When Love Happens

When the Fat Lady Sings

2011-03-08T20:21:00.000-08:00

I've been dreading writing this post. You can probably tell from my sporadic blogging, I'm trying desperately to hold on, but it's time to let go. About two years ago, when I began planning my wedding, I typed these fateful words into my Google search bar -- "wedding blog." I was hoping to get a few ideas here and there, some inspiration and nab a few great wedding vendors. Little did I know, clicking on that catchy title "Weddingbee" would spark a nearly two year obsession. I applied to be a Bee not really thinking I'd be accepted. I think that's how most Bee bloggers feel when they submit their application to Weddingbee. Who'd want to read MY writing? What great ideas do I have? But Weddingbee is about much more than just getting good ideas. It's a community.

Oh hive, you listened to me gripe, worry, stress and celebrate. My DIY projects, my indecision, my (not-so-helpful) tips. How can I leave you?! If you read my last post, you know that I'm still addicted to the wedding world and I don't want to let go, but every season must end before a new one begins.

I'll drop in here and there to say hello and see what you're all up to, but it's time for me to move onto a new season of my life. I'm a teacher facing layoff, a budding entrepreneur, a wife making a home with her husband. If you care to keep in touch, you can be following me at www.when-love-happens.blogspot.com.

Thank you for walking alongside me in my wedding planning journey. I'll miss you!

source

Wedding Withdrawal

2011-03-05T22:59:00.000-08:00

It's been just short of 9 months since the wedding and I have a bad case of wedding withdrawal. I reluctantly began selling all of my wedding stuff on Weddingbee classifieds, but I refused to unsubscribe from my wedding blogs and still shamelessly read them even though I am no longer planning a wedding. I still often look through my wedding photos, album and engagement photos so I can remember my wedding day.

It's funny - the rollercoaster of emotions that come from wedding planning. At first you are ridiculously excited, then completely overwhelmed, then determined to finish all your planning, then resigned to the fact that you may not finish every DIY project you wanted to do, then nervous as the day approaches, then stressed the week of as you hammer out the last details, then unbelievably happy on the day of the wedding, then relieved as you close the books on that big wedding day you've been planning for x amount of months (or years).

You go on your honeymoon and think, "Phew! I'm so glad I'm done wedding planning!"Then, if you're at all like me, you slowly....incredulously...begin...to miss wedding planning! Yes, it's true! I miss wedding planning and getting every detail JUST right. I miss drowning in piles of paper and ribbon as I complete DIY projects. I miss looking through my day of schedule to make sure EVERYTHING is accounted for...okay, no I don't miss that part.

So, I find myself in wedding withdrawal and I kind of can't believe I feel this way because I was SO glad the wedding was done with 9 months ago. Any brides out there anxious to finish wedding planning? Any married brides out there that are so glad the wedding planning is over? Any (somewhate crazy) married brides like me that want to plan another wedding? :)

Missed something?

We go to the happiest place on Earth.
I get all dolled up.
Mr. Lace and I get a peep of each other.
We had awesome music.
We took photos.
We get married!
We write. We fight. We say our vows.
Big surprise...I cry.
We are photo crazed.
Say cheese!
I'm obsessed with details.
Feeling toasty?
Traditional surprises?
Dress change REMIX!
Photobooths are fun!
Some advice from the other side

Laced with Love: Lessons from a Bride on the Other Side

2011-02-13T14:53:00.000-08:00

I hope that you enjoyed the photos from the wedding. The day went by so fast. Before I knew it, the party was ending and it was time to go home! I'll be honest and tell you that I miss my wedding. I miss the flowers, being drowned in wedding details, researching vendors and spreadsheets galore. I was so happy with how things went and if there WERE any problems, I was completely oblivious because my fantastic vendors and coordinators handled everything. It seemed like it went off without a hitch.

So, now that the wedding (and the recaps) are over, here are my lessons for your day of from the other side. I tend to be the kind of person that is far too prepared for things...probably annoyingly so to others around me. Here are a random assortment of things I was so glad I overprepared for!

1. Bridal Kit - My makeup artist gave me a touch up kit, but I packed my makeup bag with EVERYTHING in it just in case. I also made these for the bridesmaids and myself:

I used about 20 Q-tips on my wedding day, mainly for cleaning up makeup. I think I used all 10 of mine and stole more from my bridesmaids. I also used a lot more tissue than I thought I would. I had a small travel pack of tissue, but between crying and touching up makeup, my pack was gone before the ceremony had started! Mr. Lace had extra tissue in his pocket for me which totally helped. I had rolled some tissue up and hid it in my bouquet, but when your eyes are watering and your bouquet is mainly white, it is sometimes hard to spot exactly where you hid your 5 rolled up tissues!

2. Toothbrush and toothpaste! My day started around 7 am and ended at 1 am so it was a good thing I threw in my toothbrush and toothpaste into my bag. I brushed my teeth right before the ceremony, then once again when I took a quick bathroom break after dinner. I HATE the feeling of dirty teeth and I am super conscious of it so it was nice I didn't have to brush my teeth with my finger. :) The gum I packed helped too!

3. We didn't have a TON of downtime, but I in the small moments I did, I found myself feeling hungry. I had coffee and a croissant in the morning, but I was too excited to really eat lunch. I ate a quarter of a sandwich because I was in the middle of getting my hair and makeup done. Then it was off to photos. Good thing I made baskets of snacks for the groomsmen and their dressing room and for the bridesmaids and myself. Not that they were healthy snacks, but the sugar helped me power through the day.

4. Even though I had a fabulous photographer, a camera came in handy at the very end of the night, when we were outside the venue getting ready to leave. Trusty BM M ALWAYS has a camera on hand and snapped a few photos before we got ready to leave. Our helpers and family had just finished cleaning everything up and we were all getting ready to get into our cars when my BM's whipped out a camera and snapped these.

Anything you dare not forget on your wedding day?

Missed something?

We go to the happiest place on Earth.
I get all dolled up.
Mr. Lace and I get a peep of each other.
We had awesome music.
We took photos.
We get married!
We write. We fight. We say our vows.
Big surprise...I cry.
We are photo crazed.
Say cheese!
I'm obsessed with details.
Feeling toasty?
Traditional surprises?
Dress change REMIX!
Photobooths are fun!

Laced with Love: I Should Tell Your Momma

2011-01-23T19:49:00.000-08:00

I only titled this post "I Should Tell Your Momma" because when we got a disc of photobooth photos from Snappy Joe, I saw my friends and family do things I've never seen them do before. Since some of these friends and family follow my blog, facebook and Etsy sites which are all linked together, I decided I shouldn't post them lest I embarrass them. However, I had a mom wear a bandana around her head like Tupac, people kissing and touching of body parts that would prompt you to shout out "stranger danger!"

Anyway, here are a few highlights courtesy of Snappy Joe Photography!

I SHOULD tell your mommas...

a la Michael Jackson

Our flowergirls gettin' down.

This family dressed up as KISS for Halloween.

In college, a few of my friends called this the ultimate test of friendship. If you were willing to stick your finger in your friend's nose, you were a true friend. Marriage should be enough, but just in case, we had to do the test.

I bought and wore this bee hat just for you Hive!

We made sure we set aside money for a photobooth in our budget because we knew it'd be entertaining for our guests and for us when we got to see all the photos afterwards. Even though most of my guests have been to many weddings with photobooths, they still go back again and again to take photos. We had no doubt we wanted to have one at our wedding. Are you pro- or anti-photobooths?

Missed something?

We go to the happiest place on Earth.
I get all dolled up.
Mr. Lace and I get a peep of each other.
We had awesome music.
We took photos.
We get married!
We write. We fight. We say our vows.
Big surprise...I cry.
We are photo crazed.
Say cheese!
I'm obsessed with details.
Feeling toasty?
Traditional surprises?
Dress change REMIX!

Laced with Love: The Dress Change Remixed

2011-01-19T20:04:00.000-08:00

In many Chinese-American weddings, many brides change into a traditional Chinese dress called a qi pao (pronounced chi-pow). First off, it's a beautiful, but unforgiving dress. Here are a few images I found on the web:

(source)

In my mind, it's most traditionally worn in red with gold shoes, both colors associated with good luck. Well, I've never been much of a traditionalist so I didn't want to wear a qi pao. After all, my wedding dress was the most expensive dress I'd ever bought and I did love it ever so much, why would I change out of it?! Nevertheless, being a good daughter, I asked my Mom if she wanted me to partake in this tradition. She said no, I didn't need to do it if I didn't want to. Just to be sure, a couple months later, I asked her again because it would take a couple months to have a qi pao made for me. She said no again. Since I had asked twice, I decided she was sure.

Two weeks before the wedding, we were out shopping for accessories for her outfit for the wedding and as we were walking through the mall she says, "So, don't you think you should do a dress change?" *insert record scratch here* It's two weeks before the wedding, I had checked twice and NOW she was asking for a dress change?! We both agreed that there'd be no time to get a qi pao made so she suggested a "normal" special occasion dress as my change. I agreed and we began looking. As we walked through the mall, I tried on various dresses in ivory, white and green, our wedding colors, but couldn't find anything I liked. The next day, I said that if I couldn't find a dress, we'd forget the whole idea. We headed to another mall and I tried on every white, ivory and green dress I could lay my hands on. I decided another color wouldn't really match. But then, with an armful of dresses, I found a reddish pink dress and fell in love! I took it along with me to the dressing room and saved it for last. Every dress was a no until I changed into the little red number. Through the dressing room door, I said, "Mom, it's not the right color. If they only had it in white or something, I think I'd buy this dress!" I opened the door and she said, "it's perfect! It's RED! You can wear this red dress instead of a red qi pao!" It turned out to be perfect compromise for my Mom and I. Red for my Mom and gorgeous for me! :)

So, here it is, my red dress change remixed --

All photos courtesy of Hanssie Trainor.

Are you planning on changing into something else during your reception?

Missed something?

We go to the happiest place on Earth.
I get all dolled up.
Mr. Lace and I get a peep of each other.
We had awesome music.
We took photos.
We get married!
We write. We fight. We say our vows.
Big surprise...I cry.
We are photo crazed.
Say cheese!
I'm obsessed with details.
Feeling toasty?
Traditional surprises?

Laced with Love: Two Traditional Surprises

2011-01-18T18:45:00.000-08:00

My title is a bit of an oxymoron, I know. How can something be a surprise, yet a regular tradition? Well, let me explain.

Surprise #1: Mr. Lace's family always does a family dance for the bride and groom. We've done 80's songs, 90's songs and more recently "Grease!" So, Mr. Lace and I knew they'd plan a dance for us, but we just didn't know what songs they'd be dancing to. We were so lucky because we've had the longest, most complicated dance thus far! All photos courtesy of Hanssie Trainor.

Put your hands up!

If you liked then you shoulda put a ring on it, if you liked then you shoulda put a ring on it...

Cotton candy, sweet and low, let me see that tootsie roll!

Surprise #2: My friends always do a little entertaining skit or speech for whoever is getting married. So, my friends put together this little video for Mr. Lace and I. First, photos of our reactions (complete with ugly face -- you know, when you laugh too hard and your face gets all screwed up?) and then the video!

A few things I should preface before you see this video:
1. When my friends first met Mr. Lace they thought he was kind of a tough guy.
2. I've always been a "nice" girl.
3. Mr. Lace and I really like Popeye's chicken.

Okay...action!

Do your family or friends have any wedding traditions or surprises in store for your wedding day?

Missed something?

We go to the happiest place on Earth.
I get all dolled up.
Mr. Lace and I get a peep of each other.
We had awesome music.
We took photos.
We get married!
We write. We fight. We say our vows.
Big surprise...I cry.
We are photo crazed.
Say cheese!
I'm obsessed with details.
Feeling toasty?

