It's that time of year again. The end of the year, to be exact. What is your new years resolution? Mine is to make my wedding a dream come true. My resolution is to make my wedding perfect with minimal fights. I am not always the happiest bride-to-be to be around. This year I will be willing to plan my wedding with no arguing. No unhappiness. I am not going to let the happiest day of my life to turn my life until then into a wreck.
This next year is a crucial time in my life-- planning my wedding. We've started already, but once it's the "year of", it becomes so much more real. We have to get serious about this. New years bring new things, and this new year will bring one of the most amazing days of my life. Nothing is going to ruin this year.
Happy reading to all of you, and a very happy new year.
Monday, December 31, 2012
Sunday, December 30, 2012
Picking THE Dress
For most women, this can be a terribly difficult thing to do. So many dresses make you feel beautiful or they all make you feel fat. No matter what the reason is, it is difficult for just about any woman.
I am a mix of the two above women. I am overweight, so you would think that all of the dresses make me feel fat. WRONG. I felt stunning in all of the dresses that I tried on. I liked some of them more than others, yes, but I felt great in them all. Admittedly I did like some of them more than others, but that's beside the point. After my first time trying on dresses, I was convinced I found the one. Theeen, I went onto this wedding forum and found a million different girls with the same dress. All of a sudden, my dress seemed bland. After that happened, I decided I liked another one I tried on better. It had more detail, it fit my body shape better, and it was CHEAPER, all of which things I loved about it.
Looking back, I realized that after all of this I had decided on two dresses that were nothing like what I had pictured myself wanting. I hadn't tried on a single dress that fit anything like the description I had of a dress in my head. I thought about it and decided, "I've only even looked at dresses once, I need to give it more time before I jump into a decision."
As my mom pointed out to me as I explained this whole fiasco to her, "You can change your mind as many times as you want; it means you get the keep trying on dresses!" She is absolutely right. If I had made a final decision after trying on dresses one time, what if I had missed the dream dress that I may have tried on the next time?
So, to whoever is reading this, I want to tell you to TAKE YOUR TIME. Not just with your dress though, but with everything. Give yourself a chance to make your day perfect. No settling when it comes to your wedding.
That's all for today!
I am a mix of the two above women. I am overweight, so you would think that all of the dresses make me feel fat. WRONG. I felt stunning in all of the dresses that I tried on. I liked some of them more than others, yes, but I felt great in them all. Admittedly I did like some of them more than others, but that's beside the point. After my first time trying on dresses, I was convinced I found the one. Theeen, I went onto this wedding forum and found a million different girls with the same dress. All of a sudden, my dress seemed bland. After that happened, I decided I liked another one I tried on better. It had more detail, it fit my body shape better, and it was CHEAPER, all of which things I loved about it.
Looking back, I realized that after all of this I had decided on two dresses that were nothing like what I had pictured myself wanting. I hadn't tried on a single dress that fit anything like the description I had of a dress in my head. I thought about it and decided, "I've only even looked at dresses once, I need to give it more time before I jump into a decision."
As my mom pointed out to me as I explained this whole fiasco to her, "You can change your mind as many times as you want; it means you get the keep trying on dresses!" She is absolutely right. If I had made a final decision after trying on dresses one time, what if I had missed the dream dress that I may have tried on the next time?
So, to whoever is reading this, I want to tell you to TAKE YOUR TIME. Not just with your dress though, but with everything. Give yourself a chance to make your day perfect. No settling when it comes to your wedding.
That's all for today!
Friday, December 28, 2012
Making Your Own Centerpieces
There are so many ways to have your centerpieces be at the reception. The most common centerpiece, of course, is flowers. It's easy, it's beautiful, it's expensive. Oops, did I say that last part? Yes, price is the number one reason why more people don't have flowers as their centerpieces. Flowers can be very pricey, but worth it if you have the money to spend on them. Flowers can be great, especially if you put them together yourself! You can have a bouquet of flowers you picked out yourself, or just have flower petals around the table without being the centerpiece. There are so many different ways to use flowers on your tables that you may want to reconsider using flowers, even if they are a little ways out of your budget. That's not for me, of course. I can't afford anything even a cent over budget.
The second most common centerpieces I'd have to say are candles. Simple, elegant, alluring. Candles make you feel warm and fuzzy inside. Candles make you feel happy and at home. Candles can be the perfect thing for a wedding reception. Just candles, in my opinion, can be a little boring though, especially when it's just one. One idea is to add a few candles of differing heights to make the table look more interesting. You could maybe even add flower petals around them, real of fake, as mentioned above. Another thing I have heard of is putting tea candles in vases over water and let them float around. This idea, I think, is very cute and creative and will definitely be a hit. To be honest, candles, I believe, are usually best off at an evening wedding. They make everyone's faces glow, which just adds one more aspect of beauty to the whole ordeal, which is not something you can get during a day time reception.
