Weekend Goodies! aka NO LACE!

Friday-
Ventured down to downtown (or uptown? I'm not sure what you call it!) Charlotte to the courthouse. Asked the sheriffs office on the first floor where to find a certified copy of my criminal record, sent to the second floor to the criminal clerk of court, stood in line, made my request, back down to the first floor to pay $15 for it, didn't have cash, she sent me back up to the atm on the 2nd floor, back down to pay her with cash, back up to the criminal clerk of court to give her my receipt and get a piece of paper saying I have no criminal record..... ugh! All this just to send it in with my application for a temporary alcohol permit!!! W.O.W

Then on to Poppies to order the adorable pumpkin shown below!

Then the gym

Then cooked steaks with the honey! :-)

Saturday-
Got up, did some chores around the house, ate breakfast.... then a bad headache started to set in.... so I layed back down for a bit..... showered.... and got ready to leave for the beach!!!

11:45 AM- Melanie arrived, we packed up the car and headed out!

2:30- Made a pit stop in Cary to see Olga, seamstress extraordinaire! Dropped off the dress (got told I bought the WRONG type of bra to sew in the dress..... so I'm back on the bra/corset hunt)

Then off to the beach we went! We arrived at our hotel about 5 PM, and to Melanie's surprise, Melissa and Jennifer, some friends from home were waiting there to surprise her! Boy was she surprised!! After the initial shock wore off we headed to dinner at the beach, came back and had cake. We hung out in our plush (FREE) hotel room for the rest of the evening.

Sunday-
We ate a fantastic continental breakfast at the Comfort Suites, packed our things and headed out to see the sand, where Karen, Sabrina and Sabrina's little boy Kaleb met us. We also had another surprise for Melanie- our friend Marianne drove in just for the day to spend her birthday on the beach with us! She was again, in shock! Saturday was Karen's birthday so I wanted to celebrate a little with her.... we had cupcakes on the beach, YUM!

We ended our trip with a late lunch to P.T.s Grill for some good greasy hamburgers and fries!

It was great to have a weekend that wasn't focused on wedding chores, but to focus on someone elses celebration instead!

Here's the only pictures I have from the weekend, hopefully more will surface on facebook soon!

Kaleb and Sabrina enjoying cupcakes on the beach to celebrate Karen's 24th!

Weekend Recap....

OK here we go.... lots of goodies to share.....

Friday-
1. Went to Michaels, bought stamp ink in copper and chocolate brown, and another grapevine wreath.
2. Went to IKEA to buy the rest of the sheets.
3. Tested out stamp ink on our orange envelopes. We decided on the brown, the others were hard to read.
4. Stamped our return address on 80 envelopes, and put postage on them.

Saturday-
Got up early and drove to Asheville to experience the J Crew Sidewalk Sale. I bought:
A. White pants for me ($10)
B. Khaki pants for me ($10)
C. Navy blue pants for me ($10)
D. Polka dot bikini for me ($6!) Still on sale online for $34 for each piece!
E. Khaki pants for Jeremy ($10)
F. Khaki pants for Jeremy ($10)

AND.....

to make myself feel better about the whole dress issue... I still wanted a backup dress in case my moms dress is a disaster. So... I popped in the clearance store- I picked up the 3 wedding dresses that were in my size- 2 strapless and another one.... the first 2 were ok..... the third fit PERFECT! It was only $40, so I had to have it!!!!! It's def. not something that I would have normally picked out for myself- but at $40..... I'll find somewhere to wear it, or I'll sell it, if I don't use it for the wedding.

Is it my perfect dress? No.
Is it perfectly suitable? Yes.

It's the goddess dress on J Crew's site, if you want to see a picture of it :-)

now for pics-
Testing out the different inks- Gold at the top, Copper in the middle, Chocolate Brown last

Stamped our envelopes

Put postage on envelopes

All the sheets from IKEA- 36 tan, 10 white

J Crew Sidewalk Sale- this is only about 1/2 the place!

Dud.

The JCrew dress was so pretty. But;

A. Not wedding-dressy enough for me.

and

B. Not worth $700

Out For Delivery!

