I was Plus Size Bride, and I am ok with that.

In the last year and a half I have been dress shopping  more that I would like to admit. I was the maid of honor in my best friends wedding last fall and as you all know I got marired myself in October. I have learned a little bit in the last year and a half, one of those being I HATE dress shopping. I have had some bad experiences, at certain stores (coughdavidsbridalcough) that make me glad this whole buying a wedding dress thing is all over.

I am a plus size girl, I fall with in size 16-18 depending on the style of the dress. I know that "Bridal" runs small, and I know I was in for a headache before I even started looking for my own wedding dress. I promised some family and my close friends they can go through the whole "looking at me trying on dresses" process, mostly for them, not for me, I hated the whole idea of it. So a month before hand I was at David's Bridal with a friend who was looking for a gown for some benefit, and I figured I would get an idea of some dresses that I wanted so when I went in with the big group of people, I wasn't overwhelmed.

I am not a princess dress person, or a tight dress person, I wanted something tea length-ish. So while my friend was pulling dresses for her benefit I asked one of the girls there what they had for that style. With out even asking me my size, or even measuring me, she simply said "Oh, we don't have many of those in your size, maybe two or three. Our plus section is very small in store." At first I thought her tone was rude, but maybe I was over reacting, but when my friend who was with also heard the sassy/rudeness in her tone. I knew I wasn't over-reacting. So when I went home that night I decided to go on their website, to look at dresses. I wasn't going to have people watch me try on dresses if they only had "two or three for my size." and browsing that website looking at things in my size, was kind of hilarious.

 Because I am a size 16-18 I am right on the edge of regular size and plus size. Some of there dresses go up to 16 or 18 and when others 18 and up are plus size. So I checked both, just in case. I found a dress I loved, it was what I wanted. In standard size it was pretty cheap $200ish. It only went up to a 16. I know bridal runs small so I checked plus size, They had 16 short style dresses compared to the almost 50 of standard size, and most of their short dresses started at 850+, I felt annoyed and discouraged and put off looking at dresses for awhile.

If you follow my YouTube channel, you know I ended up finding my dress, and where I found it was online, Modcloth to be exact. I took my own measurements and decided on a dress I really loved, so I was happy I got to try it on in the comfort of my own home, and with out some sales lady judging me. But my dress shopping wasn't over. I had to go for my friends wedding, which again wasn't a great experience, some dresses we couldn't even look at because they didn't come in that size. In the end I was happy it was over.

I knew going into this it wasn't going to be easy. I know I am a bigger, I know a lot of things wouldn't come in my size. Once I found the dress it was like "phew ok now that is over." but then started the comments, Oh those  "so are you going to lose weight for your wedding? How much weight have you lost to fit into your dress?"comments. Now for some reason a lot of people, and I mean random coworkers, family friends, even random people I barely know online expected me to magically become thinner, or lose weight for my wedding. "you are going to be in pictures! you will look at these forever! Aren't you gonna try to lose weight?" Now don't get me wrong, the 2 months till  wedding I made sure I wasn't eating junk ( i don't eat a lot of junk anyways, but it happens.) so I could make sure I would stay fitting in my dress, but I am fat, there is no other way to say it, I am fat. I was a little smaller than this when I met Eric, I go up and down in my weight all the time but for the most part, I am this size, why would I JUST lose weight to look good in my wedding dress?

Its bad enough trying on dresses at places where they made rude comments at you for being plus size knocks down your self esteem, but once you find that dress that you think you look amazing in, and now people are telling you that you need to lose weight to be thinner so you can look good in photos because its your wedding? So I wont look good because I am fat? No! I am going to be a fat bride, and I have no shame in that. I know I am a bigger girl, it took me a lot of years to love myself, a lot of struggles to love myself, and I am finally here at age 28 and I love myself even though I am fat. Even though that girl at David's Bridal made snotty comments about my size. My now husband loves me, not because of my size. He wont care if I am 20lbs smaller in my wedding dress or this size right now. I am fine with the fact that I am a plus size bride.

