Welcome one and all. My name is Jessie and this is my blog that details the planning process of my wedding. I’m mostly doing this for myself so that I have something to look back on when I forget things (or when I feel nostalgic), but I figured that others might be able to use some of the info I found.
I’ll try to keep the posts somewhat organized (for my sake mostly) so hopefully info is easy to find.
Sit back, enjoy your stay and happy planning!
Well seeing as I haven’t posted anything related to my wedding since August, I suppose it’s time for a bit of an update. Where do I even start? Well…
Dress: A beautiful Alfred Angelo in ivory with some bits of claret, ordered from Chris & Tina’s Bridal Boutique
Cake: designed & to be made by my cousin/bridesmaid
Photographer: Getting prepped for the engagement session later this month – Andy King Fine Art Weddings (or his blog since his website isn’t up and running yet)
DJ: booked – StudioTwentyFive (Rosewater’s house DJ company)
Invitations: Printed out and ready to give out/mail. They’re beautiful, but they were a bit more of a hassle than they needed to be. I bought them from Michaels and wrote a small review about my experience with them here. It’s the one titled “Beautiful, but needs better quality control”.
Flowers: Ordered & deposit put down. I decided to go with Peony Room because she does beautiful bouquets & arrangements for affordable prices…and she also does hair/make up for an affordable price.
Centerpieces: We decided not to go with flower centerpieces, and to make them ourselves. They will involve paper lanterns of some sort, but we’re still experimenting with what we want.
Wedding Coordinator: I wasn’t originally going to go with a wedding coordinator because we didn’t have the budget for it, but then my sister sent me a Team Buy to purchase event coordination services from Ell’Events for $99!!! It’s normally $1000 to book them for those services. How could I turn that down? So I booked a coordinator for the day of to make sure I’m not trying to put together centerpieces in my wedding dress or something.
Bridesmaid Dresses: I had an idea of what I wanted, but I didn’t want to put my bridesmaids in something they wouldn’t like. So we went back to Chris & Tina’s to go through the Alfred Angelo rack. At first they each had a different dress picked out, but in the same colour (to match the claret on my dress), but then in the end they ended up getting the same dress. Either way, it works for me because they’ll look awesome.
I think that’s most of the major stuff I have planned so far. David and I went to the National Bridal Show this past weekend to get some freebees, and to see if we were maybe forgetting anything. Seems like we’re pretty on track so far. We managed to set up a few gift registries and get some coupons for the guys’ suits.
My favourite part of the show (other than cake samples)? Meeting Jane Dayus-Hinch!
Still lots to do, but I have reading week later in February. We’ll be taking care of a lot of things during that week:
- Suit rentals
- Gift registry
- Wedding party dinner (so everyone can meet each other finally)
- Shopping for shoes to go with my dress
- Engagement session with Andy
- Probably a whole lot of other stuff I can’t think of right now.
I swear I’ll update more often!
130 days!!
I swear I haven’t forgotten about this blog. I promise I’ll blog something this week.
Until then, here’s a beautiful wedding video:
http://joannagoddard.blogspot.com/2011/01/wedding-video.html
A lot has been happening, but I haven’t had much time to sit down and write it out. However, I just wanted to share something that I found while looking for wedding cake ideas. I’m sure sushi/sashimi/Japan lovers will appreciate this.
We’re slowly beginning to cross things off the wedding list which, despite that meaning money is going to start disappearing, it’s nice to finally start getting things done.
From feeling like a bride…
I think I managed to jump over my first hurdle though, and that’s my dress! I know I wanted to find a dress this month (allows time for the dress to be made & altered), but I also knew I didn’t want to check out too many stores. Knowing me, I’d become too indecisive if I had too many choices.
My two major wants: a strapless dress with red somewhere on it
EDIT: Well it looks like it was a good idea that I didn’t go with the dress at San Jude’s Bridal. Check out the comments for this post to see why, or google San Jude’s, Sherwood Bridal, Lucia’s Bridal or Bridal Wardrobe.
