Hello everyone!

I have been super busy with finalizing last minute wedding details but figured I needed a break and decided to take one by writing an entry on a blog about our wedding.  Ironic, I know.

As promised in my last post, I will be writing about the “fun” stuff this time around.

I am going to discuss in categories but will leave some stuff out until after the wedding in case some of my guests happen to stumble on this site…

Wedding Dress – I only went to 2 places to try on dresses.  They way I see it is, the more options I had, the more difficult it would be for me to make a decision.  And let’s face it, there are about a gazillion type of dresses out there and each one may be nicer than the next.  It just never ends.  Luckily for me, since I knew I was getting married in Aruba, I decided against a big, lavish and poofy dress.  I thought about transporting it on the plane and how hot it would be to wear on a beach.  This definitely trimmed down the type of dresses I was trying on.  Word of advice, when you know the dress you have tried on is “the one”, try to keep your composure in front of the saleslady.  The reason why I say this is because, depending on the store, you are able to negotiate the price on your dress.  When I knew the dress I tried on was “the one”, I told the saleslady I will think about it (although it was hard!).  A few days later (even harder to wait!), I called her and told her that I liked the dress but it was out of my budget.  I asked her if there was anything she could do for me in terms of price, such as including the alterations in the price of the dress or including the sales tax in the price of the dress.  Any little bit counts when you’re talking about big ticket items.  I also did my research and called the dress designer’s showroom and compared the prices.  Lo and behold, the showroom had a price much lower than the boutique.  The reason being the showroom does not do alterations/cleaning and you would be on your own for that.  I knew that I didn’t want to go through the hassle of looking for an excellent seamstress and cleaner and risk ruining my dress so the next best thing was to get the bridal boutique to price match.  They eventually lowered the price of the dress and included all alterations and I was a happy happy camper.  The dress only weighs 1.5 pounds!

Bridesmaid Dresses – So after my dress, comes the bridesmaid dresses.  I went into this whole wedding thing thinking of a bright color scheme since we are in the Caribbean.  Fuchsia and gray was the color scheme I was leaning towards.  The bridesmaids tried on fuchsia dresses but none were in the exact shade I was looking for.  Furthermore, I started thinking about the colors of the chair sashes that the hotel offered and wondered if it was in a different shade of fuchsia.  This would result in a clash of colors!  I emailed the hotel for color options and they sent over pictures.  The fuchsia totally did not match.  So back to square one.  While researching wedding ideas one day, I came across the below picture.  Sold.  Coral and yellow.  The bridesmaids would wear coral and the decor (flowers, chair sashes, centerpieces and other accents) would be yellow.  We ended up going with different styles of dresses for each bridesmaid since they all have different body types.  Makes sense right?!

Save the dates – As mentioned before, we used emails to send out our save the dates.  We found a website (www.pingg.com) that offered free modern looking save the date templates.  There are some that are totally blank where you can create your own.  Instead of using the website to send out the invite, on the last step of the process, we saved the image we created onto our computer.  We sent the save the date out with the image embedded in the email and also attached the file in case some of our guests were not able to view the email with the embedded image.

Invitations – Here is where I will rave the most of all the vendors I have worked with for the wedding.  We knew we wanted to use boarding pass invitations because it was different than the classic style invites we’ve received before and ours was a destination wedding so it is different!  Although we knew we wanted boarding pass style invitations, we did not want pictures of palm trees, seashells, ocean waves on them.  It was a personal preference.  We also knew there was no way we’d be able to make/design them on our own even though I did do some research on templates and directions.  My friend eventually told me about a friend of a friend who designed her own invitations and paper goods for her own wedding.  I saw some pictures and was really impressed.  I quickly emailed her and told her about the wedding and my vision.  She was in one word AWESOME.  The patience, the professionalism and the attention to every detail….I cannot say enough.  Let’s just say I am pretty indecisive and she was willing to work with me every step of the way.  She was also very open to our ideas and took all our suggestions into consideration.  After working with her on the invitation, I quickly hired her to do all my other wedding paper goods (guestbook sign, escort cards, table numbers, etc.).  I would let her know what I had in mind and she would always make my ideas 10 times better by making it more creative and putting her own spin on things!  Below is a picture of our invitations which we absolutely love.  It was different, modern and beautifully designed.  We received tons of compliments and people started asking us if they had to return the RSVP since they wanted to keep it entact!

