wedding dress shopping. valley.

happy friday ya'll!!

from the feedback we got yesterday you all enjoyed cake's story! so today should be an even more enjoyable ride! unlike cake's "say yes to the dress"esque story valley's is a little bit more unique! 

once valley was engaged she started poking around the internet just to get ideas. one of the first dresses she stumbled upon was this simple white milly dress on the neiman marcus website.  it was elegant, timeless, simple, and could be styled anyway the wear wished. valley immediately sent the link to cake with the message something to the condensed effect of, "isn't this stunnnnnnning!!! would it work as a wedding dress? who orders a wedding dress off online? they have my size and it's only $500? this is exactly the type of dress i'd want to get married in! HELLLLP!!!!"

here's a video of the dress's movement; it's stunning in real life. 

(sorry you have to scroll down a little on the page and click the video.)

okay so this is the point in time where valley and her fiancé set a date and she gets down to business. she tries desperately to work out a weekend where all our sisters, mom, and valley's future MIL would be available. this is next to impossible given work schedules, babies, the wedding time line, distance . . . etc sooooooooooooooo once again valley circles back to this milly dress.  she looks online and it's been MARKED DOWN!!! say what?!?!?! so valley calls cake in total excitement and they scour the neiman marcus website for their return policy and discuss the possibility of ordering this dress. . . .eeeek should valley pull the trigger?!?!? after so much debate and cake's urging of "what's the worst that can happen? you have to return it?!?!" valley orders the dress!!!

it arrives on a weekend where all but cake are present at our parent's lake house; the family face time's cake in for the try on. as soon as valley walks into the room there's an audible gasp. it's perfect. it fits perfectly. it flows perfectly. it's soooooooo valley. it's the one.  so low key that there's hardly a story, but that's why its soooooo valley.  

and just like cake's dress it's simple but never boring and can be personalized with amazing accessories.  valley drew her veil inspiration from maria vontrapp in the sound of music.  she found a beautiful veil on this danani handmade veils, here's the link to the veil she ordered. it's also shown with a wreath which fit right in with her vision!

here's a few pics from valley's wedding day. maybe this post will get valley's butt in gear and get her to share a few more with you all. promise she wants too; she's just busy with life and we know you totally get that because we're friends & all :)

professional photos by lamb + lark. isn't she best! swoon.

happy friday & we'll see ya next week.
x&o.

cake & valley.

wedding dress shopping. cake.

goooooood morning our lovies,

today & tomorrow we'll be sharing our wedding dress shopping stories. like most newly engaged woman finding "the dress" was high on our priority list! both of us being into "fashion & style" we knew all of our family & friends would be highly anticipating seeing what we had chosen for the big day. however, from a young age our mother always stressed that the day we got married should be about the marriage and not the wedding. verrrrry sound advice, in fact some of the best advice we've ever been given. the other best advice we've heard about marriage is "happy wife, happy life!"

so with out further adieu, her's cake's story while she hunted for "the dress" in the battlefields known, as wedding dress shopping!

the first thing cake did as a newly engaged woman was buy all the bridal magazines and tear out all the dresses she could found and stuff them into clear plastic sheets and categorized them in a white binder. but the sad truth was there weren't that many she liked.  she immediately knew she didn't want ruching, heavy beading, pick ups, white-white dress, heavy satin . . . .  and the list went on and on and on; but on the other hand she didn't know what she wanted, was her vibe boho? vintage? classic? short? strapless? lace?

sooooooo, she set a date that worked for her mom & valley and booked her first appointment at Priscilla of Boston, at their Chicago location. her consultant politely looked at all the pictures cake had provided and listened to the long list of things she didn't want. ha. once the consultant came back with dresses she asked cake, "okay, which one is your least favorite?" after some thought she pointed to a melissa sweet drapey, cowl-back dress.

but you guys, once she had it on and walked out of that fitting room . . . . whoa. she looked tall, elegant, classic, red-carpet ready, statuesque . . . .  any maybe a little Grecian too. which unfortunately a nearby costumer who was with another bride commented on as well, "you look so beautiful and like a Grecian goddess!"  it was so sweet but unfortunately cake couldn't get the comment out of her head, she didn't want to look Grecian. ugh. the hunt continued.

