On the Hunt...Reception Venues

I started my search for venues in the same spot where many other brides have started, on the internet, with a google search. However, I must let the cat our of the bag, because when I really started looking at reception venues, we were newly engaged and not even thinking about when we would have a wedding (it just wasn't very practical at the time). So many of the places that I initially fell in love with like 2-3 years ago were sooo not going to work with our actual wedding budget. So I just nixed any venue that I had bookmarked circa late '07-'08.

I started to look at some of the other typical wedding websites to get ideas. I contacted a boatload of hotels (seriously, I think I still have like 25-30 random info packets on my laptop right now) in the DMV to get their wedding package information but I didn't feel like a hotel was the right place for us, I guess some part of me felt like it was a little too cookie cutter. But I've also seen beautiful weddings at hotels so to each his own. But there was one location that I thought might work, the Mason Inn and Conference Center, on the campus of George Mason University (GMU). My mom and I even went to take a tour, and we did actually like it, it was overwhelming love at first sight but it could work. I kept it on my list of possible locations but kept it moving.

Outside the Mason Inn

Small Ballroom

Table details

But the funny thing is, on the way to Mason Inn we passed a historic home just minutes away from GMU and I thought I knew what it was as we drove past (based on previous online hunts) and a google search confirmed my curiosities, it was Old Town Hall (OTH). It was also on my list of top reception venues to check out, I immediately scheduled a tour the next day for an upcoming weekend. Upon our arrival at OTH I fell in love with the building, it looked so elegant. As we toured the grounds I was pretty sure that I wanted to book that place ASAP. There were multiple locations throughout the venue that we could utilize and even an outdoor garden area that looked really nice and lush and perfect for cocktail hour. And I don't know about you but parking was also at the top of my list of must haves. I didn't want us to have to pay for valet parking or any kind of parking for my guests, it's just an expense I didn't want to take on. But I was happy to find out that there are 4 free parking lots within like 2 blocks of the venue which our guests can use. SCORE!

Old Town Hall

Main Floor Room

Expanded view of the Main Floor Room

As the days passed after my two initial visits I just couldn't stop thinking about OTH. But I thought maybe I should see a couple more places. So I headed over to The Lorien, a boutique hotel and spa in Old Town Alexandria. I was a little annoyed and didn't really want to continue with the tour after the woman told me that our date was already taken. I mean, really lady, you could've told me that before I came over here, after work, in the rain. But I played along seeing the sights and they were nice, but since I knew it wasn't even an option, I was really just window shopping. They also had many multi-function spaces and an outdoor area, but none of the inside spaces were big enough to accommodate both dinner and dancing, so those activities would have to be split between 2 rooms. Not a big deal for some but I thought it would be a little awkward for guests.

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After that disappointment, with my mom in tow we headed over to The Lyceum in Alexandria, VA. I saw this venue suggested on many websites and wedding boards so I figured why not. But it just didn't do it for me. There was nothing that caught my interest. There were multiple spaces that could be used but one of the two spaces was within the museum and I'm not that fond of having cocktail hour around a bunch of artifacts. And the price wasn't right for us either, so it was ruled out.

So after viewing 4 possible venues and even dreaming about one for many a night, we decided to book one of them and I couldn't be happier. Stay posted for an upcoming post where I reveal our venue!

*All photos are my personal handiwork unless specified.

Money, Money, Money, Moooney...Mooonnneeeyy!

I am a budget bride and I don't have an issue with admitting that I'm planning a wedding on a pretty tight budget. Now, there are probably budgets out there that are even tighter than mine but to be honest what bride doesn't wish she had a little more money, you know 1k here, 5k there. Those dollars could really go a long way toward things that aren't within the budget. But when we finally decided to start planning the wedding there was one thing that we knew for sure...no debt for the wedding...it was going to be all cash. And additionally, we knew we were going to be the one's footing the bill for the entire shindig (unless someone wants to toss in a few dollars) and I'm probably not gonna say no.

