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Once we had placed our order for our save-the-date magnets, I began thinking about how to mail them out. I knew that I didn’t want to just drop them in an envelope without backing of some sort. Cue my favorite craft store: Hobby Lobby. Somewhere in between choosing the perfect ivory card stock, I came across packs of 50 notecards and envelopes made of kraft paper. I hadn’t even considered kraft paper, but I instantly knew it was perfect.
Determined to make my project more crafty, I also picked out two stamps and a decorative edge punch.
Over several days I stamped and cut to my heart’s content.
DaraR is selling a pair of watermelon heels from BenjaminWalk.com. She’s asking $50 for the size-7 shoes.
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:
I bought dresses for two of my bridesmaids at 8:00 AM inside an abandoned Whole Foods store.
Did that get your attention?
I previously told you about the benefits of living an hour from the J.Crew headquarters in Lynchburg, Virginia. A few months after I bought a pair of shoes for 97% off at one of their wedding clearance sales, J. Crew staged another warehouse sale inside a building that Whole Foods left after they built themselves a new store here in Charlottesville.
By this point, I had decided that I wanted my bridesmaids to wear silk taffeta dresses by J.Crew in Matisse Blue even though it might be difficult to find matching decorative items. I was pretty sure I could find them at the warehouse sale. You see, those Matisse Blue dresses were from the spring/summer collection and weren’t being shown in the fall catalog. I thought they might be sent to the sale to get them out of the warehouse.
Complicating things was the fact that these warehouse sales are where eBay sellers shop for things to sell. I had to get to the dresses before the resellers did. If the resellers got them, I’d have to pay to to three times as much to buy them through eBay.
At 7:45 AM on the opening morning of the sale, my maid of honor and I joined the line of eager shoppers snaked around the building. We reviewed the mission. We had to find these dresses:
Dresses from J.Crew (Discontinued)
The doors opened and everyone was handed a trash bag and price list, then we came around a corner into the shoe section of the sale. Most were like deer in headlights at the sight of rows and rows of tables holding boxes full of shoes. My maid of honor was one of them. I wove through the crowd toward the bridal section as my MOH held up a pair of heels and called “I could wear these!”
As I’ve mentioned before, Mr. Lion and I had an interfaith, nontraditional wedding. It wasn’t very religious, but we wanted to incorporate elements from each of our cultures into our big day. One way I wanted to nod towards my Jewish heritage was by dancing the Hora during our wedding reception.
My mom’s side of the family is Jewish, but not many of them had traditional Jewish weddings. In fact, our wedding was the first time I had ever participated in the Hora. I wasn’t exactly sure what to expect. Allow me to now speak from my very recent experience: the Hora is a lot scarier than I expected!
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.”
To be blunt, I’ve gotten to a place in wedding planning where I just don’t give a hunk of doo anymore. Just me? At this point we’ve been engaged for almost a year and a half. I’ve been steadily planning since about day 3 of our engagement. I have all my vendors booked, the menu picked, my first dress fitting scheduled, and a pretty good grasp on what detail items need to be accomplished. (Damn you chalkboard frames!) The issue now is that I can’t get anything done. AT.ALL. I mean to do something, but then I can’t quite figure out what it is I should be doing, and I take to my couch and DVR.
I could sit here and wax poetic about the joys of wedding planning, the fun I’m having, the lollipops that fall from the sky every time I accomplish a wedding task, but um - no. I’m seriously over it. I want to create a bonfire of all my damn wedding magazines that have the same advertisements and the same articles in EVERY.SINGLE.ISSUE. I want to fling my wedding binder that I long ago neglected out the window at full force. I want to eat brownies and cheeseburgers (whoops, I’ve been doing quite a bit of that) instead of trying to focus on keeping the lbs off so that I can zip up my gown.
What have I done in the last month? I’ve ordered 10 invitations from Vistaprint. That’s all folks. I suck.
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Ed. note - This post was originally published as Miss Porcupine, and actually belongs to Miss Elk!