At the end of this journey that is what I learned, its been a few months since I started writing this post, my wedding has come on gone. Its been a long journey, and all that is said and done, that day, was amazing. I felt amazing, I took a moment to myself in my best friends bathroom after I was all done up and looked at my self in the mirror, and I saw myself as an adult, I saw a little bit of my grandmother in me (who is a plus size woman) and I saw a beautiful bride. I was overwhelmed by all the compliments that day, I know you get them because you are "the bride" but being told how beautiful you look and stunning, makes you not think about the fact  other people told me i had to look "skinny in your wedding dress." because you don't need to. I had a friend pull me aside that day and tell me as a fellow plus size girl I inspired her, because most people say we "cant wear light colors." and "some dresses are flattering" but I pulled it off and I looked amazing. That right there moved me. And it helped a lot that the one person who mattered  that day, my husband, told me I looked perfect, and amazing all day. And that my friends is what matters. Not the losing weight to look pretty in your dress, or fitting into some plus size bride bubble that stores want you to fit into it. That YOU feel beautiful and amazing and that you are happy. Because its the happiest day of your life, it goes by super quick and you want to enjoy it, not worry if you "look fat" in your wedding dress.

My Star Wars Themed Wedding Shower!

I know things have been slow lately here on the blog, to be honest its been far in my thoughts because I have been busy with wedding related things, my day job, as well as other things. But, two weeks ago Eric and I had our Wedding Shower! It kicked off the #supersmithwedding16 wedding festivities! And our wedding party pulled together what I can only say was the best wedding shower in the galaxy! Because you know, it was STAR WARS THEMED!

One of the best things is having a wedding party that understands your personality, and Eric and I are reallythat  our friends get us They could of thrown us a fancy, traditional wedding shower (which there is nothing wrong with!) but they instead took the geeky route and did it all up Star Wars. And man was it amazing!

My Maid and Matron of Honor made most of the decorations, and pulled together what I can only call, fun, geeky yet also classy. It had small little Star Wars nods, like death star center piece vases (which Lyndsey painted ALL BY HAND), a Stromtropper helmet to sign for a guest book,  and  the cutest little mason jars with  candles that had Leia and Han silhouettes that said "i love you, I know". As well as a HUGE Kylo Ren cut out, which I cracked up over, because it pulled everything together.

That a long with a fun DIY photo booth, it had the perfect mix of everything. The girls really hit it out of the park (or galaxy!) with it. Even the favors where smores that say "may the smores be with you." And having the guests play Wedding Jeopardy, which was really fun because sometimes showers can get boring, and it made everyone interact with each other, and it was filled with a lot of laughs and fun! 

Everything about it was perfect, even the selfies being taken with Kylo and all the silly photo booth pictures. It was the best way to start off the wedding countdown. I am truly lucky to have such an amazing wedding party and have such amazing people in our lives. 

Here are some final photos, my dress was PRINCESS LEIA (which will have its own outfit post coming next week), as well as the link to the vlog from the night! I wish I had more details for you guys, like how everything was made, because the girls did an AMAZING job with making a lot of the decorations, maybe I can convince Lyndsey to do a craft blog post on the vases. But I know a bunch of you wanted a blog post. Thank you guys for reading! Look for more wedding related blog posts coming in the next month! Make sure to check out the vlog at the end of the post! 

I started using a planner this year, and this is what happened....

I am fairly new to this whole planner thing. I used to keep on in high school, and I have always had a dry erase board some where in my apartment to keep track of things like appointments and bills. But at the start of this year I really noticed I needed something to keep all the dates I have put together and organized. Because with wedding, work, YouTube, even conventions,  and everything else in between, I needed something to keep it all together long term. I had dates and times I needed to remember months a head of time, I had dead lines, and projects that needed to be finished. I am a pretty organized person, I try to get stuff done early, and with lots of time to do it. But I was having a hard time managing it all; so I looked into planners,

I had seen a few YouTube that I follow use planners, as well as cosplayers. So I had a good idea on which one I wanted. But I wanted to stay in a budget because I wasn't sure if this was something I could keep doing, or if I would forget to do it after a month or so. Because lets face it, that does happen. A lot of these people make their pages super fancy, and covered with stickers, but I knew starting out I should keep it simple, get myself used to the planner first, get into a routine and see where I go from there. It was Janaury so a lot of the planners were on sale, so I picked up the "Me and my big ideas" planner (Or mambi) for udner $20, one role of washi tape, a few colored pens and took an afternoon to transfer all the dates and things I needed to get done from my notebook, into the planner.

