Bridesmaids.

I had very good looking bridesmaids friends! Chantelle and Sarah looked absolutely stunning and even though the hairdo was painful (blow-dried, round brushed and back combed - eep!), I think it might have been worth it!

Dress: Aurelio Costarella

Tights: their own

Shoes: Wittner (Chantelle), Nine West (Sarah)

Necklace: Anthropologie

Hair: Jude Dierden for Identified Hair

Make up: Jane Wong for Beyond Aesthetics

all photos by NK Photography :)

Tomorrow.

via

Tomorrow I'm going to a bridal shower the girls are throwing me. As per usual, they are VERY good at keeping secrets and I have no idea what's going on.

Thanks in advance to Chantelle and Sarah for being so lovely!

Accessorizing.

Last weekend the girls and I went out to look for accessories for their dresses. Honestly, I am realising more and more than it's not that I just don't like styling fashion - I'm clueless! I feel so sorry for my girls because I can't look at their outfits and know exactly what I want/what would look good/what would work. I'm terrible to go shopping with!

So, after about 3 hours traipsing around the city we came up with these ideas:

The Dress:

The Legs:

via

The Shoes:

Either...

or...

We're leaning toward the latter

The Arms & Shoulders:

At first we really wanted a capelet/bolero/shrug but we just couldn't find one that would be appropriate to wear all day/that was nice/that was in AUSTRALIA. The girls are inside most of the day, so in the end we decided just to bring along a cardigan and they won't wear it during the ceremony....

The Waist:

We got our dresses from Aurelio Costarella's sale. We decided to style them with doubled-up belts a la Costarella SS08/09. We chose light grey and cream coloured belts to lighten up the look... They look awesome.

The Jewellery:

This necklace is from Anthropologie and adds a little bit of visual interest to the simple dress... and I think it's just pretty.

Excited.

Oh the count down is well and truly on... Sometimes I still feel like I'm marrying Zac in 6 months time, or a years time, but definitely not 2-and-a-half weeks.

via

It's a funny thing, being a bride-to-be. On one hand people expect you to be SUPER-DOOPER EXCITED and all you talk about is weddings 24/7. I've known brides like that, there isn't anything wrong with it at all, but as a bystander you do wonder what happened to the rest of their life. Then the other thing is that if you do get super-dooper excited about your wedding, the details, creative things (that require precision) people are very quick to bring out the word "bridezilla" which is like a slap in the face if you're trying to stay normal while planning your wedding.

I am so excited to marry Zac, you have no idea. I'm just so aware that when I'm having a conversation with someone they may not want to hear about my wedding... they may just want to talk about books or religion or boys or friends rather than discuss the intricacies of whether my florist is grumpy or not.

I'm so conscious of showing my over-the-top excitement that I think people think I'm a bit too chilled out about the whole affair.

Except the people closest to me. They know I'm keeping it in. Sarah and Chantelle tried to get it out of me on Friday while having a coffee at Tiger Tiger.

"Sorry," I said, "If I let out my excitement now, I will make a fool of myself and everyone in this cafe will stop and stare at us."

So we're going down south this weekend, all us girls. And we're going to let out my excitement on a Winter Beach somewhere....

via

Brides-people.

Chantelle and Sarah are the best bridesmaids in the world! Not only because they are so helpful, supportive and encouraging but also because they are such good friends and are helping keep it real and lovely in their own unique ways.

Taken while on a retreat in New Norcia... I have no idea whose sunglasses I am wearing!

Love you girls!

Jason and Aaron are the best bridesmen in the world! They listen to me rant when I need to vent and they make understanding noises and say funny things that make me laugh all the time.

Taken at Perth Domestic, just before Aaron moved away..

Love you bros!

Two Presents.

I had ordered a present online for my bridesmaid, now the company emailed me to say that's they are backordered.... until August.

That's not very helpful!

BUT>>>> I found something else I thought they may like.

BUT>>>> They won't ship that particular item to Australia... unlike everything else :)

I'm going to contact a friend in California to see if she can help out, otherwise it's back to the drawing board.

