Since I spend so much of my day on the Internet collecting interesting links, I thought I'd start sharing them with everyone. Not always wedding related!
Sexy Robots....creepy, but interesting
Best Time to Buy (including wedding dresses)
Marry a Rich Dude... um who takes this kind of advice???
Must Read on Wedding Debt... be careful girls, its easy to get carried away
Girls Gone Wild... not innocent fun
Thursday, September 25, 2008
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
Wedding Industrial Complex
Ok, because of the current state of the economy in the US, I thought this would be a good time to bring this up. I am a budget bride. Before I started all of this, I had no idea what weddings cost. Depending on who you talk to, the average cost of a wedding in the US is between $14 and $43 thousand. Now some people say that the higher numbers come from polling by wedding magazines and wedding websites, which are sure to skew the numbers a little. Brides with lower budgets are probably not participating or responding to these sorts of surveys.
It pains me to spend that amount of money on a wedding. Not when there are so many people in our world who don't know where their next meal is coming from. Some days I feel like not having a wedding at all, and other days I get caught up into the hype the WIC feeds us all. It's a difficult struggle for me. I want to make my family happy, but I want to put a cap on the spending as well. We were lucky to be given a fairly large budget from both sets of parents. However, I feel that it is not necessary to spend all of this- we have a house and other responsibilities.
I know I got a little bridezilla- ish when searching for the perfect venue. It just so happens that the place I fell in love with costs over $3,000 in rental fees. It is really hard for me to justify this cost- which is why I've been so back and forth on the whole eloping/ destination wedding thing. However, I feel like its all or nothing. I either want to elope, or have the beautiful wedding of my dreams. There is no option that lets me have a big party in my parents' backyard. I kind of wish I would feel very decisively one way or another. My ambivalence is making it difficult to start planning.
But in the end, I want my family there. I want my 92 year old great- grandmother to watch us say our vows. I want my parents (yes, both of them) to walk me down the aisle as a sign of love, not to give me away. I want my cousins to tear up the dance floor.
Next up- how I try to have the wedding that I want without all the bills....
It pains me to spend that amount of money on a wedding. Not when there are so many people in our world who don't know where their next meal is coming from. Some days I feel like not having a wedding at all, and other days I get caught up into the hype the WIC feeds us all. It's a difficult struggle for me. I want to make my family happy, but I want to put a cap on the spending as well. We were lucky to be given a fairly large budget from both sets of parents. However, I feel that it is not necessary to spend all of this- we have a house and other responsibilities.
I know I got a little bridezilla- ish when searching for the perfect venue. It just so happens that the place I fell in love with costs over $3,000 in rental fees. It is really hard for me to justify this cost- which is why I've been so back and forth on the whole eloping/ destination wedding thing. However, I feel like its all or nothing. I either want to elope, or have the beautiful wedding of my dreams. There is no option that lets me have a big party in my parents' backyard. I kind of wish I would feel very decisively one way or another. My ambivalence is making it difficult to start planning.
But in the end, I want my family there. I want my 92 year old great- grandmother to watch us say our vows. I want my parents (yes, both of them) to walk me down the aisle as a sign of love, not to give me away. I want my cousins to tear up the dance floor.
Next up- how I try to have the wedding that I want without all the bills....
Thursday, September 18, 2008
Save the Date!
I am in the process of making our STD's (haha) for the wedding. I really wanted to go with magnets, so my guests can stick them on their fridge. That way my wedding will stay on everyone's mind! While doing some research, I came across this site. They have hundreds of templates for Save- the- Dates, and you can even customize some of them with your own photos. I loved this photo booth one:
A little pricey for me at 100 for $150. I briefly considered buying magnet paper and printing my own, but then I found VistaPrint. I signed up a few months ago, and I am literally bombarded with free offers. A little annoying, but well worth it for the great deals! Currently, 25 small magnets or 10 larger magnets are FREE! I've decided to go with the smaller size (3.5" x 2.0"). It's about the size of a business card, but I think can still be well done. You can download a template and design your own for a $4 upload fee. (I used Illustrator, with a free 30 day trial.)
