becks

Quote: Originally Posted by JenB I contacted rebecca last week and still have heard nothing in return........... Hi Jen: I'm so sorry but I never got your message - I just went through both e-mail accounts and my PMs and didn't see anything that might have been from you. Feel free to e-mail me directly at [email protected] or send me a PM.

I've had really good luck with a tailor in mid-town. I found him totally by accident when I needed some pants hemmed and he's done just about every type of garment for me at this point (dresses, suits, blouses). Plus his prices are reasonable. Mid-City Tailoring 28 W 44th St. (in the lobby of the building), between 5th and 6th - the building is pass through, so the other side is 25W 43rd. (212) 719-2215. Ask specifically for Oscar.

I haven't been to Aruba, but DH and I went to Tahiti for our honeymoon and LOVED it. Don't stay on Tahiti - go to one of the other islands. We spent 5 days at the Sheraton Moorea (really nice because there's an easy boat that runs every hour) and used points to get a regular room and paid for an upgrade to an overwater bungalow - it wasn't too pricey. Note that it is SO quiet at night - there's literally no nightlife on the island at all. However, the thing we did that was even better was a cruise on the Paul Gaugin (Regent). We went to a whole pile of islands, scuba diving, fun trips, etc. And with Regent your alcohol is included in the price so it was a steal. Plus, there's stuff to do at night, fun people to play with, etc. We went in November as well - the weather was PERFECT.

Yeah... mothers in law... I tell every woman I know to marry an orphan. and then I wonder why they laugh. I can't stand mine. And it's next to impossible because everything she does comes from the right place, and is well intended, but it's just so awful. I've had her tell me not to lift heavy things because it would damage my womb (yes, she said womb). I've had her tell me that I should share things with her the way I do with my mom because my mom lives on the other coast. I've had her come to my house (mind you, the day after the housekeeper was there), and offer to clean. I've had her go through my personal papers (while I was at work) and call me to see if she can organize them for me. (Yes, even my tax returns.) I don't like to hug or kiss her when she visits, but she grabs me and kisses me anyway, even when I push her away. And ALWAYS leaves a massive orangy-red lipstick mark on my face. It's never ending. And it doesn't help that my MIL comes from a generation older than my mom and a culture where mothers are invasive. I've sat down with her privately and had conversations about boundaries, and it's helped... for about a week each time. On the white dress, it is inappropriate. And anyone who knows anything about wedding manners knows you don't wear white unless your the bride. Personally, I'd suggest having you FI say something. Like "mom, you know it's unacceptable for anyone other than the bride to wear white. Maybe you should save that for another occasion and find a new dress." Don't get involved in this one. He's your FI's mother, make him control her.

Just tell your dad that he's not walking you down the aisle. Tell him it's not what you envision when you think about your wedding day. Tell him you hope that he isn't hurt, but it's just not what you want. He'll get over it. Him saying that he couldn't wait to walk you down the aisle may have been his way of letting you know that he would be happy to do so if that's what you wanted, rather than an assumption that he would. As far as the dance, do whatever you feel like. We had no official dances (other than to kick things off), and it was a great party. If you don't want a father-daughter dance, don't have one.

I don't have a lot of personal insight, while my parents are divorced, it happened later in my life and they are still friends so it was easy for me. To me, there are a couple of questions you should ask yourself: (1) do YOU want him there - ignore strained relationships etc, do YOU want him there? (2) Is it important to you that he know that you wanted him to attend your wedding? Go with your instinct - if you want him there or want him to know you want him there, send the invite. Worst case, he declines. Good luck!

