Wedding planning/advice
 

I am in the process of planning my wedding, which is in June and I am just wondering who else is in the planning stages and what advice or tips, resources anyone is finding helpful. A lot of my stuff is planned, so now it is down to pretty much what everything will look like, centerpieces, flower girl dress/basket, sign in table, gift table, favors, where I should get my shower gift book, etc. So the dress, bridesmaids dresses, church, reception, caterer, photographer, honeymoon, rings, etc. have already been taken care of. So now that you know where I am at, fire away!

I wish I could help you, hon, but I really look forward to hearing about your plans as the ball gets rolling. Maybe you should ask Hootie, SisterPlum, and the others who are (or recently have been) planning their wedding too. Good luck and keep us updated! ;)

Check out alt.wedding and soc.couples.wedding I did a lot of lurking there when planning my wedding. You've got the big things down... don't sweat the details.

Don't forget the invitations, reply cards, and program. For my wedding, I bought some great stationery at an arts and crafts supply store, designed them myself, and printed them on my laser printer, and they looked very professional :) For the envelopes, I did the calligraphy by hand.

I'm getting married, though not for another almost-two-years. I have lots of advice though:

1) Buy a copy of Bridal Bargains by Denise and Alan Fields. It's an amazing book, lots of great money-saving tips, which I need badly!!

2) Before you buy all those tchockes, ask yourself "Will I use them after the wedding?" Fi and I are not having a guest book, favors, cake topper (we're putting flowers on the cake instead) or any of that, we feel it's just money wasted, and we are paying for the wedding ourselves. See if family members have things to loan you. We're using his parents' silver toasting glasses...money saved AND it's sentimental.

3) Flowers: I've heard a lot of good things about freshroses.com. Perhaps you will want to look at them.

4) DO NOT skimp on photography.

5) Join The Knot.

Congrats on getting married! PM me if you need any advice, or just to share bridal stuff.

I've got the not skimping on photography thing taken care of...He is very good and very NOT cheap. Our engagement pics turned out great and I love the guy's personality. Pictures are extremely important to me, especially since I am not having a videographer.

They way I picked my dress is indicative of my personality. I had been trying on dresses and I was extremely frustrated. My mom and I had fought about it. She hated everything I picked. I wanted to BURN everything she picked, it was pointless! Then one afternoon I decided to skip band rehearsal because I got this charge of shopping inspiration and my mom and I headed out on an impromptu dress search. I found two dresses that I liked parts of, but not the whole thing. So, in keeping with my indecisive and hard to please nature, I said to my mom "I want the top of that dress I just tried on and the skirt from the one I am wearing." She laughed and said "Yeah right, like we are just going to buy 2 dresses and cut them in half..." and then the alteration lady says "I can do that". Lucky me! So we bought the one with the skirt I like and she has ordered the stuff to make the top look like the other dress. She is cutting the top off of the one I bought and giving it to me so that I can have it made into a purse or use it as material for the flowergirl basket. So she is completely rebuilding a top to the dress. Yea!

enough sharing for now :)

Oh wow, I didnt know they could do that! That is really cool though, congrats on finding a dress, been through enough weddings to know that is almost the hardest part!!!!

Hey! I recently got married (October 20) and the best advice I can give you is to check out things online. The Knot (http://www.theknot.com) and Ultimate Wedding (http://www.ultimatewedding.com) are great resources! Also, if you're interested, there is this great message board of brides that I used (and still use today...just cause the girls are so great, I love chatting with them) at http://www.frugalbride.com . The site is a Canadian brides site..but there are about 20 or so Americans who just came onto the site to get/share ideas! That's where I got my ideas for a lot of wedding things!
I'd agree with not skimping on a photographer (esp. since you said you're not getting a videographer). Personally I'd also put a vote in for thinking about a videographer....or even having a friend videotape it or something! My wedding video is the greatest thing I have.....it shows things I missed, things that pictures never would have caught....like how I looked every second during the vows. I will treasure it always! Actually, if you'd like I have my wedding video trailer (a 5 min piece) online and if you PM me, I can send you the link!
Feel free to PM/email me anytime with wedding questions, I'd love to help!!!:) And good luck with your wedding planning....it's a lot of fun!!!!!:D

bride maid's dresses
 

I was in a wedding for one of my best friends this past summer. We got our bridesmaids dresses from J.C. Penny's bridal catolouge. The service was great, they came in less than a week from when we ordered them, they were gorgeous and cost only $130 including shipping. The only thing to keep in mind is that formal dresses run a size or 2 smaller than regular dresses and I think the largest they carry is a 16 ;)

I have, what I think, is a fabulous idea for wedding cakes - that I saw on one of Martha Stewarts shows. This tip is because wedding cakes can cost thousands of dollars. If you are having more than say 50 guests..what you can do is have a small and beautiful wedding cake that you and your husband cut and maybe the wedding party will eat and in the kitchen you will have sheet cakes of the same type of cake and icing but not the expensive cost of like a zillion tier cake. So say you have a white wedding cake, the sheet cakes in the kitchen will be white also - so when the guests are served - there is no difference in the cake - it looks like its all the same :)

From a former groom and father of two brides:

Try to understand that your husband to be may not care whether the nut bowl has peanuts or cashews. Many just want to show up, say "I do," and get on with it. It's you they love, not the pagentry.

