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I’m all about making it easy—so what are the guys going to wear? No idea. That’s Mr. Eggs Bene’s decision. I mean, I get to choose what the girls are going to wear; why shouldn’t Mr. Eggs make the decision for the boys?
Of course, I do have some ideas…mainly that I really love the look of gray suits, and just as I love the look of bridesmaids with different dresses, I’m really liking the idea of the guys each wearing whatever gray suit they might have already (or feel like purchasing). Mr. Eggs wants to get a new suit, so at some point we’ll go shopping for that. It’s helpful that Mr. Eggs Bene has stated pretty clearly that he has no interest in a tux. Which is excellent because I don’t really think that “tux” goes with “wedding in the woods in the middle of February.”
I’m not sure exactly what he wants, but here are some looks that I love.
After trying on the amazing mermaid-shaped dress, there was one other dress that the consultant had pulled. Or maybe my friend grabbed it. I don’t remember. What I do remember is that it was strapless, and I was pretty sure I didn’t want a strapless dress. But, given how well the mermaid dress had gone over, I had to try it.
And when I walked out, I looked at myself in the mirror and was amazed at how much I liked it. And unlike the mermaid dress, I felt like me in this dress. This dress that was chiffon and strapless and so unlike what I thought I would end up in. This dress was 3517 from the Justin Alexander Sincerity line. I loved the way the ruching pulled in my waist. I loved the ivory color that would go beautifully with my mom’s veil. I loved the way it moved when I walked. But, it was still a strapless gown. And I wasn’t convinced.
I have to admit, I was kind of dreading shopping for a dress. To be honest, I’m not really happy with the way that I look right now (though I am finally doing something to change that), and I was afraid that every store I walked into would only have size 8 sample gowns and I would look like a moron who couldn’t get them over my hips. Luckily, that was not the case at all—at least not at most of the places that I went to. (However, apparently I managed to go to the three stores that are super picky about photos, so I have no pictures of me trying on dresses, except for some randomly snapped iPhone pictures that my best friend took which I don’t have and which I’m telling her to delete!).
The first place I went was a tiny little place up in Seattle. And frankly, it wasn’t that great. It was small, I wasn’t super impressed with the selection of dresses, and the consultant who was helping me spent more time paying attention to her daughter than to me (though I think my best friend and bridesmaid extraordinaire had fun playing with the little girl while they were waiting for me to try on dresses. Which is hard when you’re by yourself and the consultant forgets to come in and help you). But, my mom got to be there for the first “trying on of the dress” experience, so I’m really glad for that. But needless to say, we did not find my dress at that store.
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I’ve mentioned before that our venue is a pretty special place. One of the biggest things that appealed to me about IslandWood is the fact that they have four lodges on the property, so most of our family and friends who can come for the weekend can all stay in the same place. That means we’ll eat all of our meals together, we can go hiking around the woods together, we can run from lodge to lodge darting through the raindrops together…
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I got asked the question today. You know the question. It’s the question that every engaged woman gets asked, usually more than once. And I’ve found that no matter what the answer is, whoever’s doing the asking always has to comment on the answer. The question, of course, is: are you changing your name?
First, I have to say that I love that this is a question that is now asked, rather than an assumption that is made. At least in my circle of friends and family, no one is assuming that I’m changing my name. But, whatever the answer is, the questioner still comments. Oh, you’re changing your name? Doesn’t that mean you’ll lose your identity? Or, huh, you aren’t going to change your name? Doesn’t that mean you won’t really be a family? Now, I haven’t actually gotten either of those responses directly, but that seems to be the gist of the two types of responses.
When I was growing up, it was never a question for me—of course I’d take my future husband’s name.
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Does anyone else think that our generation of moms may have gotten the shaft when it comes to weddings? Don’t get me wrong—overall, my mom has been fantastic during this whole process (only one set of tears on my part so far, and that was due to not being able to communicate—we’re working on that!), but there’s something that I didn’t realize about my mom and weddings. She never really got to plan hers.
I had no idea about this until I was talking to her one day, and she mentioned how once she and my dad decided to get married, her mom pretty much took over. Booked the church, booked the country club, invited all the guests. My mom wore the same dress that her sisters had worn, the same mantilla veil that had been passed down in her family (that I get to wear, too!). I think she picked out her bridesmaids and what they were going to wear, so she probably also had some input on color scheme…but overall, she didn’t really get to plan her wedding. So how’s that fair?
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Create the honeymoon of your dreams.
My current idea for my girls’ dresses is to have them all pick a black dress and call it good. Why? Well, for two reasons really. One, because I’ve been in several weddings and have only actually worn one of the dresses again. Which one was that? The black dress.
