Ginger & Tim 10-30-12 CC/SCP; Update--1/2:TR Day 1: Checking into the CS

[JBeanBunny]

Originally Posted by Freckledginger

Grand Total (thus far ): $17,449.20[/CENTER]


Yeah...it kinda blows my whole initial $12,000 budget out of the water, huh? Especially when you consider that my dress & the rings aren't even added on there yet. Luckily, we have money in savings and my parents are helping (big time) by paying for my dress and the DP. I've learned two things from this experience: weddings are ridiculously expensive (for the most part; I realize there are exceptions to this, and some brides are able to do AMAZING weddings for a lot less money) and you will want more things for your wedding than you initially anticipated (e.g. DP, cute decorations that Etsy or Pinterest convinces you that you need, etc.). Oh well, I guess you expect to only get married once, so why not go big

Ahh, Pinterest will be the death of me!! haha! As if I need any new ideas!!! I'd considered showing my budget and around how much we'd spent, but being engaged for over 2 years and doing SO much myself over those 2 years, I have absolutely NO clue how much I've spent at JoAnn's, Michael's, Brambleberry, Hobby Lobby, Etsy, Target's Dollar Spot, etc... Not to mention what my mom has helped me with- I'm sure the number is sensationally large, and I don't even want to know how much I've sunk into DIY projects! I really ought to quit my job and craft for a living, if only I knew how to survive as such!

I'm totally jealous of your DP, everything sounds so lovely! And then I nearly had a heart attack when looking at the expense report! $495 for an iPod hookup? Seriously? But I know it's going to be a gorgeous event! I'm thrilled that you're having photography for the event too! That way you can look back on all of your wonderful wedding events (and show them off!) I'm dying to see all of your photos!

[tric8783]

Wow your BEO looks great! I definitely thought it would be a lot more for the actual wedding plus the DP, and youre spending a good chunk on your DP. You're making me wish I looked into the cruise wedding and been on a real beach instead of the BC beach! Your photographer's fee is great too. Getting a little jealous

The flowers are so pretty and different! I really like the striped ribbon the bout, so different and cute. I think the shades of blue will work really well together!

[Freckledginger]

Originally Posted by JBeanBunny

Ahh, Pinterest will be the death of me!! haha! As if I need any new ideas!!! I'd considered showing my budget and around how much we'd spent, but being engaged for over 2 years and doing SO much myself over those 2 years, I have absolutely NO clue how much I've spent at JoAnn's, Michael's, Brambleberry, Hobby Lobby, Etsy, Target's Dollar Spot, etc... Not to mention what my mom has helped me with- I'm sure the number is sensationally large, and I don't even want to know how much I've sunk into DIY projects! I really ought to quit my job and craft for a living, if only I knew how to survive as such!

I'm totally jealous of your DP, everything sounds so lovely! And then I nearly had a heart attack when looking at the expense report! $495 for an iPod hookup? Seriously? But I know it's going to be a gorgeous event! I'm thrilled that you're having photography for the event too! That way you can look back on all of your wonderful wedding events (and show them off!) I'm dying to see all of your photos!

I can totally understand getting bitten by the DIY bug! I had successfully avoided all that until my invitations arrived. After examining the envelopes, I decided I needed envelope liners. Cut to me in Hobby Lobby purchasing not only supplies for envelope liners, but welcome bag tags, envelopes for the welcome bag newsletter, and some stamps that I thought I couldn't live without. Those places are like a drug for me... I walk in thinking simple, and I emerge two hours later with all this stuff that I never knew I needed It's super satisfying and relaxing to craft though I think.

Thanks for the compliments about our DP! I'm very excited about it, but it is costing a lot more than I had initially hoped. Oh well, I guess it's just like when you visit Disney World... You know that spending more money than you hope is a necessary evil when you're down there, but you have lots of fun so it's worth it. There have been a couple costs where I've been like, hmmm that's a lot more than I would have anticipated. Floral is an area where you have to be really careful, otherwise you can spend a lot of money. Luckily, the Rosie from Floral is really great about coming up with more budget-friendly solutions. Yeah, $495 is for pipping in the Wishes Soundtrack for the fireworks and for providing an iPod setup. I agree it's a bit pricey, but both DF and I thought that background music is important, so we're just eating the cost there. Hopefully, it'll be a fun event though! It's been a really nice indulgence to get to customize the entire event since we don't get much of that with DCL.

Your wedding is getting close! You must be so excited!!

