Sneak peaks!!!!

Okay first, my sister is in labor right this second and I am THRILLED for her, and rather crushed that I'm no longer in NC with the fam, but trying to fly back as quickly as I can to meet my forthcoming nephew.

And second.... my fab photographer Julie Dreelin posted some sneak peeks that I HAD to share!

Bling! And letterpress! A match made in heaven!!!!

Bling PLUS hot red shoes? Yes please!


Our guys looked goooooood....


And we didn't look half-bad, either ;-)
(Isn't T's floppy hair in the beach wind the most adorable thing ever, by the way? Makes me want to marry him all over again.)


Unforeseen consequence of tall, skinny heels - they got stuck in between every single board of our rustic wedding locale. Oops!



And here we are! Getting married! Just a taste of the amount of laughter that went on. Our cheeks hurt we grinned so much during our own ceremony. My mom's too, I think - that's her front and center in blue!


And outside of our reception later that night!!

Happy, happy, happy....

All hail a good tailor

Major kudos are due to the tailor who turned a grandfather's seersucker suit (a fantastic suit with a very vintage feel, but perhaps a bit too vintage of a cut) into a suit fit for a modern groom.

We weren't sure it was going to be possible. But behold, as of last night, a suit that fits the F-Word perfectly, with flat front pants!

As much as we were intrigued by the idea of having a custom suit made, we love that he will get to wear his grandfather's suit on our wedding day. How many guys can say that? I think it's really special.

Paired with the same navy linen tie and red dotted pocket square as the groomsmen, it comes together a little something like this...












Wow... we are really making this thing happen!

The guys (sans bout)

The guys in our wedding aren't wearing boutoinierres boutonierres boutonnieres. Sure, it's traditional to wear them. Sure, wedding blogs are filled with examples of interesting bouts that provide a little more edge to the look. But: guys dislike them and flowers wilt. Floppy wilting flower by night's end = turnoff.

So instead, a dapper pocket square. More T's style, anyway.

So to our favorite groomsmen, who are wearing bouts, thanks but no:















And to President Kennedy, who is demonstrating the F-Word's #1 pet peeve by wearing both a pocket square and a bout, tsk tsk:













Our groomsmen will be sporting a cheerful ensemble of stone chino suit + blue checked shirt + navy linen tie + red dotted pocket square.

Two things:

1. The tie has tons of texture that is apparent in person and not so much in our rushed dusk photograph. It's a great beach tie.
2. We used unmentionables to stand in for pocket squares, so get over that when viewing the photo. And pretend that my hastily Photoshopped white polka dots are real ones. Basically, pretend this is a great pocket square and not wadded-up red underwear.

F-Word Friday: Famous Friends and Family

Last week we talked about the tuxedo, and I alluded to the seersucker suit I plan on wearing on the big day. Which is what I had planned on talking about today. That and what the groomsmen are wearing, since we just decided that. It’s going to be a stone khaki suit with a big check gingham-ish blue and white shirt, and a solid linen navy tie with a red pocket square with white dots. They’re going to look goooood.

Which brings us to today’s revised topic: the groomsmen. This is particularly relevant since next weekend is the bachelor party, but also because it allows us to examine a common wedding stereotype. You know how everyone says that the goal of every wedding guest is to make sure you look good but not better than the bride? Well, the same is not true for the groom, which is fine. I assume most grooms get at least a little vain on their wedding day (and I’ll readily admit that my vanity began long before this wedding and will continue afterward), but no groom has any interest at all in upstaging our better half, and I’m no different. But here’s the thing: I have 4 groomsmen, and I run the risk of being the 5th best-looking guy in my own wedding party. I mean, that’s a little awkward, right? Not only that, but they’re all subtly different, so there’s something for just about everyone.

Without further ado…The Groomsmen:

The Brother-in-Law: Let’s kick things off with Maggie’s brother Lane. Classic southern male. Tall, rugged, loves to fish and hunt. Dead ringer for a young Harrison Ford. Has the big pickup truck that he looks born to drive (whereas I, in the same truck, look like Mike Dukakis driving a tank). Big accent. Talks. Real. Slow. Then says in 12 words what I had been trying to say for the last 12 minutes. Loves to drink with the boys, yet is always in the running for World’s Greatest Dad.

The Other Brother-in-Law: Or soon to be. Alex and I were teammates in college. Played the same position. He was an All-American, I was on the bench watching. He’s still playing professional hockey at 32, and has spent the last two years being the most popular foreign athlete in several small European countries. He has a bronze medal from the World Championships. He’s really funny and smart, and he’s impossibly good-looking. Seriously. Think Pierce Brosnan or Dermot Mulroney, only without the metrosexuality. True story: right after college, I was dating a girl in Boston who wasn’t Maggie. So we’re out at a bar with four of her friends, standing in a circle at the bar talking and waiting for some of my friends to come. So in walks Alex, whom these girls have never met. I wave so he can find us at the bar, and the girls turn and see him and go silent, except for some hyperventilating. Then one of them turns to me and says “Wait, you actually know him?!” Oh, and three years ago he started dating my younger sister. They’re getting married next year.

