A Foxy Fête: Tatted Up

When it came to the wedding, I had a tendency to tell pretty much anyone all they wanted to know (and more) about the food, details, ceremony, attire, etc. Not much was unknown.

However, I did mange to keep at least one thing relatively quiet. Any ideas..?!

All photos by Exclamation Imagery unless otherwise noted.

If you guessed "personalized temporary tattoos", then you win a prize!!*

About two and a half weeks out from the wedding, I read Mrs. Funnel Cake's post about the temporary tattoos she had made for her wedding, and I absolutely fell in love with the idea.

For one, it's awesome and unexpected, and two, Foxy and I already have real matching tattoos. Needless to say, this idea went from inspiration to reality in about an hour (well, a few days if you count delivery time). I whipped up a quick design on my computer (with some elements borrowed from Mrs. FC, since we're both lucky enough to share initial's with our husbands), put my order in with Tattoo Manufacturing, and got 150 of these bad boys delivered about four days before the wedding.

The sign reads: 

Love tattoos but hate the pain?

Love the pain but hate tattoos? (That's.. weird.)

Either way.. Grab a tattoo and spice up your skin!

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You may recognize this little symbol. While it resembles the sign for infinity, it's also two S's intertwined. Both Steph and Scot have this tattooed on their bodies to represent their love and commitment to each other!

We had everything set up on a small table next to the photo booth, including a bowl of water, some paper towels, and a trash bin to enable easy application for our guests!

I totally loved seeing everyone sport their new tats throughout the evening - people really seemed to get a kick out of it.

personal photo | photo by Mrs. Pony

Even baby Joey got in on the action!

The only sucky part is that we still have at least 75 of the tattoos left over. So if you won the prize mentioned above: *you get 75 temporary tattoos left over from our wedding! Yay you!!

Are you adding any unexpected or random elements to your wedding??

Miss a recap? Catch yourself up!

It's Wedding Week! - The week of the wedding started out pretty hectic, but we made it through (relatively) unscathed.

We're Cool People (who had to deal with a slight change of plans) - On Friday, we made our way to the venue, had a relatable moment on the radio, and learned about some last minute changes that we made an effort to take in stride.

Practice Makes Perfect.. And Crabs Don't Hurt, Either - After most everyone was settled in on Friday evening, we had our rehearsal followed by the best dinner ever - a Maryland crab feast!

Rise and Shine! - Wedding morning was soon upon us, and I woke up at the crack of dawn ready to get prettified.

Pretty Women - Over the course of the next several hours, myself and the girls hung out, got our hair and makeup done, had a photo shoot, and drank champagne.

Dressing Up - Soon enough, it was time for me to slip into my dress!

Dapper Dudes - At the same time, Foxy and his guys were ironing and getting into their suites - and Foxy was opening his wedding day gift!

The First of Many Looks - We had our first look, and both felt so much better after being able to see each other for the first time that day.

A School Bus Photoshoot - Our vehicle of choice for the day was a school bus, which we turned into a photo op both inside and out!

Smiles and Sun - The photos continued by the lighthouse and pier.. with sunglasses and a few funny stories along the way.

ALL The Family - We then met up with family at the lock house for even more pictures, and I started getting a bit antsy and having problems with my dress.

And Then There's Us - I kinda-sorta-maybe forgot all about couple and bridal pictures. Thank goodness for our amazing photog reminding us!

Final Touches - Slight chaos then ensued in the minutes before the ceremony started, consisting of me getting sewn into my dress and the boys getting their bouts pinned on at the last minute.

And So It Begins - The guests arrive, the wedding party lines up, and the ceremony space is revealed - complete with programs, white knots, and bubbles!

All I Want Is You, Will You Be My Bride? - The time had finally come - we all made our way down the aisle while my stepdad and stepbro played and sang a beautiful, acoustic version of "All I Want Is You".

Take Me By The Hand and Stand By My Side - In other words.. the ceremony!

Bubbles and Bustles and Beverages, Oh My! - Bubbles are blown, my bustle is tied in, and cocktail hour commences with lots of love, hugs, and drinks.

The Guestbook - The final version & reveal of our fingerprint guestbook - and some tips, should you want them!

I'd Do Anything For You - The reception kicked off with our oh-so-intricate first dance sway to Wake Up by Coheed and Cambria, which our guests joined in on halfway through.

Make 'em Laugh, Make 'em Cry - Which is exactly what we did, thanks to our bestest friends' amazing and beautiful toasts.

Food & Details - All the details about our cocktail-style reception and rustic decor.

Good Times, Bad Touch - Our guests got down with their bad selves on the dance floor with a lot of finger pointing, interpretive dance, and.. our very own rendition of Bad Touch. 

Faux-to Booth Fun! - We said no to veggies and yes to a sorta last-minute DIY photo booth!

Linens & things

Ugh I'm so behind on this. Foxy and I spent a night at our venue and had a meeting with our DOC over a month ago, and here I am just writing about it. #badblogger

Anyhoot, the Vandiver sent us an email a while back promoting cheese & wine for $109 when you book online - a deal they are giving guests if you stay at the inn on a weekday night before January 2012. Um, sign us up please. Since Foxy and I work random hours and days, we were able to go on a Tuesday night back in October and set up a meeting with our DOC for the very next day!

On the agenda:
1. Check out as many of the Vandiver's 17 rooms as possible.
2. Discuss logistics.
3. Choose linens. (Foxy was SO excited for this part. Well, not really. Ok, not at all.)
4. Spend some QT with Foxy Mama.