Laced with Love: The Toasts

2011-01-16T20:40:00.000-08:00

....*blush* sorry.... I know, it's been a long time. Between the holiday program at our school, the holiday season, SIL Lace getting married and starting up my Etsy shop, I haven't had time to sit down and blog! But, thank goodness for a chance to breathe with the MLK holiday!

So, let's see, where did we leave off? Oh yes, the wedding reception! We had planned to have the traditional best man and maid of honor speeches, but my brother asked if he could give a toast when I told him I was engaged and of course, I said yes. Then, bridesmaid M, who introduced Mr. Lace and I way back in 2000, surprised us with toasts.

So, here are a few snippets -- the laughs, the tears and everything in between! All photos courtesy of Hanssie Trainor.

This was before all the crying started!

Look carefully in MOH C's hand. TWO pages of notes and she said that she didn't really know what she was going to say. :) She did great though and managed to make me cry.

Bridesmaid M also has a typed page of notes and made me cry.

Look at how prepared all of our toasters were. Brother Lace also has a page of notes. Here, he's reading a thank you note I wrote to him for buying me a souvenir from his trip to Florida. Can you see the Keroppi sticker on the letter? I used my best stickers for people I love.

I don't know why, but when I cry and need a tissue, I usually fold my tissue into increasingly small triangles or rectangles. I don't know why crying makes me start breaking out into origami.

About to burst at the seams from my brother's speech!

I think the crying part of the wedding was finally over.

Even though the toasts ended up taking a lot longer than we had planned for, it was worth it in the end to have some of our closest family and friends speak to us on our wedding day!

Are you having toasts on your wedding day? Are there any additional toasts besides the best man and maid of honor speaking?

Missed something?

We go to the happiest place on Earth.
I get all dolled up.
Mr. Lace and I get a peep of each other.
We had awesome music.
We took photos.
We get married!
We write. We fight. We say our vows.
Big surprise...I cry.
We are photo crazed.
Say cheese!
I'm obsessed with details.

Laced With Love: Every Little Detail

2010-11-30T21:28:00.000-08:00

There are so many things to manage when you are planning a wedding. After you've nailed down all the big things like venues and vendors, you have a million little details to take care of. And if you're like me, you were involved in every little detail whether it mattered or not. I styled and DIY'ed my own wedding, as many of you are doing. It meant, I had to search for ideas, find the best deals and craft everything on my own. But, being a Type A, detail-oriented kinda gal, you can imagine how much FUN I had doing all of this...at first. Do you know what I'm talking about? I'd be super excited when I was inspired with a new idea, but as I started getting into the thick of the project, I'd want to hurry up and finish it. And of course, you never have one project at a time whilst wedding planning. There are always seventy things going on at once. There were many times where I felt like abandoning projects, but let me encourage you, if you are in the thick of wedding planning, hang in there! It'll all be worth it in the end!

So after I nailed down my vision, a vintage-juxtaposed with modern-simple-school-themed reception (hmm when do I have "too much" theme going on?), I began looking for vintage-y decor and designing my own paper goods. Everything had a simple, clean look.

So, let me show and explain all of our reception details. Ready?

This was our guest sign in table. I made these programs on my computer and printed them out on my printer. Fancy, I know.

Instead of a regular guest book, I made an address book box (from a recipe card box) for people to make their own address card. This has come in so handy for the holidays! We have EVERYONE'S complete info now!

This was for our candy bar which was open for the last two hours of the reception. People filled these glassine bags with candy and I printed a little label for them to seal up their bag.

Here are some shots of the tables before dinner service began. The flowers were DIY. Mr. Lace and I chose which flowers we wanted to use from the Flower Mart and sat down to make a mock up with Mr. Lace's aunt. These consisted of three mason jars - a small, medium and large - and various white and green flowers. We added votives with tealights too.

I made up little pop quiz cards. Our emcees were awesome and ran a little pop quiz game for our guests. The winners took home the centerpieces. The table letters went better with our school names than numbers. I spray painted chipboard with chalkboard paint and wrote letters with white paint markers.

I also made these little Fun and Adventure books. Inside, guests were able to fill out a little suggestion for something to do together in our married lives (where to go for dessert, dinner, vacation, etc.) and to stick their photobooth photos.

Since Mr. Lace and I were at the head table, I made this little sign for us.

Cocktails were going to be upstairs. Here were our escort cards. At first, I didn't want to do escort cards to save myself some time, but because we had three different entree options, each guest had to have something indicating their meal choice.

So, I went from no escort cards to 220 escort cards. You'd think I'd make it easy on myself, but no. I printed each name, cut it on my paper cutter, glued it onto the craft paper, punched a decorative edge on the bottom and stapled a specified ribbon for the three meal choices. Easy peasy!

A quick sign with directions since I'm a teacher. Can you read it?

Last, but not least, here are the favor bags I made for the kiddos attending our wedding. Inside, there was an activity book I made, Mad Libs, pencil and box of crayons.

In the end, it was worth all the trouble of finding decor, making signs and crafting all the different details of the reception. It was actually kind of fun for me even though it took a lot of time and caused me a lot of stress. For those of you in the midst of crafting and styling your event, hang in there, it'll all be worth it in the end when you get to see the photos of all your hard work! This is NOT to say I didn't abandon projects that I didn't absolutely love. I definitely wanted to do too many things and had to cut many unnecessary projects out.

What are your time, energy and effort consuming projects that are driving you nuts?

Missed something?

We go to the happiest place on Earth.
I get all dolled up.
Mr. Lace and I get a peep of each other.
We had awesome music.
We took photos.
We get married!
We write. We fight. We say our vows.
Big surprise...I cry.
We are photo crazed.
Say cheese!

Laced with Love: The Bridal Party

2010-11-25T12:05:00.000-08:00

Hope you all enjoyed your holiday this week! I am stuffed full of prime rib and hot pot...our typical Chinese-American Thanksgiving. It was our first Thanksgiving together as a married couple even though it didn't feel all that different since Mr. Lace has been spending Thanksgiving with my family for the past couple of years anyway. More on holiday adjusting later...

Anyway, here we are -- the bridal party. All photos are courtesy of Hanssie Trainor.

Mr. Lace's groomsmen are his oldest and dearest friends and family. His cousin, far left, flew out from Texas to be in the wedding. I had the chance to befriend Cousin Lace in college while he was stationed there before Mr. Lace and I ever became a couple. His other four friends are his childhood friends and the group still gathers together regularly to play video games (what else right?).

My bridesmaids are a mash up from different parts of my life. On the far left, BM V and I met in 5th grade at a church activity at her house. We were instant friends and wrote letters and hung out all through our school years. BM J's big brother and my brother are best friends. We always say that we were predestined to be friends. We met in 6th grade, but didn't become close friends until we were in high school. BM M was the one who introduced me to Mr. Lace and is one of my dearest friends from college. She and I lived together for our last two years in college. MOH C is also a dear friend from college. We met our freshman year and did a lot of nerdy things like puffy paint Easter eggs for all of our friends and tie up all the supermarket bags to conserve space. BM K also doubles as my sister-in-law! We got along from the moment my brother brought her home and now that I'm married...we're neighbors!

A quick side note about what the girls are wearing. I told the girls they could wear whatever shoes they wanted to wear. My only requirement for their jewelry was that it made a statement. I made the hair flowers and their cute, rewearable dresses were $50 from Anthropologie. WHAT?! A $50 dress from Anthropologie? Impossible. The dress was originally $198. I wrote it off and started looking at other dresses, but then it went on sale....to $49.99. The rest is history. :)

Here are a couple of everyone together in front of this ridiculously tall statue outside the OCPAC.

And a few of me because I'm apparently very vain.

Here's one last set of funny photos. So, the flowergirls and I were trying to snap a photo. The flowergirls are Mr. Lace's cousins two daughters (our unofficial nieces?). I found their dresses at Marshalls for $25. I made the hair flowers for the girls.

So, our photog snapped a photo of Ringbearer R standing there feeling a bit left out. R is my nephew.

But he quickly moved from sad to angry for being left out! I also am falling over in this because one of the flower girls leaned too far into me.

We had a lot of fun with our bridal party. They were awesome. They were there when they were supposed to be there and so incredibly helpful to us. My BM's were also magically there to help me every time I had to go use the restroom. I hope I left you a nice visual image there. :) Till next time!

Missed something?

We go to the happiest place on Earth.
I get all dolled up.
Mr. Lace and I get a peep of each other.
We had awesome music.
We took photos.
We get married!
We write. We fight. We say our vows.
Big surprise...I cry.
We are photo crazed.

Laced with Love: Photo Crazed

2010-11-10T20:00:00.000-08:00

As if we hadn't taken enough photos of ourselves, Mr. Lace and I scheduled in a little sunset portrait time at the suggestion of our photographer. During our engagement session, it was kind of gloomy so we didn't get that romantic flattering sunlight. Our photog suggested some sunset portraits during our wedding since we had a pocket of time during cocktails. So, we skipped out on cocktails to take advantage of the setting sun.
Some of my favorite wedding photos came out of this one hour session.

You'll face this challenge later when you make a wedding album. Black and white or color? The one of us kissing or the one of our faces apart?

Missed something?

We go to the happiest place on Earth.
I get all dolled up.
Mr. Lace and I get a peep of each other.
We had awesome music.
We took photos.
We get married!
We write. We fight. We say our vows.
Big surprise...I cry.

Laced with Love: The Part that Always Gets Me

2010-11-09T20:42:00.000-08:00

It's the part that always gets me at every wedding - recognizing the parents. More than the bride walking down the aisle, the vows, the first kiss, it's when the newlywed couple thanks their parents for all their love, support and sacrifice that turns on the waterworks for me.

I am really close to my Mom and lived with her during the years after I moved back to LA and before I got married. I saw her everyday. We took walks together. We ate dinner together. We fought once in awhile. But not just during that time that I lived with her after college, but in general. Before being married to Mr. Lace, she was probably the person I was/am closest to in this world. She has always been there for me (whether I wanted her or not), sacrificed and cared for me. So, after the engagement excitement wore off and it got closer and closer to our wedding day, I realized that my relationship with my Mom would change dramatically. No longer would I see her everyday, eat with her, talk to her whenever I wanted. It started hitting me hard and I started to have a lot of weird (for lack of a better word) feeling about getting married, coming under the safety and protection of Mr. Lace and moving to Orange County!

Because of our close relationships with our moms, Mr. Lace and I wanted to take a small opportunity to recognize our love and gratitude for our parents during our wedding ceremony. In other weddings I've attended, when I see the bride and groom hugging their parents and everyone crying, I cried too. I understood the sacrifice and love that parents give to their children. And, as children, we often don't show enough gratitude or respect for their dedication in caring for us. I know that there were plenty of times I'd think, "I shouldn't have said that," after a rousing disagreement with my Mom. But, over the years, we've both gotten better about saying sorry and admitting when we were wrong and trying, but I'm sure I've hurt my parents much more than they've hurt me. I know that's not the case for everyone and that everyone comes from different home situations. But, Mr. Lace and I knew we wanted to take a moment to reiterate to our parents how much we love them. We didn't really say much to each other, it was mainly just crying!

It looks like I'm about to smile....

But it's the tight-lipped expression I get right before I cry.

That's me trying to regain my composure.

But by not, I've completely lost it. And look at all those people snapping photos of me crying!

All images courtesy of Hanssie Trainor

So, there it is. The part that always gets me when I attend weddings...and of course, since it was my own, it hit me with a vengeance. What are you doing to honor or recognize your parents at your wedding?

Missed something?

We go to the happiest place on Earth.
I get all dolled up.
Mr. Lace and I get a peep of each other.
We had awesome music.
We took photos.
We get married!
We write. We fight. We say our vows.

