My mother-in-law-to-be told me about a salon that offers free hair and makeup trials for brides. I called them up and learned that their “Bridal Nights of Beauty” only took place on Mondays. Despite the inconvenience of going straight from work in Manhattan to Staten Island, I made an appointment. When I arrived, I showed the hairstylist a photo of a bride with a side part, side-swept bangs, and pinned curls low and to the side. What did I get? A side ponytail on the top of my head. Then, the makeup guy airbrushed on foundation, blush, and eyeshadow to make me look glamorous. When he was done, I resembled a cherub, but not the adorable Botticelli type; I just looked like a fat, rosy-cheeked baby.

After that disappointment, one of my bridesmaids, Melissa, recommended her friend from home, K. She kindly agreed to come to my apartment to do a free trial, and she even brought some false eyelashes. Two and a half hours and a couple of episodes of “So You Think You Can Dance” later, I was all dolled up with lashes that seemed to curl up to my forehead. I was so excited to look in the mirror, but when I did, I looked freakish with too-wide eyes and plastic-y skin. I didn’t feel pretty.

A few weeks later, I flipped through my parents’ wedding pictures. My mom’s makeup was flawless. She looked amazing. I always thought she was prettier than me, but then I began to think that no amount of makeup would make me look beautiful on my wedding day. I was just an ugly girl and I would be an ugly bride, no matter how made-up.

In a last ditch effort, I decided to finally pay for a hair and makeup trial at House of Trends, a fairly new salon in Staten Island. Paul’s mother and sisters swear by it (Paul’s mom later apologized for that first recommendation). They warned me that they get booked up pretty quickly so they might not even have my wedding day open. It was 11 months away at that point, but surprisingly, they already had a bridal party booked the morning of my wedding. Luckily, they were able to squeeze us in after that party, so I booked them, then I booked my trial.

I found a new hairstyle online. It actually was a side ponytail, but more Eva Longoria than fourth-grade picture day. I showed the photo to my stylist, Jessica. “Oh, I did her hair!” she told me. That was a good sign. After using almost a full can of hairspray, Jessica showed me my hair. Gorgeous. Exactly what I wanted. And the curls looked soft and natural, an incredible feat considering my hair is pin straight.

Then came my makeup. Could Michelle, Jessica’s sister, possibly make me feel beautiful? I was all broken out that day (what am I, 15?), but I guess it was good to see if she could cover me up in case I was as pizza-faced before the wedding. She used plums on my eyes and a glimmery pink on my lips. Instead of the strip of false lashes that K used, Michelle applied small clusters of fake lashes individually. It felt a lot more natural and a lot less porn-starry. But how did it look? Let’s just say, third trial’s a charm.

Countdown to the wedding: 291 days

I’ve been researching wedding customs for my freelance work, and it’s got me thinking about which traditions I’d like to incorporate into my wedding. Aaron and I both come from rich cultural backgrounds: his father’s family is one of the oldest in New Mexico, and his mother is Scottish; my father is half Hispanic and half Italian, and my mother is also Scottish (the MacBean clan—their tartan is shown here).

We would love to honor our heritages by incorporating a few traditional symbols and rituals into the big day, but which ones? Here are some ideas:

–A particularly lovely Scottish tradition has the minister reciting a special wedding blessing at the beginning of the ceremony. This prayer is attributed to Reverend Donald MacLeod of Duirinish, Skye, Scotland, in 1760, and it goes like this:
A thousand welcomes to you with your marriage kerchief,
May you be healthy all your days.
May you be blessed with long life and peace,
May you grow old with goodness, and with riches.

–In traditional Mexican weddings, the priest places a special lasso (often made of silk or rosary beads) around the bride and groom in a figure eight shape. This ritual dates back to the Spanish rule over the Aztecs, when the Spanish married large groups of Aztecs at the same time and needed a way to indicate who was marrying whom.

–At the end of an Italian reception, the bride and groom break a glass or vase. The number of broken pieces is meant to represent the number of happy years of marriage the couple has ahead of them. Italian couples also tie a ribbon in front of the wedding chapel to symbolize the eternal bond of love.

–Scottish couples carry sprigs of white heather in their pockets or flowers for good luck. Legend has it that moments before a young Scottish warrior died in battle, he gave a sprig of purple heather to a messenger to give to his beloved. The messenger then presented it to the maiden, who was so overcome by grief that her tears turned the purple heather white. She declared that whomever carried white heather on their wedding day would have a marriage blessed with happiness.