The RSVP card was perforated so that our guests would need to tear the main portion and mail back.  The envelopes were all individually printed with the guests’ names.  I love how it was personalized since I am not a fan of address labels….especially crooked ones on nice envelopes!  My fiance claims that no one ever cares about the envelope but I think it gives off an important first impression.

If you are interested in my designer, her company is called Beyond Creative.  You can access her website here.  Her contact information is available on the website.  I can 200% vouch for her!

Photos – We are flying our photographer and his assistant from NYC.  We hired Willi Wong Photography.  He was the photographer of two of my cousins’ weddings and did a fantastic job.  We knew that photography was one of the most important element of our wedding.  Pictures are super important since they are the only thing you have to visually remember your wedding.  We are comfortable with Willi’s work and did not have to do any research on him.  Basically, there were no risks involved when we decided to hire him.   This will be his first time in Aruba which I think will make our trash the dress session even more fun!

There are still so many things to share with you all but I will save that for after the wedding!

25 days and counting!  Even though there is still so much to do and time is flying, I can hardly wait!

Hello everyone!

I am so excited to be a guest blogger on this website….especially since this site has helped me tremendously during my planning process.  It only makes sense to share what I have learned and my own experience with other brides-to-be who are thinking destination wedding.  Just a warning that this post will be ridiculously long because I am all about details, details, details.

Here’s just a little bit about myself and my fiance.  We started dating in college and he proposed last November and 9 years later, here we are!  We will be getting married on Renaissance Island (with a guest count of 84!) next month and are so excited!  (More on how we decided on location later in this post).

“How has it been planning a destination wedding?” is a FAQ amongst our family and friends.  So I will tell you what I told them.  Once you decide to have a destination wedding, you will need to realize that things will be out of your control and some of your visions may or may not work out.  I had to learn this quickly and I’m not going to lie, it was hard since I have a super Type A personality.  If you can handle this, then you are more than halfway there!  Obviously, every wedding planning process has it’s pros and cons and they’re all subjective.  For instance, if you give me 500 different options for flowers (the norm for US weddings), it will take me 500 days to decide which one to choose.  However, with a destination wedding, my options for certain details of the wedding are drastically limited so it is much easier for me to make a decision.  This is the type of person I am.  It’s really what you prefer.

My fiance and I looked at some places in NYC when we began our wedding planning.  We felt that with our guest list size, budgets were going to be blown out of the water if we had it in NYC (not to say a destination wedding is cheap at all, but more on that later).  Aside from the budget issue, we really didn’t see any venues that represented “us”.  One day we discussed the possibility of having a destination wedding.  I began to get excited about the prospect of this.  A wedding and a vacation all in one!  Prior to any mentioning of a destination wedding, I had begun to feel that wedding planning was becoming arduous and chore-like.  Once we started thinking destination, I had all these thoughts about how to make it “cute” and “unique”.  This was the first time I was getting excited.  After getting approval from both our parents, it was full steam ahead!

We knew right away that Aruba was the destination.  We went to Aruba in 2005 and it stole our heart.  The people, the food, the culture, the weather, the beaches, the everything.  With direct flights of a 4.5 hour plane ride from NYC, we thought it was convenient and practical for our guests.   Now comes the hard decision.  Which venue?  We didn’t have time to do a site visit prior to deciding so we relied heavily on the internet.  After combing through countless websites (including this one!), and emailing various hotels for their wedding brochures, we decided on Renaissance Island for the location of the wedding and the Aruba Renaissance for the hotel where our guests would stay.  What really sealed the deal for us was that we wanted a private wedding!  Also, we knew that many of our guests were not “stay on the beach for the entire day” people so the Aruba Renaissance offered the flexibility of being in the middle of town by all the shops and restaurants and also offering a a convenient way to access a beach.  Best of both worlds.  We were sold.

Now, here comes, in my opinion, the most difficult and annoying part of the wedding process.  Contracts!  After we decided on the Renaissance Aruba, we emailed the wedding coordinator and the group room rate coordinator to start it all.  We wanted to negotiate a reasonable room rate for our guests because hotel stays in Aruba can be pricey.  We went back and forth many times until a final contract was drafted.   At this point, it was February and I was beginning to get a little stressed because I wanted to include our website information along with our save the dates but we also wanted our website to include ALL the details of the wedding (logistics, prices of hotel, etc.)  So basically, we were waiting on the room rate contract to be finalized in order to send out our save the dates.  Of course, I’m thinking, it’s only 6 months until the wedding!  Is it too late to send out a save the date?  The answer is no.   The only reason why I say this is that when you are planning a destination wedding, the time line for a states wedding do not apply to you!  This is a benefit of a destination wedding!  While it is somewhat true that people work on island time over there and do not respond in what you think is in a timely fashion, things do eventually get done.  But obviously, the earlier you send out your save the dates, the better it is so your guests can make travel arrangements.   The point is, don’t stress out about meeting deadlines and what not because things will fall into place.