Now, that black dress was for a wedding where we all had the same black dress, and it was one that was purchased specifically for the wedding. But, I still managed to wear it again (at least twice, maybe more). Also, this is an excellent way for someone with a tighter budget to be able to wear something they have in their closet (or borrow from someone else); or if they want to splurge on something new, then they can! Win-win-win!
And two? I heart pictures like this:
We still haven’t decided exactly what we are going to do for the girls’ dresses yet. I have several ideas, but one thing I knew I wanted to do was to create jewelry for them to wear. (Mainly because I love the idea of making something for my wonderful friends, and also if they end up hating it, it wasn’t something super expensive that they’ll never wear again!)
So I spent some time on Etsy* and bought some blue beads, and black beads, and green beads,
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As I mentioned in my last post, we’re having our wedding at IslandWood. I’m so excited about this for the simple reason that for everyone who can come, they will be invited to celebrate with us all weekend—from Friday night through the welcome brunch on Sunday. And even better—there are so many things to do around IslandWood that we don’t even have to entertain them the whole time! They can entertain each other! We will have some things that people can choose to do on Saturday before the wedding, or they can just take off and explore on their own (or visit the rest of the island if they so choose).
IslandWood was originally built to be an educational center for grade-school children to learn about environmental issues, but it has become so much more than that, including a home for classes for the Bainbridge Graduate Institute. There are four lodges where people can stay that are all located on the property. Additionally, all meals for the weekend will be eaten in the dining hall (including our wedding dinner cooked with local and sustainable ingredients by the chefs!).
Did anyone else have a long, hard search to find that perfect venue, only to discover that it was right in front of you the whole time? Or was that just me?
See—we’ve known from the get-go that we wanted to get married in Seattle. Or at least I’ve known that. (Luckily Mr. Eggs was perfectly happy with that plan and said sure!)
So, we decided to start looking in Seattle.
Normally, there wouldn’t be a question of geography with that statement other than “where in Seattle do we want to look.” All the while I was assuming we were all talking about the large city located in King County, Washington. Except that normal isn’t me, my life, or wedding planning. The hitch in all of this comes from the fact that I grew up, and my parents still live, on an island in the Puget Sound, west of Seattle. So therefore, when I talk about “Seattle,” that generally encompasses Seattle and the Island. And again, that’s normally not a bad thing, until my mom and I figured out that when I said “Seattle” I actually meant the city, while when my mom heard “Seattle,” she was picturing the Island or perhaps somewhere on the peninsula. Whoops. Lesson number one in communication learned.
Our photographer search was so easy, it’s almost unfair. Awhile back when Kat (AKA Mrs. Cherry Pie) was starting her photography business, I won a free engagement session with her and Justin (AKA Mr. Cherry Pie). This was great for me because I’m pretty sure that this was on Mr. EB’s list of “things one doesn’t really need,” but because it was free he couldn’t really say no. And of course, Kat and Justin were beyond fabulous and took some amazing photos. It was a super easy decision after we saw the pictures to book them for our wedding—especially because they’re going to be photographing our Friday-night welcome dinner as well!
We had such a great time with Kat and Justin taking our engagement photos. It was a super windy day (resulting in lots of random hair pictures), but it didn’t rain! Which is pretty amazing, especially given the weather that the Northwest was experiencing at the time, namely 50-degree days and lots of rain (and a little hail every so often). Makes me remember that no matter when one plans a wedding in this part of the country, there’s always a decent chance for rain!
We started the day at Pike Place Market before we took the ferry over to the Island to take some more pictures in a park and at my parents’ house (with Cody!). Mr. EB and I had a lot of fun—though I felt really uncomfortable at times being in front of the camera. Luckily, it was really only for the first bit that I felt weird, and then all of a sudden it felt totally normal to have two cameras in our faces! Is that how it’s going to feel on our wedding day, too?
I wasn’t sure—I really wasn’t. The last time I remember sewing anything it was some ridiculous pillow thing that I made on my mom’s sewing machine with leftover scrap fabric she had from making quilts for my sister and me. Yeah—my mom makes quilts, I play with leftover scraps. It’s fun!
BUT—I really wanted to give it a try, specifically because I really wanted to make part of the gifts that I plan to give to my girls. (So girls, if y’all are reading any of this, well, feel free to keep reading, but just know that you’re likely to see something similar to one or both of these projects prior to the wedding!)
Now that that’s out of the way—let me show you what I made. (And we’ll just keep quiet about how long it took me to make these, m’kay? Thanks!)
