yipee skippy!!!

amy liao, one of my bridesmaids, is one of the most creative persons i have ever met. when she's not creatively trying to survive dental school, she vents her creativity by making things. and look what she made me!!!!!!!


i love penguins (though the love is lessining with time) and so amy combined this love with the wedding toppers i was thinking of getting! mr. penguin even has the slit eyes and bowtie! i am so blessed. =)

unfortunately, these cute babies burned in the oven because amy lost the baking directions for this clay. this is what happened:


she was so heartbroken, and i am so mean and was laughing hysterically when i saw these. mr. penguin has boils on his face! HAHAHA. mr. zok said that it looks like mrs. penguin beat up mr. penguin. hahahaha.

amy said she is going to try again. isn't she amazing?? i think she should sell these. =)

in other news, i have been having terrible terrible headaches lately. i think it is from wedding planning. =/

outdoor wedding

my plan is to have an outdoor wedding. whether or not monterey's normally overcast skies will cooperate with me is one thing to consider, as is cost if i want an ocean view. but august is usually pretty sunny in monterey, so hopefully God will let it be sunny on our wedding day. =)

some options we have are

intercontinental the clement monterey
pro: really close to home and the famous monterey aquarium, brand new venue, might be able to get a deal!
con: pacific grove tends to be more overcast than other areas of the bay, can't find pictures of the ballroom!

tehama golf club
pro: pretty pretty pretty everything
con: pretty far from home

pebble beach
pro: ocean view, close to home, pretty much my dream wedding
con: price i hear is reasonable, but still hesitant

berwick park
pro: ocean view, close to home
con: max 100 people, if you're not facing the ocean you face houses, separate reception venue needed

bernardus lodge
pro: pretty indoor and outdoor areas
con: kind of far

club del monte
pro: good rates, pretty venue
con: need clearance of all guests b/c it's a naval academy

carmel valley ranch
pro: pretty venue indoor and out
con: far from home

pasadera country club
pro: pretty outdoor area
con: not in love with banquet hall and a little far
quail lodge
pro: beautiful indoor and outdoor
con: $$$ and far

i won!

so a perk about reading so many wedding blogs is that you get to enter into tons of contests. i have probably entered myself into about 15 free giveaway contests, and i won one! i got a $75
gift card to www.beau-coup.com.

now what in the world do i buy???? $75 could technically pay for like 1/3 of my favors if not more! PLEASE HELP!

stationery inspiration!

recently, my old friend veronica shin became veronica kim. she just posted pictures of her wedding on facebook and i was FLOORED at how pretty the entire shebang was. it was in true veronica shin/kim fashion. i told mr. zok that the wedding was outdoors in 105 degree heat and then 95 degree heat at nighttime, and mr. zok's response: sorry, but i would not get married! he is kidding... i hope. =) but here is my favorite favorite FAVORITE part of her wedding:

she had this cute theme of books throughout her wedding since her family is obsessed with books, so her wedding planner last-minute thought of this brilliant idea to make her guestbook in old card-catalogue fashion! so those pink and white papers are little card catalogue slips. SWOON! [picture courtesy of thetreasuredpetal.wordpress.com] maybe i am obsessed with this because i am an english teacher.

then today i ran across this in the bride and bloom magazine at borders.

they are RECIPE CARDS! and they are so cute! if i were a baker or a cook, i would totally do these. but i am neither. i am actually domestically challenged.

c'mon brain! be creative! what will we do for our cute paper goods? esp if i gocco them? =/

escort cards

isnt this just lovely?


courtesy of tenthousandonly.blogspot.com

ring bear and flower girl

so i just found out recently that a ring bear is not called a ring bear, but instead a ring bearER. i was so incredibly sad to find out so. i just thought it was called a ring bear because bears are cute and so are these little boys. oh well.

john and i have already set our ring bear and flower girl. i will not disclose names. if my pooh bear could walk, he would do the job though. it would mean the world to me. but alas, he is not "real" and thus cannot walk down the aisle.

regardless, i am very fond of our ring bear and flower girl, and here are some little things i would like for them to use!

tuxedo to match mr. zok

this dish for the rings instead of a pillow. maybe. but i think i will buy it either way. i love it.

look at these little booties! (she will be over a year by then, so i don't know if this will work)

save the dates

hello everyone!

well, i have been thinking about what to do with our save the dates (or STD as I'll call it from now on). I have seen some amazingly cute magnets, stickers for calendars, and others that match the theme of the wedding. Being in jennie fashion though, i need to make it more interesting and thus more complicated. so this is what i'm thinking....