As a caveat, I am not a graphic designer, and have never used Illustrator before. However, I am fairly computer savvy, and spent a few hours figuring out how to use the tools and came up with this:
Those pictures in there are just placeholders- I want to rip- off the photo booth one, where we hold a sign that says "Please Save" in the first one, and "the Date" in the second one. I might put a background of fireworks behind the picture or somewhere on the magnet. What do you think?
If you don't feel like messing around with Illustrator, there are hundreds of templates on Vista. I saw that Miss Champagne from WeddingBee used a template of gold damask, two elements I wanted to incorporate in our wedding. If you search through Vista's templates, keep in mind that you can change the colors of their designs, and also change all of the text, font, and placement. I rotated all of my text and pictures 90 degrees so that it would print out longways instead of like a business card.
Again, not planning on using this picture, although I do love how my dress complements the colors! I am wearing this dress again this weekend for a rehearsal dinner, so I may ask my sister to take a bunch of shots of us to get one that might be usable. We are going to eventually take engagement pictures, but I am not sure if they will be done before I want to send these out. Which design do you like better?
Breakdown:
100 small magnets from VistaPrint........ $30 with shipping
100 postcards to mount magnets from VistaPrint..... FREE promotion
100 plain envelopes..... $10
100 stamps...... $42
TOTAL COST FOR STDs........ $82 or $.82 each!
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
Cleveland Lakeside Courthouse!!!
I finally made the final choice on my venue! I just was so overwhelmed by the sheer beauty of the courthouse that I knew it had to be my venue. If you are thinking about using the courthouse for your wedding, there are a few things you should know.
1. The "coordinator" there is extremely difficult to work with. She sometimes took over 2 weeks to return my calls. Also, she wouldn't send me the contract until one year out from the wedding. On July 5, I started calling her to get the contract. Three weeks later, she finally answered my call. Let me just say I was extremely freaked out during those three weeks that I had lost the venue. If you want her private number, leave me a comment with your email.
2. It costs $525 an hour. If you want the attached parking garage it is another $550. However, you get from 5 PM Friday until 8PM Monday to set up, tear down, etc. They only charge you for your actual ceremony/ reception times. I'm planning on going with the parking, although I'm not sure if it would be absolutely necessary for everyone. It tends to be pretty empty in that area on the weekends.
3. You also have to get liability insurance for $1 MM. Now, most people can do it through their homeowners insurance, but it will cost between $200-400. This is a cost I didn't know about- if it wasn't already enough there!
4. There is no kitchen area, not even a sink. Most caterers will charge you alot more to cater a wedding here, because they need to bring immense quantities of glasses, silverware, and cooking set- ups. No glasses can be washed or reused.
Congrats! And if any readers are having their wedding there, I'd be happy to talk about caterers, rentals, decor ideas, etc. I haven't booked a caterer yet!!
1. The "coordinator" there is extremely difficult to work with. She sometimes took over 2 weeks to return my calls. Also, she wouldn't send me the contract until one year out from the wedding. On July 5, I started calling her to get the contract. Three weeks later, she finally answered my call. Let me just say I was extremely freaked out during those three weeks that I had lost the venue. If you want her private number, leave me a comment with your email.
2. It costs $525 an hour. If you want the attached parking garage it is another $550. However, you get from 5 PM Friday until 8PM Monday to set up, tear down, etc. They only charge you for your actual ceremony/ reception times. I'm planning on going with the parking, although I'm not sure if it would be absolutely necessary for everyone. It tends to be pretty empty in that area on the weekends.
3. You also have to get liability insurance for $1 MM. Now, most people can do it through their homeowners insurance, but it will cost between $200-400. This is a cost I didn't know about- if it wasn't already enough there!
4. There is no kitchen area, not even a sink. Most caterers will charge you alot more to cater a wedding here, because they need to bring immense quantities of glasses, silverware, and cooking set- ups. No glasses can be washed or reused.
Congrats! And if any readers are having their wedding there, I'd be happy to talk about caterers, rentals, decor ideas, etc. I haven't booked a caterer yet!!
