Manolo for the Brides

Once upon a time, men (and women!!) in a country on the eve of its birth laid down their lives to cast off the yoke of tyranny. In the present day, those of us who live in the grand ol’ U.S. of A. celebrate their sacrifice by setting off Chinese fireworks, drinking too much, and laughing our butts off at people dressed in red, white, and blue.

Not that there’s anything wrong with dressing in red, white, and blue. In fact, a smart nautically-inspired suit that makes one think that one might like to travel back in time to the 30s can look chic and sharp! Generally, however, I think I’d prefer to wear my reds, whites, and blues separately or in groupings of two to avoid any erroneous implications. I say think because my everyday uniform is black on black with a little touch of black.

For those who can pull off color or the lack of it without looking like some crazed she-beast, here are three luscious frocks — two from Nicole Miller and one from Vera Wang — that could conceivable be used to send a message like “I love America” or “Why settle for something from David’s Bridal” or “Hey, I’m not afraid to grab two friends and make a spectacle of myself on a patriotic parade float.”

Looking at this gown lineup, I can even imagine some bride-to-be who loves her country very much dressing her bridesmaids in red and blue…hey, I said I could picture it in my head, not that I would actually suggest someone actually do that.

Happy Fourth!

I was recently interviewed for an article in the NY Post, and it’s looking like I will be jetting off to NY tomorrow to film a TV segment. It was a false alarm — the network decided not to do the story. Ah well, better luck next time!

Once again, you guys have truly rocked my socks.

Last week I hit you with this bizarre image:

And you scraped your collective chins up off the floor long enough to give me nine great captions for it! You didn’t make it easy for me, but since in the end there can be only one winner, I girded my loins and made a decision. The laurel goes to the fabulous Gemdiva for this, well, gem of a caption that happens to appeal strongly to my personal fondness for tales of the undead:

Wearing a gown cleverly crafted from the lining of her coffin, the recently risen vampire bride claimed her first victim, closely observed by a gallery of sycophantic Renfields.

Congratulations, Gemdiva! And thanks to everyone who played!

News of iDo: Planning Your Wedding with Nothing But ‘Net is getting around, thanks to my ubercool publicist at Simon & Schuster and the word getting around. The sweeties over at Aisledash called me a “wedding guru,” which made my entire weekend. I was quoted in an article on Smartmoney.com, and I’m being interviewed for an article in the NY Post tomorrow. And there was an entire article based on iDo in the NY Daily News!

If you’d like to see what all the fuss is about — or you already own one copy of my book and you’d like one for a friend — tell me in the comments what you think I should call my next wedding planning book. Be as silly or serious as you want to be — there’s no guarantee I’ll ever cop your title, but you never know!

At noon EST on Wednesday, June 25, I’ll use a random number generator to pick the lucky commenter who will win an autographed copy of iDo.

Sometimes it’s fun to head on over to YouTube and see what pops up when words like ‘wedding’ and ‘bride’ are typed into their search engine. And sometimes what pops up is…I think disturbing is the word I’m reaching for here. But don’t just take my word for it. Take a look at what I found the other day:

I have to admit, there are a couple small touches I kind of like. The bride’s tiny, off-kilter tiara really does appeal to me for some reason, and there’s no denying how happy the couple look. Alas! Those disembodied Hello Kitty heads festooned about like some surreal trophy room have haunted my nightmares since I found this video. Look at them! They’re even in the boutonnieres! Were they felled with tiny popguns? Or do they grow that way, waiting to be harvested to lie on some poor schlub’s lapel? Either way, the subject has left me in need of a bit of a lie down and a well-fortified cup of tea.

Unless the point of the show is to instruct prospective brides in the finer points of carrying out DIY doings, such projects are usually presented on television as a silly idea doomed to failure from the outset because you should leave that sort of thing to the professionals, you silly, incompetent bride-person, you. If they work out, someone carefully points out that if it had gone wrong, clearly the wedding would have been ruined. If the bride, her mother, or her friend is unsuccessful, droll or doleful music is played and the scenes are cut to make it clear that there was never any chance of anything short of disaster.

But is disaster so inevitable? Not necessarily. In fact, if approached thoughtfully and planned intelligently, DIY projects can add tremendously to the intimacy and charm of a wedding without causing undo fuss behind the scenes. Let’s deconstruct a DIY disaster on a recent episode of Bridezillas and see how it might have been done more successfully.

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Yes, my friends, it’s time once again to play Twistie’s Sunday Caption Madness! Today’s image is taken from the mists of bridal parties well past. You all know the rules by now. Take a gander at this photo, post your snarkiest captions, and I’ll announce the winner next saturday.

Ready…set…snark!

In a recent article here, I begged wedding gown designers to offer us something they haven’t in years: sleeves. I truly thought I was whistling in the wind and it would take a very long time to see any sort of action on this request.

Lo and behold, yesterday I went shopping in my local bookstore and paused before the magazine rack, only to see this looking back at me from the display:

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Once again, you guys amaze me with your snark and creativity. Last week I hit you with this photo:

And you came up with nine really great captions for it.

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