Weddingbee Blog

I know… I know… you all are getting tired of my invitations. But I think I’ve found the *perfect* invites. I’m not sure what style I’ll go with, but the company is called Papel Vivo — they are based in Canada, so the US prices are rather reasonable for letterpress! Here are some styles that I like:

They can also do matching place cards, table numbers, direction cards, etc. I think I’m still going to go with the Shutterfly Save the Dates, because I’m not quite ready to commit to an invitation style and definitely not a color!

Unfortunately, my photographer is booked every weekend in August, so we’re not going to be able to take engagement pictures until September. If we send the Save the Dates in October, guests will still have 9 months to plan for it, which I think is plenty.

Playing around some more on Shutterfly. Here’s another try with one of my FAVORITE pictures of us (I think MK would kill me if I used it ). The picture is on my nightstand so if MK isn’t over, he’s still the last person I see.

Check out Shutterfly for great Save the Dave designs. Rather than using one of their pre-made designs, I used a plain picture and then enhanced it with a calender boarder. I don’t like how I look in this picture and will likely use a different one, but this is the style I’ll probably use. I’ll circle the wedding date with a permanent marker.

I’m still playing with the wording and fonts, but this is how the inside right and left could look.

The cards are pretty inexpensive.

Cards Price (per card)
1-9 $2.49
10-20 $2.19
21-50 $1.79
51-100 $1.59
101+ $1.49

I might actually make two versions, most will say “Kelly” which is actually my nickname and 20 or so will have my real first name so that my parents can send them out to their friends.

Shutterfly can stamp and address the cards for you for an additional 49 cents — which is totally worth it, considering that stamps are 30-something cents, so they’re charging almost nothing for printing the addresses and return address! I need to see if they could address everything for me but NOT mail out the cards, since I would still have to circle the actual date on the cover of the card. Otherwise, I’ll have to address everything myself.

I’d like to take care of the Save the Dates before the end of August.

I’ve already lost 2 pounds! I know that it’s just water, but it makes me feel better and motivated to lose more!

I’ve been on Atkins since lunch on Saturday. Lunch? Yep - I had wheaties and soy milk and a peach for breakfast.

I woke up at 5:30 am on Saturday morning with heartburn. I had gone out to dinner nearly every night last week, eating and drinking too much. I couldn’t fall back asleep and felt generally icky so I decided that I really needed to go on a diet.

But MK and I had gone to D’Agostino’s Friday night and bought Wheaties so I was excited about eating them for breakfast. I don’t usually have cereal in the house because I would snack on it too much. So I decided to have my Wheaties (it’s not like I wanted a glazed donut) and start my new carb-free life with lunch.

My goal is 10 pounds for dress shopping and another 10-15 for the wedding. I’ve never been thin, and that’s not really my goal. I look great when I’m one size smaller and FANTASTIC when I’m two sizes smaller than I am right now. Any more than that and I’d lose my boobs!

I know I’ve gained around 5-10 pounds since last fall. MK hasn’t said anything, but I know that he’s noticed. I’ve also been exercising less so I’ve gotten “softer.” I didn’t make it to the gym this morning, but will do my best to go at lunch!

Ok, so I’m officially following the good Dr. Atkins (rest in peace)!

Need to lose some weight pronto to go dress shopping and take engagement pix. This is just a short term solution - I can’t live without carbs forever. But the plan is two weeks on Atkins and then just basic healthy (NO muffins!) eating.

Wish me luck!

I’ve been very unproductive today. A few too many glasses of wine with dinner last night and paying the price today. But hey, looking for invitations for a wedding that’s 11 months away is a productive use of time… right?

After looking at all of the Indian invites, I think I want to stick with my original letterpress plan. Bella Figura seems to run at approx $8 - $10 per invite, including the response card/envelope.

Marsville Letterpress is around the same price - in Canadian Dollars - so it’s actually 30% cheaper. But I’ve heard some girls on theknot having problems with their customer service. Is $300 worth the aggrevation? I don’t know but I really like their invites and they sent me sample papers which I love!

Also I will need a map/direction card with whichever option I pick.

At first, the Indian invites seemed like a total bargain - some as low as 75 cents each. But the invites that I actually like are more like $2.00 - $4.00 each, plus shipping ($100), plus printing costs (how much?), plus the RSVP cards/envelopes (although an extra card for directions is included).