Once we logically thought about how much we would be comfortable putting on the table for the wedding we settled on a budget of $12,500. And believe me that number still makes cringe a little, I mean there are so many other things I could be doing with that money, but I digress. And considering that the average cost of a DC area wedding is between 27k-45k (check your city here) I think were doing pretty good. But this budget is also very aggressive and we'll have to see if we can actually pull it off.

So with our budget in mind I did what every bride does and I plugged it into one of those wedding budget generators and the allocations were ridiculous, meaning, who on my type of budget would really spend almost $400 on stationary! But if you take a look below, I've compared what the "Traditional" budget generator says we should be spending on the typical categories and then tweaked the figures a bit based on how I foresee our money being allocated.

*The percentages shown are based on how each category makes up the total budget.

As you can see strictly based on budget we've prioritized the reception and photography over everything else, allowing it to take much larger portions of the budget than traditionally allocated. But those are the things which we are placing a higher value and were fine with spending the extra money in those respective areas.

The closer we get to booking additional vendors and really understanding our decor plans, we will be able to really zero in on the final estimates of our wedding day.

How's your budget holding up?

Keeping the Girls Updated...The Goods

I promised you that I would reveal the actual newsletter that I created to keep my bridesmaids updated about all the wedding happenings. Read about the contents and how it came about here. So without further ado, here's the first installment of the newsletter that they received. There have been some details omitted to respect everyone's privacy but you get the gist.

If anyone is interested in the template to make their own, I created it using Powerpoint so it is fully editable and can be emailed by request, just let me know by leaving a comment below.

Tip: If you do choose to tackle something like this I always convert any editable document into a pdf to help maintain the formatting and document integrity across various computer platforms (i.e. mac, pc, mobile phone, etc). If you have a mac pdf converting is built in. But if your a windows person there are a number of free pdf converters for windows but here's my fave along with a link to download.

• Primopdf (windows only) 

No Barney Purple Here Folks!

I've been talking alot about various wedding related things such as our photographer, ceremony venue and wedding planners but I haven't really shared any design related details about our day yet. So the next couple of posts will be dedicated to all things wedding vision and inspiration related. Enjoy!

First up, our color palette.

Our colors from left to right: wine, raspberry, deep fushia, gray, silver

Somehow when I started thinking about what I wanted my wedding to convey the color silver was always there. Its such a chic color, I love metallics and like gray it brings a touch of modern edge. I knew that I needed another key color to really pop and add some sophistication to the mix...and from there I fell in love with the deep purple color I like to call "wine" purple. Now, I've never been a fan of purple in the past, because whenever I think of the color purple that nasty barney purple always comes to mind. And that just wouldn't work. The other colors will be accents and will be incorporated into all elements of the decor. Using just 2 colors would be too simple for us.

Here is another color palette along with the inspiration boards which I considered, which is from 100layercake.com, another one of my wedding blog faves.

Next up...I'll share my inspiration board and theme for the wedding.

We Have Our Photog!

I am pleased to announce that we now have our official wedding photog! I'm super excited and pumped about this decision which racked my brain for many a night. So who is it you ask? None other than Edward Underwood Photography. And I must say our road to finding this guy was no small fete...I stalked many websites trying to put a new faves list together after getting obsessed with photos from another photographer who was way out of our budget (another post altogether). But after viewing his portfolio I fell in love with his work. And even after visiting another photography duo I still couldn't stop thinking about those pics, they are just everything that I want my wedding photos to be. So instead of me ranting about them why don't I just show you.

* All photos are from Edward Underwood Photography

On the Hunt...Our Ceremony Locale

After we finally set a date it was time to give some serious thought to our ceremony and reception venues.

In terms of ceremony locations, I would have loved to have an outdoor ceremony, but I am also practical and I knew that I didn't want to have worry about heat strokes, rain or any other uncontrollable craziness on our wedding day. Plus, both of our families are pretty religious and we just decided that having a church ceremony was the way to go. But figuring out the which church would be an ordeal all it's own. I never knew how much churches actually charge for what seems like such a short amount of time. I had a serious case of sticker shock. After I got past the price tags I was able to prioritize our choices to three.

