Picking Fleurs- Part Two

I last left off at eagerly awaiting Florist A's quote. I was really hoping that she would be within reason, because she was definitely my favorite florist between the two. Well I am happy to say that her prices were within our budget and I booked her. My chosen florist is Blooms by Martha Andrews. Let me give you a little peak into some of the incredible work she has done.

{Photo via Blooms by Martha Andrews/Photo by: Anne Andrews}

{Photos via Blooms by Martha Andrews/Photo by: KT Merry Photography}

 {Image via Blooms by Martha Andrews/Photo by: KT Merry Photography}

{Image via Blooms by Martha Andrews/Photo by: Alexandra Frankel Photography} 

{Image via Blooms Blog/ Photo by: Christian Oth Studio}

{Image via Blooms Blog/Photo by: Tanja Lippert Photography}

FLOWER WANDS?!? Oh my goodness, the little girl inside of me is going ballistic. How much more adorable does it get? As you can obviously see, Martha Andrews has talent that is undeniable. The details that she includes in her work is beyond perfect. When you meet her you can just tell that she is in love with what she does in life. That passion oozes out of all her wonderful floral creations.

As I have mentioned before, flowers were one of the things that I was the most excited to book. I am thrilled that I was able to find a floral vendor that shares the same vision and style as I do. Way to go Martha, you are the bee's knees.

Did you strike gold with any of your vendors?

Doe, A Deer, A Female Deer!

What is that I hear? Is that the Sound of Music?! I think it just might BEE!

Well hey there, Hive! My name is Miss Doe. It is an honor to meet all of you! I am incredibly excited to be here. As soon as I recovered from the shock of receiving an acceptance email, I instantly called all my friends and family. They all know what Weddingbee is and were so thrilled for me. Except I did not tell my little brother because I figured he just would not understand what the heck I was talking about. I later received a text message from him that said " I hear you are some sort of bee keeper now?" Oh man, that was my favorite response of the day.

So who are we? We met way back in ninth grade when I was 15 years old and he was 14 years old. Yeah, yeah I robbed the cradle. We were both born and raised in a small Historic farming town in Northern California. While most were trying to find their escape route, we were planting our feet in the ground. We have no intentions of leaving. Why would we? We have the mountains, ocean, wine country, the capital, and the city by the bay right at our fingertips.



He is an avid outdoorsman and his passion is duck hunting. He also enjoys managing his old dudes softball (aka beer drinking) team. He is happiest in the outdoors with a cold Sierra Nevada.



I love reading, cooking and photography. I am a Rat Pack fan and have a crazy obsession with Christmas. I like to pair a good glass of wine with either Ferris Bueller's Day Off or possibly some Full House reruns.



Meet our two loves: the wiener dog with an attitude problem named Ladey and the very lazy basset hound named Sherlock.

Oh did I mention our birthdays are only 1 day apart? It is a crazy coincidence, but it is true!



You are probably wondering why Miss Doe, right? Other than the fact that the icon is insanely adorable, we actually chose Doe because my fiance is a big time hunter. No, don't worry he does not shoot female deer. That is actually highly illegal. He goes after those big bucks with massive antlers. Which is what I will be calling him from here on out, Mr. Buck.

Miss Doe and Mr. Buck, it just seems to fit us so well.

Together we are planning a Spring wedding in the foothills of Northern California. We are blending our two styles to create a rustically elegant wedding. Somewhat of a city meets country. Most importantly it will be filled with a whole lot of family and love. So here we go, let the fun begin!

Much love from here on out,

Miss Doe

{All photos are personal}

Picking Fleurs- Part One

I had mentioned previously that our venue is semi-all inclusive. Part of what is included in the cost is floral centerpieces for all of the tables. What is not included is bridal party flowers and decoration for the arbor at the ceremony area. Which means I needed to find a super awesome florist because flowers are very important to me. I am THAT girl, the one that dreamed of flowers everywhere at my wedding. Now our budget does not exactly dream that same dream...but I think we came to a nice little compromise.

I set up appointments to meet with two florists on the same day. I came prepared with inspiration of bouquets that caught my eye.