Originally Posted by tric8783

Wow your BEO looks great! I definitely thought it would be a lot more for the actual wedding plus the DP, and youre spending a good chunk on your DP. You're making me wish I looked into the cruise wedding and been on a real beach instead of the BC beach! Your photographer's fee is great too. Getting a little jealous

The flowers are so pretty and different! I really like the striped ribbon the bout, so different and cute. I think the shades of blue will work really well together!

Thanks so much, Tricia!!
DCL is very reasonable for it's wedding packages. The only trade-offs are your guests have to pay for a cruise and your ability to customize the wedding is limited. Our guests were going to have to travel anyways, so we figured why not have more time together and go on a cruise

I absolutely adored your wedding, so I think you made a great choice! It was gorgeous!! Your wedding has been quite inspiration for me, and I think I may steal your parasol idea for the bridesmaids if that's ok

I appreciate your compliments about the flowers! I'm really excited to see them! I think they won't be completed until October though, so I've still got a while to go.

My big dilemma now is Bridesmaid dresses... it's hard to find cute bridesmaid dresses in the blue I wanted. There's lots of navy and aqua, but a true light blue is hard to find. My sister and I are working on sorting that out at the moment. I love planning for the wedding, but it can sometimes create so much stress about the tinniest of things

[Freckledginger]

Invitations Done!! Another thing to cross off my to-do list

The printed invitations arrived from Vistaprint about a week ago, and they looked terrific! I was really nervous about what the quality would be like, but I was really impressed. I upgraded to the premium 100 lb matte card stock, and turned out to be exactly what I was envisioning.

White envelopes were also included with the invites, but unfortunately, were sorta see-through. After looking online though, I decided I could still make use of the original envelopes--just needed to make an envelope liner. It was a surprisingly easy DIY project, and I think really adds something to the invitations.

-------------------------------------

Easy Instructions for an Envelope Liner:

Materials:
-Scrapbooking paper
-Cardboard
-Cutting Mat
-X-Acto or other crafting Knife
-Scrapbooking permanent adhesive tape

1) Make liner template by tracing envelope on cardboard. Remember that you want the liner to be smaller than the envelope (so it doesn't block the envelope adhesive), so I just came in roughly 1 cm from my original trace to cut.



2) Once I had a suitable cardboard template, I placed the template on top of a sheet of paper on the cutting mat. I used a small cutting mat that came with a magnetic ruler, which was handy as it held everything in place well. I then was able to cut the liner out using an X-Acto knife, and slide it into the envelope




3) I then applied a few strips of adhesive tape to the back of the top portion (triangular area) of the liner, and affixed it to the envelope. I then folded the triangular portion down to create a crease, and then presto, the envelopes were complete


-------------------------------------

After doing the envelope liners, I had some scrap paper left over. To be a little more green as well as give the envelopes a little something else, I used a hole punch to cut out hearts to affix to the outside.



The calligraphy I did myself by tracing a computer script that I liked. I probably could have saved myself tons of time by just printing on the envelopes, but I liked the organic and intimate feel that handwritten addresses have.



Here's the final product:



I'm really proud of them! Hope our guests like them!

[ccbride412]

The envelopes look great! I love the liners!

[dsnygrl21]

The finish product is AWESOME for your invitations! I love the liner. It definitely gives it that extra touch of magic, lol.

I feel like most brides go over their budget completely. We had started our budget as being about 20K. Now our budget is almost 40K!! It's like, how did this happen?!

Everything always seems to work out and glad to hear you have the financial support from your family! That is great. Everything sounds so good so far! Am I going to have to take a trip to Disney to get a glimpse of this?? LOL

[LittleKittyMarie]

Your invitations look fabulous! I love the colours and fonts! Also your tutorial for the envelope liners is awesome. I never would have thought it would be so simple!

Your BEO looks great, although I hear you about it being depressing. Not looking forward to getting my BEO, whenever that happens... probably in another eight months. Yikes. I was surprised to see you had to pay a fee for guests attending your wedding (after the first eight, I think it was). Do they tell you exactly what that fee is for, or do they just pass it off as another mandatory expense?

[JBeanBunny]

Ginger... those envelope liners are AMAZING! I'm totally jealous (and kind of glad) that I didn't have that idea before I sent mine out! I'd seen a similar tutorial a little while back (on pinterest, ) and I was just thinking that I could've saved a LOT of money by buying plain envelopes and make a gorgeous liner! Or maybe not... You know me and craft stores! It's a dangerous situation! Did you know that my first instinct after seeing your envelopes was to Pin it? And then I realized... oh wait, I know how to get back to this page

I have a friend who's having the SAME problem finding pale blue bridesmaids dresses! She had ordered some from David's Bridal, only for them to tell her "Whoops, we're discontinuing that color. Pick another one" As if you can change your wedding colors on a whim! We've had many-a-conversation about shades of blue (hers being light blue, mine being royal to midnight blue)

And yes, it's getting VERY close to my wedding... I am very excited! but I'm also starting to freak out a little! I've got so many loose ends that need to be tied up and work is draining all of my energy! My days off are no longer for rest and relaxation, they're for crafting all day long! (and getting nagged by my DM about more things I need to be doing! Ahh!)