Laced with Love: The Laces on Personal Vows

2010-11-03T18:27:00.000-07:00

I don't mean it as a put down, but Mr. Lace is not a writer. It's just not his thing. He's magical when it comes to math, science, engineering and such, but he's never loved writing. You can imagine my surprise when I (half) jokingly suggested having personal vows in our ceremony and he heartily agreed. The conversation went like this:

Me: You know, I was thinking, we should write personal vows in addition to our traditional vows. It will make our ceremony more personal and we'd get to say what we want to say to each other on our wedding day.
Mr. Lace: You're right. That's a good idea.
Me: (Blinking) You know you have to write them yourself.
Mr. Lace: Yeah.
Me: And then you have to read them out loud in front of everyone.
Mr. Lace: Yeah.
Me: And you still want to do it?
Mr. Lace: Yeah.
Me: (Thinking) Can I get this in writing?

Seriously, I was so happy that he agreed and made him promise not to back out. Keep in mind, this conversation happened months before our wedding. So, for a long time, "write vows" was at the end of our to do list. The month of the wedding rolled around and suddenly Mr. Lace started chickening out. But it wasn't just him. I started chickening out too! Neither of us really enjoys being the center of attention so are our wedding approached, we started considering what writing personal vows would really require of us. After a long conversation, we decided to still write personal vows. After all, it was already printed in the program and on the day of schedule.

Three weeks before the wedding, I started brainstorming ideas. What angle? What should I say? Will it sound cliche? What if Mr. Lace and my vows ended up being vastly different in tone and length? What if I went on and on about how wonderful he was and he wrote, "You're cool." As each week passed, I'd ask Mr. Lace if he had started and of course, he hadn't. It was the week of the wedding and neither of us had nailed down our vows. Needless to say, I was stressed out. I decided that I'd sit down and write them in one day. I made sure I didn't have any interruptions or appointments and began writing draft after draft until I felt that it was perfect. Of course, at the end of that day, I wasn't completely happy with it and had to go back and revise it several times before I nailed down a final draft.

During this process, I thought, if this is hard for me, this is going to be ridiculously hard for Mr. Lace since he doesn't really like writing! I hounded and pestered him about it. Two days before the wedding and his vows still weren't done. Instead, he had gone out to eat dinner with friends, watched several movies and documentaries, but none of his free time was devoted to writing vows! Naturally, we got into a fight two days before our wedding about how he didn't care because he wasn't putting forth as much time and effort. I shared my worries about the vows being inconsistent in tone and length. The whole thing was stressing me out.

The next day, Mr. Lace and I had to prepare for the rehearsal so we met up early to run errands. As Mr. Lace was getting ready to go out, SIL Lace asked me if I had finished my vows. When I began telling her about the stress these vows had caused, SIL Lace said that Mr. Lace had stayed up till 4 a.m. working on his. He had taken out all the letters and cards I'd ever written to him and read through each one.

Hive, I felt so terrible. Why couldn't I just trust that I would love whatever he wrote? Instead, I'd turned a reflective part of our wedding planning into something stressful. Mr. Lace came out with his vows and asked if I wanted to read them to make sure they were "okay." I started crying as I apologized. He didn't need my approval in his own expression of how he felt. He told me that it was okay, but after I had calmed down a bit he said, "No, but really. You always proofread all the writing I need to do. I want you to read it to see if it sounds okay." I laughed, but insisted that I didn't want to read it. Instead, we gave our vows to cousin Lace and asked her to read our vows to see what she thought.

It ended up being the most important and heartfelt part of our ceremony. As soon as Mr. Lace began reading, the tears came streaming down my face. I was a mess! By the time it was my turn to read, I not only looked a mess, but sounded one too!

Mr. Lace reading his vows to me.

I think he said he knows I love him because I share my bacon and churros with him.

I'm a crier. What can I say?

So, as a bride who has been through the vow writing process, here are my tips.

1. Agree on a due date so you don't procrastinate. Make sure your due date is not the day before the wedding! Try to finish them a couple weeks before. If Mr. Lace and I had written these earlier, our week before the wedding would have been stress and fight free!

2. Agree on a general length. That was hard for us to quantify. Should we write 150 words? 200? What if one person is more wordy. It'll take them more words to get their point across. If that words for you, that's great! It didn't for us. Instead, we gave each other a time limit. We said our vows would be between 2- 3 minutes long.

3. If you decide not to share your vows in advance, like Mr. Lace and I, find a trustworthy, well-educated friend or family member that can read over both of your vows for tone and length. He/she can give suggestions or hints to help.

4. When you print it out, make sure you make the print large enough to read so that you don't have to squint at your paper or keep your eyes glued on your paper and ignore your spouse-to-be.

Even with all the stress, personal vows were totally worth it for us. We were able to express our commitment with one another during this very important ceremony in our own words. Apparently, we got a few guests to cry. We heard that Seattle cousin Lace was bawling through the vows. People around him thought he was being sarcastic until they looked at him and saw that he really was bawling!

Are you planning on writing your own vows? Has it been an easy or difficult process for you and your fiance?

Laced with Love: The Main Event

2010-11-02T23:29:00.000-07:00

We put a lot of time and energy into planning our wedding, but we knew that the most important part for us was our wedding ceremony. Hive, it's time to share the most important part of our wedding day with you. Since this post was kind of picture heavy, I took some of the photos and put them together as little collages so you wouldn't have to scroll through fifty pictures. Now you only have to scroll through forty. Just kiddin'.

All photos are courtesy of the wonderful Hanssie Trainor.

My husband-to-be walking in with the pastor and groomsmen.

The kids and bridesmaids lines up and ready to go.

My Dad and I walking down the "aisle." And by aisle, I mean flight of stairs. At rehearsal, the BM's and I spent a long time practicing walking down the stairs to find a balance between looking up and avoiding a face plant.

On a side note, if you can, please get a second shooter. Without a second shooter, you only have one perspective.

Here are a couple to give you an idea of what the Orange County Performing Arts Center looks like.

It's really hard to fully capture the beauty of this place. You have to just be there!

In his introduction, the pastor said, "aren't we excited for Mr. and Miss Lace?" As the audience cheered, our groomsmen whipped out their kazoos and noise makers. I love the BM's reactions.

We had a Christian ceremony so we chose to have our friend Mike play a few worship songs for us.

We chose to do both traditional and personal vows. Mr. Lace liked it and he put a ring on it.

Because we don't need a photo of Mr. Lace and I smooching, here's one right after we kissed.

Mr. Lace is ready to walk back down that aisle.

The photo on the far right is framed in our bedroom. I don't know if you can tell, but I have an ECSTATIC smile on my face in the photo on the top left. I wasn't smiling because I was relieved it was over. I'm sure part of it was because I was happy, but I know for sure that part of it was because up until this point, I had not even thought about our guests. Our ceremony was truly ours. We shared in each moment together and were vaguely aware of the people around us. When we started walking down the aisle it was like, "Oh hey! You're here! I'm so glad to see you!" Sounds kinda mean, but I'm just being honest. I was concentrating on getting married and trying to remember every detail of what we were saying to each other.

My next post will likely be about our initially dreadful, but later wonderful personal vows. Stay tuned!

We had awesome music.We took photos.
Mr. Lace and I get a peep of each other.
I get all dolled up.
We go to the happiest place on Earth.
I become a real housewife of Orange County.

Laced with Love: The Ceremony Music

2010-11-01T18:31:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the hiatus. Life has been busy and I have struggled to find a nice block of time to sit down and blog. I am stealing time away from something right now so I can tell you all about our wedding ceremony.

Mr. Lace and I actually put a lot of thought into each aspect of our wedding ceremony. It took us several months to choose the songs involved in our ceremony. We spent an entire day on our ceremony schedule. Most importantly, hours upon excruciating hours writing personal vows.

Let's focus today, on music.

We hired a great DJ named Eugene Ng through Zuno Productions. He met with us several times to find out about our musical tastes, to get a feel for our wedding guest crowd and answered all my e-mails in a timely fashion. I was really annoying because our wedding site didn't have ANY sound equipment so I'd e-mail him once to see if he had 2 microphones for my wedding musicians and pastor, another time to find out if he had music stands, another time to see if he could be in charge of our slideshow and about a billion times in between.

With our DJ in place, Mr. Lace and I sat down on Saturday to choose all of music from the processional to the bouquet toss. We were determined to choose it all in one day. After all, there were plenty of times, pre-engagement, that we'd hear a song and think, "That'd be a good song for our wedding." Alas, neither one of us made mental notes or wrote the titles down. We thought it'd be easy between our two iTunes libraries, YouTube and our old cd collections to nail down a handful of songs.

WRONG. After a very tiring day of listening to song after song, we came up empty. Songs we thought would be perfect ended up being too fast, too slow or had an inappropriate lyric in one place or another. What we thought would be a one day job, we ended up spending MONTHS on.

What did we end up? Let me share some of our song selections with you.

Mr. Lace and I really like Ocean's Eleven and it doesn't hurt that the whole movie is set in Vegas, one of our favorite quick trip spots. So, Mr. Lace and the groomsmen walked into the ceremony to Claire de Lune. We opted for a piano version we found on iTunes.

The other song I'll share with you is the one I walked down the aisle (well, stairs actually) to. Did you ever come to some part of your wedding planning and you just found "it." You didn't have to decide, you just knew. Well that was this song for me. As soon as I heard it, I knew it was the song I'd walk down to. I'll be honest and tell you that when I decided on this song, I swore I'd never share it with anyone. I didn't want to share my good find with anyone. I know, so selfish. But now, four months out from my wedding, I'm finally ready to let go and share this beautiful song called "River Flows in You" by Yiruma with you.

I was considering "Bella's Lullaby" by Carter Burwell, but parts of it were just too eerie for a wedding. But during my search, I found this song which was incorrectly called Bella's Lullaby and fell in love. I love happy accidents!

What songs are you walking to? Were there any decisions that you didn't have to think about in your wedding planning process?

We took photos.
Mr. Lace and I get a peep of each other.
I get all dolled up.
We go to the happiest place on Earth.
I become a real housewife of Orange County.

Laced with Love: The Romantics

2010-09-23T19:24:00.000-07:00

After a morning of pressing and primping, Mr. Lace and I were off! Mr. Lace and I, the photogs and my MOH C, drove off to the Lab to take some photos. We chose to go to the Lab because we took half of our engagement photos there and it was down the street from our venue. Since a lot of our photos took place in public places, we got a lot of oohs and aahs and well wishes from people who saw us walking around. Everyone was really sweet and they made me feel pretty darn good about how I looked! :) Taking photos totally helped me feel more relaxed because we were busy and I didn't have to think about walking down the aisle with people looking at us.

So, now it's tip time from the other side of the wedding.

1. Photos before, between or after?

Couples do there weddings in many different ways. Some people opt to take their photos before the ceremony so that they're all out of the way. Some people choose to take them between the ceremony and reception so that they don't break tradition and see each other before the ceremony. Some take them after all the partying is done. I suppose it depends on what time your ceremony is also, but Mr. Lace and I took our photos before the ceremony and then took another set of photos after the ceremony with our bridal party. We split our photos into two sessions mainly because we HAD to have a cocktail hour (for the venue to change the ceremony location into a reception location) and we didn't want our bridal party to show up four hours beforehand and follow us around to take photos.

2. Bring someone with you!
MOH C had the foresight to volunteer her services during the two hours we were taking photos. She got ready a bit earlier than the rest of the BM's and came with Mr. Lace and I. She was AWESOME! When Mr. Lace's orchid snapped and we had to stop by the wedding site to pick up another bout, it was MOH C who ran down to pick it up. When I needed someone to hold my bouquet or lift my dress, MOH C was there. When I was trying to get into the car, it was MOH C that made sure that all of my dress made it into the car and didn't drag on the street as we drove from place to place. And lastly, when we were getting a bit hungry and needed a snack, it was MOH C that jumped out of the car in 4 inch heels and bought a 20 piece chicken nugget for us to share.

3. Location, location, location!

If your photog isn't familiar with your reception site, snap some photos while you're there so your photog can get an idea of what the place looks like. Better yet, when we went to take our engagement photos, we spun by our venue to let her see it for herself. That really helped because she knew what the lighting would be like, potential locations for group photos and any interesting spots to snap photos. We decided to go back to the Lab because we thought it'd be fun to have a set of casual and formal photos in the same spot. See? (All photos by the fabulous Hanssie!)

