Love

Trend Spotlight – Opalhouse at Target

| The Bee Life

In case you’ve missed it, Target has been teasing it’s newest home decor collection hitting shelves this Sunday.  Opalhouse is a full collection to help you furnish any part of your house from a stunning dinner party, to a bathroom upgrade, new bedding, bold furniture, your outdoor patio, oh… and did I mention? Wallpaper. Let me say it again… WALLPAPER! *heart-eye-emoji*
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There are three styles that make up Opalhouse: Indochic, Canyon Sunrise and Mallorca.  Indochic is described as “French-Vietnamese fushion, full of elegant shapes and sophisticated jewel tones.”  Canyon Sunrise is “an organic look with eyes on southern horizon.” And finally Mallorca is “all about the black and neutrals, with contrasting colors… and intricate details.”  But I think the colors, design and patterns of the products speak for themselves, with pieces that can fit into your home without completely restyling.

These three styles are stunning and while they can certainly hold their own, also work together with the intermixing of the colors throughout. Honestly, I don’t even know where to start, I love the kitchen and dining pieces, perfect for summer dinners on the patio or a casual brunch, the bold deep velvet green pillows and fun patterned bedding give an instant retreat feel to any bedroom, oh and did I mention… the wallpaper?!?
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I can’t wait to see this collection in person, I’m not one for day-of hype, but I will be taking a trip to Target on Sunday to preview everything in person and building my wish list, while trying not to fill up my cart too much.

So… get ready for some bright new colors, bold patterns and a whole lot of gorgeous coming to Target, very very soon. The collection drops THIS Sunday, April 8th. Start your wish list how and preview the full collection!

 

 

Image Source: Target.com/Opalhouse 

#EmnBWed – The Girls

| The Bee Life

For an avid Bee readers, I’ve mentioned there would be more wedding photos to come! Well today’s the day… in the effort to not completely take the Bee Life over with wedding I’ll be featuring groupings every now and then from our special day!

One of the things I love the most about our wedding photos were my getting ready shots at the house. Our master suite turned out to be a clutch spot to not only get ready but snap beautiful candids and portraits with my girls… including my number one, Moz! *heart-eyed emoji*
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So many of the candids of getting the dress on/all tied up (which seemed like an eternity during the time) with finishing jewelry touches are so stunning and perfect. Timothy Logan Photography did a wonderful job not only capturing the space and making it look stunning but also putting the pieces of the morning together. I’ve been trying to scheme on what else we could have shot up in our space, maybe some boudoir shots?

Hope you enjoyed a few of these just as much as I do!

Xo

Latest Obsessions 03.18

| The Bee Life

With March being my favorite month, my latest obsessions are full of more of my favorite things! Craving sunshine, sweet summer vacays while keeping busy in these cold months with scandalous TV shows and swooning over our beautiful wedding memories.
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Our Wedding Pictures. I received the edited photos pretty quick, but recently received all of the raw images, that was a field day going through ALL of those pictures. Most of them being full of bloopers and blinks, good for a chuckle, but there were a few gems in there that I just heart-eyed emojied over. I am planning to tease some more wedding pictures this year on the blog, so get ready!

Red Bathing Suits. I am ready for summer, and I am ready for some new suits! With my significant weight loss this past year – I am feeling great in my body and actually looking forward to bathing suit season! I am loving red/orangey suits, whether it’s this one-piece from Target, or this fun ruffle top with a mixed printed bottom from Old Navy. Athleta also has this strappy red one piece that I have my eyes on.

A Sunny Vacay. So being summer ready and bathing suit ready, I need someplace to soak up some rays! We were blessed last year to be able to go on four-great trips, three of which were full of sunshine, bathing suits and lazy days.  So we are looking forward to hitting the road and getting out of town to soak up some more sunshine in my red bathing suits!

Versace. Well, let me clarify, The Assassination of Gianni Versace: American Crime Story on FX.  We loved watching OJ vs. the People the first of the series, mainly because that happened when B and I were too young to remember! The acting in both of these series is beyond amazing, Darren Criss has transformed into the super creepy Andrew Cunanan and the rest of the cast is uncanny to their inspired real-life characters. Not to mention the music in the show is sooo on point!

What’ve you been obsessing over? What have you been binging to satisfy the cold months and what vacays or summer fun are you looking forward to?