The Rabbi: Travis = not an actual rabbi. Not even Jewish. Not so much religious at all, as far as I know. But “Rabbi” is the term Wall Street uses for mentor, and it fits here perfectly. He’s only four years older than I am but he’s twice as good as I am at the same job, and he casually refers to himself as my Yoda, since every prediction he’s made about my life since the day we met has come true. For example, he told me I’d become nearsighted staring at trading screens all day, and I bragged about my 20-15 vision. Eventually, I had to ask his advice on local lasik surgeons. And after he met Maggie for the first time, he told me I’d be engaged in 9 months. I laughed him right out of the room, and eight months later asked for the phone number to his diamond guy. And if that’s not bad enough, he looks exactly like David Beckham. I mean exactly, right down to the four-too-many tattoos that look dumb on everyone else and uncomfortably cool on him. And he coaches his four-year-old daughter’s soccer team.

The Dean: My father, the Best Man. If I had a dollar for every time a woman met my father and then said to me some variation of “well I certainly see where you get your charm,” I could buy America out of recession. We are alike in almost every way, except he’s older, more seasoned, and has a better tan. Plus, he’s a much MUCH better writer. Not only is he coming to the bachelor party, but I guarantee my friends are more excited to see him than to see me. He’s like the love child of a pre-shotgun Ernest Hemingway and The World’s Most Interesting Man from those Dos Equis commercials.

So there you have it. I couldn’t ask for a better group, even if I’m way over my head standing next to them.

And don’t even get me started on our Master of Ceremonies…

Dress-up Ken

Last night we played one of my favorite games: Dress-Up Ken! This is when the f-word patiently tries on about ten different groomsmen and groom looks for me and we critique each one.

We're getting close, which is good for our planning needs and bank accounts. But it's bad for my love of the Ken show.

Maybe soon I can make the f-word model honeymoon looks? Cookout ensembles? Brunch attire? :-)

Two big decisions for the guys: this suit and this shirt. Ties (of course!) to be continued...

(T. M Lewin is our favorite shirtmaker, fyi... even more so than Thomas Pink, and a heck of a lot cheaper. Ladies, get your men in these shirts, trust me!)

Tie ten on

We cannot stop buying ties. Seriously. Since planning this thing, the tally looks like this:

Purchased - 10 Ties
Returned - 2 Ties
Gifted - 1 Tie
On Hand Right Now - 7 Ties
Wedding Party - 5 Guys

Here's how this mess began:

Remember when we were going to have a coral and peach wedding? Ha ha ha. We found a brilliant tie for Trevor to wear - very English, just gorgeous. It would've looked great with a light stone/linen suit and a pink shirt. Then, we found four groomsmen ties. Done, right?


No... we switched colors. We love both of these ties, though, so Trevor kept his groom's tie, returned two groomsmen ties, kept one of those, too (and wore it with a khaki suit to my cousin's wedding - it would've been a great wedding look), then gave one to his dad for Christmas.







Moving on to blue and red (thank goodness!).

We knew right away that Trevor should wear blue seersucker, and our first thought was that he could wear the tie his dad got married in - navy with white dots. Only the more we looked at it, the more we were seeing the tie's age and decided to purchase a new tie very much like his dad's tie. Here's Trevor in the seersucker, with his dad's tie, and a cat toy feather in place of a flower. We eventually decided that more color would be better; navy and white polka dots weren't a bold enough look because they don't pop in the photos. The new tie is gorgeous and is imminently wearable, though - not a chance he's returning it. But I can definitely see incorporating polka dots elsewhere - the ribbon on the bouquets/boutonnieres, for example.

In search of red and blue ties, we found ourselves stuck in the cool weather tie season - not many whimsical warm weather ties at all. In a series of frustrating shopping attempts, we'd fall in love with one tie to discover that it was the only one left in the entire country. That happened twice.

Still, a red and cornflower blue tie was so great with his suit, we bought it anyway, thinking we'd figure out the rest later. But since we're still unsure about exactly what the guys will wear, we keep buying promising ties and hanging onto the receipts, not knowing exactly what we'll want yet afraid to pass up "the" tie. We've considered just having everyone in different great ties, but because Trevor won't be dressed like them to begin with, he's hoping for a little more consistency.

The latest contenders for either Trevor, the guys, or a combination of the two:

Left: We have two of these and could probably find two more if it's the guys' tie. It also looks great with the seersucker - so do we need three?

Middle: This could work depending on what the guys wear, and photographs really well. There were five at the store, but we only bought one. Trevor's keeping it as a "Christmas tie" no matter what.

Right: Looks really fun with seersucker, but there's not enough of these to go around, so if he went with this we'd need to find a complementary tie for the guys. His Virgo sensibility can't deal with the opposite-leaning stripes on the other two, so they would be out.

Lesson here? It's easier, more fun, and cheaper to buy ties than anything else, but unless you want to end up like us, hold off on buying ties until the other attire decisions are made. If I were more patient, I'd have just waited until the new spring ties were all here and then I'd have my pick. But no, way too easy.

We're currently leaning toward a navy chino suit for the groomsmen, by the way, but still aren't sure. A very light stone could work, too. Mixing and matching so far hasn't worked - our last attempt (seersucker vest with navy pants, going for a vintage feel) looked like a waiter's uniform. And groomsmen without jackets looks a little middle school dance to us, as much as we'd hoped the guys wouldn't have to buy full suits. We shall see.

Stay tuned to see just how many ties we end up with.