BUT>>>> Sarah gets back from India tomorrow, so (in a way) I don't really care about all this stuff, I just can't wait to catch up with her for the first time in about 3 months. Seeing her will be a gift in itself.

Amazing Lake Hotel in Udaipur, India. via

This Week.

The past couple of weeks we've been busy little beavers.

Our cupcake boxes arrived, and saved us a pretty penny because Ebay is so much nicer to us than a brick-and-mortor store, about $50 nicer. Unfortunate but true. I almost had a picture but we ate the cupcake too quickly...

I had another meeting with the florist this week. I had emailed her the pictures that I showed her in our initial meeting, but she thought they were really different? Went in to clear up any confusion and hopefully bring the price down by simplifying the bridesmaid's bouquets. Found out all sorts of lovely information like when we can pick the flowers up etc.

We sent our paper off to the nice, scatterbrained man at the Print Shop. We are getting some films made up at the moment which he will turn into plates and then magically - voila! - Our invites will be done. Probably a week later than I initially hoped. I have been addressing envelopes all week. Sick of it. But I feel a great sense of accomplishment. I still have to line and stuff them....

I bought my girls a gift. It's on it's way. I hope they like it.... but I won't post a picture because they both check the blog. Haha, sorry Sarah - sorry Chantelle!

We had a meal tasting at The Old Brewery with Mum, Lisa and Phil. It was lovely and will make a good Winter lunch. I got full very quickly and promptly got grumpy because I needed to sleep it off. I'm glad I found this out before the wedding day. Poor Zac! I won't each as much on the day or else I will be like a sleepy winter bear! Sorry no pictures. Was too busy eating.

We also found out that they have changed the carpet and painted the big, huge, ugly red wall in our function room. I am thankful for small mercies. I had no idea how to decorate with that red wall clashing with all the neutral tones in the room. Yik!

Did I tell you we found some friends with nice cars to use on the day? I can't remember, but we have. They are even grey-coloured. How coordinated is that? I do feel a little bit bogan though. Riding in a Holden. Haha!

Photo via

We filled out our Notice of Intention to Marry form. Laughed when we had to tick Yes or No when it asked if we were related.* Mentioned to Paul Morrison about getting together to talk ceremony specifics. Trying to find a time to talk with him about it is like nailing jellyfish to a wall. Impossible! Haha... love that guy :)

Perhaps the biggest thing this week is that Lisa and Phillip bought Zac a suit in the UK, again. The UK is a much better friend than AUS. About $600 worth a better friend. Here is the suit on an model who has a seedy-looking-porno moustache:

from Hugo Boss UK

Perhaps the best thing about Zac getting a suit is that we can know for certain that he will be wearing something at the wedding. No more jokes about wearing his 'birthday suit'.

*We ticked 'no'. Just clarifying.

Ombre.

Still need to see this dress in person, but HOW HOT does this look on Chantelle? I loved going dress shopping with the girls, but Chantelle saw this one all on her own...

Ombre dress, Morrison

Bridesmen.

My (Clare) side of the bridal party is a little different. I was looking for a way to include my brothers in the whole deal, while still allowing Zac to have some friends on his side of the bridal party and making sure that there wouldn't be too many people standing with us when we say our vows (c'mon, someone has to be in the congregation!)

So, after little while of pitching a sneaky plot to Zac, we came up with an idea that allows to to include our 4 brothers and 4 of our friends.

Quite simply, we will both have our two brothers and two friends stand with us.

It will look something like this:

L-R: brother, brother, friend, friend, clare, zac, brother, brother, friend, friend

There are some logistical issues to work out, Phillip was particularly concerned about how the boys would walk back down the aisle.

We've never really been interested in hooking up my friends with Zac's friends, so the idea of them walking arm-in-arm out of the church was a bit weird for us anyway.

Who knows. Maybe single file? Maybe the boys can just give each other a handshake and a kiss on the cheek and still link arms and go down the aisle!

These sort of things should be fun to work out :)