Weddingbee Blog

I know. I have already written about shoes a few times. I’ve talked about bridesmaids shoes, I’ve talked about my non-wedding-bridal-shoes, and on several, different occasions, I have mentioned my own shoes. However, this post is not about my shoes or my moms’ shoes or any other lady shoes at all.

In fact this is a post about MAN shoes! Yep, with out so much as a pro/con list Mr. Aardvark selected and purchased his shoes for the wedding! Enough of my blabbering on, let’s get to the pictures!

He ordered them from Zappos. We were sitting on the sofa one quiet afternoon and he asked, “What do you think of these for the wedding?” I really liked them. They were cool, but not trendy. They were stylish, but not too much so. And the color was to die for.
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Mr. Aardvark and I love kids. We are lucky enough to have a number of kids in our family who will be in our wedding. We are having three flower girls and a ring bearer. One thing I really wanted to do-up right was the thank you gifts for the children. They are all fairly young (between five and two) so I wanted to make sure their gifts were age appropriate, but I also wanted to make sure it was something they could have as a keepsake as they grew up.

After a bit of brainstorming and memory searching, I came up with an idea that I thought was brilliant. When I was little (and now) I loved “treasure boxes”: any wooden or plastic box totally captured my imagination. I would fill them with pretty rocks or fall leaves or earrings my mom had lost the match for. I still have a couple of these “treasure boxes” to this day, and I use them as jewelry boxes.

Mr. Aardvark and I decided treasure boxes (filled with candy treasure) would be fun enough to feel like a real gift to a little kid, but still something they could keep their whole lives.

Of course, just buying pretty boxes would be too easy. So, I decided to paint my own!

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No, that is not a typo. This is a story about how, my Mama Aardvark, Step-Mama Aardvark and I  all went dress shopping together and found their (S)MOB dresses.

Before we get to the pretty pictures, there is something you need to know. My family is pretty unique   in that, despite divorces and remarriages, everyone gets along. In fact, getting along is a bit of an understatement when it comes to Mama and Step-Mama Aardvark. One might even go so far as to say they are friends.

And, as sometimes happens with friends, they have very similar taste. I cannot count the times they have shown up dressed identically (without planning) to an event. They purchased the same grill within weeks of each other (first off, how often do you buy a grill, and second, what are the odds they both got the same one!?). They have purchased the same glassware (unknowingly). I even remember a time when I was I was in high school and we all three had the same pair of shoes in the same size and color!

Knowing this, we decided to all shop for dresses together so that they wouldn’t accidentally end up in the same dress at our wedding!

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Four years ago today I was a single college student in South Dakota. I had just joined a cycling team. I had been riding a bike my whole life, but had never competed. I was relieved/nervous that the first event of the season was an indoor “race” the team participated in for a local charity.

I was relieved because it was on stationary bikes so I knew I wouldn’t get dropped. I was also relieved because it was Singles Awareness Day (AKA Valentine’s Day). I was glad to be doing something besides sitting alone and feeling sorry for myself. (Leslie Knope had not yet invented “Galentine’s Day.”) I was nervous because I had never met any of these people in my life and I didn’t know if I would be fast enough to “keep up.”

If I had know I was about to meet my future husband, you can bet I would have been a lot more nervous! While neither of us claims love at first sight, for me it was at least interest at first sight. After each of us had ridden our “leg” of the race we all went to Pizza Ranch for lunch. (If you have never been to or seen a Pizza Ranch, it is an ideal location for calorie replacement and people watching.)

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Hive, forgive me, this may be a bit of a rant. Really, it is more of an open letter to people who may witness a bride-to-be eating. I know that weight and weight loss are very personal subjects, and I acknowledge that others may enjoy a bit of outside motivation. However this is my experience and I feel I need to share it with you.

I thought that an upcoming wedding would be a big motivator to be in the best shape ever, but honestly it has had the opposite effect. And really, that makes sense, because when I was in my best shape ever, I was spending 20-30 hours a week training, and was laser-focused on competition. These days, not so much. However, all my clothes still fit and I don’t feel horrible so I have had a hard time seeing a “problem.”

Well, I must have missed the memo that all brides are fitness-crazed, calorie counting, and worried about the fit of their dresses. Lucky for me, a few months into my engagement this was pointed out to me. The kicker? It was pointed out by an acquaintance! Someone I knew, kinda, but in any other situation would be totally inappropriate for her to comment on my weight or size. We were talking about getting ice cream (or was it doughnuts?) with a group and she looked at me and said,

“But you have a wedding dress to fit into!”
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So, currently we have less than 70 days to go until “the big show,” and I am starting to feel the time crunch. After hearing over and over again not to put off projects until the last minute, I am starting to take that a bit too seriously because I can see the “last minutes” coming closer and closer.

This weekend, for example, Mr. Aardvark went out on a bike ride (outside in Wisconsin!) because it was so nice out! I could have joined him, but instead I finished the flower girl/ring bearer gifts. Chances are I would have gotten them done if I had ridden, but I REALLY wanted to check them off of my ever-growing craft list. (Post on those to come.)

On Sunday, as we were getting ready to watch a Packer-less Super Bowl (AKA a few hours of great ads), I was working on boutonnieres, but what I really wanted to do was make soft pretzels. Why? Because I have convinced myself that if I don’t do it NOW, it won’t happen.

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If you recall, waaaaay back in October, my five best ladies all got together to go dress shopping. I had it in my head that, since each girl got to pick her own dress, it would be easy peasy. The only request I made was that the dresses be navy and somewhere between floor-length and “whore” length (aka anything from tea to knee).

I imagined, before this trip, that everyone would find their dress and we would take a group shot. Well, only one-and-a-half dresses were found (and no, no one found just a skirt). Bridesmaid OT found her dress and Bridesmaid Sis tried on a dress that we ended up ordering from House of Brides. Everyone else left empty-handed. No group shot for me.

