Twenty-Eleven Minus One

Mr. Cheetah and I have spent a couple New Years apart in our tenure (or tenyear, ha ha, I'm so punny) together, but for the most part we've been lucky enough to start each New Year together with a New Year's kiss. But not this year.

Maybe Next Year

Due to our schedules (and needing to save time off for other things, aka the honeymoon) our only engaged New Years, where the new year will be the year of our wedding, will be spent apart.

It sucks.

Anyone else spending New Year's Eve without their Significant Other?

Addressing Our Guests

Do you hear that?

Is that the sound of wedding fairies singing?

Because I finally have an invitation design! I still need to add the finishing touches and get it to the printers ASAP but at least now I have a plan.

Now that the design plan is in place, I've been thinking up ways to address these bad boys.

Option 1: Calligraphy

I have a thing for slanted formal calligraphy. Too bad my handwriting mimics that of a 10 year old and there isn't room in the invitation budget for a pro.

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Option 2: DIY or Faux Calligraphy

I don't have the courage to teach myself calligraphy, but many a bee have outlined how to fake your way to gorgeous calligraphy by first printing the addresses from your printer, then going over them with ink.

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Option 3: Home Printer

Hardcore traditionalists will tell you that the only proper way to address a wedding invitation is to hand write it, but I'm not buying it. I've received many invitations that were printed via a home printer and they looked great. With all the great fonts out there, this can be a cheap, easy, and stylish option.

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Option 4: Wraparound Labels

I love the way the wraparound labels on our Save the Dates turned out, but I think I may be looking for something different for our invitation suite—or as I like to call it, our invitation sweet!

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Option 5: Mailing Labels

Simple square or rectangular mailing labels look great on envelopes of all shapes and sizes.

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Circular labels, paired with handwritten or home-printed addresses are high on my list. Mrs. Seashell made up some amazing round labels when she ran out of her gorgeous wraparound labels.

Can you believe that these were a last minute save by Mrs. Seashell?

Or I could go the route of Miss Panther, and use an awesome custom shape to address the invites.

Panther's fabulous save the date envelope

Am I missing any other addressing options? How did you address your invitations?

All in the Family

My absolute favorite part of the holidays? Hanging out with these people:

My siblings!
Me, Baby Brother Cheetah, Little Brother Cheetah, and sister Cheetah.

Meeting Baby Bro Cheetah for the first time.

We've had to deal with a lot in our family in the past few years, and I don't know what I would've done without these three fantastic people. Mr. Cheetah has grown very close to them too. In fact my brothers are so excited that Mr. Cheetah is also becoming a "brother," that the three have decided that their imaginary band's name is "Future Brothers."

Mr. Cheetah and Baby Bro Cheetah sharing a hammock

Since my siblings are such a valuable group of people to us Cheetahs, it was very important that they all have a special role in our wedding. My sister is my Maid of Honor, and my two little bros will each be Groomsmen.

Mr. Cheetah, me, my bros, Sister Cheetah and her BF.

I feel very lucky to have such great relationships with my siblings and I can't imagine my wedding without them, but that's not to say it's always been peaches and cream. There was definitely fighting in our house growing up (and we can still butt heads every now and then), but I think we learned a lot from growing up together. We learned how to live with other people (the four of us shared one shower—I don't miss those days) and we learned that sometimes you fight with the ones you love—a simple but important lesson.

Sisters Cheetah!

Little Bro & Mr. Cheetah

Baby Bro and the Cheetahs last Christmas

Do you have siblings? Do they have a special role in your wedding?

*all personal photos*

For Their First Tree

My go-to holiday gift for newlyweds that celebrate Christmas is a personalized ornament for their tree:

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Engraved frames complete with a wedding photo are always a favorite:

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Of course Etsy has some great finds:

LoreleiRose

YourKeepsakeCo

Country Squirrels R Us

Charms of Faith

You can also get an ornament to celebrate an engagement!

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If you have a tree, do you have any ornaments commemorating your wedding or engagement?

E-Pics!

Our super fantastic awesome photographer, Amelia Lyon, just finished our engagement pictures. I'm not going to waste your time with a lot of text, lets see the goodies!

All photos by the incredible Amelia Lyon.

Make It vs. Buy It

Mr. Cheetah, are you there?

No?

Good. Now back to the veil discussion.

As I mentioned the other day, I'm in love with long veils and I plan on wearing one during my ceremony. I tried on a drop dead gorgeous one when I bought my dress. It was cut slightly different then most of the cathedral veils I've seen, I believe my consultant called it a Rectangle Cut. But it was $400. For two unadorned pieces of tulle—albeit long and pretty pieces of tulle. I know veils can reach much higher than $400, but since I want multiple veils $400 seemed a little steep. But I wasn't worried. Hey, I can sew a little, why not just make my own? Sewing, Beagle, Cola, and Perfume did it, so maybe I should give it a try.

A long gorgeous veil

Why I'll only be wearing my long veil during the ceremony

Then I learned about OBridal.com by Occansey Designs here in the Hive. OBridal custom makes veils to your specifications often for much cheaper than bridal salons. They even make rectangular cut veils!

Veil made by Obridal

Making my own veil has been my plans for months. But I'm nervous. I have sewn, but I've never made a veil before, and 2 tiers of 100+ inches of tulle seems a bit intimidating. I feel like I could do a decent job...but perhaps OBridal could do an awesome job?

