The Flower Girl and a Special Dress

Our flower girl has quite the important role in our ceremony. Not only is she the keeper of the flower petals, but she is bringing in some fun family history. You see, my dad comes from a family of ten kids. The youngest was only five years old when my mom and dad got married. Naturally, she was their flower girl.

Fast forward twenty seven years, she now has two daughter's of her own and I am getting married. My aunt was my mom and dad's flower girl, and now her daughter will be my flower girl.

Don't you just love how stuff like that works out? She also has the cutest Southern accent EVER. (Okay, it's an accent to this Californian. I so wish I had a cool accent like that.)

Such a beautiful princess needs a dress befitting as such. I know most bridal stores have flower girl dresses to choose from. I bought my dress at Alfred Angelo, and they do have many options. However, I am not sold on all of those dresses. I don't feel like I need to get her dress at a bridal store. What about opening up my options to department stores that carry fancy little girl dresses? For example, I found some great options at Nordstrom.

{Image via Nordstrom}

{Image via Nordstrom}

{Image via Nordstrom}

Bridal stores have a scary return policy, whereas Nordstrom is known for their customer service. Being that I don't live near my aunt and cousin, I feel like ordering a flower girl dress through Nordstrom would be a safer option. Plus, their prices seem to be slightly lower. 

I need to start making decisions here so that we can find the perfect dress for our very important flower girl.

How do you weigh in on the bridal store  vs. department store route? How will you be dressing your special flower girl?

Fakeagement Ring

I know I haven't talked at all about where we are going on our honeymoon, but lets just say it is out of the country. Let's also just say that every time I go on vacation, I lose something. Such as my favorite Juicy Couture jacket that I had found for $20 at Marshalls that I am convinced got stolen. (Obviously I am still a little upset about that one.) Also jewelry, favorite makeup products...you name it. I don't know what it is, I must have a hole in my suitcase or something.

This got me thinking (read: freaking out) that something would happen to my wedding ring while on our honeymoon. I wouldn't be able to wear my ring while we are out snorkeling or swimming. I also wouldn't feel comfortable leaving it in our hotel room. This is quite the conundrum, what do I do to keep my ring safe?

The easy answer is to not bring it at all on our honeymoon. However, i'm not really down with not wearing my wedding ring as a brand new newlywed.

Enter the "fakeagement ring." (Surprisingly, I made that word up. Shocking, I know.) If I can find a decent looking ring to wear on my honeymoon, then I can keep my wedding ring locked up in our safe. If something should happen to my "fakeagment ring" while on our trip, then no tears will be shed and there will be zero heartache.

I had been on the search for awhile now for the right ring. I needed it cheap in order to achieve the purpose, but I wanted it to look decent. I needed a good lookin' CZ. Where do you go to find a good lookin' CZ? Why Nordstrom of course!

I found a dramatized replica of my ring at Nordstrom for $26. I say dramatized because it is huge. I look like a real housewife of Beverly Hills wearing this ring. The reason why I chose it though is because it had the same style as my ring.

Here is a reminder of what my real engagement ring looks like:

 

Here is the "fakeagement ring":

Here they are side by side for comparison:

The ring on the right is fake and cost $26. The ring on the left is real, and well...didn't cost $26.

I will be sad to not be wearing my real ring while on my honeymoon. However, I would be devastated if something happened to it while traveling. I will have peace of mind knowing that my real ring is safe. If something should happen to my fake ring? Who cares!

What do you think of the "fakeagement ring" idea? Do you plan on doing something similar?

The Piggy Bank

I know I mentioned here that my first wedding purchase was shoes. Technically that is not true. It was my first big purchase, but truth be told my first purchase for the wedding was actually a piggy bank.

Yes, a piggy bank. Two days after our engagement I was at the Hallmark store and I found this:

You know that phase you go through soon after your engagement where you buy ANYTHING that might say "wedding", "bride", or "groom" on it? Yeah, I was definitely in that phase. I bought everything. (Because apparently I really needed that Bride key chain? I know. Lame.)

However, this wedding fund piggy bank came in handy recently. For almost a year now I have been randomly dropping change in it when I think of it. I wasn't very consistent, so it took awhile to fill it up. This past weekend I realized it was probably time to head on over to the Coinstar machine at the grocery store and cash it in. 

Mr. Buck and I took bets on how much we thought was in the jar. His guess was $7, mine was $13. 