As always, I can't wait to hear more about your wedding! As always, I'm totally jealous of your DP! Happy planning to you! (new pics of my completed pixie dust are up on my PJ! )

[Freckledginger]

Originally Posted by ccbride412

The envelopes look great! I love the liners!

Thanks so much, Meaghan!! I'm really proud of how it turned out Once I bought all the supplies, I was delighted to find that they were really easy to make. Picking out the paper was actually the hardest part, haha. I spent over an hour in Hobby Lobby trying to decide on the paper. I was initially going to try to go with something blue to match the invitations, and found a cute light blue herringbone patterned paper. But just as I was about to walk away from the aisle, I saw the vintage stamp paper out of the corner of my eye. I wasn't sure about the color of it at first, but now I'm really happy I went with a contrasting liner. I think it makes the invitation pop lots more, and I like that it has a vintage feel and incorporates the travel element also. The stamp print is made from vintage French stamps, but I figure it just gives it a bit more of an exotic flare, hehe

Originally Posted by dsnygrl21

The finish product is AWESOME for your invitations! I love the liner. It definitely gives it that extra touch of magic, lol.

I feel like most brides go over their budget completely. We had started our budget as being about 20K. Now our budget is almost 40K!! It's like, how did this happen?!

Everything always seems to work out and glad to hear you have the financial support from your family! That is great. Everything sounds so good so far! Am I going to have to take a trip to Disney to get a glimpse of this?? LOL

Thanks so much, Kelly!! You're too nice

I'm glad you like the envelope liners! When I'm doing a DIY project, I find myself thinking, "either this is amazing or just a hot mess..." haha. You end up investing more time than you realize in little projects like that, and it becomes hard to distinguish if it's going well or not. So the positive feedback from you and the other ladies is very reassuring I really appreciate it!

It's also very comforting to hear that you've also found your budget expanding more than you initially thought! The BEO tells me where it's going, but it's still unbelievable to see how quickly costs rack up! Your wedding is going to be AMAZING though!! I'm sure it'll all be well worth it in the end

Hehe, you should totally come down to Disney!! Oh, I'll be sure to post tons of photos as soon as I can after the wedding. Hope you'll do the same with yours!!

Originally Posted by LittleKittyMarie

Your invitations look fabulous! I love the colours and fonts! Also your tutorial for the envelope liners is awesome. I never would have thought it would be so simple!

Your BEO looks great, although I hear you about it being depressing. Not looking forward to getting my BEO, whenever that happens... probably in another eight months. Yikes. I was surprised to see you had to pay a fee for guests attending your wedding (after the first eight, I think it was). Do they tell you exactly what that fee is for, or do they just pass it off as another mandatory expense?

Thanks so much, Nicole!! Timmy and I are super happy with them! Victoria, our stationer, really deserves all the credit for them. I just put them together and added an envelope liner I have found invitations to be a surprisingly cool part of the wedding planning process.They really help to set the tone of the wedding, and I found it really neat to see a glimpse of all my planning concepts/what the wedding will feel like. Just had a look at your PJ (am going to post on there shortly), and your wedding invitations are going to be PHENOMENAL! Can't wait to see the finished product!

Regarding the BEO, DCL Weddings (as well as Escape Weddings at WDW I think) have a included guest limit due to the package nature of these weddings. You pay a standard flat fee for a ceremony and cake/champagne reception, so in order for Disney to make money on these packages, they only allow a certain number of guests. The additional guest fee ($20 pp) is said to be for the extra cake & champagne required for groups over 10 (including the couple). Although I've never seen them make a bigger cake for DCL brides, so I suspect this is DFTW way of working the system a bit more unfortunately. Oh well, I guess this happens no matter where you have your wedding... it's just an industry thing.