Save the dates went out.  We decided to do electronic save the dates because it was a cost that we knew we could sacrifice and not regret later on.  I have to be honest, the thought of sending out emails for our save the dates was hard to wrap my mind around.  My fiance eventually talked me into it and I am grateful because a few months later, I don’t regret saving that few hundred dollars because the save the date absolutely made little/no impact on our wedding in the long run.  Word of caution, if you are going to email your save the dates, send them in small waves or many email accounts will flag you as spam! Because we didn’t think about this, we ended up having to email the save the dates out individually to people who did not receive them the first time around.  This is ironic, because something that was supposed to simplify our lives actually made it more complicated.  But we learned and that’s why I am able to share with you this information now!

Next, the wedding coordinator at the Renaissance requested that we fill out a wedding questionnaire so he can give us a quote.  Once a quote is given, we needed to put 20% down in order to secure the date.  This questionnaire is very basic.  It asks if you’re going to be using a DJ or a band, how many boutonnieres would you need, etc.  You are not under contract to actually go with what you initially decided on since chances are, you will change your mind.  The quote is just to determine your 20% deposit and closer to your wedding date, when things are finalized, the 20% you put down will be applied to your bill.

The date is now officially ours.  I had about a billion questions for the wedding coordinator.  Sometimes he would respond within a few hours, sometimes within a few days and sometimes it would take a week.  I understand now that things do not take long to finalize over in Aruba so many things can be decided on last minute.  I’m one month a way and I am still trying to make decisions.  One thing about wedding planning is that EVERYTHING IS A DECISION.  It can be very daunting at times.   What I did to really make myself feel better is I drafted up a little report/summary for the wedding coordinator so everything I wanted was on one page instead of in 4127481 different emails I had sent him over the course of a few months.  The wedding summary basically had details of the decor, menu, flowers, etc.  I also included pictures since some things are just hard to describe.

To end this entry.  I will post some tidbits I followed while planning our wedding.  Hopefully they can help you too.

• Pick wedding date
• Finalize guest list
• Budget things your way (My fiance and I didn’t create a budget.  We decided early on that we would analyze the cost of everything we were spending as it came.  For example, when it came time to decide on a photographer, we would ask each other how much is this photographer worth to us instead of restricting ourselves with a number.  Having seen many friends get married, we knew sticking to a budget would never work for us.)  Also, another thing we did was decide on what mattered to us and what didn’t.  Things we wanted to splurge on and things we knew we could skimp on.  More on that in my next post.
• Decide on location.
• Don’t be a bridezilla.

I would also like to add that there are many misconceptions that people have on destination weddings.  The main one being that it is cheap.  I have to clarify that any wedding can be cheap or expensive, whether you have it in NYC or in Aruba.  It really depends on what you end up planning for your wedding.  There are a lot of miscellaneous costs associated with a destination wedding that you may not incur if you were to have it locally.  Flights and hotel stay for your family, flights and hotel stay for your photographer if you choose to go with someone in the States, etc.  It’s really a personal discretion!

In my next post, I will blog about the fun stuff (photography, invitations, bridesmaid dresses, favors, etc.)!  That’s the stuff that really matters anyway!

If you have been patient enough to last this long with me, thanks for reading and I can’t wait to hear your feedback.  If you have any questions, fire away.

Until the next post!

XOXO,

FY

I’m so excited to announce we have another guest author on her way! “FY2010″ will be getting married on Renaissance Island this August and I’m sure she has plenty of wonderful things to share. I just hope she can find some time which we know is tight when you are planning a wedding. Thank you so much to “FY2010″ for your interest in sharing. Our readers will be so grateful. Best of luck to you, your fiancé and on your upcoming nuptials!

I am so excited – Scott Hayne has posted some of Jing & Jeff’s Westin Aruba wedding photos on his blog! They are so filled with beauty and emotion – very powerful. You can so clearly see how much these two love each other. Scott caught teary moments from both of them. You can’t look at these photos and not smile. I hope we get to see more!