We were both wrong. This is how much it came out to:

For those of you who are math challenged like I am and don't want to count, that would be $34.43. Not bad, right?

My thinking is that "wedding fund" money can only be used towards wedding things. I don't want to just waste it on any ol' thing. I know some of you are wondering what on earth I could buy for the wedding with such little money.While it may not be a large amount of money, it's still more money in my pocket than what I had yesterday. I am determined to find something for the wedding that I can buy with that money. 

Have any of you found a creative way to save money for your wedding?

A Tiffany Blue Surprise

Earlier this week I came home to find a package on my front doorstep. I didn't remember ordering anything, so I suspiciously brought it inside. As I began to open it, I noticed an iconic blue color staring back at me.

Tiffany's? Someone must be playing a joke on us. How did they find a box that perfectly matches Tiffany's?

I then removed the ribbon and opened the enclosed card. My eyes laid upon this fun goodness:

 

Oh my word, this is not a joke at all. This is in fact from Tiffany's (insert jumping up and down here.) It is a gift to us from the owners at our venue, Monte Verde Inn. As I opened it up, I could not believe what I saw. Two perfectly gorgeous champagne toasting flutes.

This was extraordinarily thoughtful and classy. Monte Verde Inn truly knows how to make two people feel special. As I have said in the past, they are a very popular venue and hold a large amount of weddings each year for many different brides and grooms. Yet, they know how to make each couple feel important and valued. Their commitment and love for what they do is undeniable.

This was such a huge surprise and we are both incredibly thankful that they would take the time to think of us. (As well as all of the other Monte Verde Inn 2012 brides and grooms who also received this generous gift.)

Now I can check "find toasting flutes" off of that big to-do list!

I guess the only way to properly end this post is with a quote from one of the greatest movies of all time, Breakfast at Tiffany's.

"Did I tell you how divinely and utterly happy I am?" -Holly Golightly

Have you had a huge surprise come your way while wedding planning?

Working On My Fitness

You guys, I just discovered the most incredible thing for weight loss. It's seldom used, but works like a charm.

Oh yeah it's uhhh, called exercise. I've been lying to myself for years thinking all those fad diets work. You name it, i've tried it. I even tried that all liquid "Hollywood" diet. Yeah, I nearly passed out on that one.

News flash, none of that works. Maybe it will help you lose a little weight here and there, but nothing that will keep the weight off.

In reality, we all know what the magic spell is....eating healthy and exercising. I always thought I could get away with the former, but in reality I need both. It is not fun, in fact I absolutely loathe exercise. I kept putting it off because I had a really awesome reason why I shouldn't lose weight.

Are you ready for this? Here it goes: I already had my dress, what if I lose so much weight that they can't alter it enough?

I know, I know...horrible excuse. We all know dresses can be taken in. I was just avoiding the hard work that comes with weight loss.

I now have a treadmill in my house, so there are zero excuses. I just need to roll out of bed in the morning and get my tooshie moving. Lately I have been feeling really great and I can tell that I am improving. Running farther, lasting longer...that kind of thing. Yet, I still feel like this sometimes:

{Image via Pinterest}

Okay are you done laughing hysterically? I know I am not the only one that feels that way. I huff and puff on that treadmill and barely make it sometimes. I am quite certain I look ridiculous the majority of the time. I have to keep in mind though that I am better off today than what I was yesterday. I know that I am making progress, even though it might be slow. 

My dress fitting is in approximately three months, which means I need to get serious here. It is time to achieve buns of steel. No more working out when I "feel like it." Let's get real, when do I EVER feel like it? I just have to set my routine and stick with it. The last thing I want to do is look back on my wedding pictures twenty years from now and regret not achieving my goal.

Who else has taken up exercise to try and lose some weight for your wedding? How's it working out for ya?

Rehearsal...Lunch?

I consider myself to be a traditionalist, but if something else works out better then I am not afraid to go in that direction. Which is why we will be holding a rehearsal lunch instead of a dinner.

When we started researching options for rehearsal dinner locations, I was absolutely flabbergasted. It seemed anywhere decent I found cost nearly as much as the food at the wedding. I had a hard time wrapping my head around why a large amount of money is going to be spent the night before the wedding. (Where a large amount of money had already been spent.)