Everyone loves their monogram and wants to put it on everything! And you should – they are gorgeous, personal and fun!! One of the things that many of my clients ask me is how to use an iron-on transfer so that they can put their monogram on their OOT bags, t-shirts or other items. I figured that I would share with you the things I tell them Here are my hints for using transfers: buy the right transfer paper, pick the right bag (or t-shirt, etc.) know how to flip your monogram printing on the highest print quality you can trim your image iron some more Buy the right transfer paper So, which transfer paper is the right transfer paper? It depends on the color of the fabric you’re putting the image on – dark images need transfer paper for dark fabrics to prevent the color of the fabric showing through the monogram. You don’t want your perfect pale yellow to look like a murky green when you iron it onto that blue bag! If you’re putting the image onto white or cream colored fabrics, you can use transfer paper for lighter fabric. One more note, if you’re putting transfers onto stretchy t-shirt fabric, they also make a stretchy transfer paper. Pick the right bag I mention purchasing the right bag (or t-shirt, or whatever). Buy cotton. Don’t buy synthetics. It takes a lot of heat to get the transfer to work and synthetics will melt and you’ll be stuck with no bag and you’ll need to buy a new iron. How to flip your monogram In order to put your monogram onto your bag, it has to be backwards when you print it. Then when you iron it onto the bag, it’s right side up again. So how do you do it? It will depend on what you have. If you had your monogram professionally done, go back to your designer and let them know what you’re trying to do. Chances are that they will be more than happy to flip your image for you for free or for a nominal charge. If you designed your own in Photoshop or another graphics application, there should be a button that will do this for you. If you designed your monogram in a Microsoft format (Word, PowerPoint, etc.), I find that the easiest way to flip your image is in PowerPoint. Here are some screenshots of how to flip an image: 1. First, open your monogram in Powerpoint. 2. If it’s not already a picture, you’ll need to convert your image into a picture format (I like .png best because it won’t have a background). Here’s how to do that (all the images are from Office 2007, so if you have a different version, I’ll try to tell you where to find the tools): 3. Now flip your image – click on the image, and then go to the Picture Tools menu, select the flip or rotate button and select Flip Horizontal, and you’re set! (other versions, the picture toolbar will be on the bottom of the screen, find the flip/rotate button and select Flip Horizontal) Note that sometimes when you flip a monogram using Powerpoint (or Word) the image can blur a bit. If this happens with yours, you may be able to group the pieces and flip, or you can use the steps above to flip each piece of your monogram one at a time. You may have to adjust the location or level of the pieces as well. Printing Set up your print file – get the image to the size and shape you want and do a test print on regular paper at regular resolution to make sure everything is right. Also, if your monogram is being printed small enough, print more than 1 copy on each – transfer paper is pricey, so the more copies you can comfortably fit on a page, the better. Once you are satisfied that the file prints the way you want, print one copy onto transfer paper at the highest quality you can. The process for this will vary from printer brand to printer brand, but generally, select print, when the print dialog box opens, select properties. In the properties dialog box, there will be a Quality tab. Set the print quality as high as you can. It will use more ink, but your monogram will look so much better on your bags. If your test print on the transfer paper worked, you’re set to print them all. Trimming your monogram Once you have your monogram printed onto transfer paper, you’ll need to trim down as much of the blank space around the image as you can. I try to keep my edges to 1/8 of an inch or less. The transfer paper has a shiny look to it when you iron it on, and it will look better if you can eliminate as much of the blank space as you can, so that your bag doesn’t show so much of the shiny edges. If you have a big white area in the middle of your monogram, this applies to that space as well – use an exacto knife or the tip of your scissors to gently start an area that you can cut out from the middle. Ironing Unfortunately, ironing on a transfer isn’t like taking wrinkles out of your favorite light cotton blouse. Actually, it’s sort of like trying to squash a big bug. Press hard, and press for a really long time to make sure it’s good and dead. Or in this case, stuck. When I do transfers, I actually use a wooden cutting board (get a new one or wrap it in a couple of cotton pillowcases to keep your bags clean) rather than an ironing board, and I set it on the garage floor – concrete which won’t burn or dent if I drop the iron on it. And yes, the floor – the lower it is, the more of your bodyweight you can lean on the iron. Set your iron at the highest setting, and turn the steam off. Position your transfer on the bag where you want it, and jump in. Spend a LOT of time on the edges – if anything is going to go wrong, the first thing will be the edges peeling. Move your iron in little circles, but keep it moving, and press down. Transfers are sticky when heated, so the more pressure you put on them, the better they will stick. And really iron – figure that for a 4x4 monogram you’ll want to spend at least 2-3 minutes ironing each one. If yours is bigger, it will take longer. One last note – be prepared, you’re going to ruin at least one bag. Probably two. It’s just the way it is. But order a couple more than you have to have. You can keep the ones you ruin as a reminder of how much loving effort you’ve put into your planning. Plus, they make good reusable grocery bags. (As one of my favorite clients once said… saving the world one ugly bag at a time) Good luck! Be sure to post pictures!

Quote: Originally Posted by Future Mrs. Griffith So they didn't have to grind down your nails like with normal gel nails?? I really wanted great nails for the wedding but also didn't want ruined nails when the tips came off so this is a great alternative! Thanks for sharing! Nope, no grinding. They do buff the surface down a bit - they need to take off the very top layer to make sure they stick, but nothing like the old gels with tips. And when they take them off, you can have a plain old mani and you'd never know. Even clear polish will look fine. Putting it on takes a little longer than a regular mani - probably about 40-50 minutes. Taking it off takes about 30-40 minutes, so when I took off and put back on it was about an hour and a half.

I'll apologize in advance for the quality of the photos (cell phone...), but here are a couple of photos for those who want to see. This is one layer of "Bubble Bath" and one layer of "Passion". It looks a lot like Essie's Mademoselle/Sugar Daddy which is what I used to always wear in a regular mani.

Thanks for the kind words Crystal! You are such a gem to work with I can't even tell you! I'm so glad you're happy with them; it was an honor to have a small part in your planning efforts!

Voted. We need to get more people on this!!! Dumb #1 and #7!!

Quote: Originally Posted by Mischaka and what salon did you go to?? Quote: Originally Posted by ErinB Do you mind me asking how much it was? My salon is out on Long Island - Sway Nails & Spa in Manhasset - but if you get desperate, you can walk from the train station. I paid $35. Not bad, given that I normally pay around $12 each week - acutally saved me $1!

