It’s All in the Name of the Wedding!!!

Hair, Wedding

I have been growing out my hair since I got engaged two years ago and today I chopped most of it off. I wasn’t planning to cut my hair until after the wedding because I was going to donate it to Locks of Love. I have been growing it out and donating it every two years for the past 10 years but after doing my hair trial two weeks ago the stylist and I decided that I needed an over due cut. I feel a tad selfish because I love donating it but I decided that I can always grow it out and do it again.

Of course I have to do a shot with the glasses:

Here is one without:

For the first time in my adult life I have bangs. I love it and the stylist said I will have more curls to work with on my wedding day.

Have you done something different to your hair to help your bridal hair? What do you think of my new style?

It’s a wedding…

Wedding

It’s not my wedding yet but my cousins wedding. My cousin and his high school sweetheart are getting married today. The mass will take place at 9:00am and the reception will be from 4:00pm to 1:00 am. His wedding is going to be completely opposite of mine. We are having an intimate affair and they are throwing a huge party. I am completely stoked about it and can’t wait to share some photos with you after it’s all done. I just spoke with him and they are both extremely stressed out, which got me thinking if I will react in the same manner the night before our wedding.

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However, lately I feel that I am getting less stressed out as the wedding approaches. The strange thing is that since I took those 2 weeks off after I told you that I was stressed out I feel so rejuvenated and embraced the idea that things will go wrong. I realize that I could only control certain aspects of the wedding. I can plan and organize as much as I want but the truth is things will go wrong and there is nothing I can do about them. Now that my attitude has changed I’m enjoying the planning even more than before. Life is great and my focus has now shifted towards creating a happy marriage rather than being consumed by the wedding details.

I text my cousin and reassured him that today I will be there to make sure things run smoothly. I think he just needed someone to tell him that they are going to be there for him if things arise that they were not expecting. I told him that I will be there throughout his wedding making sure things go right. He really appreciated that and thanked me. I hope he and his new bride have a lovely time and things work out.

How are you handling the stress or if you are already married what advice do you have for the rest of us? Is there anyone taking charge at our wedding to make sure things run smoothly?

I love photography…

Photographers, Wedding

How cute is this bride with her umbrella? I just wanted to share with you these lovely photos I came across in Wedding Cabaret. You have to appreciate a happy bride with a black birdcage veil. These photos are so great. Enjoy!

{All photos by Ben Blood Photography}

I have found myself countless of times admiring the different personalities brides have and how they bring it out during their wedding photos. I hope you enjoyed these photos as much as I did.

Take Out + Candy = Our Boxes

Candy Buffet, DIY, Wedding

When you think of favors or recuerdos in a Mexican wedding you think of something plastic with lace. My mom and aunt kept asking me what type of favors I was going to have and since I don’t want to ruin the surprise of the candy buffet I insisted on simply stating candy. I don’t have anything against recuerdos but I rather have something that my guest can eat instead of just throw away.

Here is an example of a recuerdo:

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Like I’ve previously mentioned here we are having a candy buffet. When trying to figure out where our guest were going to put the candy in I began to look around at different ideas.

One option was bags:

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Another one was jars:

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And the last one was take out boxes:

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The one I completely fell in love with was the third option. I found that Paper Mart has the cheapest take out boxes. I ended up spending less than $20 for 100 boxes including s&h. If you live near L.A. you can pick them up from there warehouse and can save on the shipping.

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Here is how our boxes arrived:

Here is where we thank our guest for sharing with us:

Here is our names and wedding date:

Here they are all together:

Many hours and miles of ribbon later we finally finished our boxes for our candy buffet. I am really happy on how they turned out especially since my HBoO and I burned ourselves on the glue gun on more than one occasion.

Total cost of this project approximately was about $25 for 100 boxes all completed.

What do you think of our boxes? What kind of favors are you going to have at your reception?

I’m back from the Salon!!

Hair, Make-up, Wedding

When looking for a salon I was mostly looking for convenience and for great reviews. I decided to go with Atlantic Studio not only is it close enough to my house that I can walk there but my stylist is amazing.

I walked in with my supplies on hand and with an open mind. I took a collage of photos which could be used as inspiration. Since I’m not the “Bridezilla” type I wanted the stylist to have some input on what would work best with my hair, face and skin type.

I wish I would have taken a before picture of my hair but I didn’t. Here is a photo of me without make-up.

Here is the after shoot with make-up and hair done.

This is a side view of my hair with a flower.

Here is the back of my hair.

Here are a few more pictures of me at home with my make-up and hair done.

You gotta love the lashes.

I’m still debating wearing my glasses on my wedding day so here is a picture of me wearing them.

At first a was a tad skeptical about having that trial done since I didn’t want pay for it but now that I’ve done it I would recommend it to anyone. I discovered that my HBOo does not like so much eye liner on me. I also realized that I want more loose curls and due to that I will be layering my hair next week. Overall this experience was amazing and I wouldn’t change anything except like I previously mentioned planning a romantic date.

Did you have a hair or make-up trial? What do you think with glasses or without? Less make-up or more?

I love color but how much is too much…

Dyed Crinoline, Wedding

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A while back I heard of this colorful trend dyed crinoline. After doing a search online I found that the Wedding Cabaret can do it for you for only $25. How cool is that you don’t have to deal with the mess of having to clean up the dye.

Another alternative for the more adventurous ones is to dye them yourself Mrs. Avocado from the Wedding Bee gives a great tutorial on her blog about how to do it. Another site that tells you how to diy it is here.

Unfortunately I won’t be able to partake in this latest trend since my slip is 100% polyester. I wish i would have read the label before I purchased it at Alfred Angelo Bridal.

Aww sadness now I won’t be able to have photos like this one.

