Miss Spaniel, Los AngelesAge and Occupation: 28, Law StudentFiance's Age and Occupation: 29, PsychologistWedding Date: March 2010Venue: Calamigos RanchAbout Me: I'm a third-year law student trying to balance graduating with starting my career, keeping up a relationship, and, oh yeah, planning an Old World, multi-cultural, "mountain lodge" wedding for 180 guests! A South Asian Jewish girl getting ready to marry my handsome Catholic Dane, I'm hoping to blend our cultures in our wedding just a bit more gently than by providing samosas as appetizers and offering æbleskiver for dessert. (Although that would also be awesome.)
Though I will most likely go with a more traditional western/American style look on my wedding day in the end, I’ve found myself thinking more lately about how I might incorporate Pakistani elements and wondering if maybe a bridal lehenga might be the way to go, after all.
Dusty Gold Aurang shirt and lehenga, $2,000 from Bargello. Purple calla lilies, image from The Knot. Tejani bridal jewelry, image from Maharani. Bridal hair image from Maharani. Brian Atwood gold strappy leather ’Katie’ sandals, $636 from BlueFly.
Miss Trail Mix, New YorkAge and Occupation: 26, PE TeacherFiance's Age and Occupation: 27, MBA StudentEngagement Date: March 2009Wedding Date: June 2010Venue: Tannery Pond at the Darrow SchoolAbout Me: I'm a country girl who somehow found herself living in the Big Apple and loving every minute of it. I'm planning a rustic, country-chic wedding in my hometown in upstate New York and it's going to be a Party with a capital P. White wine, flea markets and running keep me happy and my friends, family and fiance are my world. I'm a little bit crafty, a little bit crazy but mostly just crazy in love.
Remember my organza flower DIY craftiness? I mentioned that I wasn’t 100% sure what I was going to end up using the flowers for. Here’s one idea (inspired by bunting flags!):
Miss Cheeseburger, Baltimore, MD/State College, PAAge and Occupation: 25, Medical StudentFiance's Age and Occupation: 25, Medical StudentEngagement Date: June 28, 2008Wedding Date: March 2010Venue: Catholic Church Ceremony & Hotel ReceptionAbout Me: I'm a passionate girl from Pittsburgh, currently living in Baltimore for school, who loves Penn State, seeing movies, football, thunderstorms, black and white photos, Christmas, good beer, my amazing friends and family, and of course, my mister! We met, fell in love, got engaged, and will be married at our alma mater (go lions!) in a traditional Catholic ceremony followed by a hotel reception with lots of DIY details. It means so much to have our families and friends meet at our favorite place on earth to celebrate our love for one another - I truly couldn't ask for anything more!
Early in planning, I really thought I would be a DIY invitation bride. After DIYing our Save the Dates, however (more to come on that!), I started looking into other options.
That’s when I came across one of my favorite vendors to date - our invitation designer! Her work may look familiar; I’ll try to let you figure it out!
Here’s a little sneak peek (that will hopefully leave you wanting more):
Miss Lamb, NorfolkAge and Occupation: 25, Homeland Security ConsultantFiance's Age and Occupation: 27, Graduate StudentEngagement Date: January 2009Wedding Date: January 2010Venue: Trinity Presbyterian Church/Harrison Opera HouseAbout Me: I’m a Homeland Security Consultant with a tendency towards pulling office pranks, taking lunch breaks, and drinking Wawa shakes. I’m also an English major with a serious obsession with alliteration and rhymes. While I’m not keeping America safe, I’m training for half marathons and the Escape from Alcatraz swim. Or moving for the third time this year. Or baking. Or wedding crafting. Or crying about wedding planning. All the while, I’m getting myself into Lucille Ball-esque scrapes and making Jim Carey-esque faces. Our big fat Czech/Baptist/Jewish/Italian wedding is a combination of vintage eclectic, DIY, and little spoonful of sugar from our Event Coordinator. It’s going to be a Norfolk flavored wedding with the verve of an only-daughter-blow-out bash!
After drooling over some gorgeous vintage inspired engagement shoots, I knew that I had to incorporate some vintage styled clothing into a few of the Lamba-bop-shoo-bop’s e-shoot pics. I combed through Etsy trying to find a dress with the right measurements and the right price tag. Here are some of the dresses I tagged along the way:
Miss Cola, Mountain View, CAAge and Occupation: 27, Product Communications and PromotionsFiance's Age and Occupation: 28, Managing Partner and Senior DesignerEngagement Date: March 5, 2009Wedding Date: June 2010Venue: The Mountain Terrace, Woodside, CAAbout Me: I’m a Washington State native, enjoying life in Silicon Valley California with my fiancé, our three kitties and one leopard gecko. I like reading wedding blogs, Photoshopping wedding design mock ups, making lists, and planning, planning, planning! I’m a bit of an anomaly, on one side I’m a very girlie girl, I collect shoes, I lay out my outfits 4-6 weeks in advance, and I’d never leave the house without my hair curled and makeup on. But on the other side, I’m a total tomboy, I love to go camping and hiking, play drinking games (hey, I’m Irish!) and most of my closest friends are guys. My fiancé and I are planning a DIY-focused wedding with a balance between easygoing (what he wants) and chic and stylish (what I want), and are tying it all together with elements in lavender, sage, butter cream and chocolate.
