Re-wearable BM dresses

There's some debate on the re-wearability factor of a bridesmaid dress.  Most BMs don't end up wearing their dress again, and I'd hate to ask my BMs to spend too much money on something they're going to wear once.  On the other hand, what if going for re-wearability means sacrificing aesthetics?  

Let's look at some contemporary contenders for the versatile BM outfit:

• The Little Black Dress.  Every lady has one or needs one in their closet, and there are so many ways to dress one up or down.  No one looks bad in a LBD.  While I love the general idea, I'm reluctant to go with this because potential-MIL is a little superstitious and will say it's bad luck to wear black to a wedding, and WTH, your bridesmaids are wearing black?  Hell no.  I'll give this one up for peace with the MIL.
  
  
  
  
  But look how nice it is when the accessories pop from the black!!
  
• Convertible dresses.  Personally, I think it's a very nifty idea to be able to wear the same piece of fabric 10+ different ways, and it's a great balance of variety and uniformity.  Plus, I think this is a project my mom could whip up inexpensively in not too much time because she's sewn samples of these before for a local designer.  But a lot of reviews of these dresses mention that these dresses don't look great on bustier ladies, and they say it's difficult if not downright impossible to wear a bra with most of the styles.  That's pretty disappointing, and I'd hate to have to tell my BMs they can't wear a bra.
  
  
  
  
  But they look uniform and pretty, no?  Except for maybe the completely strapless on the left over there.
  
  
• Two-piece outfits.  I'm not a fan of the ones closer to formal, traditional two-piece dresses (example).  However, what I do love is the version with a pencil skirt paired with a frilly top and maybe a colorful sash, like pictured below:
  
  
  
  
  This is probably better suited for something closer to the casual side of the spectrum, but I'm sure you can dress up the pencil skirt/frilly top combo to fit a more elegant, formal wedding.

Of these, which one do you think is the most versatile option? Are there other re-wearable options I didn't cover here?

Quick note on rings

Just a quick note here to proclaim my love for Etsy.  I was perusing through their jewelry selection and loved how there was such a big selection with excellent price ranges!  If the mister doesn't get an engagement ring from Etsy, I'd love for us to get an affordable custom set of wedding rings there! :) 

Cute BM dresses!

ModCloth just recently brought this dress back in stock, and I just love the draping detail at the top and that you can wear it beautifully in two ways!  I think it'd be adorable for bridesmaids, but is it too casual?  Accessories would be so key here.  I'd want this for a beach wedding and would have the BMs wear this in varying shades of blue (or whatever theme color I'd choose).

I am also inspired by Cinderella Project's entry on mismatched BM dresses.  Lovin' the mixture of colors look, especially when working with a monochromatic palette:

 

The trouble with doing mismatched BM dresses is figuring out the uniformity aspect: how do I set it up so that the girls still look like my ladies?  Cinderella Project suggests sticking to the same fabrics.  I'd probably also ask that the ladies stick to the same length (likely knee-length) to help with the uniformity.

Honeymoon Registry!

Asian weddings in general don't really include much of a gift registry because cash is the traditional and expected gift.  I wasn't much interested in the idea of a registry at all until I came across the idea of "honeymoon registries."  WHAT IS THIS AWESOMENESS, you ask?  It's pretty much how it sounds: you register elements of your honeymoon--it could be anything like flights, meals, room upgrades, excursions, even the accessories you'd need for your trip!

The site I browsed through to look at samples was Honeymoon Wishes.  They have samples for all the destinations they have.  Here's one from a Cancun registry!

Although I'd still rather have cash gifts to contribute towards building a home, I would entertain the idea of at least a small honeymoon registry if people wanted to register gifts.  Also, this is a great registry alternative if you already have a furnished home with your significant other.

A bit more form-fitting

I saw the following dress from Claire Pettibone's Fall 2010 bridal collection (Willow) and just loved the detailing on the top and back! 

The bottom part of the dress, I don't feel too strongly about.  But this is a gorgeous, unique design that demands an updo! :)

Soda Bar! And other edible/drinkable delights...

The mister and I are not big drinkers (though he can certainly hold his liquor better than I could), so I was delighted to see this:

A soda bar?  Adorable!

These jars are lovely!  Plus it gives us a lot of flexibility on what we'd like to serve, alcoholic or not. :)

Other treats I've run into: HEART-SHAPED MACAROONS. OH.  EM.  GEE. (Click on the image for the recipe.)