{Image via: Style Me Pretty/Photo by: Claudia Hung Weddings/Design by: Alyssa Flowers}

{Image via: Style Me Pretty/Photo by: Lori Barberly Photography/Design by: Lee Forrest Design}

{Image via: Style Me Pretty/Photo by: Patricia Lyons Photography/Design by: Jack Lucky Floral Design}

Yup, I am a peony girl. Big, lush, romantic peonies. Our first appointment of the day was with florist A. I was already slightly aware of the wonderful work she does from all the stalking I did of her blog. Her style is very tres chic, and I gobbled that up like a 12 year old girl at a boy band concert.  All her work is very trendy, out of the box, and absolutely perfect.

When we arrived at the appointment she was prepared with beautiful books filled with her work for us to peak at. She loved my ideas for peony bouquets but brought up the fact that peonies are expensive flowers. She asked if I would consider doing just my bouquet in peonies and doing my bridesmaids bouquets in garden roses. Apparently garden roses are different than regular roses....I thought they all came out of gardens? She explained that their shape is similar to peonies and it would be a less expensive option. I can roll with that. Then I told her how I was trying to keep the ceremony decorations simple. The idea came up of sprinkling white hydrangeas across the top of the arbor at the ceremony site. We continued on to discuss smaller things such as boutonnieres and then before I knew it the appointment was finished. I liked this lady, I felt like she really took to heart my vision and style. We had hashed out some great ideas in this appointment and she said she would be emailing me a quote soon.

Our next appointment was with florist B who is known for being a solid company. They are well respected and have been around for a long time. Although when we sat down to start the appointment I was slightly disappointed by the books they were showing me of their work. It was incredibly outdated and slightly sticky- euuuw. They did not really offer me any new ideas. Instead I had to bring up all the ideas from the previous appointment with florist A. They thought peonies, garden roses and hydrangeas would look great. Shouldn't they be the ones giving me these ideas and not the other way around? What I did like about them is they instantly gave me a bid which actually came in under budget.

Up next, I will announce which florist I chose to go with.

Are you obsessed with flowers like I am, or is it low on the list for you?

Touchdown! Scored An Officiant!

For some reason I put off the search for an officiant for quite a long time. Until it hit me that I was missing one of the most important vendors, the reason the entire wedding is taking place. We needed someone to marry us, but not just anyone.

Mr. Buck and I are both Christians and so it is very important to the both of us to have a religious ceremony focused on our beliefs. Unfortunately, where we are getting married there were not many options. Our venue mainly had recommendations for judges, but we were looking for someone of faith to marry us. There are various pastors within the area, but I wanted something more than that. I was looking for someone that we could easily connect to. In came the football coach.

I come from a town where high school football is huge. Think Kenny Chesney's song, Boys of Fall.

{Image via Urban Country News}



A few years back we had an awesome football coach for one of our high school's. Every kid loved him and he whipped that team into shape. On top of that he was very involved with a group called Young Life. It is a Christian ministry that gets teenagers involved in faith based activities. My sister was a volunteer for Young Life which is where she met the football coach. She knew he is ordained because he had officiated a few weddings of people that she knows. Unfortunately he left to coach at a high school up near the foothills. Great for them because he is highly respected, but sad for our small little town.

When we were on the search for the perfect officiant for the wedding, my sister brought up the football coach. He just so happens to live near the vicinity of our venue. I called him up to see if he would be interested in officiating our wedding. He was incredibly gracious and told us he would be honored to do so. He is not technically a pastor but that is fine by us. I am well aware of the incredible work he has done to help others in their faith. That is all we needed, someone with whom we had a connection and would officiate a Christian wedding.

We will be meeting with him and his lovely wife in December to go over details of the wedding. We would love to do it now but it is football season and from what I have heard...he eats, breathes and sleeps football. And I know better than to come between a man and his football.

Is your officiant someone slightly unconventional?

Heart Punch Woes

The search for a heart shaped hole punch has proven to be less than fruitful. I returned the previous one that punched upside down. I came across another heart shaped hole punch made by Martha Stewart that looked as though it would be perfect. I scoped it out in the store and it did indeed punch the right side up.



You are thinking this is going to have a happy ending, right? That would be a big N-O. Unfortunately it punches an abnormally large heart. Who needs one that big?!

