6 1/2 months to the wedding and I haven't tried on a single dress

You're probably reading the subject line and thinking "No way! I had my dress picked out a year before the wedding." or something along those lines. And even if you didn't have your dress picked out by now, you had gone into bridal shops and tried stuff on. "How does she live?" You must be asking yourself, "Isn't the thought of not having a dress just killing her?"

The "New Orleans" $995.00

But really, I do have a dress...well...sort of. I have a pile of silk and polyester for lining, a zipper and some buttons at my parents' house.  It all started b/c I was a fatass and incredibly lazy (not to mention too excited to wait) and internet browsing/shopping is way easier. You don't have to worry about hours or locations or driving time or bad weather. I ♥ the Internet.

The first few weeks of being engaged I did what any sane bride would do...I googled "vintage wedding dresses" and came up with this gem from Dolly Couture (It's under a cut so that Math doesn't accidentally see it) almost right away.  But wow...$995.00! So I wrote that one off and looked for cheaper dresses in the $100-300 range because (if you've read my last post) I was not willing to become one of the bride casualties to the expensive wedding dress industry.

Unfortunately, I could not get the other dress out of my head nor could I find cheaper versions that quite had the same elegant simplicity of the "first" dress. In the end I convinced my mom that she could make the dress since it was so simple with no beading or crazy folds. And now I'm patiently waiting for her to finish it and yes, it is kind of killing me. I tried on the prototype which I guess kind of counts but mom says that is not at all what the finished dress would look or feel like. So I wait.....impatiently...while all my other current bride friends are going to try on dresses at tiny boutiques and David's Bridal alike.

Yes, I am a little jealous that I won't have gotten a "real" wedding dress fitting experience where all my bridesmaids hover around me and tell me how good or bad I look in a certain dress. I will never have the experience of trying on a dress 4 sizes too big and awkwardly holding it closed while I try to imagine how it would hang on my particular frame. But, you know, that's OK. It's just more time I'd have to spend coordinating with the BrMs and shopping and re-shopping etc.

And the benefit of making a dress is that it is SOOO much cheaper than even a David's Bridal Special, though some online sites could rival the price. And another benefit is that it will be so unique and me. No one else will have the same dress ever (unlike if I bought it from Dolly Couture where you can see how many people had bought the dress before you).  I am confident that I made the right choice.

Even though it does feel weird to not have tried on a single wedding dress.

And this post would not be complete without pictures so here are a couple other dresses from Dolly Couture that I like (though not quite as much).

The "Summerville": $565.00

Budget much? How the wedding industry has brides by the proverbial balls.

$205.99

Wedding planning would be a lot more fun if I had an unlimited amount of money (or I guess, in this case, if my parents had an unlimited amount of money). Yeah, I'm not ashamed to admit it, my parents are paying for most of the wedding stuff. I mean, it's great since if it were up to Math and me, we would have to wait a couple years to save up the money. Math has been working to pay off his (now "our" hehe) 2nd mortgage and I bought a car about two weeks before he proposed. (Bad timing on his part? LOL).

 A friend's wedding on the awesome balcony of the Colorado History Museum
(now the renamed and totally rebuilt, "History Colorado Center").

People have been asking me if I am going to put our budget on my blog. Some people think that I shouldn't but others (usually other brides-to-be) have been asking.  I figure that I might as well, I mean, I know money can be a point of comparison and contention between people but I personally think that everyone should be more open about it in general. For instance, I have a friend who did her wedding for around $10,000 and I have to say that she is one of the people I admire the most for this. Her ceremony was lovely, her reception a TON of fun, food tasty, dress beautiful etc. etc. And she did it without paying too much.

Hehe...Love this pic. 

I would like to be her. Unfortunately, I'm not.  While I'm cost-cutting at every turn there are a few major differences between her wedding and mine that increased my budget to...um...$15,000.

