Here’s the info that many of you have requested about the infamous Monique Lhuillier sample sale in Beverly Hills:

When: Wednesday, December 5th & Thursday, December 6th, 10am-6pm

40-90% off the original prices

Bridal Gowns and Ready to Wear

Valet Parking available on Melrose Place
Merchandise is ‘as is’ All sales are final.
No alterations provided.
No appointments are taken.
First Come First Serve.

708 N La Cienega Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90069

*The Sample Sale location is on N La Cienega
BEHIND our flagship salon*

This is the first year the sale doesn’t have any weekend dates, so it might not be as crazy during both days. Then again, there are a lot of industry peeps who are jobless due to the strike… so you never know!

Good luck to anyone who goes! Please say hello to my dress sisters for me!

We were whisked away from the chapel in my Dad’s most excellent and award winning hot rod (complete with matching purple car magnets that my mom magically found) to the reception which was a short 5-minute drive away.

We got a chance to meet our coordinator in the lobby to switch my veil, and then we went to our hotel suite to enjoy some champagne and appetizers on our own. We only got about ten minutes of downtime before we made it to the penthouse, but it was nice to gobble down the food and have some real alone time. Our guests had enjoyed a full hour of open bar and passed goodies, so we knew we weren’t delaying anything too much…

Look at how wonderfully twirly my dress is!

My Dad made the opening speech to welcome and thank everyone for coming to the event… it was super sweet.

Yet another “weird” thing that we did at our wedding… we sat at a normal table! Yup… we didn’t have a raised head table nor a sweetheart table… just a normal 10-person table where we sat with half of our bridal party and their dates. We sort of treated the reception like one of those fancy award honor dinners you go to where the guest of honor sits at the front & center of the room… and we loved it. We got to talk to our friends, walk around the room with ease, and still be where everyone could see us!

This was my favorite memory of the night….

Now we got to talk to about half of the tables before the speeches began… but let me tell you … I ATE ALL OF MY FOOD! Well, minus the salad (eiw… salad and green stuff!), I devoured the amazing appetizer and the delicious filet mignon! I had no doubt that Mr. Lemon would get to eat all of his food since he’s the world’s fastest eater, but I made it a point to savour every last bit of my food to get me through the night. So yes… it can be done ladies!

Mr. Lemon’s Dad, who luckily has lots and lots of public speaking experience, gave a short and wonderful sppech (that Mr. Lemon didn’t tell him about until that day) immediately following dinner.

Adam, the best man, then got up to give his speech….

 
(something made us giggly)

Then my MOH Audrey followed up with her speech about our mutual appreciation for hot smart athletic guys.

And you know what happens after speeches are over… the dance dance party begins…

Part I: Beauty Shop Prepping
Part II: MAC Attack
Part III: The “Morning-Of” Brunch
Part IV: Aunt Kathi’s Perfect Bedroom
Part V: VroomVroom to the Chapel
Part VI: The Boys In The Garden
Part VII: Rings and Other Ceremony Things
Part VIII: Purty…Purty Flowers
Part IX: Let’s Do This!
Part X: We Do
Part XI: Strike A Pose
Part XII: All By Ourselves

The bridal party was off to the cocktail reception… the guests had all departed… and now it was just the two of us (and Papa Lemon waiting in the getaway car) and we got enjoy a bit of calm between the storms. This time, we opted to take some photos inside one of the main hacienda’s buildings, which happens to be the Admissions Office of my high school. The room seems to come alive most on perfectly foggy days and our wedding day was no exception!

[here's our favorite photo of the bunch... and our photographer's favorite as well... it's on the cover of our proof book and DVDs]

Time for some smooches! This is actually one of only a few kissing photos from the night… guess we’re not really the super-PDA couple after all!

We even got in a few solo shots to add to the mix….

And of course you couldn’t leave out Dad!

Now did we take bunches and bunches of “us” photos… nope. Why? Well, we honestly didn’t have any sort of “extra” time planned into the schedule to wander to various locations and pose. But in retrospect, I really have no idea what I’m going to do with all the portrait style photos of us that we have already! We’re going to frame a few, give some to relatives, but otherwise, they’ll be in our album, on a disk, and here on the Internet… that’s it. Our 20 minutes of us time was perfectly enough to calm down, collect our thoughts and still snap some lovely pictures. Plus we didn’t burden our guests with any time to waste. The party started once they arrived at the reception with absolutely no delay!

Part I: Beauty Shop Prepping
Part II: MAC Attack
Part III: The “Morning-Of” Brunch
Part IV: Aunt Kathi’s Perfect Bedroom
Part V: VroomVroom to the Chapel
Part VI: The Boys In The Garden
Part VII: Rings and Other Ceremony Things
Part VIII: Purty…Purty Flowers
Part IX: Let’s Do This!
Part X: We Do
Part XI: Strike A Pose!