Finally, I love how beautiful and refreshing cherries would be to serve as a snack for guests!  This bride had set these up as a post-ceremony snack for guests and had decorated the bags using a Martha Stewart edge punch and a "With Love" stamp she bought from eBay.

Edit: Just saw an idea for a DIY cupcake bar!  I'm not crazy about the execution, but it's another option to consider and could be fun. :)

Hairpieces

I love the crystal headband look!  I found these on Etsy but neglected to save the links to the vendors' sites. :(

Mermaid Silhouettes

Expanding a bit on my last post, I'm going to start looking at mermaid-silhouette dresses for inspiration.  Here are a few I've seen that I like so far:

From Sophia Tolli

From La Sposa

 

From Anjolique Bridal 

From Lazaro Wedding

From Mikaella

First dress?

I was hanging out with girlfriends K and C, whom are getting married themselves (not to each other, though!).  After happy hour, we headed back to K's place for C to try on her wedding dress.  Their friend had bought 3 dresses at a sample sale, so K invited me to try one of them on, just for fun.  It was a mermaid silhouette, one that I hadn't considered before in my browsing for wedding dresses, and I looked fabulously curvy!  I wasn't crazy about the dress itself, but I liked the idea of showing off my figure (and I think the mister would love it, too!).

I wish I had a photo to show you, but I was worried it'd be bad luck before even getting the proposal! :(

Another issue I've come across in the dress search is that I know my mom has her heart set on making my wedding dress.  I'd rather buy a dress and ask her to alter it, but I'd hate to hurt her feelings.  Plus I have 3 more sisters after me, and I see this as "taking one for the team."  But it's been awhile since she's made dresses for people, so maybe she's not as keen on the idea anymore?  Or, as K and C suggested, maybe I could ask her to make my ao dai.  I'll cross that bridge when it comes, but until then I'll keep looking through dresses for inspiration.

Dessert Table

I read somewhere that a standard wedding cake can go anywhere from $2-$8 a person and that couples typically allocate about $500 for the cake alone.  I'm not much into wedding cakes myself (at least based on the ones I've tried).

Without a doubt, I know I'd want to have a small, single-tier cake (maybe double-tier at the largest) for my wedding as part of a great dessert table with all the great desserts the groom and I have enjoyed over the years.  Benefits of a dessert table:

• It accommodates to many different tastes for the guests.  Some people will want the traditional cake dessert, but maybe some will be too full from dinner and will opt for fruit or candy.  Or cookies.  Or jello.  Or pies (hell, I could probably do a pie table alone and still be able to satisfy guests' tastes).
• It can be really affordable, depending on the desserts you decide to go with.  I imagine more candies and cookies will keep the price lower.  A 8" guava cake from Aki's Bakery would probably feed about 12 people (depending how you slice it), and that's $30 ($2.50pp).  Gourmet macaroons costs about $2 a cookie (ouch!), but the costs might be lower if you order in bulk; Trader Joe's supposedly has some frozen macaroons that are actually pretty decent and are $5 for a dozen.  Pies go for about $8-$12 a pie, with each pie feeding maybe 8-12 people ($1-$1.50pp!).  DIY-desserts are the cheapest (boxed brownies on sale for $1 can yield 2 dozen brownies (less than 5 cents a serving!). 
• The dessert table doubles as decor!  If taken the time to set it up nicely, a dessert table could look really stunning.

Okay, so this last one is just mostly about the cake.  I'm not too keen on the actual design of this, but I do love the strawberries!  Feeding each other strawberries instead of cake would be more fun. :)

A list of desserts that could be included (pending budgetary allowances of course):

• Candies: chocolates, gummies, and sour candies
• Fruits (in-season is best)
• Chocolate-dipped
• Tart form
• Parfait form (parfait bar?  Awesome!)
• Pies (chocolate pie, strawberry pie, apple pies with an a la mode option, custard pie)
• Cupcakes (banana cupcakes, s'mores cupcakes??)
• S'mores
• Small ice cream sundae bar (good for a summertime wedding); alternatively, maybe a halo-halo bar!
• Hot chocolate (good for a wintertime wedding)
• Guava cake, banana cake (cupcake forms are also acceptable)
• Doughnuts (could rent a mini-doughnut maker machine and give them out in pairs like "wedding ring" favors)
• Pudding?  Banana pudding, rice pudding
• Brownies
• Cookies (those Japanese cookies that the mister loves so much, classic chocolate chip, baklava)
• Cheesecake

And there's probably a ton more I haven't thought of yet.  I'm sure there could be a game made out of this like an Iron-Chef style contest among tables to see who could make the tastiest dessert. :P

More invites/save the dates!