–In Italy, the wedding traditionally takes place in the morning, allowing the newlyweds to have some quiet time alone together while their relatives prepare for the reception festivities. Our wedding will be in the late afternoon, but it would be great if Aaron and I could take a few minutes before the reception to enjoy each other’s company before the big party!

Image courtesy of http://students.roanoke.edu/.

It sounds like the beginning of a bad joke, but this will be how our ceremony begins. Neither Paul nor I are religious, but having a wedding officiated by a secular figure just didn’t feel right. We wanted a representative of both of our faiths, so a single interfaith minister wouldn’t work, either.

In college, I saw the movie Keeping the Faith, with Ed Norton and Ben Stiller. Years away from marrying Paul, I decided I wanted a pair of friends, like Norton, whose character is a priest, and Stiller, whose character is a rabbi, to officiate my ceremony. When we were ready to book our officiants, I learned pals with these professions weren’t in abundant supply. I googled ridiculous things like “rabbi priest friends” and “Jewish Catholic wedding buddies,” but no dice. Finally, I stumbled upon the Interfaith Clergy Network, an organization of priests, rabbis, and ministers who perform interfaith weddings together. The NY-area officiants were based in Long Island, so we drove out to meet them.

Rabbi Paul Swerdlow and Father John Malone have worked together for years as the on-site clergy at the Northport VA Hospital, and have performed weddings together. They were kind–not that clergy members wouldn’t be–and seemed to genuinely enjoy getting to know me and Paul. They asked us questions about our families, how we met, and what we did for a living. They explained the order of the ceremony to us, how they’d work in both sets of traditions, and what we’d need to provide (like the chuppah, the traditional Jewish bridal canopy, and the unity candles). Then, the rabbi left and the priest begun asking us questions he’d need answered so he could get dispensation (permission, basically) to perform a ceremony outside of the church.

First question: “Have you been married before?” Easy answer: “No,” we said in unison. Next: “Are you blood relatives?” After a giggle, we said no. Then came the stumper: “Do you pray together?”

It was like the question you didn’t think your teacher would dare put on a test, so you didn’t bother studying the answer, but then you wish you had. I was hoping Paul had some brilliant way of dancing around the question, but instead, he was silent. The priest stared at me, begging for an answer with his kind eyes. “Not as much as we should?” I responded, which was more of a question than an answer. I wasn’t about to lie to a priest, but I was scared a flat-out “no” would offend him. “You pray, don’t you?” the priest said in his charming Irish brogue. Paul and I looked at each other nervously. Then, probably sensing our terror, Father Malone said, “‘I love you’ is a prayer. You say that to each other, right?” Thank God. “Yes, of course,” we assured him. “Good. I wouldn’t marry you if you didn’t,” he said with a smile.

We booked him and Rabbi Swerdlow the next day.

Countdown to the wedding: 298 days

We have an awesome DJ for our wedding: Jessie Garcia of PlayItLoud Productionz. I was so impressed with his professionalism during our interview; he answered every question I had and gave me a folder with all of the necessary information. I can understand why he came so highly recommended.

Jessie also has this site where couples can organize their wedding playlist online, and then when it gets closer to the big day the three of us will go through it together and make adjustments. He had a lot of great ideas about what sort of music changes to make during the reception if, say, the younger people are sitting around but the older people want to dance. The DJ can really make or break the flow of the reception, and I trust that he’s going to do a stellar job of running the show.

We definitely don’t have our complete playlist yet, but here are some of the songs we’re thinking of using:

–“Such Great Heights” by Iron & Wine. This song, originally released by The Postal Service, is such a great piece for so many reasons. It also happens to be “our song.” This will definitely be the song we want for our first dance together as husband and wife.

–”You Make Me Feel So Young” by Frank Sinatra. Aaron and I are both big Sinatra fans, and we think that including his music during the reception will lend a classy vibe to the event. Some of the songs are easier to dance to than others, so this might be good background music while people are eating.

–”Americano” by Brian Setzer Orchestra. This is a really fun song to swing dance to, a fact that a number of our more coordinated friends will appreciate. I can’t swing dance for the life of me, but I enjoy jumping around and pretending that I can.

