Problem Solved: Programs

I took my cardstock + pretty font idea one step further and added what basically boils down to fancy popsicle sticks to turn our programs into fans.



A pretty ribbon at the base of each and voila:


They aren't the most amazing programs ever or anything, but they are pretty and functional and, as is my motto these days, good enough!

Black tie not optional

Remember my compromise on ring dog? Well, I found the perfect attire for the pre-ceremony picture session:

How cute is that? My pups will be tres chic in black and white (white fur, black tie).

[from Terrier Tie Company on Etsy]

Problem Solved: Favors

Mmmmm, Dewar's chews. Dewar's was recently voted The Best Thing About Bakersfield, btw. I'm not making that up.

I went and bought 2 pounds of each of their five flavors (peanut butter, peppermint, almond, caramel and chocolate almond).


My good friend Archie helped me keep an eye on the candy while I sorted, bagged and tied.


I tied each bag up with a ribbon and placed them all in a basket for people to pick up on their way out. It was a fun project but took about three hours from start to finish. Definitely a good thing to do with a movie on.

I want to do a little sign to let people know we appreciated having them be a part of our special day - are there any good "we love you, take a favor" rhymes out there? I just can't resist my last opportunity to do something cute.

Stressful Wedding Things: Favors

ARRRRR. Seriously? I have to do this? Fine. It's gotta be candy. I've been to my fair share of weddings and I don't even remember what the favors were. But the one that sticks out in my mind is my friend's wedding where each guest got an individually wrapped Smith's heart cookie - both yummy and thematically appropriate.

I want my favors to be both edible and local, so I can support local business and give people a taste (literally) of Bakersfield. Right now I'm thinking a handful of Dewar's chews, wrapped with a ribbon. Something along the lines of the picture on the right:

[I'm being a bad blogger right now because I saved this image a long time ago and can't figure out where I got it from. If this is from your blog and/or wedding, hats off to you for coming up with a great favor idea!]

Problem Solved: Photographer

continued from yesterday...

One of the things I noticed during my search is that photographers I liked all seemed to have blogs alongside their "regular" website. The blogs were a little more personal and showcased a wider variety of photo shoots.

On a whim, I went to Google Blog Search and typed in "Bakersfield", "photography" and "wedding". Which eventually led me to this amazing videography site where I found, on the blogroll, the fantastic Ellie Grover.

In looking through Ellie's pictures, I recognized a ton of familiar faces. People I had gone to school and church with my entire life. And I later came to find out that Ellie and I had gone to the same church growing up, although our paths had never crossed. It was meant to be!

I contacted her and booked her right away for our wedding date. We had our engagement session just this past weekend and it was AH. MAY. ZING. Ellie is such a sweet and talented person and a very soothing presence to be around, which will be a major plus on our wedding day.

I can't wait to see how our engagement pictures turn out and I know we will treasure our wedding pictures for the rest of our lives. Problem solved!

Escort cards: fly me to the moon...

Aaaah, paper. I love it. I found these on the clearance table at Kelly Paper. Two different shades of pink and two of orange - perfect. Since they were standard size, I cut them in half and started to fold my mini planes.

Aren't they cute?? I don't know why I didn't think of this earlier. I really did like the lollipop idea, but this is much more practical and much less expensive. And I need to save $$$ whenever and wherever I can.

Once all the RSVPs are in and I finalize my seating chart, I'll write each guest's name and table (named after airports) on one of the wings. They'll be laid out on a table for guests to pick up on their way into the backyard - er - venue.

Cupcakes!

In addition to the actual wedding cake, I knew all along that I wanted cupcakes. I LOVE cupcakes.


Mmmmm. Doesn't that make your mouth water? Who doesn't enjoy a great cupcake? And one of FH's nicknames for me is Cupcake, so it has a nice thematic touch to it as well.

If we were getting married in LA, we'd be paying $4 a cupcake for major taste but also major attitude. Seriously, people. I used to frequent a cupcake store that shall remained unnamed where the workers would scream at you if you left the door ajar (fresh air dries out cupcakes, apparently.)

Cupcake stores are everywhere you look around here. But Bakersfield, not so much. I did some research and found some good options that my Mom, sister and I promptly proceeded to visit. There's not much we won't undertake for this wedding.