1. His family has a church that they're been members of for many, many years, but it's too small and probably wouldn't accomodate everyone that was invited comfortably. 
2. My grandparents have a church which they have also been members of many years and many of the weddings for our family have taken place there in the past. 
3. Then there was another local church which my aunt was familiar with but we had no other ties.

We ruled out #1 for the obvious reason, #3 was ruled out based on the location (it was a little out the way considering all the various logistics of the wedding day). So we went with #2 and we'll be keeping the unofficial family wedding tradition going by having our ceremony at Fort Foote Baptist Church.

Personal photo from inside our ceremony venue

I was excited and apprehensive all at the same time after making this decision, for a couple of reasons:

• The contacts at the church weren't very responsive or helpful when I initially contacted them for information, and really just hard to get into contact with in general.
• The price still bugged me. But after actually being able to talk to someone I was able to get the price down from almost $900 to $525 (I mean really, we'll only be there for like an hour!). My first real round of negotiations, if you can call them that, were a success.

But I've been able to rationalize this decision in my head and now everything is good. We put down our deposit. I got an actual cellphone number for my main point of contact and I squared away all of our contract details.

Next up, our hunt for the perfect reception venue!

Running of Brides = Success! (I think)

Ok so that title doesn't sound very optimistic but I promise there's light at the end of this story. So I don't know if anyone else has experienced Filene's Basement Running of the Brides but if you haven't here's a video from their website which sums up the chaos of the day pretty well (which I tried so hard to avoid).

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I attended the event on July 30, 2010 at Mazza Gallerie the only DC location for the event. But I was determined not to be a part of the chaos, so I enlisted my mom as my sole team member (yes, we were a team of two and yes, I hear you giggling). No fancy shirts or crazy costumes, we were on a mission. 

Here's a quick timeline of our day:

• 11:00 - We arrive (slight chaos still going on) and assess the situation, then split up
• 11:30 - gathered have our first batch of dresses, about 5-6 each (whew those things are heavy)
• 11:30 - 11:50 - I try on the first batch and quickly realize that a ballroom gown is not what I want
• 12:00 - 12:20 - gathered our second batch of dresses, we're starting to get the hang of this thing
• 12:20 - 2:00 - the above cycle continued (the time passes faster than you think)
• Let's fast forward to the good part...at about 3pm I purchased my dress!

I was torn between 2 dresses both were similar in style but I leaned towards the one that I have because in the end I thought that it wouldn't need as many alterations as the other dress. The runner up was a lace due to the stress of the day it had a deformed zipper which would need to be replaced and some torn lace here and there. I just wasn't in the market for a dress overhaul. But in the end I think I was able to find a dress that I will be able to make into my dream dress with minor alterations. I think I have a win-win situation, but only time will tell.

Dress details including pictures yet to come...I really want to find a pic of it online but I'm having a hard time, so we'll see.

Why the Long Engagement?

I talked about how we met here and then our history and official engagement story here and here. And in the engagement story I briefly touched upon how we had a long engagement, it'll be 4 years and some change by the time we tie the knot in August 2011. But that timeline isn't for everyone and at first it wasn't for me either.

I was so excited to be newly engaged, I started to read all the wedding sites and buy up as many wedding mags as possible, researching venues and oohing and ahhing at all the lovely photos and thinking about what our date should be. Maybe May 2008 or August 2009. But for some reason, even though we were engaged, for him, the timing was just never right to actually plan a wedding and get married. So I started to really wonder...why didn't he just wait to propose when he was really ready to get married. But I didn't push the issue, I knew it would happen at some point, I just had to be patient. So with patience in mind, I just forgot all about a wedding and just continued to cultivate our relationship. And that's what I like to think we did over the course of the past 7.5 years of being together.

