Instagram

I have a confession.  In case you hadn't noticed!  I am a huge Instagram devotee.  I bloody love it.  It's given me the control over photography again, it takes me back to being at uni and doing my final year project using only the camera on my phone.  It's a camera, right?

I post all my pictures to my other blog: http://photographie365.blogspot.com/

But I also just discovered this natty little website too: http://statigr.am/amygeorgina

Just thought I'd share....

Wedding Converse

Well, lookie here, we are totally going to order these for the evening do at our wedding, oh yes!!

Andy's Converse - You can't really see it, but it says Mr Hiorns on the bottom of the heel...

These are mine, of course, check out the leopard print!  As with Andy's these are stamped - mine of course say Mrs Hiorns

I hope we do actually get round to ordering these as they're brilliant and will make a brilliant keepsake of our day.  Andy's never had Converse before so I'm taking his Converse cherry!  Ha.

What do you reckon??

#ZOMGBloggersBash

Gah, I used to be ever so good at blogging things, and lately, I just don't have time!  I need more hours in the day dammit!!

So, what news have I for you?

First, and most recently, I attended the #ZOMGBloggersBash on Monday night at The Distillers in Smithfields.  Can I just say, lovely pub, BITCH TO GET TO!!  Total fucked up nightmare to get there but nevermind!

I quite enjoyed it, I was nervous as hell, but I was with Lex and Charly and so I kind of felt safe.  The bar was rammed when we got there, we picked up our name badges and were handed our Bloggers Bingo cards - the name of the game was to meet new people and gather their names based on criteria - red nails, someone who uses Wordpress to host their blog, someone whose twitter name begins with a capital letter etc.  The prizes on offer were pretty cool.  Personally, I was holding out either for the Illamasqua goody bag or the You're Naked Without One hairclips!

We kinda stumbled around, not sure of ourselves, and not sure of really where to place ourselves.  Lots of bits going on, the girls from The Historical Sauces were there with a table full of vintage styling books and luscious lippies, Little Miss B hats with some gorgeous samples and Wonderland Wigs were there too with some samples to try on (though my beehive, WHICH I DIDN'T GET A PICTURE OF!, wasn't well suited to wig trying!).  There was even a pop-up studio hosted by Tigz Rice Studios, but it was all a bit too busy and so we headed to the bar and got a cider and sort of stood bewildered for a bit.

Eventually we sort of stumbled into conversation with Bethany from My Arched Eyebrow and Betty from Betty Leopard which was lovely, ah, at last, lovely girls to chat to!!  From there we headed upstairs to where Lex and I had thrown our coats at the beginning of the night.  Relief to sit down, stupid pink kitten heels.  I re-iterate my point, kitten heels look great when paraded in front of the bedroom mirror but they're a feckin nightmare to walk anywhere in!  Lex was there chatting away to Tabatha from You're Naked Without One.

Eventually came the climax of the night - the burlesque.  I'd never seen any burlesque before and so I wasn't sure what to expect!  Ruby Jones was first and did something that I wasn't expecting, but I loved it a lot!  Miss Banbury Cross came next and didn't disappoint - champers everywhere!

Then came the Bloggers Bingo raffle draw.  First up was the consultation with Genna McWhinnie - I think it was aimed at beauty and fashion bloggers, lots of whom were in attendance that night - as the paper was drawn out I said I wasn't sure if I'd be able to use this prize.  Lex said, was your sheet really folded up - I said yes, and by the looks of it, I guessed it was my sheet Ree Ree was pulling out!  Sure enough it was!!  Mixture of "Yay I've won!" and "Oh dear, I feel bad, someone else would probably have a real need for that!".  That probably makes me sound really ungrateful, but I felt bad for winning a prize I wasn't sure I could use!  Nevertheless, I think Lex is going to use the prize to hook up with Genna and create a "What Happens at a Rockabetty Shoot" video so that's pretty perfect really!

Time to head home, we grabbed a cab with Shona from Heyday (lovely to finally meet her, albeit, I felt starstruck for some reason, no idea why, but she's just such a lovely beautiful lady!) and Cathy from Perdita's Pursuits.  They both got out at St Pauls and we carried on to Waterloo.  Lex headed off to Waterloo East but Charly and I were greeted with empty departures boards.  Oh.  Lovely.  Snow?  Perhaps?  No, apparently a train had broken down at WIMBLEDON which had shut down more or less everything North of there.  Lovely.

I cannot thank Charly's Chap Phil for coming to pick us up from Wimbledon (we got the Tube, with a nosy bloke who was ever-so interested in our conversation!) and dropping me back to my car at Worcester Park!