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25. That’s my current age, and how old I will be at our nuptials. On paper, it looks like a pretty good age to marry. I’m a quarter of a century old, have been through college and medical school, and have been living independently. But in real life I am FREAKING out. How is it possible that I am that old, and that I am getting married (and about to be a doctor!). It feels kind of like the day I realized that I was older than all of the people on The Real World—I always thought THEY were so old and still to this day cannot believe I am that much older than them.
I guess it doesn’t help that I still like a lot of things meant for teenagers. As I’ve shared before, I have a strange love for television shows quite obviously designed to be enjoyed by high schoolers. On any given night I may be watching Pretty Little Liars, or The Secret Life of the American Teenager (I really hate that one, but can’t stop watching!). I have reread the HP series so many times that I am now starting to over-think them (I can’t read the 4th book anymore, too many plot holes). Sometimes Mr. Elk likes to ask how old I think I am, because I clearly can’t believe I am in my mid 20s.
Create the honeymoon of your dreams.
Long time, no see, friends! I know I said goodbye already, but when Mrs. Avocado suggested this series, I was excited to play along. Since I haven’t really looked at our wedding pictures in almost a year, it was a lot of fun to revisit some pictures I’d forgotten about!
I suppose there is no harm in starting at the end, is there? My first random photo is from late in the reception. I was dancing with my brother and some law school friends, while one of the groomsmen was trying to pick up one of my girlfriends. 
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I’m saving you all reader space here by consolidating the dress searches that didn’t result in purchase into a single post. You’re welcome.
I had NO idea what kind of wedding dress I wanted. None. OK—that’s a lie. I knew I wanted it to be white. But in terms of silhouette…no clue.
Since my mom was in town a couple weeks after our engagement (and we had the venue and band locked in), we decided to go try on some dresses. I thought it was absolutely crazy to try on dresses that soon, but we made a strict “no purchase” rule.
Part I
We decided to visit Bridals by Danielle in the Washington Square section of Philadelphia on a Saturday afternoon. The store.was.hopping. Although there was only one bride trying on gowns in the main area, it’s not that big of a space, so with her seven onlookers, it felt a little crowded. However, they were not lacking for dresses. Apologies in advance—no photos were allowed.
…and other songs not to play at your wedding reception.
I started a spreadsheet of song ideas a while back (thanks, yet again, Google Docs!), and every time I hear a song I want to use for the wedding, I add it to the spreadsheet, noting whether it’ll be for the ceremony, cocktail hour, dinner, dancing, or other (cake cutting, wedding-party intros, etc.). The spreadsheet has been steadily growing for the past five months or so, and the other day I looked back at some of the songs I’d added at the beginning.
I did a double take when I saw “S&M: Dancing.” Suddenly I was overcome with visions of Mr. Unicycle’s grandma belting out “Sex in the air/I don’t care I love the smell of it” while my great aunt grinds lasciviously with a groomsman. Hmm. Maybe a song about sadomasochism isn’t the best choice for a classy wedding reception celebrating the sacred vows the Unicycles have just made. Here’s what else you might want to reconsider adding to your playlist:
Songs about exes:
Every time I go on the treadmill (my absolute favorite place in the world…) I play Katy Perry’s “The One That Got Away.” That song is just so dang catchy! It’s the perfect tempo for running (OK fine, jogging [all right fine, walking quickly]) and also dancing. I also love belting out the lyrics in the car. But, um, why would “the one that got away” have any place at our wedding? And for the record, neither I nor the mister even has a “one that got away,” which somehow makes it even more inappropriate.
I may have mentioned a time or two my love of yellow roses and how they influenced my color selections. With a more concrete vision of where I saw the wedding going, I contacted two florists to chat about my ideas and receive quotes. Both florists came highly recommended and had plenty of experience working at Wren.
I met with the first florist after seeing some of her handiwork on display at the open house Mr. Hawk and I attended. I loved being able to see table arrangements and bouquets in person. She was enthusiastic and knowledgeable, and clearly knew the setup of both Wren and Legacy Hall. Less than a week after our meeting, she sent me a detailed outline of all of the main flowers, colors, and arrangements. She even wrote out in paragraph form the setup and details. (She was a type-A girl’s dream.)