Honestly, it's not that we/they don't understand that it's a big day, but young girls are socialized to be much more excited about the tiny details. The wedding may not be as important to him as to her -- but that doesn't mean that the marriage isn't. Don't confuse the two.

It's just not worth a knock down-drag out fight over helping to make the decision whether the napkins are purple or white.

When he says something doesn't matter -- don't take it personally. Make a decision and he will love it.

By the way, congratulations, and best wishs for many years of happiness.

That sounds like a great idea! I'm no where close to getting married but like to plan ahead of time and see what other people do. That will go in my "Wedding in a Spreadsheet" ;)

I have been at a wedding where they did that before. That works extremely well when there is a large number of people (this one had 300+). That way, the cake is feasable to make and everyone still gets fed. Faster too.

1. Bring scissors to open gifts.
2. Bring tape for the gift table at the wedding/reception so that the cards won't get separated from the gifts!!!
3. Don't freakout if something doesn't go exactly as you planned, life will go on, you will be married and the guests probably didn't know about it anway!;) :D :D

One thing I forgot to mention - Make a checklist of *everything* you think you might need. I decided to spend the night before my wedding at the hotel where our reception would be. So I packed up my dress, petticoat, hose, white handbag, jewelry, blah blah blah, and went out there the night before the wedding. We had our "night before the wedding dinner" (not really a rehearsal dinner b/c we didn't do a rehearsal - but the whole wedding party went out to dinner, and we gave our attendants their gifts etc) and went back to the hotel. Before going to sleep, I did a nervous last-minute check. Dress, check; jewelry, check; underwear, check; shoes - OH &#*@!!! :eek: So my dear fiance drove all the way back into the city to get my shoes from our apartment, then drove all the way back out... and our wedding was a morning wedding! And he still married me :D

There was a term that was tossed around on those newsgroups I mentioned: "Bridezilla". For the bride who insists that every little detail be absolutely perfect - usually driving herself, her fiance, her parents, and everybody else nuts in the process. Like DeltAlum said... it's not a crisis if everything isn't "perfect perfect" - at the end of the day, you're still married, and that's what's important.

i forgot about bridal party gifts! because my friend's wedding was on a tight budget they couldn't spend a lot of money but wanted to show their party that they cared about them and wanted to do something special. so lynn, who is very domestic, made 3 jars of jelly for everyone. it was very touching to know that she spent the time and effort on it. the jars were very pretty and everytime i eat toast i think of the happy couple.

Maid/Matron of Honor Duties
 

First of all, congrats on your wedding!! :)

I'm glad this topic came up, because one of my best friends (& a sister I pledged with) is getting married this fall. I'm in the bridal party, though not the maid of honor. That honor fell onto another good friend of ours (and another sister :)).

The maid of honor is very conscious about doing everything she's "suppossed" to do in her position. And was just asking me if I knew of any books or anything that would give her ideas.

So, for those of you who are married or about to be married, anything that really stands out that the maid of honor (or entire bridal party) did?

I'd love to help her make our friend's wedding extra-rockin'-cool!

Thanks!!

My maid of honor is organizing my showers and is helping me sort out shower guest lists and my wedding guest list. She is keeping in touch with the other bridesmaids and keeping them on track...she is in Baton Rouge though, so it's a long distance job! She gets to come to Houston occasionally though!

Congrats!
 

Congrats on your engagement! I sell wedding invitations, so if you have any questions about it you can PM me to ask:)

RedHotChiO

Do you guys post on the knot message boards? What are your names there? I've become addicted to those boards since getting engaged.

Anyway, I'm getting married in May and have done pretty much everything that can be done right now. We just have to wait for bridesmaid dresses and ivitations to come in.

About the wedding cakes and general cost of everything: It really depends on where you are. My cakes are going to serve 300 people and are only costing about $500 for the wedding cake and the grooms cake.

Congratulations on all who are getting married this year, and to those recently married. Best of fortune on a successful union.

Last week, I was officially invited to step in for a bridesmaid that couldn't fulfill her obligations. The Bride only has two female attendants though, so I'm very busy trying to pull together a lot of activities in a short amount of time (wedding's early May)....