she made appointments are david's bridal, mary's chicago brial salon, another small bridal boutique in chicago . . . .  but she couldn't get the first melissa sweet dress out of her head. so she gathered all three of her sisters, mom, and future mother in law and booked another appointment at Priscilla of Boston. Of course in the mean time she had done ooooodles of googling and had firmly decided she could make the dress more of a vintage 1930s and not Grecian, if she added the right accessories. so off cake & her entourage went to re-try on the first dress. face plant. in the end cake said "yes to the dress" and everyone reassured her that with the right styling the dress would "totally read as vintage NOT Grecian"

one of the stylings cake found that convinced her she could make the dress her own.

now is the time for cake to introduce you to Veronica Shaeffer, aka the most amazing woman a bride could know. she creates custom bridal dresses & accessories while mixing vintage and classic vibes together. hello, she's perfect! she made a cap like head piece with a detachable cathedral length veil. it was beautiful and made all the difference. cake topped off the look with a faux bob hair style, red lips, a vintage Chanel bracelet, valley's signet pinky ring, and cake's signature black nail polish.

up close look at the cap that was created for cake's 1930s wedding vibe

here you can see the cathedral veil is attached

and now the veil is gone leaving just the bridal cap

the melissa sweet dress cake bought was just over $1500, for those of you who are wondering. no need to go crazy and spend thousands of dollars. not that there is anything wrong with that but for us it just seems silly. and in the end our mom's advice had sunk in. so while the whole process was fun and 100% worth it cake wanted to make sure the whole wedding day was about the marriage and not just a wedding.

professional photos by peter thurin

hope you enjoyed.
tomorrow it's valley's turn,
just wait until you hear how untraditional her wedding dress shopping was :)

x&o.

cake & valley

ps. here's a picture of little baby georgi with cake's wedding veil. see it really is all in the styling <3

rockstar 24/7. cake & valley.

after browsing some of favorite blogs last week we noticed a trend, lots of the big time bloggers were all wearing old navy jeans. slightly unusually but not too crazy, what with all their sponsorships & #ad's they curate. but after some googling we realized WHY they were all showcasing the old navy rockstar 24/7 jeans,. take a look at this article and you'll find out that premium-denim-Italian-fashion-designer Adriano Goldschmied helped Old Navy with it's latest stretch skinny denim.

after like 30 seconds of internal debate and some quick texts to each other, cake took one for the team and ordered a pair to try out. we're both solid 28s in jeans which can translate to either a 4 or 6 depending on fit, rise, stretch . . . . etc; so she made the executive decision to order both sizes to do a little blog research.

SIZE 4 pictures

SIZE 6 pictures

the fit felt almost the same in both sizes with the exception of the baggy-ness that can be seen in the knee area & crotch area. so she stuck with the size 4.

a few more things to note are that the jeans are much more a legging. which to be honest has never been our thing, a jegging doesn't really speak to us. however, a few things we did love about these jeggings were the following:

1. the material is unbelievably soft, like buttah.
2. the price is right. all of the styles are full price at under $40. PLUS the silver lining is that currently all of the rockstar 24/7 are marked down with an extra savings at check out! word.
3. since we've always been opposed to a jegging we didn't have a similar pair in our closet.
4. functioning zipper, button closer, and pockets.
5. they were a perfect alternative to an athletic legging for felling more pulled together without sacrificing any sort of comfort.

so in a nutshell these jeggings were just the right pair to keep around for running after kids, valley's weekend job at a wine tasting room where she stands all afternoon, attending any & all sporting events to cheer on cake's husband's team, errands, doctor visits . . . . .basically any weekend mom-ing dog walking play ground going road tripping pants.

cake literally wore them to the last Dartmouth Men's soccer game where she surprised her husband with a post victory date night. these were the perfect pair of pants to cheer the team onto their win, change her uggs to heeled boots, head out on a date night, and then wake up the next morning and wear the jeans to run errands with her kids! just take a look :)

DATE NIGHT LOOK

DAYTIME LOOK

alright enough about these jeans, just go to your closest old navy and try them out for yourself.
you probably won't regret it

happy friday.
x&o.

cake & valley.

daytime look info: old navy jeans, j.crew turtleneck {similar here}, target tank, free people turban, nike shoes {similar here}, baby gap pjs

date night look: old navy jeans, rebacca taylor blouse{similar here}, target booties.