Wedding Wednesdays: The Dress

As an avid watcher of Say Yes to the Dress (judge me, I don't care), I can honestly say I haven't watched it once since I brought home my wedding dress. The show is so right (like, you won't end up liking what you thought you wanted) and so wrong (why would you EVER spend THAT much money for a dress?!) for many reasons and lucky for me, my dress experience was an absolute breeze. My Mom flew in for a long weekend. I took a Friday off of work and made three appointments. This may come as a surprise, but I didn't invite anyone else. With my family living in Ohio, wedding plan was all done via email, text message or Facetime calls. I knew I would get so many moments to spend planning and preparing with Mike's family and my closest friends, so this one special day and important life event was just for me and my Mom. Plus, the thought of walking out to a crowd of people ready to "Ooo and Ahh" or "Boo and Hiss" made me sick to my stomach!

I did have some dress options in mind when I started looking. I liked more of the column look, lace, vintage, no silk, fluffy, sparkles, yes to the possibility of sleeves or blush color and it had to be ready in five months. Easy enough, let's go. Silk was our first stop. It's a consignment shop, where all the dresses were runway samples, once wedded or were purchased before but not wedded. The woman helping us was amazing, and we had the whole store to ourselves. I loved that she didn't put me in anything that was so many sizes bigger (because you won't get the right idea of how it'll fit after alterations), nor did she let us get out of our price range.

The first dress I tried on, The Big Bird Dress, as my stepdad called it, actually took my breath away. I liked it! The bird-like ruffles were a little jarring at first. But reality sank in. I was a bride and holy shit, I just tried on my real first wedding dress. Ever. Sounds so silly and little-girl-princess type of stuff, but it was like I saw myself as this woman I didn't recognized. I grew up. I have my own life, my own car, an awesome house, a professional career and soon a great guy to call my husband. My Mom, who was snapping photos of me in these big white gowns was going to be the Mother of the Bride and I was that Bride. Of all the emotions I was preparing to experience that day, dignified and uplifted weren't at the top. I digress...

I tried on two more dresses at Silk, left for lunch where I ate a giant Philly Cheesecake for lunch (yes, the greasiest, fattiest lunch a shopping-for-her-wedding-dress bride shouldn't eat), then went to Ava Clara to try on, what seemed like, 20 more dresses. The store was nice and had lots of beautiful dresses to choose from, but none were like the fit and flare, lacy, strapless style from Silk. So, needless-to-say, we went back to Silk, tried on the third dress again, my mom cried and that was that! We bought the strapless, sweetheart neck, lace Tara Keely dress on the spot and believe it or not, not one single alteration had to be made to it!

It definitely was not what I originally had in mind, but I fell in love with it more and more each time I looked at it. The dress was perfect for the venue, the evening and me. Most importantly Mike loved it - and me in it!

It was also fabulous for twirling!

Wedding Wednesdays: My Grandmother's Dress

My Grandma Barb is on the right. My Grandpa is on the right and her sister, Alice, is on the left. 

When we were cleaning out my grandmother's house a few years back, we came across her wedding dress. In a plastic shopping bag. In the bottom of her linen closet. I imagine in 1947, most women didn't pay to preserve their wedding dresses. In my grandmother's case her sister made her dress (by hand, then made herself a matching one) and probably didn't see the need.

Fast forward 67 years when my Mom brings the dress to me the weekend we go shopping for my own wedding dress. Obligatory photo in Grandma's wedding dress:

It actually fit! And the peplum style is totally in right now. But with the yellowing, stains, rips and button-up turtleneck look, it just wasn't the dress for me. I knew I wanted to make use of it either in my bouquet or some special piece in the wedding. I found this arrangement and it served as my inspiration for the project.

I researched the best way to clean yellowed silk, turns out Woolite was the best option. I took a deep breath and cut the dress into several different sections. I soaked each piece for 10-15 minutes, then hand-washed them and hung (throughout) the house to dry.

I didn't realize just how much material was actually used in the dress, so this process took days! I tried different flower techniques, new shapes of petals, tried incorporating my Mom's lace from her veil, but Martha and a little tweaking to my own styles won in the end. Once I got into the groove, the flowers came along quickly. I found the pine cone and Dusty Miller sprigs at Michael's and decided two use just two colors from my wedding bouquet as a pop of color. The last issue I had to deal with was the vase. We decided these flowers would be with the remembrance candles the mothers light at the beginning of the ceremony, so it had to be bigger in size and quite a statement. Three weeks before we wedding, we were visiting friends in Charlotte and I was told to check out Old Time Pottery. Thank goodness I did, because I found this stunning Mercury glass jug for only $20!