At any rate, I have about 25 wedding oriented web sites, along with my Martha Stewart Book of Weddings, that I've saved into my favorites folder. A few I've used in the past few days:
www.theknot.com
www.superweddings.com
www.bridesmaidaid.com

If you know of any good wedding etiquette sites, please pass them along, because we're doing a few things differently than the traditional "big wedding/reception after wedding", so I'm assisting her in fine tuning. Any support groups for the dear bridesmaids/maids of honor would be great too! We are really the workhorses of this gig! :D

I do agree that the cake/sheet cake situation depends on location. Here in California, my coworker didn't notice too much of a price difference between the tiered cake only and a smaller tiered cake and sheets to cut in the back. Maybe they're hip to it out this way--or maybe it was the bakeries she selected!

And boy are you all right about the dress sizes...I wear an 8 (sometimes a 6) and tried on the sized 10 bridesmaid's gown. It fit...if you like the corseted look! I'm sure they could have found a better way to make a bridesmaid feel fat and dumpy than that! ;)

The shoes are bought though...and they're cute dressy strappy sandals that I can wear again!

it's not just bridesmaid's dresses that are made smaller!!!! When I went to try on my wedding dress, I was sized and told I needed to buy a size 18 dress cause of my large chest (I normally wore a 16). Well, when I eventually ordered it, the company wanted to charge me another $20 cause of "extra material" needed for the larger size! I said screw that and ordered a size 16 in the hopes I'd lose enough weight!
Well, between the time i ordered it and the time it came I lost so much weight that the size 16 was too big!!!:) Actually on my wedding day my dress also ended up being a bit too large cause I didn't eat much the week of my wedding!:)
On a side note...I just thought I'd mention my proud accomplishment of losing 35 lbs for my wedding day (and still losing!!!!) I went from a size 16 to a size 12...my goal is a size 10 so I'm almost there!!!:D

I went to a friends wedding a week ago and she forgot to bring her bouquet with when she walked down the aisle - we had to pass it up to her via the bridesmaids - but several people said they didn't notice:D

I got asked to be in my friend's (a former roomie and AXO sis) wedding tonight, so I am excited!!

Sisterplum, I noticed in your pictures that you had lost a lot of weight. You looked so good! That is definitely something to be proud of! Anyone who hasn't looked at her pics definitely should.

dxsaigirl thank you so much! As you can probably tell, I'm very proud of my weight loss! So is my husband as he met me when I was beginning to gain weight! Now it's almost all off and I feel great!!!:)
One of the best feelings of my life is everytime I see someone who hasn't seen me in a while and they say "Wow! You look great!":D I went to Art's company Christmas party and wore this amazing dress! I hadn't seen any of his co-workers or bosses in at least 6 months...Art's boss and 2 recruiters (he's a computer consultant) all came up to me individually and complimented me on how great I looked!:D:D Hee hee!
So thank you for mentioning that darlin...it made my night!!!!:D:D

Oh, I'm so jealous of you all who are planning weddings! I had *so* much fun planning mine!!

The one general thing I will say because nobody has said it so far -- just remember that it is *your* day. Of course I'm not suggesting that being a snotty brat is a good idea, but I always hate hearing about people who do things at their weddings to make other people happy even though it's not what they want to do. For example, I have a few good friends who had ultra religious ceremonies to please their families, even though they didn't really believe in it. It's great to make others happy (although that's not what a wedding is about) but when you start out your wedding by saying things that you don't believe or don't mean, I think you are setting yourself up for failure. One friend who did this is already divorced, and I'm not saying that the ceremony is the cause, but I think it's important to go into a marriage saying what you mean and meaning what you say.

I was blessed with supportive, wonderful parents who happily wrote checks and either agreed with what I wanted to do or came around eventually, and inlaws who didn't have much to say about anything. Our wedding was (very) unconventional in many respects, so it was great to have the support of my (wonderful) parents.

Okay -- as far as websites -- what I found most helpful and interesting was looking at websites made by actual couples who had gotten married or were planning their weddings. For example, I liked www.tnj.net a lot -- the "our wedding" part is really nice. I would search yahoo for things like "our wedding" and browse the results. I found some of the wedding guides to be rather cheesy, although I did like the magazines, especially Martha Stewart. We found our cake idea and I found my dress in Bride's.

Whatever you do, relax and have fun. After all the work planning the wedding and doing everything the way I wanted it to be done (I really planned every little detail, but not to the point where I was psycho), our actual wedding day itself was the most fun day of my life. There were a few minor mishaps (we didn't have enough wine, so the caterers had to go out and get more) but overall it was as perfect as I could have wanted.

Oh -- a quick side note -- I don't know what, if anything you are wearing on your head, but you may want to wear it around a while first. I wore a tiara, and the thing was digging into the side of my head all night and it hurt. Had I worn it more first, I would have been able to stretch it out a little so it wouldn't have hurt so much.

Good luck!!! You will have SO much fun!