Laine & Pete

Pete’s family (Carolyn, Patty, Kathy, & Jill) hosted a beautiful bridal shower for me a little over a week ago. It was amazing, Martha Stewart has nothing on these ladies. Carolyn planned everything with a Parisian theme since she and I often talk about how she HAS to go there, and how much I love it.

It was held in the banquet room at LoRusso’s Cucina. There was a beautiful cake, delicious food and each guest received an Eiffel Tower cookie, artisan soap, and individual gift to take home.

I was blown away, they should start a party planning company and do this professionally. Check out pictures below:

Lately there has been a lot of buzz about some new websites popping up that offer deep discounts on high end designer merchandise. Some examples designers are Manolo Blahnik, Armani, Marc Jacobs, Nicole Miller, and BCBG.

Unfortunately, most of them are invite only. The good news is I’ve managed to get invitations for all of them, and now I’m paying it forward.

Here’s the list

• Glam List: Use my email
• Editor’s Closet: Use my email
• The Top Secret: Leave comment for an email invitation
• Ideeli: Link will gain you access to register
• Hautelook: Open registration
• Gilt: Link will gain you access to register
• Rue La La: Use my email

If you are required to enter a referring email when signing up just enter lainestl@gmail.com as the address, and you should be able to gain access. If you have any trouble just leave a comment below and I’ll send you a direct invitation.

Pete’s father is generously hosting our rehearsal dinner, it somewhat snuck up on us so instead of ordering invitations I ran down to Target to pick up some DIY invites. I’m actually pretty impressed with their Papyrus and Letter Impress lines. I went with the Baroque wedding invitations (only $35 for 50) and used the response cards as direction cards and printed everything at home. They turned out really well and are a total steal.

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I wanted to make sure the wedding rehearsal information was on the invitations as well and couldn’t find any wording examples. With the help of the girls on the knot I came up with this:

Mr. and Mrs. John Doe
request the pleasure of your company
at the wedding rehearsal and dinner for
James Doe and Jane Smith

Ceremony  Rehearsal
Friday, the fifteenth of May
Five o’clock in the evening
Spring Haven Mansion
545 East Main Street
Hendersonville, Tennessee

Rehearsal   Dinner
Friday, the fifteenth of May
Six o’clock in the evening
Bluegrass Yacht & Country Club
550 Johnny Cash Parkway
Hendersonville, Tennessee

R.S.V.P. to John & Jennifer Doe (555) 222-3333

I’m not doing a hair & makeup trial with my stylist, because it wasn’t exactly in the budget and she’s 300 miles away. So, I started looking around online for some pictures I could show her so we could come up with the wedding day look. I came across the best online makeover tool I’ve ever seen. InStyle has a great little online application you can use to upload a picture of yourself and try on makeup and hair styles. It looks pretty realistic too, which is the key advantage over other tools I’ve found. You can also try on completed looks if you are makeup challenged like me. Check out the tool here.

Finally! For some reason I’ve anguished over this decision, probably because it’s so difficult to really judge jewelry online. I also didn’t want to pay an arm and a leg for “fashion jewelry”.

I nearly bought a pair from ebay, but they were a little small. There was a pair on Overstock I was eyeing, but the reviews were pretty lackluster. I kept coming back to a gorgeous pair of crystal vintage style earrings on White Aisle. Although they weren’t exactly dirt cheap ($60 + shipping) they also didn’t break the bank. Hopefully they look as beautiful in person as they do on my computer.

Since I had such a rough time finding these I thought I’d list off some sites that have great vintage style bridal jewelry. Unfortunately just googling “bridal jewelry” magically transports you back to 1987.

• White Aisle
• To Die for Jewels on ebay
• Anna Bellagio
• Adorn Brides (for renting fine jewelry)

Yes, I said cheap. Only because I spent about three months googling “cheap mantilla veil” with absolutely no luck at all, so hopefully this post will save another bride some time and frustration.

I finally ended up finding my veil via a fellow bride on The Knot who had purchased hers on ebay. The seller is Enchantment for All, and I picked up an ivory fingertip mantilla veil for $34 + shipping (as of the date of this post, prices were down to $25), cathedral veils are just $60.

It came in and it’s beautiful. Now it doesn’t quite compare to the $985 veil I found, but I think I’ll survive. I also think I should go into the veil production business if there are people out there who will pay a grand for some tulle and lace.

A couple years ago I co-hosted my sister’s bridal shower. Since she had a pretty sizable guest list I wanted to do bridal bingo to hold everyone’s  attention while she opened the gifts. I searched around online, but couldn’t find any free templates that I liked. I also wanted to do the purse hunt game, but ended up in the same situation.

So, I created them myself. If you want to use them, here they are. Just download and print on 5×7 paper. You can also edit the content if you’d like, since it’s in Word.

Bridal Bingo

Purse Hunt

Since we just booked the honeymoon we decided to go shopping today and pick up some (really cheap) beach clothes. We still want to look good, but these aren’t things we’ll wear everyday (OK, maybe Pete will) so there’s no reason to break the bank. Here are our finds:

Laine

Blue Sun Dress | Maroon Maxi Dress | Paisley Dress | Purple Maxi Dress

Pete

Pinstripe Shirt | Cargo Shorts | Linen Slacks

My mom finally found her dress! She’s been looking for a while but hadn’t had much luck, so we’re all excited about this. We searched all over: Dillards, Macy’s, Nordstroms, Saks, Neiman Marcus, the list goes on. Mom finally found a beautiful affordable dress at David’s Bridal (surprisingly). Check it out on their site here, and below is my hot mom in the dress:

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This is for the fellow brides who are tearing their hair out trying to manage guestlists, budgets, thank you notes, vendors, etc. I’m a little OCD about keeping these things organized, and quickly realized that my (completely useless) wedding planning book was not going to cut it. So, I started looking for electronic options. I’ve tried just about everything out there, here are the best ones I’ve found:

• Good ole Excel: I found a killer spreadsheet from Indiebride via Weddingbee. It’s called The Tracker, and it rocks. It’s great if you want to keep everything local and know excel pretty well. You can download a copy here.

• WeddingWire: This is what I use, the spreadsheet is great but Weddingwire is much more user friendly. It allows me to grant access to Pete or anytone else who needs to have access to the guestlist. It has a really impressive seating chart tool, which is more sophisticated than any of the ones I’ve tried that you have to pay for. You can manage your gifts, thank you notes, guestlist, RSVPs, budget, vendors, etc. It’s completely free also. Sign up here.