Christa Getting Married: June 2012

Friday, June 29, 2012

Wedding Photo Friday: Fun Themes

Happy Friday!!!

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Christa

Thursday, June 28, 2012

Planning Goals for This Week and Bridal Shows

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Last week my planning goals were to get organized and to figure out my engagement party plans. My organization is so far on point but my engagement party plans are still in progress. I have also added two more reception venue appointments to my list for our visit to Chicago. Needless to say my schedule is now packed, but I am excited none the less. I can not wait to share the photos of the venues. 2 more weeks!!

This week I did not set any planning goals. Being a mom to a small child, and a student I've come to realize that maybe weekly goals are too demanding. My schedule is pretty tight as it is, so I'm going to set my wedding planning goals for every two weeks. The hard part in doing this is that I will probably struggle with adding more things to my list since I feel I have more time to my goal deadline. I know myself way too well.

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On another note, I've been looking into going to some bridal shows and expos. Of course I'll be attending one in Chicago, but will also go to one in Atlanta so that my bestie can come along with me. HERE are date, times and locations for the Chicago Bridal Expo and HERE are date, times and locations for the Great Bridal Expo. The Great Bridal Expo travels but I will be attending the one in ATL. Be sure to check out these sites!

Of course I will have pictures! Let me know if you'll be attending as well.
Christa

Monday, June 25, 2012

Engagement Party 101

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Hey hey hey guys,

If you've been following, you know that I've been having a small issue with an engagement party idea and how to even go about planning. My wonderful best friend/ maid of honor has been researching and helping me and so I think we have come up with an idea. Of course I'm not going to say too much about it until we get closer to the date. Any who, I'm sure a lot of engaged couples have been going through the same struggle as I am so I want to share something that helped me.

Theknot.com has been one of my go to websites for all of my wedding questions. Anything from etiquette to where to go for honeymoons is on this site. If you have not subscribed to this site (free), do so!

Here are five tips from an article on theknot.com about engagement 101. I am not a rule following type of girl but I do like to read and see what the "rules" are. For each bullet, I'll tell you my opinion based on my ideas for my party. These are great tips to help get you started.

Give the Couple Room to Breath- I'm not going for tradition here so most likely my fiance' and I will be throwing our own engagement party. It's tradition for the brides family to host the party but all of my family lives 6+ hours away so that will be hard. To include everyone from both sides and friends, I believe that meeting in NC will be better for all. Plus the wedding will be in Chicago so my family has the favor for the wedding. SN- my fiance's family is here in NC and in Georgia.

Find Out the Size of the Wedding- My wedding size as of now is average. I do not have an official count for you guys because we are still making a list but stay tuned. But in this, everyone who is invited to the engagement party will be invited to the wedding.

Consider What Will Make the In-Laws More Comfortable- I will make sure everyone is comfortable including myself. I sometimes forget to make sure I'm happy because I'm always so worried about everyone else's happiness.

Suggest That the Couple Register Before Hand- I've definitely decided that I will not be registering for gifts for my engagement party. I will however be asking for something else. Stay tuned for this.

Remind Yourself That There is Still a Wedding to Throw- I love this point. Don't splurge on the engagement party because you're definitely going to splurge on your wedding. This is why I will be going for something very simple, fun and family oriented. This is a way for both sides of the family to officially meet before the wedding.

I suggest you view this article in full HERE. What do you think? Send me pics of your engagement party and I'll post them. I'll be posting the details of my engagement party soon so stay tuned.

Friday, June 22, 2012

Wedding Photo Friday: Fine, Classic, Vintage

Some inspiration for your weekend. Enjoy!! I did!

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Any favorites?

Christa

Wednesday, June 20, 2012

Wedding Binder Organization

My temporary wedding binder and all of the accessories that I bought to organize the binder with have been sitting in a corner of my home for about two weeks. I've been putting off this process due to the fact that I hate organizing but I love the idea. Yesterday I finally "started".

All that fills this binder currently are a couple of notebooks, dividers, sheet protectors, a sticky note pad and a letter from my church. I have a long way to go

I gathered some ideas from blogs and of course my trusty go to site YOUTUBE. I found so many helpful tips but the one I was inspired by the most was from The Plunge Project: How to Build Your Wedding Binder. I will not ramble any longer. Below are some helpful tips I found. Happy organizing!!

From Nicole of The Plunge Project:

Staying organized when planning your wedding can be tough, and unless you’ve hired a wedding planner to plan your big day from start to finish, one item you’re going to need is a wedding binder. After all, how else are you going to keep track of your to do lists, inspiration, the mass amounts of vendors you’ve talked to, etc, etc.?!

Of course, there are places that sell them pre-made, but I didn’t feel like those really suited me. Plus, with all the free resources available to us online, there’s no reason you can’t make a great wedding planning binder yourself (for a fraction of the cost).

To start, you’ll need a binder of course. I started with a 1″ spine but quickly had to upgrade to a 2″ spine (and I’m about bursting at the seams on that size too). Really, it depends how big a wedding your planning to have and how many details you need to figure out. To be safe, I’d go with at least a 2″ spine.