A less thought of idea is to use a fruit basket. Fake fruit, real fruit; take your pick. It can be fruit inside a jar or vase, which can be interesting, or just a simple basket for people to look at or even eat out of. Pretty simple idea, and with the right fruit in the right season, it can look very appealing.
If you want to go super cheap but still something everybody will love, do candy bowls! Easy to do, inexpensive to pay for, and they taste yummy, too! An idea I heard of a while back is to do different kinds of candy at different tables to encourage people to mingle. There's a thought-- forcing your guests to get to know each other. Just kidding, I think it's a wonderful idea. I might consider it myself if I didn't have so many invited guests that come from such different backgrounds that it might be a little weird for certain people to get to know each other. Oh goodness, that must sound bad.
Anyway, whatever you do for your centerpieces, I encourage you to make it your own and reflect your and your fiancé's personalities. No matter what you pick, I'm sure it will be great. It is, after all, a wedding. Nothing can go wrong there, wink wink.
The second most common centerpieces I'd have to say are candles. Simple, elegant, alluring. Candles make you feel warm and fuzzy inside. Candles make you feel happy and at home. Candles can be the perfect thing for a wedding reception. Just candles, in my opinion, can be a little boring though, especially when it's just one. One idea is to add a few candles of differing heights to make the table look more interesting. You could maybe even add flower petals around them, real of fake, as mentioned above. Another thing I have heard of is putting tea candles in vases over water and let them float around. This idea, I think, is very cute and creative and will definitely be a hit. To be honest, candles, I believe, are usually best off at an evening wedding. They make everyone's faces glow, which just adds one more aspect of beauty to the whole ordeal, which is not something you can get during a day time reception.
A less thought of idea is to use a fruit basket. Fake fruit, real fruit; take your pick. It can be fruit inside a jar or vase, which can be interesting, or just a simple basket for people to look at or even eat out of. Pretty simple idea, and with the right fruit in the right season, it can look very appealing.
If you want to go super cheap but still something everybody will love, do candy bowls! Easy to do, inexpensive to pay for, and they taste yummy, too! An idea I heard of a while back is to do different kinds of candy at different tables to encourage people to mingle. There's a thought-- forcing your guests to get to know each other. Just kidding, I think it's a wonderful idea. I might consider it myself if I didn't have so many invited guests that come from such different backgrounds that it might be a little weird for certain people to get to know each other. Oh goodness, that must sound bad.
Anyway, whatever you do for your centerpieces, I encourage you to make it your own and reflect your and your fiancé's personalities. No matter what you pick, I'm sure it will be great. It is, after all, a wedding. Nothing can go wrong there, wink wink.
Invitations
A lot of people have debated over when to send out invitations. Some people say to send save the date cards as much as a year and advance and send out invitations around 8 weeks in advance. Other people have suggested skipping the save the date cards and just send out invitations 4-6 months in advance.
I personally prefer the second option and here's why: You save on postage. Yes, tacky, I know, postage stamps should not be on the top of my list of concerns. Really, though, if you are inviting a lot of people-- whether anywhere near all of them come or not-- it can get costly. Next, you save on envelopes and paper (the save the date cards themselves.) If you are not as concerned about saving the money, how about you use the money on the invitations themselves? Saving $100-200 on save the date cards can give you more freedom to buy nicer invitations. I, for one, would prefer nicer invitations.
I want to design my own invitations and put them together myself. Once again, going for more cost efficient. Yeah, I am willing to put in the extra effort to get EXACTLY what I want, and for a good price too! A typical wedding invitation's price can range anywhere from $1.50-$6.50. That's insane! Definitely a good reason to go for non-commercially made. I've already got some ideas of what I would like, now I just need to go over the ideas with my man. I AM including him in the wedding process, after all!
Here is what I want to start with for invitations. This, is a pocket fold invitation. Well, not the invitation itself, but what you put the invitation ON. When you first take it out of the envelope it is delivered in, it is a quaint little, well kinda a smaller envelope! You open that up and there printed right in the middle is a page attached to it that has the invitation itself on it. The basics invitation details/information-- who's giving the bride away, the names of the happy couple, the date, etc. Underneath the invitation part of the envelope is a smaller little pocket for you to put additional details in, such as the location of the wedding (address, city, state, name of location), RSVP card, and whatever else you can think of!