It was hard to imagine our wedding day without my Grandmother there. We shared so many wonderful memories together, and she would have loved every second of the day. With this arrangement, I felt like she was a part of the entire evening. Not to mention, I think she would have been impressed that I took her trashed heirloom and made into something we can cherish forever.

Wedding Wednesdays: The Bachelorette Party

There's no doubt about it, I have the absolute best friends a girl could ask for. These girls, located across the country, and around the world, managed to plan the most perfect party that was fit just for me. We decided the party had to be the Saturday before the wedding (which fell on a Wednesday). I gave the girls a guest list, a list of my favorite food choices in Norfolk, and requests of possibly Granby Theater, Bugatti's, and black, white and gold.

Fast forward through many secret video conference calls, mysterious 'party planning committee' email chains, many "I don't know if I'm supposed to tell you this" conversation starts, several "what do you really want" questions and general excitement to the ultimate Bride Rite of Passage, December 27th finally arrived.

I was sent to my Mom and Stepdad's hotel room while the girls prepped our house for party central. When I returned, gold balloons filled the rooms, white flowers adorned all the surfaces, handmade black, gold and white banners adorned the walls, it was beautiful! They ordered mini biscuit sandwiches, lemon bars, potato salad and cole slaw from my Norfolk favorite, Handsome Biscuit! Along with Sue-made people chow and chex-mix, cheese and crackers, veggies and hummus and snacks, the spread of food was phenomenal.

Once the wine got flowing we played a drinking game consisting of questions Mike had previously answered about me. Some interesting tidbits about me and Mike were revealed, as was a new term for his least favorite pair of my shoes (i.e. shooties). It was absolutely sweet, totally embarrassing and just splendid. All the girls were asked to write a note or piece of advice to me, were photographed by my sister's Polaroid camera and then combined to make a wonderful scrapbook of the night.

Around 10 p.m., we made our way to Granby Theater for an awesome VIP Party Box...complete with Justin Timberlake! And by Justin Timberlake, I mean a life-size cutout of the [second] man of my dreams! He was waiting for me at the entrance of our VIP box, along with a bottle of champagne, snacks and a endless attention from EVERYONE in the club.

The rest of the evening contained the normal bachelorette debauchery one would expect, and will be left to your imagination. So many memorable and un-rememorable moments of the evening though (seriously, Emily, what happened to that necklace?!)! We finished the weekend out by taking my mom to her first Drag Yourself to Brunch show. I'm pretty sure she was loving every second of it, as the rest of us were trying the 'hair of the dog' method to soothe our bodies from the previous nights' festivities. I was left feeling incredibly enchanted to have such incredible girls in my life to spend a great celebration weekend with. I haven't had all my friends together like that in many, many years and know it will be many, many more before I get to enjoy them all together again.

Wedding Wednesdays: The Ring

I guess I never fully explained the story of my stunning engagement ring. My Godfather, Uncle Carl (who was actually my Mom's uncle), was one of my most favorite people in the world. He was married to my grandmother's sister, and even after Aunt Alice's sudden death - and him remarrying - he still remained a big part of the family. Uncle Carl was almost 60 when I was born, but I still had so many connections with him. He was a typesetter for the Youngstown Vindicator newspaper for years. He would share stories of the newspaper industry, the deadlines, the changes in machinery, I found it all so interesting (maybe that's where my love of newspapers started?). I would write to him through high school and college and send newspaper articles I had written or photos I had published. He'd always write back with an enchanting story and how proud he was of me.

After he passed away in 2011, my Mom gave me a fancy black box, in it, a necklace. It was a gold choker with 9 graduated brilliant cut diamonds. My Uncle Carl had bought it for Alice and later had given it to my Mom, who wore it on her wedding day. My Mom recognized that I wasn't much of a gold (or a choker) kind-of-girl, and that the clasp was a little iffy, so wearing it in general could be a little dicey. She said that maybe one day I could use it as a ring, or trade it in for something I would actually wear. We kept it in her jewelry box for a year or so, then I approached Mike.

"I'm going to give you this and I'm not going to ask about it, or look for it, or say anything else...but if you ever wanted to use this as an engagement ring, you can." That's what I told Mike in late 2012 and didn't see the necklace again until March 2014, as an engagement ring.

photos by DCPG photography + design

Mike worked with the jeweler at Either Ore in Strawbridge who created a couple different custom designs. Since the diamonds were all different shapes (the one in the necklace center was the biggest, and they all decreased in size from there), it certainly wasn't an easy task. The diamond cluster came out just brilliant. After six years of dating, when Mike took the ring out of his pocket as he was proposing, all I could think was, "Oh my goodness, did he really do it?! Is this really it?" - concerning the ring, and not the actual proposal, haha. Of course I immediately snapped out of it and listened to all his sweet words, then the cheers of all the tourists who had gathered around our picnic on Colonial Williamsburg's grounds. It was certainly a perfect day, and the most perfect way to hold dear of piece of someone so very special to me.