While I was procrastinating on my Save The Dates, I came across this great site with some easy DIY wedding projects, called Do It Yourself Weddings. And since I think there’s nothing better than finding a great project and making it your own, I promptly bookmarked the site and ordered my fabric to make a custom card box. (For those of you that need explanation, a card box is used to store cards on the gift table, so they don’t go missing if they were just placed on the table. Plus, it makes a cute centerpiece for the table, too!)
To start this project, I ordered some fabric from Joann.com and FashionFabricsClub.com, and headed to Michaels (yet again, I swear, since this wedding planning began it hasn’t been more than 2 weeks between trips there… but I’ve finally figured out where most things are in the store!). There wasn’t much in the way of paper mache boxes at Michaels, but they did have a whole aisle of expensive-ish hat boxes. So I only bought one round hat box and headed back home to scour our garage, which is about 1/4th full of random empty boxes. I was looking for a second, smaller, round box, and two square boxes, since my plan was to do a 4 tier box that resembled a cake. You might remember this Photoshop mock up from an earlier post: Read more…
Mrs. Star, New York CityAge and Occupation: 22, ActressFiance's Age and Occupation: 24, Casting AssistantWedding Date: October 2009Venue: Ceremony: The Kraine Theatre, Reception: Midtown Loft & TerraceAbout Me: I’m a professional actress who’s always had New York City in her blood and I'm finally getting the chance to make a home in Manhattan with my fiancé, my dog, and my big dreams! I love polka dots, craft projects, Dunkin’ Donuts’ iced coffee, and anything sparkly. I’m having a blast planning our elegant/dramatic/New York City/acting-themed/largely-DIY wedding and am thrilled to be the youngest current Miss Blogger!
Of course, when you’re as obsessed with weddings as I am, even though you’re on vacation (and already married!), you can’t stop thinking about weddings.
The Greeks love their weddings every bit as much as we do, if not more. While we were on Santorini, we saw THREE separate weddings! I love how they do weddings there, with practically the whole island getting involved. They drive a parade of cars carrying the bridal party and family members through the streets of the villages, honking and making a huge, celebratory ruckus. Then they end the night with a good round of fireworks. I love how they make everyone on the island know that someone is marrying the love of their life that night.
I happened to snap a few pictures of one of the weddings that we stumbled upon, because their receiving line was so long that it ran into the public square in Oia and we happened to accidentally walk right through it. They had at least 300 guests; the whole village was overtaken!
Fiftyfootbride’s stunning ring sits atop a stack of wedding-related reading material.
Keep on loading your inspirational wedding pics to the gallery to see them featured here on the blog! Remember, your images must be under 1MB in size, or they won’t load.
Miss Pudding, Greater Toronto Area/VermontAge and Occupation: 26, High School TeacherFiance's Age and Occupation: 26, Computer EngineerEngagement Date: August 2008Wedding Date: July 2010Venue: Catholic Ceremony, Cultural Hall ReceptionAbout Me: Quite literally a citizen of the world, I was born in Poland, grew up in Canada, and now live in the beautiful state of Vermont. I love reading historical biographies, multi-tasking, teasing my hair, and, despite my height, wearing high heeled shoes. I am the ultimate klutz with an uncanny ability to put on a graceful front. Mr. Pudding and I have been dating for over six years, and are very excited to finally merge our (very large) families. We are planning a traditional Polish-Catholic wedding that is anything but predictable.
Doesn’t the name of this post make it sound like I am going to talk about diamond encrusted underwear or something? Sorry to disappoint!
I’ve been watching the Rachel Zoe Project (I have a lot of time for Bravo lately), and loved the way she styled her celebrity clients for the Golden Globes. I was particularly happy to see that both Debra Messing and Anne Hathaway wore navy blue, further convincing me that the colour choices that I made for our wedding are indeed chic!
I loved Anne’s overall look, and plan on using it as inspiration for my bridesmaids!
Mrs. Sushi, Hershey/HawaiiAge and Occupation: 27, Graphic Designer/PhotographerFiance's Age and Occupation: 25, Laborer/Aspiring Hip Hop ProducerEngagement Date: December 25, 2007Wedding Date: March 2009Blogging Since: October 9, 2006Venue: Byodo-In Temple, Luau ReceptionAbout Me: I’m a notorious people-watcher who loves all things paper, food, traveling, grubbin’ on food, gossip magazines, food, sock monkeys…did I mention food?! Mr. Sushi and I are both haolepinos (half Filipino, half Caucasian) and hope to be able to somehow incorporate our cultures at our destination wedding in Hawaii. All while planning from the sweetest place in earth, Hershey!