I'd love to do something similar again, but perhaps on a slightly smaller scale.  Big thanks to ReeRee Rockette from Rockalily and Zoe from The London Lipgloss for organising.  It was lovely to finally meet ReeRee after chatting to her on Twitter for what feels like years!  Hope to meet again soon!

God Bless My Parents

After yesterday's doom and gloom post I received a wonderful email from my mum and dad.


I just wanted to share one snippet as it made me pee myself laughing this morning at 6am when I read it:


"If you end up going in the van dont worry he will put some clean carpet down and maybe bolt a chair in there for you to sit on,  we still have the full harness seatbelts, it'll be fine,  if you are lucky he will even give it a wash beforehand!"


Brilliant.

Is this cold feet or just a winter of discontent?

Hello!  And I suppose Happy New Year!  I am lacking in a desk calendar right now so I’m a bit lost as to what day it actually is.

I realise I have not blogged in about 2 months.  I think I was probably disheartened, being the comment whore that I am, that no one commented on my last post about finally finding my wedding dress.  That and the fact that I’ve run out of steam and inspiration again for the wedding.

It’s now 2012.  The year we get married.  We got engaged just over a year ago.  This time last year, we were in the throes of finding a venue and ultimately realising we couldn’t afford a wedding.  Fast forward a year, I’m in the throes of second thoughts about the venue and ultimately realising we can’t afford a wedding.  Nice.

I should be excited but I'm bricking it, we have what, 4 months or so to find nearly £15k. HOW? HOW HOW HOW? We're already making a list of what we're going to cut - band, sweetie table, flowers, house for the week (and just spend two nights in a hotel) etc. Nice huh!

I think our flowers are sorted, my mum knows a florist but it was quite hard getting across to her what I really wanted and most of my ideas where shot-down. Nevermind,.  Apparently I don’t want lilac roses or gerbera’s or hydrangea’s, “Because they’re the wrong purple and are not ‘vintage’”.  It took me a good 20 minutes to get a word in and tell her I didn’t want a vintage wedding, it just so happened that my dress was a vintage style.  Might have to go back in a few weeks and put my foot down on what I want.

My dad is going to attempt to make our cake. We saw an image in a wedding cake magazine and I just said, "That's the one".   I’m pleased he wants to make it (well, that said, I think it’s going to work out cheaper to buy pre-made cakes and then my dad will just decorate them).  But it means we can have what we want without the ridiculous price tag (no offence cake makers, I cannot afford £400 on a CAKE!!)

Andy finally asked his Best Man last week, so that’s good news and only took him a year to the day from our engagement!  Think he’s going to sort out suiting in the next month or so.

I need to find shoes and underwear and a bolero by the end of March for my prospective dress fitting.

I sat awake for a good hour lastnight worrying about logistics; how to get my great Aunt there, where can she stay, how will we get the cake there, will the cake be okay as my dad will have to put it together on the Friday night, do I get dad to put it together after the ceremony, do we get the caterer to put it together, whose car are we going in, do we need to hire a car, am I going to end up travelling gypsy boy style in the back of my dad’s Transit?  On and on and on and on these questions went round and round and round.  It wore me out thank fuck so I eventually fell asleep, but still, it was just awful. 

I’ve been back at work two days now and have achieved shit all because I’ve been worrying about the wedding.  I start looking at other venues, before I remind myself it really will be cheaper this way, it really will be the day we want, even if we are getting married between two toilet doors….  Yes, really, this is a HUGE stress of mine, and I’m really considering throwing my toys out of the pram and telling them that I want to get married in the upper barn – even if that means it’s all hands on deck to get the tables laid post ceremony.  ARGH!!  Then, I keep thinking, should we have just got married up here in the local registry office on the Friday?  Should we have just got married in the registry office in Chichester?  Should we have just got married in VEGAS?!!!!

To be honest, I'm a bit too pre-occupied with lots of other things to be that interested in the wedding at the minute, how depressingly sad is that? I should be super excited, but I'm just not, because I feel like I've made the wrong decision with all of it so far and ultimately, we can’t afford any of it.

I’m sure my parents will read this and weep.  Yes, I’m sorry, I am sounding like a bridezilla and I cannot thank the two of you enough for the support you’ve given so far.  Do not think for one minute that I don’t appreciate it, I just feel terribly stuck with it all (it’s probably not helping that our boiler broke yesterday, eating our last £300 for the month, and so all I’m dreaming about is payday, even though, as soon as payday comes, we have to save save save, or rather, pay the photographer off and save the rest.)  And I know everyone involved in this is bricking it about money as much as we are.  Whatever happens, we will have a wedding, Andy and I will be married, and so I just need to tell myself that, and everyone else involved needs to stop worrying.  Who cares if we have to have an iPod instead of the band, who cares if I have shoes from BHS instead of Vivienne Westwood? 

