I agree Mandalinn82. I was uncomfortable the whole time. I was sweating and uncomfortable the whole time. To make it worse I had a pimple on my back that everyone could see and it was so red. Might I add very embarrasing!! But my SIL was great, she helped me the whole time try on like 6 different dresses. There was a family of woman over the other side of where you come out and they were helping me also to pick the right dress. When I cam out in the one that I liked they all gasped, that really made me feel good!! I love my dress. Hopefully I can upload a picture soon and show you!!

Thanks for the tips! I'll be the girl in the Shower to Shower...

It is now acceptable to wear hose with peep-toed shoes and many have decided that applies to open-toed shoes as well. (Living in the Midwest, I have become an expert on fashion don'ts and their rationales!)

I just think it looks tacky and, yes, they do sell pantyhose with openings for your toes. To keep them from just sliding up your legs, there are two openings- one for your big toe and one for the other four, which creates a little thong.

If you want the bare leg look but want the support of pantyhose, several places sell pantyhose styled like leggings. They even have varying lengths to accomodate a shorter skirt or the long walking shorts that are popular right now. I found a great brand at Target (called something like "Solutions").

Thanks to you guys, I am a little more excited about the dress... I'm sure I'll get more excited as I lose the weight!

Sunshine - I had a serious back pimple issue as well! There is a really great over the counter treatment that cleared it up for me - fairly inexpensive, and SO worth it not to have a giant red splotch on the wedding day. It completely cleared my back up (and I get sports bra/sweat acne on my back constantly) in 3-4 weeks. Its called Natures Cure Body Acne Spray. Don't bother with the Nature's Cure pills...waste of money...but the spray is salicylic acid and it -really- works. I didn't bring it on the honeymoon, but my back stayed clear for the two weeks after the wedding anyway.

Well for once my mother is not acting like a MOMZILLA. She has offered to pay for our honeymoon, which I am super duper excited about. We are planning on going Hawaii, and wanted to know if anyone has any recommendations. My mom was saying something around $1000.00. So I wasnt sure what to do? Any advice that would be great.
Thanks

That's awesome! They have their moments, don't they?

I'm not sure what a trip to Hawaii would cost. I would call a travel agent who can give you some pricing and then you can always try to get a better price on one of the online sites.

We haven't really gotten that far in our planning yet. All I know is I want to go to a non-English speaking country, preferably in Europe, where bikini tops are optional

LOL Lafayette you are so funny!! I wish I had the body for it to be optional. I am working on it so that is the good thing. I was just so surprised that she called me out of the blue to do it. I was really excited. I have been frantically looking like crazy for places, but I still need to plan my wedding also. FH will be here for good in 3 weeks from California I am so excited.

Sunshine, did your mom mean $1000 total or per person? If memory serves, Hawaii can be quite expensive, although I suppose it depends on how long you stay. I'm sorry I don't recall where you live exactly, but I think the flight alone might run a few hundred dollars per person each way. But how awesome of her to offer up some honeymoon funding!!

I haven't talked to my aprents specifically about financial agendas yet. They are currently in a crunch because they are closing on a new home near my sister in Va Beach on June 30, but they haven't had any offers on their house in CT yet, so if they don't sell their house before closing on the new one, they're going to get hit with double mortgage payments So yeah, now is not the time for me to ask about wedding money They did pay for my sister's first wedding and even for the reception in CT after her second wedding, so I know they will do what they can. Thankfully, neither of us wants a big traditional wedding, so we'll hopefully be a bit cheaper than the typical wedding.

The most stressful time of our wedding planning was before either set of parents had "disclosed" the amount they wanted to contribute. I knew my parents were struggling and considering early forced retirement because of my dad's health and I didn't want to make them feel they had to pay for a wedding, too.

It was hard to listen to my mother's suggestions/demands and not to scream because one was more expensive than the other but they hadn't committed any money. Starting the planning process with no cash made us look at what was really important to us and consider a guest list of who was really important to us.

In a way, I'm very grateful for that time, even though I was stressed to death! In the end, it all worked out because we found a way to pay for everything ourselves and the money they offered became the bonus fund that allowed us to upgrade the venue, bar, etc.

BTW I don't have the body yet and, unless they can reverse the Michael Jackson technology, I will never have the skin tone! It's little incentives like these that help to keep my fiance from encouraging me to exercise by walking to the custard stand and to have a huge dessert every time we sit down for a meal! Whatever works!!! Lingerie is also a wonderful encouraging option... I promised him something new for every five pounds and I'm sure it will make me feel better about myself, too!

Sunshine – How exciting about the honeymoon. I haven’t really thought too extensively about the honeymoon, we may not take it immediately after the wedding depending on other things on our schedule. I would be happy with a tropical beach and frosty drinks with little umbrellas in them, anywhere I can find that I’m happy. I’d like to go somewhere where I could scuba dive as well, always wanted to try that.

Mandalinn – Thanks for the dress shopping advice! I’ll be sure to powder up before hand. I’d really like to find a lighter gown, but it seems like those are few and far between. If it were up to me I’d show up in a simple white sundress, unfortunately that doesn’t match the formality of the tux my df is set on.

I know I am really excited about the honey moon and my wedding. Well I am having my wedding in las vegas and we are going to be flying out the following Monday after the wedding which is April 7th 2008. We are getting married on Saturday April 5, 2008. Our goal right now is to buy a house and save money for our wedding which is hard but i know that i could do it.

Shan- have you looked at some of the "destination" gowns? Sandals resort actually has a line of 5 wedding dresses that are advertised as being lightweight. There were designed by Vivian Dessy Diamond of The Dessy Group. They are very pretty and I'm sure you could find something that would look sharp with a tux- it might just be a matter of pairing it with more traditional accessories like pearls.

Good luck!

Time to cut the guest list... Hard to decide who to cut! We want it smaller and more intimate, but there are people who have been important to me that I would like to invite. Sigh... I'm sure it will turn out ok

Oh, boy! They recommend cutting work folks first, then guests of singles. No matter how you do it, it can get tricky.

You may want to start over with a fresh list and just put down the people you really want there. It made our decision to cut some of the obligation invites very easy- not as easy to sell to the parents, but very easy nonetheless!

Good luck!

That is what was hard for us because we wanted all of our family and friends there, but we are getting married in Las Vegas and we had to cut down our list from 50 to 30 because of the price of food. We have a budget of $3500.00 and we can't go over. So I sympathize with you on who to cut out!!

That was the one wedding-related hassle we didn't have to deal with. I don't know if it was the gay thing (because that eliminated most of my dad's side of the family for religious reasons) or the fact that both our sets of parents are VERY low key and didn't have a list of people they wanted invited, but we actually got to -add- people after our original list. It sounds like a nightmare! I can't imagine having to cut any of the people we invited...I sympathize!