This is a beautiful, peacock-themed wedding invitation that's vintage-styled and eco-friendly from HouseofHazelnut.  The price says $8, so I assume that means per invitation?  Pretty pricey, but absolutely gorgeous.

The next one is pretty cute:

It's kind of hard to see, so follow this post for a better view and a backstory.

More cake toppers! And other fabulous accessories!

Oh my GOD, I am loving the cake toppers on Etsy.

This one above is from Garden4Arts.  They make these cake toppers in several animal varieties with different accessories, similarly styled to the one above.  Priced at about $60 each + S/H.

Here's a similar set from kikuike.  These are just as adorable, maybe a little more elegant, and the sticker price on this one is $100 + S/H, which looks like the least expensive set Kikuike has on her Etsy site.

From StyleMePretty, these photo accessories caught my eye from a Nashville backyard wedding.  It's a more DIY-version of the popular photo booths you see now in weddings; I like that quite a lot.  I tried to find similar accessories on Etsy, but so far all I can find are these, which are fun but not as cool-looking as their polished counterparts above.

Last but not least, I love this idea of puzzle-style escort cards from 100 Layer Cake. 

See the original post for a better view.  Basically, guests pick up their escort cards and find the corresponding phrase at their seat.

All super-fun ideas! :)

Wayfarers Chapel

I'm one of those Catholic brides who long for the look and feel of an outdoor wedding but are confined to the rules of the Church, which basically say that in order for the Church to recognize your marriage, you'd need to be married in a church.  So I've been looking for a way to reconcile my desire for an outdoor wedding and my parents' desire (and probably his parents', too) that our marriage be recognized by the Church.  One way is Wayfarer's Chapel in Palos Verdes, designed by Lloyd Wright, Frank Lloyd Wright's son.

The boyfriend and I went to visit the chapel ourselves earlier this week.  I think he knows I'm secretly scouting for wedding locations, but we went under the guise of "sightseeing."  And what a sight to behold!

Pros:

• It is breathtakingly stunning.  The soft way the light enters the chapel, the views of the ocean from the cliff side, the modern fountain and small garden surrounding the place... I imagine it'd be a wedding photographer's dream.  It's so beautiful that we'd save money on decorations because the setting is already gorgeous.
• It is tiny.  The website says that the chapel will accommodate up to 100 guests.  This is a huge plus for me; I would want something as personal as my wedding ceremony to be shared only by our closest friends and family, and having a chapel that small makes it easy to limit the guests our parents would want us to invite.  Most people would enjoy the reception more anyway.
• It is in the LA area.  I originally thought that my wedding would be in the Bay Area, but having the ceremony where I grew up (LA area, not Palos Verdes!) would mean a lot to me.  

Cons:

• They are not too keen on letting you choose your music or your officiant.  The music is less of a big deal (though I'd rather not come in with the traditional wedding march), but I worry that the chapel will restrict the participation of a Catholic priest there in order to make it a formal Catholic mass/wedding.  That was kind of the whole point, after all.
• It is in the LA area.  While I'm happy to have the ceremony in LA, I'm not so thrilled about moving the reception away from the Bay Area where I imagine the majority of our reception guests will be.  And splitting the two means doubling the costs of makeup, hair, and probably other vendors I haven't thought of yet.  My friend suggested that I just do the reception in LA, too, but... I don't know, we'll see. (Edit 7/31/10: K suggested that I save money on hair or makeup by hiring her so that my costs there don't double.  Huzzah!  But I don't think that'd be for both hair and makeup.)
• Not a huge con, but the sticker price is $2500 to book Wayfarer's Chapel.  This is not a price that I mind for such a beautiful location and setting, but when you compare this to the cost of getting married in other churches (maybe a few hundred dollars or donation-based), it's a hefty premium.

I have that feeling I got from when I saw the Mark Schneider Kismet ring.  Now that I've seen something that's pulled so much on my heartstrings, it's going to be really hard to let go.

