Weddingbee Blog

I have been on a more or less self-induced hiatus, however, I am back and hopefully will remain more of a presence around here until the big day rolls around. We also have really gotten a lot done. This week we even ordered our invitations (finally!).

I want to back up a little to the idea of bridesmaids dresses though. As far as our wedding party goes, we’re not having anything out of the ordinary. I know bridesmen and best women are becoming more and more popular these days, but we’re rather generic when it comes to this stuff. However, we have decided to forgo some of the common titles for our bridal party. I prefer to lump them all up as the Chickadees’ Circle of Love. Mr. Chickadee on the other hand refers to them as our “posse.” Either way, come June we’re going to stand at that aisle surrounded by some of our favorite people in the world. But what they’d be wearing? Well that was a whole other issue.
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Although I have not technically chosen my invitations (the Chickadees are still in negotiations) a new problem has cropped up that I want to bounce off the Weddingbee hive.

We are currently house-hunting. We have not technically chosen the house either (hmmm, notice a trend here? Yes, we are indecisive) but we are getting close to a decision. So as it stands now, we are hoping to have a new address in the near-ish future. We’re a little shaky on the timing as well, though.

All this boils down to the fact that I have absolutely no idea what return address/RSVP address I ought to get printed on our invites. I don’t want to put our apartment address because we might not be living here when the invitations get sent out & returned to us. However, I’m not sure we’ll have a new address by the time we have to order invitations either.

I know it used to be traditional to have RSVPs returned to the bride’s parents, but it just doesn’t seem practical, especially when my parents live in Dallas and I… don’t. And I would sort of like to see them before the wedding and after next weekend I don’t think they’ll be up to Illinois again.
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Word to the wise: Do not order samples from your favorite invitation company when you don’t actually have the money to order them… unless you want to end up like me.

See, it all started when Mrs. Bee posted about the gorgeous invitations over at Kenzie Kate. Being a big fan of something old, something new, I had seen the website before. But Mrs. Bee’s post happened to coincide with my recent decision not to make my own invitations, so I checked it out again.

I was playing around on the site, admiring the beautiful designs when I came across the The Palm Springs design. Needless to say, it was love at first sight.

So I thought I would order a sample. It was inexpensive and so easy. How could a girl resist? I’d almost forgotten I’d ordered them until I found the package in my mailbox today. And boy oh boy was I in for a treat.

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I thought my days of lounging around the house while it snowed buckets outside were over upon graduating high school…

but surprise! SNOW DAY!

Unfortunately, Mr. Chickadee is not so lucky… so while he’s working hard I’m spending the day doing productive things… you know, like walking around in my wedding shoes and veil. Breaking in my shoes, pretending to be America’s Next Top Model, same thing, right? Right.

As you may remember, I’m the bee suffering from veil-a-phobia, so the fact that I was wandering through a bridal shop, fell in love with a veil (that actually looked right on my head!) and took it home with me that day is a little bit surprising. But I guess when you know, you just know.

My veil’s short and perky (just like me!) and I think it’ll add a lovely bit of whimsy to my wedding day ensemble.

My veil on the day I bought it… and me today, in my lazy snow day mode (right).

The stock image of my shoes from zappos.com (left) and my actual shoes in white (right).

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Hi, my name’s Miss Chickadee and I’m a wedding procrastinator.

I’m proud to announce that it’s been almost an entire week and a half since my first (and hopefully last) major wedding breakdown, which was followed almost immediately by a wedding intervention courtesy of Big Sis & Mama Chickadee. Needless to say, it was an intervention worthy of Dr. Phil himself, complete with motivational speeches, list-making, and more than a few tears.

The good news is, I am a reformed Chickadee and the proud possessor of 100 COMPLETELY FINISHED Save the Dates. I also managed to check many many other things off my to-do list… including a few toughies like choosing a veil, shoes, and bridesmaid dresses!

Today though, is going to be completely devoted to my Save the Dates. I know what you may be thinking, though, “didn’t we already get a post about this?” Um, yes. Good memory. You’re right, I did already write about them… but they’ve changed. What can I say, it’s a woman’s prerogative to change her mind.

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Like so many others these days, I’ve been a very busy bee. In addition to the usual pre-holiday hubbub, I’ve started a new job and it’s keeping me very busy. I feel like right now I’m also in a bit of a wedding lull. I’ve hired all my vendors, made all the big decisions, and now I’m just waiting to get cracking on all those DIY projects (like those Save the Dates I haven’t worked on since July!).

However, I’ve noticed a lot of bees posting their engagements pictures lately and realized I never posted mine. We ended up getting our pictures done on two different nights since our first attempt happened on a cloudy, rainy night. We got our pictures back soon after and Mr. Chickadee and I love them so much! It was so much fun to get to see our photographer, Mark Romine, in action.

Once we got the proofs back we decided to order a photo guest book of our engagement pictures. Just yesterday Mark e-mailed me to let me know the design was ready for my approval!

You can see the entire guest book design here but I’ll leave you for now with one of my favorite pages!

Photos by Mark Romine. Click to enlarge.

I’ve heard time and time again that a woman doesn’t truly feel like a bride until she dons her veil for the first time. One of the employees of Michelle’s Bridal Shoppe even told me a story about a bride who chose her veil first and planned the rest of her wedding day attire around that. For many brides, the veil is an integral part of her wedding day.

So I’m beginning to think I may have a problem.

The thing is, I fully appreciate a beautiful veil. There’s something really breathtaking about a cathedral length veil skimming the floor as a bride makes her trek down the aisle. It’s just that I don’t really like veils on me.

Some lovely full length veils from Romona Keveza.

