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

When Your Family Hates Your Venue...

So wedding planning is tricky. Yes, the wedding is about the couple that's getting married but there are also loads of family members that want to interject their opinions into everything. So what happens when your parents* dislike the venue you've chosen?? I know, I know, this is my fault for planning a big, fat Polish wedding, right? Well maybe or maybe not. Either way, it sucks to hear that the venue you and your man have booked and love isn't a fan favorite among the rentals. It was hard hearing their not-so-approving opinions but in the end it only brought me and my fiancé closer together. After some gentle negotiations and polite head nodding (alright I'll admit and tears shed) we came to a semi-peaceful truce. One that did not require a venue change. We explained our vision to them and helped them understand what we had in mind. In the end, I realize that our families only want the best for our wedding day (even though sometimes they have a funny way of showing it ahem) and I know it'll all work out. Sometimes you just need to go through some of this crappy stuff to be even more grateful for the awesomeness that awaits your future married life :) And c'mon it wouldn't be a wedding without some drama right?! haha


*Editor's Note:* My dad liked the venue from the start, he's pretty awesome.

the venue hunt is on

I need a venue that will let us do this all night long*

Ahh, the great venue search. You tireless monster that won't let up, how I loathe thee. All the wedding industrial complex people tell you that once you have your venue chosen, everything else just "falls into place." Now that's all fine and dandy, but what if you can't find the damn venue?! 

We had a pretty short answer to what we wanted out of our wedding reception: an awesome (read kick a**) party! That's what! It seems simple enough right? Apparently, the wedding industrial complex people disagree with our interpretation of "awesome party" since they consider 10 pm to be a perfectly normal end time, (I know I know, I was shocked and dismayed as well, I mean 10 pm really?! My grandma parties later than that. Apparently this is due to silly noise ordinance rules, but still. Sigh.) Everyone knows that a big fat Polish wedding needs to go on into the wee hours of the morning!

That quickly narrowed it down to any venue that was willing to accommodate our party-crazy arses till midnight or later. In an attempt to be the perfectly organized wedding planning, bride-to-be (I don't know who I was kidding, clearly that is not me) I suggested a super cool Excel spreadsheet to track all our options. Well 52 rows, what seems like hundreds of Web searches and at least 15 site visits later, we have yet to choose our venue.