#3

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.

Pass the Vino

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.

Of course I loved the floral table runner, but what really caught my eye was the wine bottle. What a creative way to number the tables! Now, Mr. Chickadee and I are far from connoisseurs, but we do enjoy a glass of wine with dinner every once and awhile, and certainly wanted nice wine selections for our wedding reception. It just seemed perfect to use the bottles to label each table.

So today I did a little trial run of our numbered wine bottles. On the way home from the post office I swung by Friar Tuck's and picked up a yummy bottle of Merlot. Ok, I didn't really care what it tasted like, I just browsed the aisles looking for a pretty bottle!



Next I designed a new label, nice and simple. The dimensions were 3.75" by 5" but that could be changed depending on whatever bottle you choose. I made it really simple, with the number in the font Ecolier and the word "table" in DaunPenh. I printed it off on some scrap paper I had in my craft room, which was a pretty thick, textured white cardstock.




After cutting it in my handy paper cutter, I adhered it to the bottle, right over the old label! At first I thought I'd have to remove the original label, but Darcy said on the show that they just covered it up. If it's good enough for Martha Stewart, it's good enough for me!

I just took a glue stick to stick it on the bottle, but I think when I do it "for real" I'll use glue dots instead, as I don't think the glue stick will seal it permanently. But this is the finished product!



So, what are you doing to spice up your table settings?

Engagement Pictures

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?

#2: Mr. and Mrs. Who?

Things I Learned From My Sister's Wedding: #2

When making your honeymoon reservations, make sure you specify what your new, married name (if you choose to change your name) will be.

I think it's quite common for the bride to really take control of the wedding planning, and this often includes the honeymoon. My sister was no exception. She made the honeymoon reservations in Cancun, used her account to pay for it, etc.

Well, as a result, when they arrived at the Dreams Cancun, they were greeted as Mr. and Mrs. H (her maiden name) instead of Mr. and Mrs. V (married name). Things were labeled in their suite as Mr. and Mrs. H and when my new brother-in-law called down to the front desk he was referred to as Mr. H. Oops.

Luckily, my sister and her husband have good senses of humor. Still, I would suggest making it quite clear to your honeymoon accommodations what your new name is going to be!

Blogging Brides

Last summer our local newspaper ran an article about the growing trend of bridal blogs. At the time it was particularly interesting because my family & friends didn't know the extent of my own bridal blogging. The brides interviewed ranged from women who had created "wed-sites" to women who were letting online readers choose specific details of their weddings via online polls. Honestly, nothing there shocked me, as I am quite familiar with the online wedding planning sensation. Still, it did get me thinking about my own bridal blogging journal.

After getting engaged, I turned to such online sites like TheKnot.com and LiveJournal for ideas.
It amazed me that there were always new posts appearing on these communities and when I posted I almost instantly received tons of feedback from other brides just like me! It was only a matter of time before my iolvement in these communities deepened from occasionally commenting and absorbing ideas, to rushing home after dress shopping and posting tons of pictures. It was then that I revealed my new obsession to Mr. Chickadee. He was indulgent at first, laughing good-naturedly when I talked about my "friends" online. However, when I told him not to go snooping around my websites because there were dress pictures there, he changed his tune a little.

"You put pictures of yourself online?"

Um, yes, of course I do. (I also put pictures of him online). He knew this, of course, as I absolutely lived for the picture feature on Facebook. But still, he was worried. I tried to insist that these were "locked" communities, or message boards for brides only, but he was still skeptical, insisting all sorts of creepy people could be lurking about, looking at these pictures. I kept insisting that this wasn't the case, but maybe he had a point.

Sure, I use an alias here and blur out the names on my mock-up of the save the dates, but I was still telling people where we lived and when we were getting married, not to mention showing them all how smoking hot I was in a big white dress (hehe).

In addition to those predators out there who want to glean personal information from your wedding plans, there's the (perhaps more common) problem that arises when you rant about an AWOL bridesmaid or crazy family member in your blog and it gets back to her. I try to prevent this by never putting something on my blog that I wouldn't feel comfortable having my mom/grandma/mother-in-law/little sister read.

So what do you guys think about sharing the intimate details of your big day with the entirety of the internet?

I still maintain you can do it in a safe way, so long as you're careful about not giving away too much private information, but perhaps it is a big risk we're taking.

