NOTE: This is a very wordy post at first... but keep reading, the pictures at the bottom are worth it!
Nothing says perfect wedding like having your wedding dress stolen. Don't you agree? Because I mentioned this "incident" in my last post, I will share what happened. It was not fun. But don't worry. I ended up having an AMAZING wedding which I will tell you about.
So... I am sitting at work one day, about 5 months before my wedding. I had picked out my dream wedding dress about 2 months earlier. It's all good, if you will. Except it wasn't. I received a random phone call from the bridal shop saying "I am sorry, but we have gone bankrupt and we do not have your dress and cannot refund your money."
There was silence. Pure shock followed by Italian rage. Okay, okay, I didn't exhibit my Italian rage until later when I had to be escorted out of said store by a police officer (more on that later), but I wasn't happy. And neither was Big Joe (my dad). See Big Joe
here.So here's the actual story written by a few professionals:
http://www.charlotteobserver.com/100/story/42545.html http://www.charlotteobserver.com/business/story/46226.htmlCan you believe this?? I couldn't either. Their solution for stealing all of our money was to let the dress-less brides go to what was left of the shop and have a "free for all" with the leftover dresses. Um, no thank you. My FABULOUS friend Michael and I went to check out this situation ... just for curiosity's sake. (There was, in fact, as the story reported, a cop standing guard. You know, to deal with all the "crazy brides." I think he had to have been the worst cop on the force... can you imagine that morning at the police department? "You, new guy... go keep an eye on those brides at the bridal shop... tomorrow you can hunt real criminals." ) Anyways, my fab friend Michael was a witness to this situation. I apparently got an "attitude" with the lady in charge of this asinine non-solution solution. So, she kicked me and my friend out but we didn't want to go. We were MAD! In hindsight, it was a tad dramatic of me to "resist" leaving the store, but I was a bride with no dress. There was a clear lack of rational thought at this moment. Due to all of my 5 foot 3 scariness, they had the worst cop in the force escort us out of the store. Seriously, the guy probably had a water gun instead of a regular gun. (But I might have still been a little scared. Even if he didn't have a gun, he probably knew a lot of people with guns.)
Anywho. The bottom line is that those ass faces at the evil bridal shop never intended to give me my dress or my 9 bridesmaids their dresses. They just stole the money and used it to try and keep their shady store afloat.
They are the true Bernie Madoffs of the world. La Bella Sposa is probably where he picked up all his tricks.
This story has a good ending. I was able to get my dress (again) from the fabulous
J. Majors, which I mentioned in my last post. Most of my bridesmaids got their money back and only had to pay for their dress once. My wedding was, and I may be a little biased, but INCREDIBLE. So it all worked out. Moral of the story: Never pay all of the cost upfront. I really shouldn't be giving financial advice of any sort, but listen to me here ... I speak the truth. Here are some pictures from our happy day. And please note, I am aware that our wedding was 1.5 years ago so this post might be a little delayed. But this blog is about food and party planning, and I don't know of any bigger party that had more food than my wedding... :)
(All photos taken by the amazing Christopher Record - check him out
here)
The dress that I bought twice - totally worth it! by
Lazaro :)
Me with my grandpa - It's not sauce, It's GRAVY... please go to my
first post to understand what i am talking about.
Our large and incredibly fun wedding party doing a Saved by the Bell group high five - Go Bayside! (for those of you that get that reference)
The bridesmaid dresses were chocolate brown and also by Lazaro.
We walked into our reception like we owned the place. Note that I changed my sash for the reception to match my bridesmaids' dresses... the chocolate brown was perfect for the fall.
This was what we walked into, so of course we were happy! It looked amazing! Our wedding was held at the beautiful
Ballantyne Hotel in Charlotte. We had a lot of help planning. I had a huge wedding (Italian, remember?) and there is no way I could have handled being a bridezilla (joking... or am I?) and planning a wedding at the same time. We used Jen at
Soiree Charlotte - she rocked, book her
now if you are in the Charlotte area! The awesome flowers were created by
Crawford & Company. The ceilings were draped in a sheer white material and the walls were draped in brown velvet. The ballroom was transformed and it looked like a fairyland. That is the cheesiest thing I have ever written, but it's TRUE.
Our appetizers were shrimp cocktail with lit ice cubes - it looked SO cool!
Our cake was by
Cake Lady Jill. All of the layers were a different flavor, but our favorite was the carrot cake. Jill even made us a tiny replica for our anniversary this year. Here's a picture of our cute anniversary cake because I can't resist:
HOW CUTE IS THAT?! I think we are going to have to have this every year, even when we are old and gray and the sugar will send us into a diabetic coma.
Don't worry though... it wasn't just pretty cakes and lit up shrimp cocktail... it was ridiculously FUN too.
We had an 80's band! (This was a compromise with Big Joe. During cocktail hour and dinner we had a Frank Sinatra impersonator. Not joking. Only after "Sinatra" were we were allowed to rock out to the 80's courtesy of
The Breakfast Club.)
A signature cocktail was served.
With our favorites... Drew and Michael, the new mom and dad :) Black and white "Wayfarers" were passed out when the band played "Sunglasses at Night."
Our favors were mini cocktail shakers from
Beau Coup... we attached the recipe for our signature cocktail.
And my absolute favorite part:
A photo booth.
This. Was. So. Fun. 'Nuff said.
I will leave you with two of my favorite photos from the day:
We rode off happily ever after in a golf cart. This was appropriate since Mr. Fo and I met working at a golf course 8 years ago!
I crashed my golf cart into him (true story) and the rest was history.
(NOTE: I still can't drive, but he loves me anyways.)
