jmastr05

I agree as well!

I have not seen that exact dress before, but it reminds me of some of the Watters & Watters or W Too dresses. You should check out their site(s)!

Appletinis are a crowd pleaser and lime green in color. Midori Sours are also lime green and tasty. They remind me of the sour apple straws. I agree with sxcT that most blue drinks I came across have Blue Curacao in them. I've never had Blue Curacao, so I don't know how it tastes, but it looks good!

I love that song!!!

Ok, here are the prices... Bamboo Arch with white drapes (for ceremony): $325 Plastic chairs with white cover and colored sash (for ceremony): $7.25 Vase with clear marbles (for center piece): $10 Colored table overlays (for reception) $10

I started reading this thread TOTALLY expecting to think that whatever I read, I would probably think it was cheesy. But I agree with ska2M: This idea is a really good one! It's something specific to your destination and it's alcohol! Hard to beat that combination!

I'd vote for head piece. If the destination is windy, and many beach destination are, the veil could become a distraction.

Thanks! It really was easy and inexpensive. I would recommend telling your WC about your plans and asking her to make sure that the length of the stems match the height of the vases. You don't want stems that are too long and then they look weird in the shorter vase.

Just remind him how much it cost to get your makeup done! It'll probably zap that idea right out of his boy brain!

The hotel was the Divi Aruba All-Inclusive, in Aruba. However, to be honest, I'm not sure if the hotel or other vendors were the ones renting me the supplies. My WC was not a hotel employee, but an independant WC who is contracted by various hotels in Aruba (Lissy Lampe of Ceremonies and Celebrations). She took care of everyting. It may have even been her company that owned the supplies. As for the pricing... That information in on my personal laptop, which I don't have with me right now. I'll send include the prices in another post.

I say #1. I love how the orange pops against the white. It's really stunning.

I rented everything: white chair covers, colored chair sashes, white table clothes, colored table overlays, vases for the center pieces, an arch draped in fabric for the ceremony. I wanted to bring as little with me as possible (but I still ended up with 2+ suitcases of JUST wedding supplies). I think it worked out very well. I would explain what I wanted to my WC, and then she would send me a picture to make sure I liked what they were going to rent for me.

There are probably some inappropriate cake cutting songs out there, but I'd be hard pressed to think of one. I think any song you like will be fine. Let's be honest, most of the guests won't notice or remember the song being played while the cake was cut. So if the song makes you and your FI happy, then it's a great one!

I love the antique-y, romantic details of your dress!

I love those pictures! They're awesome!

I have only seen this in the strictest of Catholic churches in Italy. I think it's a Vatican tradition that has stuck around in certain churches. I also think that they may make exceptions for weddings. I attended a regular mass at a Catholic church in Italy. The relative that I went with told me that the more liberal priest at that church would serve Communion to women with exposed shoulders. But the priest conducting that particular mass was not the liberal one, so she didn't even go up for communion (she was wearing a sleeveless dress that covered the top of her shoulders, but stopped short of covering the rounded part of the shoulders). I later attended a wedding at that same church. The bride wore a strapless dress. I am not sure if this was allowed because this time it was the liberal priest conducting the mass, or perhaps the long veil was considered coverage, or maybe they simply were being nice to a bride on her wedding day. I guess you can always ask your WC to confirm with the priest and then not have to worry about it.

I watch too much Food Network, so I know that bakeries can also make edible shells and spray paint or brush paint them with edible color to make them look realistic. The shells on my cake were actually supposed to be chocolate shells. But much the same way 3 tiers turned into 2 tiers, chocolate shells turned into real shells. Good thing I was pretty easy going about the cake! Check out this example: http://www.flickr.com/photos/93372387@N00/3498260885/. The caption says the shells are made of edible gum paste.

Yes, the shells were real. You could tell that they weren't shells from the beach, but purchased shells. We only cut 1 slice, and just avoided the shells. When the wait staff finishes cutting the cake, I am pretty sure that they removed the shells. No one ended up with a shell in his/her plate.

Thanks torilynnsmith. I agree that there is a ring for everyone. I think the split shank makes it work for me. It gives the ring some width and avoids that "string tried around the finger" muffin top.

Yeah, I think I'll end up getting a "wedding band" one day. Maybe for our 5-year anniversary or something. One of my co-workers brought up a good point: When I have kids with whom I'll be playing in the dirt, finger painting, etc, I may want a less fancy ring than my engagement ring, like a wedding band. Although most of the wedding bands I like are also fancy... whatevs, I'll deal with it when the time comes! I know other girls who also felt that their engagement ring and wedding band together were too much. I think this is especially true for girls with slender fingers. (I have the opposite problems, my fingers are more like my dad's sausage hands!)

What I did for my center pieces was cheap and required no transportation! (They are flowers though). I used the bridesmaid bouquets as the center pieces. After the wedding party was introduced into the recpetion, each girl dropped her bouquet into an vase that already had water and clear marbles in it. The WC arranged for me to rent the vases for $10 each, which is really the only additional cost for the center pieces!

I have an unusual ring situation... I decided that I only want an engagement ring, no wedding band. As you can see in the below picture, in order to wear both rings on the same finger, I would need a custom wedding band that fits around the center stone of my engagement ring. (The center stone is not raised enough for a wedding band to fir underneath it). But I didn't want the ring to be lopsided with 2 bands of diamonds on 1 side and only 1 on the other side. So my other options would have been to wear my engagement ring and my wedding band (A) on different hands, or ( one at a time and switch which ring I decide to wear on a given day. I just didn't like those options. So in the end, I took off my engagement ring, gave it to the best man the morning of the wedding, and got married with that! My husband said he didn't mind. (I have a picture that's more zoomed-in, but it's too big to upload).

I chose light grey/sliver. I think the color will be very complimentary with the shades of purple and dark grey suits. Also, I think it will be the most versatile color for future use.

I am happy to say that #25 doesn't apply to me! But it's more a sign of what I'd like to call my "black thumb," as opposed to a sign of me not growing up. If you want to sentence a plant to death row, send it my way!

Given my limited budget, I decided that the cake wasn't going to be a priority. So I chose the decoration that was included for free. (Just to be clear, the decoration was free, not the cake, lol). The inside of the cake was chocolate cake with a filling of chocolate ganache and fresh strawberries. (The cake was supposed to be 3 tiers, but they made a mistake and it ended up only being 2 tiers. But we were having a sheet cake anyway to make up the difference, so everyone was still able to have cake if they so desired). See below! So many of the cakes posted on this threat look awesome! I love the colors and beachy designs.