We haven’t talked much about honeymoons for a while around here. But they are a part of the getting married process for the vast majority of couples, and they’re fun (if you do them right!).

Of course there are dreams and there’s reality. Mr. Twistie and I dreamed of London for our honeymoon, but that wasn’t in the budget. Instead we headed for the Great White North. We drove up the West Coast from our headquarters in California to spend a couple days in Vancouver and one on Victoria Island before meandering our way back to California again. We had a blast. Most of our time was spent exploring quaint or odd or even deliciously tacky stuff we happened across on our journey. We stopped when we were tired or saw a likely spot to spend the night, and we must have visited a hundred tiny antique shops on the road. The one hotel we booked in advance turned out to be a bust, but we found some delightful places to stay on other nights.

London it wasn’t, but it was a great trip. Besides, we got to London a few years later, too. That was amazing. I want to go back.

But enough about me. I know that for a lot of people the ultimate honeymoon looks a lot like the picture at the top of this article: white sands, blue water, lazy days in the sun, and rum-based drinks with tiny umbrellas. Is that your dream honeymoon? Or does yours look quite different? For those of you who have already gotten married or planned your honeymoons, did you get what you dreamed of?

Tell us all about it!

Way back in the dark ages when I was getting married, the internet wasn’t a part of my daily life. In fact, it barely existed then. I knew a couple couples who had used computers for keeping track of records when getting married, but, well, I used 3×5″ index cards and two file boxes, one for the guest list, one for vendors and receipts. It worked just fine. I read a few bridal magazines, thought about weddings I’d attended over the years, and went from there.

But that was nineteen years ago and I was behind the times technologically then. I’m haphazardly Luddite/technophile in my leanings.

Now, though, most couples planning weddings start by booting up the ol’ laptop and doing a Google search on weddings or wedding planning… unless they do most of their planning using bridal reality shows as their basis.

So I’m curious, other than the obvious (aka: the blog you’re reading right now which, it goes without saying is a treasure trove of fabulosity and function), what online resources have you found useful while planning your wedding? Which ones would you recommend to someone starting to plan? Have you found any you would steer couples away from?

It’s a world wide web out there! Tell me what you’ve found.

Welcome to the final installment of Kid Week at Manolo for the Brides. Sorry about yesterday, but WordPress kept spitting me out. Ah well, better late than never.

Love ‘em or hate ‘em, there’s one thing for certain: kids get colorful at weddings. Whether as guests, or as participants, I’m betting most of us have at least one story about kids at a wedding. Me? I’ve got dozens!

Of course I do have my favorites.

Probably my single favorite comes from a wedding where most of the guests were seriously leery about the chances of the couple in question making a go of things for any significant period of time. They had barely known one another when they got engaged, it would be generous to describe the bride as a tidge on the flighty side, and the groom… well, let’s just say most of us didn’t think he was going to roll well with the punches of life with the lady in question. We loved her, so we did our best to be supportive, but in the backs of our minds (and, I regret to say, with the actual tongues in our heads albeit very very quietly in corners where the bride couldn’t hear us) we were all calculating the odds for a speedy divorce.

So the ceremony got underway and the officiant asked if anyone could raise a legitimate objection to the union. At that precise moment, a babe in arms who had been peacefully snoozing, woke up and started howling at the tops of its tiny lungs.

As it turns out, the baby was right. The couple filed for divorce less than two years later.

Out of the mouths of babes.

So what about you? Do you have a memorable moment – good or bad – involving children at a wedding? Tell us all about it!

According to an article at The Wedding Report, there are two words that top the list when people describe what they want their weddings to be like. Those two words? ‘Romantic’ (45% polled use this word) and ‘simple’ (42%). ‘Traditional’ came in third at 35%.

How would I describe the wedding Mr. Twistie and I had? Probably as ‘fun’(29%) ‘rustic’(9%) and ‘DIY’(19%).

What three words would best sum up your wedding style?

Life is full of surprises. Wedding planning is, too.

Sometimes the surprise is discovering that what you thought was a perfectly simple concept makes no sense to anyone who is not you. Sometimes it’s that everyone else so blandly accepts an idea that strikes you as clearly and profoundly deranged. Sometimes it’s the fact that you don’t react to something the way you thought you would. It might even be how someone other than you reacts.

I think for me the single biggest surprise in the wedding planning/getting married process was how calm I was when the moment came. I was happy, I was excited, but I wasn’t nervous at all. I had no urge to laugh or cry without provocation. I’d always assumed that when the big moment came, I would need that hankie I’d so cunningly slipped up my sleeve… but it turned out I didn’t. Aplomb was my middle name, and that is something that happens about once every three blue moons.

What’s been your biggest surprise? Tell us all about it!

Image via Heirloom Radio.com, where you can learn a little more about this 14-piece one-man band and many other fascinating inventions that didn’t quite work out)

If you’ve been to more than one wedding in your life, chances are you’ve heard some really bad music. It’s one of those eternal verities along with rubber chicken at conventions and the embarrassing drunk person at the office holiday party.

If you’ve been to as many weddings as I have – and that’s a lot! – you’ve heard some really great music… and some truly, epically awful stuff.

For me, the absolute worst wedding music I’ve ever heard was a church organist who played show tunes at a funereal pace. Never before has People Will Say We’re In Love sounded so like the couple fears blackmail. As for Shall We Dance… you couldn’t do a polka at that lack of pace, that’s for sure!

But the cherry on top that made me have to work extra hard to cover my laughter with a cough was the moment when the groom and his attendants arrived at the altar to the most hauntingly dismal rendition of Here Come the Clowns it has ever been my misfortune to hear. Triple phail!

So what about you? Have you ever heard wedding music that bad? Maybe even worse? Just plain inappropriate?

Tell us all about it!

I’m guessing it’s not every bridal blog where you would expect to see a picture of Edgar Allan Poe looking all creepy at you.

The funny thing is, if I could have invited any famous person – dead or alive – to my wedding, Mr. Poe would definitely have made the short list, along with Oscar Wilde and Vincent Price. Mr. Twistie probably would have voted for Eddie Cantor.

Why these men? Because, in a word, they all knew how to have a good time. Oh, and Vincent Price was also known for his fabulous cooking. Had his arm been properly twisted, he might have brought along something tempting to eat.

Hmmm… maybe Vincent should win, after all.

What about you? If you could invite any famous person from any point in history to your wedding, who would it be? Why?