vendors

Dec122010

Thank You Notes Revealed

I totally forgot to post this! About a week or so ago, I ordered our Thank You notes from OvernightPrints. For those curious, I designed them in PhotoShop CS4 using their basic guidelines to ensure everything stayed in the printing lines, popped it onto their system and boom, ordered! One of the main reasons why I love OvernightPrints over VistaPrint is they don’t charge an upload fee.

After finally deciding to go with a horizontal photo, I messed with different fonts, wording, and layouts. In the end, it was down to 5 pictures. We chose the following picture and simply Thank You in a beautiful script font…

And of course gave credit to our fabulous photographers, Emeric Photography on the back of the card. I just love the blue, but maybe I’m biased…

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Dec062010

Post-Wedding Update Type Post (Including TTD Pictures!)

Whoops! Had that OvernightPrints link all wrong! My bad.

Wow, has it really been 3 days since I last posted? Craziness!

This weekend has been really productive for me in terms of post-wedding stuff. And considering that we bought ourselves a Hanukkah/ early Christmas Wii, that’s really saying something!

Let’s see, in the last 5 days I…

+ordered our marriage certificate
+received our CD of Trash the Dress pictures from the amazingly talented Emeric Photography
+ordered our holiday cards (using an Emeric picture) from Shutterfly
+wrote, completed, changed, and ordered our holiday newsletter from Vistaprint
+ordered our Thank You cards (also using an Emeric picture) from OvernightPrints
+just finished and ordered our 2nd Inkubook that we won in the giveaway (all Emeric pictures)
+played lots and lots of Lego Star Wars: The Complete Saga
+spent loads of time with my amazing hubby
+began knitting a pair of socks for a test knit

You want to see some of them, right? Seriously, I am in love with these pictures!

Using my Ebates account for Shutterfly, OvernightPrints, and Vistaprint, I am expecting a nice big fat refund check soon. I will never again shop online without first checking there to see what rebates I’ll get. It’s like the best “discount” ever! For OvernightPrints, I already had a coupon (HOLIDAY) for 50% off the cards, so not only was my order discounted, but I’m getting cash back. Yes, I’m cheap like that.

Most of our stuff was dependent on getting the CD, which is why so much happened so quickly. I had everything all laid out and just waiting for the picture. Of course, even then, I was still popping different pictures into the layouts.

This post is not sponsored by any company, I just happen to love Ebates and online shopping. <3

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Sep212010

September 21 TMW Post

Tweet: so relieved that my dress fit & the strap length is now perfect! 3 weeks left to lose arm fat 😉 #wedding

Tweet: surprise! pretty much only my female friends and fellow brides might appreciate this one =D http://twitpic.com/2q22bh

Things are really wrapping up now. I picked up my dress from getting teeny tiny alterations to the straps and it fits perfectly. OK, well not perfectly but close enough. I am still on the hunt for undergarments, but what I’m wearing in the above picture might just work out. It’s a too small strapless bra and an underbust corset-type thing with a hook and eye closure. It sucks everything in where it needs to be sucked in. Too bad it can’t work wonders for my arm fat. I have a few more weeks to swim in my parent’s pool and hope to diminish it a bit. If not, no big deal. Seriously. I mean it… it’s not a big deal! My fiancé loves me as is and doesn’t want me to change too much. This is why I love him so much! Or part of it at least. 😉

Yes, I am aware that I am an odd bride. And quite proud of it actually.

Tweet: Final wedding payment coming out today for the all in one photog/ video/ limo/ ceremony. Woohoo! 20 more days to go!!

Holy shnikes this thing is for real! It’s been so amazing with my wedding weekend buddies @brokebride2be and @celestialaxis counting down and pushing each other along.

Today I called and changed the credit card for the final payment for Vegas. As a reminder, we are using a single company in Vegas (Scenic Las Vegas Weddings) that will provide us with the minister, photographer, video/ slide show, limo to various locations, and the flowers. I have booked the bakery (the amazing Retro Bakery) and a hair stylist for me wedding morning (Storybook Brides). We pretty much don’t need anything else except some wine or champagne to go with the cupcakes. Oh, and the favors that I’m mailing out to Vegas to myself, along with the canvas guestbook and the markers.

Our “Trash the Dress” session is the Tuesday after the wedding and we’ve got that booked already with Amelia Cline and Jessie Emeric. TTD session? What?! Remember that I was the extremely lucky winner of this from Green Orchid! I am stoked but dunno if I’m more excited about the wedding itself or the TTD session. Either way, our 5 days in Vegas is going to be amazing!

In 20-something days, I will be ready to focus fully on our January reception here in Miami.

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Jul202010

July 20 TMW Post

Tweet: @msrib – i totally want to do this for our guest “book” for Miami: http://bit.ly/bsnMGS #wedding (even if i had one for my bat mitzvah…)

Image from BridalBuds

Seriously, how adorable is this idea?! I showed it to Steve and I think he liked it. Seeing as he’s the one that’ll be drawing the tree or whatever design we decide on, I’d hope so. I can’t decide if I want a small one – like 8″ x 8″ – for the handful of Vegas folks and a larger one – 16″ x 20″ or bigger – for the reception. Either way, we have this great huge half wall over the pass through in our kitchen where they would reside perfectly next to our ketubah. We’re looking at over 100 guests in Miami, so either we’ll make 2 of them, or just have a really small design. Another option is a very large mat framing a relatively smallish photo of us. My friend Abby did that and it was too cute. It was maybe 12×16 with a 5×7 totally off-center picture.

And the bat mitzvah thing? Yeah, I totally had a 2′ x 3′ humongous picture for everyone to sign. Mhmm… it’s crammed in a closet somewhere and was never hung up. Hopefully this one will be different.