The Rainbow Wall during our engagement photos.

And at the same wall on our wedding day.

The Waterfall Cans during engagement photos.

And here we are again in our wedding duds!

4. Props

While I would've loved to bring props, I had too much to keep track of to remember to lug props around with us. Plus, I think Hanssie did a great job making every photo look interesting!

The girl is amazing. She took this set of beautiful photos with a wall and some light!

Can't decide if I like this better in black and white or color! I LOVE the shadow on the wall!

And my perpetual dilemma as I look through wedding photos...black and white or color?!

Do you have any special plans for your wedding day photos?

Mr. Lace and I get a peep of each other.
I get all dolled up.
We go to the happiest place on Earth.
I become a real housewife of Orange County.

Laced with Love: Peep This!

2010-09-20T19:58:00.000-07:00

The morning of my wedding was a whirlwind. I spent about four or five hours getting ready and all of sudden, it was time to go downstairs to see Mr. Lace. It all happened so fast and I was about to partake in the part of my wedding day that I totally didn't plan. That's right. I didn't plan our first look. Well, that's not completely true. Mr. Lace and I knew what time we'd meet and that we'd meet at the hotel that I was getting ready at, but that's all. After Mr. Lace arrived, he spoke to MOH C and then Hanssie did the rest. Hanssie went to find Chris. Her second shooter, Michelle, stayed with me. I walked when she told me to walk. I waited when she told me to wait. I had no clue what was going on with Mr. Lace, but my photogs had everything under control. All of a sudden, Michelle had me walk out and after a brief pause she said, "Okay, in a second I'm going to have you turn around and you're going to walk to Mr. Lace and tap him on the shoulder."

I had no clue how close or far he was from me. For all I knew, he could be across the street. After a moment though, Michelle got in place and gave me the thumbs up to turn around. I turned around and realized we were on a grassy lawn in front of the hotel. Mr. Lace was only about 100 yards away, but everything seemed to go in slow motion. As I got closer, I started crying and I thought, "I can't be crying already!" In that moment, I wasn't really sure why I was crying, but in retrospect, I realize I was completely overwhelmed by the culmination of so many hopes and dreams of so many years.

As I tapped Mr. Lace, on the shoulder, I felt like my day was really beginning. All photos courtesy of Hanssie Trainor.

I know everyone has different opinions about the First Look, but for Mr. Lace and I, it was perfect. We had a few precious moments to ourselves before the whirlwind of events that would follow to say what we wanted to say and get a peep of each other before the ceremony. We ended up spending most of the early afternoon together taking photos before our ceremony. Mr. Lace makes me feel calm and safe and being able to spend some time with him calmed me before our ceremony. Had we not done the first look, I think I would've been a ball of nerves for the entire day.

What made you decide on having or not having a first look?

I get all dolled up.
We go to the happiest place on Earth.
I become a real housewife of Orange County.

Laced with Love: All Dolled Up

2010-09-15T21:27:00.000-07:00

The day before our wedding, Mr. Lace and I spent the day running errands, checking into hotels and getting ready for our rehearsal. I purposely woke up early that morning so that I'd be really tired at night and it would trump that nervous excitement that might keep me all night. After the rehearsal, Mr. Lace dropped off Momma Lace and I off at our hotel and we parted ways.

And what did I do the night before the wedding? I took a shower and went to bed. Yup. That's all. I was worried about getting tired midday and feeling sleepy on my wedding day. I think I crashed around 11 p.m., but of course I woke up in the middle of the night, not because I couldn't sleep, but because my Mom was having some kind of dream where people were ordering her around and she yelled "STOP!" really loud around 3 a.m. I woke up with a start, but managed to fall asleep again pretty quickly.

The next morning, Momma Lace and I stopped at Starbucks to pick up some coffee before we met up with the bridesmaids to get ready. My fantastic hair and makeup artist, Kelly Zhang, was early and began working on the bridesmaids right away. We spent 4 hours getting ready, but the time zipped by super quickly. Before I knew it, my fabulous photographer, Hanssie Trainor, knocked on the door, stepped in and began snapping photos!

Before I share some photos from the morning of, here are a few things for those of you getting ready for your big day.

1. Be prepared - bobby pins, q-tips, cotton balls, Kleenex, water, blotting sheets, hair spray, safety pins, straight pins, chapstick, lip gloss, fake eyelash glue, toothpicks...throw it all in a bag and bring it with you all day. I was surprised at how often we ended up using items from this bag! When you're in a wedding dress and your girls are in dresses and heels, it's more inconvenient to get around.

2. Consider your transportation from one place to another. Make sure there's enough space for you and your dress. It ended up being more difficult to move around, sit, bend, etc. in my dress than I would've imagined.

3. If you plan to get ready in a hotel room and your photographer is going to take photos, try to get large room. Our hotel room was a LOT smaller than we thought and was really crowded most of the morning. There wasn't much space for my photographer to be able to snap photos without people or stuff being around. She did beautifully for such a cramped hotel room!

So now that I've given you a few tips, it's time for photos. All photos are courtesy of Hanssie Trainor unless otherwise noted.

That's Kelly making sure my hair will stay up all day long (which it did!). She gave me a great tip before she left, she said at the end of the night, when I was going to wash my hair, to condition first, wash and then condition again.

All done!

Bridesmaid M is the camera queen. She has such good aim!

Sister-in-law Lace getting ready. Her hair was super cute.

Getting into my dress. It felt a little awkward getting into my dress. You only see three of my BM's here, but there were actually ten other people in this room.

I had to adjust my boobs.

I wasn't in love with the original sash that came with my dress so I made my own.

MOH Lace helped me get it on. It was a little tricky because the ribbon in the back was so long.

MOH Lace is my best friend because she can tie a perfect bow.

I'm ready to go downstairs and see Mr. Lace!

And before I leave you today, I love these detail shots by Hanssie.

My Watters dress with my handmade sash.

Mr. Lace's cousin in made all three of these rings.

Ballet flats from one of my favorite retail shops.

I love this hanger from Etsy, but it turned out that my dress was too heavy to hang out it so, it was mainly decorative. I still love it though.

Our friend Darren Lo designed our invitations for us.

The morning went by fast, but the rest of the day went by faster! More on that later!

We go to the happiest place on Earth.
I become a real housewife of Orange County.

Laced with Love: The Most Magical Place on Earth

2010-08-25T20:44:00.000-07:00

Whilst planning our honeymoon to Disneyworld, I discovered that the Wizarding World of Harry Potter would have it's grand opening two weeks before we were there. And have I ever mentioned to you that I love the Harry Potter series? If not, let it be known, I LOVE the Harry Potter series. For my sake, Mr. Lace has watched all the movies with me. However, as time passed, he started asking questions. "Why does Snape hate Harry so much?" "Does Hermione like Ron?" "Why didn't Harry die?" He was looking for a short answer, but for any of you Harry Potter fans, you know, there are no short or easy explanations in Harry Potter. I wouldn't say he loves Harry Potter, but I think he'll admit that it's a well-crafted story and is impressed with my in-depth knowledge on the topic (or so I'd like to think).

Anyway, when I mentioned going to the Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Universal Studios, Mr. Lace was all for it. However, we didn't make any firm plans. After our third day at Walt Disney World we realized that if we didn't do a little research and planning, we might not get around to going so Mr. Lace stayed up late looking up tickets and transportation. I know that he wasn't necessarily excited about leaving Walt Disney World to go to Harry Potter Land, but he knew I'd be majorly bummed if we didn't make the trip. So, on the fifth day of our honeymoon, we hopped in a taxi outside the Grand Floridian and headed to Universal Studios.

Mr. Lace forking over $200 for our tickets.

So, how do I describe the Wizarding World of Harry Potter? It's about the size of Toon Town at Disneyland if you're familiar with that so I was a bit disappointed with the size. I kind of feel like they could make an entire theme park just centered around Harry Potter - a Hogsmeade, a Diagon Alley, the Weasley home, Hogwart's Castle, Platform Nine and Three-Quarters, the Dursley's home. This was a mish mash of Hogsmeade, Diagon Alley and Hogwarts. When you enter you see the Hogwart's train.

Don't let the snow deceive you. It was 100 degrees and 100% humidity (or so it felt). See this guy wiping the sweat from his brow?

First item on the agenda was to get something to drink. Libations anyone? Your choices were frozen butterbeer, cold butterbeer or pumpkin juice.

Sweat-drenched Mrs. Lace drinking cold butterbeer.

Okay, so these drinks were like $5 each which is obviously pricey, but to be expected. I was so STINKIN' excited about buying the butterbeer though. Mr. Lace ordered us each a butterbeer. While I was drinking it, Mr. Lace said, "How is it?" I replied, "MMMM it's sooooo good." Mr. Lace took a sip of his butterbeer and said, "We just paid $10 for cream soda." Okay, so yes it was pretty much really cold cream soda, but it was so good.

Our next visit was to Hogwart's which happened to be the entrance to a ride.

The line weaves through Hogwart's Castle.

Professor Sprout's greenhouse

Hall of talking photos and yes, they talked! There were larger paintings of the four founders and they talked to each other about He-who-must-not-be-named and Harry Potter.

Mr. Lace taking a dive into the pensieve to check out some old memories.

Dumbledore's office

Honeyduke's and YES, there was a line to get into this store.

I didn't catch photos of Ollivander's (where you could choose your own wand), the Owl Post (where you could send a postcard stamped at Hogsmeade), Dervish and Banges and Zonko's. There were hour long waits to get into the STORES.

Soon after this, as we were leaving Universal Studios, it began to POUR. People were walking around drenched and shoeless because everyone was ankle deep in water. What was supposed to be a twenty minute taxi ride back to Walt Disney World, turned into an hour and a half long ride. We were soaked and tired. At dinner, Mr. Lace asked, "so, what did you think?" Even after the ridiculous ride back to Walt Disney World, the crazy crowds at Harry Potter Land and the mother of all rain storms, it was totally worth it.

We go to the happiest place on Earth.
I become a real housewife of Orange County.

Laced with Love: The Happiest Place on Earth

2010-08-16T21:07:00.000-07:00

The day after our wedding, Mr. Lace and I got up at 6 am, got ready, went back to our place to drop off stuff and pick stuff up and headed out to the airport to catch our 10 am flight to Florida. We left Orange County, California and 2 sausage and egg McMuffins and 6 hours later, we landed in Orange County, Florida! We found the Disney Magical Express which would magically transport us over to Disneyworld.

Those magical sandwiches are our favorites. Unfortunately, we lacked the foresight to buy some extra food to bring on the plane.

This is not just a bus, it is a BUS. The seats reclined, had a foot rest and room for feet. It was nice to stretch out after the flight.

We didn't do much that first night, but it was so much fun. We walked around Downtown Disney and ate at Planet Hollywood. We crashed through after that because we were so exhausted from the day before.

We woke up bright and early. Okay, no, we didn't. We slept in till 11 am everyday. I felt like we were wasting precious Disney World time, but couldn't figure out why it was so hard for us to wake up at 7 or 8 am in the morning so we could head out the parks. Seriously, it wasn't until day 2 when we remembered the time change. We were so unaware of time while we were there... it was so awesome.

Anyone, on Day 1, we headed out to the parks and figured out what it takes about 30 minutes to get from one place on the DW resort to another. So, here's us, kinda bored at the monorail.

I know you can't actually see the monorail. Apparently, since it was already 1 pm, everyone was at the parks so we couldn't find someone to take a photo. Except that guy in the blue shirt in the background. I guess we could've asked him.

So, here's the rundown of each park:

Magic Kingdom
We went on a few rides here, but since there was a lot of overlap, we didn't really go on any rides that we had back at home at Disneyland. This park was about three times the size of Disneyland, but had just about the same attractions and rides. We really enjoyed our time here and the castle is amazing, but to be honest, we think Disneyland is a bit more charming.

