Fonts I am loving for invites & addressing envelopes...

Fonts I am loving for invites & addressing envelopes...

Fonts:

Albemarle Swash
FontleroyBrown
Andes
CoventryGarden
ChopinScript
Renaissance

I don't know about you guys but I spent WAY too much time looking for the right font for the save the dates & envelopes. What fonts did you use on your envelopes?

Flower Girl Dresses

Yesterday I research flower girl dresses for HOURS online & I still am not sure which one I like the best. My problem as usual is I like too many different styles.
I am loving the tutu for flower girls, this has to be my fav of all of them, but I'm not sure if it would be too casual. If I do go with this option, tiara's tutus on etsy provides for a lot of color options and lengths, she even can make adult sizes! I'm thinking if my nieces get these, their auntie is going to have to get one too ;-)

via tiarastutus on etsy $27

I spent a lot of time on http://www.mygirldress.com/, they have a large selection of dresses and most are 50% off, ranging from $35-$70. I am digging this dress because of the tulle & cute flower on the waist & it's a steal at $39.99 but I am not sure about the colors.

via mygirldress

I ADORE the detail & bow on this dress, can you believe it's $46.25!

via mygirldress

I'm not sure when I should get their dresses because they are 4 & 2, and who knows what size they will be in April. Maybe January is a good month to get them? How far in advance did you buy your flower girl dresses?

Update: The 99 Cent Wedding

If you recall the posting earlier about the 99 Cent Store Wedding Sweepstakes... here's the update!

I came across a posting on LA Weekly about the 09/09/09 99 Cent Wedding Sweepstakes (complete with great pictures). Looks like a cool concept... not sure if I would have wanted to be the one participating.

Check it out.

Pantone Wedding

When it comes to choosing colors, I know it is pretty hard to find the "exact" shade of yellow, blue, grey, etc. to match your vision, especially considering all the different areas that come into play (invites, dresses, etc.) 

The Dessy Group has a pretty neat tool called "PANTONE Wedding" that lets you share your inspiration board with all of your wedding vendors. Pantone colors are a standard in the print industry, so when you have the color code and order something using Pantone, you know you will get *exactly* what you ask for. It also helps with choosing color combinations (better than a color wheel would if you ask me) if you are in that stage of planning. 

Check it out. 

Make your own online RSVP for your wedding website

After looking at all the free wedding website, I thought that weddingwire.com had the best tools but I liked the themes that projectwedding.com had, so I went with theme! After looking at the budget, mi amor decides that we can save some money by having people rsvp online, since projectwedding.com does not have an rsvp option, I decided to make my own rsvp link, by making a google form. It was easy to make, the thing that took the longest was to find the right wording, to prevent people from bringing more guests than were invited, but at the same time to make sure we know exactly who is coming. Although the form seems to have an option to embed on a website, it did not work for me and when I checked the help section in google a lot of people have problems embedding the form, so instead I just put a section in our wedding website titled RSVP and instructed people to click *here* to rsvp.
Also make sure to list on your website when you want them to respond by.
Here are some pics of the form, sorry they don't look that good, I have no idea how to get screen prints onto blogger.
Creating the form: You can add text, paragraph text, multiple choice & choose from list. I used text for everything except for the actual rsvp question, I put the check box option, we are having buffet, but for those of you that are having a sit down dinner you may want to use the check box option for the entree.

This is how the form looks but to get a better picture click *here*Once people use the form, google sends you an email notification and the RSVPs are in a spreadsheet!
They have different themes to choose from go *here* to learn more about google forms.

Wedding Cost

I don't know about you guys but mi amor & I had this imaginary # in both of our heads of what our wedding would cost, after all, all we wanted was a nice place, a buffet dinner and be able to provide our guest with an open bar. We soon found out we were way off base, just the cost of the food and drinks was barely in budget. If we would have checked out costofwedding.com we would have realized that the average wedding in our area (West L.A) is $18,511 and $30,852 -This does not include cost for a honeymoon or engagement ring. Every time I think about the budget it really stresses me out, to the point I now understand why some brides just say they are ready to elope!

After we realized we were way off base with the over all budget, we started wondering what was the average cost of items such as cake, centerpieces etc. I found costhelper.com it's a great resource to find out how much anything cost, not only wedding stuff but pretty much anything. In their wedding section they have the info on how much typical wedding related items cost such as wedding dance classes, They tell you what the typical costs are and what they may include and even mention discounts you can get. I found it really helpful, it educated me about what wedding items may cost instead of what I think an item may cost.
What resources do you use to determine how much you are willing to spend on a wedding related item?

My Craft Coupons

Where the heck are my Michaels coupons? That's what I have been asking for the last few weeks, I get emails from them but when I click on get coupon it showed me a measly 20% off coupon! But all is well now that I found mycraftcoupons.com they have links to weekly craft coupons like Michaels, Joann's, Aaron Bros and Hobby Lobby (not in CA), how awesome is that! Ok, now time to go shopping or the way I like to see it, time to go save some money!

Getting Married? There's an app for that.

To add to WestsideWeddings growing list of iPhone apps... Here's a list of some pretty interesting iPhone wedding applications I've come across recently:

iWedding - wedding event planner (comes with counter, budgets, lots of lists).

iBridalGown - need to find a wedding dress? There's an app for that! (Sorry that line is pretty catchy.)

Wedding List - Wedding guest list app by the folks from iWedding.

Wedding Day - Countdown app till the big event (I know I have one on my iGoogle!)

Personally, I'd like to take over the whiteboard at Westside Wedding's place and start making some flowcharts!

Free printable boxes!

{Source don'teatthepast.com }

I am on a DIY kick and what I mean is there are a lot of things I want to DIY but have yet to actually do any of them :-) One of them is cupcake boxes! I *must* have them so when I bake cupcakes I can put them in these pretty boxes and give them to my peeps. I recently came across don'teatthepast.com and she has such great printable favor boxes and they are FREE! and when I make said cupcake I am going to top them of with these cupcake flags thanks to Martha Stewart!

{Source Martha Stewart}

Maid of Honor Checklist

I came across a pretty thorough and cool Maid of Honor checklist from lovetoknow.com.

I toggle between having excel sheets and the paper pen method of doing things, I think with all the wedding stuff going old school would be the best way to know.

Click here for the printable checklist.

Be organized! The Maid of Honor is to remain cool, calm, collected at ALL TIMES (see picture).