LUGGAGE TAGS!

I was thinking of doing luggage tags as a favor since people are coming from far away to celebrate with us, but i can't find any that i feel are nice enough to go with the ambience of the wedding i'm hoping to create. so i think it will be perfect for a STD, especially since then they can use it when they come!

here is my preliminary design so far:


the top image is of google maps of where the wedding will be, and in the blurb it says save the date and yada yada. the bottom image would be the back, which would have our guests' personal information so they don't have to fill out those dinky address strips AND it'll be colorful so their bags are easier to find. obviously not all of our guests will be michigan alumn, so i am thinking of making them relative to each person's university. but we'll see-- that might be too taxing. and i think i might do a softer yellow, even though that yellow epitomizes michigan, and put a navy blue border around the edge.

any input?

in search for the perfect purple dress

so i unfortunately have this problem where i find something i love and then realize it is completely out of my price range. and of course, in jennie fashion, i have fallen in love with a melissa sweet silk charmeuse purple bridesmaid dress (pictured in the middle below), only to realize that it is much too expensive. so the hunt for the bridesmaid dress continues, and here is what i've found




arent they peachy? i realize that not all of them are purple in this, but polyvore.com wouldn't let me attach the colors i wanted. all of these dresses come in purple, but the beige one on the bottom left hand corner does not come in a shade of purple i admire. thus, if that is the final pick, it will be a black dress with a purple or off-white sash.

to answer some questions that you may have

1. what is my color scheme? purple, green (plants), lots and lots of ivory/white, and GOLD BABY

2. what does my dress look like? there are no pictures of it online ANYWHERE because it is discontinued, and i refuse to post a picture of myself in it online because a.) mr. zok might see it and b.) then it will not be as fun on the wedding day. but it is an ivory very whimsical vera wang with a mermaid cut. it is not shiny or shimmery but indeed splendid!

a quick break from pictures and planning

hello everyone. read if bored. but to forewarn you, this will probably be long, as there is much on my mind.

wedding planning is fun at times, but quite hard i'm realizing. not that i didn't think so before, but being the fickle-natured being i am, making executive decisions while completely removing myself of emotion in order to do so is so taxing for an event that is supposed to be the most emotional day of my life. having to heartlessly remove people from my guest list as a result of money matters and practicality makes me feel like i am voluntarily removing people from my life, however thin the thread that hangs them on might be. considering people's feelings in regards to their naivete about weddings is frustrating but a reality, and i cannot please everyone. sometimes not even myself. and that sucks.

on the other not so depressing hand, i have a beautiful ring on my finger, a beautiful wedding dress, a beautiful hometown for the wedding, and the root of all superfluous beauty: a beautiful relationship with Mr. Zok. I am no longer longing to know if the fairy tale could be mine; it is. and as i plan our wedding and have the privilege of witnessing even through pictures the beauty of love among other couples, i am no longer saying "i wish i had that" as i would have years ago. i now say not only that i do have it, but sometimes i want to stick my tongue out at other couples and say "ours is better." the cheesy-toed, hairy-cheeked, small-eyed, gorilla-chested, choco-pie monster loves the allergy-stricken, emotionally-unstable, cheap, comatosed slob as she does him. and that is beautiful. we are jesus' water turned to wine.

alrighty, enough mush. wipe the gag off your monitor and from the corners of your mouth. apologize to your cubicle mate for the foul smell that now resonates in your office. pray that you don't get fired.

i'll stick to the pictures. =)

fickle me think!

don't ask about the title of this post. i don't even get it.

