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I already have lots of anxiety about, well, everything. When I was in high school, I had nightmares that I would either not show up, or forget my pencils on SAT test day. In college, I can clearly remember a recurring dream I had every night on the week leading up to a Model United Nations competition. My squad would show up, but either we forgot to register, forgot to wear our uniforms, or we would be representing a country that was completely made-up. What? Munchkin Land is not a real country? Rats…
When you read the title, did that song totally pop into your head? HaHa. The Sound of Music is one of my favorite things. Actually, I have a lot of favorite things. They range from reading a great chick-lit novel (Anything from Emily Griffin or Lauren Weisberger is fine by me!) to my TiVo - which captures Jon and Kate Plus 8 and Office re-runs all week! Mr. Dumpling shares my love of The Office, Thai food, reality shows and sleeping late. We’re a good match!
When we thought of what kind of wedding we wanted, we knew it had to be uber personalized. I wanted Mr. Dumpling’s family members that I hadn’t met before to walk away feeling like they knew a little something about me and vice versa for my family and Mr. Dumpling. The first thing that I knew I wanted to personalize was our music. Namely, the song I would walk down the aisle to.
Heres my short list of aisle songs:
1. Here Comes the Sun, The Beatles
2. Here, There and Everywhere, The Beatles
3. Something, The Beatles (accoustic instrumental version)
4. God Only Knows, The Beach Boys
5. To Make You Feel My Love, Garth Brooks
Haven’t we all be in a wedding where we’ve had to wear a hideous dress? And by hideous, I mean not only was the dress ugly, but it was an awkward length, and it probably cost somewhere around $300. Well, I don’t know about you, but I don’t like wasting money. Especially not on a lime green dress with a pink sash and orange tulle underneath (don’t forget the matching flip-flops and straw hat!), nor on a dress with shoulder pads that went out of style during the Brenda & Brandon years (90210, holla!). Whatever the bride told you, you absolutely, positively wouldn’t have worn such a dress again. It would have been so obvious to everyone around you that you were wearing a recycled bridesmaid dress!
Check these out. Tell me these aren’t hilarious!
From Ugly Bridesmaid Dresses, where people freely submit their own pictures.
Embarrassing stories are the best, right? Back when I was a tiny 7th grade dumpling, I met my MOH, R. If anyone knows what it’s like to be the new girl in class, it’s her. She moved to Alabama from Canada and had the strangest accent I’d ever heard. Mrs. Austin sat her right behind me, and 12 years later we are still acting like junior high schoolers. Here’s a synopsis of our first conversation:
Me: Hi, I’m Miss Dumpling. Where did you move here from?
R: Hi, Im R. I just moved here from Canada.
Me: OOOHHH Neat! Do you speak Canadian?**
R: Are you serious? (She realized I was serious.) Oh, ok. Yes. I speak Canadian. (Rolls her eyes)
Me: Sweet! Say something in Canadian. Umm, say “The dog is sleeping.”
R: Wow. That’s a tough one. “The. Dog. Is. Sleeping.” “Eh.”
Read more…
Featured on Weddingbee
Unique Wedding Favors
“Add a memorable touch to your wedding with unique favors that match your theme.”
Part 1
Part 2
The Vera Wang that Almost Was…
So, you’ve seen the dresses I liked, disliked, and the one I let slip away. Now, lets move on to the fun part!
Mr. Dumpling: do not read any further.
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When we got engaged, I remember thinking to myself, “How can a dress possibly cost $5000?” But then, I flipped through the pages of In Style Weddings and Modern Bride, and I quickly got schooled.
One day, while searching for gowns online, I found an incredible Vera Wang dress that I loved, and immediately went to a bridal salon to try it on. I just wanted to know what it felt like to put it on! It hit me in all the right places and made me feel pretty, but unfortunately, it was out of my price range.
Imagine my delight (read: an ecstatic, frantic OMG moment) when I saw my dream dress for 1/3 of the price at a sample sale in San Francisco! It was still more than I had planned to spend, but I hardly ever spend money on myself. It felt nice knowing that because it was heavily discounted, that I might be able to buy it. I also felt like a bride in it, which was something not one single dress had done for me before that day. That dress just did something to me.
Here she is, with a champagne colored sash that I added.
Create the honeymoon of your dreams.
I have to say, trying on wedding dresses is the most fun thing ever! I was one of those brides that would try on any dress that the consultant suggested. I felt that she knew best and had seen what looks good and what looks bad on most body types, so I completely trusted her. I can’t say that she got it right every time, but at least we had fun.
This one is from Anne Barge, one of my favorite designers. I like it, but I’m not sure if I can rock the deep V-neck… without… ahem… help in the cleavage area.
Our wedding is in March, and it’s a beautiful time of year in Vegas. It’s typically about 65 degrees, a bit breezy, and nearly every day is sunny. Vegas is known for its sunshine and lack of rain. Seriously, I think I’ve seen rain only a handful of times this year! So, needless to say, the weather will be delightful on our big day (knock on wood).
However, since our wedding is towards the end of March, it falls right in the middle of Lent. Lent is the 40 days before Easter (not counting Sundays), beginning on Ash Wednesday. It’s a time for fasting for some, and giving up a “vice” for others. If you want to learn more, you can read about Lent here. Because of Lent, we can’t have any flowers decorating the church. According to the church, flowers are a sign of celebration, and having them would not be appropriate. From what I’ve read on the Internet, all parishes are different. But, ours told us that we’re not allowed to have any floral decorations besides our bouquets (Phew! That would have been tough!). We will, of course, respect their policies. As a side note, Mr. Dumpling is Catholic, and I’m in the process of converting.
