Asking the moms

In my last post, I wrote about how I formally asked my bridal party to be part of my big day!  What I kept out of that post (because I am sneaky that way) was one of my favorite parts of the whole thing....I asked the moms too!!

Will you be my mom? / Will you be my mother-in-law?

To me, it came so naturally, and seemed so obvious.  I was preparing to ask the ladies in my life to be a part of my wedding day - how could that NOT include my mom and my mother-in-law to be?  My mom has had the pleasure of knowing me for 25+ years, for better or worse...and Bettie, bless her heart raised the man of my dreams! I dare you to name a more important couple of women.

Obviously, neither of them had a lot of say in the matter.  Their DNA dictates their involvement in our wedding.  BUT, I have learned from past experience that everyone's situation when they start planning a wedding is a little different.  Every mom has an opinion, or doesn't have an opinion, about certain topics.  My mom has two daughters after me to help plan weddings for, but Ant is an only child, so this is the only wedding his mother will be deeply involved in planning!  Everyone's situation is unique, and I was not going to pretend that the world revolves around me.  By asking each of them to be a part of the wedding, it allowed me to formally tell them exactly how I felt.  I wanted them to know that I wanted them as involved as they wanted to be!  If that meant every fitting and appointment and napkin color, great.  If that meant they kindly said "thanks but no thanks" to certain parts of the planning process, that was fine too!  I love them both dearly and want them as involved as they choose to be.

So...long story short, both my mom and Ant's mom each got boxes of their own!  Theirs were slightly different as far as the contents were concerned, but had the same overall message.  It included all of the details about the day of wedding dress shopping, and invited them to join me on this journey of a wedding planning experience!

Great news: they both said yes!! :)  I am so lucky that both of them have been so supportive, and have chosen to take active roles as both my sounding board and company on errands and appointments! 

What do you think about this idea?  Good?  Bad?  Brilliant?  I'd love to know!  Did you do something similar?  How did you ask?

Asking the ladies...

Okay, it has been wayyyy too long since I've had a wedding focused blog post....and now that it's 2014 - aka the year I am getting married(!!!!) I figured it's about time to get back to business.  If you follow my instagram (@theshorelinebride) you will start to notice a few more wedding related errands over the next couple of weeks.  I've decided it's time to refocus after the holidays and check a few things off the list that have been lingering for awhile!  Hopefully I can also use January to go back through and finish some posts about my vendors....the process of picking them, etc.  

In the meantime - I thought I'd go back and talk about how I asked my favorite ladies (now my bridal party!) to be just that.  First - I knew I wanted to make sure that I made a big deal out of asking the girls - while it is mostly about fun, there are some time and money commitments that come with being in a wedding - and I wanted to make sure they knew how much I appreciated them and couldn't imagine getting married without their help (and fabulousness).  I also asked everyone fairly early - one piece of advice I had gotten was to wait until a little later in the planning process - but I came back from our EMoon and knew I wanted to get all the girls together for a White Carpet appointment at the White Dress by the Shore later that month to kick off the wedding planning (blog posts about it here and here) - so I had to get right to work!

There are so many cute and unique ways to ask your girls to be bridesmaids.  I googled and searched Etsy and saw so many great ideas (here, here, here and here for a few example) - but none were exactly what I wanted!  So I took bits and pieces from each thing I saw and slowly started to put together my perfect combination.

Below is the note that I put in each box - since it was so early, we had almost NO details yet.  I didn't even know the location and date yet!  But I knew I was marrying Ant and I knew I wanted them involved.  What more do you need, really?

This note comments on 5-hour energy...my 19 year old sister got this one, the rest of the girls got a nip of Jack Daniels!  I love that in addition to all the fun little bits, like chocolate and champagne, I was able to put a quick trip down memory lane with some pictures of me and each bridesmaid.  The nail polish also became the perfect last item for the box - I had gone through all of Essie's colors looking for a fun name - there were lots of wedding related ones, but none that quite matched what I was looking for.  Then I found Sunday Funday, one of their newer summer colors...not only was it a bright fun color, but the box was doubling as an invitation to our first event, on a Sunday!  It was meant to be.  So I bought every bottle the store had :)

I also included personalized handwritten notes, that actually asked each girl to be my Maid of Honor/Bridesmaid.  I used beautiful place cards I had bought in Venice as the cards - I thought they were the prettiest and allowed me to make them way more personal than any of the Etsy versions I'd seen.