Still, it's a risk I'm, at least, willing to take for the sense of camaraderie and support I get from the other blogging brides-to-be out there.

(For more information about safe blogging, check out the articles at ConnectSafely)

#1

Things I Learned From My Sister's Wedding: #1

If you're not willing to spend a bundle on day-of makeup or don't feel comfortable with the gobs of foundation and powders your make-up artist slapped on during the trial, you absolutely can do it yourself (or at least have a trusted bridesmaid do it for you).

However, I do have a little caveat. If you're doing it yourself, I'd actually recommend getting it done by a pro well in advance. Just let the make-up artist know that you plan on doing it yourself for the big day and let her/him teach you how to make yourself over! If you're unsure about actually doing it yourself, take along a trusted bridesmaid or family member to learn how to do it. I would recommend, though, doing your own eyeliner and mascara, as it was nearly impossible for me to do that to someone else.

A couple weeks before the big day my sister and I stopped by her local Clinique counter. We worked with a really nice girl who helped us choose colors and taught us the best techniques to apply the make-up. Now, I do have to admit that my sis spent more buying all the make-up than she would have if she'd just paid for a day-of make-up artist, but this way, she was able to keep all the great stuff!

In the end I did both of my sisters' and my own make-up, and I think it turned out pretty well, if I do say so myself. :) We only had to re-powder twice (once at the church, once at the reception) and the make-up stayed all night long!

It's In! Now let's just hope it will zip...

Just yesterday I wrote about my dress. I ordered it in July (ok July 19th to be exact, and I'm probably going to take my dress out to dinner every year on our anniversary I love it so much) and wasn't expecting it to be in until December or January, but surprise! It's in now!

Right now in a little shop in Aurora, Illinois (which is woefully, 2 1/2 hours away) MY DRESS is hanging there are lonely and in need of me. Luckily my newly married sister lives there and I was planning to go see her this weekend anyway, so I'm sure we'll make time to swing by and visit my darling dress.

Now I do have a question for you though: my wedding is still a good 8 months away so I'd really rather not start the fittings/alterations process yet. Especially as I'd still like to lose a little bit of weight and haven't even begun the process of looking at shoes/elaborate undergarments (probably Spanx? Anyone have other recommendations?) How far in advance did you/are you beginning the fittings process? And do you know how many fittings you're going to need? Did you use the alterations person at your dress shop or find someone else?

And, if you, like me, just recently found out your dress is in, feel free to just squee and post pics in the comments. I promise I'll jump up and down for you in excitement!

Playing Dress-up, Part 3

So I was definitely intending to tell you more about my dress hunt after my last post on the subject, but I got so busy that I forgot! So now I'm back to finally wrap up the saga and show you my dress!

While my mom was still up north we stopped by Wolsfelt’s Victorian Bridal in Aurora, Illinois. We went into the experience thinking we’d just look around and try a few gowns on, but wouldn’t end up buying anything because I still had my heart set on trying the Watters dress. Looking around before we were helped only reinforced this idea. The dresses we saw were mostly over $2000, while I was looking more in the $1000-1200 range. Still, we figured it couldn't hurt to look around.

So anyways, when I made the appointment the lady on the phone was so nice and friendly and asked a ton of questions. When we arrived, she had already pulled a few dresses that she thought I might like and then I went through and picked a few more. While I was trying them on, Pat, the assistant kept asking questions to get a better feel for my personality and what kind of wedding I wanted to have. I felt like for the first time I had a sales lady who was using her expertise to help me. She actually told me what worked with my body and what didn’t, and I wasn’t offended to hear it since I knew she just wanted to help me.

They only had a few of the mermaid or trumpet style dresses so I ended up trying on a lot of the ball gown types as well. I even tried on one huge duponi silk dress that was so wide I don’t think both my dad and I could have gotten down the aisle together! It looked fine on me, but it just didn’t have the spark that I wanted. However, I had picked up one mermaid shaped dress early on that Pat had described as a total Barbie dress, which sounded perfect to me!

I always wonder how people would actually know when they saw "the dress" but I guess now I know! There isn’t anything I don’t love about this dress…from the color, to the train, to the slight beading, even the bow! It’s such a mix of trendy and traditional, sexy and demure. It was even within my price range! So I reluctantly left my dream dress behind but by the time my mom and I drove the 2 1/2 hours home, we knew it was “the one.” That night I called and placed the order. They even gave us 10% off for ordering on the same day I came in for my first appointment!