My JCrew dress has made it to Charlotte, and is "out for delivery"

I can't wait to get home!!!!

:-)

Having Cold Feet....

about the whole dress issue. Here's the time line of events.

1. Jessica buys beautiful Amsale Tyler dress in October for 1/4 of retail.
2. Jessica has buyers remorse and sells said dress in March/April. She breaks even.
3. Her sister brings her their moms dress in April.
4. Jessica tries on the dress, it fits. Jessica starts thinking.
5. Jessica takes dress to seamstress to have it analyzed for the possibility for remaking it.
6. Jessica gets excited.
7. Jessica starts to have second thoughts about moms dress.
8. Jessica is still in love with a J. Crew dress she saw months ago.
9. Jessica decides to order said dress to see if she loves it as much in person.
10. Dress is G.O.N.E. from JCrew's site.
11. Dress magically reappears 3 days later on the site, but in a size to small, and too big.
12. She orders both.


13. She's anxiously waiting.......

Save Your Girls Money.....

My girls are wearing dresses from target.com

Over the last few weeks, their online selection of "party dresses" has greatly expanded.....

all these are under $50!

I have purchased the ones with boarders



Great options for bridesmaids, rehearsal dinners, or even reception dresses!

Playing Dress Up

We've had Jeremy's suit for a couple of months now... and he'd yet to try it on.... with news from his brother that his pants were too little.... Jeremy realized he needed to try his on....


they are WAY too small!!!! But he looked pretty cute anyway!



On theknot.com one of the lovely girls, Shannon, let us all in on a little J. Crew secret.... there is a distribution center in Asheville that has a clearance store, and they host a "yard sale" once a month (which we thought was the first Saturday of the month... but not this month... it was sad to drive all the way there, and not get to experience it... oh well)

I still found this AMAZING dress!!! I had no idea the clearance store sold their cocktail attire, much less their wedding dresses!!!!




Aren't we cute?!



:-)

I said goodbye....

To my beautiful Amsale dress last night. I made the decision on Monday to go ahead and stick it on Oncewed.com to see if I got any takers... that evening I had 2. I got what I asked for it, didn't even have to come off my price! I pretty much broke even, between what I paid for it, what I paid to have it cleaned, what paypal took from me once the girl paid me yesterday, and what I will have to pay to ship it today. I got it out last night and showed it to Jeremy, it was kind of a bittersweet moment, for him to see the dress I'd bought to wear on our big day. But honestly, it was kind of a relief that it sold, I was worried it wouldn't.

My Mom's Dress

I got my mom's dress from my sister on Friday, I've been trying to decide how to incorporate it? Wear it? After messing with it last night, I think I can go from this.....

http://inlinethumb26.webshots.com/45273/2811821720050159285S600x600Q85.jpg

to this....

http://inlinethumb63.webshots.com/43198/2871141870050159285S600x600Q85.jpg

I don't want Jeremy to see it, that's why I am not posting pictures here

THE Reception Dress!!!! :-)

Yesterday I got a package from target.com ...... I knew it had a white strapless dress in it that I'd ordered last week.... I was not excited about it, thinking I would most likely send it back, like I've done with almost every other white dress I've ordered, so I didn't even bother to open it for hours. Boy was I WRONG! It's the dress, I love it! My orange belt makes it awesome, and I will for sure wear it again! It came with a white belt with a flower, but it doesn't match the dress too well. Here are a few pics!



It looked way better after I steamed it!

WWYD????? HELP!

Jeremy and I had lunch with my sister yesterday... it was so good to see her. She brought me our moms wedding dress, when we got home last night, I had to take it out and try it on. I had not seen it since I was a little girl playing dress up. It fits perfect.... and by perfect I mean, the arms are a tad tight, but otherwise perfect... as in, it doesn't even need hemming. Just a good dry clean, and it will be awesome.... even though it's totally not my style.

Would you scrap the dress you bought and love to wear you're moms?

Remember, I am changing anyway for the reception....

Or Maybe.....

I could wear that orange flower belt with this....