One girl on theknot posted that the envelopes don’t seal(!) and her friend had to ship them in plastic bags. I don’t know if she got them from the same website. Argh! So many details. I think I’ll still order samples from India, but they charge $5.00 per sample plus around $15 for delivery (all refundable if you order from them), so I’m not going to go crazy and order a sample of every invite on the site.

I think I found my videographer! His name is Wes Jones and he meets all of my wish list items:

• videos are less than 30 minutes total
• no cheesey effects
• incorporates super eight

He has two samples on his website and I will meet with him in the next few weeks when he’ll bring more samples with him (he lives outside of the city). Best of all, he’s within my budget (albeit, the max I was willing to spend)!

I’ve been checking out more Indian invites looking for more pastel/less ethnic looking designs. I think I’ll order a few samples and then decide.

Front & Insert

Envelope

Inside & Envelope

Front

Inside

I’ve also been looking a bit at invites. Right now I have it down to two things: letterpress or Indian. Indian? Yes Indian! You can get GORGEOUS invites from India at a fraction of the cost of US. I just have to make sure they are not overly ethnic. Let me know what you think…

These are both from Marsville Letterpress which is a Canadian company with great prices.

Bella Figura letterpress invitations.

Indian Invites: Inside View

Inserts (invites, direction cards, etc.)

There are tons of others I like and will order samples in various colors.

There is something very interesting on the indian invite website - they offer calligraphy for envelopes but computer printing costs MORE than hand written calligraphy! Crazy!

From wedding_natsi…

EVERETT, Wash. (AP) ? A young woman decided to call off her wedding 12 days before the event and her parents knew they’d be stuck with the bill, so they decided to have a party anyway and invited the homeless.

Residents of the Interfaith Family Shelter, housed in a former convent across from Our Lady of Perpetual Help Catholic Church where the wedding had been scheduled, attended the bash thrown by Katie Hosking, 22, a medical assistant at the Everett Clinic, and her parents, Bill and Susan Hosking of Lake Stevens.

“They had a DJ and really good music. It was a warm, friendly atmosphere. The food was delicious. It was a nice break with people not worrying about anything for one night,” shelter manager Carol Oliva said. “Toward the end of the evening, they packed up all the leftover food and we got to bring it back to the shelter.” One homeless woman got her son out of a wheelchair, “took that child out on the dance floor and picked him up and danced with him. It was a beautiful sight. Our kids realized that even when something bad happens, somebody else has something worse,” Susan Hosking said. “It was an eye-opener.”

The almost-bride would not say what led to the breakup, only that it happened June 6, 12 days before the scheduled date of her wedding.

Planning a reception for 150 guests at the Echo Falls golf and country club, her parents had made a $2,500 down payment and written another check for the $6,200 balance. Club policy requires full payment for any event that is canceled less than 60 days before the scheduled date.

“Personally, it’s a really hard time for a family,” said Jessica Gamble, the club’s catering sales manager. “It’s a really awesome thing that they did. They made the best of it.”

Susan Hosking said that once she and her husband “got past the panic,” they took a suggestion from her brother-in -law in New York and decided to invite the staff and residents of the shelter operated by the Interfaith Association of Snohomish County to share in the evening.

More than 50 family members and close friends were joined by about 40 homeless people, shelter workers and volunteers. The shelter staff arranged rides to the club.

Instead of a wedding cake, chef Michael Greb produced strawberry shortcake to top off a menu that included baron of beef, salmon, shrimp cocktail, fettuccine and fruit.
“Oh my gosh, we had so much fun,” Katie Hosking said.

Shelter residents, she said, “came up and thanked us several times ? thank you, thank you, thank you. We all danced. I still got to dance with my dad.”

Her mother said she was happy to demonstrate an alternative to the case of Jennifer Wilbanks, 32, who got cold feet and vanished shortly before a 600-guest wedding in Georgia. Wilbanks pleaded no contest this month to telling police a phony abduction story and was sentenced to probation and community service.

“That food would help feed people at the shelter for another three or four days,” she said. “With the notoriety of the runaway bride, I would like people to know that these things do happen, and there is another outlet. The money is spent.”

A sad wedding day story from PhotoPete and a crazy wedding day story from strangeyetbeautiful…

My younger brother is now officially married. His story is a pretty great one…

In August 2003, my brother went on a guided tour of Japan. My brother’s wife (let’s call her Apple) was also on the tour with her aunt and grandmother. Because my brother and Apple were the only 2 young people on the tourbus, they were seated together. At first they didn’t like each other too much because both had very strong personalities. But they spent the entire week together on the bus sitting beside each other, talking for hours on end and discovered that they did like each other indeed. My brother also became very close with Apple’s aunt and grandmother who thought he was a fine young chap and took an immediate liking to him. My brother and Apple toured many cities in Japan together and soon they were very close.