A 4th of July Wedding
While searching for a theme for a 4th of July wedding, I came across a few rather obvious ones. American flags, red, white, and blue, eagles, or stars and stripes. I wasn't feeling any of these ideas though. My original ideas for a wedding had been to use a black and white damask, and a pop of a bright color like fuscia or red. After deciding on my venue, I wanted to incorporate gold into my color scheme.
Enter my new brilliant idea.... fireworks! It still represents the 4th of July, but is not as cheesy as having American flags everywhere. There are lots of great ideas that would incorporate a fireworks theme. I can give sparklers to the guests as favors, or have a sparkler send off.
Enter my new brilliant idea.... fireworks! It still represents the 4th of July, but is not as cheesy as having American flags everywhere. There are lots of great ideas that would incorporate a fireworks theme. I can give sparklers to the guests as favors, or have a sparkler send off.
So fun! For centerpieces, I don't really want flowers(or the florist bill that comes with), so I've been looking into other options. I wanted to make an impact with tons of candles, but unfortunately my venue won't allow them. I like the look of the curly willow branches I've seen brides using. I would like to spray paint mine gold, and put them into a large vase with Floralytes to provide a soft glow.
If I wanted to use candles, I'd have to use the flameless LED ones. They have floralytes that change colors- would this be a cool way to show off the colorfulness of fireworks, or just be cheesy? I also like the centerpieces that use ostrich feathers. Now, I'm not sure on this saving money, because ostrich feathers are surprisingly expensive. But they are beautiful, and you can get the feathers dyed any color you want. I could also use the colored floralytes for these too.
I love how both these ideas kind of evoke the feel of fireworks- high and lighted against the dark, both fanning out into beautiful patterns. Maybe I could do a mixture of both, one type on the long tables, the other type on the rounds? Could I also use damask with these ideas, or does it not go together?
Long Tables vs. Rounds
I'm thisclose to finalizing my venue contract, so I decided to start with the seating plans.... more later on which venue I went with!
I am in love with the idea of doing long feasting type tables at the reception. I know there are a lot of pros vs. cons out there, so I might do a mix of both long tables and rounds. I can put our friends and cousins at the longs(because I don't want to split all the groups up), and put my parents and other relatives at the rounds. Hopefully this works out. I've been using this program to help me with the table design and seating, and for a FREE program it works great! Just sign up, and got to Weddings/ Seating. I also put my guest list into excel, and you can upload it right into the program. I'm an accounting geek, so I use excel for everything, and it is super easy to sort people.
Here's a vague picture of how I want my tables to look:
I am in love with the idea of doing long feasting type tables at the reception. I know there are a lot of pros vs. cons out there, so I might do a mix of both long tables and rounds. I can put our friends and cousins at the longs(because I don't want to split all the groups up), and put my parents and other relatives at the rounds. Hopefully this works out. I've been using this program to help me with the table design and seating, and for a FREE program it works great! Just sign up, and got to Weddings/ Seating. I also put my guest list into excel, and you can upload it right into the program. I'm an accounting geek, so I use excel for everything, and it is super easy to sort people.
Here's a vague picture of how I want my tables to look:
The middle one will be the kind of head table. We haven't decided on if we are having a bridal party or not, but even if we don't we would just put family in friends up there who would have been in the bridal party. So it would be kind of the un- head table. The two rounds closest to us would have our parents, and whoever they would choose to sit with them.
I am still trying to figure out how to seat people at the longs. I plan on fitting between 20-25 people at each one, so I don't want to just tell guests which table and have them find their own seat. That could create some confusion. I will probably put something at each setting with a name on it. Maybe a sparkler!
Also, my side of the guest list is significantly longer than FI's, because of my massive family. Should I seat some of my side over on his? I'm sure there are other bride's out there with lopsided guest lists- how did you figure this out?
Does anyone have any experience at a wedding with long tables and can offer any suggestions?
I'm Back!!
Ok, so I know I was getting pretty discouraged and overwhelmed with all the planning. So I took a few months off. But now I'm back in full swing. My reception, caterer, and photographer are almost booked, and I have lots of new decorating ideas to show you. I promise I'll stick around this time!
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