Tweet: @msrib – just sent a bunch of inquiries for Miami vendors on @weddingwire… now the waiting for replies begins 🙂

I know that we have a quote from a photog whose work makes my little heart pitter patter, but I decided to do my due diligence (use this word all the time at work) and look around a bit, right? So yes, today I emailed about 15 photog’s in the Miami – Ft Lauderdale area this afternoon. Sure, I sent the same email to them all using @WeddingWire‘s fabu contact form, but whatev, it worked.  So far, I’ve received 1 email even remotely within our budget. Her images are totally amazing also, but, well… something is lacking. I think it’s the extra’s that K includes.

Photog K is $1100 for 3 hours of photos and a DVD filled with all our edited images. It also includes extra print credit of $150 towards any prints that we print through her.

“Images are usually processed within a 4 to 6 week time period depending on the current backlog and busy season. Once your images are ready, you will be presented with a link to your password-protected online viewing gallery.

High Resolution Files are include a personal printing license. These files are full resolution with no watermarks. Low-resolution, watermarked files are also included for personal perusal of your wedding collection or for sharing images online.”

Photog A is $900 for 3 hours of photos and a DVD filled with all our edited images.

“The above prices include my photography services, editing the photos for you, and putting them onto DVDs for you. I take about 100-200 photos each hour. All the photos I take on your wedding day will be edited for color/brightness/contrast/sharpness/etc, so they are ready to be printed. Then I will send you in the mail all the photos on a DVD (3 copies actually) about 4-6 weeks after your wedding.

Since you are receiving a DVD of very high quality digital negatives of all your wedding photos I do not offer any online viewing galleries, print ordering services, or wedding album design.”

I’m fairly sure if it’s just between these 2 overly talented photogs, it’s kinda a no-brainer. Which would you choose?

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Jul132010

July 13 TMW Post

Tweet: @msrib – is it possible to get a good photog for about $1200? in miami? yeah, i didn’t think so. i hate budgeting.

Tweet: @msrib – is music really needed? don’t need an MC or anything like that. just some background noise. not getting a dance floor. #budgeting

As seen in my last post, I am focusing on our Miami reception right now. I got a quote from one of my favorite photographers and it’s totally in our budget. She is local and I’ve coveted her pictures for a long time. It’s pretty much a given that she (or her hubby) will be doing our reception pictures and that makes me happy to no end! The best part is we’re not doing any traditional wedding stuff, not having a dance floor or emcee and are basically dubbing it as just a big party.

It’s been pretty much decided that we won’t have a band or DJ, just an iPod DJ for some background music. Although, the band at my cousin’s wedding yesterday was simply amazing! I got a bunch of videos of them singing and just… wow… they were awesome. This past weekend was the third wedding I attended while engaged. Sure, I’ve gathered ideas at them all, but this one was not full of ideas for me. Instead, I wandered around and gathered ideas on favorite shows in Vegas. What is your favorite?

Tweet: @msrib – aw crap. my test labels look terrible w/smeared text! apparently the clear labels hate me b/c they’re perfect on plain paper #wedding

I actually wanted to get started with our labels this past week, even though they aren’t getting sent until after our Vegas Vows. They’re all typed up in InDesign and I sent a PDF to myself at work to do a test run. Thank goodness I only printed a single sheet cuz on paper they were PERFECT… on the clear labels, not so much. The text was all super thick and bulky and totally unreadable. I was seriously bummed since I bought 100 labels for 85 envelopes. Meaning a very tight margin and I just lost 10 of them. *sigh* I’m totally bummed about it. Maybe the labels will have to be white since my envelopes are white. Grrrrr! I am annoyed, but whatever, they’ll still be pretty and embossed and… tossed in the trash almost immediately, right?

I printed them at work and think it’s an inkjet. Has anyone has good success with clear labels? What kind of printer did you use?

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Jul062010

July 6 TMW Post

Tweet: @msrib – how many professional photographers do i have on my feed… debating if i want pro pics for our uber casual wedding reception

I’ve been seriously debating this issue. Our big DAY will have plenty of coverage as included in the package by Scenic Las Vegas Weddings. As will 2 days later thanks to the amazing photo shoot we won with the amazingly talented Emeric Photography

In a series of responses from photographer and non-photographer friends, I was convinced that yes, we DO need a pro photog at the reception. As one friend pointed out, the party, with all our family and friends, will look like drunken party pics especially compared to our pro pics for everything else. So now, I need to figure out a budget for the January shindig and see how much cash we have to spend on pictures. I have a friend that I would love so much to use, but I just don’t know if we can afford her. Luckily she said she has a friends and family discount. She is one of those truly amazing photog’s with crazy high ratings on WeddingWire. I am in love with her work. Le sigh.

Tweet: msrib – as open as i’ve been w/all my dress choices, i think i’m gonna keep the final selection a secret until the pics are posted. maybe #weddingwednesday

I did end up purchasing the gown last Monday. I was in and out of David’s Bridal in about 45 minutes with my newest dress in hand. They had the size and color I wanted to try on. To be fair, I did wander around to check on other floor length gowns and tried on one other. Little Miss Indecisive is no longer so! The dress is in my closet. My mom said she like it a lot better than the last all lace one. I don’t have any pictures of myself in it as I was having major undergarment issues. Plus the straps are a bit big so I need to have then fixed before I’ll post any pictures. I suppose in this case, third time really in a charm!

Tweet: msrib – Hello mini future Mr & Mrs Fletcher! #caketopper http://twitpic.com/21eohx

And I leave you with a bit of creativity… all I need to do is spray on the varnish and we’re done!

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