While I realize how photojournalistic style is in vogue, one of the things that really intrigued us about our photographer was her ability to pose a picture. I’d read enough horror stories about brides who got 997 photos from their photog without one single picture of her and her family together, or with grandma, etc., to know that I wanted some posed shots just for the posterity of it all. We didn’t take photos beforehand, since there was a wedding before us at the chapel and we wanted to use the grounds for the shots. Our families and attendents all made it to the hotel in time to enjoy the full hour of the cocktail reception, and we got all the photos we wanted. (Well… minus having Grandma in the big family photos… but that was a transportation slip-up and we got the photos at the reception)

Here’s our new BIG family!

My wonderful new set of East coast parents!

Yup… I’m definitely Daddy’s girl

People remark how my Mom and I make the same facial expressions… as captured perfectly by this totally unposed picture… someone must have said something cute, and we reacted with the “awwww” face.

My kick-ass brothers and super adorable nephew

(p.s. throwing your ring bearer around the grasss keeps the blood flowing to his brain to prevent crankiness)

Now here’s the perfect example of an awkwardly posed photo… which upon being snapped was instantly rearranged. As you can see, Mr. Lemon and I had very different qualifications for choosing attendents. I went for the whole graduated height thing while he opted for consistency. Hmmm….

Ahh…. so much better! And look at that… the uneven numbers aren’t even noticed!

If you’ve got a big dress… you have to show it off somehow!

Now here’s some of the fun posing….

I <3 how Mr. Lemon’s gold vest/tie stands out in this photo!


The guys popped into the hacienda for a couple more photos.


I call this one his band photo shot.   

Part I: Beauty Shop Prepping
Part II: MAC Attack
Part III: The “Morning-Of” Brunch
Part IV: Aunt Kathi’s Perfect Bedroom
Part V: VroomVroom to the Chapel
Part VI: The Boys In The Garden
Part VII: Rings and Other Ceremony Things

Part VIII: Purty…Purty Flowers
Part IX: Let’s Do This!
Part X: We Do

(sorry for the long delay… I had some major blog-picture-uploading issues!)

Here I go….

My Dad said that I ran down the aisle… I don’t remember much but the smiles and the jitters…

As you can see…. we faced the entire congregation during the ceremony, which is sort of unique.

Plus we got to sit during the sermon and all the parts that we weren’t needed for!

Mr. Lemon’s lovely parents

Exchanging vows…

Our blessing

Almost done…

HOORAY FOR Mr. and Mrs. Lemon!!!!

…don’t trip on the stairs! (Trust me… many a Catholic school girl has tripped on these babies and muddied their kilt)

OMG… did we really just do that???

 
the rest of the story:
Part I: Beauty Shop Prepping
Part II: MAC Attack
Part III: The “Morning-Of” Brunch
Part IV: Aunt Kathi’s Perfect Bedroom
Part V: VroomVroom to the Chapel
Part VI: The Boys In The Garden
Part VII: Purty…Purty Flowers
Part IX: Let’s Do This!

T-minus five minutes: Time to put that massive veil on my head!

Again… a step stool would have been handy again… or higher heels for my gals

Dad’s getting nervous… must be getting close…


…the gals are all smiles though…

…the ringbearer is _______ (perplexed/anxious/tired???)…

…and I’m getting super giggly…


…mom is holding back the tears…

…the boys are sneaking across the lawn…

…as the groom processes in…
(that’s right! Even though coordinator-lady didn’t want to let him, he bucked the “movie” tradition and escorted his parents in!)

Mom walked down the aisle with my handsome brothers

And the girls followed made their way at the end of the party… notice how the ringbearer is looking fondly for Papa Lemon in the distance for comfort and assurance…

But where is the bride?

[shh..... i'm hiding by the virgin wall (we seriously called it that since boys visiting campus weren't allowed past it) so no one can see me!]

…the doors are closed so I guess everyone is waiting on me.. here I go!

I love flowers, but when it came to the exact flowers I wanted for the wedding, I was clueless. I knew I wanted whites, creams and blues. Oh… and they needed to be naturally arranged as opposed to being symmetric and modern. And pretty…. really really pretty. Thank goodness my florist (Kim England) read through my wants and used her creativity to deliver exactly what I had hoped for!

My brother was the flower courier, picking up the boxes and delivering them to my aunt’s house and to the chapel.

One of the bridemaid’s bouquets

There were 4 BM bouquets and 1 MOH bouquet. Each one was different, and the amount and color of the blue flowers was different in each of the bouquets (going from light blue to dark blue).

 
My bouquet

The guys were pretty simple too, but all unique as well. Here’s Mr. Lemon’s bout.

The dad’s bout (similar to Mr. Lemon’s)


One of the GM’s bout’s (they were all blue)

In the end I’m really glad I left this job up to the experts, since their styling was perfect. I got something original and unique to our wedding, and I didn’t have to think too hard about any of it or become a flower expert overnight. And I got “pretty” flowers on my wedding day… which is all that I wanted.