This castle is a lot bigger than our castle!

Animal Kingdom
The best ride by far here was the Safari ride. It was like jungle cruise, on land, but with real animals! It was STANK hot though. I'm not sure why this park felt extra hot. It was probably the weather, but we attributed it to the animals. We got to see rhinos, hippos, pelicans, flamingos, ostriches, a lion and giraffes!

There are no fences at all. You just drive through in a truck and the animals are chillin' on the side, all docile and calm! I'm sure a safari in Africa would be better, but this has to be the next best thing.

Epcot
This was our FAVORITE park by far. We went there 4 out of 5 days. We loved the food, attractions and the food! Here's the view from Italy.

Chris was a little unimpressed with the Epcot ball because he felt like it looked bigger when he first saw them on Full House and Family Matters.

Look who came to visit us when we ate at Les Chefs de France! He talked...or squeaked!

It was also opening day Captain EO which brought us back to the good ole days. They made some updates to the show that surprised us. There's a whip that whips out from under the chair and a water spray when Hooter sneezes.

Hollywood Studios
Because I never go to California Adventure, I'd never been on Toy Story Mania which, I'll admit, I love more than Astroblasters now! At the beginning of the game, I was beating Mr. Lace, but then I stopped watching the counter, thinking I was ahead, and by the end, I was far, far, far below.

We went boating on our last day before we needed to head over to the airport.

And the view of our hotel from the boat!

Food
The food was terrific. Our favorites turned out to be Narcoosee's at the Grand Floridian, Teppan Edo at Epcot, Les Chefs de France at Epcot and Boulangerie at Epcot. Can you see why we spent so much time at Epcot?

At Wolfgang Puck after a long day. Macadamia nut crusted chicken on mashed potatoes.

Free champagne toast at Narcoosee's.

Here's my dessert - chocolate mousse!

We reluctantly flew home to LA. I wish we could've stayed for another week, but alas, it was time to go home. I was so bummed and to make matters worse, our flight was delayed, we taxi'd at LAX for an hour before we could deplane, our shuttle ride left because of our delay, we waited for 30 minutes for a Super Shuttle and then had to circle LAX for 30 minutes before the driver could drive us out to Orange County. Sigh. We should've never left. :(

Next up, I, happily, and Mr. Lace, semi-reluctantly, made a half day trip out of Disneyworld (don't worry, it was for a really magical reason) and I'll share all the details in my next post.

Laced with Love: Real Housewife of Orange County

2010-08-10T11:38:00.000-07:00

No one tells you how BUSY it is after you get married! Maybe it's not the case for many of you out there, but for me, things are finally beginning to slow down. Well, sort of. Summer vacation ends this week and I'm heading back to get my classroom ready for my next group of students. I've been busy doing all the moving I didn't do before the wedding from my place to Mr. Lace's...I mean, our place. I never really understood the whole nesting thing before getting married, but now I do. There's a bird family that's made their nest on a tall bush by our garage and Mr. Lace and I go out to check on them everyday to see what they're up to. They're pulling branches, twigs, leaves to make their nest a comfortable place to lay eggs and raise their babies. No babies in sight, here, but I at least understand an innate desire to make our place homey and comfortable.

So, I've been doing a lot of shopping, cooking, cleaning and decorating. When I go to Target at 10 a.m., I'm rolling with all the other housewives of Orange County. It's pretty nice to have the freedom to do whatever I want during the day, but it's all going to come to a screeching halt once school is back in session.

I've been working on all my name change stuff which I'll post about later, but I just wanted to drop back in and say hello! Next up, the honeymoon!

Are You Ready to Rumble?

2010-06-24T20:02:00.000-07:00

Sorry, I wish it had a cool video to play along, but I couldn't find one. Anyway, my brother used to always play this song as he was getting ready for basketball games and I always associated it with preparing for something big, something exciting. So, as I got ready to write this post, this is the first song that popped into my head and thus, the title was born. Can you imagine me playing this song on the morning of the wedding, jumping on the bed as everyone else in the room is getting ready? :)

Today is my last day as Miss Lace. Tonight, I'll be sitting in a very nice Orange County hotel with full amenities, but I can't help but wish I lived a bit closer to a venue so I could spend my last night as Miss Lace in my white wooden bed that Mr. Lace helped me build, see my white wooden desk with my Harry Potter collection sitting on the corner, surrounded by my many photographs of family and friends, look through my bookcases of books (which, when I told Mr. Lace we'd have to move, he said, "why? Haven't you read all those books already?") and use my plush throw from Restoration Hardware one last time. I know what you're thinking, "you can still bring all your stuff over to your new house with Mr. Lace." It's true, but it'll be different. Something about this change creates a bit of dissonance within me. On the one hand, I am so excited to start my life and home with Mr. Lace, but on the other hand, I'm a little sad to be leaving my home for so many years behind. It's a big change and my feelings are bittersweet.

I'm a ball of emotion. Everything that I've been doing this week has been filled with emotion. I felt giddy as I went to pick up my wedding dress. I thought to myself, "this is my last Thursday as a single lady." I felt nervous excitement even as I drove from one wedding errand to another. I'm excited to get all gussied up with my girls. I'm nervous about seeing Mr. Lace for the first time. I'm ready to see all of our planning through. I'm worried about how things will go even though every single bride I've talked to said to just let it go and roll with the punches (though they speak from wisdom and experience, it's hard to adopt that mindset from this side of the wedding). My vows are done, all my luggage is ready to go and I'm ready to do this!

You know how people write wedding vows to say during the ceremony? Well, we should call those marriage vows. We should write vows about the actual wedding. Here are mine:

Tomorrow, I promise to smile when Uncle Lee is red in the face from drinking too much beer and talking at supersonic levels. I promise that I won't grimace if my bouquet doesn't turn out exactly the way I want. I promise that I will sit down and eat dinner...all of it. I promise to not be a bridezilla. I promise to look the other way when Aunt Marge takes a little icing off the cake thinking no one is watching. I promise to answer gracefully instead of rolling my eyes when our relatives suggest anything about having children. I promise to have fun. I promise to enjoy Mr. Lace, myself and our big day.

I feel like a kid (umm..or a young at heart adult :)) the night before a trip to Disneyland! My heart is racing with excitement now as I get ready to start the wedding festivities. Today I'm a Miss. Tomorrow I'll be a Mrs.! See you on the other side, Hive!

Find Your Soundtrack

2010-06-21T22:34:00.000-07:00

No, not for your wedding, not for your first dance or grand entrance. Find your soundtrack. Make your playlist. Find some music that calms and soothes you because you're going to need it.

I told you previously that I wasn't stressed. I had worked so hard so that there'd be very little left to do during this last week of the wedding. I had maybe 5 things I needed to do this week - two meetings, write vows, pack for the honeymoon and get a manicure and pedicure. Since yesterday, five more things have popped up, all pressing and needing to be done NOW. So, today I worked on getting those 5 things done and now I still have my original five things to do and one less day to do them.

I tried my best to not be outwardly annoyed. I vented to some of my BM's and then turned on my soundtrack. Luckily, I randomly created this playlist a long time ago to play while I write and journal. It's entitled, "Mellow Out Miss Lace." I turned this on as I prepared to do some packing and write vows (not at the same time of course) and I instantly felt my shoulders unbury themselves from my ears. Ahhhh...music. So soothing and healing to the soul!

What's on my playlist? We have some Coldplay, a lot of Jack Johnson, Lifehouse, John Mayer, Lauryn Hill, Snow Patrol and many many more. My favorites on here are "Tell Him" by Lauryn Hill, " "Monsoon" by Jack Johnson, "Amber" by 311, "Such Great Heights" by Iron and Wine and "Let Go" by Frou Frou (to pump me up, but in a mellow manner).

Up next? A nice hot shower to relax my shoulders and then time to buckle down!

What's on your playlist?

I'm So Excited...I'm So Scared!

2010-06-21T09:20:00.000-07:00

Any Saved By the Bell Fans here? Remember when Jesse Spano was taking caffeine pills because she was so stressed and how so much to do? Then at the end, she pretty much flipped out and sang, "I'm so excited! I'm so excited! I'm so scared!" I'm not flipping out, but I do understand the mix of feelings she had!

Last night, as I was lying in bed reflecting upon the day, I felt weird. Happy yet nervous. Excited yet scared. I couldn't feel TRULY happy and excited because it was mingled with a ton of other emotions. I think a lot of people only emphasize the stress that brides feel the week of their wedding, maybe some of the giddy excitement of getting married too, but the main picture is of a frazzled bride who has more things to do than is humanly possible in the week leading up the the wedding.

While I do feel a bit of stress (writing vows, last minute family requests, last minute additions from out of nowhere, changes to the schedule, etc.), Mr. Lace and I are in pretty good shape. But the other emotions I'm feeling are much stronger. Maybe you can relate (or you will when you get closer to the wedding).

1. Happy - like overjoyed happy whenever I see Mr. Lace because in a few short days we'll begin a new chapter in our lives together AND we're going to Disneyworld! Many of our family and friends are beginning to come into town and I'm happy seeing and spending time with them. Oh and happy that the wedding day is almost here and I can finally put down my scissors and glue.

2. Nervous - I don't really like having a ton of attention on me. I won't faint or keel over (knock on wood), but I will be all awkward and not know how to receive the attention. A nervous smile? Fidgeting with my hands? My mean looking resting face? I'm nervous about making such a huge commitment (no, not scared, just nervous).

3. Worried - No, not about how the wedding will go. I'm worried about having enough energy to say hi to everyone and spend the entire day smiling (will my cheeks hurt?). I've become an introvert as I've gotten older and although I love spending time with people, I get tired more easily with people, namely large groups. I do better in small groups and I always enjoy retreating back home to have some time for myself. I'm worried though because I don't want to come across tired or unhappy to see my guests. When else will I have all my closest family and friends in one room?

I'm whirring with emotions, but it usually mainly goes back to a light-headed excitement as I get ready to marry Mr. Lace! How have you been feeling in the wedding planning process?

Why Is It...

2010-06-14T22:43:00.000-07:00

Why is it that 12 days out from my wedding....

-family tragedies and woes occur?
-I get the hiccups randomly throughout the day?
-I keep walking into things and become covered in bruises?
-I break out?
-I am getting tension headaches (okay, I guess I know the answer to this one)?

This is a tough case of Murphy's Law! Let me count the ways!

1. My grandpa went into the hospital last week and two days later, passed away. His funeral will be the weekend before my wedding. Unfortunately, because of Chinese traditions, I'm not supposed to attend his funeral because it's so close to my wedding. Instead, I'm supposed to wait 100 days after my wedding to make a visit to Northern California to pay my respects. My Dad's entire side who will have to travel from Northern California to the wedding is in a planning frenzy as they prepare for the funeral.

2. I haven't gotten hiccups in months, maybe even years! However, I came down with a bad case of hiccups...you know, the really loud ones that make your entire abdomen and head move? The kind that make you feel like you might yak? Well, after an hour or so, they went away, but then came back 4 or 5 times throughout the day. Right when I was least expecting it, they'd return! It's been like that for a few days now! I'm hoping they go away in time for the wedding so I don't hiccup through my vows (I, Miss Lace, *hiccup* take you, Mr. Lace, *hiccup* to be *hiccup*...).

3. I've been walking into beds, tables, chairs, etc. I don't know if I'm being extra uncareful or if my depth perception is off. My legs are covered in bumps and bruises. I burned my hand on my flat iron this morning. And the other day, I was walking toward Starbucks and right before I got to the door, my shoe lost traction and I slipped and fell on my butt. LUCKILY, there was a man sitting outside Starbucks to laugh at me and then ask if I was okay.

4. My skin has been in pretty good condition for the past few weeks thanks to drinking lots of water and eating less dairy. But, today, two monsters appeared. They're looming under the surface, just waiting for my wedding day to roll around!