I always knew Melissa was going to be my Maid of Honor (MOH from now on)...she has been my BFFL since 6th grade - we used to practice walking down the "aisle" in her bedroom....and so on and so forth.  She is also the most organized person I know - the perfect balance to my lack of organization and planning.  I could trust 100% that she'd be there for me - even though neither of us really know what planning a wedding truly entails! (Although trust me, I'm learning)  I decided that it would be fun to ask her in a way that went along with the way Ant had asked me to marry him!  This is what the door looked like when she showed up at my apartment:

I included a long list of her responsibilities (don't worry it's not as long as it seems, every third line or so says "Have fun!").  One she said "yes!" she came in and was greeted by her box!  Presentation is everything - in addition to all of the fun items inside, I bought tulle ribbon, lots of white tissue paper, and some wedding related stickers to tie it all together.

AHHHHH.  I forgot about the best part of the entire thing.  The top of the boxes.  Each box was decorated with the girl's name....by my fiancé.  This is why he's the best.  He was helping me brainstorm ways to decorate them, and came up ON HIS OWN with the idea that he could decorate them.  (I may or may not have commented on how nice his handwriting is compared to mine...which is true, but still!)  It added such a special touch to each one - they all were completely different and unique and done by him.  While in the scheme of things, maybe not a huge deal, I really loved that he did it.  It shows that it is truly our wedding, and while they are saying yes to being part of MY bridal party, it's his wedding too.  Anyway, rant over...here is a picture of Melissa's.

YAY! I officially had a maid of honor.  Then I put her to work :)  Our project for the rest of the afternoon was to put together the rest of the boxes!  Here is the table covered in all of the goodies...

All wrapped up and ready to go! Having Melissa help me made the project SO much faster - and also more fun! It allowed us to spend the afternoon talking about wedding stuff while accomplishing a huge task.  Don't they look nice all ready to go??

How did you ask your bridal party to be a part of your big day?  

New Year's Resolutions

Happy 2014!!!

Do you make New Years resolutions?  Every year for the last....at least ten years mine has been to stop biting my nails.  For those of you who know me at all, you know thats like asking a miracle to happen. For those of you who don't know me - see the photo below.

I have bit my nails, and worse my cuticles, since at least the 5th grade.  Apparently it is a habit that runs in my family - my uncle, and sister from another mister do the same thing.  I regularly make at least a finger or two a day bleed.  For our engagement pictures - I got a "pre-manicure" a week before the shoot, so that my fingers had a little time to recover, and then got a real manicure the day of so that my nails would look acceptable for the pictures.  Thats the level of serious we're at.  It is not a nervous habit, but more of a "anytime my hands aren't busy" habit.  Driving, sitting in a meeting, watching tv, etc.  The worst is that I rarely realize I'm doing it - it tends to make people a little crazy....oops!  Anyway, this wonderful habit of mine is one that I've never really been able to get rid of.  Keeping my hands moisturized helps, getting manicures helps, staring at my beautiful ring and realizing how gross my fingers around it look helps.....but nothing makes it really go away! ESPECIALLY not making it a New Year's resolution.  It became more of an ongoing joke with my BFFL, to see how long I could last in January before I got bad again.  It's usually about a day.

Last January I was the well-being captain for my district at work, and I came up with all of these great ideas for how to promote people following through on their resolutions.  Ant and I had been talking about trying to get a serious gym routine down, I was trying to get more organized both professionally and personally (I am NOT one to use a planner), and so on.  I figured most people are usually in the same boat this time of year.  I downloaded all these fancy new apps that are supposed to help you with these things, and told myself I was going to use them, no. matter. what.

Shockingly, none of them lasted.  I recently went through and cleaned up a lot of my unused apps on my phone.  Did I feel defeated?  Nope!  Ant and I have gotten ourselves into the closest thing to a real gym routine I've ever had, and I've never felt better or stronger physically.  While I am still far from organized, I have established strong routines in my new job that make me confident every day that I am accomplishing the things I need to do.  These things are happening, not because I am resolving to do them....but became I am getting my butt out there and doing them!

Don't get me wrong - if resolutions in the New Year work for you, more power to ya!  But I am choosing to start the New Year with more of a "to-do" list, of priorities for things we just need to do!  My nails may or may not make the list.  A bride can still look beautiful with a few rough cuticles, right?

In 2014:
Ant and I will finalize plans for our wedding - keeping FUN as the biggest theme throughout. (I've added simple and pretty...but fun keeps it's #1 spot)
Once our closet project is finished in the house - storage & clutter control will be our next focus.
Ant & I make a killer team in the kitchen - but are often too lazy.  We are going to try to plan meals better - at least 3-4 a week at home.
Our honeymoon is booked! But we still have to pay for half of it...and a million other things!  I want as many things wedding related paid off going into the summer as possible.

...and those are just our joint household priorities!  My own list is a whole different story :)

What are your New Year's resolutions, or priorities?  What are you most excited about in 2014?  Here's to a happy and healthy New Year!