Our New Toy April 7, 2009

To commemorate Drew’s last mid-twenties birthday, his grandparents, dad, and I all went in together to get him a solution to the serious camera envy he’s been experiencing ever since the last wedding we went to where he played with a Canon Rebel.

Behold the Nikon D-40:

When we bought it today, our salesperson immediately lapsed into a foreign language rattling off words and abbreviations like “aperture,” “ISO,” and “granularity.” Drew nodded knowingly, while I became increasingly terrified that I would a) never be able to turn the camera on, much less take a decent picture b) these words also double as some password to the elitist photography underground or c) I am going to drop it. But all my fears quickly dissolved when I realized that the camera is not only user-friendly but really cool to use. Sure, I’m only pointing and shooting right now, but regardless we spent an awesome afternoon walking around German Village snapping pictures of everything in sight.

What does this have to do with weddings? Well, besides my urge to take creative pictures of my ring, I’m in the midst of a ton of DIY projects right now, so now I have the equipment to document it all in high res For now I’ll leave you with a few of our beginning efforts. We have a lot to learn, but I think this will be a perfect new hobby for us to share.

 

 

Heaven in a Dressing Room April 1, 2009

Unfortunately, neither of my maids of honor (yes I have two) live in the same state as me. So when my best friend from college and I decided to meet in Pittsburgh which is about halfway between us to shop for her dress, I figured we should make the most of it! Drew and I are level two rewards members at Nordstrom, mostly because we bought his entire work wardrobe there last year, and the program comes with some perks. Some of them, like free shipping on all online orders I’ve taken advantage of, and others like the personal shopping service I hadn’t.

Let me just say, if you ever have the chance, a personal shopping trip at Nordstrom makes the best girl’s day ever! We arrived and were immediately ushered into a huge room filled with beautiful clothes, shoes, and accessories all in our size…of course we immediately zeroed in on the Jimmy Choo’s, and spent a blissful few hours mincing around in front of the floor length mirrors in all sorts of fabulous ensembles. Every five minutes, our man Stanley would knock on the door to bring more goodies or suggest other outfits. Heaven! Even though we didn’t end up buying her dress at Nordstrom, the experience was amazing and as always the staff was incredibly helpful. Here are some of the fun things we tried on:

One of the most gorgeous shoes I have ever tried on…the subtle tie-dye effect was so cool!

 

Robin Piccone makes very flattering bikinis. I still might have to take advantage of this one!

I couldn’t find the exact dress that was our favorite, but it was something like this - simple, a-line, classic, and gorgeous.