The first project I took on was this clutch that Mrs. Peep Toe blogged about here. Now, first off, I should note that I’ve had my sewing machine since I was in college. And I graduated from college in 2004. And I had yet to ever take it out of the box. It was still sealed and everything. Oops. And yes, I have lived in multiple places and carted this thing around with me the whole time. Anyway. Finally decided it was time to break it out. I don’t have tutorials here because I’m linking to the tutorials that I used (and also because I didn’t want photographic evidence if I messed it up royally). But I’ll take pictures of the process next time, I promise! (And all of these photos are taken by moi. I’m working on getting better with my d5000—I love the camera, but need to play with it more!)
And I thought it turned out pretty well:
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Or at least one ring to make me very happy! (Yes, I know the title’s overdone. And yes, I’m completely OK with that.)
I love my ring—it’s so perfectly me, it’s ridiculous. We hadn’t talked much about rings before Mr. Eggs proposed, but I had made it clear that I’m not a yellow gold person. A lot of people I know have princess cut diamonds, and I always thought that was what I wanted one day for myself.
That was until Mr. Eggs started asking me more questions and I realized that my ideal engagement ring has always been my mom’s. My mom has a yellow gold ring with a beautiful round cut center diamond. She now has a 3 stone ring which she got several years ago (she always says the 3 stones represent her three children - awww!). But before she added two stones to the ring (and how I remember seeing the ring growing up), it was a round cut solitaire engagement ring. I’m so glad that Eggs asked me more questions about what I wanted, because I love that my ring is so similar to my mom’s (except that it’s platinum instead of yellow gold).
Photos by Persimmon Images
The last part of this story that cracks me up?
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I still can’t believe that Mr. Eggs Benedict pulled off such an amazing surprise. Well, I can believe it, because I had NO idea that he was going to propose when he did. I thought it was going to be months before he asked, and I had reached the point where I was actually completely OK with it. (I’d had hopes earlier on in the summer during our second trip to Hawaii together that that might be the time, but he didn’t want to do it then. Remember how I said we don’t like being hot and sweaty? That factored in to when he wanted to propose—hence waiting until December.)
Mr. Eggs and I moved in together after he graduated from law school. I had graduated the year earlier and had been living in Portland for a year at that point. About a month prior to his graduation, I moved into the apartment and then he moved in in May. Anyway! The point of all that is that sometime at the beginning of November I started telling Mr. Eggs that I wanted to get a Christmas tree. I’ve never had my own Christmas tree before, and it turns out Mr. Eggs had never had one of his own, either. I’ve been in school for what feels like forever, so now that Mr. Eggs and I were living together and starting our family together, I really wanted to start our traditions together! And one of those traditions I was determined to start would be cutting down our own Christmas tree together.
Of course, that turned into a slightly bigger ordeal than I was first anticipating. See, since neither of us had ever gotten a tree before, we didn’t have a stand, or lights, or decorations. And do you have any idea how hard it is to find a tree stand the first week of December? Yeah, neither did I. So we had to go to three stores to get a stand, some lights, and a few ornaments. By this time, I was getting a bit, um, cranky. So—refuel with a latte and head out to the Christmas tree farm!
Because when I say I wanted a Christmas tree, I mean going and cutting one down ourselves. My family’s been going to the same Christmas tree farm for years, and there’s just something way more satisfying about cutting down your own than just picking one up in a parking lot.
(Two puns in one title? Yeah, I couldn’t resist.)
I’m a BEE!!! That was all I could think when I opened Mrs. Penguin’s email welcoming me to the hive. Not at all original, I’m aware. Though, as my sister reminded me when we were discussing invitation ideas, unless I want to attach a scroll to a dove and release each one in a recipient’s front yard, any idea I have has probably already been done before somewhere.
In any event, Mr. Eggs Benedict (hereinafter Mr. Eggs, Mr. Bene or some variation of the same) may or may not have gotten an earful as soon as I emailed and called him to tell him the good news. Even more serendipitous, I think, I was spending the day with my mom and sister finishing up our invites when my phone buzzed with the email.
So, who are the Eggs Benedicts who are crazy enough to get married in the Northwest in the dead of winter?
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Mrs. Eggs Benedict, Seattle Age and Occupation: 29, Attorney Fiance's Age and Occupation: 35, Attorney Engagement Date: December 5, 2009 Wedding Date: February 2011 Venue: IslandWood About Me: I'm a Northwest girl who spends my time goofing around with Mr. Eggs Benedict and our dog, hiking, traveling, drinking wine and planning a wedding that will showcase the best of what the Pacific Northwest has to offer. I also love photography, beating Mr. Eggs Bene at Mario Kart, and watching the most ridiculous natural disaster flicks you can think of (seriously, how can you deny the awesomeness that is The Core or 2012?? That's right, you can't). We are planning our weekend wedding adventure at an environmental educational center, and I can't wait for the fun to begin!
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