It looks real cute and all but it is too large for these wish tags. I should have paid more attention to the size when I bought it. I was too busy jumping up and down with excitement in the aisle of Michaels because I found one that punched right side up. This meant I had to trek back to Michaels one more time to return yet another heart shaped hole punch. They know me by my name now. They just looked at me and said "that one didn't work out either?" This also marked my fourth trip to Michaels in a one week time span.

There were no more punches for me to try so I had to settle for a plain ol' circle hole punch.

At least they were 50% off so I did score a good deal. I am slightly perturbed that I could not find the hole punch that I wanted. When it comes down to it though, I highly doubt any of the guests at the wedding are going to complain about my hole punch not being heart shaped. If they do, then I am going to personally kick them out of the wedding with all of my hole punch fury.

Okay maybe not, but I would be thinking it.

Has anyone been irritated by something as mundane as a hole punch?


{All photos are personal}

Save The Date Reveal

I have heard from many of my guests that they received our Save The Date, so I think it is time to do the big reveal.

I tell ya what, when you get engaged one of the things you definitely don't plan on is taking forever to make a decision on how to address the envelopes. It took me nearly a week to decide on whether I should hand write, label or print on the envelopes. I finally made a pro and con list to try and figure this out. Ridiculous, but it worked. The final ruling was to print straight on the envelopes, and I think it turned out quite nice. Granted, I had to do them one by one so it took a few episodes of True Blood and Breaking Bad to finally finish them. I decided to use Monterey BT font which is the cheaper (as in free) cousin to the very beautiful Feel Script font.

I ordered carrier cards to keep the magnet in place while it is in the envelope. Although our Save The Date had a serious identity crisis before they were sent out due to the carrier card. We were concerned that people would not know it is a magnet. At first glance it does look like a postcard.

However from the feedback I have received from our guests, they all figured out it is a magnet. I actually had many compliments on the carrier card.

As much as I love the magnets and I find them very functional, we did encounter a small problem with a few of our guests. Some of them have stainless steel refrigerators. For those of you who aren't aware, magnets do not stick to stainless steel. I fretted about this for awhile but finally I said to myself, hey it's not my problem they're all fancy. So yes, we did get demoted to a few filing cabinets and old non-stainless steel garage refrigerators. That's fine by me, at least they have our date saved.

Something funny did happen though while I was assembling all of the Save The Dates. The carrier cards came in a large stack. When I got to the middle of the stack I noticed a pink card with a Bible verse on it. On the back of it was a random website address.

I got SO excited and figured Magnet Street was doing an In N Out Burger secret bible verse thing. (If you haven't had In N Out, you have not lived.) For about a week I was convinced of this theory. I finally decided to visit that random website address that was on the back of the card. Um yeah, it was an actual wedding website for a real couple. That card made it into my order purely by accident. What a bummer.

Other than a few issues like an identity crisis and being useless to our stainless steel refrigerator guests, our Save The Dates turned out great. The simplicity is just perfect and I love that the main focus is the photo.

Did anyone else do magnets for their Save The Dates?

How did they turn out? Did you run into any issues like I did?

{All photos are personal}

I Did It My Way

We chose to have a seventeen month long engagement. People questioned us on this decision over and over again like a broken record. The constant "why are you waiting so long" question got old real quick. When I ran into people they would ask me what I have planned so far, and I would follow up with a laundry list of what I have done. At the end of every conversation they would answer back with a snarky tone and say "isn't it a little early for that?"

This made me constantly second guess myself as to whether I was in fact planning too early. I would receive email updates from wedding websites and it would say I am 360 days out from the wedding and at this point I should start researching venues. I would sit there and think hmm, I did that six months ago. Was that bad? No, it is not.

We chose to give ourselves the precious gift of time. We wanted to enjoy the process of planning and I have had the opportunity to put all of myself into every detail. Why should I have to wait to plan everything just because of a long engagement? I dove head first into planning right after we were engaged. Within two months I had booked the venue, florist, DJ, got my dress and had my shoes. I was able to reserve my favorite vendors because I booked so early. (Except of course the bride who beat me at getting a makeup artist. Who ARE you?!)  Now with eight months out from the wedding, I am working on my guestbook alternative and getting ready to order favors.