Originally Posted by JBeanBunny

Ginger... those envelope liners are AMAZING! I'm totally jealous (and kind of glad) that I didn't have that idea before I sent mine out! I'd seen a similar tutorial a little while back (on pinterest, ) and I was just thinking that I could've saved a LOT of money by buying plain envelopes and make a gorgeous liner! Or maybe not... You know me and craft stores! It's a dangerous situation! Did you know that my first instinct after seeing your envelopes was to Pin it? And then I realized... oh wait, I know how to get back to this page

I have a friend who's having the SAME problem finding pale blue bridesmaids dresses! She had ordered some from David's Bridal, only for them to tell her "Whoops, we're discontinuing that color. Pick another one" As if you can change your wedding colors on a whim! We've had many-a-conversation about shades of blue (hers being light blue, mine being royal to midnight blue)

And yes, it's getting VERY close to my wedding... I am very excited! but I'm also starting to freak out a little! I've got so many loose ends that need to be tied up and work is draining all of my energy! My days off are no longer for rest and relaxation, they're for crafting all day long! (and getting nagged by my DM about more things I need to be doing! Ahh!)

As always, I can't wait to hear more about your wedding! As always, I'm totally jealous of your DP! Happy planning to you! (new pics of my completed pixie dust are up on my PJ! )

Hi Jillian!! Thanks so much for the compliments on the envelope liners! That means a lot coming from such a crafting queen like yourself! Hehe, very flattered that you considered pinning my tutorial!! Gotta love pinterest! Speaking of which, I've been so enjoying looking through all your pins lately! You've got some great stuff on there! I've gotten a bit slack with mine.

The bridesmaid dress search is killing me at the moment I'm finding it seriously challenging, and now I'm facing a bit of a time crunch with it too. Really should have considered bridesmaid dresses a bit more when I was selecting colors, whoopsie. I am pretty much at the point of just giving my two bridesmaids the free choice as long as it's blue... I'm a bit nervous how that would look though. Has your friend found any good options??

I'm about to head over to your PJ now and catch up with all your updates!! Excited!

[JBeanBunny]

Originally Posted by Freckledginger

Hi Jillian!! Thanks so much for the compliments on the envelope liners! That means a lot coming from such a crafting queen like yourself! Hehe, very flattered that you considered pinning my tutorial!! Gotta love pinterest! Speaking of which, I've been so enjoying looking through all your pins lately! You've got some great stuff on there! I've gotten a bit slack with mine.

The bridesmaid dress search is killing me at the moment I'm finding it seriously challenging, and now I'm facing a bit of a time crunch with it too. Really should have considered bridesmaid dresses a bit more when I was selecting colors, whoopsie. I am pretty much at the point of just giving my two bridesmaids the free choice as long as it's blue... I'm a bit nervous how that would look though. Has your friend found any good options??

I'm about to head over to your PJ now and catch up with all your updates!! Excited!

Well, I'm lucky in terms of bridesmaid dresses because... I only have one!!! haha! I have more friends coming along, as well as sisters in law, but with such a small wedding group, it seems like it would imbalance my wedding guests! I do have to go re-dress-shopping, though. I found a cute one-shouldered royal blue dress with black mesh over it and black glitter floral on the mesh (Bought it on clearance for $10) but it's pretty short and seems more like a prom dress... we're in our mid-20's, we don't need to go back to high school! Luckily, my MOH is going to Chicago with me for my bridal shower and dress fittings (she needs to learn how to lace up my corset!) so while we're together, we'll look for another dress. Best of luck with your dress search!!! I know it's a tricky decision, but you'll figure it out!!

[tric8783]

Originally Posted by Freckledginger

Thanks so much, Tricia!!
DCL is very reasonable for it's wedding packages. The only trade-offs are your guests have to pay for a cruise and your ability to customize the wedding is limited. Our guests were going to have to travel anyways, so we figured why not have more time together and go on a cruise

I absolutely adored your wedding, so I think you made a great choice! It was gorgeous!! Your wedding has been quite inspiration for me, and I think I may steal your parasol idea for the bridesmaids if that's ok

I appreciate your compliments about the flowers! I'm really excited to see them! I think they won't be completed until October though, so I've still got a while to go.

My big dilemma now is Bridesmaid dresses... it's hard to find cute bridesmaid dresses in the blue I wanted. There's lots of navy and aqua, but a true light blue is hard to find. My sister and I are working on sorting that out at the moment. I love planning for the wedding, but it can sometimes create so much stress about the tinniest of things

You're so sweet, thank you! From the looks of it your wedding is going to be gorgeous! All of our guests traveled too and I know they loved WDW, but you're really giving them the best of both worlds, lucky!

I really loved the parasols, they kind of brought everything together. Steal away!! I got the girls' parasols from Luna Bazaar. I got the guest ones from Oriental Trading, I could tell puting the two next to each other the LB ones were nicer, but obvi the OT ones were less and got the job done!