You’ll also need:

Dividers — I used 2 packs of 5 dividers, so 10 total. I also made sure to select the ones with pockets, as you’ll need those as well for smaller items like business cards, coupons, etc.
Sheet Protectors — I found it easier to just put pages in clear sheet protectors instead of hole-punching them. These usually come in pretty large packs of 100 or so, so one pack should be all you need.

Now the sections you divide the binder up into are completely up to you. However, mine is divided up like this:

The Basics — This is where my color swatches, time lines, checklists, and vendor contact list lives. The Knot has a great master checklist you can use here.
Inspiration — Every time I find an image that inspires me online or in a magazine, I clip/print it and place it here, in style board form. It’s really nice to have one place where you can start to form your vision.
Bridal Party Attire — This is where I keep the receipt for my dress and accessories, along with all the details of the ‘maids dresses and the guy’s tuxes, including quotes and coupons from multiple tux rental places. If you haven’t found a dress yet, this is a good place to store photos of ones you like.
Ceremony & Reception Venue — Since I’m having everything in one place, this is just one tab for me. However, some of you might want to split this one up as you need to. This is where I keep the floor plan, contracts and details, and the menu for my big day. Catering was required to come from the venue itself, so that why I included that here. Some of you will need a separate tab for all your caterer options as well.
Rentals and Decor — This is where my linen and rental quotes live. Once I commit to a certain vendor, I’ll remove the other quotes and make this a place for receipts and other related information.
Flowers — Pretty self explanatory, this is where my many floral quotes are housed, along with a few images of flowers I like. Once I commit to a certain vendor, I’ll remove the other quotes and make this a place for receipts and other related information.
Photography — This is where I keep my signed contract, along with all of my photographer’s pricing and information. She mentioned that her pricing might eventually go up, but if I can produce these sheets, my pricing will remain static, so these sheets are good to have.
Entertainment — This is where I kept the many brochures from DJs, bands, etc. that I received. More recently, it’s been replaced with a signed DJ contract and an ongoing list of songs on our must-play list.
Guests — This is where I keep information on the room block, seating, favors, etc. Since I’m still over 5 months out, I don’t have much in this section yet.
Honeymoon — Hotel accommodations, flight schedules, activities, etc. – those will live here when we get our honeymoon booked.

Then, I keep random things: magazines, post-its, etc. in the front binder pocket as well.

Of course, wedding binders aren’t one size fits all, so use mine as more of a starting point than anything else. Choose which categories you need, and assemble the sections in order of importance to you.

What other types of information can be stored in your wedding binder?

Sample invites, programs, etc.
Registry print-outs
A list of gifts you’ve already received and thank you cards that have already been sent
Bridal party contact information
Rehearsal dinner details
Payment schedules
A list of favorite wedding websites/resources – including The Plunge Project, of course ;)

Really, you can include anything you need! I personally house a lot of my spreadsheets (budget, payment schedules, etc.) on the computer because I constantly update them. However, it’s sometimes nice to be able to look at a printout of it all.

A few final tips to keep your binder updated, ensuring it’s as useful as possible:

If you’re doing some of your planning on the computer like me, print a new copy of everything as soon as you update it and replace the old copy. That way, you’ll always have the most recent and relevant information at your fingertips.
Place new proposals, receipts, contracts, etc. in your binder as soon as you have them to ensure everything remains in one place. There’s nothing worse than loosing something important!
Sort your binder once a month to get rid of any information that isn’t relevant to your wedding anymore. For instance, if you have information for 5 photographers, throw the information for 4 away when you sign a contract with one. There’s no need to keep everything if you don’t need it all! Otherwise, you’ll end up with a 4″ thick binder ;)

Here's LovetheYesGirls, a great video explanation of a different approach to organizing your wedding binder.

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Did you have a wedding binder? If so, send pics and tell me how you organized. I will post some. I'll keep you updated on my binder journey...I'm excited to see how big my binder gets.

Christa

Monday, June 18, 2012

Planning Goals This Week

Last week my one goal was to set appointments to see reception venues in Chicago for this coming July. I can happily say that I have accomplished this goal...well for the most part. I have one more venue appointment to set because I came across this venue at the last minute. I'll only be in Chicago for a week so I'm not trying to over book my schedule too much. I also set an appointment for a dress fitting. I know exactly what dress I want. In all my excitement that this particular Chicago wedding dress boutique has the dress, I couldn't help myself (In my mind, it is way too early to be going on dress fittings).

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So this weeks goal (s):

Get organized- creating my wedding binder is of high importance! Then organizing my email making a folder just for wedding information. I've already gotten confused with all of the venue emails I have gotten. SN- Get beautiful, personalized wedding binders from zazzle.com.
Engagement Party- Well I'm still in the process of deciding if I want an engagement party or not. What do you guys think? Also my bestie has been asking me. If I decide yes, then I will work on the details with her. Who, what, when, where and how?

I have 5 to 7 days to achieve these goals plus continue with my everyday schedule. We'll see what happens and of course I will keep you guys updated.

Christa