The first store I checked out was San Jude’s Bridal in Ajax. It’s a nice store/house that allows walk-ins. She has a nice selection of dresses and does alterations on-site. She also carries Bridalane dresses, which caters to plus-sized girls. I tried on four dresses and fell in love with two while I was there, which was then narrowed down to one when I got home. I was almost decided on one dress, but my mother wanted me to check out a couple other stores first.
The second store I checked out was Your Special Occasion also in Ajax. They specialize in more than just bridal, and they’re a dealer for Weddingstar. Unfortunately the only have a small samples collection, although you can order a dress out of a catalogue if you really want it. I find it hard ordering a dress without seeing it on me though. Sadly, I didn’t get to try anything on, but I’ll probably head back there if I end up ordering from Weddingstar again.
The third store I went to was Chris and Tina’s at Parkway Mall in Toronto. This is actually where my sister bought her wedding dress, so I went there on her suggestion. They are extremely helpful, and they have a really good eye for what looks good on a girl. I tried on four dresses and fell completely in love with the first dress I tried on. Absolutely beautiful and everything I wanted, and my parents agreed. My dress ended up being $300 cheaper (including alterations) than the dress I tried on and almost bought at San Jude’s, and because of a promotion going on, I got a free headpiece and garter! I’ll be back there in December to do some measurements to actually order the dress, and shop for bridesmaids dresses with my girls. This place is a must-see if you are around the GTA. They also take walk-ins, but appointments are recommended for busier times. I walked in, but it was also a Thursday morning.
…to becoming bridezilla
We are in the middle of shopping for a florist. We’ve done some online research and we have some places we want to check out, but there is a florist near David’s house so we decided to go see what she had to offer. I didn’t like it.
Most brides and a lot of grooms (especially when you’re marrying an artist like I am) have a vision when it comes to flowers, and an important trait that a florist should have is the ability to openly listen to what a bride and groom have in mind. Not so much the case here.]
She asked what my colours were and what kind of flowers I wanted. Before even asking how much we’re willing to spend, she told me that what we wanted was too expensive for us and started telling us what flowers we should have instead. After a while I couldn’t even say anything because she started telling us what her vision was instead. My favourite part? Two of her “suggestions” (read: telling us what to do) were flowers that I do not like whatsoever…”but they’re affordable so you should go with these” – again before she even asked us what our budget was. By the end, she never did ask us what our budget was, but she did imply that we weren’t ready/or could afford to sit down and put down a deposit with her if that’s what we were planning on doing.
I was a little irritated by the time we left the store (although not openly, I can’t be a bitch to people unless they’ve been huge bitches to me), but I was definitely ranting when we got to the car. Needless to say, we’re still shopping around. I think I’m going to e-mail a couple of places that were suggested on the Babbling Brides forum to see what they have to offer.
On a different note, I think we almost have a photographer! Sweet.
I’m finally back in Canada and ready to start some planning! Both fortunately and unfortunately I have to do a lot of the planning this month while I have a million other things to do. Isn’t that how it always is though?
Wedding goals for this month:
On the plus side, we managed to start shopping and we got some things done…and under budget!
We went to Michaels and bought our invitations, thank you cards, and some save the date cards for friends outside of Ontario. The whole thing came to under $300, which is good considering I think I budgeted for $300 for the invitations alone. Do it yourself invitations = awesome. My sister used them (and I had the “pleasure” of putting them all together myself) and they were cheap and pretty so I thought I’d do the same.
I don’t want to spoil the surprise, so here’s a taste of what I got.
Invitations – They’re only black and white, but our colours are black, white and red, so we’re going to add a touch of red to them in the end. This photo is quite spoilerific, isn’t it?
Save the date cards – Clearly the sample that comes with the kit. Unless our names changed while I wasn’t looking.
Thank you cards
And I started dress shopping yesterday! So exciting! And a little tiring. Obviously I’m not going to be posting pics of those, but I just had to share my excitement in that. I think I might have found “the one” but I’m going to a couple more stores in the next couple days just to compare prices and make sure that it’s what I want.
I think I’ve posted enough for one day, but I thought I’d share a couple links that I’ve been using for ideas.