We couldn’t take pictures on the day I first saw it since I hadn’t paid yet, but when I took my mom back up to Chicago a few days later we stopped by with 2 of my aunts and 3 of my cousins (yes, I'm that girl) to see it again and take pics. Here are some of my favorites:

(Dear Mr. Chickadee, dad, and anyone else who doesn't want to know, you can stop reading now!)

.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.



Please excuse the orange industrial clips in the back.


The simple beading on top.


With a veil on, though I haven't quite decided what length I want.


I love the back!

The dress itself isn't a fancy designer or anything, just a private label by Wolsfelt's, but that doesn't matter much to me, I love it! It should be here around the beginning of the year and I absolutely can't wait!

MOB Dress

Since my sister's wedding, I've gotten a few inquiries about my mom's dress. I'm planning a whole series of tips/tricks/lessons I've learned from my sister's wedding but for now, I'll tell you about the adventures of shopping for my mom's dress.




Picking out a dress was one of the things my mom was most worried about prior to the wedding...and the idea that she'd need to buy TWO dresses in a year made it even worse. Living 3,000 miles from my sister and I certainly didn't help either. She'd perused the Nordstrom's website and found a lot of promising options, but was disappointed by the selection at the actual store. So she made plans in July to fly up to Chicago from Dallas to go MOB dress shopping and to look for bridal gowns with me.

In the meantime I made an appointment at House of Brides in Schaumburg. We'd been in the store looking for bridesmaids dresses with my sister and they seemed to have a lot of options so we figured we'd go back. When I called I made sure they knew that the wedding was in October, only a few months later, and they told me that would be no problem whatsoever.

However, when we actually got to HOB that day, we were scolded like naughty school children when we showed up. Apparently everything in the store takes at least 4 months to order, despite what the lady on the phone had said. Disappointed, we headed down the street to David's Bridal.

We had been to this same David's a few weeks before shopping for a strapless bra for my sister and it was sort of a nightmare, but this time we actually had great service. The dress we picked out for my mom was only in a dark purple at the David's in Schaumburg so our salesperson called all over until she located the dress in mocha elsewhere in the suburbs that we could take home with us that day.

The dress was affordable, needed no alterations, and in the end looked sooo beautiful on my mom!

If you're looking for MOB dresses my biggest tip is to shop early! A lady at one bridal shop told my FMIL and I that MOB dresses can take nearly as long as a wedding dress to come in, so you can't start too early.

What are your moms wearing to your weddings? Where'd they find their dresses?

I have a little confession to make...

I've been a bad bride-to-be. When I first got engaged I rushed to book so many of our vendors. We had a date, a photographer, a reception venue, and the church before the first month was up. But then....well, I just got busy. You know, that sort of busy-ness when you graduate college and don't have a job yet and actually don't have anything to do on a daily basis except watch The Office on DVD? Yeah, busy, right.

So now I'm getting married in June and I don't have a DJ. That's ok, right? Well, I hope so. My FMIL and I are going to meet with our first DJ tomorrow but I'm sort of stumped. When I met with photographers I looked at their work, but what do you look at with a DJ? It's not like he's creating the music, just pressing the buttons to make it play, right?

So how did you go about choosing a DJ? Any important questions I should make sure to ask? Anyone have central IL recommendations for me? Thanks ladies!

Also, tomorrow we're getting our engagement pictures and I'm so so so excited! I'll let you all know how it goes after we get home tomorrow!

And, more info from my sister's wedding coming up as well!

New Bride on the Block

Sorry I've been a little absent the last week or so, but I've been a very busy bee. On Sunday, my big sister became a Mrs. Despite early forecasts of thunderstorms and cold weather, we ended up with a beautiful, but blazing hot day in the Chicago suburbs. In the coming days I'll fill you in on some of the details of my sister's big day, but for now, I'll leave you with some pictures taken by my FMIL, me, and other random people who picked up our cameras throughout the night. I ended up with some 250 pictures from the day, so believe me, there are more to come!


One of my favorites from the day: My dad with my little sister and I. I loved the guys' get-up, especially after they added the bright pink rose as a boutonniere!