The site that I found this at, you can get 25 of these pocket fold invitation holder thingies for 20 bucks! That is a lot cheaper than what a wedding invitation would normally cost, that's for sure! Admittedly, you still need to pay for the invitation to put into the holder, but it can be a lot simpler now that you've got this; simple enough to make yourself.
This, my dears, is card stock. That's right, something you can buy in an office supply store. If you think about it, that's most of what a wedding invitation is made out of! That and some fancy text and maybe a design or two around the border. What it comes down to, though, is the paper. Paper is pretty cheap, even card stock paper. You can buy a huge amount of card stock for pretty cheap and add your own fancy writing to it for little to nothing. All you need to do is go to your local UPS store to get it all printed for you, and there you have an invitation. It may not be spectacular, so maybe add some ribbons to it or even do a photo invitation, but you don't need to spend hundreds of dollars on invitations to get something you like.
Really, you don't need to spend a lot to get great invitations. The fact of the matter is, the invitations aren't what make the wedding special, so you don't need to worry about them too much, and you certainly don't need to waste a bunch of your budget on something that most people will throw away after the wedding anyway. Find something nice, spend a reasonable amount on it, and be done with it and move on to the rest of your wedding planning!
Ooooor, if you don't want to make your own invites, ignore this entire post. If you have the funds and resources to buy pre-made invitations, go for it. If you don't have the time or energy to make your own, then by all means, do what you have time to do. If you want to make your own but can't (for lack of time or creative skills), then maybe have a friend design it for you!
Anyway, I hope this post was useful for the few of you that actually read this.
Until next time.
I personally prefer the second option and here's why: You save on postage. Yes, tacky, I know, postage stamps should not be on the top of my list of concerns. Really, though, if you are inviting a lot of people-- whether anywhere near all of them come or not-- it can get costly. Next, you save on envelopes and paper (the save the date cards themselves.) If you are not as concerned about saving the money, how about you use the money on the invitations themselves? Saving $100-200 on save the date cards can give you more freedom to buy nicer invitations. I, for one, would prefer nicer invitations.
I want to design my own invitations and put them together myself. Once again, going for more cost efficient. Yeah, I am willing to put in the extra effort to get EXACTLY what I want, and for a good price too! A typical wedding invitation's price can range anywhere from $1.50-$6.50. That's insane! Definitely a good reason to go for non-commercially made. I've already got some ideas of what I would like, now I just need to go over the ideas with my man. I AM including him in the wedding process, after all!
The site that I found this at, you can get 25 of these pocket fold invitation holder thingies for 20 bucks! That is a lot cheaper than what a wedding invitation would normally cost, that's for sure! Admittedly, you still need to pay for the invitation to put into the holder, but it can be a lot simpler now that you've got this; simple enough to make yourself.
Really, you don't need to spend a lot to get great invitations. The fact of the matter is, the invitations aren't what make the wedding special, so you don't need to worry about them too much, and you certainly don't need to waste a bunch of your budget on something that most people will throw away after the wedding anyway. Find something nice, spend a reasonable amount on it, and be done with it and move on to the rest of your wedding planning!
Ooooor, if you don't want to make your own invites, ignore this entire post. If you have the funds and resources to buy pre-made invitations, go for it. If you don't have the time or energy to make your own, then by all means, do what you have time to do. If you want to make your own but can't (for lack of time or creative skills), then maybe have a friend design it for you!
Anyway, I hope this post was useful for the few of you that actually read this.
Until next time.
Wednesday, December 12, 2012
Wedding Favors Can Be Fun!
A lot of people do typical and over-done party favors at their receptions like bubbles, or bags of Hershey's Kisses or something like that. Party favors can be something unique and not like favors at every other wedding.
First idea for a favor most people don't think of: M&Ms. Not JUST M&Ms though; personalized ones!. You can have one with your wedding date, the happy couple's names. It's something unique and fun that everyone will LOVE! It can be pricey, but if you want it and can afford it, then DO IT!
First idea for a favor most people don't think of: M&Ms. Not JUST M&Ms though; personalized ones!. You can have one with your wedding date, the happy couple's names. It's something unique and fun that everyone will LOVE! It can be pricey, but if you want it and can afford it, then DO IT!
Next idea! How about something bride and groom based? What would you think of wedding cookies.
Not just any wedding cookies, but bridal cookies. Cookies that are
designed to look like a bride and a groom. Set them all on a table, let
the girls choose the bride cookies and the guys choose the groom
cookies! It's a slightly cheaper alternative, if you can't afford the
M&Ms. Cute idea, popular at receptions. You will hear great things
from guests if you choose these!