LOLA444 and her fiance pose pretty for engagement pictures
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If your photo is featured as the Gallery of the Day, you’re eligible for a special Weddingbee badge for your blog or website! Check out instructions on how to grab the badge here!
Throughout the weekend, whenever I could snag someone, I would hand them their Thank You gift for being a part of our wedding.
Mr. HW kept it simple for the guys and got each one a nice pocket knife with their initials engraved in it.
The flower girls got little dolls that had the exact same dress as the girls wore in the wedding.
Here is Aunt Pam showing off the cute dolls.
We had fun playing with them the morning of the wedding.
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When I was in college in New England, getting packages with a return address of One Ivy Crescent in Lynchburg, Virginia was a thrill. It meant that yet another boxy, Shetland wool, or roll-neck sweater had arrived from J.Crew. We were addicts. We thought the label “J.Crew U” was a compliment to our great style, not a criticism of our homogeneous look.
One day, I decided to find One Ivy Crescent in Lynchburg, just an hour south of Charlottesville. A friend told me that the clearance center at the J.Crew factory carried current merchandise that had been returned or slightly damaged and not the cheaper outlet-only line that you’d expect. J.Crew doesn’t publish any official information about the two stores it operates out of the Lynchburg factory, but I post their addresses on the Weddingbee boards every now and then in hopes of helping people find them.
During my visit, I got on the factory’s email list and started getting announcements about sample sales and warehouse clearance events. Last spring, I got a message about a wedding clearance event that J.Crew held in an empty storefront in Richmond and decided to go check it out.
I was too excited to take a picture. / Photo from the Richmond Bargains blog
I hadn’t finalized wedding colors or my bridesmaids when this sale happened, so I wasn’t really looking for anything specific. I was stunned that gowns that used to sell for over $1,000 were marked down to $200–300. All bridesmaids’ dresses were $30. All shoes were $10. On top of that, everything was 20% off for the final weekend of the sale.
4. Take a tour
Hawaii offers SO many specialized tours. Helicopter, zip-line, kayaking, whale-watching… the list goes on-and-on. While you can definitely try to do all of those things on your own, I would suggest going with the pros at least once on your vacation. It’s nice to be in the hands of someone who does it every day!
Sparks and I went on a guided LOST tour (in a Hummer! Off road!), and it was hands-down the best thing we did in Oahu. The guide took us to places on the island that we would have NEVER found on our own, and I felt like we learned so much!
We went on a 5 hour LOST tour with KOS… it was amazing!
“We have to go back!”
5. Visit Pearl Harbor
Confession: We almost didn’t do this. I know, it’s terrible. But if anyone else out there is thinking about skipping it, I’m here to convince you not to! Here’s why:
Also, if you go on Wednesday or on the weekend, you can visit the flea market at Aloha Stadium on your way to the memorial. Sparks and I found so many unique and affordable gifts there. I definitely recommend stopping by!
Our tickets to the USS Arizona memorial
Inside the memorial
Tips and Tricks: You absolutely cannot bring ANYTHING but a camera into the Pearl Harbor grounds. Not even a camera bag. So travel light if you go.
The flea market at Aloha Stadium is freakin’ HUGE. Like insanely huge. Sparks and I walked from end-to-end, and take my word for it… everything for sale is pretty much the same on both sides. Don’t feel like you missed out if you didn’t make it through the entire thing.
Checking out the flea market
Fresh island soaps 
Next up: Maui! (Then it’s on to wedding recaps!!!)
I got inspiration for my holiday cards this year from this post on Papertrey Ink’s blog. (Have I mentioned that would happily buy everything they sell, if I only had the money? Because I totally would.) I ordered the tri-fold card bases, and while those were in the mail (plus, ahem, some stamps) Cinnamon Buns and I went through the wedding photos and picked our favourites out. When the card bases arrived, we got to work.
You can switch up how you fold them up; we decided to go with this orientation.
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