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Things I learned from my sister’s wedding: #4

Try to get everything done a few days before the actual wedding. Ok, admittedly this is much easier said than done, but try to schedule all your do-it-yourself projects to finish up well in advance of your big day. That way you won’t be up the night before tying ribbons and folding programs when you should be sleeping.

My sister got married on a Sunday and the Wednesday before, my parents and I showed up at her apartment and helped her finish all the crafty projects, including her favors of Jelly Beans in little bags.

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For all those Central Illinois brides out there (I know there are a few!), this Thursday is the second annual Bridal University in Champaign-Urbana.

This event brings together some of the area’s best vendors (including my photographer!) in an informative session on choosing vendors, making the most of each vendor and his/her services, and answering all those plaguing questions. There’s also a fashion show and creative workshops meant to “put the fun back in wedding planning.”

The event is taking place this Thursday from 6:00 to 9:00 p.m. at Michelle’s Bridal in Urbana

If you’re feeling a little lost in the wedding plans, or need something to add the fun back in, come to Urbana for the night…. or you could always come to meet me!

I’m happy to say that after all my initial trepidation, we have chosen a DJ! Unfortunately, Mr. Chickadee wasn’t able to make it to the first meeting, but his mom and I did sit down with Ben Miller, of Premier Productions, and we were really impressed. We ended chatting for well over the allotted hour, and I was almost late for my engagement pictures!

One thing we discussed at length was what sort of tone I wanted to set at the reception. Ben asked me to identify three adjectives to describe the reception of our dreams. I have to admit, he sort of put me on the spot and with my background in literature and writing, I came up with some pretty lame adjectives. Still, I maintain that I’d like our reception to embody these three things:

1. Fun - I don’t know anyone that doesn’t hope for a “fun” reception. For Mr. Chickadee and I, specifically, we want our reception to be like one great big party! We want our guests to dance the night away, which requires a great DJ like Ben to play some of our favorite tunes.

2. Emotional - In addition to a great party, that day will be the celebration of joining our lives in marriage! I want to feel a wide range of emotions that day - from excited to romantic to nostalgic to absolutely ecstatic. I want my guests to experience those emotions as well.

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I stumbled across this article today, written by Miles Stiverson, and thought I’d see what the hive thinks.According to Stiverson, these are the 10 biggest mistakes guests make at weddings:

1. Not sending RSVPs
2. Sending RSVPs with extra guests
3. Bombarding the bride with phone calls and questions
4. Buying a non-registry gift
5. Showing up late
6. Bringing a big, heavy gift
7. Giving unexpected toasts
8. Requesting songs
9. Drinking too much
10. Crashing your wedding

Would I be a horrible Bee if I admitted to committing one or two of these party fouls? Is it my fault I thought my sister needed a pretty set of Vera Wang toasting flutes for her bridal shower? Can I really be held accountable if I thought the reception was sorely lacking a few Barry Manilow tunes? Should I have been more watchful of Mr. Chickadee’s drinks so he didn’t end up like this at the end of the night?

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I love finding things I forgot I owned!

A couple months ago, Mr. Chickadee and I had his parents over dinner. This, of course, meant we had to spend all day cleaning the apartment. For the first time in a while, all the surfaces of our apartment were cleared of the wedding magazine and half-crafted invitation clutter, revealing my savvy decorating scheme… which is less savvy and more like all the picture frames we’ve been given over the last 4 years. (We are slowly converting pictures of us to pictures of other loved ones, as we realized it’s awkward to put up 50 pictures of just yourselves all over the house).

Almost exactly a year ago Mr. Chickadee and I were in NYC with his parents for a week. In preparation for the theater we’d be seeing, I went out and doubled my fancy dress wardrobe. Mr. Chickadee’s mom picked this particular dress out for me to wear to Wicked, and though I wasn’t in love with it at the time, it’s sort of grown on me. Plus, I found it on major clearance for $14 at Von Maur. This picture is currently framed and gracing our dresser:

(Yes, with all of New York City at our disposal, this is a picture of us inside the darn hotel room!)

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Things I Learned From My Sister’s Wedding: #3

If you’re getting ready at a hotel, your house, or anywhere other than the ceremony location, you might want to invest in a hand steamer. We had a 20 minute ride between the hotel and the church, and when we climbed out of the limo we were all wrinkly. Luckily, my sister had thought ahead and had a steamer waiting for us at the church!

We were able to steam the wrinkles from all four of our bridesmaids’ dresses, my mom’s dress, and even the bride’s dress! If you’re worried about taking a steamer to your own dress, though, at least have one there for the bridesmaids’ dresses. The steamer worked wonders and brought us back up to looking picture perfect!

You can find hand steamers at any of your basic home stores like Bed, Bath & Beyond or Linens n’ Things…or even register for one like my sister and her husband did!

Taking turns steaming each other in the church basement.

What could be better on a rainy Friday than a DIY project!

A few weeks ago I tuned into Martha Stewart’s show and saw Darcy Miller showing off some of her great ideas for weddings. I absolutely fell in love with one of her table settings, which showed up on her blog soon after.

Photo courtesy of Darcy Miller’s blog.

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This afternoon Mr. Chickadee and I are having our second set of engagement pictures taken. We went down to Bloomington a couple weeks ago for a photo session with out photographer, Mark Romine, but the weather just didn’t cooperate. It was cold, overcast, and got dark way too quickly for our 5:30 appointment.

Luckily today is a gorgeous fall day! The plan is to dress up in the same clothes as last time and combine all the best pics into one set of fantastic engagement pictures. But one question is lingering over the whole thing…what are we going to do with these pictures?

Our photographer does offer a great option of creating a guest book out of the pictures, but we just haven’t decided if it’s worth the extra $300. There’s really no place for the pictures in our Save the Dates, either.

So what are you guys doing with your e-pics? Any fantastic suggestions or creative ideas for us?