Upcoming Posts!

So excited to be posting again, but have to leave for work soon, so this entry is just kind of a bookmark until I get home. 

Content to look forward to:

• A potential wedding ceremony venue? with pros and cons.
• Some new adorable cake toppers
• An invitation design or two
• Hair styles
• Dress styles I'm considering

DID I FIND THE RING?

Dammit, I fell into a designer ring line and came across this:

It's "Cascade" from Marc Schneider Design. And now that I've seen this ring, nearly all other engagement rings have been ruined.

Though admittingly, I would not be disappointed with his "Kismet" ring either, shown below.

I love that they have such a sleek, contemporary design!

Also, since I've been so concerned about cost, my bestie was telling me about man-made diamonds, also known as synthetic or "cultured" diamonds.  The benefits of cultured diamonds sound amazing!  They're typically about a third of the cost of regular diamonds, have virtually the same physical properties (and are still diamonds... not fake, just created in a lab!), can have color added to them like rare colored diamonds, and don't have the bad press of being "blood diamonds."  I still love the idea of a gemstone engagement ring, but I'm not sure if that's what I'd want for this design.  MAYBE a colored cultured diamond, but it'd have to be in very subtle tones.

Admittingly, I'm not as enthusiastic about the matching bands for these rings.  I guess I'd like a pretty traditional/plain wedding band for everyday wear.  And no Mark Schneider trademark secret heart either.

But I love them!  I think I'd need to try them on to decide!  (Or just let the mister decide and surprise me... that would make me love the ring more, I think, if he had a hand in chosing it, too... as long as I really love all the ring choices equally!)

---

For mens' rings, Marc Schneider has a smaller collection.  I prefer the really simple designs for men's rings, but somehow (and maybe it's just the way they photograph, I don't know), I really like the men's rings on this page, especially "Edge."

Engagement Rings

My bestie asked me about the sort of engagement ring I'd like.  I'd love a pretty ring but know that the traditional diamond sort isn't for me.  Neither is something on the other end, like a Claddagh ring.  So, of course, that leaves the gemstone route.  And I think that's just right for me.

I'm mostly a fan of the blues.

I think of these, the first and the third settings are more my style.  But have I found the right ring like the bestie did?  No, I don't think so.  Maybe it's just one of those things where you need to just try it on--to experience--before you know it's the right one.

Also, depending on the stone, it can be a lot more affordable than a diamond ring.  All the pretty and little to none of the guilt. :)

Adorable Cake (AND CUPCAKE) Toppers!

Lollipop Workshop has the most adorable cake toppers!



Along with these expensive-but-worth-every-penny cake topper, I also love these more-affordable cupcake decals from HelloFrosting:



Saw both of these from InspiredBride.net. :)

Another beautiful gown!

More on the traditional end:

I love the ruffles cascading down this!

Integrating some culture through a second dress

In a lot of Asian American weddings, the bride wears the western-style white dress for the church ceremony and the culturally-traditional wedding dress for the reception.  I hadn't really imagined myself doing something similar, mostly because I'm not really a fan of the Vietnamese ao dai.  But I got excited about wearing a bridesmaid saree to my girlfriend's Indian wedding, and started thinking about it.  Then I saw some modern, sleeveless versions of ao dai recently that made me love the idea.  It's elegant, sexy, and more casual. 

Unfortunately, it's hard to find sleeveless, wedding ao dai online.  So I'm going to post up photos of non-wedding examples that are sleeveless and might eventually inspire a wedding version (either gold/yellow or red).




I love the "halter top" style.

Also, I like how a lot of ao dai layer fabrics with sheer embroidery on top.


Basically, I think what I'm looking for is an ao dai with a strong western spin to it (without just making it white because of the whole "white's for funerals" thing).  That would be an ao dai to best represent me.


Also, because of the nature of this dress, I'd probably have to make it a summer wedding or have it somewhere really warm.  I'm okay with that.  But I kind of wanted an off-peak month so venues and other bookings would be less expensive. :P

Men's Rings

It's hard enough to find the right engagement/wedding ring, but to find a men's ring is even harder!  However, this sweet little number caught my eye:

I saw it on InspiredBride, but the ring is from an Etsy vendor.

Hot Chocolate Vials

I love this for a winter wedding! The vials would also be great for other types of fillings if we're thinking of other seasons. From InspiredBride.