DIY Preview: Monograms

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Dear Online Diary,

Many can attest how I want to personalized our wedding when it comes to details. This may well be one of the reasons why H2b and I decided to move our wedding from this year to next year. More than a year of planning will give us ample time to prepare ourselves not only to our wedding day but more importantly to our married life.

Having said that, a personalized monogram will grace our invitations, misallettes, favors, table numbers and thank you cards to name a few. Ever since I joined W@W, I’ve been seeing some posts of B2Bs who shared their DIY monograms that left me wondering how they did it. Some even paid well-known artists to create a monogram for them. I’ve been bugging H2B to make one for us. Unfortunately, he’s occupied with work (which I completely understand, by the way) and he seems not in the mood to start the wedding preps just yet (well, this I do not understand).

I got no problem with that. I have the whole world wide web (wwww?!) to turn to (and W@Wies, too). Lucky for me, I found several tutorials about creating wedding monograms. Thanks to those who posted these treasures, I was able to come up with our own monograms. Using the ever reliable Adobe Photoshop, I’ve made a few to get a taste of what I can do.

{Monogram #1}

{Monogram #2}

{Monogram #3}

{Monogram #4}

More monograms to come so please watch out. I need more practice as I cannot get the color I want, which are teal, celery green and gold. Comments and suggestions are very much appreciated. =D

X.O.X.O.,

All About Bridal Bouquet

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Dear Online Diary,

Today as I was searching for wedding bouquet inspiration, I remembered the seminar H2B and I attended last weekend. I learned that there are some pointers to consider when selecting the bouquet that will complete my look as well as the female members of our entourage.

Here are some tips shared by Eve & Co., a floral and event styling company.

Tip#1
The first tip is to know when to stop. As B2B’s, we have to filter the good ideas and then select the best.

Tip#2
We have to keep it real. Make a list of Must-Haves and Nice-to-Haves then select the best based on the flower’s cost, safety, suitability and time needed to implement.

Tip#3
It’s all about the fit. The flowers should fit the couple and their entourage. For example, petite B2Bs need to carry either a regular Beidermeire, Classic Hand-tied or Composite instead of a cascading bouquet or big arrangement that will make her look smaller.

There are at least 6 kinds of bouquets B2Bs can use. They are (Please click on the picture to follow its source):

Pomander is a bloom-covered ball. This is not a popular choice among the brides as it is more suitable for the flower girls.


Cascade is about 2 and 1/2 ft. long. Florists usually recommend this to B2Bs with a Spanish-themed wedding.


Nosegay is a small round cluster of flowers. In this case, chocolates and flowers. Perfect for the secondary sponsors and bridesmaids.


Beidermeier is similar to nosegay but bigger. Generally, flowers are arranged in a circular structure.


Composite is a compilation of loose flower petals arranged under a single flower to create an illusion of a single big flower. Roses are the hands down choice in creating this type of bouquet.


Classic Hand-tied is a collection of flowers beautifully arranged and tied together.

Incidentally, I found the perfect inspiration for my bouquet. I want something I can carry, fun and unique. Here it is:

It's something, isn't it?


X.O.X.O.,

Getting Hitched Button Pins

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Dear Online Diary,

Still about the recently concluded 4th Wedding Congress sidelights (I know. I can’t get over it!), H2B and I are among the lucky couples who were able to get these very cute and brightly-colored Getting Hitched button pins for free courtesy of Fotoloco.

We got these pins by winning the mini-game conducted by Mr. Marvin Natorez, who was the seminar speaker for Trends in Wedding Souvenirs. He added our names on each pin to make it more personal and special. Thank you Folotoco and keep the creative juices flowing!

Here are the pins for you to enjoy...


... and as always, I prefer not to pre-empt our wedding date announcement so I blurred the dates. =P


X.O.X.O.,

Wedding Congress Seminars and Sidelights

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Dear Online Diary,

H2b and I attended the recently concluded 4th Wedding Congress Seminar and Bridal Fair held last July 24-26, 2009 at the Mega Trade Hall 2 in SM Megamall. It was such a nourishing event where we were able to finalized our wedding band design and learned a lot through the seminars they conducted.