It's the white version of my bridesmaids dress!

I also just ordered this from Target.com.... it has one review, and it says that it's not as short as it's pictured.... :-)

Dolly Debate

I really love this dress.

It's so dreamy and flow-ey.

I could rock my gold Juicy shoes with it.

But it's $500

Is it worth it?


I've decided to wait as long as possible before ordering it, in case I find something else, I don't want to have to pay their restocking fee of 20%




Dress is Dolly Couture

Picture Updates... round 2

Candle holders found at the Winston Marshall's on Monday... $10 each.....



The groomsmens ties found at Belks in Winston on Monday...



Cake plate found for our wedding cake Homegoods/Marshall's in Huntersville on Tuesday...



Cute brown bolero found at Homegoods/Marshall's in Huntersville on Tuesday...
(sorry it's fuzzy)

Yesterday...

I stopped in Marshalls on the way home to look for more of the candle holders I found in Winston on Monday (I'll post pics soon).... no luck.... BUT I did find a cake plate for our wedding cake, and the cutest brown bolero to wear over my wedding dress, if it's chilly on the big day!

Upon entering the dressing room, the woman working says "Is that for an adult? Oh, I see, Cute!" I replied "I thought it might look good over my wedding dress if it's cold" her response... "Ok.... oh, that would be cute!" (she seemed a little slow.... probably hated the idea, and then realizing what she'd said, and wanted to take her foot out of her mouth)

Tried it on, LOVED it!

Went to checkout... the checkout clerk (probably 45-50ish lady) was like, "oh this is nice" and I told her the same senario of wearing it over my dress.... she then looked at me like I was the most tasteless bride she'd ever seen, and was like "hmm, ok"

I get home, all excited to show Jeremy.... and he basically had the same reaction the checkout lady did.... Whatever, I mean, I don't anticipate it to be below 65 degrees on the wedding day... but I also don't anticipate 75 degrees in February (ahem... last week!) I'm just trying to be prepared.... damn.

This is not my dress, nor the jacket.... but this is close to the jacket I bought.... picture it chocolate brown



BTW- this is the Balenciaga dress and jacket Nicole Kidman wore when she married Keith Urban... Nicole has style right? Yeah, I thought so too....

Smells Like Couture.....

YAY for arriving home and finding my BCBG dress, Juicy shoes AND Jeremy's little gift arrived too!!! It turned out way better than I expected! I'll post pics after Valentines Day! :-)



The dress is AWESOME! It's much more pink than I thought it would be, but still very pretty! I pranced around in the dress and shoes for a while, and wanted to take some pics of me in it... but my camera was not cooperating till late last night.



(BTW... "Smells Like Couture" is written on the sole of the shoes!)

DELIVERY!

When I get home today, my BCBG dress, and my Juicy shoes should be waiting for me! I can't wait!


Maybe the little thing I had made to go with Jeremy's Valentines Day gift will be there too!

I created our guest book using Picaboo on Monday, and it's on it's way here too!



AND-

Tomorrow our new bed arrives from Pottery Barn!!!!!

Yesterday....

One of my favorite things to do is go into an expensive store and pretend like I have money to burn.... hehe

Well a couple of weeks ago, I went in Monkee's in Davidson (where I saw those Juicy shoes!) well the girl had asked me if I was looking for anything in particular.... I told her I was looking for a white, ivory or gold dress. She took my info and told me that they'd call me if they got anything in. Well, Monday I got a call, they had a beautiful creamy white dress! So, I made it a point to stop in! Here's what I tried on.... both are Milly.





and I tried this one for fun!

Here it is!

OK... the cups on the dress need to be taken in... I currently have madonna "cone boobs" in it, because my chest doesn't fill it out enough.... but here are a few pictures I took tonight... don't you love my $7 gold cardigan from TJMaxx?? (I'll be putting some dressier buttons on it though! The sweater isn't as "chunky" as I was wanting though, so I'll keep looking... but this one looks fine, if I don't find anything else!

It Arrived!

I came home from work to find my white, sequin Michael Kors dress had arrived!!! It's so much prettier in person!!!