–”In a Little While” by U2. Another mellow song that would be nice background music. I just looked up the lyrics online and they’re kind of depressing, but the melody is generally upbeat, so I still feel okay about using it.

–”I Believe in a Thing Called Love” by Darkness. I’ve listened to this song so many times and I can’t honestly say I can decipher any of the lyrics beyond “I believe in a thing called loooooove!” But it’s such a fun song to try to sing after people have been on the dance floor for a while.

–”Sexyback” by Justin Timberlake. The lyrics might be a little suggestive for some of my relatives, but I’m a huge Justin fan and who can resist the beat of “Sexyback”? Maybe we’ll play it towards the end of the reception.

–”Hey Ya!” by Outkast. Here’s a fun song that makes everybody want to dance. I may have to teach my side of the family how to “shake it like a Polaroid picture.”

–“Billie Jean” by Michael Jackson. The lyrics are strange and Michael Jackson is stranger, but how can you hear “Billie Jean” and not want to show your stuff on the dance floor? This song is a must-have for our reception.

I attended a bridal show a couple of weeks after I got engaged. In the gift bag was a coupon for a free in-studio engagement portrait session with this Brooklyn photographer. I wanted to take our engagement pictures in the schoolyard and music room of our middle school where we met, but this was free, so we figured, why not? Even though we only came out with three photos we liked–out of about 25–I learned some important lessons:

• Even if the photographer tells you to wear solid black tops (as ours did), bring a few options with you. Change outfits for some variety in your photos.
• Don’t forget makeup and a hair brush for touch-ups during the shoot.
• Chat with your photographer beforehand and get comfortable with him or her. We didn’t, and our discomfort showed in our photos.
• If the photographer places you in unnatural positions, speak up! Ours put us in this awkward kissing pose which we’d never place ourselves in ordinarily. Those shots are among the worst in the series.

Since we were unhappy with the results, we didn’t consider them to shoot our wedding, but we’re glad we did the shoot because we figured out what we wanted in our photographer. And so began our search. We wanted someone who made great use of color, excelled at taking detail shots, and captured special candid moments well. I got recommendations from my magazine photo editor friend and checked Craigslist. We found a lot of people who fit our criteria, but not our budget. I came across a Southern California-based photographer, Gail Chatelain, who was originally from the New York area and frequently returns to shoot weddings. She had beautiful shots on her Web site, but since they were pieced from many different weddings, I asked to see a couple of complete weddings. (Make sure you do the same before booking! We loved one photographer’s online portfolio, but once we saw several photos from the same wedding, we realized he wasn’t as talented as his “best of” shots made us believe.) Since Gail was miles away, she mailed us CDs of her work. I was very impressed, but I wanted to meet her before we booked.

Then, our budget changed. We found out that my family’s 10-year-old miniature Schnauzer, Skippy, needed radiation after a cancerous tumor was removed and this was going to cost $5,000. My mom was worried about how they could afford that and pay for the wedding, so I adjusted our budget. (Skippy’s back to his old self, by the way. He has a check-up this Thursday and hopefully he’s cancer-free!) I contacted Gail to see if she could lower her fee, but, unfortunately, it wasn’t feasible. I told her I understood, and we went back on our search. We came close to booking someone else who didn’t have as much experience shooting weddings, but then, I got an email from Gail saying she reconsidered, and was hoping we would, too. A few weeks later, we met Gail in Manhattan and loved her. She was so warm and bubbly that she instantly put us at ease. We knew we had found our photographer.

Here’s some of her work! 

Photography by Gail Chatelain, who also owns the copyrights.

Paul’s family heads down to Wildwood, a beach town on the Jersey shore, almost every summer. In between my sophomore and junior years of college, I went with them and stayed in a room with Paul’s mom, dad, and younger sister, Amanda. Paul was there, too, but, at night, we might as well have been in separate time zones. His parents made him sleep on a cot that was practically out the door, as far away as possible from the bed I shared with Amanda. It seemed silly to keep such a distance between us (we were 20, not 13), but it was their room, their rules, so we respected them. I just didn’t go on vacation again with them…until last month.

Paul and I were too happy to pay for our own room this time. It’s not that we craved the privacy (we get plenty of that in the apartment we share!); we’re just so over sleeping a mile apart from each other simply to put his parents’ minds at ease. And his parents didn’t protest. We’re engaged, after all. Paul’s 30-something cousin, Danielle, her husband Joe, and their 8-year-old daughter, Brielle, our flower girl, were also on the trip.