I am LOVING the OPI Axxium Soak-Off Gel Laquer!!! I had mine done three weeks ago (yup, THREE weeks) before hubby and I went on vacation. We were in central america, went hiking, scuba diving, and all the sorts of things that would ruin a manicure in about 5 minutes. Even on a good day, my regular manicures start chipping in about 3-4 days. But this one lasted for 3 weeks. While you could see where it's grown out (I used a sheer pale pink so it was hard to see), it was still really shiny and unchipped 3 weeks later. It takes a little longer than your usual manicure - mine took about 45-50 minutes - because the set the gel with a UV light. And they didn't file the bejeezus out of the surface of my nail - they just buffed it down a tiny bit, which made me so happy. They soak it off with polish remover which took a while, but my nails looked normal and healthy when it was gone. And while it was on, they didn't have that thick appearance like acryllic nails do. Anyway, not all salons are doing these so you may have to hunt a bit - but how fabulous to know that your nails are going to hold up to a week in the sun/sand and still look great on your wedding day!!!

I'm sorry she's stepping on your toes. That's not fun! But seriously, don't worry about it. Tell her in no uncertain terms that you do not want to hear ANYTHING about the resort or her experience. Tell her that you want it to be totally new to you because you want your wedding experience to be a something totally unique. Tell her that one of the reasons you picked the resort was because you didn't want anyone attending to give you input, so that it could be totally yours and yours alone. Get your FI on board, too. And then anytime she opens her yap to tell you that you should *whatever*, hold up your hand and tell her you want it to be new when you get there, and walk away. Oh, and yeah, that's not a nice thing for her to do. But MILs are a pain. I still tell everyone I know to marry an orphan.

Wait... you post here before you even call me?? Oh, that's just not right. But CONGRATS!!!! I'm so excited for you. And can't wait to lay claim to the guest room!

I can highly recommend the fabulous woman who did my makeup. She's in Queens - I actually flew her down to Mexico for the wedding - it was one of the best decisions I made. Actually, DH made the decision - he took one look at me after the makeup trial and asked her to come down. She's really amazing. Her name is Alisha Rogers. I'm pretty sure she doesn't want her cell and e-mail posted on a public forum, so I'll PM them to you.

I think you used the html code instead of the image code from photobucket.

Don't sweat it. I've been married for a year and a half, and I still make reference to "my boyfriend". Fortunately, DH thinks it's hysterical.

if your perforator is a handheld, just dump it. They are miserable to work with. Get a Michael's coupon and go pick up a rotary trimmer with a perforating blade. At 40% off you can probably find something for under $20. Something like this would be fine, just make sure it's long enough to fit the width of the cut you're wanting to make (so if you've got 8-1/2x11 paper, and you're cutting the short length, then 9 inches is enough. If the other way, go with a 12-inch cutter. Good luck!

Jannae - here's another idea, because I suffered from the same sorts of symptoms for weeks and weeks before a secondary symptom took me to a different type of doc. Acid reflux can have these symptoms. I had no symptoms of acid reflux, except really, really intense shoulder, lower back and neck pain - especially on my right side (I sleep on my right side). It went on for so long without easing, then (thank god) I started getting a weird tickle way at the back of my throat. I went to see an ENT, he stuck a scope up my nose (sorry if TMI), looked around, pulled it out and asked if my back and shoulder hurt. Amazing. So for months I was in excruciating pain. He told me to try a 14-day regimen OTC prilosec, cut back on acids and coffee and see how it went. The pain was much better in about 4 days and gone in about 10. Now whenever I get a sore shoulder, I pop a prilosec along with my Advil. Maybe that's what you're experiencing, maybe it's not. But the $15 investment in a box of Prilosec can't hurt.

Does your printer have a manual feed option (like if you were printing on legal or something?) If so, give that a shot. It sometimes also helps if you stand there and put gentle pressure on the sheet to feed in into the rollers. Also, some printers have a slot in the back that allows for "straight feed" printing. Short of that, if you are using metallic or some of the glossy finishes they can sometimes be too slick for your rollers - try opening up the printer and gently rubbing the rollers with an old nylon stocking - it adds a little friction to the grip. (And please don't ask where I come up with this stuff... )

Hi Jessica! Worst case, you can use glue lines (get them from Michaels next to the glue dots). They stick to everything. They are stretchy, so you can stretch one from corner to corner of the label and then wrap it around the chapstick. Good luck!

Oh sweetie. I'm so sorry you have to go through this. It's so wrong. All the advice you've been given is good. I'd suggest what others have said and explore some counseling. And talk to him. From what you've shared, it doesn't look like it's innocent, and given that he's told you he'd ceased contact with her, there aren't any excuses. But figure out what's really going on and follow your instincts. I hope that there's some way through this for you, but if there's not, I'm glad you found out sooner rather than later. Big hugs!!!!! We're here for you, whatever you need.

I like that Morgan! It has a vaguely slate-like texture, it's too bad it's not just a little bit more mottled in color or it could pass for slate. And where you wanted to dress it up, just put an area rug on it. But wow, I didn't realize that rubber flooring was so expensive! $8 for a square foot is a lot - you can get tile for less than half that.