
The only rule when it comes to planning your wedding: anything goes. If there was ever a time to be 100 percent authentic, your Big Day is THE day. And this doesn’t just apply to the bride and groom. The hottest trend is mismatching bridesmaids dresses so each girl gets to wear a gown that’s flattering to her body type AND makes her feel fantastic. Your bridesmaids will be into the idea because they’ll have the opportunity to contribute an original spin to your special ceremony, plus they won’t have to drop a ton of money on a dress that they don’t love. Win-win!
1. Shabby Chic to the Max: Boho brides, take a good, hard look at this set of mismatched maids. They’ve all stuck to a grey-and-white theme, but added their own flair with patterns. The bride even let them wear flat booties, which means there wasn’t a sore foot in the house. (via Jen Rodriguez)
2. All That Glitters: This set of bridesmaids has a very vintage feel, resembling a scene straight out of The Great Gatsby. They also prove that mismatched dresses don’t have to be different in just color or pattern. They can also be embellished differently. Keep all the lengths long for added glam. (via Erich McVey)
3. Pastel Party: Spring weddings call for soft colors, and now you don’t have to pick just one. These bridesmaids look ethereal in floor-length shades of purple, pink, peach and teal. Make sure you give all of your girls matching bouquets to tie the look together like this bride did. (via Skyla Walton)
4. Make Me Blush: Give your maids a color and let them run with it? Why not? Looks like that’s what this bride did, and it turned out fabulous. Each girl ended up with a unique, flattering frock within the blush color family — three ladies have floor-length gowns, which could signify that they’re maids or matrons of honor. That’s a pretty fashionable way to give a shout-out. (via Jacquelyn Poussot)
5. Mix-and-Match Times Two: This bride appears to have given her maids two inspiration colors: mint and blush pink. Other than that, they had free reign to choose their own lengths, fabrics and shoes. The key was the one patterned dress that had both colors and, thus, tied ‘em all together. (via Jen Rodriguez)
6. First Lace: All of these bridesmaids have on the same gown, but there’s a mix of shades. Envision the line-up of your bridesmaids before letting them pick colors so that no two girls in the same hue are side-by-side. (via Jose Villa)
7. Bright-smaids: You don’t have to shy away from color on your big day, as proven by these gals in cheery shades of pink. We’ve seen it done in every color of the rainbow — just give your girls a color and let them choose a shade that suits their skin tones. With enough colors, you could even have your girls line up to create an ombré effect! (via Wendy Laurel)
8. White Is Alright: These cream-colored dresses prove that wearing white to a wedding is no longer a no-no. In fact, it’s the perfect hue for a beach or summer wedding, where you want everything breezy, bright and clean. You can also tone down the white of your maids’ dresses if you want your dress to shine brightest. (via SugarLove Weddings)
9. Thinking Pink (and Glam): These gals make their mismatched-ness look glam, thanks to the sweeping length of each gown. They also keep things looking meant-to-be-mismatched by sticking to similar fabrics and colors and by toting bouquets that do match. (via Steve Steinhardt)
10. Simple Shading: In our final example, let’s just reiterate just how easy it is to mismatch your maids. Choose a single dress and a few shades that match your theme. Then, assign each girl a color based on her spot in your bridesmaid line. Voila. Now you’re ready to walk down the aisle in style. (via Style Unveiled)
Gone are the days where you must have the matchy-matchy bridesmaid dresses. The trend is creativity, and you can let yours shine with a mismatched set of gowns that will make you, your maids and your wedding day sparkle.
Which mismatched trend do you like best for your wedding day?
Welcome to Selfmade Finance School, our new money series with Block Advisors to help small business owners with their tax, bookkeeping, and payroll needs year-round. This week, we explore the tax implications of bringing family members into your business.
