Weddingbee Blog

Hello hive!! Happy New Year (granted I’m like two weeks late…oops!)! I’m so excited to be back and writing again, and I’m super excited for all of the stuff I have coming up! I have actually finished quite a few wedding projects to show you all! Yay! Before I start to delve into all of the DIY fun stuff that I have promised you all, I had to show you something. Today, I got slapped in the face by reality. I came home to find this:

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Let’s take care of some business first, shall we?

Now that I am done with school for the semester, I have four weeks in which to really cram in my projects before the next one begins and I’m juggling 19 credit hours, work, and final wedding touches. So the last couple of days I have sat in front of Netflix (tons and tons of Grey’s Anatomy anyone?), and have begun part of my bridesmaids’ gifts.
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Favors pretty much always look the same around my neck of the woods. It’s some type of candy wrapped up in some kind of fabric. It’s a great choice, but it’s just not us. So I started to do some soul-searching as to what I wanted our favor to be.

Mr. D voted for something practical (this is coming from the man who once bought me a comforter for my birthday!). When I asked him to elaborate he said maybe we could do bottle openers or beer coozies. Yes, I come from a population of perdy hard beer drinkers so Mr. D wanted to help them open them or keep them cool. I wasn’t so down with that. I mean these are cute and all:

Image via Wilton

but just not what I was looking for.

Then I started considering something eco-friendly.
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Mr. D and I have really started to gear up for the wedding. Starting next month, our wedding events begin. My fantastic mad hatter tea party bridal shower is next month, my bachelorette weekend is in February (as is Mr. D’s dude weekend), and the wedding (dum, dum, duh, dum) is in March.

Holy shit, things are getting real.

In preparation for the big event, Mr. D and I are starting to tie up some of the loose ends (fonts for the invite, setting the rehearsal dinner time, yada yada), but we recently began something that is making us focus on the reason for this big shindig: pre-marital counseling.

Back in June we took one of these things:

Image via Foccus Inc. USA

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I like to think that I have always played it straight with you, hive. So I’m going to come right out and say it, and I’m going to say it bluntly: I’ve been kind of a bitch lately to Mr. D. Why, you ask? Honestly, there is no real excuse, but if I had to blame it on something other than me, I would say stress. I am so frickin’ stressed out.

I know now that I take on way too much crap, so it’s no wonder I’m so stressed out all the time. I work full-time, I go to school full-time (online, but it’s still hard as hell), and I’m planning a wedding, which because of all the DIY-ness of it, is like another full-time job. Plus I’m the one that my family likes to call when they have issues with each other or other such problems in their lives. Now add to this the fact that I’m just about to finish finals and I’m dealing with my dad dying, I’m a flat out bitch. Big time. Unfortunately, Mr. D has been taking the brunt of my bitchiness lately. This is something I feel absolutely terrible about.

It’s become more and more obvious that I need to find something to do that allows me to target my stress into something important instead of snapping at Mr. D for simply asking a question.
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I first want to thank this beautiful, beautiful community for being so kind, understanding, and supportive in the days after my father’s death. Words cannot even begin to express how thankful I am to have wonderful people like you in my life. While I will miss my father every day for the rest of my life, I know that I have to continue living my life because that is what he would want me to do.

This came in the mail about a week after my father’s death, which made me realize that while my world had stopped during that time, the rest of the world did not:

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First off, Aardvark Dream Team…yes you five bridesmaids…shoo. This is surprise for you.

Everyone else,

I had this big plan that I would wait and do a post about the bridesmaids’ gifts after I had all the parts in place, then these came in and I was so excited I could not contain myself and I need to show someone.

I came home from a weekend of thanks and turkey to this HUGE BOX.

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Quite simply, this is the most difficult post I have ever had to write in my life. I don’t even know where to begin, or what to say. My entire world has changed, and I’m still unsure of how to deal with it. Even to write the words make it real, something I am not sure I am ready to admit.

In one short phone call, my life has been forever altered. My grandmother called me this past weekend to inform me that my father, at the age of 45, had passed away. My father and I have had a very tumultuous relationship. However, in the last year we had ended our 10 year estrangement and were working to rebuild our relationship. Now, I never get to see the accumulation of that relationship. I don’t get to have my father walk me down the aisle, or do a first dance. And the most difficult of all, I don’t get to ever introduce my future children to their grandfather.

In the midst of my sorrow, something else has happened.
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How did I find Weddingbee?

I actually found Weddingbee back in 2007 when I was engaged to Mr. D the first time around. I was googling something wedding related when Google sent me to a post by the wonderful, Mrs. Strawberry and I was immediately in love the with the hive. However, our engagement never actually went towards wedding planning, so to save myself from going crazy I stopped coming to Weddingbee. Then we got engaged the second time around. I waited for about six months, when the wedding planning actually began before actually signing up and becoming a poster on the boards. I was so excited to come back to the hive though—it was such a loving and supportive community and I couldn’t wait to be a part of it!