There were things I loved, and things I didn't really like about the planner, but it got the job done. I kept it simple for the first month, I did it all in pen, very few stickers, I had no themes just writing down what I work, the  meals I plan to do, appointments that were that week, bills due as well as wedding projects that needed to be done. It was simple. and after keeping to it for a month strong, I slowly starting getting into stickers. Because I had to look at this for a whole week, I wanted it to motivate me to check it every day. A few more rolls of washi, some cute star wars, marvel and other scrapbook stickers, and I started to develop a good system to my planning. I did it about two weeks at a time, because it was best for me, it helped me plan meals so my grocery shopping wasn't so random anymore, it kept me on top of chores and things I sometimes forgot about. I was really enjoying it. And thats when I decided, to check out a few sticker shops on etsy.

I went in with a budget and a list of stickers that would fit my planning needs. What I started to notice it, my planner was the issue.I liked the set up of the mambi planner, but the binding of it made it hard to take anywhere, and it made it bulky, it made it weird for me to write in it because it was hard to fold over. I liked how it was affordable, but in all honestly my "dream" planner was the Erin Condern. If I was going to invest money in cute stickers to help my planning, why not just get a good planner? Lucky for me it was a big sale on that website, because the new planners were coming out in June, in mid April the ones for the rest of the year were pretty cheap. I paid no more than $21 dollars for my new planner, the cover didn't really matter to me because I could get a new one or decorate this one if I needed. I had a pretty good stash of stickers from etsy, as well as my friends sticker shops to help me. I was so glad I got this planner because it was just easy to use, I'm not sure if its becuse it reminds me more of my notebook i used to jot stuff down in before, but i find it so much easyer to grab this planner every day, and update my lists, check off what I've done and what not.

I've noticed a lot of changes in myself with organization since I started planning. I get more stuff done/. I have learned how to better manage my time, motivate myself to do better in things like youtube, and even start using my blog again.  Not to mention taking that hour or so every week and putting time into the planner, is sort of "me" time. I didn't think a little planner could help so much. Maybe I was more un-organized than I thought, What was first meant to help me stay on top of wedding tasks and other life things, has become the way I plan meals for the week, and set up my grocery list based on that. (which means we do less take out because I plan ahead.) Its motivated me to set upload schedules on both my YouTube and now on my blog. I had youtube work time, managed with my day to day work time. Even Eric will ask me to note something in my planner to remind him to do something or when something is going on

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Its really helped me mange things, and I am so happy I got into planning. I wont lie, the cute stickers, and layouts do help. I've gone from very few stickers to a whole spread themed by them. I enjoy going on etsy and finding stickers and thinking of spreads a head of time. And I think thats what keeps me doing it, that little creative motivation. And I'm glad it did, because in the last 5 months planning has changed how I mange things in my life.

Going through my 20's and not growing apart from my best friend.

Best friends are hard to come by these days. You don’t always find that person and say, hey yeah I am not leaving your side for the rest of our lives and we are gonna do stupid shit together until we get old okay? I actually never had a “best friend” until I got older. I was always awkward and weird and though I had people I called a friend, I never had a constant one, they always came and went because I am the kind of person who sometimes doesn’t want to be around people but not a lot of people understand that. In my 20’s its been harder, and people come and go, my list of actual friends are shorter now, and as I am getting closer to my wedding its starting to be clear who actually wants to be in my life and who doesn’t. And it makes me glad that in the whole scheme of things, I have someone to call my best friend.

Now the word best friend is different in your later 20’s than when you are a teenager or even up to that  Taylor Swift age of 22. When people grow up, get married and have kids things change. You don’t see each other randomly when you are bored at 10pm at night and want to grab ihop. Sometimes we go weeks, or even months with out seeing each other because our work lives don’t mesh up, or the one time we had planned to hang out, a baby is sick. You have to be more understanding as an adult than you were when you were 19. So its harder to keep people in your lives, and to make sure the people you have around you are there for you even if you can’t see them everyday. And for me that’s Lyndsey.

See Lynndsey always in some way understood me, we always understood each others. I get her in a way a lot of people don’t, and she does the same for me. When we were in our early 20’s we were content hanging out, at her apartment on our laptops watching re-runs of SVU and Gilmore Girls for a whole day, than going out and hanging out with tons of people. As we got older, its sort of the same, expect now our spouses are with us, and theres a toddler running around, and it’s a hockey game or mickey mouse club house playing in the background. We know that we don’t always HAVE to be doing something amazing together to be friends. Sure we have a lot of great memories, of doing some fun and silly things, but that’s not all our friendship is about.

