It's Easy Being Green

On Saturday, we headed to Lincoln for another wedding.  I was pretty excited to wear my new dress.  When my sister was visiting, we may have shopped quite a bit.  I saw this dress at Dillard's and really wanted to buy it, but it was still around $50 and I didn't think I should spend that much.  Then we decided to check out the Dillard's Clearance Center over in Iowa.  Imagine my surprise when I found the exact same green dress on the rack - in my size!  And it was only about $25, so I definitely made the right decision to not buy it the day before.

I probably should have gone with a sleeveless dress, because it was pretty hot on Saturday.  I also should have taken pictures before sitting in the car for 1 hour, the ceremony for 1.5 hours and the reception for 2 hours.  Just pretend you don't see the wrinkles in my dress, ok?  

Dress: Daniel Cremieux
Shoes:  BCBGeneration
Bangles: Charming Charlie

My Sister's Wedding

I'm a little late on this post, but it's my sister's fault for getting married on the exact same day as my parents.  So, these pictures are from June 3, 2000.  

We originally ordered our bridesmaids' dresses from David's Bridal.  Then we found out they were back-ordered, so we had to find a new plan.  We ended up getting a similar dress from the Chadwick's catalog.

Here's a random and funny story about the dress.  When John and I were first married, his parents were over at our apartment, and I had the above picture on a bookshelf in our living room.  His mom asked me about the dress, and we realized that she wore the exact same dress the exact same summer for her sister's wedding.  How weird is that?!


And here's a picture of all 4 siblings.  Can you tell we are related?  We kind of look alike!

Wedding Wednesday - Modeling Advice

While my family was visiting, I also had a good friend's wedding to attend. This is the exact outfit I wore for the banquet at my conference, but I didn't take any photos!

You may remember Brooke and Anne from previous posts.  I love these girls!

When we got home, Matti and Delia were happy to provide modeling advice, so I will have better poses on the blog. 

What do you think?  Should I hire them as my blog consultants?

Dress: Limited
Shoes: BCBGeneration
Sunglasses:  Fossil

Registry Madness

The 2012 wedding season is in full swing.  Last Saturday, I went to Bed, Bath and Beyond to purchase all the gifts.  When I went to the Customer Service station and said I needed 4 registries printed, the worker looked at me like I was crazy.  It took awhile, and I had to order some things that weren't in stock, but I got gifts for all 4 weddings.  Now I just hope I don't mix up who gets what item.  

I wore my new dress, but traded my pink cardigan for pearls, which made me feel fancier.  

Dress: Gap

Belt: Francesca's

Shoes: BCBGeneration

Necklace:  from China

Bachelorette Party

Remember this phone?  It's at my friend's house, and I have to pose with it whenever I am over there, because it is really cool and orange.  I was over there last weekend for another friend's bachelorette party.  It was pretty fun, and I got to see some friends that I haven't seen in quite awhile.  Plus there was cake!  Wedding season is in full swing, so I'll be doing "Wedding Wednesday" posts on a more regular basis again.  I know this wasn't for a wedding, but it was a wedding related activity, so I'm counting it!

Dress:  Ann Taylor
Belt: Chinese Laundry
Necklace:  InPink
Shoes: Seychelles

Wedding Wednesday - Becoming a Smith

In honor of Valentine's day yesterday, and the fact that I've skipped Wedding Wednesday for a few weeks, due to the various challenges I've been doing, here's a few pictures of my wedding day! I can't believe it has been almost 5 years! 

My bridesmaids and flower girls.  I don't think there are cuter flower girls in the whole world.  I love their pink shoes! I was pretty sure at least one of them would panic when they saw the crowd and not walk down the aisle, but they did so good.  I'm sure it helped that they could hold hands and encourage each other. 

This is one of my favorite pictures from that day.  We were walking across the street from the church to the reception.  It captures how genuinely happy we were (and still are!).  Just pretend you don't notice the tan lines. 

These photos are all from our photographer, Tanya, from Candid Moments.  She was wonderful.  If you live in Omaha and need a photographer, I highly recommend her.  Seriously, call her.  

And that's how I became a Smith.  Best decision I have ever made! 

Wedding Wednesday - Blue dress

This is from May 2010, when one of my friends from elementary, middle, and high school got hitched.  It was so much fun to be there for her happy day, and catch up with all my other friends who I only get to see once a year, if I'm lucky. 

It is so much easier to get dressed in the summer.  Just throw on a dress and some strappy sandals an you are good to go.  Winter is probably more interesting, but I like the simplicity of warm weather.  I'm actually wearing this dress today, but it requires several other layers to make it winter-appropriate.  Just a few months of winter left, and then spring will be back! 