 

 

Image Sources: Versace | Vacay | Timothy-Logan Photography

 

Life After Wedding

| The Bee Life

Let’s keep the love train going! This weekend, B and I will be celebrating our 2-year proposal anniversary!! Yah, I know it’s a little obnoxious to celebrate every little anniversary or moment – but that’s what makes life special! And we always love an excuse to drink champagne and order Chipotle.

It’s crazy to think it’s been 2-years since we started this new journey of being engaged, wedding planning, and now living life married! After the wedding and all the holiday crazy, I had a weird lull – as I know many brides tend to have – where I kept asking myself; “Now what do I do?” We were consumed for almost 2-full years of planning, meetings, parties, and more planning for one single perfect day… and now it’s all over!  I loved planning our wedding, I would do it again, but our day was also so perfect and special I’d never want to replace it.
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So back to the question, now what? Well, we need to figure out a few trips this year, we have some ideas but nothing is finalized yet, we went on 4-trips last year, and I want to keep that up.  We are also figuring out and prioritizing house projects that have been on the list for the last 3-years… *smiles* … so looking forward to those, since that is something we both enjoy doing. Also, just continuing to experience more things together like more of our city, new foods, new adventures with friends and family and new hobbies.

I am also in the process of scrapbooking our wedding, which means I’ll continue to swoon over all of our gorgeous pictures, randomly post one or two now and then on instagram (or here!) and this lull will quickly turn into getting back on track to a normal life! A normal, beautiful life with B.

XOX

Valentine’s Day – 2018

| The Bee Life

Happy Valentine’s Day!!

The somewhat controversial, holiday that has been called many things – a Hallmark holiday, only for people who have a sig-o, a day to buy overpriced flowers,  yada yada.  But, I love, love!
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This year I decided to show a little extra love to B each and every day of February instead of just the holiday. It’s been fun planning out each day with a new surprise, I wanted to do it for 28-straight days because it’s far too easy for us all to just focus on spoiling our loved ones on this one, single, day — thinking we are in the clear until the next anniversary or holiday.   Some days have been more extravagant than others, and some are simply a text with a memory or a handwritten love note (my fave!)

So regardless of your feelings on the day, I want to send a little piece of my love and well wishes especially to those reading right now. And I hope that you can share a little bit of extra love today, whether it’s smiling at a stranger, buying someone’s coffee, taking out the trash for your boo, giving a compliment to a coworker or calling someone you haven’t seen in awhile.

Don’t forget to share love, today but most importantly… always.

Photography by: Timothy Logan Photography

DIY – Homemade Valentine’s

| The Bee Life

It’s February! That mean’s a month all about L-O-V-E! And I have a really affordable DIY to share with you that is easy to make, beautiful, and completely personalized Valentines for all your favorite people.
DIY - Valentines - the bee lifeWhat You’ll Need:
– Craft/Scrapbook paper; think patterns, pinks, reds and hearts!
– Scissors, glue stick, hole-punch
– Markers
– Ribbon
– Stickers; stick to metallics, hearts and letters! (optional)
– Photos (optional)

Step 1: Gather all your goodies to create your Valentine’s; once you’ve got all your goodies and figured out who you want to make a card for – it’s time to start making!

Step 2: Pick out your papers, and determine your shape – obviously a heart is a good go-to, if you’re afraid to freehand the cut find a template online or trace on paper before. You’ll want to cut two of your papers so you can have a front and back – these can be the same or mix and match! It’s OK if it’s not perfect, because it’s handmade!! Once you’ve got your shape cut, glue the front and back together.  An optional add; is to hole punch around the perimeter of the heart and then weave ribbon in and out of the holes.

Step 3: Start to Personalize! Add your pictures; stickers and write a sweet note to your honey or bestie… and wah-la! You’ve got a personal, one of a kind Valentine for that special someone.
DIY - Valentines - the bee life (2)Since I am an avid scrapbooker, I had a lot of these supplies in-house stocked away. But scrapbook paper is usually on sale for 7 for $1; ribbon is around $3.99 a roll, stickers can add up if you buy a bunch; but finding some that can be used as accents won’t break the bank.  Not to mention you can always find a great coupon to help. If you stock up now, you’ll have a mini stockpile ready for next year, woo!