Have you requested fabric samples maybe? Try Bari Jay, Watters, J. Crew, Ann Taylor?

The invitations came out amazing!! The liners look great too!! Have you sent them out or theyre just ready to go at this point? yippeee!

[Freckledginger]

Originally Posted by JBeanBunny

Well, I'm lucky in terms of bridesmaid dresses because... I only have one!!! haha! I have more friends coming along, as well as sisters in law, but with such a small wedding group, it seems like it would imbalance my wedding guests! I do have to go re-dress-shopping, though. I found a cute one-shouldered royal blue dress with black mesh over it and black glitter floral on the mesh (Bought it on clearance for $10) but it's pretty short and seems more like a prom dress... we're in our mid-20's, we don't need to go back to high school! Luckily, my MOH is going to Chicago with me for my bridal shower and dress fittings (she needs to learn how to lace up my corset!) so while we're together, we'll look for another dress. Best of luck with your dress search!!! I know it's a tricky decision, but you'll figure it out!!

One bridesmaid is good!! I was originally only going to have my sister as my maid of honor, but when I found out that my best friend from college was also going to be able to make it, one became two! I feel the same way about having a small bridal party with a small wedding.
I like the idea of having bridesmaids wear different dresses, which will come in handy due to the different body types of each bridesmaid (my friend is petite and pregnant and my sister is tall with an hour-glass figure). The challenge is just finding different blue dresses that look good on each bridesmaid, but coordinate somewhat also. I know it'll get figured out eventually though Sounds like you and your friend will have fun when you're back in Chicago! Dress shopping with girlfriends is always fun!

Originally Posted by tric8783

You're so sweet, thank you! From the looks of it your wedding is going to be gorgeous! All of our guests traveled too and I know they loved WDW, but you're really giving them the best of both worlds, lucky!

I really loved the parasols, they kind of brought everything together. Steal away!! I got the girls' parasols from Luna Bazaar. I got the guest ones from Oriental Trading, I could tell puting the two next to each other the LB ones were nicer, but obvi the OT ones were less and got the job done!

Have you requested fabric samples maybe? Try Bari Jay, Watters, J. Crew, Ann Taylor?

The invitations came out amazing!! The liners look great too!! Have you sent them out or theyre just ready to go at this point? yippeee!

Thanks for that, Tricia! I'll definitely check out Luna Bazaar for parasols for the BM's!

I haven't requested any fabric samples, but that's a really good suggestion. I've checked out a few of the companies you suggested previously, but I think I'll go back to them tonight and look at getting some samples.

Thank you for the compliments regarding our invites! We're so happy with them. I sent them out on July 16th, so our US guests have already received them, but the Aussie guests haven't yet. Our RSVP date is Aug 10th, so cross your fingers our guests will be amazing and send them back in a timely manner (most likely not though, ). It'll be exciting to start to hear from people though!

[Freckledginger]

Our wedding bags arrived today!



They were a weekly special from the Wedding Chicks Shop (http://shop.weddingchicks.com/): 20 cotton-canvas tote bags for $100. We were able to select our colors for the font as well as include our names, wedding date, & place we were getting married. If you're in the market for tote bags, they offer a bunch of different designs (a varying portion of which are put on special each week), send you a digital proof before printing, and are pretty speedy. I'm very happy with the quality, and looking forward to coming up with all sorts of fun things to fill them with

[JBeanBunny]

Originally Posted by Freckledginger

Our wedding bags arrived today!



They were a weekly special from the Wedding Chicks Shop (http://shop.weddingchicks.com/): 20 cotton-canvas tote bags for $100. We were able to select our colors for the font as well as include our names, wedding date, & place we were getting married. If you're in the market for tote bags, they offer a bunch of different designs (a varying portion of which are put on special each week), send you a digital proof before printing, and are pretty speedy. I'm very happy with the quality, and looking forward to coming up with all sorts of fun things to fill them with

Ginger! I'm having major bag-envy! They're gorgeous! So put together! I'm starting to feel like mine look like a little like a childrens arts and crafts project! I looked through that site and found a couple that I loved- too bad I can't go back in time and get those instead- it probably would've been cheaper in the end! *sighs* I think I'm in the stage where I'm starting to question things, no matter how pointless those thoughts are now! Keep us posted with the goodies you put inside of the bags! You know that always peaks my interest!

[tric8783]

Love the bags!! We got ours from Wedding Chicks too and I loved them!! I got a coupon today for 25% off the site actually! I still want more after the fact! hahaha