Shoes!

Ring it On

I've already blogged about Dave's wedding ring. One more time, it is a fingerprint ring (with my fingerprint inside, not Dave's, you strange, confused, unromantic people...). Here is us making a mold of my finger (beware the sleepyface, be-robed pictured halfway down the page). Ever since he sent the mold in a few weeks ago, I've been asking "Has it come yet? Has it come yet???" So it was wonderful to get home one day and discover this in my email:

ehh...he'll get the right hand someday...

The subject line was, appropriately enough, "Is this real life??"

I know! It's bizarre.

Can you confirm this is your fingerprint, plz?

Woah! Did you guys know we're getting married? It's true! We have rings n stuff...

Will and Kate and Happiness

Like the rest of the world, I was caught up in the big wedding this Friday. Working in a newsroom, where there are more TVs than people, it was like living inside a William and Kate Funhouse--you couldn't walk two feet without seeing constantly-streaming feeds or hearing another breathless report.

And why not? It was a great event. The dress! The kiss! The adorable curmudgeonly bridesmaid! I admit I kept one of those streams running on my desktop (also running? The Telegraph live blog, which had many gems throughout the day, my favorite being their takedown of how American television anchors had to keep explaining why Kate was not, unfortunately, a princess).

My favorite part of the whole wedding? Cartwheeling verger and 20-foot maple trees aside, I just loved those smiles. The smiles that say "We just got married, yaaaay!!!" The big, goofy, rosy-cheeked smiles that mean they are ridiculously happy, excited, thrilled, dazed.

I love those smiles. I see them on the faces of my sweet, wonderful, married friends, and they just make me grin. So it was wonderful to turn on the TV and not see nerves or discomfort or "WTF am I doing oh crap I hope this works out" (which, to be fair, is maybe how I would look if my nuptials were on display for 2 million+ people...), but the same joyful, time-of-our-lives smiles.

Can't wait for my own, big ole smile :)

Saved!

Last weekend, while visiting wonderful Boston friends, Dave and I spent an afternoon addressing a stack of fresh-off-the-presses save-the-dates. These will be winging their way to people's mailboxes soon, but here's a little preview:


Ta-Dum! Some minor information has been removed, for privacy reasons, but otherwise, here's the winner!

I am thrilled that after months of sketches and designs and research, I finally settled on a Save-the-Date that perfectly reflects me and Dave. What this also means, of course, is that I took the plunge and designed my whole invitation suite! It was a daunting task, but ultimately I am so excited to see the final results--I know they'll be a wonderful intro to our wedding!

For the detail-minded, I drew and painted the invite myself. I used heavyweight watercolor paper, drawing first in pencil, then outlining in waterproof calligraphy ink. I watercolored the drawings, then scanned them in to my computer. I edited the image--some scaling and color correction--with the free image-manipulation program Gimp (because I am both pro-open sourcing and pro-not spending money). The font is Czaristite. We used Vistaprint to print our Save the Dates as postcards. Although I've seen some bad reviews of Vistaprint online, ultimately they were ridiculously reasonable (we printed 200 postcards for less than $30), arrived promptly, and printed beautifully.

I can't wait for our friends and family to find these in their mailboxes!

Kiss and Make Up

Next on the wedding agenda: make up!

I'm planning on going the professional route, seeing as my skill with make up is...putting it on sometimes every six weeks? (True story! One day I wore make up to work, when one of my coworkers stopped me and commented on it. I guess the nice thing to say would have been something like, "You look really pretty today!" Instead she said "Wow, you look SO MUCH BETTER today than you usually do!" .... And I said, "Thank...? You...?")

So, to the salon!

The plan is to schedule my hair and make up trial for my bridal shower, so I can be glammed out for my lovely friends and family. And since the bridal shower is swiftly approaching, I spent an evening wandering around Internet-land picking out some possible make up looks.

I'm thinking soft and romantic, pink cheeks, natural look


Basically: Keira Knightley in every movie ever.


And also real life...
This one I like because it's still soft and romantic, but with a little more oomph


Here she is again in different light.
Love the smoky eyes, although I might want something a little less sultry


Another natural beauty.
Since I never wear make up, I'd like my to be enhancing, but minimal.
Something like this pretty much takes the cake.

In my dream world, I would pull off bright red lips.
Sadly, I am completely incompetent when it comes to this look,
and I always end up looking like a cross between Ronald McDonald and Miss Havisham.

Plus, while I am pale-as-paper white,
my skin tone isn't quite as red-lippy friendly as Ms. Hathaway's.

Pink cheeks, little color on the lips, bright and clear skin--
just enough pretty to be special,
not so dramatic that I still look like me!

Elizabeth Taylor's Weddings Photos

Leaving her first wedding, to hotel barren, Paris-Hilton-great-uncle Nicky Hilton.
Even though I know there are seven more to follow,
and this one resulted in a not-great marriage,
which lasted for less time than most cheeses take to age,
it's hard not to see how happy and swept-away she is.

Style, class, drama--all good things to keep in mind on the wedding day.

How to Be the Perfect Girlfriend/Boyfriend

While Dave and I are vacationing in South Carolina this week, I'm going radio silent on wedding planning. It's wonderful. In the meantime, please be entertained by these two videos, which despite being humor videos, actually contain some good advice on how to maintain a healthy relationship. Happy Friday!

Dating Humor:
How To Be The Perfect Girlfriend



Dating Humor:
How To Be The Perfect Boyfriend


Also, aren't these two actors adorable?
I want to move to Wee Britain and have them be my zany friends.