Happy Crafting!

Tips for Creating Your Wedding Registry

| The Bee Life

Since we are in the prime of engagement season, a lot of you newly engaged ladies and gents will be looking to start creating your wedding registries! This is a super intimidating process, regardless if you’re needing everything new or looking to upgrade existing pieces.  So here are some tips I recently learned creating my own registries, and some tricks I learned after, to help you create your dream registry!
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Tip #1: Take A Walk Either through your house/apartment and make a check-list for each area and start creating your wish list of things you want/need!  Since everything is digital now, I also recommend going to the store, especially if you can’t decide between two stores.  Seeing, touching and comparing products will help make a decision and then no surprises when you receive gifts.

Tip #2: Use Starter Guides/Check-Lists These are pre-populated lists made by your Registries and they’re life savors, more and more sites are creating these.  It wasn’t until I’d already created two of our registries that I found Zola and their check list.  It was a game changer! The checklist allowed me to think of things I needed, ideas for pieces to upgrade, and filter out things that weren’t that important for us!

Tip #3: Star Your Most Wanted Obviously everything is a most wanted item, but reality check, not everyone is going to buy off your registry, and if they do – make sure you get your priority items first! I regretted not doing this sooner, as I ended up returning items in place of ones we needed more.

Tip #4: Take Your Time Since this can be a bit overwhelming, don’t feel like you need to do this all in one day or one weekend, start early, browse, shop, and add as you go and think of things.  You really just want everything final about a month before your first major wedding event (people are last minute shoppers!)

Tip #5: Put a Cap on It After you have your list created you’ll quickly find out what your priority items are, so limit the number of registries you create! This will be a life savor for you and your guests.

Tip #6: Use Zola The part I love most about Zola is the behind the scenes interface for brides/grooms, not only do they have a wide variety of products and brands, on top of money funds that you can create, they also make returns, shipping, exchanging, SUPER EASY AND you can be really secretive about it so you don’t hurt anyones feelings! Their app is easy to use and their customer service is great!

Tip #7: Link to Wedding Website Be sure to link your registries with your wedding website! This will be helpful especially if you plan on using your wedding website URL on all the various invites and serves as one central place for your guests.

Tip #8: Download the App! A lot of the apps for registries make it easy to shop, check-in and have built-in scanners for shopping in stores.  It can also allow you to check-in on pieces that might become out of stock or discontinued (because that happens more than you’d think!)

We had three registries; Target was a no brainer for me just based on shear convenience for myself and guests, Pottery Barn was mainly used for new dishes and few other fun pieces, and Zola was the catch-all but mainly all my dreamy Kate Spade pieces and other fun and functional pieces.  This is one of the fun parts about getting married, so don’t stress, add as you think of things, and get ready for a lot of awesome new stuff!

Happy Shopping!

2017 Recap

| The Bee Life

I thought 2016 was epic… but 2017 was pretty epic, too! Especially since WE GOT MARRIED! On top of getting married we went on four amazing trips, celebrated four other weddings for dear friends, conquered some house projects, got my butt into gear with my health, and created a ton of other awesome memories!
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This whole year seemed like a constant celebration for our wedding, or our dear friends weddings from bridal showers to bachelorette parties to planning for all the events, let alone the big day.  Every time we saw family or friends, dinners and happy hours turned into wedding planning filled with laughs and good company.

We traveled to DC, Myrtle Beach, St. Louis/Ozarks, and Palm Desert – all of these being firsts together and perfect getaways from all the wedding crazy filled with more family fun. We are so fortunate to be able to travel like we do, and can’t wait for all our future trips together.

We have been so blessed this entire year and I can’t believe it’s nearly over!

Happy New Year!

Merry Christmas – 2017

| The Bee Life

Before we all start running around and making our last minute trips to the grocery store, Target and anywhere in between, on behalf of B and myself, we want to wish you all a very Merry Christmas!
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We hope to remember to take a moment and pause in all the hectic and reflect on the true meaning of this holiday, how fortunate we are (in our many different ways), and squeeze everyone a little tighter this year.

We are so excited to spend our first Christmas as Mr. & Mrs. and continue to build our own traditions when we can and celebrate this most special day with our nearest and dearest.

Merry Christmas!

E+B

 

Photography Credit: Timothy Logan Photography