Dress:  Limited
Shoes: Unlisted

Wedding Wednesday - Just last week

On Friday, one of my friends from college got married.  Two of my best friends and I decided to make it a Girls' Night.  I'm sure our dates were happy to stay home.         

I'm getting a lot of use out of this $7 dress.  I think I've worn it 4 times so far.  That's less than $2 for each time.  I won't do that math on my other dresses, it's probably pretty bad.   

Dress:  Ann Taylor

Pearls:  from China

Bracelets:  gift from a friend
Belt:  from another dress

Tights:  Target

Shoes: Seychelles from DSW (not that you can see them)

Wedding Wednesday - Flower Girl

I was sorting through old pictures the other day and found this one:

This is from 1990 or 1991.  I was the flower girl in my Aunt's wedding, and I was super excited.  I have no idea why I look so sad in this picture.  My mom was the Matron of Honor, and my older sisters were bridesmaids.  My mom made all of our dresses.  I got a lot of use out of this dress, for Christmas, Easter, and other fancy occasions that year.  A couple years ago, my nieces found it at my parent's house and I think they wore it a few times. 

I don't remember much from that day, but I'm sure I was happier than the above picture implies!

Wedding Wednesday - Always a Bridesmaid...

Actually, I've only been a bridesmaid a few times, and I have been a bride, so I guess that saying doesn't really work for me.  This summer, I was a bridesmaid for one of my friends, who was marrying one of my husband's friends, so we were both in the wedding party.  The wedding was in July, and outside, so needless to say, it was a little warm!  The ceremony was beautiful and pretty quick, so we got back into the air conditioned reception hall before we completely melted. 

For me, the trickiest part of being a bridesmaid is getting my hair done.  Most stylists just have no idea what to do with this mess of curls.  I always break the rules and show up with my hair freshly washed, because otherwise, it is unmanageable.  On this particular day, I told the stylist that I wanted it  up and as contained as possible, since I knew we would be out in the heat and humidity.  I told her to just leave it curly, and use the natural curl as much as possible.  She proceeded to blow dry my hair into a giant fro.  (One of the other bridesmaids took a picture at this point, which I still haven't seen.)  Then she straightened and teased my hair into a little side cascading deal, and curled it with the curling iron.  Completely the opposite of what I asked for!  And so much work for her!  All that to say, I actually liked what she did, and it held up ok in the 100+ degree humidity. 

Dress:  David's Bridal
Shoes:  Payless ($8!)

Wedding Wednesday - 10 years ago

December 2001 - My brother got married!  I cannot believe he and his wife are about to celebrate 10 years.  This outfit was really thrown together at the last minute, because I had been looking for the perfect thing to wear, and never really found it.  This was also before I had a digital camera, so I took very few pictures, and in this one, I'm hugging my brother, but you get the basic idea of what I was wearing.

What you can't see in the picture is my sparkly hair.  I had a friend who volunteered to give me a cute updo, and she added quite a bit of glitter as her finishing touch.  Ok for prom, not really ok for your brother's wedding.

One other problem with this outfit:  During formal pictures, I was on the end, and the background was really dark, so it looks like my face is just floating out in the middle of space.  Didn't think that one through!

I don't remember what brand any of this was, but here's a rundown on what I was wearing

Black cashmere turtleneck: from Sam's Club
Skirt:  from Dillard's Junior's section (don't think I ever wore it again)
Boots:  from TJ Maxx.

Wedding Wednesday - Guarding the gifts

August 2010 - Two of my good friends got married on the same day at the exact same time.  One of them asked me and 2 of our other friends to be the guest book and gift attendants.  The wedding coordinator assigned me to the gift table, probably because I look so trustworthy (or because the other girls looked so shady).

The bride had asked us to wear black/white dresses, and I didn't have anything that I was very excited about.  After trying on almost every dress at the mall, I found this Kenneth Cole dress at Marshall's and totally fell in love with the plaid!  The bride also made us super cute pearl bracelet/corsages to wear.  Acting like it was a spy microphone was the logical next step.

After the wedding and reception, we ran over to the other reception for a little bit.  It was a busy day of weddings!

Dress:  Kenneth Cole
Shoes:  Unlisted

Wedding Wednesday - Dancing Shoes

I feel like I have been to a million weddings in the last 5 years!  It's always a fun excuse to buy a new dress, or try to re-style an old one.  I've enjoyed other blogs that have theme days, so I figured I'll try a few out, and see what sticks. 

Here goes my first wedding outfit post.  This was in April 2009, when some of my college friends got hitched.  They had a live band, and we all danced the night away.  I had recently gotten these pink shoes at Loft and was pretty excited to wear them.  The best part was at the end of the night when my feet didn't hurt at all!   

Dress:  Max and Cleo (I think it was about $20)
Shoes:  Loft ($10)