I’ll share a few of my favorites here, but be sure to check out the full post on Scott Hayne’s blog: Aruba Westin Destination Wedding Photos»

I love that our "Jingle96" had to have 'the dress'... no slinky 'destination dress' for her - Isn't she stunning in her Jim Hjelm? And I love that laugh from Jeff. He's ready to get this show started!

She looks like an angel doesn't she? What I would give for skin that flawless!

They said their vows under a beautiful white fabric arch on the sands of Palm Beach. One of the nice things about the Westin is that they are at the very beginning (or end depending how you see it) of Palm Beach so there is much less tourist traffic than most of the high-rise hotels.

Now this is a bridal party shot! Remember - on your wedding day, don't panic if there are clouds. Clouds can help make for some of the most dramatic sunsets and photos. And the "Westin's Wind" you will here some complain about (some claim this is the windiest part of the beach), does it look like an issue here? No way. Jing will be glad to assure you that she found the wind to absolutely not be an issue.

I have to say that this one starts the "I'm Too Sexy" song going off in my head. These two are way too cool! They look they came out of a fashion magazine. I love a little attitude. We agree - you're fabulous!

All I can say is, Wow!

Hmmm... are those Cubans!?!

Don’t forget to check out the blog post where you can see even more of Scott’s stellar work: Aruba Westin Destination Wedding Photos»

If you’ve been reading for a while, you know how much I LOVE Trash the Dress photo shoots. I’ve been eagerly awaiting Jeff & Jing’s shoot and boy is it worth the wait! The photos are stunning! Scott spent hours with them going to several locations that included the Alto Vista Chapel, the Bushiribana Gold Smelter Ruins, the Natural Bridge and they sought out the famous Divi Divi tree on Eagle beach. 

One of the wonderful things about Aruba is its landscape. On one side you have the glittering sandy white beaches and serene sea, and on the other you have the fantastic texture of rocks, ruins, caves and crashing waves! I can’t decide which I like best – the way the natural beauty of the calm side compliments a happy couple, or the way the rock side provides such fantastic contrast. With Scott and Jing’s permission, I’ve picked a couple of my favorites to share here on the blog, though I have to say I think my favorite changes every time I look at them. To see his full post and even more fabulous photos go to: Scott Hayne Photography, Jeff & Jing’s Aruba Pre-Wedding Shoot»

Here is Jing's Favorite - the "Crashing Waves" shot.

I love this cave shot! We see the bride and groom in a world of their own. Check out the texture of the rock - wow!

A beautiful moment at Aruba's famous Bushiribana Gold Smelter ruins

How gorgeous is this girl!?! And memories of staking the rocks at Bushiribana come back to me...

My Favorite (at least today). Pure Joy! This is what its all about

Jing becomes one with the famous Divi Divi Tree on Eagle Beach. This IS Aruba!

Goin to the Chapel! A visit to the charming Alto Vista Chapel. I LOVE the treatment applied to the photo on the left.

And there are even more on Scott’s site! Soon I’ll be posting about some of his other Aruba photo shoots as well, but today is all about Jing & Jeff! Congratulations and thank you so much for sharing your beautiful moments.

Wedding coordinator: The hubby and I are so glad we chose the Westin to host our wedding extravaganza. They truly went above and beyond for us and we can’t thank them enough! Our wedding coordinator, Patrick, did an amazing job. He was always on point with communication through email, answering all our questions in a timely manner (even to say he received our email and he’ll get back to us shortly). I often here of brides in Aruba having communication problems with wedding coordinators or planners, but that was NEVER the case for us!!

Jeff & I met with Patrick for our pre-wedding meeting, where we discussed details of the ceremony & reception and any other last minute details. I had given him my DIY projects (escort cards, programs, flip flop basket, menus, table names, etc) and instructions of where and how to place them. We walked around the property and did a quick run through of all that would happen on our big day! The meeting was very helpful and reassuring for Jeff & myself, so we enjoyed the rest of our days prior to the wedding in the sun!

The big day finally arrived and it was PERFECT with a little bump but nothing that ruined the day! A crazy thing happened as my girls and I were about to take the elevator down to the beach for the ceremony….the POWER went out on the whole island…eekkss!!! I have to be honest, I did freak out for a minute, but luckily the generators kicked in, I was able to take the elevator down and walk down the sandy aisle! Unfortunately the microphones didn’t work on the beach, but it didn’t stop us from saying our vows!