5. The tension headaches can be expected I guess. I've been immersed in wedding details, emails and finishing last minute stuff, but then came my grandfather's passing and Mr. Lace going out of town twice this week and I realized that I'd have to do a lot of these details on my own. So far my old friends Tylenol and Excedrin have NOT been helpful.

I know that life can be unpredictable, but I was hoping that we wouldn't have so many extra things to deal with before the wedding! Do you have any pre-wedding surprises or unanticipated issues?

RSVP's Make Me Smile

2010-06-08T19:12:00.001-07:00

RSVP's can be a source of stress as many of the other bees have shared. On the one hand, you have your best friend who drove to your house as soon as she got her RSVP to give you her response and ask, "Am I the first person to RSVP?!" to the one who holds onto the card for what seems like years. When you ask them if they're coming they say, "Oh. Is RSVP card due already?" (Yes, it was due two months ago) So I've compiled a list of reasons why the RSVP process sucks.

RSVP WOES

the uninvited plus one
the one without a name
the late one
the one who doesn't mark their meal choice
the very late one
the yes, then no
the no, then yes
the very, very late one
the one you have to tactfully call so that you don't end up in an hour long conversation (you have planning to do after all!)

But, I'm on the other side now. I received my very last RSVP and it made me smile. As I typed their response into my guest list spreadsheet, I felt a sense of relief. It's DONE. Everyone who is coming is on there. I know their names. I know their meal choice. I know the name of their unborn children. Okay, maybe not, but I know enough for the wedding.

So, if you are collecting RSVP's, take heart, there's light at the end of the tunnel!

What's your best or worst RSVP story?

The Finals

2010-06-08T19:11:00.000-07:00

As I sit here, watching the Lakers/Celtics game, I am thinking about the anticipation as I followed the Lakers through the season, watching their hard work culminate in entering the NBA Finals. Putting all rivalries aside, these two teams must have been so happy to make it to the finals and the days and hours leading up to each game must be so exciting.

So, why is it, when I'm in the final days leading up to the wedding, I am hardly excited? When people ask how many days it is before the wedding and I give them the countdown, a fresh wave of adrenaline and stress runs through my body. I am super excited about getting married and going to Disneyworld, but no one prepares you for the stress level that comes with the final weeks leading up to the wedding!

Think about it. All those things you thought, "oh, we can do that closer to the wedding. It's too early to start that." Or, all those times you half finished a project. Or, those times you put off a decision because you didn't feel like making it or felt indecisive. Well, it all comes back and bites you in the butt.

My to-do list, though long, is no longer growing. I am very happy about that. I have a finite number of things that I have left to do and I refuse to add any more to it. It's already an ungodly amount of things to do in 18 days.

And the stress? Well, that I have very little control over, but I've been doing some things to help me through it.

1. I've been going to sleep at 10 p.m. every night. On a good night, I'll sleep at 9 p.m. I LOVE sleeping, so this isn't difficult for me to do.

2. I've been making healthy indulgences so that my tummy is happy, but my butt will still fit into my dress. 5 M&M's while I work on the schedule, a small Jamba Juice as my midday snack, stopping off at my favorite shop after running wedding errands to look around.

3. Being productive. When I need to accomplish something, I turn off other distractions. No TV. I work faster and more accurately when I don't have distractions. Well, obviously, now is not one of those times since the Finals are on. I guess you have to make exceptions once in awhile.

Where are you in your planning process? Any tips for brides who are fast approaching their wedding day?

2010-06-01T22:17:00.000-07:00

With a few weeks left until the wedding, I was still crazy enough to tackle a DIY project. I didn't want to have a traditional guest book because I knew that I, personally, would never look at that again. I either want something sentimental, something that can be displayed or something that's useful. There are tons of good ideas, but I really liked the idea of the address book box and what better time to start one than when all your closest friends and family are gathered in one place?

On kraft paper, I printed the alphabet using our wedding stationery font and then used my handy dandy 1" circle punch and punched them all out.

I made cards to put basic information on and put different wingdings at the top.

I cut cardstock to the size of the box and attached the letters.

Then I stuck it all in the box.

This had to be my easiest DIY project for the wedding because it used very few materials and very little time! So, I plan to have the three types of cards out on the table. Guests will use pen to fill out the info and then file it by last name in the box. I won't be super anal about how they're filed because knowing me, I'll go through it after the wedding to alphabetize by first and last name. Yes, I am aware that I make life more difficult for myself. :)

What was your easiest DIY?

A Lacey Shower

2010-05-31T20:36:00.000-07:00

Okay, so now that Open House is over and I at least opened up report cards and started inputting SOMETHING, the craziness at work is winding down and I can now catch you up on wedding planning.

But first...my bridal shower. Waaaaay back when, my MOH asked me to create a guest list and nail down some possible dates and that was pretty much the last I heard about my shower. May 22 rolled around and I knew to be at BM V's house by 11 a.m. I arrived and to my delight, I found my self in a DIY shower! How stinkin' rad is that?!

So, first, and most importantly, we ate. I'm not entirely sure who made what, but we had Hawaiian food - korean style ribs, cabbage salad, spam musubi, bacon fried rice and somen salad. I had to refrain from getting seconds (and thirds and fourths...).

Hmm..how many spam musubis can I take without looking like a pig?

Next, we played two games. Look at how much fun we're having. The game was "Name That Body Part." Haha, I know what you're thinking, but we don't roll like that. Pictures were taken of Mr. Lace's body parts like his elbow, knee, hand, eyebrow, etc. Similar photos were taken of some of our male friends. They were mixed up and we watched a Powerpoint presentation where we had to choose which body part was Mr. Lace's.

After that, it was time to move onto the DIY stations. There were three stations.

1. Do-it-yourself cupcakes
There were two kinds of cupcakes, three kinds of icing and several types of toppings included maple bacon (I heart bacon).

The real Miss Lace.

2. Scrapbook Station

I enjoy making scrapbooks, but they are always for other people. Today, everyone made a page for ME! This must be the best kind of scrapbook ever!

Look at all my busy bees making a craft for me!

3. Do-it-yourself truffles

The BM's and DOC N made truffles from scratch and provided toppings for everyone to roll their own delicious chocolates.

One box is pictured here. I made four. :)

At the very end, I opened gifts and BM/SIL K made a ribbon bouquet for me.

Four of five of my BM's.

Aunt Lace, me and Momma Lace

It was such fun and a very blessed time with some of my close girlfriends. My BM's designed a shower that was very ME - low key, fun and filled with good food. It was filled with personal touches which meant so much to me. It was the best shower I ever went to (and it happen to be mine).

How was your shower? Have you ever attended a really fun shower?

Just Call Me Bashful

2010-05-12T21:37:00.000-07:00

In high school and college, I used to be a pretty loud and outgoing girl. I wasn't terribly shy. I was quick to make friends and enjoyed being in the spotlight. If you walked into a birthday party, I'd be the one talking loudly and laughing. I'd be the one loudly convincing everyone to do something. I'd be the one volunteering to get up in front of everyone to do something silly.

However, as I've gotten older, I've become more introverted, enjoying more time to myself. Id rather go unnoticed. I don't like having eyes on me. If you walked into a birthday party, I'd be sitting in the room on the side with my closest friends chit chatting. If I had to be in the main room, I'd be sitting on the side, listening and watching, letting someone else steal the spotlight.

I think the change has to do with insecurity issues and growing up. Being tired and stressed out might also play a role in it, but who knows. However, as Mr. Lace and I spend more time on what our wedding day is going to look like, I'm beginning to experience a bit of anxiety having all eyes on me. I kept telling Mr. Lace that all eyes would be on us... you know, as a couple, where the attention would be split 50-50, but Mr. Lace reminded me that although people would look at him, the ratio would probably be more like 80% on me, 20% on him. Wait, wait, wait...so, you're saying...

225 guests x 2 eyes each = 450 eyes
450 eyes x 20% = 90 eyes on Mr. Lace
450 x 80% = 360 eyes on me

YIKES! I'm totally feeling shy about having that many pairs of eyes on me. I'm going to feel awkward and weird having everyone looking my way. Just call me Bashful!

(source)

There's not a whole lot that I can do about this except to not choose activities that draw MORE attention to us and if possible, deflect attention on others (or at least share). After thinking about this, I'm hoping all those eyes will fade into the background when I focus on what's happening between me and Mr. Lace. We're getting married. We're making a commitment to be faithful to one another forever. We promise to support one another through everything. I'm hoping that focusing on this will keep me from thinking about the many eyes that will be looking on our way.

Are you psyched for the attention you'll get on your wedding day? Or are you completely nervous and what are you doing to cope?

Letting Go

2010-05-11T21:00:00.000-07:00

With only 45 days till the wedding, we have a lot going on:

1. Mr. Lace started a new job.
2. I'm wrapping up the school year which means prepping for Open House, report cards and packing up my classroom.
3. I'm still waiting to hear about my pink slip and trying to figure out how we're going pay the bills and for the house if I do end up getting laid off.

We're in pretty good shape, but we still have a lot of things to take care of and it's getting to the point where I have to just let go. I'm generally a pretty controlling person and when it comes to these DIY projects, I KNEW I could do them if I just had enough time. However, regardless of my DIY abilities, time is NOT on my side. I had a few more projects lined up that I would've loved to do. However, I had to drop a couple of DIY's that I realized that I wouldn't have enough time or energy to complete...

...like these DIY straw flags...let go.

(source)

This pretty baby's breath garland for decor...let go.

(source)

These adorable tea lanterns...let go.

(source)

So, I'm officially letting go. I still have three projects to complete and THAT'S IT. I told my friend this earlier this evening and her response, "yeah right!" I'll try my best to stick to my guns and not stress myself out.

Another thing I'm letting go of? The slideshow...but in a different way. As I was thinking about the slideshow, I realized that I didn't really know how to put one together and neither did Mr. Lace. We knew we could figure it out, but it would take a lot of playing around. Then, it came to me! It's time to let go! I approached my brother and asked if he'd be willing to do the slideshow for us if we gave him our pictures and music. Thankfully, he agreed. This past weekend, we gave him all of our photos and music on a flash drive and I let go (in more ways than one!). I felt so relieved that that was done, for us at least.

Are there any projects or ideas you had to let go of? Was it difficult or easy?

My First Time...

2010-05-08T20:24:00.000-07:00

Hey, hey, hey... get your mind out of the gutter. We're not talking about that thing, that thing, tha-at thiiiinnng (Lauryn Hill, anyone?).

Anyway, although I'm an avid wedding blog reader and magazine reader, I hadn't attended any wedding shows. I signed up for one way back when, but ended up not being able to make it so I gave my tickets away. I didn't know what to expect and had a vague picture in my head of tables with vendors showcasing their services or goods.

Well, last week, only two months out from my wedding, I had the opportunity to attend my very first wedding show! I was really excited about seeing what these wedding shows were all about. I enlisted one of my engaged friends to come with me to The Wedding Salon so I wouldn't be lonely.

First off , it was at a swanky West Hollywood hotel called The London that I'd normally never set foot in.

(source)

We navigated ourselves through the traffic to West Hollywood. I was a little overwhelmed when we got out of the car in the valet line because there were so many brides walking around. No one had a veil on, but I could just tell they were brides because they had notebooks and folders in hand that I'm sure held precious to-do lists, notes and wedding information.

We checked in and got a program and gift bag ticket. Score! A gift bag! The lady who gave it to us said we might want to get the gift bag at the end because it was heavy. Double score! A HEAVY gift bag! :) We began walking around and there were tons of vendors with their services and goods displayed just like I imagined....sort of. I didn't imagine the services and goods to look like THIS:

All photos courtesy of Focus Photography, Inc.

Oh! Look at that jewel!

I also tried a slice of red velvet cake with buttercream filling and chocolate cupcake that were delish. I was tempted to pull these off the display when no one was looking.