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Or this one.

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I guess the only burst of color that I’ll be wearing is going to have to be on my shoes. Are you dying your crinoline? How are you going to add color on your wedding day?

My hair is going on trial tomorrow!!

Hair, Locks of Love, Make-up, Wedding

Tomorrow I have my hair and make-up trial and I’m utterly excited. I’ve spoken about how I would like my make-up done here but I’ve yet to say anything about my hair.

Here are a few things you should know about my hair:

I’ve never dyed it.

It’s wavy.

It’s back length.

It’s black.

I’m donating it to Locks of Love after the wedding.

Now that you know more about my hair I will show you the looks that I’m interested in.

Look 1.
I love this look because of the loose curls that seem to have taken no effort to create. I also love the small bangs on the side of her face.

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Look 2.
This look is slightly similar but doesn’t have the small bump like the top one. I still like the bangs in the front and the loose curls.

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Look 3.
I’m also considering having an updo. As you can tell I love loose curls and this updo is perfect for my hair accessories that I’ve written about here.

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Look 4.
Here is another updo that is higher than the previous one and still has the loose curls.

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I’ve read that somethings that you should bring to your hair trial are:

Inspirational photos.

A photo of your dress.

Hair accessories.

A camera to capture the look.

Wish me luck! I’ll update you on what happens tomorrow with my trial.

Lets cut the cake…

Garment District, Wedding

To add to the things I purchased at the Garment District recently is our knife set. This is pretty much how it went down.

My mom said, “Aren’t you going to buy a knife set?” I replied, “No I don’t think we need one.” My FMIL said, “I think you might need one to cut the cake.” I replied, “We aren’t having cake but we are having cheesecake. You ladies are right I should get one.” Meanwhile the cashier is waiting for me to pay for the flower girl baskets. I asked him, “How much are your knife sets?” He replied, “They start at $3…” I stopped him and said, “I’ll take it.” I figured since this wasn’t so important to me I would take the cheapest one they had.

Here is my $3 knife set:

You know you love it. Once again a bit of ribbon and a flower goes a long way.

Here is a closer glance at our knives. Not bad considering they are more expensive at the store and they are stainless steal. I don’t think it was necessary to have a fancy set engraved with our names.

What made me feel even better about my purchase was going to Michaels and seeing it for $24.99. Yes that’s right you the price underneath is for the same knives sets.

Are you using a knife set and are you having them engraved?

Like Beyonce said, "If you like it…"

Engagement Ring, Wedding

“…you should have put a ring on it!” Oh wait he did! : ) Not only am I lucky enough to have such a great engagement ring but now I also have a beautiful wedding band that complements it. Like I previously stated here my journey for the perfect wedding band has been a long one. I wanted to get something that would match with my engagement ring but at a reasonable price. The problem is that platinum is pretty expensive and I’m pretty picky. By now you must know how much I love the Garment District, well since I was in the neighborhood I stopped by at the Jewelry District. They had a great selection for wedding bands but I was still not satisfied with the choices.

Now that you realize how many different places I have looked for my wedding band here it is without further delay I chose my wedding band from Blue Nile. I am completely happy with my purchase and more importantly with the price. Using our Amex we saved 10% and we received free shipping.

Here is how it arrived:

Here is the wedding band by itself on some roses my HBoO gave me.

Here is both my wedding band and my engagement ring together.

Here is another shot. I wish I could take a picture that would demonstrate how shinny both really are.

Okay since I can’t take a professional picture here is my wedding band. Oh and yes it really does look this good in person.

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I love my rings and I can’t wait to wear them for the rest of my life. Are you absolutely in love with your rings? How was the process for you?

Music rocks my world…

Mariachi, Wedding

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One of the hardest vendors we’ve had to find is our mariachi. I never realized how hard it was to actually find a decent mariachi. My father is from Jalisco, Mexico and as such it was absolutely necessary to have a mariachi at our wedding. Okay truth be told both my HBoO and I love mariachi music. We decided that since we are going to have our venue for 5 hours we would have a mariachi for 2 hours during dinner and the dj for the remaining time.

I began the search by asking relatives and friends if they knew of any mariachis. I soon realized that although I had seen many mariachis in family events people did not keep their numbers around. Since that idea failed I began an internet search. I went onto the Mariachi4U website where you are able to place a bid for a mariachi. I was soon contacted by several mariachis ranging from $200 to $1000 an hour. I kept searching other sites and ran across Gig Masters where you can choose from a variety of musicians. I put in a bid for two different mariachis and received some responses.

At this point we had seen several mariachis perform. We went to many restaurants and to the Placita Olvera to see different vendors but they didn’t sound the way I wanted them to. They either sounded out of tune or they did not seem to entertain the crowd. I finally contacted the one from Gig Masters and found out where they were going to perform. We went to see them play and we loved how they entertained the crowd. The only problem I had was that one of the trumpet players sounded out of tune but their director assured me that he was only a sub and would not be performing at our wedding.

Yay!! We found a mariachi that meet all our criteria and that fit our budget.

A thing I found out along the way was that in Southern Cali the average rate for a mariachi is $400 an hour for about 5 musicians. You can find a decent ones for cheaper but they might not look as authentic. For example we went to see one in a “family bbq” that sounded great but since they were cheap they did not have enough money for the traditional mariachi attire.

So the mariachi we went with will be playing for 2 hours and we will have 6 musicians. Meet our newest vendor Mariachi Espuelas de Mexico.

We are so excited and hope that the mariachi is great and I can’t wait to tell you all about it after the wedding.

Oh and all this was possible because a really close friend of mine wanted to pay for the mariachi as a wedding present to us. He is absolutely amazing and we appreciate it so much. Thanks DB!

What kind of music will you be having at your wedding reception?