 If you look at us we are total opposites in many ways,  and I think that works out in our favor. When something is wrong she doesn’t have to say it and I know what to do, and vice versa. But the way we keep this friendship working isn’t by seeing each other every second of every day and taking best friend selfies all the time. We talk, we listen, we tell each other about our stupid boring days,  I get the cutest videos of what her daughter (my goddaughter) is doing that day, and I will send her silly memes and pictures of a project I am working on. We stay updated on each others lives, even if its not the most exciting. We help each other deal with drama, and other issues, We listen to work rants, and stories about baby poop, and things we never thought we would share with each other. Her family has become my family in a way that when I am at her home, I feel at home, even if I am not there all the time because hey being an adult and working sucks but you got to do it. We may not see each other all the time, but that doesn’t mean she isn’t my best friend.

I will admit when she first told me she was pregnant 2.5 years ago I was really scared. I was scared I would lose her because she was going to be caught up in this baby life and forget all about me. But she never did that. I didn’t think I could love a kid as much as I love her daughter. If anything her having a child has brought us closer. And seeing her be an amazing mom has made me realize how lucky I am to have her in my life,  seeing her raise this little person who is a little her, it no longer makes me scared that this little person is gonna steal my best friend away, I love them both, and sometimes her  more than Lyndsey (haha.) I know that sI may not understand a lot of what shes going through as a mom like her friends with kids, but I do know she understands the fact I MAY not want kids, and may never understand and she gets that, doesn’t judge me.

In our 20’s we have gone through tons of changes, some good, some bad, Some life changing and some tiny but awesome at the same time. We fought, and we sometimes went long periods of times with out speaking, but in the end honestly? Maintaining a friendship with some one through all the changes in your life is hard, you don’t know what each change will bring, but its nice and amazing to share it with someone who has been there through them all.  You just have to know and understand that growing up, getting married, having kids doesn’t mean you drift apart. We are on some what different paths in life, but that doesn’t mean we can’t live them together.

I think Ted Mosby said it best in the last season of HIMYM "You will be shocked kids, when you discover how easy it is in life to part ways with people forever. That's why, when you find someone you want to keep around, you do something about it." 

New Look, its been awhile.

I honestly feel like its been forever since I have sat down and written in my blog, If I am being honest with myself I was sort of stuck with what to do here, For the last 5 years I have written reviews, and sort of kept to the same thing, and honestly I was getting bored with it. Don't get me wrong I still love makeup, and fashion and I am still really active on my YouTube channel. Its just harder now to drop a few $$ at Sephora to write a few blog posts on makeup, and what not.And I have passions and things out side of makeup that I wanted to touch on, and I did, a little bit here and there.

I felt like I was in a rut with the blog. I had SO much I wanted to write about. But this felt like my fashion blog, even when I would write about movie trailers, or even conventions, it still felt like I wasn't happy with where this blog was going. So after about 6 months of sitting on it, I decided I needed to change that. I missed writing, and I wanted to write about different things, but still keep this blog. It has been a part of me for so long now. So after sitting down with Eric and sort of talking it out, he designed me a new banner that just said "haveyoumetashley" nothing with "a geeks love of" on it, so I would have the freedom to write and say kind of what I want with out dwelling on the fact that this is a fashion blog. People grow, and I was growing and I want to talk about more than just that. Does this mean I wont post outfits, and hair tops? NO I will always post those, it may just have a lot of other things in between. I have a few posts saved up that I have been writing here and there and they will be posted in the next few weeks, to get myself back into the swing of things. I will be posting some wedding things, some random stories and even some book reviews, and comic things. A lot of changes, but I feel happy about it. My life is more than just makeup and clothes, so I wanted this blog to reflect that. I hope you all want to come along with me through this change!

Vlog || Haloween Shopping and Star Wars Struff!

Its the time of year! Haloween everything is out! And Eric and myself took an adventure to find some new things this year for halloween, as well as check out the new star wars toys! What did we find? Check out the video to see!

The Fiancé Tag!