Then a thought popped into my head about our venue. Our venue is fairly popular and tends to get booked up every weekend pretty quickly. There is a good chance that there will be a wedding the day before ours. I decided I should check with them on this because if that is the case, then a rehearsal dinner the evening before was not going to work. Sure enough, there is a wedding that Friday evening before ours. Our options are either to hold our rehearsal Thursday evening or a 10am rehearsal Friday morning.

Well shoot. I was thinking, that stinks big time. We are a good hour away from our venue, so it seemed like quite the drive to have to take two days before the wedding. Also to be completely honest...I wanted the traditional "day before the wedding" rehearsal. Then I started to contemplate the idea of having a Friday morning rehearsal...is it really that bad? Our bridal party was planning on taking that day off work anyhow...so what's the big deal?

As it turns out, lunch menus are MUCH more affordable than dinner menus. We started to research our options and I came across a quirky little restaurant in Old Town Auburn called Awful Annies.

{Images via Awful Annies}



As you can probably tell from the pictures, this place is pretty down home casual. It's not your typical fancy schmancy restaurant where rehearsal dinners (ahem, lunches) are held.

However, their food is out of this world fantastic. Isn't that what really matters? The cherry on top is that the owners are easy to get a hold of  and are as sweet as pie. Instead of having a set menu, they told us we could choose a few options from their regular menu to serve at our rehearsal lunch. Their flexibility, responsiveness and helpfulness was so welcoming to me. I feel this place really fits the bill for us in more ways than one.

My only concern is that I have this guilty feeling that our bridal party will be expecting something more elaborate. Instead it will be a laid back and casual affair. In my eyes, I see this as a great thing. We can relax, drink, have a grand ol' time the day before the wedding. I honestly am not too interested in having two fancy shindigs in a row. I would rather have a casual rehearsal lunch, followed by a fancy wedding the next day.

What I have to remember is that our bridal party is made up of our friends. I highly doubt anyone will have issue with a casual rehearsal lunch. In fact, knowing our friends I think that they will find this even more fun.

What do you think about the idea of mixing things up and having a rehearsal lunch? If you were part of a wedding that did this, how would you feel about it?



Somewhere Over The Rainbow

I have a secret to spill. I am a Wizard of Oz nerd...big time. It is one of those movies that seems to have been with me throughout my life. Like most people, I grew up watching this movie. I never really had a favorite character because I loved all of them...even the flying monkeys! (Unlike most people, they did not scare me.) I had the entire movie memorized by the time I was eight years old.

When I was younger my mom use to do after school daycare at my house. Which was great because there was always kids to play with. I decided that I would put on a Wizard of Oz production with the daycare kids, and then we would perform it for all of our parents. Being that I was the oldest, I of course had to be every main character as well as the voice of Dorothy.

What is the voice of Dorothy you ask? My younger sister begged me to be Dorothy, so I let her but told her she could not sing. My voice was so beautiful (not) that I was going to hide behind the wall and sing for her while she lip sang. (I obviously was delusional and was a typical older sister.) All the other kids played the munchkins and my 3 year old brother was the wizard. I was rotten and apparently was on a power kick. Our poor parents sat through the entire show and I can only assume they were trying to hide their boredom and laughter.

I love everything about Wizard of Oz, and to this day will still put it on if I need to cheer myself up. It would only make sense then that I would be marrying a guy whose nickname in high school was "The Tinman." Check it out, he does kind of resemble the tinman.

{Right image via John Strange}

I could go on forever about my love for Wizard of Oz, but I am sure you are more interested in why I am even bringing this up. When I think about music for the ceremony, one song I cannot get out of my head is Somewhere Over The Rainbow. I have such a huge connection to this song, and it seems only fitting for it to play at the wedding.

On my iPod I have FIVE versions of this song. Why I need so many, I have no idea. I think every time I find a new version I just automatically hit "buy song." Then later regret it when it dings my account. Anyway, I started listening to these various versions and nothing felt right. For me it all felt too "in your face", and I was searching for a subtle version

It took some digging but I finally came across an instrumental version played in the Canon in D. There is no video format of this song so the best I can do is give you the link if you would like to preview or buy the song on iTunes. I absolutely love this version and I think it is perfect to have playing while our parents and grandparents are being seated before the ceremony.

I feel that music can really make or break things, and I am ecstatic that I found a great version of such an important song. Most likely nobody will notice but I will know it is playing and that is all that matters.

Do you have a song that is important to you that you want played at your wedding in a subtle way?