This month I celebrated a birthday and for my birthday, my future mother-in-law gifted me a super cute ring bowl from Paloma's nest on Etsy. Paloma's Nest handmakes these little bowls in Austin, TX and customizes them to say whatever you'd like. Mine says, "With this Ring" and "09.18.09" (the wedding date). Until (and after) the wedding, I'll be using this little beauty to hold my ring when I'm doing something where I can't wear my ring. (Like putting on self-tanner or rock climbing or chopping firewood). And at the wedding, one of the groomsmen will carry it down the aisle with our rings. Ooh, and at Christmas, we can hang it on our tree! Anyway, it came in the other day in the cutest packaging.
And here's what the bowl looks like. (Sorry you can't really read it, but I just snapped a pic with the ole phone.)
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
With this ring
Wedding dresses, wedding dresses everywhere
I don't know if it's a spring thing or what, but I'm seeing wedding dresses made out of random objects in store windows all over town. Here are a few I thought to snap up with the iPhone.
Dress made of wedding china at Bed, Bath and Beyond
Dress made of wedding china at Bed, Bath and Beyond
Dress made of Tile at a Bathroom studio
Dress made of paper at Kate's Paperie
Dress made of paper at Kate's Paperie
Monday, March 30, 2009
How to leave feedback
I've had a lot of people asking how to leave comments back on the actual page, so I thought I would just lay it out on the blog itself. It's pretty simple.
Just scroll to the bottom of the post you want to comment on.
Click "Comments" (it probably says "0 Comments" or "2 Comments")
That should open a box where you can leave your own comment.
If this still isn't working for someone, just let me know. And please, comment on the posts! It makes me feel like someone out there is actually reading these!
Mary
The Magic Bridesmaid dress
Finding bridesmaid dresses was pretty tough for me. I didn't want anything that looked like a bridesmaid dress (or really was a bridesmaid dress.) So no taffeta or satin or bows. Like at all. Originally I just wanted to ask them to pick any blue dress of their choice. But eventually, it turned out that this was more stressful for the bridesmaids who (very sweetly) actually wanted some guidance. But what could I do short of just picking dresses and then having that matchy look that I'm so not into? Enter Butter by Nadia. Nadia (whomever that is) makes these great wrap dresses that can be worn in at least a dozen different ways. And they're one size fits all. Really. So I just pick one dress and everyone can still customize their own look. Genius right? And I've read reviews swearing that they really are flattering on every figure and several styles are bra-friendly. The only downside I could see was the price. These babies run about $250! I felt like that was way too much to ask my friends to pay. (even though they can definitely wear it again. for those that wear dresses.) Luckily, (I'm truly bridally blessed) bridesmaid Kristen stepped in and volunteered her mom to make the dresses for us at cost! Yay! Awesome magical bridesmaid dresses back on! She's in the process of making a sample dress now, and if that works out, the only thing left is finding the material and figuring out how to convince her to make me one too! Check out below to see some of the many, many styles this dress can be worn in.
And here's a video demonstrating how to wear one of the styles:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ja_6tafFbMA
The Rehearsal Dinner
One of the aspects of the wedding weekend that I'm really excited about and not at all stressed about is the rehearsal dinner. It is being hosted by the future in-laws and...is already totally planned! Done. Yay! When Matt and I first started talking about doing the Austin wedding, we talked about trying to work in as many of our favorite places as possible. One stand out choice was Guero's Taco Bar. Guero's is a landmark in Austin. It's a favorite of President Clinton--who purportedly loves the El Presidente plate and they swear he eats the whole thing. It's also been in a couple of movies, most recently in Tarantino's Grindhouse. It's just a great taco bar (with free salsa bar!) and a great place to relax. It also features live music and is within walking distance to our hotel. So perfect right?
Unfortunately, when we looked at their website they specifically said, no rehearsal dinners. Really. Literally spelled it out. So we were super bummed and started looking into a replacement. I put out a Facebook message to all my Austin peeps asking for a recommendation and a former teacher of mine from UT replied. He had some feedback on other places, but also said he's old friends with the manager from Guero's! He said he'd see what he could and....wait for it...he actually did it! He emailed me the next day to say that the manager was willing to work with us! It took a bit longer to get the manager on the horn b/c he was vacationing, but he told us that as long as we didn't do it too late, he could seat our whole party together and we could hang on the patio and listen to free live music while we wait.
So that's done! The place already has a great decor, so no worries on that. The menu is already set. So that's done. I guess I could make rehearsal dinner invites if I have time, but that's it. So yay! Check it off the list and get hungry for some tacos!
The patio and live music venue.
The front porch.
Tarantino filming Grindhouse.
Pound for Pound challenge
Because I'm getting married and my sister's getting married and my fiance's sister is getting married, pretty much everyone I know is trying to lose weight right now. (Also, bikini season! I know, I know. That was mean.) Anyway, while doing my favorite workout--watching Biggest Loser--I heard about a great motivation for losing weight.
Kraft and The Biggest Loser are sponsoring the Pound for Pound challenge. They're asking for people across America to pledge to lose weight this spring and for every pound lost, they will donate the equivalent of 1 pound of groceries to a local food bank. You need to report your weight loss between April 1st and May 5th, but so far more than 2.5 million pounds have been pledged! There's also recipes, workout tips and videos from the Biggest Loser trainers to help. But I say, don't think of this as more pressure to look better, think of it as great motivation to help others by helping yourself. It's a great cause and hopefully will talk you out of that second dessert after dinner!
Check out details at www.pfpchallenge.com.
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
Pingg without the Pong
I just found a new email invite service that I LOVE. Pingg.com is such an awesome service. There you can create email invites using images from professional artists, photographers and event stylists like Martha Stewart. Or you can upload your own image to make a custom invite. Almost all the designs are free (custom designs are always free) and the emails take you to a customized web page that manages all your rsvp's. You can also add pictures from your desktop or from a flickr feed, videos from youtube, links from anywhere and there's a message center for guests to mention how excited they are to come. (or how sad they are they can't come.) The designs are organized by theme such as baby shower, wedding, bachelorette party, March Madness, birthday, girl's night out, etc. But probably the coolest part of the service is all the ways they can contact people for you. Obviously they can reach people through email. But they'll also post a shareable invite on Facebook, Myspace or about a dozen other social networking sites. And they'll text message your guests...for free! Yup, they'll text for the first invite, to remind slackers to rsvp and to get people excited the day of. And they'll send an email thank you to everyone who rsvp's yes the day after the event. So civilized!
Here are some of my favorite free designs.
But what really, really sold me on Pingg and the reason I went with them for my sister's bachelorette party and bridal shower (2 events, not a weird combo), is that they will print, address and mail real invites for you too! Yes, they really do everything. Now, you do have to pay for the print versions and right now they only come in a postcard version, but at $1.25 each where you don't have to do anything but put in the info, not bad! And if you type in "print20" at checkout, you get an extra 20% off printing.
Anyway, here is a look at the custom Pingg invite I designed for my sister's bridal shower.
All the info will be printed on the back and has already been mailed out to our peeps. And here's the accompanying web site:
http://www.pingg.com/rsvp/mzynt4d45b84qcjdk
So what do you think? Will any of you be using Pingg soon?
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