One store didn't have any cupcakes in stock when we visited. "You should have called ahead!" she told us. Um, aren't you a cupcake store? Shouldn't you keep some cupcakes on hand then??

Another store was, well, flat out rude. No thank you. If I wanted cupcakes + rude, I could have just stayed in LA.

Then someone suggested Sweet Surrender. Not only was it the most adorable store ever, they were super helpful and had great cupcakes on top of that. We tested nine (yes, nine!) different flavors last weekend and they were all fantastic. I'll be placing my order with them shortly and I'm thinking of something like this to give it all an elegant little oomph:

[find them at buttercreambee]

The invite's in the mail. No, really.

Whew! The invites are officially in the mail and on their way as of yesterday.

A special shoutout to my little brother for the incredible design and his magic work with getting the printer to work when no one else could (it might have something to do with the dinosaur noises, but who knows?) and to his girlfriend, for staying up until one in the morning with me, sorting, stuffing and stamping away.

Here is our little assembly line:


And the stamps on the RSVP envelope turned out great:

I always see "invite cost breakdowns" on other wedding sites, so I just thought I would recap the total cost per invite ...

Invites - 40 per box at $25/box =
$0.62 per invite (outer envelope, invite, invite sleeve, RSVP card and RSVP envelope)

+

Printing - free, although after a lot of stress and dinosaur noises (don't ask)

+

Postage - $0.42 for the outer envelope + $0.44 for the RSVP envelope =
$0.86 (that means that my postage expense was more the the actual invitations themselves...)

=

Total per invite: $1.48
(!!!!!!!!!)

Invitation Postage

My stamps have arrived! Yes, it's the little things that keep me excited around here.

You probably already know, but just a word of advice for all of you early summer brides out there: the cost of sending a first class envelope will go up two cents (from 0.42 to 0.44) on May 11. Learn more about it here.

Since May 11 is a good two weeks before my RSVP deadline and I can't bear the thought of using the "forever" stamp (c'mon Post Office, if you wanted us to use a stamp for forever, you should have made it more attractive!), I've decided to put two stamps (totaling 0.44) on my RSVP envelopes. That will cover anyone who decides to mail their RSVP back after May 11, while also still looking pretty.

These:

with

I think the flowers with the coffeepot (I actually thought it was a teapot when I was purchasing them, but whatever) is really going to look cute against the bright green of our envelopes.

And I'll be using these on our outer envelope (I didn't care for the standard wedding stamp that they have right now - a little too flowery for my taste):
The blurb on the USPS website says: "Entitled All Heart, the design focuses on a large, bright red heart that is transporting its owner to an unseen beloved who will be gifted with this heart full of love."

Awwwww. Who can resist that?

Problem Solved: Cake

My wonderful fabulous cousin (who I am still in awe of, as when I was young, because she can french-braid her own hair - how awesome is that??) bakes wedding cakes as a side business. When I first got engaged, I asked her if she would make our cake for us, if she was able to make the trip out. I just found out that she will be able to come out for the wedding and I couldn't be more excited.

It's also perfect, since one of my goals was to incorporate people we knew and love and the fantastic skills they possess into our wedding day. FH's gregarious older brother is going to be our officiant, his talented niece is going to play our ceremony music, and my insanely creative little brother is designing our wedding invitations.

But back to cake. We still have to talk it over but I'm thinking yumminess is way more important that a big fancy cake. I like the simplicity of this:

[from The Knot via The Pissed Off Bride]

Problem Solved: The Dress

Finally, after much laying around on the couch and flipping through wedding magazines and obsessing over THE dress, I looked it up on CSIS's website. I never would have picked it out in a million years based on the picture and styling they used online. But I'm glad I looked it up, because it was fifty dollars cheaper than the store price, which had already been marked down. Sign me up for that!

To recap, not only did I buy my dress from a fairly ridiculous place that represents the wedding industry that I have come to loathe, I bought it from their website. And I love it. I can't wait to turn the corner and have FH see me for the very first time.

I don't dare post a picture, or even a picture of something similar, since FH reads this blog. But here's what it doesn't look like:

Done and done

FH was in town for the weekend and we got a ton of stuff done, including:



Wedding bands!