We all had dinner together each night. I thought the wedding would come up in conversation quite a bit, but the hot topic revolved around me and Paul having kids. “We’re not even married yet!” I shouted across the table when Paul’s mom asked when I was planning to give her grandkids. For someone who was so intent on keeping me and Paul in separate beds, she sure did want us to make babies!

Don’t get me wrong. Paul and I want to have kids someday. Just not someday soon.

It’s frustrating that his family is always hung up on what comes next. Once we graduated college, they’d ask me, “When are you getting engaged?” Now that there’s a ring on my finger, they want to know when we’re having a baby. One thing at a time, people!

Other than that awful conversation, and a couple of nearly identical ones, vacation with his family was nice. I had no qualms about walking along the boardwalk with the girls while Paul and his dad played round after round of skee ball. I’m not shy about wearing a bathing suit in front of them because they’ve seen me in one so many times. And I don’t have to worry about coming off as prim and proper: I throw F bombs around in regular conversation and if a burp slips out, so be it. Even though knowing me so well seems to entitle them to commenting on every aspect of the wedding (”There can’t be any color but white in your bouquet!” “If you want a chocolate cake, it can only be brown on the inside.” “You MUST wear a tiara!” “But if you have your shower in Manhattan, then my Long Island cousins won’t come!”), I’d rather have that type of relationship with them than exchanges based on awkward small talk. They’ve been a great family to Paul, and, when we do have kids, it’s comforting to know they’ll be a great family to them, too.

Countdown to the wedding: 305 days

As intense as it was at the time, I am so glad that we were able to get a good portion of the wedding planning done before the move. At first I resisted the idea of a planning crunch—after all, the wedding is in June I still want to be able to look through wedding magazines in the dark days of winter.

But just coordinating minor details from several thousand miles away has been a challenge, even with my mother on the ground in Los Gatos. I will therefore be eternally grateful that we have already completed what inexplicably became the most stressful part of the process—choosing the floral decorations.

I love flowers, and I understand that flowers can make or break wedding décor, but it seems strange that you can easily spend thousands and thousands of dollars on living ornaments that die the next day. I was especially concerned because I had absolutely no idea what sort of flowers would be appropriate for our event, and I didn’t want to spend $6,000 on an eyesore. Apparently you are supposed to just “know” what sort of flowers you want for your wedding, along with what dress you want, what color scheme you desire—all of which you are supposed to figure out at the age of eight, or at least before you enter high school.

My mother and I interviewed several florists before booking Flower Divas of Santa Clara, California. They were a bit more expensive than some of their competitors, but far more professional. We immediately presented our florist, Shawna Futagaki, with a challenge: how do we tie together two colors like magenta (my color choice) and blue (Aaron’s color choice)?

Shawna didn’t bat an eye, suggesting that we use magenta-toned blooms to match the bridesmaid dresses and then have a blue ribbon hanging from the bouquets. We ended up not going with that color palette, because we decided to go with the British-looking tuxes and I woke up in the middle of the night afraid that the wedding would look like red, white, and blue. Together we came up with a new palette that everyone is really excited about.

The bridesmaid bouquets will still incorporate the magenta hues, but they will also contain ivory, burgundy, and orange blooms. The centerpieces will also reflect these color choices, although they may contain slightly more orange flowers than the bridesmaid bouquets. There will be a mix of tall and short centerpieces, which will look great with the high ceilings in the opera house.

The picture here is the closest one I could find to what I think the bouquets will look like, but you’ll have to use your imagination and pretend that there are ivory flowers in there as well. And my bridal bouquet will be ivory, with lots of garden roses and peonies and pretty fluffy things. The key has been to use a few phrases with our vendors to describe the look we are going for with our event—“British” “traditional” “formal, but not stuffy or minimalist.” Finding pictures of things we like in magazines has also been enormously helpful.

Hm, note to self: buy magazines on exotic honeymoon locales!

Countdown to the wedding: 312 days

Life has improved markedly since my last post. I bought a new computer, and even though I lost everything from my old hard drive (the Apple people couldn’t transfer the data from the sick laptop and somehow my external backup also failed), I have almost pieced my book proposal back together as well as the rest of my electronic life.