Yes I might have done everything early, but ya know what? If I screw up a project, which I have done and will continue to do, I have time to fix it. Fact of the matter is, I am not stressed. Everything is at my leisure. As Frank Sinatra would say, "I did it my way."

I am by no means saying that long engagements are better than short ones. I am here to say that if you are planning a long engagement, stand by that decision and be proud of it because there are so many wonderful perks. Time flies when you are having fun, and I am having so much fun.

Life threw us a great big yummy chocolate fudge sundae when we got engaged, and we chose to put the cherry on top. With sprinkles, of course.

Black vs Khaki

As of two weeks ago, here was my thought on suits for the guys: eh, we will deal with it around two months before the wedding. Well that all changed when Mr. Buck was a groomsman in a wedding last week. While we were at the tux shop getting him fitted I was casually chatting with the lady working there. She mentioned to me that if we order the suits for our wedding by the end of this year, we will ensure this years prices and not have to pay when prices go up in January. Say what? That changed everything for me, plus I am not one to shy away from planning ahead and booking early. Now all of a sudden I have to make a decision on what kind of suit the guys should wear. They have no interest in choosing, if I left it to them this is what they would all show up in:

{Image via Bright Colored Tuxes}

Not going to happen. I have a super powerful title called Bride which means I am allowed to say no to these types of things. We did compromise though and decide the guys can all wear camouflage socks.

Now luckily for us I have seen my fiance in various suits over the years so we kind of have an idea of what each one looks like on him. I now present to you, our 9th through 12th grade prom pictures. Awkward poses in all its glory.

{Photos taken by VIP Photography}

At the wedding that he was recently in, all of the groomsmen wore khaki.

{Personal Photos}

You see we have many options to choose from. Except white, that one is not in the running. We are very torn between black and khaki. The khaki would go well with the outdoor scenery at the wedding, especially since it will be Spring. However the black is classic and timeless. How can I choose? I think he looks smashing in all of them. (Gag, I know.)

Will you help me out a little? What is your take on this black vs khaki dilemma?

Did you also have a tough time deciding on what the guys should wear?

Frank Sinatra Meets Lynyrd Skynyrd

Finding a DJ was something I wanted to do very early on in the planning process. It was among one of the most important vendors to me to book. They are basically responsible for keeping everything flowing smoothly-from ceremony to reception. I was preparing myself for the search to be difficult. You see, my taste in music is quite eclectic. My ipod is fairly interesting to browse through because the main bulk of it is this:

{Images via Amazon}

Lots of Rat Pack music, old country and new country, 90s boy bands and the occasional show tune. Real good stuff. Now on the other hand, this is what Mr. Buck listens to:

{Images via Amazon}

Yup, that is pretty much it. He's a simple kind of man. He doesn't have an ipod and the only time he listens to music is in the car. As you can probably imagine, our road trips are pretty interesting. One minute you are listening to That's Amore and the next is Sweet Home Alabama. 



Which means that we needed to find a DJ who would accommodate our vast taste in music. I have been to many weddings where the music is only one genre or on some occasions....highly inappropriate. At one wedding my brother and Mr. Buck put in a request for the DJ to play Lynyrd Skynyrd. He actually told them no. What a hater.

I mean if I had it my way, I would have these guys DJ the wedding.

 {Image via DJ Jazzy Jeff}

For some reason though, I don't think they will be available. When I began the search for a DJ I went into it knowing that I was looking for that all around DJ. You know the type...keep the party moving, good personality, well spoken, and play everything that we want. Including playing any requests from our guests.  I came across Joe Kalamaras with SJ's Disc Jockey by recommendation of both my makeup artist as well as my venue. From the reviews I found online, it seemed as though this guy is it. He also has his play list on his website so I was able to confirm that he does in fact play anything and everything. The rave reviews I found online proved to me that he is very experienced. To top it all off he was affordable and within our price range.

We booked him soon after I met him and was able to check that to-do off the list! It feels great to know that we booked a DJ who I am confident will do a fantastic job at the wedding.

Were you picky like I was when choosing your DJ?

Did you try and find a DJ who would be willing to play all types of different music?



Best Wishes: Part Three?

I know what you are thinking. Oh how embarrassing, poor Doe has a typo in her title. Right?