Really thinking about our timeline, here's why it wasn't practical for us until now:

• 2007: We were freshly engaged and just about to graduate college and headed into a major transition in our lives and tackling wedding planning just wasn't fitting into that transition. Not to mention we were dead.broke, college loan debt anyone, I know you can relate.
• 2008: We were getting into the swing of things being working people and all. Then he found a new job and moved to Philly, I was on my way shortly after. So again no time or money for a wedding.
• 2009: This just wasn't the year, nothing major going on it just wasn't top of mind, we were happy being together and exploring our new city.
• 2010: This year just seemed like it was our year we both agreed that we were ready to take the plunge into married life and finally set a date.

And throughout all those years, we always got questions from family, coworkers and friends - when's the date?, have you decided yet?, what's taking so long?. etc. etc. but none of those questions ever made us feel the pressure. At a certain point we just realized that when we were ready to take on the full commitment of  marriage we would make it happen. Everyone has their timeline and regardless of whether it's exactly one year after you get engaged or 10 it doesn't matter because every couple is different and what works for one doesn't always for another.

What timeline worked best for your relationship?

Keeping the Girls Up to Date

Before I started blogging my heart out, I started to think of ways to communicate my wedding plans with all my bridesmaids. I knew that I didn't want to constantly call each one of them and just spill the beans about my wedding, that would get annoying for them, even though I wouldn't mind talking about weddings 24/7. So of I googled and checked out a couple of bridesmaid newsletters on the web and I figured that would be the perfect thing for me to do. It wouldn't be too long but it would definitely get all the important stuff out there. Here's the information that I included:

• Intro - something short and sweet so they knew what was up
• Bridal Party contact info -With one out of town chick and the others off doing their grown woman thing I figured cellphone and emails were sufficient to help enable any future communications
• Ceremony and Reception details - names and addresses for each, they could always google the rest if they were interested
• My First Inspiration Board & Color Palette- I was hoping that this would give them a quick glimpse into my wedding vision, it even had a pic of my reception venue
• Some Details - I decided to dive a little deeper into my vision of the day just because that's the first thing people always ask me
• Their Roles - I wanted to make sure they knew a little bit about what I was expecting from them as a bridesmaid. Relax, no bridezilla stuff over here like they must wear their hair in a ballerina bun or must diet for 8 months. I just wanted to make sure we're on the same page
• What Next (For You) - This was to help clue them into what was priority in the upcoming months and this issue focused on dress selection so that they could start getting ideas of how much they would like to spend and even start researching dresses they may like
• What's Next (For Us): I also wanted to let them know what we would be busy with so that in the next installment they would have some details to look forward to.

So the way I planned it they would receive a new issue every 3 months and an additional one the month of the wedding so that everyone has the most up-to-date info. I'll be posting the newsletter design and a simple tutorial in a couple of days so look out for that.

OMG Where has all the Time Gone!

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I felt like it was just yesterday when I started blogging my bridal adventures...ok soo it basically was yesterday. But at any rate I have been a little delinquent lately. Work has been super crazy and I actually haven't found too much time to do much else. So wedding planning has been pushed to the back burner for the time being.

Here's a small recap as to what I've been up to in wedding la-la land over the past 2 weeks or so:

• I was able to have a  super productive "first official" meeting with my wedding planning duo (they're proving to be more and more awesome as the time passes). We were able to get everything on the table as far as additional vendors that we would need AND I was able to see some reception decor designs and stationary ideas. I'm so excited because this thing is really starting to slowly take shape.
• I've narrowed down the bridesmaid dress choices within the confines of 3 vendors - David's Bridal, Alfred Angelo, Lela Rose for Dessy. My next step is to send them out to the girls to let them take a peek.
• I've been frantically trying to devise some ideas for our STD's (save-the-dates for those not always plugged into wedding craziness). We have ranged from simple modern postcard style to magnets. But I know we need to get crackin on them soon because we want to send them out early into the new year.

There is much more that I can't wait to share with everyone so keep following along.