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I should probably begin this post by saying: I’m Ms. PD. It’s apparently been two months since my last post, after I got frustrated with uploading a video into my recaps. (Also, when I just wrote “recaps,” I accidentally typed “recraps.” Freudian slip from my guilt?) So, hello again! I love what you’ve done with your hair. Anyway.
All my life, I just assumed I’d take my future husband’s last name. So when I first flirted with the idea of not changing my name, it felt positively roguish. It sounds like I’ve been watching too much Downton Abbey (and I have been), but these were my father’s actual words to me when I mentioned the idea to my parents: that simply isn’t done, love. It was all very you-don’t-bring-us-honor-Mulan.
But guess what. I didn’t do it, loves. I’m still EL; he is JD; we are we; love is grand. Before our wedding, there were plenty of resources explaining how to go through the process of changing your name. There weren’t as many about the process of not changing your name. Even though you actually do nothing (no paperwork, no cost)…there’s still a process that I worked through in my mind to come to my decision. So for anyone else who is toying with the idea of not changing your name, here are some questions I asked myself and/or fielded from other people.
(Individual hangers but I’m currently using all four for myself. Worst wife ever.)
To preface: there are a lot of reasons why I chose not to change my last name:
A zillion months ago, more like two months actually, I teased you with a photo from our engagement session. After a long wait, we finally got the rest of the photos from our photographers on Saturday. After cringing at awkward angles and laughing at weird faces, it’s time to share our favorites with the hive!
Sorry, this is a shameless personal photo post. Lots of photos coming at you…now!
*All images in this post by Nataly Lemus Photography
Let me just preface this post by saying that I love my dress and every lovely detail of it. But let’s get down to the nitty gritty. Okay fine, not so much nitty gritty as silky smooth, but that just doesn’t have the same ring.
Ever since I started looking at wedding dresses (we are talking long before my engagement here, bees), there was one little detail with which I was completely enamored: buttons. I loved the look of a little row of buttons all lined up down the back of a dress. It just seems so much more special than a zipper, even if there is a zipper hiding underneath. I was completely drawn to these little suckers, and couldn’t get enough. Buttons all the way to the ground? Love. I do not care that the skirt of a dress does not need to be buttoned. Like most obsessions of mine, my fascination with buttons had nothing to do with practicality. Rather, it has to do with the romantic feel they embody. I can’t quite explain it, but something about pictures like these just make my heart melt:
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| Image via DressesDenimAndDiaperBags / Dress by BHLDN |
One way that Mr. Hawk and I greatly differ is in our emotions. In the nearly two years that we’ve been together, I can only specifically recall seeing Mr. Hawk cry three times (one of those being the day he proposed—awwww). And even then I’ve never really seen him cry more than a couple glistening tears down his cheeks.
I, on the other hand, am a crier. I’m sure Mr. Hawk is lucky to see a week or two go by without my tears. I don’t want to make myself seem coo-coo-cachoo, but I often get moved to tears by movies, music, TV shows, or even commercials. And, unfortunately for me, also unlike Mr. H, I am not a one-to-two-tear crier if I’m feeling particularly moved.
Image via FanPop via ABC’s 2003 special “Britney Spears: In The Zone” with Diane Sawyer
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It’s been over a year since our wedding, and a few months since our (dangerously, awesomely crazy) first anniversary. We are sort of slacker married people: we haven’t printed pictures yet, there’s no album, we don’t have a cute sign outside our house with our awesome new last name on it. But other than that? Marriage is awesome.
But I’m not here today to talk about marriage. Nope, for once, I am just going to talk about the wedding. And by “talk about,” I mean “show you pretty pictures of.” Mrs. Avocado recently talked about revisiting her wedding by randomizing a bunch of pictures, and it sounded good to me! So here are some glimpses into our wedding day, in no particular order at all. I still feel warm and fuzzy looking at them.
Our place cards. The stamp is from our save the dates, and my awesome then-fiancee and still-sister spent an entire day making these while I was sick on the couch recovering from my bachelorette party. I still feel sick thinking about that morning, but these are beautiful, and I loved how the two of them rallied and didn’t even give me a hard time for sleeping through all their hard work.
Post-ceremony photos. I was so happy:
The more I immerse myself into the world of weddings, the more I hear questions from brides that start with the words “Is it OK if I,” as if there is some list of rules that every bride must follow on her wedding day, otherwise end up shunned by her family and friends for making a mistake!