Here's something else you could think about. This one isn't actually a favor, but it's something that can go along with a favor. Have you noticed that a lot of reception favors have ribbon tied around them? The top two wedding favors (boring candy and bubbles) almost always have ribbon. Well, what about printing wedding details on the ribbons. Have the date and names of the happy couple written across the length of each ribbon. It's something that is super cheap and something to be remembered.
So, there are a few ideas for interesting and not over-done wedding favors that everyone (including you) will love. Just keep in mind that it's more important to find something you will love and remember than what everyone else will love. It's YOUR special day, so if they don't love it, they'll fake it. ;-)
So,
Tuesday, December 11, 2012
A Stress-Free Day
So, last night the fiance and I went to the arcade in town. We went in with $7 on our card, traded 3500 tickets for $35 on our card. We played a Wheel of Fortune game for quite a while to kill time before he had to go to work. I love getting some fun time where we don't have to deal with anything. We had just two hours before he had to go to work, so two hours of fun. Just for us.
We're not gonna get much time alone anymore where we can just have fun. We need to take it in. We need to be happy with the time that we have. We need to be willing to do the work to get to our dream wedding and marriage. All work and no play? Well some play. But it will be worth it in the end. That one day is our light at the end of the tunnel.
I am going to be happy with the little fun we're gonna get between now and then, between all of the stress and planning. This is supposed to be a time of joy, after all!
We're not gonna get much time alone anymore where we can just have fun. We need to take it in. We need to be happy with the time that we have. We need to be willing to do the work to get to our dream wedding and marriage. All work and no play? Well some play. But it will be worth it in the end. That one day is our light at the end of the tunnel.
I am going to be happy with the little fun we're gonna get between now and then, between all of the stress and planning. This is supposed to be a time of joy, after all!
Sunday, December 9, 2012
The beginning of a journey
In all honesty, I started this blog because a friend suggested it. She's got a pretty cool blog with the same concept and I enjoy reading her posts. Anyway, I hope people like my posts like I like hers!
So anyway, here's what we've done so far:
Set a date-- Check!
Start a guest list-- Check!
Set a wedding and reception venue-- Check!
Make a budget-- Check!
Try on dresses-- Check!
Do everything else-- Unchecked
So planning a dream wedding, or a wedding you can afford (hopefully there is some overlap), is no so easy. I mean, every little girl had the picture in her head of what she wanted, but things change once you grow up. Things especially change once you are engaged. In fact, EVERYTHING changes. Suddenly nothing is as easy and your mind goes blank. Everything needs putting together and it's not the same puzzle as when you were a kid.
Lucky for me, my fiance is not like most. Most men would just leave all the work to the woman of the relationship, and I don't have a man like that. Though we may disagree on somethings, I prefer that to having no help at all. He actually told me he doesn't want me looking at too much wedding stuff without him because he is worried I will do too much without him! So that's cool that he really wants to be involved.
I waited for the moment I would get engaged for a loooong time. When it finally happened, I didn't know what to do next. I hadn't anticipated anything past that. So basically, I was at a roadblock. My brain started to hurt from trying to think of what to do. I was flustered. Do all brides go through that or was it just me?
So anyway, that's the beginning of it all. More to come soon, and I will fill you in as it happens. You can expect a new post soon!
So anyway, here's what we've done so far:
Set a date-- Check!
Start a guest list-- Check!
Set a wedding and reception venue-- Check!
Make a budget-- Check!
Try on dresses-- Check!
Do everything else-- Unchecked
So planning a dream wedding, or a wedding you can afford (hopefully there is some overlap), is no so easy. I mean, every little girl had the picture in her head of what she wanted, but things change once you grow up. Things especially change once you are engaged. In fact, EVERYTHING changes. Suddenly nothing is as easy and your mind goes blank. Everything needs putting together and it's not the same puzzle as when you were a kid.
Lucky for me, my fiance is not like most. Most men would just leave all the work to the woman of the relationship, and I don't have a man like that. Though we may disagree on somethings, I prefer that to having no help at all. He actually told me he doesn't want me looking at too much wedding stuff without him because he is worried I will do too much without him! So that's cool that he really wants to be involved.
I waited for the moment I would get engaged for a loooong time. When it finally happened, I didn't know what to do next. I hadn't anticipated anything past that. So basically, I was at a roadblock. My brain started to hurt from trying to think of what to do. I was flustered. Do all brides go through that or was it just me?
So anyway, that's the beginning of it all. More to come soon, and I will fill you in as it happens. You can expect a new post soon!
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