First of all, my guest list is much bigger and I just can't cut people. There have been a lot of people in the various stages of my life that have helped shape me into the person that I am today and I would like to have them share in this special joy. And feeding those people is going to cost money, unfortunately, you can't skimp too much on the caterer.  Unless you got Qdoba, and as tasty as that is...it's not really wedding food.

The Rockin' dance floor!

Second, I made the mistake of picking bridesmaid gifts that are more expensive (think $10-20 difference per each) and more rare per unit than I'd thought. Probably because they're vintage items....But I can't change it now since I've already bought some of them. Unfortunately, that's all the info I can give since I don't want my BrMs to know what it is. And I actually think all of them read this. Well...maybe.

Third, I'm just not quite as savvy as my $10,000 friend and DEFINITELY not as creative/crafty/DIY-y. I really should've just hired her as a wedding planner because she has given me so many great ideas that take me way longer to implement than she did because it involves me learning how to actually be artsy/talented.

One of the big budget decisions I've been waffling back and forth on is getting a florist or not since that will cost more money but also that person will have more knowledge of bouquets and bouttoniers etc. Though $10,000 friend made her own everything and as I was the one who caught the bouquet, I can tell you that that thing was SOLID like a ROCK! It took me around 10 minutes to unbind it all. =)

But, I mean, there are a lot of things I have done to keep the price down from making my own Save the Dates to hiring my mom (for the price of grattitude and kisses) to make my dress. Which brings me to the title of this post...I was reading this article on Boulder weddings and found this gem of a quote from the owner of Boulder Bridal (the same bridal shop that pretty much told my mom that my idea for a dress was completely undoable in every aspect):

"(some) Brides' dress budgets have dropped so low that (I ) often don't have a dress to fit their needs. And yet, it doesn't take much to convince them to spend more on a dress. Once the bride puts into perspective a $2,000 dress when the rest of their wedding costs 10 times that amount, they're willing to give a 'little more' to look and feel good (scare quotes added by me)."

TWO-THOUSAND-DOLLARS for a dress you will wear ONCE for about 4-5 hours. (I've been thinking about buying a Coach purse for ~$300 and am having a hard time justfying that. It is at least something that I will be able to use forever [lifetime warranty] in 85-90% of situations.  I'm sorry, but I really don't think my wedding dress should cost more than a Coach purse.)

The wedding industry has a tight grip on starry-eyed brides-to-be.  This is the shit they are selling...that: 

"OMG! $2000 is a GREAT deal for a dress!"

And:

"But don't you want to look beautiful on your wedding day?"

A $2,000 dress is, 8-15% of the "average" wedding budget (and also 2/3 the price of my first car that lasted for 9 years). That's the price for being beautiful?

Of course I do, but in the words of my fiance, my parents and countless friends and coworkers, I have looked "beautiful" in $20-$80 dresses. So, maybe I could add a little room for more fabric and a specialized style. How about $300? Now that's a GREAT deal for a dress. Here are some examples of ~$300 or less dresses (and yes, they're probably from China, but I'm sure so are David's Bridal's and countless others. And if not the whole dress, then I'm sure at least some piece of it.) All of these are from Milanoo.com. 

$183.99

$175.99

Whew...this bride doesn't mess around!

Since I last updated I have booked two major things:

1). Caterer:
YES!!  We've unofficially booked the caterer and they have been generous enough to let us pay the deposit after the holidays!  I still need to fill out the official contract as well but we have till Jan 16th or so to do that.  Woohoo!  They are called Footers Catering  and are located in Denver, CO.  Unfortunately, the price is better than most I've seen but still when you factor in the # of guests that I'm expecting, it's still a lot of money.  But food-wise it comes to ~$23.00pp.  When you add in rentals of tables, chairs, plates, silverware and all that shit, it's more like around $52.00pp.  Which, is really REALLY not bad.