However, as the weeks went by, one by one I would get a cell phone picture of one of my bridesmaids in a dress she had found. Until last week, I got the last one, my sister’s dress had finally (it was not actually late as they told me it would ship in January but still…) arrived!

It was off to Photoshop to create that group picture I had been dreaming of!

From Left to Right: MOH MD, Red, Sis, OT, and Flossy*

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So wayyyyy back when I first got it in my head that we I wanted to DIY our invitations, I figured it would be cheaper than buying them. I knew it would take LOTS of man-hours but I figured the end result would be pretty inexpensive. Well, I was wrong. I was also right. You see, we ended up spending WAY more than I thought but significantly less than we would have for similar purchased invitations.

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First: I apologize for my weak attempt at a punny title.

Second: We have our wedding bands! And I could not be happier. However, it took me a while to get to that point. It is not a very long story, or even that traumatic, but let’s start and the beginning.

Months and months ago we started shopping for rings. Our first stop was TQ Diamonds, the same place Mr. Aardvark purchased my engagement band. I went in knowing I wanted something without bling that could be worn alone or with my engagement band. I didn’t want anything too delicate and if at all possible, I wanted to coordinate with Mr. Aardvark.

After a little poking around we found these:

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I have loved the idea of incorporating flags into a grand exit for a while. They are so cute and playful, and pretty in photos. On top of that, we wanted our “big exit” to be from the church instead of the reception.  It’ll be daytime, so we nixed the idea of sparklers. Furthermore, our church does not allow rice, birdseed, or bio-confetti to be tossed because it would end up all over the city sidewalk (and I guess the city doesn’t like that?). Flags seemed like the perfect solution. But what would the flags say?

Image by Kate Hayes at L Photographie

Early in our engagement, MOH MD commented on the fact that I included the word “yay” in every one of my  twice(ish) daily  e-mails.

[I should note that blogging has really helped cut down on the wedding spam to my bridal party.They thank you.]

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Hive, I know I dragged this out. I know, I teased you about the invitations in several posts. But the wait is over! I would like to invite you to, not only view our invites, but see just how they came to be (bee?)!

[Note, if you want to skip all the romance and get right to the main event, the invite pictures are at the bottom!]

First things first, I would like to give a big shout out to PaperSource, Staples, and Vistaprint. These were the three main vendors we used to put together our invitation suite. All of the unprinted paper came from PaperSource. I found their quality nice, their prices reasonable, and their colors fantastic. The little beige inserts came from Staples. They were fast, cheap and easy. I would not recommend them if you are a stickler for perfection, but if you are a stickler for getting it done adequately, I would say go for it! And last, but not least, I tweaked our save the date design to make our RSVP and had them printed “for free” at Vistaprint.

I used illustrator to lay out all of the text onto 8.5×11 paper in a way that it could be cut into four, with each text block making a square. I really wish I had Miss Eagle’s tutorial beforehand, but after a lot of trial and error I managed to get it pretty square. I then sent the files off to Staples to be printed and cut into fours. The fact that they cut everything was nice because it saved me some time, but not that much time in the end, because each invitation had to be trimmed square afterwards.

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Yesterday, like all days I went to the mailbox when I got home from work. Little did I realize what excitement awaited inside! That’s right, not just bills and junk mail for me. And not just one, but two VERY excited bits-o-mail.

Yes, our very first RSVP came back! And I have to say, Mr. Aardvark’s aunty won the race on that one! I am pretty sure everyone (or almost everyone) has gotten their invites by now so (since we are already getting RSVPs and all) I should be able to finally reveal them this week!
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So a few months ago, we did our Pre-Cana classes through the Church. It was loads of fun and I really enjoyed the conversations it inspired. We even got a little certificate that showed we took the course.

This, however, was not the end of our Catholic marriage prep. We also had to complete a FOCCUS inventory and review it with another couple from our church. Well, we are halfway there because we both finished our surveys. We had to do it individually and without input from the other and then discuss together. In a few weeks we will get an appointment to view our results with another couple. I am really looking forward to that part.

I was a bit nervous about the questionnaire at the beginning because it came right out and asked if we were cohabiting. And the answer was yes. I was a bit nervous that the whole thing would be very preachy. But really, it wasn’t, most of the questions were simple ’agree’ ’disagree’ or ’uncertain’ multiple choice and covered family, finances and faith. There were a few questions about child rearing here and there but over all it was pretty low-key.
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Any minute now someone will be opening their mailbox, (not their e-mail box either, their real live mail box) and they will see this:

Of course the stamps will be canceled and the address won’t be blurred out (I hope!).

In case you cannot tell, this is a super-secret-bees-only-sneak-peak at our invitations—full pictures and how-to coming soon!
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Bridesmaid Sis, AKA Little Sister Aardvark, will most likely kill me for this post. But what are big sisters for if not to antagonize/love/guide/learn from their little sisters.

The first thing you should know is that I am 11 years older than BM Sis. Technically we are half siblings, but the technical business doesn’t mean much to us. In my big complicated family we are siblings. Period.

Growing up in a house with a baby, right as I was hitting the difficult-anyway pre-teen years, did a lot to develop my patience, my people skills, and my ability to sleep through anything. I will forever be grateful to my siblings for that.

How could being 11–14 be easy with a haircut like that?

The above picture includes me, my sister, Step-mama Aardvark, and my brother. The strangest part about this photo for me is that Sis is about as old now as I was when it was taken. I remember how it was being right in between grownup and kid, and sort of jerking back and forth between the two. I loved both of my siblings but was convinced they would be eating/napping poop machines with the occasional cute moment forever.

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