Sit back, relax and enjoy your flight

I’ve been to weddings with different seating arrangements: open seating, assigned table, and assigned seat. We decided to assign tables for our wedding because we wanted to make sure everyone had a place and that our family and bridal party wouldn’t be stuck in the back due to post ceremony pictures.

I searched the internet for ideas for the escort cards and came up with a few that I liked:

All images from the Knot

While searching the web I stumbled upon Aylee bites template for a boarding pass save the date (for a destination wedding) and thought it would be perfect for our escort cards. I downloaded the free template and manipulated the information to fit our wedding. Each guest will have a boarding pass with a destination that matches up with our table names that are all named for places that we have traveled to together. (Similar to Mrs. Latte's cards)

Here are the easy steps that I followed in making our escort cards:

1. Download Aylee bites template and input our wedding information

2. Print out the boarding passes, 3 to a page, on white card stock

3. Use the handy dandy personal cutter to cut out the passes

4. Switch out the cutting blade with a perforation blade to make the ends of the boarding passes more realistic

5. Use a 7.5" x 8.5" tracer to trace out the boarding pass jacket from cardstock. Sadly I could only fit one jacket per page, but to save on paper I’m only doing one jacket per couple. Both of their passes (since they will be at the same table) will be placed together in the one jacket with both of their names on the front.

6. Cut out the jacket using the personal cutter. Make sure you have switched back the blade to the normal cutting blade.

7. Fold the jacket cardstock in half

8. Use another tracer (can you tell I love cheapo homemade tracers? Makes it so much easier to keep everything looking the same) to cut out a portion of the front half of the jacket. This will allow for the boarding pass ends to be seen while in the jacket.

9. Glue the open side and bottom of the jacket together.

Be careful with this step! The first time I glued, I used the whole width of the Xyron runner, but it was too thick and the passes wouldn’t easily fit in the jacket. I learned to only use about half the width of the runner to ensure the passes would easily go in and out of the jacket. A way to optimize your runner adhesive (since that stuff is pricey, even with coupons at Michael’s) is to place two jackets next to each. This way half of the adhesive will roll onto one, and the other half onto the other.

10. I printed out the guests names on white cardstock with a faint gray box around to guide me when cutting.

11. The matting for under the names were cut from scraps of paper that I had saved from other projects like the save the dates. Yay for making use of scraps!

12. Glue the name onto the matting and then the matting onto the outside of the jacket.

13. Insert boarding passes and there you have it!

After showing the mock up to our planner and to MOH Navy, both looked at the number in the box, (which I thought it would be cute to use the numbers from our wedding date) and thought that would confuse guests. As in "wait a second, we're married but one is at table number 11 and the other is at table number 23?" So we have changed that section to just have our initials.

I can make the jackets earlier on, but really have to wait for the RSVPs to start rolling in to complete this project. Note to guests - That means don’t slack on those RSVPs!

Did you do assigned tables? If you did what did you do for escort cards?

Tie it up

I thought that picking out ties for the guys would be easier than the dresses for the bridesmaids, but that wasn't the case.

When I first started thinking of ties I was in love with the striped blue and green look seen here.

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But then I looked at the colors of BM dresses and thought maybe the navy would be too much. The dresses are more of a royal color.

Well, Mr. E and I headed to Kohl's one weekend and knocked out all of the ties (groomsmen, dads and ushers) in one sale run! 

The Dads will be wearing the blue ties on the left.  I don't know if you can see, but the dots are alternating lighter blue and light green.

The Ushers will be in the light green with blue dot ties in the middle.

And last but certainly not least we have the groomsmen in the blue sort of pin-tuck ties on the right.  Do you notice a difference?  Yeah the one on the left is a darker shade of blue then the other three.  Well as fate would have it, we could only find 3 in the slate color we wanted and with 4 groomsmen that wouldn't quite cut it.  We found the Navy blue and decided to just go with it and give it to Mr. E's brother, the best man to stand out.  We'll just say that was the plan all along ;)

What are your guys wearing for the wedding?  Did you have more trouble picking out what they will wear then you originally thought?

DIY Fail

Sometimes DIY projects are best left to someone else.