Is there a book out there that outlines these rules of weddings? A book that says a bridal party must include 1 person per every 50 guests and no more than that, or bridesmaids must wear exactly the same dress and shoes and makeup and hair, or that the color of the bridesmaid dresses must be carried out into the main décor of the reception space, with napkins and tablecloths matching perfectly?
If so, I’ve definitely failed to read this book, and instead I find myself writing the rules as I go. So, here is a quick list of Miss Elk’s new wedding rules.
1) The ceremony is about the bride and the groom, period. This time should be a reflection of the couple. There are a few exceptions (see rule 3#).
2) Whoever is footing the bill does get a say. I know my first rule said that the bride and groom get to choose whatever they want for the ceremony, but things start to change when someone else is paying.
Read more…
Create the honeymoon of your dreams.
Because of our status as wedding pros (award given once you’ve attended 15 weddings together—we have 32 under our belt), we had seen what we thought was every possible venue. Ballrooms, country clubs, museums, tents—you name it, we ate cake there. Each venue type we visited had its own unique benefits, and every couple made their reception truly their own through personal touches. However, since we had attended multiple weddings in each of these venue “categories,” we wanted to find something that was different. We had a few criteria when making that decision.
Primarily, we wanted the venue to be uniquely Philadelphia. Since we chose to get married in the city where we both live instead of where I grew up (as is more customary), we wanted our guests to get to know and love the city while they celebrated our marriage. Satisfying this meant finding somewhere that had gorgeous views of the city…
…or incorporated the historic aspects of the city…
Mrs. Mouse and The Dude
JonesTurnedPhillips executed an adorable candy bar, complete with cheeky chalkboard signs!
Vanwhye Photography
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Oh hive, it feels like I’ve been away for such a long time—but I guess that’s understandable since SO MUCH has happened in the last few weeks. First and foremost, we got married (obvs)!
Never in my life have I hugged pretty much everyone that I know in a matter of half an hour! I actually really enjoyed this part of the day. Apart from every single person telling me I looked beautiful, that they loved my dress and that the Top Gun theme was Amazeballs…this was the first time I got to say hello to many of our guests and albeit brief, it was lovely.
I started out with little bro’s girlfriend. At this point I was still wanting to look pretty and carry my bouquet. That was ditched rather swiftly.
My Grandad walked out of the church, wandered over to give me a hug, and I swear all I did was say, “Hi Grandad!” and he began to cry tears.
I have been obsessed with the stacked ring look for a while now and I decided to try it out for myself.
This is the first combination I tried. I can’t help but think I’m doing something wrong because it kinda looks like my finger is suffocating…
The road to finding the perfect bridesmaids’ dresses was certainly not an easy one. Having a bit of a perfectionist streak, I didn’t really allow for much wiggle room once I had a set vision of what I wanted. As I previously mentioned here, I had my mind set on a more organized version of mismatched dresses. I loved the look of completely individual non-matching dresses, but I did worry about creating a cohesive look. (Remember when I described my active imagination? Well, it was telling me free rein could equal complete and utter chaos.) I thought that an easy compromise would be to find a collection with many options for my ladies to choose from. But when it came down to it, shop after shop left me feeling disappointed and less confident about my decision.
Now for a little backstory that y’all are missing… Long ago when I first started researching options, I found the J.Crew bridesmaids’ dresses online. I immediately liked them, but there wasn’t a J.Crew Bridal Shop in Richmond, and I’ve never really been the type to order clothing online willy-nilly. I wanted to be able to hold them, touch them, feel them, smell them (well, maybe not smell them, but you get the idea). So I pushed the option to the back of my mind and went on my way, visiting every bridal store in town; however, with the passing of every failed appointment, I found myself back at J.Crew’s website admiring the dresses.
L.O.V.E. / Image via Once Wed Photo by Jill Thomas Photography
I was going through some files one day and found a stack of wedding invitations that I’d saved. Sometimes I see people write on the Weddingbee Boards that guests throw invitations away, but I never have. Does anyone else save their invitations?
Anyway, looking at the stack, they were almost uniform. Two were printed on the exact same paper with the same border, and those weddings weren’t near each other in time or location. They were all lovely invitations. They were just very similar.
Photo by Miss Mink
There was a time when I judged an invitation by running my finger across the text. I cringe at how petty that is, but I thought the best invitations didn’t look different—they felt different. I’m glad my horizons have broadened. When we started looking at invitation designs, the overall look, not the feel, was important to me.
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