Plus, the food was really great!  We're going to have apps, like mushroom quesedillas w/ pesto and 2 stations: Pad Thai and Crepes.  I don't want to give too much detail because you'll have to come to find out what all the yummy choices are, but I will say that it is about 75% vegetarian.  Only 1 app, 1 soup and then mix-ins for the stations will have meat in them.  (For the stations, you can elect to just not have meat but can still eat the whole rest of the stuff in it). =)

2). Photographer:
We've found a great local photographer courtesy of on of my high school friends.  He's a young photographer just starting out, but with some wedding experience already.  He's got a great eye for light and effects and is a great price!  He is also letting us put down the deposit in January, which save us for the holidays. ^_^

His name is Chase Hoffman, and he's charging us $800 for the whole wedding from before to after and for ALL our good pics on a DVD.  Amazing rates.  I'd highly suggest you check him out, though he did say that he was planning to raise his prices a bit.  But still a great deal, I'm guessing.  And also a great person to work with. :)

3). Videographer: I have enlisted a friend of mine to do the videography-ing.  The "cheapest" videographers I've found  were $700-$900 and, I'm sorry, but that's just way too much to hold a camera and ask people to give their best wishes to the bride and groom. And since we have all the equipment and Math is great at making videos, we decided that all we really needed was someone to hold the camera.  And yes, we ARE paying him like $200. Plus, I think he will do a very great job.  He's an architect (methodical) and also very people-persony. Whew...cross that off the checklist!

4). Hotel: My mom booked a block of rooms at the Westin Downtown. Rooms are normally like $200/night but she got a deal of like $130 or something like that.  I made a VERY extensive list of details and things to do on our wedding website. So please go check it out, don't let my efforts and roughly 2 1/2 hours of my life go to waste!!  I still need to research cheaper downtown hotels for those who can't/won't afford the Westin. Though I hear that it's a very nice hotel! We'd love for all our friends to stay downtown and join us for brunch the next morning. There's nothing like the party that keeps on giving. ;-)

I still have to find a DJ. Ours was supposed to be an employee from The Artwork Network, but he is no longer working there and the owner didn't give me his contact info so I'm guessing he left on not-so-great terms.  So, that leaves us w/o a DJ so the same applies as above. We will pay you ~$200 to monitor our iPod playlist, make sure stuff cues on time and make important announcements.

I'm also still looking for a florist/deciding if I WANT a florist. I have a couple contacts, but they wanted to wait until after the holidays, which is totally understandable.

We're getting close to having all the big stuff done. Yay!  After that, the fun stuff will start.

Save the Date Video!!!

Wedding Fashion - an industry in itself.

Well, I haven't posted in a while...I'd like to use the excuse that not a lot of wedding stuff has happened in the last month but actually the opposite is true. A TON of wedding stuff has happened but I have not had the time (or energy) to post about it. Though in all fairness some stuff was, and is still, not quite decided upon.

First things first...Do you remember in my last post how I said I'd found my wedding shoes?

Well I was wrong. While these shoes are gorgeous they have two drawbacks:

1). The back slips off if I walk too much (like from 1 side of my living room to the other). This *might* be fixable with ball of the foot pads to push my foot back a little but that's a gamble. And...

2). They're not these shoes:

These shoes may make their debut at Christmas. Stay Tuned.

The photo that I grabbed off of Nordstrom's website doesn't do them justice. They are purple Enzo Angiolini "Thaddea", 5'' (with a 1'' platform) peep-toes which are surprisingly comfortable and made of real leather. *Droooooool* Unfortunately, they were neither free nor cheap, but were actually exactly the budgeted price I had for wedding shoes - $110. Now, if you count the green reception shoes and the flip flops, that makes my total wedding shoe expenditure about $165. But hey, unlike a lot of other things about the wedding, the shoes are an investment for life. Most men and a lot of women still probably won't understand this, but those of you that do...you know. ;-) 

And y'all had thought I'd already found the perfect shoes....

My phone didn't capture the purple very well so I messed with the colors to make it look more vintage-y. 