Wedding Wednesdays: Invitations

As a graphic designer I have been thinking about creating my own wedding invitations for years. My typical design style is bold & busy. For our wedding invitations I wanted something beautiful. Something just, stunning, with pretty script fonts and pale colors. I confess, I also wanted an elaborate map, a schedule of events, a policy-sized (4" x 9") invite, possibly a photo strip, baker's twine, a paper bag, printed envelopes and perhaps a custom stamp! In my first attempt, I created seven different font combinations, only to be denied by The HTB. In my second attempt I tired all new fonts, introduced some colors and still, he was not impressed. Honestly, neither was I.

So I took some time off from designing. I looked over and over at the collection of the invites I loved. I made the HTB look at hundreds of invites to get me going in the right direction. I finally realized that while I loved the beautiful scripty invitations, they just weren't us. It wasn't my design style so everything I designed just wasn't good enough. Plus, I hated the way a capital A was looking in every script font I picked! I found some serif and sans serif fonts we were both really digging and all of a sudden, the invitations were starting to come together. We kept all the designs to ourselves until they were almost complete. I think we surprised quite a few people with the designs and color choices, but we couldn't have been happier with the outcome.

I will pass along two pieces of advice, which we learned the hard way. 1) Create a numbering system for your RSVP cards (i.e. Aunt Tillie is #16 and a 16 is written on the back of her card in light pencil), because you will get some RSVP cards back without names. 2) Don't use an inkjet printer to print the addresses on the outside of your envelopes. After the Post Office processes them, they'll look like this:

We were lucky in that only one was returned to us and what was on the inside completely blew everyone away so they immediately forgot about the outside (at least this is what my Mom and sister told me after I saw these two arrive in this condition). 

Wedding Wednesdays: The Shower

Outside the Shabby Hollow

These days I'm only lucky enough to make it home once or twice a year (home being Alliance, Ohio, where I grew up and almost all of my side of the family resides). I was excited for both myself and my Mom for the idea of the Bridal Shower. I was looking forward to seeing all of my aunts, cousins and family friends, and catch up on the Alliance - and wedding - gossip.

The Grove Girls, or The Panel as we lovingly call the guests at Buni's house on Saturday mornings

For my Mom, it was something so much more. Living nine hours away from your family, in general, is hard. But planning a wedding via text messages, Facetime, emails and Pinterest is just brutal. My Mom was a Godsend when it came to decision-making, flower critiques and keeping every detail straight. So with the shower, I felt this was her time to shine. Every decoration, color, snack or drink was up to her (except for the games...why are there always SO many games?!). I can't say I was completely surprised with the outcome, only because it's my Mom and I knew this shower would be spectacular...but it also couldn't have been more perfect for me!

Opening presents, the party-planning committee (Debbie, Aunt pat and Serena),
Checking out the Mimosa situation, and the overall cuteness of the cottage

The shower was held at The Shabby Hollow, a small cottage outside of Alliance built completely out of found materials around town. The quaint one bedroom abode is decorated with antiques including several gorgeous handmade quilts. My Mom personalized the event with custom-made invitations from my dear friend, and bridesmaid, Shawn.

Homemade bird feeders, Pinterest - take notes!

All the linens, serving dishes and vases were my Grandmother's. My Mom handmade heart-shaped bird seed feeders and the little cake toppers I had been obsessing over for months (with matching bridemaids birdies as well!), ordered Mars candy bars from overseas, displayed both my grandparent's wedding photos and homemade buckeyes and chocolate truffles as well.

The to-die for cakes, handmade cake toppers and family photos

Not to mention, she served all my favorite foods and my Aunt Jodie ordered two delicious cakes (pumpkin cake with cream cheese frosting and almond cake with a raspberry filling and coconut frosting, um, YUM!) from the best bakery in town. She's insane ... and completely amazing.

Momma and sisterly love

The whole weekend was overwhelmingly remarkable. Family, friends, old traditions, new beginnings. I also have to give a big thanks to Deb, Mike's stepmom. We had planned on flying to Ohio for the shower, but at the very last minute our flights got cancelled and we had to make the nine-hour road trip. She was a total trooper. We managed to get all the gifts in the car so the HTB and I could start making use of the waffle maker and loads of other much-appreciated gifts we received. They say nothing brings together a family like a wedding, and for this particular weekend, I couldn't have agreed more.