After Japan, my brother continued onto China by himself, but went to Korea afterwards. For 2 months my brother and Apple hung out, had fun, and fell in love. My brother also became close to Apple’s parents who took an immediate liking to him as well. Life was good. Alas the time came when my brother had to return to America. But they talked on the phone every night for hours on end (my mom can attest to the exorbitant phone bills!). It was hard to be apart, so Apple having never been to America before, decided that she now had a reason to visit.

She needed to apply for a tourist visa so she trusted an elderly man who assisted people in getting tourist visas to the United States. However he turned out to be shuckster who really didn’t know what he was doing. As a result she was turned down for a tourist visa. Twice. It was heartbreaking, but they decided that she should apply for a student visa. She wanted to come study English in the the States for a year or so… and of course there was my brother. But their plans were foiled again and because she had been turned down for the tourist visa, her student visa was also denied. Twice. Having their hopes raised and dashed so many times was devastating. A vast ocean separated them and it seemed that they could not be together.

There was only one last hope left - to apply for an engagement visa. Meanwhile, my brother and Apple had been travelling around the entire world to meet each other since she could not come to America. They went to Vancouver, Bangkok, London, Paris, Venice, Rome - some of the most beautiful and romantic cities in the world. During this time, my brother came to realize that she indeed was the one. A year had lapsed since Apple had begun applying for visas and they were desperate to be together permanently. When my brother submitted his engagement visa application, he told their wonderful story and included pictures from all their adventures around the world. They continued to talk for hours on the phone every night and were very hopeful that this time they would finally be together.

In early June of this year, we finally got word that her visa had been approved. My brother and Apple were ecstatic. On June 24, 2005, Apple arrived from Korea with her parents. It had been almost 2 years since she and my brother first met and they had been going through the visa approval process for almost that long as well. They had been through a lot and now they were finally together. Our two families had dinner that night. Apple’s parents saw that she was becoming part of a good family and they trusted and loved my brother. Her parents left her with their blessing and returned to Korea.

In the past 2 weeks my brother and Apple moved into their own apartment and got married at City Hall. They’ll have another ceremony for family and friends later this year (which I’ll be planning of course ). They’re busy buying furniture and setting up the apartment so they’ve put wedding plans on hold for a little bit. They are very happy and I am happy for them.

For my father-daughter dance, I chose What a Wonderful World by Louis Armstrong and Mr. Bee chose You are the Sunshine of My Life by Stevie Wonder for his mother-son dance. Amid the chaos of the days before the wedding, I decided that having a father-daughter, and mother-son dance back to back was too much - your guests don’t want to sit there and watch you dance for 7-8 minutes straight. So we decided to skip the separate mothr-son dance and just have the four of us dance to What a Wonderful World together.

I had an idea recently (which is what I should have done for my own wedding.) I could have had our band play abridged versions of the two songs so that we could have had separate father-daughter, mother-son dances. Maybe a minute and a half for each song. You could even have your dj play abridged versions. Alas. Everything is so clear in retrospect.

****

A friend of mine recently introduced me to Luther Vandross’ Dance with my Father. The song is actually about missing a father that’s passed away but it’s such a beautiful song! It’s perfect as a tribute to a deceased father. If a mother and daughter danced to this song at a wedding, I swear I would just begin bawling on the spot.

Dance with my Father - Luther Vandross

Back when I was a child, before life removed all the innocence
My father would lift me high and dance with my mother and me and then
Spin me around ’til I fell asleep
Then up the stairs he would carry me
And I knew for sure I was loved
If I could get another chance, another walk, another dance with him
I’d play a song that would never, ever end

How I’d love, love, love
To dance with my father again
When I and my mother would disagree
To get my way, I would run from her to him
He’d make me laugh just to comfort me
Then finally make me do just what my mama said
Later that night when I was asleep
He left a dollar under my sheet
Never dreamed that he would be gone from me
If I could steal one final glance, one final step, one final dance with him
I’d play a song that would never, ever end

‘Cause I’d love, love, love
To dance with my father again
Sometimes I’d listen outside her door
And I’d hear how my mother cried for him
I pray for her even more than me
I pray for her even more than me
I know I’m praying for much too much
But could you send back the only man she loved
I know you don’t do it usually
But dear Lord she’s dying
To dance with my father again
Every night I fall asleep and this is all I ever dream