Wedding World Lingo

Who knew that basically a whole other language exists out there in wedding world? Words like bustle, chapel length, tastings and registries quickly entered my vocabulary. It's amazing how many things you learn while wedding planning. I'd like to share a few words (and my hopefully humorous definitions of them) that I've learned along this journey.

boutineer — remember those things you gave to your date at prom? Well this impossibly hard to remember how to spell thing is the grown-up version of that. This could come in the form of flowers, buttons, twigs, etc.
chapel length — the length of your dress train and/or veil. according to quick internet search it's about three to five feet from the hem (bottom) of your dress. there is also cathedral length (the super long version) as well as elbow and finger tip length veils. 
chivari — a fancy looking chair that will cost you more than the regular ol' chairs.
centerpiece — the decorations for your reception tables.
deposits — the cash money you gotta pay up so said vendors can make the wedding happen.
letterpress — really expensive but pretty way to print your wedding invitations
registry — where you sign up to ask for a variety of gifts from kitchen utensils to home stuff and more. also where you get to play around with that scanner gun at the store ;)
response cards — the small but very important pieces of paper that let you know who is coming to your wedding and who isn't (if of course they send them!) i've heard horror stories of no responses, so keeping my fingers crossed for ours!
tasting — one of the fun parts! when you get to try the yummy food/desserts that you'll serve at your wedding. schedule a lot of these, I mean helloo free food and sweets!
vendor — the people who will make your wedding happen i.e. photographers, caterers, etc.

hmm, so this is all I could think of for now. This is just a small sampling of the lingo you'll hear tossed around when you're planning a wedding. It's a bit daunting at first, but you'll quickly get the hang of it. In fact, it may get to the point when you'll be having a conversation with someone who isn't currently planning a wedding and/or in the industry and they'll look at you like you have two heads when you bring some of this stuff up. But alas, their time will come ;)


Images via www.itmightbelove.com, www.celebrityweddings411.com, weddingchicks.com, stylemepretty.com

Low-Cost Save the Dates

Ahh Save the Dates. The lovely little reminders you send to your guests to let them know you're planning a big bash in a few months. I learned what save the dates are, along with many other wedding-related terms when I first got engaged. I learned even more about them when researching options. Who knew that these things can cost ya a pretty penny? After finding out the average costs, I was appalled. Who would want to spend that much money on something most people will probably throw away? Well, definitely not us! Once we settled on a Bay Area wedding I decided postcards were the way to go! I found some vintage-y looking ones highlighting various San Francisco landmarks and I thought it was a pretty novel idea. Apparently I was wrong. See below:

 

 

 

Turns out postcard save the dates where all the rage. Regardless I went ahead with my idea since it was a) cheaper and b) a little more fun and c) tied into our wedding since for many guests it will be a destination wedding hence travel and postcards :)
So it may not have been super original but for 9 bucks for a pack of 20 it was the most cost-effective option I could think of. Plus postage for postcards at just 29 cents a pop also saved us a couple bucks. Now, as much as I like the personalized options with photos of the couple it just wasn't for us. I felt a bit weird thinking of our faces on peoples fridges. We did personalize by ordering a custom stamp from Etsy from this awesome seller. Check out how it turned out below (in the late hours stamping away). 

The only downside to my idea was that since it was a postcard some guests missed it in their mail. Regardless, I'd still highly recommend this low-cost yet equally fun save the date idea!
Images in order of appearance via me, Ruffled, Wedding Chicks, The Vegas Wedding Planner

The Wedding Planning Book to End All Wedding Planning Books

Early into the planning process I stumbled upon A Practical Wedding, a wedding blog that differed from any other. And I'm so glad I did. You will be too once you read it. It offered a refreshing, down-to-earth perspective on wedding planning and marriage in general. Not surprisingly, the blog evolved and its creator Meg Keene recently published a book, A Practical Wedding: Creative Solutions for Planning a Beautiful, Affordable, and Meaningful Celebration.

I wasn't planning on reading any wedding planning books nor am I planning on reading any more but thank goodness I read this one! You know the feeling when you're reading a book and you can't help but talk during the process? Well that's what reading this book was like for me. Kind of like this:

"Oh my god yes! I totally agree!"
"I thought I was the only one that thought that! It's so nice to hear I'm not crazy!"
"Seriously, who the hell cares about the effin' chairs?!"

Basically, Meg took a very unique approach when it came to writing a book about wedding planning: She was actually NORMAL about it. As in, she reminds us all that the whole point of planning a wedding is the getting married part, not the part about how great your reception is or what your centerpieces look like. So if you are a clueless yet sane bride wanting to plan a meaningful celebration, read this book ASAP. She gets down to the nitty gritty and helps you figure out where to start in an easy-to-understand step-by-step process.

Thanks to movies and media, the prelude to the wedding planning process — the proposal itself — has been exaggerated to such great lengths that it has made most of us forget the point of it all. Meg's insightful and empowering words shatter the typical stereotype.  I absolutely LOVED the quote from the book discussing this topic:

"It's exciting to decide to get married. And scary. But the moment of the proposal is just that: a moment. It moves you to the next step of the process; it's not the be-all, end-all. So maybe you have a fancy candlelight dinner followed by parachutists delivering you a pear-shaped, seven-carat diamond. Or maybe you decide to get married one Sunday morning over the newspaper and a cup of coffee. Either way is fine. The point is that you decided to spend your life with someone you love."

And that ladies and gentlemen is just a small piece of the wisdom you'll find in this book. Another favorite tidbit of mine featured in the book: the genius and oh-so-true tips from Kayce Hazelgrove of shinyprettybits.com and foodiewashere.com titled "The Six Stages of Wedding Planning." Kayce takes you through the various stages of emotional highs and lows of planning a wedding. 

My favorite was #4: OUTRAGE/DEPRESSION: "WHAT THE EFF" "EFF ME"

"This stage is marked by feelings of bitterness and frustration. You may feel as though you are failing in some way. This can cause you to swing between feeling angry over all the expectations being placed on you and despondent over your inability to live up. You may find yourself resenting others with friends and family who own a barn, can DJ, or have the enviable ability to craft masterpieces out of bits of random fabric and paper." 

Now I'm not sure if any of you guys planning a wedding out there have felt this way, but I certainly have and reading this book was a nice affirmation of 1) I'm not a crazy person and 2) knowing that it can be done in a sane and gasp! maybe even fun way. As Megan of notmartha.org puts it:

"It’s like having a very cool older sister who went through all this already to help guide you on what is and what isn’t important."

I couldn't have said it better myself. Buy this book and read it now. You'll be thankful you did.



P.S. Listen to Meg's interview discussing the book on NPR's Talk of the Nation here.

Wedding Hair & Makeup: Freakin Kidding Me??

So as with most things wedding-related, hair & makeup is absolutely, utterly, ridiculously overpriced. Yes, I want to look good on my wedding day but I am not willing to pay an arm and a leg for it! Unfortunately for me, it seems the Bay Area has some of the highest prices around for this stuff. I've never gotten my makeup done professionally before so I figured my wedding day would a be a special occasion where I could splurge, but for $600 just to put some crap on my face?! Um no thanks. Unless that's liquid gold going on there, it is totally not worth it. So alas, the search for a reasonably priced hair/makeup person continues...

The Rising Cost Of Weddings

I stumbled upon this great infographic at WeddingRepublic.com about the crazy rise of the cost of weddings today. Check it out here!