The newly weds! I've never seen my sister smile so much in my life!


My sister and I up at the head table.


My parents looking all snazzy.


Mr. Chickadee and I...we're next!


Haley, one of the flower girls. She and the other FG, Amaya, were absolutely darling all day long.

And finally...one of my favorites from the night:

Mr. Chickadee catching the garter. Ok, so it doesn't appear that anyone else actually wanted to catch it, but I was still proud of him!

Going Green

Well, it's T-6 days until my sister's wedding... and, just in the nick of time, I've finished my biggest DIY project for her: the escort cards. As I mentioned before, we had previously bought up the entire stock of Martha Stewart's evergreen cardstock from Micheal's for the project. However, we hadn't planned on going green originally.

She had found this picture on the Knot (from the wedding of Andrea & Geoff in St. Paul, Minnesota) and thought it would be perfect for her clover green wedding:



However, I was a little skeptical. I had no idea how we would ever find pre-scored cards in just the right color. I'd seen the all white, easy to print on, pre-scored sheets at Michael's and figured that would be the only possible way, outside of hiring some fancy stationary place to do them. So, we resigned ourselves to this design instead.



However, then I read Mrs. Snow Pea's post about the Making Memories Kit, which includes a scoring tool that makes perfect folds. Problem solved! (Thanks Mrs. Snow Pea!)

So instead we worked up this design:


So how'd we do it? Simple!

First I cut the evergreen paper. This was a bit of a pain because it's 18 in. by 18 in. which means it doesn't fit into my handy dandy paper cutter. So I borrowed an extra-long scoring mat and a yard stick from my FMIL. Once I split the paper in half, I could slip it into my paper cutter. Each of the green pieces got cut into 3.5" by 4.5" rectangles, which means I got 16 cards from each big sheet of cardstock.

Next, I scored each of the rectangles. I wouldn't recommend scoring the paper right down the exact center because you'll end up with that little overhang when you're done. Instead, offset the score by an eighth of an inch or so. You might be able to tell that my scorer is wrapped in masking tape. That was because the area to grip the scorer is made of little metal bumps and it was starting to hurt my hands, so watch out for that!
.

Next, I waited until my sister sent over her seating chart. When that was ready, I set up a template in InDesign. If you're setting escort cards up in InDesign, QuarkXPress, or something similar, create a master page first with all your guides set up. It'll save a lot of time and energy. I'd also recommend setting up all the names in Excel and alphabetizing them by last name. Many reception venues require the cards to be in alphabetical order when you bring them in. This is a screen shot of my InDesign file:


Each of the white spots on the escort cards measured 3" by 4", which would ultimately leave a quarter inch border of green on each card. I used 40 pt. Bickham Script Pro for the names and 10 pt. Cambria for the table numbers.

Next, I took my files over to Office Max. They'll print black and white really inexpensively there. They'll also cut your paper if you want them to (although it can get a little costly and it isn't always precise). I had already picked up a pack of white cardstock from Hobby Lobby when it was 50% off, so I just took that with me, which made it even cheaper. Altogether I got 28 pages printed (18 pages of escort cards and 10 pages of menus) and it cost me $2.52! Be warned, though, printing in color is MUCH more expensive at a place like Office Max or Kinko's than printing in black.

The next step was to chop up all these sheets of names. Unfortunately, I had worked a lot of random borders in (like a quarter inch in between each card) that made it a lot harder to cut. Luckily I assigned Mr. Chickadee the task of cutting, because he is far more precise and diligent than I.


When he had each card cut, I punched them with our pretty little Martha Stewart Floral Lace Punch. In order to make sure each punch was perfectly centered, I measured out the size of the card on the puncher and made little marks. That way I had some guides to go by.



After that, I stuck each card to the green backing. I started out with a more liquid craft glue with a pointy tip. It was really easy to apply, not messy at all, and awfully forgiving as it dried slowly. However, buckling and bubbles are a lot more common when using this type of adhesive so I quickly switched over to using an Elmers craft bond glue stick. If you're messy like me, make sure to put down some scrap paper, as you're sure to get glue everywhere.


Several hours, and many many sticky glued up fingers later, we had finished escort cards!

(Ok, I'm not good at straight lines, but you get the idea!)