The seminars we attended last Saturday and Sunday are Bridal Poise by Abbygale Arenas-de Leon, Floral Details and Event Styling by Beth Amat of Eve & Co., Extra Ordinary Wedding Videos by Dominic Velasco of Imacron, Trends in Wedding Souvenirs by Marvin Natorez of Konsepto, Finding the Right Wedding Rings by Alain Siscar of Matus Jewelry, The Basics of Wedding Planning by Ralyn Pigar of Visions & Ideas, Banquet Details by Jet Versoza of Josiah’s Catering, Inc., The Art of Wedding Photography by Lito Genilo of Smart Shot Studio, Lights, Sounds and Production Design by Ronald Rosales of 4th Wall, First Year Joys and Pains by Tintin Bersola-Babao and finally, Marriage Preparedness by Athony Pangilinan of Businessworks.

{Our ID's, W@Wie pins and Seminar Folder}

I never thought that we could contain so much information in two days but we did. It's a first after a very long time. I will definitely share some of the seminar topics here so please watch out. Thank you to the speakers for sharing their knowledge and wonderful tips and techniques.

The next best thing is I finally met some of the W@Wie brides who were present in the seminar. Although we just met, it’s more than just “Hi” and “Hello”. It feels like we’ve been friends forever as we have been sharing our wedding preps and ideas with each other through our online community. Yes, that includes suppliers’ rating, rants and raves.

{Photo-op with some W@Wie brides and Tintin Bersola-Babao}

X.O.X.O.,

W@W Tags!

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Dear Online Diary,

Not so long ago, I expressed my excitement towards getting our own w@w tags. I also relayed how it can make our wedding preparation more enjoyable.

Today at around 9:00 am, a FedEx truck stopped in front of our house. Out from the truck was a man holding a small package and looking for me. My instinct tells me it’s the tags. I signed the form and in less than a minute, I was holding the small package which I quickly opened. I was right. The package contains two sweet tags bearing our name and wedding details. And as promised, here are our tags.

I purposely blurred the wedding date as I do not wish to pre-empt our wedding date announcement. =D



X.O.X.O.,

Wedding Cakes Galore: Fab and Amazing Finds

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Dear Online Diary,

While I cannot drag myself to sleep after a graveyard shift, I busied myself into finding useful wedding cake ideas on the net. Google found a couple of thousand wedding cake pictures and it never failed to give the unexpected.

Here are some of the wedding cakes I found online. Some of them are amazing and some may be a little crazy but very unique (Please click on the picture to go its source).

{Who says only brides can wear a wedding veil?}

{Who thinks fountains can only be found in a garden?}

{It’s cute and unique. Cheers!}

{Gamers will never believe that Xbox can be edible sometimes}

{Now we know who took grandma’s brick game}

{This cake is clearly inspired by the animated movie of J. Depp }

{There is no doubt who wears the pants (figuratively and literally)}

{Bridezillas in action... Comical, isn’t it?}

{Very sexy. Just make sure everyone has an answer when kids became curious}

{Poof??? OMG}

{A life size wedding cake spells F-A-B }

I can use something as fab as a life-size wedding cake. This will definitely go under my Nice-To-Have List =P


X.O.X.O.,

Officially a W@Wie Bride!

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Dear Online Diary,

Forgive me but I cannot contain my excitement anymore. I just received an email from Ms. Benz of W@W informing us that H2b and I are now eligible to get our own W@W tags! Yey!

You must be wondering why it makes me excited. For us W@Wie brides, possessing a W@W tag is a feat. It will certify our membership with W@W and it will entitle us to awesome privileges exclusively for W@W tag holders. Not only that, it doubles as cute souvenir, too.

I can’t wait to receive the tags. I’ll keep you posted so you’ll see how cute it is.



X.O.X.O.,