When we first envisioned our save the dates they included a DIY magnet.

The plan was to use a design from Mr. E, print it out and roll it through Xyron machine to make a magnet. It seemed like a great plan, all we needed was our engagement pictures to add to the magnet.

After looking through all of our engagement pictures, we decided that it might be cooler to just use the picture as the whole magnet design and just add in our names to the suitcases. Lets just say it looked better in my head then what actually came out.

Coming out of the xyron machine

A couple of magnets cut out

I just wasn't feeling it. I couldn't seem to cut the edges straight enough and it was just missing something. Even if we went back to the original design, I couldn't help but think of the time it would take print out and cut all of the magnets. I started to think of other options and ventured over magnetstreet.

Searching through the various STD options, I realized that we would need to stick to the mini magnets in order for them to fit into the cards that were already made (thanks to the help of my BMs!). I personalized 5 different designs with our colors and information and then waited for Mr. E to come home and look over them. We both decided on our favorite and submitted the order that night justifying the purchase by the offset of the cost of ink, cardstock, expensive magnet refills for the xyron machine and my sanity in cutting perfect edges.

Here's a look at the personalized design from magnetstreet.

A couple weeks later a box arrived containing these little beauties!

Did you start on a DIY project and end up leaving it to someone else (professional or family/friend)?

No Rain

"All I can say is that my life is pretty plain,
I like watchin’ the puddles gather rain
And all I can do
Is just pour some tea for two
And speak my point of view,
But it’s not sane… it’s not S-A-A-A-A-N-E-E-E"

As I sit here listening to Blind Melon’s No Rain (who can forget that iconic bumblebee?), I find it fitting to write about a huge fear of mine…

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I originally envisioned our ceremony indoors, most likely in the church that my family has been apart of since we moved to Texas back in ’95. No worries for the weather minus the walk into the church. No weather.com stalker in the weeks leading up to the wedding. No plan B needed.

Fast forward to our venue search and me falling in love with the Tribute and their beautiful outdoor gazebo. I couldn’t be more excited about getting married outdoors, but now I do have to be a weather.com stalker leading up to the wedding. Our photographer said that she has never had rain at a wedding in the month of April, so we’re knocking on wood that her streak continues for our wedding.

We do have a Plan B that I’m not overly excited about, but will not stress about using it if we need to. Our plan B is to hold the ceremony in the same room as the reception, using a partition/curtain to hide the tables. Plan B means more work for our planner and the team at the venue to turn the room in a shorter amount of time.

Either way, I know that the day with be special and memorable, rain or shine! :)

Are you planning an outdoor wedding? If so are you worried about the weather? Do you have a Plan B?

San Diego

Well I'm off to San Diego for work this week.  It will be a week full of meetings, training and presentations but I will get the chance to see the famous San Diego Zoo.

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I'll be back at the end of the week with some great wedding posts. Don't miss me too much while I'm gone!

One more DIY project completed

After our one day wonder trip, I picked up some new baskets on clearance at Micheal's (can you shop there too much?) to hold them.

I made little size tags, similar to the tags on the front of our save the dates and our favor boxes, cut them out and attached them to cardstock...

tied them to each pair of flip flops...

and then stuffed (and I do mean stuffed) them into the baskets. All but 4 pairs were able to fit in the two baskets.

I know flip flops aren't for everyone, or every bride to have at their wedding, but hopefully someone will be able to get some use out of these!

Did you find that in different aspects of your wedding planning, that your colors weren't exactly the same? Did you let it bother you? I'm actually glad we're having different, but similar shades of blue and green throughout the wedding.

Little Touches

So my awesome wedding planner was doing a little Internet research for our wedding and found these really cute blue and green suitcases. She thought these would look great on the guest book table or gift table. I ordered them the other and day and they just came in, all three suitcases were only $19!

Personal Photo

Did you find anything online to add to the decor of your wedding?

Premarital Counseling

Wiggles, rewind! (can anybody name that movie?)

Back in May, Mr. E and I headed to Hot Springs, AR for the first of 3 meetings with the family pastor that will be officiating our wedding. Since my parents have never been to the bed and breakfast run by our former pastor and her husband, they joined us for the drive up there for some R&R for a couple of days.

