it in the microwave at work. That thing would take forever! I found the recipe online here, and with a few simple ingredients, a mixer (which I didn’t have the first time I made these…let me tell you, beating that batter by hand was not fun!), and an oven, you too can make these.
Ingredients (I doubled the original recipe to accommodate my work crowd):
![Prepping Your Shoes for Your Wedding Day : wedding san diego shoes 112 HanssiesFaves-004[1]](http://www-static.weddingbee.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/07/112.jpg)