Pros of making it

• It's cool to make things!
• It'll be cheaper (estimated at $24-50 to make, $70-90 to buy)

Pros of buying it

• It's so easy and will take only a couple minutes vs. a few hours of work & planning
  
• I won't have to worry about Mr. Cheetah seeing me make it
• I can't screw it up (I hope)
  

I've noticed as it gets closer to my wedding date, I'm having the make it vs. buy it debate quite often.

So, what should I do, hive?
Make it
Buy it

The Streak

My group of college roommates has a streak of running into celebrities at our bachelorettes.

The Streak Begins

First up was freshman roommate, L, who got married about five years ago. For her bachelorette we had a night on the town and a slumber party in Santa Barbara. After being kicked out of the bars at closing time someone was drawn to L's peni-adorned veil. That someone was Michael Jordan.

He talked to the bride for a few minutes and I shook his hand and tried to tell him about all the Bulls games I had gone to as a kid (Yeah, I'm sure he just loved that.).

This is the totally amazing picture I tried to take of him... hey, it was dark and I'd had a few! Damn, I wish I had gotten the shot....

L's legs. MJ is just a few feet away! He was leaving at that point because we started to freak out.

The Streak Continues

Last spring my roomie for all four college years, bridesmaid Mrs. Peabody, tied the knot. We spent a weekend in the wine country North of Santa Barbara for her hen party (does that make me sounds British?). When we went to the bar after dinner, we ran into our celeb of the night: John Corbett, aka Aidan. We danced with him for hours and he even caused some property loss. He was telling me not to take pictures and just dance when he grabbed my camera and it fell to the ground. Yes, Aidan broke my camera. John, if you're reading this, send me a PM and I'll tell you where you can send me a new camera.

At least the memory card was safe!

Aidan & the Bride

Me and John on the dance floor

The Streak: My Turn

So when it came time for my bachelorette, we wanted to keep the celeb streak alive. We had high hopes of seeing Sandra Bullock, since she has a house in Austin, but no luck there. We kept our eyes peeled, but no celebrities in sight. The weekend was ending and I thought the streak had ended. But guess who was on my flight back to LA? Lou Ferrigno aka, The Incredible Hulk! The streak lives on, just in the nick of time!

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Lou on the flight back to LA

Do you and your friends have any silly "streaks"?

all personal photos except where noted

Controlling the Bride

After I bought my dressy-dress, I had one very important question for my bridal consultant: what kind of undies should I wear with this thing? She said I should wait for my fittings to see if I needed a bra, or if I should just have cups sewn into my dress. And then she suggested some kind of Spanx, just to make sure I'm as smooth as Bublé on the wedding day.

Me & my bridesmaids the morning of my wedding. Your 'maids dance around you in their undies as you get ready, right?

I have never worn Spanx before so I have a couple concerns. Do they work? Are they comfortable to wear all day? And, um, going to the bathroom...is there really a hole for that? Do you really use it?

With my first fitting early in the New Year (What? How is 2010 ending already?) it's time to start testing out some possible under-things. Armed with a 25% off + free shipping coupon I just ordered these three options to try out from Bare Necessities:

Simplicity High Waist Shaper by Spanx

Hide-n-Sleek Hi-rise Thigh Smoother by Spanx

Weightless Power Hi-waist Slip by Flexees

Any advice for a Spanx newbie? Is there some great Spanx-like product that I should know about? Bridesmaid WD40 told me Target has some inexpensive Spanx-like options, so I plan to check those out soon too.

What kind of undergarments are you wearing under your gown?

Dessert in the Desert

This weekend Mr. Cheetah and I took a day trip out to the desert to taste desserts. (And to all the people in cooler climates: it was 80˚ and a beautiful day. Yeah, I'm rubbing it in.)


The cake vs. cupcake debate is still on, but we are heavily leaning towards cupcakes. They are cheaper, and they just make sense for our venue. Dinner is outside, but dancing will be inside. The plan is to strategically place the dessert table inside near the dance floor to lure people to dance (though I suspect many of our guests will need no such luring). Since dessert will be served away from the dinner tables and cupcakes don't require a plate & fork, they seem perfect for our wedding. Plus, no cake cutting fee!

Mr. Cheetah and I had tested out one cupcake shop on a previous Palm Springs trip and we weren't too impressed (good flavors, but very dry cake), so we were hoping that at least one of our two tastings would have our taste buds partying in the USA. Yes, I just linked to a Miley Cyrus video, bet you didn't see that coming.

First up: Over the Rainbow Cupcakes:

Come to Momma

Let's take a closer look at these sweet babies:

Clockwise from the top: Coconut, Chocolate Cherry Cola, Red Velvet, & Dark Chocolate Grand Orange.

The coconut was the best coconut cupcake the Cheetahs have ever had—and we are no strangers to coconut cupcakes. The red velvet also got two thumbs up. The only con of these cupcakes was that they were quite filling and a tad on the heavy side. Then again we did eat four in one sitting...

Up next: The Pastry Swan:

Mr. Cheetah and I recently attended a wedding where Pastry Swan baked the cake and it was lick-your-plate fabulous. Moist yellow cake and apricot filling...I want some now.

Vanilla, chocolate, and red velvet cakes with mango, raspberry, chocolate fudge, lemon, strawberry, and blueberry cheesecake fillings.

The chocolate cake was my fave, Mr. Cheetah preferred the red velvet.

The mango filling was crazy delicious, but overall, we liked the cake at our friends' wedding better than the tasting—which we actually took as a pretty good sign.

There is one last Palm Springs bakery we want to try, but we'd be happy with dessert from either of these two bakers for the wedding. Both can make cakes and cupcakes, so no matter our final decision, we are covered.

How many cakes tasting did you attend?

all personal photos