The question for today is this: Does hiring your family members make sense for your business? Let me be clear. This is not a piece about whether hiring your family members makes sense for your relationships with those family members. As someone who is part of a family business, I could fill up a lot more than 600 words on my opinions about that. For today's purposes, we focus on whether it makes sense from an overall "good business and tax implication" perspective. As it turns out, there is a decent amount of tax nuance when it comes to employing your family. Let's break it down based on relationship to the employee:
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Spouses Who Are In Business Together
Personally, if I had to be in business with my husband, it would not go well. However, many couples build viable, strong businesses together and I say, good for them! Depending on how you have your business entity structured, it will make a big difference on the tax treatment of you and your spouse working as partners. Because a business jointly owned and operated by a married couple is generally treated as a partnership for Federal tax purposes, the spouses must comply with filing and record keeping requirements imposed on partnerships and their partners. The election to file two Schedule C (Form 1040) forms, (one for each spouse) permits certain married co-owners to avoid filing partnership returns, provided that each spouse separately reports a share of all the businesses' items of income, gain, loss, deduction, and credit. Under the election, both spouses will be subject to self-employment tax and on net earnings from self-employment and receive credit for Social Security earnings.
One Spouse Employs Another
If you have a dynamic where your spouse is an employee of your business, then your spouse's wages are subject to income tax withholding, Social Security and Medicare taxes. If you are self-employed (not a corporation or a partnership), your spouse's pay does not have to be included in your federal unemployment tax account (FUTA) contributions and payments. However, if your business is a corporation or a partnership you must include that spouse's pay in your unemployment tax contribution calculation.
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You Employ Your Child
First, let's be clear. I work in my family business, but I am an adult, so I am treated just like a normal employee. However, if you, for example, run a family restaurant and want to hire your children under 18 to work for you, there are some tax benefits. But first, you should check with your state for rules on how many hours minors can work (in non-agricultural jobs) and reference the Fair Labor Standards Act for information on limitations on the kinds of work children can perform.
"This is an often overlooked or under-utilized strategy. Paying your children for true services they provide in your business can be a powerful tax-saving tool," says Cathi Reed, Block Advisors Regional Director. "If you are a sole-proprietorship or single member LLC, and the child is less than 18 years of age, the business is not required to withhold FICA or payroll taxes. The child can use his or her standard deduction against income you pay."
You Hire Your Parent
Oh dear. If you are brave enough to do this, know that you will need to pay Social Security and Medicare taxes on your parent's wages and make the appropriate withholdings, but you don't have to pay unemployment taxes. Now all you have to do is convince your parent that you are the boss. Have fun with that!
Is Hiring Family Members Worth It For The Tax Benefits?
"There are some positive tax advantages to hiring family members. It's important to treat a family member like any other employee. Hiring your children can result in substantial savings for businesses. Make sure your child has real, age-appropriate work to do and a reasonable pay rate, comparable to other employees. Consult with a Block Advisors small business certified tax pro to ensure that you are complying with all requirements," advises Reed. "Block Advisors, a team within H&R Block, is dedicated to meeting the tax, bookkeeping and payroll needs of small business owners year-round. To start working with the tax experts at Block Advisors, visit blockadvisors.com."
In my opinion, you should not hire a family member solely because of the tax benefits. You should always hire based on whether that person is right for the job and keep in mind how this hire could materially impact your relationship with that person and others in your family. Finally, as I mentioned, make sure you have a tax professional on your team when making these determinations. As you can see, things can get a little tricky!
*All details were sourced from IRS.gov and blockadvisors.com
The opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and may not necessarily reflect those held by Kestra Investment Services, LLC or Kestra Advisory Services, LLC. This is for general information only and is not intended to provide specific investment advice or recommendations for any individual. It is suggested that you consult your financial professional, attorney, or tax advisor with regards to your individual situation. Comments concerning the past performance are not intended to be forward looking and should not be viewed as an indication of future results. Securities offered through Kestra Investment Services, LLC (Kestra IS), member FINRA/SIPC. Investment advisory services offered through Kestra Advisory Services, LLC (Kestra AS), an affiliate of Kestra IS. O'Keeffe Financial Partners and any other entity listed herein is not affiliated with Kestra IS or Kestra AS Investor Disclosures: https://bit.ly/KF-Disclosures