Deb, Addy, Me, my Mom and my Aunt Pat

Wedding Wednesdays: Style Inspiration

Excuse my missed post last week. It seems the last week of my 20s required a couple days spent in bed with the flu. Now that I'm all better, a week into my 30s and a few pounds lighter, I'm back to tackle this week's Wedding Wednesdays. Today's topic is style inspiration. People would often ask me what the theme of the wedding was. I had to laugh because it sounded like I was planning a prom, where there would be columns made of poster-board sized playing cards and oversized cardboard dice in every corner.

At first, I called it a Winter Wonderland. But the only Wintery decor was the bag of pine cones I had in mind for the centerpieces. When I opened my June issue of Martha Stewart and saw the above page of nail polishes, I said, "this is it, this is the color palette!" You can imagine the looks I got from basing our colors on nail polishes in a magazine. However, Mike was on board (if we replaced a shade with grey and added a 'greenish'), so neutrals were a go.

From then on out, I started pinning photos on Pinterest like a mad woman. I wanted mix-matched centerpieces. I wanted wood slabs.  I wanted candles, jars, bottles and vases. Short flowers, tall flowers - all felt flowers, with perhaps pink carnations and air plants. I wanted milk glass and vintage findings. I loved the dramatic garlands and swags with the overstated blooms. I have to admit, I keep saying "I", but in reality every image had to pass the groom-to-be (GTB) test ... and there were several ideas that were nixed!

Since the reception hall needed a little help, we wanted to really Wow guests when they walked in with a unique setup. I couldn't let go of the above image, until we realized we just had too many guests attending. We also liked the idea of doing a more simple alter backdrop, and let the flowers - and us - shine.

I started to get really overwhelmed with all the potential ideas. Are there too many directions? Is it too whimsical for a house full of antiques? Where are we going to get all these decorations and how are we going to make it look like these amazing photos. I quickly learned that Pinterest was my friend and worst enemy throughout this planning process. So many of these images are lifted straight from magazine shoots and probably not a reality, for even the most seasoned wedding planner. After gathering all of these images, I had to take a step back and figure out what was completely necessary and actually doable ... which I was still doing three weeks before the wedding!

Wedding Wednesdays: The Venue

This may have been one of the most stressful decisions of the entire wedding. I had always dreamed of this picturesque view of a pond with a giant weeping willow tree, dinner by hanging lanterns and dancing under the stars. Obviously with a December wedding (in Virginia) in the works, this wasn't an option - unless we wanted to be ice skating on the pond and bundled in our parkas. So, no outdoor venues, which automatically cut 75 percent of the options (including Mike's dream of renting a big house on the Ocean and having a week-long wedding celebration...darn :).

My number one choice was the Woman's Club of Portsmouth. This gorgeous venue was recently renovated and would have been perfect for our vintage chic theme. Mike immediately canned the idea of Portsmouth in general, but I called for details and found out we wouldn't be able to stay past 11 p.m., which simple wouldn't do for our NYE wedding.

The Obici House in Suffolk, top
Yacht Club at Marina Shores, bottom

We considered the Yacht Club at Marina Shores, but this venue really shines with warm-weather weddings when you can enjoy the deck and water views. We talked with the event planner at the Obici House in Suffolk, but dates, the commute and rising rates within a week, left us unable to commit.

From top left, The Parlor on Granby, pretty warehouse wedding ideas, The Wells Theater and Vintage Kitchen

We decided it was really important for all of our visiting guests to see where we met and have built our lives together, which narrowed it down to Norfolk-only venues. I tinkered with the idea of the Arts District...a loft, warehouse style wedding? The Parlor on Granby wasn't able to hold our growing guest list of 150. The Texaco Building wouldn't be completed in time. Vintage Kitchen wouldn't return our phone calls. But perhaps The Wells Theater? We were good on dates, fees, it was in our beloved Norfolk ... but we might not have use of the theater because it'd be between shows and sets would be under construction.

Somehow I came across The Woman's Club of Norfolk website, which didn't help one way or another. It was hard to get in touch and schedule an appointment, but when we finally met with Mrs. Miller and walked around the house I started to foresee a wedding. That is, until we saw the reception hall. It was dingy, dirty, the floors were in bad shape and the "stage" was covered in a dark brown poop carpet (the color, not the smell) that was frayed and frankly, terrible. I said thank you and left without a second thought. Mike, on the other hand, was totally in favor. We'll re-carpet the stage, they'll clean the house, we'll rent furniture and have them de-clutter the rooms. These seemed like pretty lofty requests to me. However, as I started to show pictures of the house to family and friends (one being an interior designer), I gained some assurance it wasn't really as bad as I thought.

The reception hall of ugly.

The main house was beautiful and full of history, stunning antiques and pretty much my idea right before my eyes. Once we added decor, food and 150 (drinking) guests, you'll never notice the other stuff, they said. I prayed they were right because we signed the contract and promised myself I wouldn't question it. But I did, until the day of setup.