A little while ago Eric and I did The Fiancé Tag! (which is basicily the boyfriend tag but you know changed a bit?) We thought it would be fun because 3 1/2  years ago we did The Boyfriend tag and since I am going to share my little wedding planning adventures with you guys, starting off with this was a good start!

So here is the original video we did years ago, if you want to laugh at how silly we look when we first started dating (I believe we were together 4 months around this time?) Enjoy!

My Top Style Icon - Kelly Osbourne

I don't think my style icons series would be complete if I didn't do Kelly O. She has played a big part of my fashion choices as well as my life for the last 10-11 years. Its a funny story really, I didn't start out looking up to Kelly for all my fashion tips, I remember it was one day sophomore year of high school, when I just cut my hair into a pixie cut, someone looked at me and said "you look like that girl, Ozzies daughter! you could be twins!" and thats when it started. At first I pulled my angsty teen "i am not one but myself" crap and hated it whenever someone said it, (the Osbournes has just become a big hit then, so I heard it A LOT) until I actually say down and watched, and I was shocked to see, she was just like me.

My Kaylee Frye from Firefly Cosplay

This year I decided I wanted to step outside of my comfort zone, and do something I never really done before. This was cosplaying at a con. I have been to conventions in the past, and admired cosplayers, and from as far back as i can remember I have been really into making myself and my friends costumers for Halloween and they always came out really awesome and I loved the time and effort that went into them. So for awhile now a few people have been telling me to do it at cons. I was always nervous, the attention and everything gave me a bit of a small anxiety attack, but with Boston Comic Con coming up Eric and i decided we would do it. Now Eric's outfit took longer than expected with a few technical things, but I had decided on something a bit easy for my first cosplay. Being a huge Firefly fan, and Jewel going to Boston Comic Con the idea of cosplaying Kaylee was a pretty good one. 

Boston Comic Con 2014

For the first time in what seems like forever I got to attend Boston Comic Con. I have attended other cons in the area, but for some reason it had been some time since I attended Boston Comic Con. One big factor to me going this year? Well one of my actresses from the show Firefly was going to be there, and being a fangirl I am, I had to meet Jewel Staite in person, she has been someone who I have adored for years. Way back to her Are You Afraid Of the Dark days (fun fact, my favorite episode of AYAOTD is the tale of the unfinished painting, which she was in) and of course Kaylee from Firefly! So I was set on going, I even had the plan of dressing up like Kaylee for what was my first time cosplaying at a Con.  (a full tutorial on my costume will be posting here in the next week!) So the day was going to be full of adventure.

Its Batman day!

There is no hiding my love of the dark knight. if you have known me for 26 years or a week, you know I love anything Batman related. Ever since I was a little kid and begged my parents to buy me that god awful cereal just because it had the batman logo on it. I was hooked on all things Batman.

It was one of the first fandoms I remember falling in love with as a kid, when little girls would play with their strawberry shortcakes and barbies I was begging my parents for a bat mobile and toy batcave to go with my action figures. I was odd for a girl but even then I wouldn't change myself or what I loved because it wasn't what most girls liked. I loved batman because he was a normal guy, and I have fallen in love with so many characters in the batman universe over the years that honestly have probably helped shape me into the person I am today. Some of my best memories are going to the movies to see the newest batman film with my cousins, and when we were old enough going to the midnight releases of Batman Begins and The Dark Knight. Jumping from couch to couch with towels tied around our necks like batman and batgirl to save the day from whatever villain we decided one of us was being that day. To waking up early to watch the animated series with my dad on Saturdays and falling in love with Harley Quinn, these are memories I wouldn't have if it wasn't for batman.

In an odd way my love of  batman  and not being afraid to show it or share my love was the start to what I am now, this person who doesn't give a crap if someone tells me I am too old to be wearing a batman tee, or collecting action figures, or fan girling over the new batgirl suit (which is so awesome by the way). When someone makes fun of me for being a "fan girl" and being "too nerdy" over what I love, I tell them "yeah i love it, your point its a part of who I am."  Because that little girl inside me is sitting there with her batman backpack not caring that she is being teased because its what she loves. And I have to make that little girl proud, because she is the reason I am who I am today. I could honestly go into depth about my love of the dark knight and ramble for hours, but I honestly just wanted to come on here and say happy 75th anniversary Batman, because with out you in my life, I probably wouldn't be the woman I am today.