This was one of my favorite vendors. They had a cake, cupcake and dessert bar display in green, pink and white. It's hard to see, but on the top of this cake are two little love birds in brown. In that folder on the table were some of the cutest cupcakes I'd ever seen. They had a cupcake with a little bamboo container of shumai with chopsticks. They also had one with sushi and chopsticks.

I would've eaten ALL of these if at all possible.

And THIS over-the-top gorgeousness. I've seen a couple of peacock themed weddings, but this display was seriously SO stunning. Also notice the huge white flowers on the column behind. If it wasn't too late to make those, I'd find a way to incorporate those larger than life flowers.

And last, but not least. For the most part, when I make a wedding decision, I'm pretty happy with it and even when I see other ideas, I won't feel a thing. However, when it comes to wedding dresses, I swear, I see another dress I love every month. I love my dress, I really do, but could I have another one....or three? :) That one in the middle was gorgeous. I must have come around to look at that dress three times during the time that I was there.

I was so happy that I went and got to see what the current and upcoming wedding trends were. Even though it's a bit too late for me, I just wanted to be in the know! I'd totally suggest that you visit The Wedding Salon if they come to your town. It was inspiring and the excitement you feel there can help reinvigorate any bride that is in a wedding planning lull.

And no, I didn't forget to stop by to pick up my gift bag! Sorry hive, I was so excited that as soon as I got home, I went through everything and began using all of the items in my gift bag so I forgot to take a picture, but I DID get Smashbox luminizing primer, an eyeshadow trio, a lip gloss palette, three different chapsticks, a heart-shaped stress ball, pen, a book with leading hotels of the world, lots of coupons and offers and a DOZEN wedding magazines which totally replenished my depleted supply of wedding mags.

Do you have any bridal show experiences to share with the hive?

A Trip with My Honey

2010-05-05T15:00:00.000-07:00

Mr. Lace and I love going to Disneyland together. He only lives 15 minutes away so it's an easy trip for us. Although we would've loved getting season passes (and we were tempted to a few times), we knew it wouldn't be worth it for us. We opted for the Costco four-pack of tickets and went at least 10 times in the first two years that we dated.

Don't laugh. That's one of my highest scores!

Well, we got the itch. After going to Disneyland so many times in such a short amount of time, we started dreaming big. We wanted to go to the Mothership -- Disneyworld. I'd been in fourth grade with my family, but remember very little of the trip except what I saw in old photos. Mr. Lace had never been. We never had the chance to go.

So, when a friend asked us about where we'd honeymoon, we looked at each other and it was decided -- we were going to Disneyworld!

I was super excited. Mr. Lace was super excited. That's all that should matter right? Right. Well, then, why did I want to talk less and less about our honeymoon every time anyone asked?

Typical Conversation #1

Well-meaning friend (WMF): So...where are you guys going on your honeymoon?

Miss Lace: We're actually going to Disneyworld!

WMF: (faking an excited smile) Oooohhh.

Miss Lace: (awkward smile and feeling terrible)

Typical Conversation #2 - modified to adjust for WMF reaction

WMF: So...where are you guys going on your honeymoon?

Miss Lace: Well, we've always really want to go to Disneyworld.

WMF: Disneyworld? (snicker) Aren't you guys a little old for that?

Typical Conversation #3 - further modified to adjust for WMF reaction

WMF: So...where are you guys going on your honeymoon?

Miss Lace: We really love Disneyland so we're planning on going to Disneyworld.

WMF: Oh...is that all? Maybe you should go somewhere else too!

It's to the point where I don't really want to talk about the honeymoon with anyone even though I'm totally excited about it. I won't even dare mention that fact that I was hoping to go to Harry Potter Land! Again, everyone is super well-meaning and suggested going on cruises, visiting Miami, flying up to New York afterwards and even driving cross country to extend our trip and visit different cities along the way. And it's true, there are tons of trips and vacations that Mr. Lace and I hope to take someday, but for us, Disneyworld is it. It's the destination and not some stop on the way to our real honeymoon.

Where are you going on your honeymoon? Did anyone politely dislike your honeymoon idea?

Think of the Children!

2010-05-04T21:40:00.000-07:00

I've heard that there are some weddings where children aren't allowed to attend for various reasons. I remember my brother once being invited to a wedding where children weren't allowed and Mr. Lace and I got to babysit my nephew. However, for us, that was never an issue. We love children and know lots of families so we couldn't imagine NOT having children at our wedding.

In fact, in our RSVP's, we were surprised that some families chose NOT to bring their children with them to our wedding. Regardless, we'll have about 30 children at our wedding and as a teacher, I know that planning ahead makes a world of difference. I'd prefer not to have bored children or worse yet, children running amuck at our venue. So, I decided to follow in the footsteps of many wise brides and make an activity book for the children attending our wedding. I COULD have downloaded the many activity books that are out there in the Internet, but that would be way too easy. I HAD to make my own.

The cover:

Hopefully, some kind soul sitting with the child will play a few rounds of tic-tac-toe with them.

My students LOVE word searches so I had to throw one in.

A word unscramble for those who like rearranging words.

I'm sure you noticed some coloring pages interspersed in there. I'll explain the plethora of Disney coloring pages in an upcoming post...if you haven't figured it out already! :) In addition to the activity book, I included Mad Libs for older kids as well as crayons and a pencil.

Are you inviting kids to the wedding? Do you plan to have any activities especially for the kiddos?

A Hair-y Dilemma: SOLVED!

2010-04-27T20:04:00.000-07:00

As I shared in my last post, I was going to see my lovely hair and makeup artist, Kelly Zhang. As I reflected, I realized that my fear of going to do my bridal trial really stemmed from my fear that I wouldn't look my best on my wedding day.

Lately, I've been stressing over how I look. Am I alone in this? I've been noticing how my makeup pretty much falls off my face after an hour or so of wearing it, how imperfect my skin is, how my hair isn't long enough even though I've been growing it out since August... and my wedding day is supposed to be one of the biggest days of my life. I'm supposed to look magical. Scratch that. I WANT to look magical. But how could I with all these imperfections?! Does anyone have a magic wand handy?

Now, I know everyone one is secretly (or not-so-secretly) insecure about SOMETHING, but my insecurities were reaching an all time high. So, armed with my photos and ideas, I went to see Kelly for her to work her magic.

I pulled up to her chic salon in Pasadena and this is what beheld my eyes:

(all personal photos)

The white, purple and black decor were SO chic. Walking into her shop made me feel confident about her style and abilities. She sat me down and offered me ice tea since she could tell I was really hot from rushing out from work to make it to our appointment on time. I showed her my photos and began describing what I liked and didn't like and she totally understood. Being a blogger and blog reader, she understood how styles have changed and are changing. By the way, did I mention that she used to be a model and did makeup and hair for runway shows? Okay, I feel confident that she might be able to do something with little ole me.

It was so much fun chatting it up with her while she did my hair and makeup. It's so nice when you can really connect with a vendor. Afterwards, she snapped photos for me. Ready girls?

So the top left is after a long day of work with the kids. The second and third are my low updo/the oxymoron.

The first one is the side do. My hair is a little on the short side for this one right now, but will be ready in time for the big day. The second is a side shot of the low updo/the oxymoron with my fascinator.

Here's a sideshot of the low updo/the oxymoron without my fascinator. I actually really liked it without the fascinator since the hair was interesting enough. Anyone interested in an extra fascinator?! :\

Kelly's got the magic! My face looks clean and natural which was what I really wanted. I barely felt like I had anything on my face at all. My hair turned out better than I thought! She sent me to home to contemplate which hairdo I wanted for the wedding day.

When I got home, I took some more photos of myself.

Did you get along well with any of your vendors? And which 'do do you think I should do?

A Hair-y Dilemma

2010-04-26T19:57:00.000-07:00

Hello ladies (and gents?). Tomorrow is the big day...that's right. My hair and makeup trial. Can I tell you? I'm completely petrified. No, no, not of my fabulous hair and makeup artist Kelly Zhang. She did my hair and makeup for my engagement photos and I loved it. I literally went in with no pictures and no make up and told her I wanted my hair "down..or up..or what do you think will look good?" She is a miracle worker. I would be completely mortified to post my before and after from that session because I literally woke up and walked in. But, petrified that I am not as good-looking as the picture perfect brides below!

When I contacted Kelly to schedule my trial, I was thinking I'd go in, tell her "I want it up" or "I want it down" and that would be the end of that. But, she asked me to bring in some photos of hair and makeup that I liked and a picture of me in my dress so she could try to style my overall look. So, I began looking.

Can I just say that there are a LOT of wedding hair photos out there? So many that I would start looking and after about an hour, my eyes would glaze over and I'd have to turn off the computer.

So, after a LOT of looking here are my inspiration photos:

1. The low, side, wavy, ponytail-y thing
I like that this will partially cover the wide and vast expanse of skin from my strapless dress. I don't like the side ponytails that are tight, but rather loose and wavy.

(source)

2. The Low Updo aka the Oxymoron

Now, if I did a low updo, I'd like the one of the bridesmaid in the photo above or these below. Loose, soft and relaxed.

(source)

3. Riding the Fence with a Half-up do

I really had a hard time finding a half up style I loved. I like the concept of the loose waves in both of these photos, but don't love the big bump. Maybe a mini bump?

(source)

My appointment is today so I'll be posting my trials soon. Wish me luck!

What are you planning on doin' with your hair? Did your hair and makeup trial turn out well?

LGN Diet

2010-04-19T19:56:00.000-07:00

One day, not too long ago, I was over at a friend's house for a birthday party. It was a potluck and when my friends and I have potlucks, the food is always good. Not those crappy potlucks where people bring lame dishes in hopes that someone else brings something good. Nope. At our parties, everyone brings good food.

Well, I was going for my third Porto's cheese roll when I said, "I probably shouldn't eat this. There's this white dress I need to make sure I can fit into in a couple months."

A friend who is also getting married in June said, "Are you on the LGN diet too?"

"Huh? What's that?" I said.

He laughed and walked away.

I thought and I thought and couldn't figure it out so I asked one of our other friends if he knew what it was.

He, too, laughed at me and said, "the Look Good Naked Diet."

"Ohhh. (pause) OHHHHH." It took me a second.

So, I've never been really good at dieting. I love iced caramel macchiatos from Starbucks, Popeye's fried chicken, Korean BBQ, American BBQ, cheese, chocolate cake, chocolate in general, brownies, coke, rice... you get the picture. There have only been two times in my twenties where I lost a significant amount of weight.

The first time was during winter quarter of my senior year of college. I think my metabolism sped way up right before it was going to slow WAY DOWN so I lost a bunch of weight without really doing anything at all for a month or two. That was so awesome.

The second time was a year ago when I found out I was prediabetic. My grandmother was diabetic and when I had a blood test done for a physical, my doctor said I was at risk of developing diabetes if I wasn't careful about my food intake and exercise. I wasn't really fazed by it at first until she said that I could lose my eyesight and limbs from severe diabetes. Well, that kicked me into high gear. I met with my best friend's mom who is a nutritionist and she told me all about the diabetic diet. In 3 months, I lost about 15 lbs. just by changing the way I eat. So here are the main ideas of the diabetic diet.

1. Limit the amount of carbohydrates you eat. This doesn't mean to NOT eat carbs, but to limit them to 6-9 servings a day. A slice of toast is one serving. A venti iced caramel macchiato is five servings.

2. Change your carb intake to whole grain and oats. It'll keep you full longer. Eat more of your carbs during the daytime where you're more likely to burn it off. Avoid eating a lot of carbs at night when all you do is sit there and watch Grey's Anatomy.

3. Indulge in a small amount of sweets ONCE in awhile. If you say you'll NEVER have any of your favorite chocolate cake or caramel macchiato, you're sure to break your diet. Have it in very small portions, very infrequently so that you don't hate life.

4. Eat lots of vegetables. Eat fruit too, but remember, fruit has sugar which is just like carbs. This counts for juice too. Juice often has as much sugar as soda!