Patrick, was the hero of the day, making sure everything was being taking care of with having no power. I must say, he rocked it out! I’m sure he was stressed, but he didn’t show it or let me know it which relieved a lot of stress on my part.The reception was the best part of the night! Patrick made sure everything was in place before the guests arrived. He even got security to buy some citronella candles and OFF spray for our guests (we never noticed the mosquitos until that evening, must have been because of the power outage). That was a sweet gesture, even our photographers captured the moment when our guests sprayed repellent on themselves!  The reception setup was perfect, Patrick did the setup as asked and everything was in place! He stayed for the whole wedding party just to make sure everything was going as planned! We are so thankful to have worked with Patrick and we couldn’t have asked for anyone better! So Patrick, if your reading this…THANK YOU FOR EVERYTHING!! YOU ROCK!!

I will be posting pictures and other reviews on my blog if you’d like to check it out. If you have questions, please feel free to ask!

http://allaboutjingnjeff.weebly.com/my-blog-spot.html

Hotel: I’m glad we chose the Westin over the other hotels.  I like that The Westin was the first one on the high rise side because it wasn’t as crowded as the others and as cramped being in the middle like all the other hotels.   Some might say that it’s windy on this side, but I didn’t find that true at all.  For those brides wearing a veil, I didn’t have a problem.  I would recommend using The Westin over and over again because I believe that they can host a hellava party!   We’ll def be back next year to celebrate our 1^st anniversary!

Flowers: I wanted something simple for all the bouquets and the florist vendor, Greta, did a great job.  I showed Patrick pictures of what Jeff & I envisioned and her work came through for us on our wedding day.  At the last minute we ordered 7 boutonnières (due the my husbands procrastination) and they came out lovely.  The reception centerpieces were gorgeous too, we asked for 3 square vases of hydrangeas and they came out beautifully.

DJ: The Westin recommended Cool Pro DJs and they were a lot of fun!  Our guests were on the dance floor all night and even the waitstaff said they had fun at our wedding because the music was great.  Jeff’s job during this wedding planning was coming up with a reception playlist and that helped out a lot.  The hubby and I did a choreographed dance and gave the cd to the DJs and they worked it out great for us.  Like Christine, we ended up having wedding crashers, but we didn’t mind it!  Kinda lets you know that your wedding was that much fun!

Food: OMG!!  This was the best part of the reception.  Some of our guests were still talking about it days after the wedding.  We had Chilean Sea Bass or Flat Iron Steak as our entrée choices.  The Westin’s food was by far the best I’ve had at a wedding and I’m not just saying that because it was our wedding, but because people are still talking about it!  In my search for venues to host our wedding, The Westin’s menu was one of the reasons why they were chosen, the prices and the selection was most reasonable for us.  I’m glad we made the decision to have The Westin host our big event because we have no regrets whatsoever.

Oh yeah, the cake, The Westin made our cake just like the picture I had given them, if not better.  Not only was it a gorgeous 3 tier cake, it was a delicious cake at that!

We truly had an awesome time and so did all 55 of our guests!  The island of Aruba is a magical place to host any event!  So no worries on your big day because regardless of any bumps or mishaps, it’ll be unforgettable either way so ENJOY!

The husband (I like the sound of that) and I just got back from the beautiful island of Aruba!  We can’t put into words the amazing time we had this past week!  We had a great time with all our family and friends and we know they did too!  We’re so glad that we picked Aruba to host our wedding, the island is so gorgeous with its turquoise waters, blue skies, and beautiful sunsets!  I’ll soon post reviews and stories of all we did in Aruba, but for now I have to unpack and enjoy this time home with the hubby!  Stay tuned!

“Vicki” from New York City shares with us her review of her spring Westin Wedding. In a separate email exchange she told me her officiant was Rev. Ruben Traxx whom she really liked and she chose a local photographer recommended by the Westin, Robert Arenz. Thank you Vicki, for your review and for sharing some of the photos Robert Took for you. Congratulations to you and your new husband!