Next, I'm happy to say that I have chosen bridesmaid dresses!  Some of the bridesmaids and I decided somewhat last minute to go to David's Bridal one day. I ended up choosing two styles because one of the styles was being discontinued and on sale for like $35.00 (Style B). Unfortunately, not everyone can wear that style because of certain future plans and living distance. So the second style (style A) is normal priced $90 (though the website says $99) or so but will still be able to be bought. The discontinued one is now only available in "honeydew" sizes 2, 4 and 20s - And now it's only $29.00.  But who wants to wear "honeydew" anyway?!

Unfortunately, both dresses didn't carry the purple that I wanted:

Style A in "Plum"

We briefly discussed using this purple for the girls on my side (7 of them, 1 out of town & one needing above style) and a green for the girls on Math's side (2 of them, both out of town). But I actually didn't like any of the green options that either style came in. Also I thought it would be a pretty unflattering color on anyone.

Style A in "Clover"

So I decided on black for both styles. Since the fabric is the same, the dresses will match nicely, though the above style will need to be shortened for sure. Another upside about black is that everyone will definitely be able to wear them again! Also since each dress is probably going to need to be altered since both styles are so fitted, that means that each girl will have a really sexy custom black dress. *ow ow* To add some color, my mom and I (and possibly one of my awesome bridesmaids) are going to make taffeta sashes in Plum and Chartreuse.

Style B. This color, "Pistachio", is the only color advertised on the site. Yuck.

Lastly, I went to a bridal show a few weeks ago and started talking to Al's Formal Wear people about Tuxedos.  I managed to get $50 off each tuxedo rental for a $10 deposit. That's 50x9 = $450 total off! Now we're not paying for the guys' rentals, just like we're not paying for the girls' dresses but still that's a significant savings for each dude. Plus, we get the groom's free with 5 rentals! That part definitely does save us money!

Al's has a cool tuxedo creator here: http://www.alsformalwear.com/byt-page.asp where I made these two lovely styles:

One word: TAILS!!! And Oxfords or whatever they're called...how awesome is that? I'm thinking...matching pocket squares? We're going to set up an appointment on Sunday to get Math measured and look more. Excited!!

Phew, fashion is fun but exhausting.

The Hunt for the Perfect Shoes

If you know me, you know I love shoes. Not only that, but you know that I’m adventurous, obsessive and impulsive when it comes to shoes. This leads to the unsaid expectation that I need to have some kick ass shoes for the wedding – no boring white flats for this girl! . (As a side note, about a month before  Math proposed to me, I saw these pink wedding shoes on the internet and found them noteworthy enough to be showcased on my FaceBook. But these are way too expensive to even consider…)

Farfalla - £475.00



Now I can’t say that I started looking for the shoes before the dress because, let’s not lie, the dress pretty much defines the wedding style…. *wink*.  However, I did find the dress almost immediately – which proves that there are areas where I’m not terribly picky.  Shoes are not  one of those. I definitely started looking for shoes before the bridesmaid dresses (sorry girls!).

Math proposed to me on March 25^th and by April 4^st I had my preliminary list of shoes with one pair at the forefront of consideration. I had decided that I was going to get the shoes in either chartreuse or purple. Here are a few contenders from the green category  The Paco Menas were the strong contender but they were just a bit too light in color, though their price was right (about $90).

Then there were the purple contenders. There were more than what was listed here but they were all relatively similar style and color to the ones pictured below:

  (from left to right then top to bottom): Paco Mena, Nina, Miu Miu, Bottega Veneta, BCBG. I did resolve that the bottom flip flop pair (BCBG) would be great for the beach and the end of the night so decided to buy those when they went on sale.
Then there were the purple contenders. There were more than what was listed here but they were all relatively similar style and color to the ones pictured below:

(left to right): Badgley Mischka, Badgley Mischka, Halston Heritage

I briefly considered these, though my heart wasn't into it. I'd rather go clubbing in these shoes.