My Application Story

I’ve always been a writer of sorts. I was an editor of my high school and college newspapers and I specialized in editorial writing. When I realized that it was starting to get close to when I could apply, I started up my blog and starting hounding the ladies I had come to know so well on the night chats in the hive to read my blog and give me feedback. The ladies were so kind and so supportive. They were always right there to read my stuff and give me feedback (Mrs. Teacup, before she was Mrs. Teacup, was an invaluable help! She would always comment on my blog and encourage me to keep going!). I blogged for about three weeks, and sent my application in as soon as Pengy announced they were accepting for March 2012.

Once that application left my outbox, I was nervous.
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Now that I have chosen my dress, it’s time for me to really start pulling together my total wedding look. We all know that I already have my shoes picked out (which I still pull out occasionally to admire). I know that they don’t really match the style of my dress, but I love the thought that I put into them, what they represent, and that they will be comfortable.

I already have a necklace in mind for the day of:
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It’s one thing to have colors, it’s another to have a theme to accompany it. At least, this is what I have been telling myself for the past four or five months. With our wedding growing ever nearer (less than five months now!), Mr. D and I are starting to really explore our decor options when it comes to our reception. We are having a simple and sweet ceremony, but that definitely will not be our reception (well, at least not the simple part!). The building that we are holding our reception has a downstairs and an upstairs. Since we are having a smaller wedding, we booked the downstairs of the venue. While it’s not dark and dank, it isn’t open and spacious either. It’s caused us to have to think creatively in order to create an amazing atmosphere in which to celebrate our wedding. Because of the lower ceilings and lack of windows, we are going for an intimate and cozy feeling.

Image via A Touch of Class Banquet Center

So how are we going to create this atmosphere, and what is the grand theme that we are going with? Well my dear friends, let’s take a walk among my inspiration photos, shall we?

Mr. D’s mother owns an antique shop, so I knew that we were going to be utilizing that resource when coming up with our wedding decor.
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Now that I have found my dress, I have begun the search for the finishing touches on my wedding day look. While I am most likely getting my hair done professionally that day, I will most definitely be doing my own makeup. I do wear makeup on a daily basis, but it’s pretty light and not very complicated. A little mascara, a tad-bit of eyeliner, some lavender eye shadow, a splash of bronzer, and some lip-gloss is all that I need. It seriously takes me about five minutes and I’m out of the house.

Obviously I want something more for my wedding day. Some days I am dreaming of something soft and dreamy. Other days I am dreaming of something striking and dramatic. My dress could allow for either makeup style. So what should I do? Most people at this point would start the inspiration hunt online and find styles that jump out at them. Then once that is narrowed down, the logical next step is to go out and buy the makeup and try on the styles for yourself. Well, I don’t exactly have the funds to toss around and buy makeup that I may or may not use again. Bummer.

Then my friend had a brilliant idea.
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If you know what the title is referencing as far as its format, give yourselves a pat on the back. If you don’t, I’ll give you a hint: wizards, HP, owls, and wands. Got it?

Another hint:

Image via Harry Potter Wikia

Well, the discussion today is not about Harry Potter. It is actually wedding related, and it’s something that I have been thinking a lot about lately. I’ve noticed more and more posts about it on the boards, and I wanted to give my take on it and see what everyone else thinks about it. So what is this topic that I am rambling on and on about?

It’s about the use of the word “tacky.”

When our grandparents (and to a certain extent, our parents) were getting married, there was some rules that we expected to be followed to a “t.” Weddings, for the most part, were really similar and predictable. This is not the environment that we face now.
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The journey to find a dress, that is! That is right, hive! I have found my wedding dress. Let the cheers and confetti ensue! Woo hoo! Are you excited? I know I am absolutely ecstatic! Before I can get down to show you the dresses I tried on and the one that I ended up going with, I have a little business to take care of=. Put that partying on hold:

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Now that I have admitted my shortcoming of a wedding dress, I have begun the search for that perfect dress. During that search I have realized quite a few things. One, is that a dress may look beautiful and glamorous, but there is a chance that the shape of the dress just won’t work for your body type. Another is that what you love on paper is not necessarily what you will end up loving on you.

I’m a curvy girl—I have more curves than a coastal highway. My grandmother often teases me that I have a “va-va-voom” figure because I’m all hourglass. I think that my Jazzercise outfit from an ’80s party I attended perfectly accentuates my curvaceous body (PS, you can’t see, but I totally had leg warmers on too):

Personal Photo

Keeping this in mind, I want to find a dress that will flaunt my curves while being everything that I want in a dress. What is it that I want in a dress?
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