watch this!!! you’ll cry!

Danny & Annie from StoryCorps on Vimeo.

Take a lookie at our homemade bouquets, with a special added touch by my wonderful bridesmaid, Ellen! (more on that in a minute)

What Ellen did to add a little special “vintage” touch was to use my pearls (from Goodwill, about 5 for $20) and wrap them around my bouquet! (She only used two strands) Isn’t it lovely????!!

Basically, instead of paying over $100 per bouquet, we headed to Metro Market (You can go to any grocery store) and picked up 4 dozen roses that totaled $54 dollars! So basically, we spent about $18 dollars per bouquet instead of over $100.

Here are close up pictures of the bridesmaid’s bouquets:

All you need to make these bouquets are flowers of your choosing, some fabric ribbon, scissors to cut the stems, a glue gun and some pins to secure the last bit of the fabric ribbon once you’ve wrapped it around the stem.

Oh, and a couple willing bridesmaids:)

What do you do instead for fear that your wedding will look bleak and lack decorations? First, let’s talk about location. GO OUTDOORS. Use the natural, ahem, free beauty of the great outdoors and have your wedding in a park or a forest. It took us months and months to find the perfect park location, devoid of eyesores such as playgrounds in the background, or public parks with too much traffic (people always around), or hefty fines and required permits by the city.

But, we finally found the perfect place in a little town called Yelm. The park was gorgeous, complete with beautiful landscape, towering evergreens, growing water reeds,

weeping willows, a lake with a fountain, flowering trees, and a little creeping brook at the entrance. Because it was in a tiny town, there wasn’t much traffic.

It even had a little dock where we took some pictures.

We ended up taking over the entire park,

using a little hill for the wedding ceremony, (the top of the hill was perfectly elevated to look like a stage!)

we gathered around a grove of towering trees for the reception, and we used all the remaining areas for private picture taking with just me and my groom.

PLUS, big PLUS… Being outdoors created the perfect backdrop for closeup pictures, where the scenery behind the sharpened object created a blurring, Monet like effect on the picture!

(Monet “The Clouds”)

Here are a couple of Nate and me:

Next, I’ll talk more about what do instead of buying premade bouquets…

Yay! I’m back from honeymooning, back from the second reception in San Antonio, and I will be posting pictures from the wedding!

Nate made my dream wedding come to life:

a 1940’s themed

evening wedding

outdoors

with interactive games,

pomanders and stringed lights everywhere,

and an audience laughing and participating and having a grand time.

Best of all, we did it for around $6600! (which in wedding terms is really really cheap: On average, US couples spend $19,581 for their wedding. However, the majority of couples spend between $14,686 and $24,476, according to this article.)

I’ll probably be posting articles revolving around weddings for a time being, which will benefit anyone who also wants to have a budget wedding! Keep an eye out for more wedding pictures, details and stories!

MWAH!

Midori

The new life, love and relationship go-too girl, Elizabeth Gilbert has inspired women everywhere so much so they made a movie out of one of her books featuring one of the biggest stars in the world, Julia Roberts. So there must be something to this guru of self-discovery and after reading a few interviews with Gilbert, I learned that love can be better the second time around.

Gilberts advice to those in desparate straits in their life and relationships:

The only thing I can say is, I have a feeling that you know already what you need to do, but you haven’t found it yet. I bet if you take a diary and sit down every single day and ask yourself, What should I do, and you start writing and you do it every day and you write the answer, even if the answer is, I have no idea, I don’t know, I don’t know—ask again the next day. Ask again. You have to keep asking.

And when asked if a broken heart can lead to a fuller heart, Gilbert says:

There’s a line from Leonard Cohen, and he has this wonderful song that says, “There’s a crack in everything—that’s where the light gets in.” And I think that’s the probably best encapsulation of how a broken heart can lead to a bigger heart. The light causes the expansion.

How inspiring and extraordinarily hopeful for anyone who has found love. Gilbert has a fantastic way of simplifying the overthought and it is contagious.

When asked her second marriage, Gilbert replies:

Our marriage has all these luxurious qualities that a lot of other people’s marriages don’t have. Suddenly, I’m very wealthy. The household is very wealthy. All those arguments about money are erased. And we don’t have kids.” Gilbert goes on to say, still, there is certain “wife” behavior that she avoids. “There was this sense in my first marriage that as soon as he walked into the house, my obligation was to be with him, in partnership, every moment that he was awake, and so I would put my work away and whatever I was doing away. I won’t do that now.

I find this fascinating. Everything that we as women are taught that do and don’t matter, Gilbert has disregarded the second time around and has made it work. Advice like “More money, more problems”, “Kids complete a family” and “To put family before work”, for example, Gilbert has refused to buy into what society has deemed a woman should do and be.

Gilbert goes on to say: “And it’s the community we’re part of, and the people who rely on us and the companionship I don’t want to lose and my own character I want to uphold in terms of my own self-regard.”

Divorce, it appears, has made her a better, happier, more committed wife and although second marriages have an increasingly higher risk of divorcing again, Gilbert makes no apologies for doing marriage “her way” this time.

Gilbert also explains:

Reality has taught us that no woman can build an honest life without sacrificing something along the way. Deciding what will be sacrificed is not easy. But the good news is this: increasingly, that decision is ours.

The “you can have it all” misconception that seemingly started in the eighties has been predominantly reinvented by Gilbert in admitting that we can not have it all, but we can have what we want if we are willing to sacrifice.

Brilliant.

Bio: Alexis Bonari is a freelance writer and blog junkie. She is currently a resident blogger at the First in Education site, researching areas of accredited online degrees. In her spare time, she enjoys square-foot gardening, swimming, and avoiding her laptop.