We kept things pretty simple when it came to our ceremony and the details around it. In fact, we didn’t even decorate the chapel at all! But somehow all the little details still managed to show up in a really beautiful way.

the rings

I’m not a big accessory/jewelry type of person, and I have really skinny/delicate fingers. Mr. Lemon doesn’t wear a watch nor any other daily adornment. So when we went to pick out rings, we made sure that they reflected us every day, and not just on fancy dress up dinner dates.
Mr. Lemon first picked out a really pretty platinum ring from the jewelry case when we went shopping. But when he placed it on his finger, his eyes bulged a little and it went right back in the case. Then, he saw the Titanium rings that looked very similar, and he was instantly sold on the amazingly light ring. He never really planned on being able to wear it daily, but he’s found he can work all day without even noticing it, and he even feels weird now when he forgets to put it on.
We bought my ring through BlueNile (just like my engagement ring), and I’ve been so happy with it! I wanted something small and delicate with a little bling but not an eternity band. Finding rings <2mm in size was extremely difficult, but this one worked perfectly and I love how comfortable it is with my e-ring or by itself.
And without any sort of efforts to coordinate our rings, they sort of match on their own.

the program

Our programs were simple and sweet and only had one folded page in the middle (4-pages total). The gocco covers were made well in advance, and I printed the inside pages (using InDesign) with a laser printer about a week before the wedding. We had originally included the text of the scriptures, but our deacon vetoed that draft and asked that we put in the response or the quote instead. We made 100, which was were a few too many, but it didn’t cost us any extra to have them on hand “just in case.” People grabbed extras on the way out for their scrapbooks, so I guess they liked them in the end!

the necklace – “something borrowed”

Other than my diamond stud earrings (a 13th birthday gift!), this was the only piece of jewelry I wore on my wedding day. The pendant was a gift from my grandmother when I graduated from high school. The diamond is from one of my great-grandmother’s rings, and my grandma had the gold of the ring melted into a new design by their family jewler (the same one who made the original ring for my great-grandma). It’s so beautiful and unique, and it just sat elegantly without any real notice on my chest all day and night. It was the perfect golden touch for a simple girl like me.

the invitations

I received so many compliments on the invitations before, during and after the wedding… and it truly was what got everyone to the church on time. The maps gave everyone the handy directions to the chapel/reception/parking, and the RSVP card gave us all the details we needed. In the end the extra details were worth it because it really helped set the tone of the whole event for us and for our guests.

For the rest of the story:
Part I: Beauty Shop Prepping
Part II: MAC Attack
Part III: The “Morning-Of” Brunch
Part IV: Aunt Kathi’s Perfect Bedroom
Part V: VroomVroom to the Chapel
Part VI: The Boys in the Garden

Mr. Lemon didn’t want to have any “getting ready” photos taken, so he asked that the boys meet him in the garden behind the chapel a little after 3 o’clock. Everyone was there on-time and by their own accord, so the guys had a little bit of “pow-wow” time away from the bustle of guests arriving before things got started in the church.


Gavin (my nephew), the awesomest ring bearer ever, was very excited about his “sharp” new shoes

My brother Mark was in charge of delivering the flowers to the guys, and dispersing water as well. (notice the OOT bag on the bench… they were spotted at the reception as well!)

FIL-Lemon had all of the important documents for the deacon and our vendors…

…including the all important marriage license!

FIL-Lemon seems doubtful of Mr. Lemon’s talent for pinning things

Mr. Lemon got a bit of a pep-talk from the ringbearer before walking down the aisle…

Is everyone’s collar straight?

Shoes tied?

No ring? Check!

For the rest of the recap:

Part I:Beauty Shop Prepping
Part II: MAC Attack
Part III: The “Morning-Of” Brunch
Part IV: Aunt Kathi’s Perfect Bedroom
Part V: VroomVroom to the Chapel

Once the last dabs of lipgloss were applied, we were out the door and headed down the hill from my Aunt’s house to the chapel. While my mom tried desperately to find a way to use a local trolley as a transportation vehicle, the arrangements just never worked out in managing to transport the guys and gals in a fluid manner. Instead, the girls all drove in one car, while my MOH Audrey and I were chaufeerred by my Dad in his ’37 Ford sedan. So… it saved us some money and worked out MUCH better in the end!

 
My dad had taken the front passenger seat out of the car, so I had more than enough room to drape my long train around my feet.

And we’re there! Quick… don’t let anyone see me or let the dress touch the ground!

Up the steps and into our hiding spot in the hacienda! (The chapel is on the grounds of my high school campus…. hence the name above the archway)

You have to just love the sunglasses with the tux!

Tada! It never hit the ground!

I must admit that I had some strange flashback high school memories flooding my brain right about now, especially with two of my bridesmaids being my best high school friends. Walking through that arch suddenly made me feel like I was 17 again and skipping around in my favorite blue school uniform and knee socks… It was definitely a fun little touch to the excitement…

And this is where the nerves started to kick in BIG TIME… 

Meanwhile the boys were readying themselves across the lawn by St. Francis (the fountain of St. Francis that is)…

For the rest of the recap:
Part I: Beauty Shop Prepping
Part II: MAC Attack
Part III: The “Morning-Of” Brunch
Part IV: Aunt Kathi’s Perfect Bedroom