For now, I will just dream of these altar decorations:
From The Singing Rabbi
Hello hive! I’d been waiting for my BFF/MOH to get her Gocco’d gift in the mail before I embarked on this post. She’s getting married in Canada next weekend and I couldn’t be more excited for her! I wanted to show her how happy I was to be part of her special day, so I decided to make her some stationery with her brand new last name. I love stationery, and I personally think that letter writing should be brought back in style. It seems like we can get so caught up in technology these days. Sure, emailing or text messaging is faster, but I love the personalized and thoughtful gesture of letter writing. It makes me happy!
So, I’ll move on to the project.
First off, please don’t get excited. I don’t have the Gocco skills of the Bees who Goccoed before me or any of the Etsy sellers out there. I’m just an overeager bride-to-be who always completely overestimates her level of craftiness. But, hey—I try! Before I got started, I literally stalked any blog or website that had a tutorial or an FAQ, especially this video from Paper Source.
This is the tidy craft table before the project.
Read more…
It never occurred to me in my teens that I needed to take care of my face. Sun spots from the sun? Yes. But for the most part, I was relatively acne free and I didn’t exactly have dry or oily skin. Fast forward to now when all I think about when I look in the mirror is how badly I wish I could reverse all the years of lying in the sun without SPF 80 or wishing I wasn’t a “popper.” Ha.
Since our wedding is less than 7 months away, I’ve really been trying to pay attention to my skin. After all, I’m going to be photographed in all kinds of angles, different lighting, etc., and I don’t want to feel self-conscious on our big day. In addition, we want to go some place warm/tropical for our honeymoon, and I don’t want to wear foundation/cover-up while I’m on the beach. It’s not a good look.
I’d show you my face sans make-up, but it’s not cute. And I’m shy and I’m afraid you’ll make fun. But, maybe this visual will help: think of super pale skin. Add some redness and dryness around the cheekbones. Throw in some whopping under-skin blemishes and some scars from 10 years of picking at my face…. and that’s me.
I absolutely adore cake, and I would eat it for every meal if I could (shh! Don’t tell the South Beach Diet people!), but we won’t be having one at our wedding. Sigh.
When we first started looking at wedding cakes, I got so excited thinking about all of the possibilities out there. Chocolate raspberry? Yes! Carrot Cake? Mmm hmm! A different flavor for every tier? Okay! We even found a baker we liked, so we sent her a picture of our dream cake, along with our budget, and she responded that it was all definitely doable. So, we had a cake tasting and we were thrilled! The cakes were delicious!
Here’s the dream cake photo we showed the baker. Photo from The Knot.
Early on in my engagement, I must have tried on at least 30 dresses. Needless to say, there will be lots of dress shopping posts. I went to local bridal boutiques, Glamour Closet - a sample sale store in San Francisco, and shopped online at places like Bride Power, Pre-owned Weddings Dresses, Dream Bridal LA and Bella Rosa Bridal. If you haven’t noticed, I like a good bargain. Seriously, my next post should be “How to get the couture dress you want without taking out a loan.” Or you can just read Miss Haute Cocoa’s fabulous post here.
I wanted something timeless, simple and elegant. I knew I definitely wanted something strapless without too much detail, but I also love big princess ball gowns.
There is a bridal shop about a mile from my office, so one day during lunch I popped in to look around. I brought my camera with me, but it’s from the 1990’s and only some of the images ended up on my card. I’m getting a new one soon. I promise!
Anywho, here’s what I found:
Read more…
Well let’s just dive right into it, shall we?
Mr. Dumpling and I have been together for a long time, y’all. I tend to ramble, so the short version is that we did the long distance thing for a while, then I made the big move to Las Vegas so we could be together.
Fast-forward to almost two years later and there we were, happily living together and very much in love. We talked about getting married a few times but I never pressed it. Things were great the way they were and I was happy.
Ha! Who was I kidding? I wanted to marry Mr. Dumpling from the moment I saw him. I was really just trying to play it cool.
Anyway, one night after work I came home, completely exhausted.
Ohmigoodness. Say WHAT?! Oh, SNAP! Now I know what all of the other Bees meant when they said they were totally geeking out over their Weddingbee acceptance email! Although, I think I took it to a whole new level yesterday afternoon when I got mine! Mind you, I’m already a huge dork as it is. Or so I’ve been told.
Hiya Everyone! I am Miss Dumpling and I am so honored and thrilled to be part of the hive! It’s a bit ironic that I chose “Dumpling,” considering the first time I went to dim sum I wanted to run out of there like it was nobody’s business! You see, I grew up in a small town in Alabama and we didn’t have a huge selection of restaurants. I also have five brothers and sisters, and growing up we almost never had the luxury of eating outside of the home. My mom was a great cook and we couldn’t afford it anyway. Mr. Dumpling, however, is Chinese and Filipino and grew up experiencing and appreciating all types of cuisines in California. When he first took me to Harbor Palace in Chinatown Las Vegas, it pretty much went like this:
“What’s that in the wall? A big tank filled with giant crab that I have to pick out and eat? And, uh, why are they rolling those little carts around? This sweet and sour chicken doesn’t taste at all like Panda from the mall!”
But, eventually turned into this:
Read more…
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Mrs. Dumpling, Las Vegas Age and Occupation: 27, Finance Fiance's Age and Occupation: 34, Real Estate Engagement Date: March, 2008 Wedding Date: March, 2009 Blogging Since: August 26, 2008 Venue: Catholic church ceremony & golf course reception About Me: I grew up in the Deep South, and while most people say I have a thick southern accent, I tend to think it only comes out when I need to use it. Living in Las Vegas has definitely been an adventure and Mr. Dumpling and I are loving every minute of it! We are planning a traditional Catholic wedding ceremony and a reception with lots of DIY! We might even get Elvis to show up! I'm a HUGE Beatles fan, love The Office and can't wait to become a Mrs.!
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