Why we chose the Westin.
My husband and I chose the Westin to host our wedding (after looking at the Renaissance and the Marriott) because it seemed to offer us the best value for our money, and everyone there seemed so willing to work with us to ensure that we had the wedding of our dreams.  We also thought that the wedding location for a beach wedding was the absolute best of the three resorts.  At the Renaissance you have to take a little speed boat boat to their private island (which is right next to the airport and the planes fly right over the island as they fly in and out of the airport), which I refused to do in a wedding dress on my wedding day.  Plus the set–up just wasn’t that great.  The Marriott was expensive and while the hotel itself was really nice, the area that they host beach weddings is squished in next to the big hut where you rent rafts and other beach equipment.  With the Westin we felt like it was neither as crowded as the Marriott, nor as family-oriented.  My husband and I appreciated that we didn’t have to line up for a palapa on the beach at 6am, which would have been a total pain, and that were weren’t surrounded by screaming children.  Luckily at the Westin we never had to fight for beach or pool chairs, nor did we have to line up really early in the morning to stake out a place.  The one thing that gave us pause about having our beach wedding at the Westin was the random blue concrete buoy in front of the area where they have the beach weddings.  But they angle the ceremony towards the light house so the buoy doesn’t end up in any of your pictures and you don’t really even realize or remember that it was there.  So don’t worry about that at all.

Our decision to hold our wedding at the Westin was validated 6 months later when they called us to tell us that another couple had inquired about our wedding date and offered us the choice of whether they would host the second wedding or not.  The fact that they would consult us about that, rather than just accepting the other couple’s money meant a lot to us.  After we gave the Westin the go ahead to host another wedding on our date they assured us that we wouldn’t even know that there were two weddings on site and they were 100% correct.  If I hadn’t been told in advance about the other wedding by Inge van Roon (the Sales Manager at the Westin who called us), I would never have known they were there.

Wedding planning

Patrick, the wedding coordinator, was a life saver.  We emailed back and forth for the year leading up to the wedding while I threw around ideas for flowers, wedding colors, menus, photographers, music, etc.  He was incredibly receptive to all of my ideas and was very helpful.  He also responded to all of my emails very promptly, which I appreciated.  By the time the event rolled around there was literally nothing left to do.  He was also very friendly and upbeat, which I really appreciated.  I know that planning a wedding can be incredibly stressful, but he made the process as painless as possible.  Actually, everything he handled for us was 100% painless.  The only painful things were things I handled myself (like the guest list).  Patrick also stayed with us to ensure that things ran smoothly throughout the wedding.  Both he and Inge were present for the ceremony and then he stayed with us during the entire reception.  Actually, they were both also present at our rehearsal dinner at the Westin on the night before the wedding.

Our Ceremony and Reception
I have to say that the Westin put on a flawless ceremony and reception for us.  We had the steel drum player for the wedding and cocktail hour, along with an open bar and passed hors d’oeuvres for the cocktail hour.  Everyone couldn’t stop raving about how beautiful the ceremony location was.  Then for the reception, everyone couldn’t stop talking about how wonderful the food was – particularly the Chilean Sea Bass, although people really enjoyed the vegetarian risotto and the Flat-Iron Steak as well.  Actually, everyone also raved about the food from the rehearsal dinner the night before (the Aruban buffet).  The DJ was great, the bartenders and waiters were very fun and friendly, and the cake was beautiful.  Oh and I was absolutely in love with my flowers.  Everyone had such a fantastic time – we really couldn’t have planned (or had) a better wedding.  We had 51 guests, most of whom stayed at the Westin with us and they haven’t stopped talking about the wedding and how fabulous it was since we returned from Aruba two weeks ago.  I would highly recommend the Westin to anyone thinking about having a destination wedding in Aruba.

Other events
In addition to the wedding and the rehearsal dinner at the Westin, we also chartered a catamaran from Red Sail Sports as a welcome party for all of our guests.  Red Sail Sports was wonderful.  It was a very nice, low-key way to introduce all of the wedding guests to each other.  Ayerim from Red Sail Sports was great.  All of the groomsmen also went golfing at Tierra del Sol and thoroughly enjoyed that as well.

Going on now for two days only, RueLaLa’s “Syle I Do” wedding sale. Among other things are Nicole Miller Wedding dresses from $199-499!!!  How awesome would the silk gown picture left be for a beach wedding? Retailing at $2200, RueLaLa is selling it for $499!

Go to RueLaLa.com

I just have to pass this one along to any lovely brides that may be reading this. As you know, I am a RueLaLa addict! (If you’re unfamiliar with RueLaLa, they offer 2-3 day designer boutique sales. You have to be a member to view sales but signing up is free. You may have read that I purchased my $2600 Nicole Miller reception dress on RueLaLa for $650!) I’ve attached some pictures from the preview. It doesn’t seem to say how long the sale will last, but it’s typically 2-3 days.