About #4.. it was a bit last minute, but when I told my mom about our meeting the week prior, she said she would see if she could move some things around and meet us in Havre de Grace. She was apparently really touched by my little blurb on wishing I lived closer to her and could actively plan more of the wedding with her in this post (previously posted on my personal blog a while back). Lo and behold, she was able to drive the 3.5 hours down and join in on the fun! I can't even tell you how much it meant to me - I may have only seen her for a few hours and we really only talked about relatively basic things, but it was the bee's knees (ha!) to have her there.

Now jumping back to numero uno: the rooms. It was a tough call, but we chose to spend the night before the meeting in the Vandiver room (also known as the honeymoon suite due to its jacuzzi tub and gorgeous king sized bed).

Image via Vandiver Inn

The next day, we were able to see 13 of the remaining 16 rooms. Why is this important, your inquisitive mind may ask? Well, we decided to "rent out" the whole venue/all three houses both Friday and Saturday nights of our wedding weekend. Rooms will go to parents, wedding party, and the officiant. Oh, and us. We actually forgot that WE needed a room. (And to add ourselves to the guest list. Apparently we're not actually going to our own wedding..?)

The cool thing is that we can assign rooms to people, and when they eventually call to "book a room", it's already set up for them. It's like my very own Barbie dream house(s)! Except it was really hard to decide on some of the rooms.. I mean, how would I know if Foxy's groomsmen would prefer a room with a nautical theme or filigree wallpaper? Ohh, the decisions.

Once we were done with the room walk-through, we got down to numero dos: logistics. We shared our "vision" with the DOC, I showed her pictures of my dress, we swooned, I told her Mrs. Lox said hi, we talked about colors and vibe and all that fun stuff. Which promptly brought us to numero tres: linens!

After seeing my dress and hearing me harp on and on about my inexplicable love for mason jars, a light bulb seemed to pop on over our DOC's head as she rushed to the attic to grab some linens "that would be just perfect".

We hemmed and hawed for a bit - can you believe they actually don't have a true turquoise linen? Just a blue and jade type green. But it actually worked out for the best; the first thing she showed us was this pretty white lace.

This was about the time when Foxy zoned out.

Since we'll be having more of a "cocktail style" reception, there will only be about 4 big rounds and lots of smaller cocktail tables around the venue. While I was definitely digging the lace, it was just much too much white. I was hoping for the bigger tables to at least have some pop of color. Since they didn't have turquoise, I asked about our accent color - a nice clementine orange. No go there, either. To which Foxy Mama replied, "well, what about peach?". Ah, that woman is a genius.

What you see is an ivory base, peach underlay, and white lace overlay, and hive? I'm in love. I was surprised at how much I dug the tritone look on the big tables, and how excited I am to see just the two tone (ivory underlay and white lace) on the cocktail tables. It's going to give the place such a wonderful rustic-y look without going overboard. ::cue more swooning::

I'm so happy to have this small (but oddly significant?) part of planning out of the way. And as usual, I don't think it would have been nearly as awesome if my mom wasn't there. She picked my dress, she picked my hairpiece, she picked the linens.. she knows her stuff, yo.

Has your mom (or dad, or sister, or SO, or cat..) helped you pick out or decide on anything wedding related yet??

Hey DJ, heeeeey!

No, not you DJ Tanner.

Image via Buddy TV

I'm kind of in shock that I haven't mentioned anything specific about our DJ Frank yet. After the venue, he was the first vendor we booked! (What can I say, we like music.) It's actually kind of awesome because our new buddy Frank apparently works with our venue quite often, so he already knows the space, layout, and general flow of things on the big day. He came highly recommended by our DOC, and the fact that someone else was trying to book him for their wedding on the same day as ours almost 2 years in advance? Yea, I'd say he's good at what he does. We'd hit that.

Mr. Foxy and I first met with Frank in July of 2010 and had an instant connection. Foxy was sold because Frank had a ton of tattoos (apparently that makes them soul brothers or something) and we were both stoked at his laid back, open attitude. As previously mentioned, he's totally cool with us having a general play and do-not-play list, as well as playing some "offbeat" music, granted he has the tracks or we provide them.

So now I present to you: the point of this post.

Foxy and I have talked more about the music to be played at the reception and already have a handful of random songs to be dispersed within all the top 40 mumbo jumbo that I'm a total hussy for.

Ready for it?

1. Olé - Bouncing Souls

Even though I've listened to and loved this song since high school, Foxy insists that "you just don't get it" and "you didn't get ready to go out drinking with your boys in college to this song like I did." Um, no, because I was straightedge and awesome. Either way, I can't wait to see what him and "his boys" do when this song pops on randomly during the reception!

2. Rock Show - Blink182

This one is more mainstream and less random, but definitely not a common reception dance song (I think?). Anyway, we both love it and I'm pretty sure all our friends will be gettin' jiggy with it.

3. My Standard Break From Life - Alkaline Trio

This one is definitely all Foxy. He big puffy heart loves Alkaline Trio - I'd say I more normal-sized 2-d heart love them.

4. Back in Your Head - Tegan and Sara

This was one of the first songs I knew and loved by T&S, and these two ladies comprise "our" band. Sure, their songs are all depressing as heck, but they're just so catchy.

5. Bad Touch - Bloodhound Gang

Please don't even ask. I'm obsessed with this song. Foxy knows ALL the words and it's (sadly) my goal by the time the wedding comes around to know them all too (first verse down!). Please don't tell me it's "inappropriate".. it's hysterical and the people who don't know the song won't even realize what they're saying in it. I think we'll be good. Or we can have Frank edit some things out.

6. Festival Song - Good Charlotte

I had to put at least one GC song on the list. I was kind of obsessed with them in high school and may have wanted to marry Benji. By may, I mean I totally did.

Thus ends what will inevitably become "Part 1" of random music to be played at the reception. I would strongly suggest for you to expect more of our terrible superb music selections in future posts.

Are you having any "offbeat" music played at your wedding?