Wrong. I deliberately put that question mark there because I never intended on there being a part three. I am actually quite surprised I am writing a part three for these wish tags, but I am so glad I am. Remember how I ended my last post with wanting to tweak the color palette of the wish tags? I ran out to Michaels, again, last night to find some new supplies that would add some color to this project. By the way, I asked Mr. Buck what his guess is as to how many times I will go to Michaels before the wedding. His guess? Seventy seven times. That seems somewhat high and dramatic, but I guess we will see when it is all said and done.

Well I kind of did more than just tweak the color palette. More like completely change the entire thing. I thought that I should use my colors for the wedding. If I use sage colored tags with light pink embossing, then maybe the wish tags would look like little leaves on the tree. I ended up buying large squares of card stock and then cutting them down into 4 x 6 squares. This was much cheaper than using the pre-cut tags, and I was able to make them bigger to give my guests more room for writing.

After I cut all the squares I ran them through the printer like I showed you how to do in part one. Only this time I made the font larger and added more lines for writing. I also invested a whole $3 in a corner rounder. Best thing ever, it made these tags look so much nicer. I also bought a heart shaped hole punch for the top to be able to string the ribbon through. Although this is the must frustrating hole punch EVER. It punches upside down, ridiculous right? And no I am not doing it wrong. I am not sure what to do about that yet, I think I will just have to either have upside down hearts or just use a regular hole punch.



I also bought pale pink embossing powder. Completely glitter free. Remember when I mentioned here how I should be restrained from glitter? Yeah, in part two of Best Wishes I used glitter. I now have glitter sprinkled throughout my house, on my dogs, and embedded on my couch. I should have just said no to the glitter. So this time around I used no glitter, only solid pink. I embossed the exact same way as how I showed you in part two.



I now present to you the tweaked (ahem, completely redone) wish tag project.

Now I get to tackle building the actual tree where these cute wish tags will hang.

How many times did it take you to perfect a project?
Also, does anyone know where I can find a heart shaped
hole punch that punches RIGHT SIDE UP?

{All photos are personal}

Best Wishes: Part Two

I think I might have an addiction, to embossing that is. I recently taught myself how to emboss and now I want to emboss everything in my house because it is so dang fun. I wonder how Mr. Buck would react if I embossed his fishing license? Yaaah, probably shouldn't go there.
Now that we have the wish tags printed we can begin embossing the other side of the tags.

1. I was really hoping that I could find sparkly black embossing powder. Unfortunately I could not find any so I opted to buy black and sparkly embossing powder separately. I then mixed them together to obtain the look I was trying to achieve.



2. The first thing you need to do when beginning to emboss is to take your rubber stamp and press it firmly into the embossing ink pad. Just a quick side note before we proceed. Before learning how to emboss, I assumed all ink pads would work. That is not true, you have to buy an ink pad that specifies that it is used for embossing.  

3. Now you need to position the stamp on the center of the tag. Press down firmly on the entire surface of the stamp to evenly distribute the ink on the tag. After you take the stamp off you won't be able to see the design very well because the ink is clear.  Don't freak out, it is suppose to be that way.

4. Put the tag on a plate or something that can catch the extra powder. You need to quickly pour your embossing powder on top of the ink before it dries. Make sure to cover it very well. 

5. Now you need to shake off the extra powder from the tag. The powder will stick to the design but make sure to clear off any little stragglers that you do not want on the tag.



6. Now it is time to grab that embossing heat tool and get to work blow drying the design. The key is to move the embosser in a circular motion and to evenly distribute the heat. Be careful to not keep it on there too long or too close to the tag because it will burn. You will know when it is finished because the design will be perfectly raised.

Here is a closeup view of the embossing. It is slightly hard to tell in photos, but if feel you feel it with your finger it will have loads of texture.



7. The last step is to tie the top with a pretty ribbon, and you are finished!

 

Now don't get me wrong, I love how these turned out. However I feel like they are lacking some color. Before I get started on constructing the tree aspect of this project, I need to perfect these tags. I am going to tweak the color palette a little until I get exactly what I am looking for. Which means I will be updating soon with hopefully a revised version of these wish tags.

Have you ever tried embossing?

Did it take you a few tries to get it exactly right?