A Bee's Life: Stiletto's Thoughts

On Discovering The Bee...
I found Weddingbee before I got engaged, when I had a girlfriend who was looking for her wedding dress. We had already gone to various boutiques in Chicago, but she had hit a wall on finding "the one." I was digging around online trying to find new places for us to visit, and I came across Weddingbee and a post by a Chicago Bee (who? I have no clue!) and her dress shopping experience. I thought the site was cool and helpful, but I didn't dig any deeper...I mean, I wasn't even thinking of getting married!

Fast forward 6 months when a ring was slipped onto my finger, pushing me deep into planning. I came across ideas online of using a vintage typewriter as a guest book...we both loved it (and have since changed plans, ha!). Searching for typewriter-themed weddings, I came across Mrs. Lovebug. Swoon. I sat for hours pouring over her planning and recaps and thinking how cool it must be to have your wedding story chronicled in such a way. I started reading the 'bee off and on in the early parts of my engagement.

On blogging...
I had a baking blog for a couple of years before I started my wedding blog. I enjoy it, but I've never really found my voice there. Since getting engaged in March of '08, I was getting completely overwhelmed with everything. So in January of this year, I decided I was going to start a wedding blog and use that as an outlet for saving my sanity. As I started my wedding blog, I kept Weddingbee in mind. What would it take to be one of their bloggers?

I looked at the guidelines provided and the criteria for applying, and as soon as I had the minimum number of posts written, I sent my application in. In the meantime, I was blogging furiously...and absolutely loving it, feeling I had finally discovered my "blogging voice." A few weeks after applying, I was pleasantly surprised to receive an email from someone who said I could call her "Pengy," wanting to know if I was still interested in being a Bee and if so, what icon would I like to choose? I was floored, overwhelmed, and so honored to have been accepted!

On being a Bee...
Weddingbee is 100% always on my mind. Sometimes I wish I had more time to respond to readers, comment on the boards, and have more inspired posts...but it's hard! I generally write my posts in the morning before my workday starts - all in one sitting! By the time my posts make their way onto Weddingbee, it's usually late afternoon and I'm heading home from work, so I get flooded with comments that I want to be able to respond to. Sometimes I'm better at responding than others.

I'm always thinking about everything I'm doing for the wedding and if there's a blog post there. Do I need to take some pictures of a project? Research something out? Write up instructions for a project? Find great inspiration photos? But no matter what it is, I'm always bursting to share! I think back to how I ate up every single one of Mrs. Lovebug's posts. I'd love it if even one person was following me now, or will in the future, and use pieces of my wedding as inspiration as they go through the winding road of the wedding planning process. So I make sure I share everything that I possibly can!

...but my one guilty habit I'm going to admit to you here? Doing projects just because I want to blog about them! There, I said it. Wow, it feels good to come clean! Wanting to feel like I have the coolest wedding on the block has led me to be up to my elbows in projects half-started and projects I'm hoping to do. What's a girl to do?

At the end of the day, I can't even begin to think about what things would have been like if I hadn't sent in my application...and if I hadn't been lucky enough to be selected. I've never seen a warmer, more inspiring group of readers on any other wedding site. And as for the Bees...while I wasn't always an avid reader, I am now obsessed with each and every one of your weddings...from those that have passed to those that are just around the corner! On most days I am still in awe that I'm able to be a part of this group.