I tell you half the problem.  Wedding blogs.  And I don’t like to drag up conversations/arguments/rants from last year but it’s true.  I look at other weddings on wedding blogs and I find it really hard to compete.  Like my wedding is a fucking competition.   It’s OUR wedding day.  Why should I care about gratification from blog readers/writers?  Why am I so goddamn needy for attention?!

Anyway, rant over, my back hurts, I have another day of nothing to show for having sat at my desk since 7:30am and I have to take Scarlett to the Dr’s as we’re getting sleepless nights with her whimpering all night long.

We have a Winner!

Saturday 5th November.  Three dress shops.  One day.  One goal: find the fucking dress!!

First appointment of the day, bit of a weird shop, I tried on a few things, they were nice, but quite expensive.  I did see one I LOVED, but it was teeny and I couldn't get into it.  It's a Benjamin Roberts dress:

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It was all chiffon, a fabric I hadn't really considered, and it had a gorgeous Art Deco-esque detail on the waist.  It was really gorgeous.  We draped a chiffon jacket over the top and it was such a 40's look I was really smitten.  Really smitten!  The lady in the shop did find a larger sample for me that she was going to order in.  I think this will always be, the one that could've been.

Onto the second shop.  The wonderful Marianne Jessica in Bromley.  Michelle was just superb, so helpful and attentive, it was brilliant.  Funnily enough one of my friends has just bought her wedding dress from there.  I ventured towards it and was just told, "No, no, don't look at that one...."  Cryptic!  Until my mum told me on the way out it was Beth's dress!! 

I am indebted to Michelle because she got me into the Chanticleer Babilee, a dress I have fantasized about since July when I first started dress shopping.  The first shop, Cloud 9, had a small sample and as a result, I wouldn't get into it.  I managed to squeeze into the sample in Marianne Jessica and uh, I was totally smitten with that too!

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Bit cross because the picture does NOT do it justice.  It's tea length with a gorgeous polka dot tulle over the top.  So gorgeous.  And it just looked amazing.  Michelle took some very detailed measurements to enable them to tailor the dress with a longer bodice and a halter strap.  Unfortunately, at £1300, this dress will reside with the other Chanticleer dress, in my, "What could've been if I had a bottomless pit of money!"

Also, Michelle had the best trick for getting into button back dresses - elastic bands!!  They did the job, I tell you!

Onto the third shop of the day.  We stood outside and considered sending Lex in to try dresses on instead of me as I had my mind made up, I wanted the Babilee and was prepared to go halves (or thirds....) on it with my dad.  

In the end we bottled in and I announced myself as the bride to be.  The shop was terrible to be fair.  Dark and dated.  And FULL!!  There must have been possibly 4 other brides in there, all with an entourage that included men.  Now, I'm not a prude right, but I see wedding dress shops as a bit of a female dominated sanctuary.  The presence of all these blokes really put me off.  I picked out a few dresses (they really didn't have a lot that I liked, I think they catered to the more frilly, swathes of fabric end of the scale! and said I wasn't putting any on until the men had gone.  I mean, not in a diva strop way (honest!)  I just said I'd rather wait until the shop had emptied out a bit.

Eventually it did and so into the changing room I went.  The first two dresses I tried on I didn't even come out of the changing room, they were just horrible.  Oh, and did I mention, aside from the men in the shop, there were 4 other shop assistants all glaring at me with such looks of distaste I felt really put off!  I tried one on, and it was quite nice, I was really nearly sold, but I think that's because I was tired and I had just had enough!  I had picked out a tea length dress that was really quite 'plain'.  The woman seemed reluctant to put me in it and as usual, picked out all the 'fat girl' dresses for me, all of which I said no to.

On with the tea length dress.  Well, wow.  What else do I say.  It was amazing.  It didn't fit obviously, but you could see that if it were to fit it would do all it needed to!  It was a great length and was plain enough that I could add my own embellishments to it (stitching to make a sweetheart neck and a halter strap).  

Even my sister said it looked nice.  Breakthrough!!

Only problem.  The tag had, "One Only", written on it.  What did that mean?!  The shop assistant vowed to call me back in the week and let me know.

I went home and looked up the style and found that my local shop, Aurora Bride, is a stockist of this designer.  So, I called them on the Monday morning.  No sample to try on, but they could order it.  Taking a skive to work I popped down that afternoon and am pleased to say, I finally have a wedding dress on order!

The design and style?  Well, that would be telling....