Betsy Johnson



The first pair I actually bought were these. They are padded and not too high and have a killer-looking heel. They were at Nordstrom Rack for only $40. I wore them for 8 hours one day which included some shopping and walking, and while they were pretty comfortable, toward the end of the day my feet started hurting REALLY badly.

Born: $44

Also, I decided that these are more reception shoes instead of ceremony shoes. So, these will be my dancing shoes!

After that, I found these and determined that they would be perfect;  they were a great combination of a wedding color and funky, but sticking with the peeptoe/pump retro look. But...... there were two problems. 1). They were 3.75''high and 2). the only sizes they had close to my 7 was 6.5 and 8.  Even still, I chanced it and these were the secong pair I bought in size 6.5. Unfortunately, they were too tight and too high and I could barely walk in them. Which is sad. You definitely don't want the bride to be hobbling toward her future! They were so cute though (and so cheap). :'( Luckily Endless.com has free return shipping!



Rampage: $37

Then I really wanted to get these even if they were Christian Louboutin and probably would have been like $500. Unfortunately, they could be found no where online except in knock-off brands and even then I couldn't find the knock-offs actually for sale. Oh well, I'll just have to fantasize about them.

Christian Louboutin

I never *actually* considered these...but aren't they fun?

Versace (probably only model shoes anyway).

And then I found these at the City Center in Vegas... Oh...my...god...They were at the Versace store, and they were on "sale."  Versace is one of my favorite designers (partly because he's Italian!) but his stuff is pretty to way too expensive. They were $350 ish reduced from $500 and I was totally prepared to spend that, which shows how much I wanted them. They were the perfect combination of purple and funky and designer.  Unfortunately, they were TOO SMALL! The two Vegas stores didn’t have any in my size and the only ones left (in the country) were in New York.  I could have them shipped to me, but that would mean I would have to buy them first. And snooty designer Versace, doesn't take returns on sale items. So….no shoes for me. 

Versace

Wierdly, I can't even find these anywhere online, it's like they have ceased to exist. Good thing I got a friend to take a good pic from her iPhone. 

 I still dream about these shoes. 

Then I briefly thought these would be great but the price and the over-the-top nature pretty much deterred me. Though I would love to put them on display in my house!

Versace...again

 After that I was at a consignment store in Boulder, Common Threads, trying to sell some of my clothes (and shoe shopping - always shoe shopping) and I found these. They are Miu Mius which is another Italian designer that I don't really know much about. But they're real leather and all nice and broken-in without looking too worn. They were cheap too, for designer. 

Miu Miu - $70

Even though they weren't the peeptoe/pump shoe that I was goaling for, they still looked sooo good. Also they had a "something blue" in them. So I bought them, the 3rd pair, thinking that my search was finally over. However……

My neighbor gave me a pile of clothes and 4 pairs of shoes that she practically forced on me. As the shoe sap that I am, I tried to give them a good home, even though there was one pair of Steve Maddens that I was sure I'd never wear. They were a bit too platform-y, a bit too high  and a bit too pointy in the toe. But just the other day I was cleaning out my closet and tried on the Miu Mius above for Math. As I was putting them away I saw the shoes Beth gave me...sitting all alone on the closet floor and it dawned on me..."Wait a second. Those shoes are the perfect color of purple. Maybe..." So, I gave them a whirl and...

HOLY MOLY, Batman! They fit well, didn't feel too bad and fit the retro and funky/creative themes soo well. I think I've finally found a winner. (P.S. Somewhere between the Miu Mius and the Maddens I did buy those BCBG flip flops but got the wrong size and had to send them back and buy the larger size). Finally, after buying 5 pairs of shoes (two of which were returned) I decide upon the free pair! I will keep the Miu Mius because I really like them but they will have no part in the wedding. The Born heels will be for the reception and dancing and the BCBGs will be for before and after the event and if we go bar-hopping.
Now let me announce....THE WINNERS!


Steve Madden - FREE!