Between the cross-country move, my computer meltdown, and my own emotional meltdowns, this past month has been a trying one for sure. For Aaron and I it has been something akin to relationship boot camp. It’s all well and good to have a “perfect” relationship when the toughest dilemma you face is deciding whether to have ivory or ecru on the tables, but until you have to deal with some major stress you don’t really know how well you’re going to hold up in the face of adversity.

That point is the major theme of License to Wed, the movie Aaron and I saw this weekend in celebration of not having killed each other yet. Robin Williams stars as the nutty priest who runs a nearly impossible premarital counseling program for the young couples who want to be married in his church. It’s not the deepest movie I’ve ever seen, but it has some cute moments and a great message. Plus, I think Aaron looks like John Krasinski and my mom was trying to convince me that I look vaguely like Mandy Moore (sure, Mom).

Thankfully, the premarital counseling Aaron and I received at the Saratoga Federated Church was nothing like Robin Williams’ crazy program. We had to squeeze six sessions into the three we could manage before we moved—one alone with a pastor for each of us, and then one with the three of us together. Neither of us really knew what to expect, but I think we both came out of there feeling like we had learned a lot and wishing that we had time to complete the rest of the sessions.

One of the most interesting parts of the program was filling out a questionnaire that asked us to rank on a scale of 1 to 10 how important certain activities were to each of us—things like spending time alone, talking to your mate, and spending time with parents—and then indicate how often we expected to engage in that activity. I almost freaked out when our pastor revealed that Aaron hadn’t ranked anything higher than a 6 and all of my answers were an 8 or above. But then we realized that if you just moved all of Aaron’s answers up three points, we had exactly the same responses for every question. We were just had a different scale in mind!

We’ve talked a bit about trying to continue the counseling out in New York, and as soon as we find a church we like, I’d love to look into that. Until then, our relationship education consists of dealing with daily triumphs and trials as a couple, and so far I think we’ve had the kind of communication that would make even Robin Williams’ character proud.

Image courtesy of E! Online.

After booking the reception hall, and inadvertently finding my dress, securing the entertainment was next on our agenda. We were faced with the question that had plagued many engaged couples before us: should we get a DJ or a band?

To me, the answer was simple: band. I had a DJ at my Sweet 16, so anything that would differentiate my wedding from a teenager’s birthday party was a good thing. I emailed a few bandleaders who didn’t look like 80s band frontmen. It turned out we couldn’t afford any substantial size band. There was a 5-piece band for a couple thousand more than our budget allowed, but the empty sound wouldn’t do for a 200-person guest list.

I thought I’d have to settle for sub-par music until I read about On the Move’s Synergy Concept. They take original artists’ songs and digitally remove tracks. A DJ plays the edited songs and the missing tracks get added back in by live musicians. I loved how different this was, and the sound was truly amazing. For songs we’d rather hear the original version of (say, any Madonna tune; I couldn’t bear to hear anyone but the Material Girl, herself, singing Vogue), the DJ is there with his full stock of CDs. Best of all, we could afford it. Plus, they played Regis Philbin’s daughter’s wedding, and what’s good enough for Reege is good enough for me!

Choosing a first dance song wasn’t as simple. I figured we’d use “Kiss from a Rose” by Seal, the first song to which we ever slow-danced together (remember what a big deal that was in middle school?). It also won the Grammy for best song in 1996, the year Paul and I started dating. But upon close inspection of the lyrics, we vetoed it. After all, it is about death. Next, we considered “Maybe I’m Amazed” by Paul McCartney. We’re both Beatles fans–although saying you’re a Beatles fan is like saying you enjoy breathing–and Paul was actually named after Mr. McCartney (maybe I’ll name a son after my celebrity crush). But the song bordered on both sappy and cliche, so we went back on the hunt for the perfect wedding theme song.

I came across a chart in the spring/summer ‘07 issue of Brides New York called Music for Every Moment. There were song suggestions for first dances, last dances, and everything in between along a scale, from traditional to anarchistic. Somewhere in between the two parameters we found “Thank You” by Led Zeppelin. Sounds crazy to get the Led out at a wedding, but we listened to it and it was kind of perfect. The lyrics are sweet, but not sickeningly so, and the melody’s quite nice. I also love the reaction we get when we tell people what we’re using. Paul’s mom actually thought I was kidding when I told her! Then again, I thought she was kidding when she told me that she used the theme song from the Godfather. Oy.