anyway, i was a-browsing theknot.com, and i came upon these pretty things. i am nowhere near ready to be thinking about flowers in my wedding planning process, but it is always fun to look. =)

first, my beloved calla lillies. i love these babies so much that we used to chop em out of our garden and garnish our bathroom with them back in california. AND mr. zok had them for me when he proposed even though they were completely out of season! isn't he swell? but they are starting to get played OUT in the wedding scene.





for those of you who are thinking these four pictures are the same, shame on you! they are not! different size bouquets! different effect! different different!

now, punch me with some culluh!!!!! (<--color, just incase you aren't down with the lingo) i particularly love the first and the third pics, but i don't know if i am that brave and/or will hate myself in years to come.






and lastly, orchids are pretty! so pretty that i buy fake ones! haha. i'm not too big a fan of the wooden vine things that look like they're going to eat the bride in the last picture though.




alrighty, tis enough for today. this wedding stuff is seriously a sickness. liz says i should have named my blog obsessed bride. =D i think fickleness + jennieness just produces obsessiveness. =)

gocco anyone?

i have been researching about these japanese print machines called goccos to hand-make my wedding invitations/stationery, and i'm so intrigued by it but am so hesitant. i don't want to spend the money on a machine that i might not be able to master due to my lack of creativity, but people say it is so easy! here is a video for anyone that is interested in what it is.

look at all of the beautiful things that have been made by creative people and this crazy machine! these images are all from etsy.







each day i am becoming more and more convinced to just go for it! we'll see what happens. does anyone know anyone that has used one? if so, were they happy with how their prints turned out?

wedding cake toppers!

to let you know what my goal theme of the wedding is, it is sort of hodgepodge in my mind still. but i do know i want it to look classic/fun/out of the ordinary. in my attempt to do so, i've found the following cake toppers that i think will look FABULOUS because they are OH SO CUTE!

these two are from peoniesandpolaroids.blogspot.com. she handmade them! and she put up directions if i end up wanting to use them. i think they are SOOO CUTE, but mr. zok thinks the girl one looks like a sock. =(



then there are the rest from etsy.com, which is such an awesome site to get cool little trinkets off of! i like this birdy one, but only a little in compared to the previous and the one that will come after this!


i found these off of etsy too, and AREN'T THEY SO CUTE? it totally plays on the asian thing, and i would want the girl with big eyes and the boy with the slits, cuz mr. zok has itty bitty eyes! wouldn't that be so cute! but i'm not a fan of the lace underlay and i'm wondering how this will look on a cake.



which one is your favorite???

(i do recognize that since this is new, people will probably not comment much, but i don't care, cuz this is fun. hahahaha)

new hobby, new blog!

Hi, people. So, I haven't been writing on my xanga, and I only email friends like once a month, but I do want to start writing again! My life since summer break has begun, however, has been consumed with schoolwork, not cleaning, having fun with mr. zok, and WEDDING PLANNINGGGGGG. and of course, in very jennie nature, i am obsessed! And I stay up into the very wee hours of the night looking at bridesmaid dresses, flowers, cakes, favor boxes, venues, photographers, shoes, and everything else that comes along with this very daunting yet so fun job! =D and then i keep it a secret from mr. zok hoping he doesn't yell at me about being so very obsessed and not using my time wisely. HA! :) My excuse is that when fall rolls around, I won't have much time to do this! =P

so being the obsessive person i am, i decided to create a blog so that i can throw my wedding planning somewhere else besides on my cluttered kitchen table and desktop of my laptop! and plus, i not so secretly love all of the wedding blogs i read on a religious daily basis, i.e. stylemepretty.com and peoniesandpolaroids.blogspot.com. they are amazing. and maybe in a strange way, i want to be just like them! but moreso, i think it will allow my bridesmaids (and mr. zok) to know what's going on with me and make the rest of the world see that WEDDING PLANNING IS HARD FOR FICKLE PEOPLE! hahaha. but i do recognize this blog here will probably be of such little interest to the gentleboys in my life. oh well.

here is a picture of a BEAUTIFUL wedding reception that i stole off of kennykim.com. i don't know him, but i know he is davis' cousin and a friend of many people i know at u of i. but i hear he is expensive as a photographer. oh well.