Required Wedding Reading

As the obsessed book bride that I am, planning a wedding has opened my eyes up to a whole new world of books!

One of my favorites so far is

 One Perfect Day, the Selling of an American Wedding.

This is a really easy to read book and gives a lot of background on the modern wedding industry and how some traditions came to be. I found the background on the engagement ring to be fascinating! 

One of the most helpful things about this book is the insight it gives on some of the moral decisions brides need to make when planning a wedding. The background and research that Rebecca Mead provides in her book really helped me make some planning decisions that I had moral questions about.

Two of my biggest concerns had been buying a diamond ring (I do not want to contribute to the horrors of the diamond trade) and buying an inexpensive wedding dress (I avoid buying things I know are made in sweat shops or items from countries with poor work standards). The information provided in this book really helped me make informed decisions!

To top it all off, the book was really fun to read. The author is not anti-wedding industry- but she does point out that it is an industry geared with making women think there is such thing as a "perfect day".

Have you read this book? What did you think?

When is too much too much?

The other day I was doing my normal blog search for wedding ideas and ran across this amazing photo:

(Source)

And then of course I had to do a Google search on "wedding piñata" and found many more adorable pictures of people using piñatas at their wedding. So fun! I love piñatas! I think it would be fabulous to have a piñata near the end of the reception.

But the more I think about it- as much as I love the idea, I don't think we really have time to be adding more "stuff" into the wedding. Especially since Ohio and I are trying to have a very unstructured reception.

Maybe I should just have a piñata as part of my bridal shower or at our rehersal dinner.

So I am going to sit on this idea for a couple months and see how I feel about it closer to the wedding.

Are you adding any unusual elements into your wedding? If so, how are you implementing that into your wedding schedule?

Sweet things

The week of our anniversary, I ended up working 7 days in a row, averaging at least 12 hours a day. I was on a tight deadline to get a million things done at the office, and was really stressed out and exhusted.
On our anniversary I came home from work really late at night and was so tired and feeling so sad that I wasn’t able to celebrate the occasion with Ohio.

So imagine when my surprise when Ohio met me after work with the most thoughtful gift!

Bouquet Toss

There are some wedding traditions I love and actually really look forward to when I am a guest at weddings. I love the first dance- I think the first song can tell you a lot about a couple. I also have a soft spot in my heart for the bride's dance with her dad.


However, there are other wedding traditions that I am not so crazy about.

I am not a fan of the garter toss. I really don’t want Ohio reaching up my wedding dress in front of a bunch of my family members and friends. How embarrassing! We will not be doing that at our wedding!

I also am not a huge fan of the bouquet toss. Mostly because I always felt embarrassed to be "singled out" at a wedding as unmarried and usually used this part of a reception to use the ladies room.

I thought we would skip this tradition all together at our wedding- but I do have a couple of  family members that are super passionate about the bouquet toss. When I told them not to expect the bouquet toss at our wedding, they told me that they would miss fighting over the bouquet in the family tradition.

At my brother's wedding, two of my cousins actually ended up falling down on the dance floor in a full out rumble for the bouquet. It made for some amazing pictures that still send me into a fit of giggles every time I lok at them.

At another wedding, one of the single ladies came onto the dance floor with a huge catcher’s mitt!

 In fact, thinking back over all the weddings I've been to, there have been some fun wedding moments that involved the bouquet toss. So I've decided to toss a bouquet after all!

Are there any traditions you originally thought you would skip but have decided to go ahead and do?

I believe in miracles!

A miracle has taken place.

I found a dress that I actually liked.

Really liked.

Perhaps, I could even say that I loved?

The dress is by Augusta Jones and its a very simple but well constructed gown with beautiful lace overlay. (See picture)

I loved the way I felt in this dress. It was so comfortable and easy to move in!

Unfortunately, the dress was only in the store for that one day as part of a trunk show. So I can't try it on again to see if I still love it.

Because the dress costs much more than I originally intended to spend, I just can't say yes to it without being able to try it on at least one more time.

The store also has a no picture policy so I can't even look at a picture to help me make a final decision.

Major Bummer!

Although I didn't end up buying the dress, we left that store and my spirits were much higher. There was hope for me yet!

We ended up at another bridal store, where my Mom and my cousin ended up pulling a dozen dresses for me to try on that had similar features of the Augusta Jones dress.

And another miracle happened! I found another dress that I really like!

Here is a picture of me (sans head) in the Casa Blanca Bridal gown that I really liked.

The bolero is not actually part of the dress, but I would wear something similar since I am going for a more modest and look.

Added bonus: its much less expensive than the Augusta Jones dress!

I told myself I would revisit this dress in a week or so and see if I still am in love with it.

How did you know when you found the right dress?

Planning Tip:Staying Organized

Event planning is a big part of my 9-5 job. I've planned everything from large dinner parties to formal receptions to press conferences and a ton of meetings.

If there is one thing I've learned from all this event planning, its that staying organized is key. My solution?
A simple 3 ring binder with plenty of clear page protectors and lots of dividers. Total cost under $20. Keeping myself sane and on top of my planning game? Priceless.
The key to staying organized with a simple 3 ring binder is making good use of tabs and sheet protectors.
Depending on how big the event I am planning is, I might have binders with 5 tabs and 50 pages, or I might have 3 binders with 40 tabs and hundreds of pages.
When I started planning our wedding, I knew that my binder was going to be centered around 2 key parts of the wedding: The Ceremony and Reception. So I made those the main tabs, and then started breaking these sections down further and adding more tabs. This keeps things tidy and easy to find. As my planning continues, I continue to add tabs and merge tabs together as needed.
Of course, no planning binder would be complete with other the following 2 essential tabs: Guest List and BUDGET.

In my binder I print out articles, pictures...I keep reciepts and lists of everything I purchase.
I've learned over the years to never throw anything related to planning away until after the event is over and all vendors are paid.
Once the event is over, I take my binder and remove anything that I no longer need.
What strategy are you using to stay organized?

Divide and Conquer

There is not much that I can complain about when it comes to Ohio. He is incredibly sweet and thoughtful and I feel so lucky to be marrying him. However, there is one thing about Ohio that I must admit is driving me a little nutty.

Ohio is one of those grooms-to-be who really wants to leave all the planning up to me. He doesn't care about decorations or colors or flowers. He doesn't have opinions on photographers or any other vendors.

To give him credit, he really tries to act interested when I show him different wedding invitations, but its pretty obvious that he doesn't really care.

He has told me that there are three simple things he cares about when it comes to our wedding:

1. Music. Since Ohio produces music and is a part-time DJ, he obviously wants us to have lots of good music at our wedding.

2. Mashed potatoes. He insists we serve them at the wedding reception.


3. That I show up.

For a while this really bothered me. I was annoyed. I wanted him to care- after all this was OUR wedding! I felt like all the weight of planning was falling on my shoulders.

Last week I made a resolution to stop being annoyed and accept that I cannot make Ohio care about the little details. He had mentioned that he wanted to help, but had no idea what needed to be done. So instead of wasting my time nagging him, I made a list of things he could do to help with the planning. I tried to identify tasks that he would enjoy, like looking into our post-wedding transportation options, rehearsal dinner locations and deciding on what wines to serve at our wedding.

So far, this has been a good strategy. Ohio has been more than happy to help now that he has some direction on what to do and I am a much happier bride-to-be.

How involved is your fiance in the wedding planning? How are you breaking up the planning responsibilities?