Frugal Bride
A website that my sister and cousin both used for affordable wedding ideas.
Wedding Star
An online shop with cool ceremony & reception related things. Some things are cheap, while some things are not, but it’s also a good place for ideas.
I knew picking the venue was going to be difficult. Venues are typically booked at least a year in advance, but I’ve heard around the grapevine that some people choose to book a place a year and a half in advance. My problem? I’m in Japan until the end of July 2010, and the date we picked is June 11, 2011. Definitely not enough time to have a large enough selection of venues to pick from. I basically had to rely on websites, reviews, David, and memories of Rich Bride, Poor Bride and I Do, Let’s Eat (both of which I, sadly, cannot watch in Japan).
At first, we thought our families would be happiest with a buffet dinner reception, so we went looking for venues that cater to or allow that. We were wrong. One family didn’t care either way if the reception was sit-down or buffet, but the other family insisted that it be a sit-down dinner. This discussion happened a two months after constantly searching through websites and menus to find a decent buffet-friendly venue. So we scrapped everything and started from scratch.
The first place that got my attention (even while we were searching for a buffet-friendly place) was the Rosewater Room. It is owned by Liberty Group whose venues (not including the Rosewater Room) have been featured on the above TV shows. It seemed just a little too expensive for us.
After searching through at least 100 different venues and their menu options, and sending e-mails back and forth for information (I wish more venues would post at least a sample of prices on their websites), I found myself always going back to the Rosewater Room website. The venue looks absolutely beautiful, it has good reviews, and they offered more food options than most other venues. It was love at first (multiple?) sight. So David and a friend of his decided to go check it out in person. I really wish I could have gone to see it myself, but David’s friend was so helpful in taking videos for me and asking questions that David and I didn’t think of.
The place is beautiful. There are square tables instead of round tables, which I think is cool. The decor in the venue itself is nice enough that we won’t need much else to make the place look nice. No cheesy banquet hall decor at all. They have wedding packages with set menus, but there are a lot of other options and add ons as well.
There was supposedly another couple interested in the same date – who knows if that’s true, or if they just want a deposit asap – so some quick discussions and a couple of days later, we dropped a deposit and secured the place for the reception.
*insert excitement here*
You know, my fiancé, David, and I used to joke around about our wedding having 500 guests because our families are fairly large. 500 was obviously an exaggeration – we’re not Italian…joke! – but when it came down to writing out a list and counting heads, the number turned out to be a lot larger than we had planned. After including family, friends, extended family, family friends, and people who we have never met but our parents wanted them there, our list was well over 150 people. Considering the budget we had in mind, that was way too many people.
The hardest part was compromising with our family over who to include on the guestlist and who to not include. I think we were going back and forth over a few people for a good couple weeks. Our families are already helping us pay for the wedding, and some members were offering to pay extra just to have people they wanted there. As nice as that is, our families don’t have a lot of money and we didn’t want to have to add that extra money on for them even if they offered to pay for it. The money we are getting from our families is a lot as it is.
Finally, we decided to put our foots (feet sounds funny) down. Sacrifices and compromises were made, and in the end we decided that we would only invite family – only up until first cousins, and our mutual friends. Family friends and extended family had to be cut, we managed to narrow it down it just under 110 people, with room to add a few extra people if needed. It may not sound like that big of a deal to some, but I’m sure there are brides out there who can relate to guestlist horrors.
The final guestlist, for the most part, is done. I thought it would take a couple days to complete. I think finalizing it actually took 3 weeks.
And this was just the beginning of the planning process…
Over three months since my last post. Whoops. There’s a reason for that though. I am currently living in Japan. My fiancé (still sounds weird to me to say that) lives in Canada, where our wedding will take place. I’m only in Japan for 10 months (less than 2 months to go!), but until I’m back in Canada, it’s a little hard to do the majority of the planning.
What have we taken care of so far?
1. The guest list
2. The venue
3. The budget
I was going to cover those in this post, but I like to blabber on and on, so I should probably break it up into separate posts.