Dress Shopping: Part Deux

Yesterday I went to look at more wedding dresses.

I was filled with apprehension.  Firstly, the whole plus size thing, and secondly, the whole price tag thing!

Our first appointment was at All That Glitters in Allders, Croydon.  The staff were lovely, but one of them couldn't stop talking, and the other one seemed bored with the whole thing and every time I said I didn't like something they'd picked out, she almost had to really stop herself rolling her eye at me.  She insisted on going through the book of dresses they had in stock and picking out all the things over a size 18, regardless of whether or not I liked them!  Erm, surely the whole point is that I LOVE my wedding dress?!

So after a few false starts we eventually found a dress, Amanda Wyatt's Princess dress.

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But to be fair, I definitely wasn't 100% about it and I just wanted to get the fuck out of there, it was so hot in there and the girl kept talking and the other girl kept rolling her eyes.  They told me I could have a lace back and but it would cost an extra 20% of the dress price.  I could have the train removed but eye roller didn't like the sound of me asking that and almost made out I wasn't allowed.  I could possibly have the straps removed and a halter neck put in.  Verbal incontinence girl kept saying it was all possible and eye roller kept rolling her eyes and in the end I realised, if I was having to make all these changes to it, it was not the right dress at all!

So, slightly disheartened we headed for lunch.  I was dreading the afternoon appointment even more, at Aurora Bride in Cheam, litrerally a 5 minute drive from home.  The reason I dreaded this appointment was for 2 reasons.  Firstly, I had tried to get hold of the shop in July when I first went dress shopping.   After leaving two messages and emailing them, I still had no joy.  I was pissed off but quickly discovered when trying to make appointments that most bridal shops are shut on Monday's.  Buggers!  So I was clutching at straws a little bit when I decided to give them one last try and sent them another email for an appointment.  3 days later, no luck, drawing closer to my day off that would be wasted unless I could cram another dress shop into the afternoon, my mum called them.  Finally, she had luck!

Now this is where I started to worry about this appointment.  Mum might have embellished it but the lady on the phone more or less said that as a plus size bride, as long as the dress fitted, it would be 'fine'.  Hmm, okay, so as long as the dress fits me, I should be god-damn happy I got into a wedding dress at my size?!  I was slightly enraged and when telling this to the girls on Twitter was told I should cancel the appointment.  Now, don't get me wrong, I should've done, but really, I had to try more dresses on because time is running out!!

So, off we trekked.  Arrived to be greeted by a pretty huge shop, nicely decorated, gorgeous soft carpet and the shop assistant in her socks, how relaxed!!  She gave me a stack of red discs (oh dear, this reminded me straight away of my awful experience at the Bridal Factory Outlet I visited in North Yorkshire, which I realise I didn't blog about.... another time!) and told me to put them on the dresses I liked.

I told her briefly that I wanted relatively plain, tulle skirt, sweetheart neck and she totally got it.  Within 30 seconds she had pulled out 3 dresses that were just so spot on, I was like, "Why the fuck didn't I come here sooner!" and also I thought, "Why the fuck didn't the girls this morning get it this quick?!"

I went prepared to my second appointment of the day, I went home before to change, put on jeans and a tshirt and the secret weapons, my Gok Wan undies, notably a strapless bra and a sucker-inner-thigh-and-tummy shaper!  This did make it a bit easier in the changing room as I wasn't concious of my mummy tummy. That said, the assistant in this shop made me feel so comfortable, it was just such a breath of fresh air.

Into the first one, I can't remember it, but I didn't like it much.  Into the second one, now, this was a bit more like it.  Interestingly all the dresses I picked out were from Sincerity.

This is the 'first one'.  (The actual first one doesn't count!)

It was called Sincerity Krystle but I don't know what the style number is so I can't actually look it up and find the official pictures!  But at £875 it was quite reasonable.

This is the second one.

This one didn't have a name as the tag fell off so I know it's 4533 and here is the official picture:

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At £935 it's still a reasonable price.

Here's some pictures of the details.

Skirt of the second one

Bodice of the second one

Bodice of the first one

So lastnight and when I had it on I preferred the second one.  I think this is because it actually fitted me.  That said, the first one I think will probably maybe suit me better.  I had a right old tizz about it in the early hours of the morning, and all this led to me feeling really depressed and calling in sick to work.  Fuck.

I don't know why it left me in such a weird mood.  I think because ultimately, I wanted a dress like this or this or a Candy Anthony (although, to be fair, I realised pretty early on I couldn't afford a Candy Anthony!)  And I guess because my dream was to have a short 50's style dress, I keep thinking I'm lying to myself by having something long and fluffy!!  

HELP!