FH's band is very simple and modern and for mine (not pictured), we are going to use the ring that FH got for me a few years ago. When we first looked at engagement rings, our jeweler told me that my ring really didn't need a band. The ring is so beautiful and has so much going on that a band would just take away from that. So I will use the old ring (polished and resized for my ring finger) for the ceremony and for times when I want to be more low key. Which won't be often, since I can't bear to be without my gorgeous ring!

Problem Solved: Flower Girl Attire

I was a little worried about flower girl dresses - they all seem so poofy and ridiculous and trying-too-hard-ish - I mean, these are little girls we are talking about here, not reality show contestants in the making.

But then I stumbled across this gem at the one and only Tarzhay...


Isn't it cute? Very summery and it definitely fits my criteria of being re-wearable - I don't want anyone in my wedding party to buy something they will never wear again.

My flower girl is the cutest thing ever so I know it will look fantastic and it will look fabulous with the dresses my bridesmaids will be wearing (more on those tomorrow).

DIY: Escort Cards

This one, I'm beyond excited about.

I think I've mentioned before that I'm a book nerd. My love of books is going to be reflected in our centerpieces (more on those tomorrow). But since FH is a plane fanatic and private pilot I'm also trying to work in the plane angle as much as possible. Books and planes are a valid wedding theme, right???

So imagine my excitement when I found these at online superstore Candy Warehouse:



I like the idea of keeping all giveaways (favors, etc) edible and thus, practical. Because really, who doesn't like candy? I'm thinking I'll use these as escort cards, a la the beautiful display from this wedding featured on the First Comes Love wedding blog :


I've gotten less than enthusiastic feedback on my idea, but I think I can make it work. I want our wedding to be FUN and I have confidence that I can transform brightly colored airplane lollipops from potentially tacky to very classy.

Problem Solved: Invitations

One thing I was determined to DIY was our wedding invitations. I'm no Martha Stewart, but invites seemed like a good project to tackle. But then I started looking at paper and custom stamps and cool envelopes and special pens and free cool fonts and well, it was all a little overwhelming.

Then I made things even worse by sending away for tons of invitation catalogs and drooling over specialty letterpress websites and fantasized about having tons of money to spend on gorgeous invites.

And then, I found a compromise.


Thank you, Michaels! Their partnership with BRIDES Magazine has resulted in an entire line of DIY invitation kits that are seriously gorgeous.

A box of 40 invitations (containing outer envelopes, invitations, invitation "sleeves", RSVP cards and RSVP envelopes) cost me $25. The regular price was $40/box but if you can't find a Michael's 40% coupon online, you aren't trying hard enough.

I loved this design and miraculously the FH did, too. (He has strong opinions about surprising things). This particular invitation set definitely evoke the casual yet elegant garden wedding theme I seem to have going on.

Each box comes with information on downloading templates for printing and a little booklet about wording choices and invite etiquette. I did some printing tests yesterday and I'm really happy with how they turned out. Now I just have to finish printing (with input on font selection from my fabulously talented little brother) and send them out!

Problem Solved: Venue

Since my Mom lives in the city where FH and I will be getting married, she has ended up as my de facto coordinator, doing all of the things that I can't do from afar, like visiting venues and talking to vendors (thanks, Mom!)

The very same afternoon she went to check out a potential venue for me, she ended up running into a good friend and neighbor who lives two doors down. Said friend asked how the wedding planning was going and my Mom explained how stressful finding a venue had been and that really, all I wanted was to get married in the backyard.

"She can use our backyard!" was the response. "We'd love to offer it!"

When my Mom called that night to tell me, I was in near tears. I had been so stressed and worried and this was such a breakthrough. Now I can move forward with planning and know that I am going to get married two doors down from where I grew up, in a place that I know well, surrounded by people that love me and FH. It is literally a dream come true.

So now, instead of daydreaming about a chic city hall affair, I'm keeping busy looking for backyard wedding inspiration - and there are a million great ideas out there. Right now, I'm thinking casual elegance. Sounds like a contradiction, but I think I can pull it off. I'm thinking somewhere on the spectrum between this and this.