5. Eat 4-5 small meals during the day rather than 3 large meals. This speeds up your metabolism since there's always something to digest and you don't overeat at each meal.

6. Yes, I have to say it. Exercise regularly. Although, at the time I had lost the weight, I was exercising about 2 times a week for an hour at a time.

And just to remind you, although I did this a year ago and lost 15 lbs., I haven't..er..uh..started yet.

Do you have any other tips to add to the LGN Diet?

DIY Flowers

2010-04-19T19:35:00.000-07:00

Well, maybe not do it MYself, but have a family member do it HERself?

So, early on, Mr. Lace and I visited a nearby florist that came recommended by a friend. We brought photos of what we wanted and researched names of flowers we liked. However, once we got a quote of what we were hoping to have, we literally had to scrape our jaws off the floor. We weren't ready to shell out over $2500 for flowers. They're already stinking dead!! When the florist adjusted the centerpieces, bouquets and bouts for our budget, we didn't like what he'd proposed for us.

We walked out of the shop pretty distraught. What were we going to do? To pay for a compromise of what we wanted and what we could afford, we'd have to cut back somewhere else in our budget. We decided to sit on it for awhile and revisit after we'd researched a few more florists.

Christmas rolled around and we hadn't really had a chance to begin Yelping florists. Enter Mr. Lace's aunt and uncle. They approached us at Mr. Lace's family get together and asked if they could do our wedding flowers. Wait, there's more. They wouldn't just arrange and transport them for us...they'd PAY for them as our wedding gift. Um, where do I sign?

We didn't even really have to talk about it. We heartily agreed, partially because of the cost, but partially because if there were family members who wanted to do something at our wedding, we wanted them to be involved in our big day. So we agreed to come up with some designs and we'd meet with them in April to do a trial.

Well, time rolled on and April approached. Mr. Lace and I began researching flowers that we liked so we'd know what to look for at the Flower Mart. Since we were going vintage, we needed mason jars and LOTS of them. We found some designs that we liked put them all together in an Excel spreadsheet (Mr. Lace's specialty). This past Saturday, we met up with Mr. Lace's aunt and uncle early in the morning at the downtown LA Flower Mart. Okay, well not that early, but 8 a.m on a Saturday?!

The Flower Mart was AWESOME. I think it's worth visiting at least once just to see the variety that they have and if you like flowers, you'll like just walking around and looking. You'll probably be tempted to make a purchase or two to spruce up your house. Mr. Lace and I were prepared though. We showed them the pictures and they took us on a quick walk through of the Flower Mart, made some suggestions and let us go and purchase the flowers we wanted to use for the trial since they had to pick up flowers for their shop.

We were looking for bells of Ireland, white china mums, jade roses, white ranunculas, white sweet pea, white peony, hypericum berries, lisianthus and green dendrobium orchid. We walked around comparing prices and all of a sudden, an hour had passed. We decided we had to buckle down and make some purchases before our meter ran out! Within 30 minutes, we found all the flowers we needed EXCEPT the ranunculas and peonies. Mr. Lace said we needed to get going since we were supposed to meet his aunt and uncle at their shop in Hollywood, but I was determined to find them. He took the flowers we had already purchased and headed back to the car while I decided to take one last look at the vendors right outside the Flower Mart. I quickly scanned each store as I walked by and dodged florists pushing large carts full of flowers in search of my elusive ranunculas and peonies. I spotted ranunculas across the street and carelessly jaywalked over to them. Yes, they had ranunculas galore, but mainly in WHITE. The other shops had ranunculas in EVERY OTHER color, just not the one I needed. I quickly purchased a bunch and set out to look for the peonies. My phone buzzed. It was Mr. Lace. He had started circling the block to come pick me up, but he saw me run across the street. He asked me to meet him at the corner. I felt defeated that I didn't find my peonies for the trial, but decided we'd have to ask Mr. Lace's aunt and uncle how we could guarantee finding our peonies. Right when I was going to recross (okay...jaywalk) across the street, I spotted them. There was one bunch left in a big white bucket. I quickly hailed an employee down to wrap them up for me. I didn't even ask how much and at that point, I didn't care. However, I still gasped when he took my $20 in exchange for 4 peonies. :(

We headed over to the flower shop and after a short conversation, Mr. Lace's aunt got to work. All personal photos below.

Mr. Lace's aunt trimming the flowers and prepping them. Mr. Lace trying to look useful.

The small mason jar

The medium mason jar

The large mason jar

We're planning on having all 3 arrangements on each table. Pretty simple, but I love it.

Mr. Lace went to grab a quick lunch for us from the Thai place next door. Mmmm noodles. Once the bowl was set down in front of me, I was completely useless.

The BM bouquet

My bouquet. And yes, I do still wear a hair tie around my wrist everyday. Note to self: Take that off on wedding day.

We were so happy that Mr. Lace's aunt and uncle offered their services to us because they did such a nice job AND they are involved in our wedding day in a big way!

Is a family member helping out in your wedding in some special way?

The Other Invites

2010-04-18T20:38:00.001-07:00

After planning our rehearsal dinner at Lucille's, I took a short break from thinking about the rehearsal. I have this bad habit of thinking, "I can do this later." However, with about two months left to go before the wedding, I don't really have too many "laters" left, yanno?

With many more DIY projects still left to do, I considered a couple of low maintenance invitation options instead of making invitations. Due to budget constraints, printing invites was out of the question.

1. Evite: My friends and I use Evite ALL the time for parties or any kind of get together. It's convenient and keeps track of your RSVP's for you. I could probably do this with a few simple clicks and be done with it especially since my address book is already loaded up on Evite.

2. Paperless Post: This is the HQ* version of Evite. They have fine stationery invitations and they also allow you track your guest list. The first 25 invites are free when you sign up and after that there's a small cost for each invite.

We have about 55 guests for the rehearsal dinner, but after counting the actual number of invitations we'd need to send, it was a mere 25! That was much more do-able than I thought so I decided to whip something up that was super simple and easy to reproduce. They're nothing fancy, but a little nicer than sending an invitation by e-mail. All personal photos below.

The first card tells about the rehearsal. The second about dinner. All RSVP's are going to be via e-mail.

The concept here was like a book card envelope like you see in libraries.

Voila! Nothing fancy, but my conscience rests a little easier knowing that people are getting an actual invitation in the mail for our rehearsal dinner. I'm sure it would've been fine to send an Evite or invite via Paperless Post (I've received a few myself that way), but this invite was simple, clean and really easy to do. How are you sending rehearsal dinner invitations?

*HQ - high quality. In college, my friends and I would use it to refer to anything or anyone that was high maintenance or bourjeois.

Envelope Backlash Part II

2010-04-15T20:41:00.000-07:00

Remember the whole black envelope fiasco? Well, this past weekend, Mr. Lace, Momma Lace, Poppa Lace and Brother Lace went up to Oakland to visit my grandparents. It was my grandma's 90th birthday and my relatives were throwing her a birthday bash. I was a little nervous, but decided I should go no matter what my grandparents might say to me. After all, you don't turn 90 everyday!

So, we made the drive up north on Friday after work and stayed overnight in San Jose to do some shopping at Santana Row and Valley Fair on Saturday before heading up to the birthday dinner.

(personal photo)

Not a great photo, but we were stuffed from the ten course dinner. Anyway, when I went in and greeted the many family members. I somewhat dreaded going up to my grandparents, but I ran out of hands to shake. I was a little less nervous about approaching my grandmother since Momma Lace had talked to her since the whole envelope deal and she had seemed to get over the whole ordeal. I approached her, wished her a happy birthday and told her I was so glad to see her. She talked to me like nothing had happened. I felt so relieved. Then, I went on to talk to my grandfather. He's not much of a smiler anyway so the stern look on his face didn't surprise me. Then, I went to shake his hand and say hello and he said, " Joan, I loved your invitation! You did such a nice job! I will definitely be there." WHAT? Did he say he loved the invitation? Are we talking about the same invitation here? It's like he erased the memory of receiving a black envelope from his mind and replaced it with a new one. I quickly wrapped up the conversation and took a seat next to Mr. Lace.

He looked at me and wondered why I had that funny expression on my face. I recounted the story to him and Mr. Lace ended up with the same expression on his face!

I guess that turned out alright and I didn't get slapped across the face by my 97 year old grandfather like I thought. :)

Did you come across wedding plans that rubbed your family members the wrong way?

Brothers and Sisters

2010-04-14T20:46:00.000-07:00

Mr. Lace has a sister who is four years older than him and I have a brother who is six years older. Our older siblings watched over and took care of us while growing up and even now, keep watchful eyes over us. They're so important to us, yet they really aren't involved in the ceremony or reception in anyway. I considered have Brother Lace walk me down the aisle, but I didn't want to deny my parents that responsibility (although Momma Lace declined because she hates being stared at so she'll walk in with Brother Lace and stand for the giving of the bride).

So, how are we going to involved Brother Lace and SIL Lace? We're not sure yet. We've considered these options.

1. Toasts: Early on in the game, Brother Lace asked if he could make a toast which totally made my cry. So he's doing this. SIL Lace is welcome to also, although I'm not sure that she'd want to.

2. Some other kind of presentation during the reception. Maybe a Top 5 to-do list for Brother Lace to present to Mr. Lace and SIL Lace to present to me filled with funny stories from growing up.

3. Scripture reading during the ceremony: However, the verse we picked is pretty short so it wouldn't really make sense to divvy it up. Plus, SIL Lace isn't really religious.

We're still brainstorming ideas and trying to come up with something that will involve them in some special way on that day. How are you involving your siblings in your wedding day?

DIY Regret

2010-04-12T19:48:00.000-07:00

Now that our rehearsal dinner is booked, I moved on to making some thank you cards for some of our helpers that aren't in the bridal party.

1. Officiant: Mr. Lace's pastor is officiating our wedding. He's such a warm and caring person and we're so glad to have him not only providing our premarital counseling, but also officiating our wedding. He's spent hours with us in premarital counseling, giving us advice, listening to our stories and just being there for us.

2. Music: Our friend Mike is an awesome musician. He's played in local coffeehouses and bars and he seriously ROCKS at Rock Band! We've asked him to play some music for us at our wedding and we just KNOW he's going to be awesome.

3. Coordinators: Two of my awesome friends, Pris and Nancy are my day of coordinators. I don't need to hire professionals because these two girls have coordinated dozens of weddings for friends and family and do an awesome job! When we were considering who to do this for us, these two girls popped into my head. I feel good that this day will be in their hands.

4. Flowers: Mr. Lace's aunt and uncle run a modest flower shop specializing in flowers for the Thai culture and they volunteered their services for our wedding day as our wedding gift. What a gift huh?! This weekend, we plan on going with them to the Flower Mart to figure out flowers. We're so grateful that they'll be helping us and gives our reception a personal touch.

So, to say thank you, I decided to make thank you cards for these special helpers. This is one of the projects I absolutely knew I wanted to do. There was no doubt in my mind that I'd make cards for my helpers. Then, why-oh-why, did I end up regretting this project?!

(personal photos)

I really did want to make cards myself as a thank you for all the time and effort are helpers are putting into the wedding, but here's why I would've reconsidered this DIY.

1. I wanted them to be a bit *more* than they turned out, but had to modify along the way because the project was taking too long.

2. This project took me a long time because I spent time buying paper first and then spending time making the cards. Because of that, I had to spend a little time here, a little time there before I finished the project. It just sat there on the table taunting me while I was trying to get the next materials or supplies I needed to complete the cards.

3. They didn't turn out much nicer than a lot of awesome thank you cards that are out there. I saw cute thank you cards at Paper Source, Target and even TJ Maxx! Everytime I saw cute thank you cards, I couldn't help but think of how much time I could've saved buying cards.

Oh well. They are handmade and I put a time and love into them so hopefully our appreciation will be conveyed to our awesome helpers.

Did you regret a DIY project after you completed it?