Public Domain URL:
http://www.freedigitalphotos.net/images/Younger_Women_g57-Love_p14792.html

But, I have tried to still email you back about your dating concerns…

Sadly though, I just checked my spam folder and found a ton of people who had dating concerns… Needless to say, if you emailed me and didn’t get a response yet, THIS is the reason why.

After my honeymoon, I will be sure to respond to all of these concerns!

My apologies.

Pastor Matt Chandler, you yell, you crack jokes that make me literally laugh out loud, and you tell it like it is!

I am getting married in two months and then I will be back! I miss writing…. BUT who says I can’t send a valuable resource your way?! My dear readers, I have learned so much the last year, some things very humbling for this so called blogger who dishes out dating advice. Once the initial infatuation and butterflies wears off, I’m not the best at relationships because of lies I’ve believed!! But I will share my adventures and misadventures to you all in a couple of months, in hopes that you can learn from my mistakes and misconceptions. I praise God for sending Nate into my life. He is truly truly teaching me what real love is all about.

Here’s the sermon!

This is a guest post by Letitflow.com.

It’s not just your regular girl or boy next door logging on to online dating sites in the hope of finding that special someone, celebrities too are using online dating sites to shun their Hollywood identities in favour of meeting everyday people.

Stars like actress and comedian Joan Rivers and Academy Award winner Halle Berry have confessed to browsing on online dating sites — and Rivers even posted an ad on the popular online dating site Match.com.

“I love smart men, funny men, elegant men,” Rivers’ profile reads.

“If I had to choose between Brad Pitt stripped to the waist or an old George Clooney in a dinner jacket, George would win hands down.”

Rivers’ profile also tells readers she is a comedian, interested in “coffee and conversation”, and includes a picture of the 76-year-old comic.

Even gorgeous Hollywood star Halle Berry has admitted to spending a lot of time in chat rooms, and to dabbling with online dating sites.

“I am never who I am,” Berry said of her experiences online.

“I have been to a couple of dating ones just to see what everybody is talking about. I chime in and say a little fun stuff.”

While it seems unimaginable that stars who attend A-list parties and could have almost anyone they wanted would want to have coffee with the average Joe or Jane, dating advisor to Date.com and Matchmaker.com, Shira Kallus, says some celebrities really just want to be normal.

“They can stop being celebrities and start being people,” she said. “Online dating lets people get to know you for what kind of person you are, not who you are.”

Founder of TheRomantic.com, Michael Webb, agreed.

“Celebrities are just like everyone else,” he said. “Unfortunately people can become captivated by the celebrity status and be attracted to them for the wrong reasons.”

With online dating, celebrities can try to develop a relationship based on their personality, not their stardom, Webb added.

And even the stars have dry spells just like everyone else. Rivers Cuomo, frontman of US rock band Weezer, signed up for an online dating service site after remaining celibate for two years, he told Rolling Stone magazine.

Last year, Luke Greenfield, director of the 2004 teen comedy The Girl Next Door, placed a profile on Jewish dating site JDate.

“I’m taking time off and I’m looking for a cool, sexy girl who’s sharp, fun, loving, and has great taste,” Greenfield’s profile read. He told readers he just bought a house and needs help decorating, and that those who don’t love movies need not apply.

However, when it comes to making a love connection, many still swear by “the real world”. Out of 2,000 people polled, only seven per cent believe computer-dating services work, according to a recent annual survey by romance-novel publisher Harlequin.

Unfortunately, Cuomo was one of online dating’s dissatisfied customers. After submitting his profile, he said the website responded: “We are sorry, but there is no one anywhere in the world that is appropriate for you.”

“So that was it, I gave up,” he said.

Like this post? See more like it at Letitflow.com – your one-click stop for all the latest news on celebrities, fashion, high-tech gadgets, luxury cars, exotic travel destinations, and much more!

(1) Fine: This is the word women use to end an argument when they are right and you need to shut up.

(2) Five Minutes: If she is getting dressed, this means a half an hour. Five minutes is only five minutes if you have just been given five more minutes to watch the game before helping around the house.

(3) Nothing: This is the calm before the storm. This means something, and you should be on your toes. Arguments that begin with nothing usually end in “fine”.

(4) Go Ahead: This is a dare, not permission. Don’t Do It!

(5) Loud Sigh: This is actually a word, but is a non-verbal statement often misunderstood by men. A loud sigh means she thinks you are an idiot and wonders why she is wasting her time standing here and arguing with you about nothing. (Refer back to # 3 for the meaning of nothing.)

(6) That’s Okay: This is one of the most dangerous statements a women can make to a man. That’s okay means she wants to think long and hard before deciding how and when you will pay for your mistake.

(7) Thanks: A woman is thanking you, do not question, or faint. Just say you’re welcome. (I want to add in a clause here - This is true, unless she says ‘Thanks a lot’ - that is PURE sarcasm and she is not thanking you at all. DO NOT say ‘you’re welcome’ . that will bring on a ‘whatever’).

(8) Whatever: Is a woman’s way of saying GO TO HE#@!

(9) Don’t worry about it, I got it: Another dangerous statement, meaning this is something that a woman has told a man to do several times, but is now doing it herself. This will later result in a man asking ‘What’s wrong?’ For the woman’s response refer to # 3.

Just wanted to share what seems like an interesting documentary, albeit controversial for the traditional girl that I am. What do you think folks? Could you find a “happily ever after” without marriage? Do you need to be the “best version of yourself” before you get married? What do you think about being single in your 30s? Did you get married because it’s what society expected of you at a certain age?

Seeking Happily Ever After