We sat down with Kristie for a couple of hours and talked about everything from the wedding basics, money, and values to religion, vows, and the 5 languages of love. It was truly amazing to really think about ourselves and what we want in our marriage aside from the one day of celebration. I won't lie, some of the questions were a little harder to answer then others, but Kristie was awesome and asked more questions to help us think deeper and truly answer questions such as what the other person is passionate about, and what our personal goals are.

There were some homework assignments to take away which included:
- Reading the 5 languages of love (discussed by Mrs. Paisley here) and making a plan to speak to each other in our languages
- Finding our Meyers-Briggs personalities
- Mapping out a financial plan
- And my personal favorite, Mr. E takes the reins and plans a get away for us

We will meet with Kristie in the fall or early winter when she is in Dallas and then one last time a couple of days before the wedding to just relieve some last minute stress and remember what we're doing it for.

And just because I love pictures in posts, here one of my parents, Kristie and us :)

Did you do any premarital counseling? What did you learn from it?

We're all allowed to make mistakes...

...just wish it didn't cost me money :(

I recently ordered the DIY materials from paperandmore.com to make our invites (envelopes, petal cards and paper) and wouldn't you know I made the same freakin' mistake I made when I was ordering samples??

After deciding that the linen paper would look much better then regular paper, I ordered a sample of bright white linen paper. Too bad I meant to click on bright white linen cardstock. I was able to catch the mistake fast, so paperandmore switched it out before sending it out.

Fast forward to ordering the materials for real (thank you work bonus!) and I loaded up the online cart with 3 sets of petal cards (total 150), 3 sets of envelopes (total 150) and 2 pack of bright white linen paper (200 sheets). I clicked purchase and was excited to have that checked off the list. A day or so later I was looking back at the site and noticed again that I ordered the linen paper instead of the linen cardstock...doh! (read that in Homer's voice).

I tried to email and have them switch it, but it had already been shipped. They said that I could order the cardstock and they would reduce the restocking fee from 15% to 7%. Darn it! I thought for a minute, well maybe the paper will be OK. But I knew it wouldn't so I ordered the cardstock and waited for the paper to come in so I could return it. Here's a pic of the comparison of 200 pages of cardstock to 200 pages of paper...

You can see the added thickness of the cardstock on the left. I'm glad I went ahead and ordered the cardstock. In an effort to make the most of my money I decided not to waste 7% restocking fee and the cost to ship back the paper. I'll just give an extra, added texture touch of linen paper to the save the dates and menus. Oh well, you can't win them all.

Did you make any mistake during wedding planning that cost you a little bit of cash?

One Day Wonder

Is what Old Navy called it. I called it an early Saturday morning to brave the crazies and bribe my family and Mr. E with breakfast to stock up on flip flops for the wedding. Well, really Dad paid for breakfast, so it was win win for me :)

The weekend before Memorial Day weekend, we (Mr. E, Elephant Bro & I) rolled out of bed (and I do mean rolled out of bed, look at some of those outfits below) and were in line at Old Navy before the doors opened at 7 am. Mom and Dad Elephant were in line at the Old Navy closest to them (you know, to divide and conquer).

There were some interesting sites in the store, but I was happy to see that most people there were going for various different colors - they must not have been brides looking to fill a flip flop basket in colors that coordinate with their wedding. The manager at our store was very strict on the 5 per person rule, so we went through once, and then came back for a 2nd spin, just to be on the safe side.

Mr. E in line the first go round. Doesn't he look excited?

Brother Elephant  and Mr. E outside the store between rounds 1 and 2. Brother Elephant is telling me to hurry it up with the iPhone, and no he doesn't normally mix plaids with stripes or black socks with brown shoes.

Don't let my brother tell you that he did it all for the wedding. While I was on the phone with mom going over the sizes that we grabbed, he had time to pick up not 1 but 2 pairs of jeans on sale.

Me in line the 2nd time.

The cashier that rang me up the first time asked if it was worth it to get up at 7 for $1 flip flops. I told her it was for the wedding and I would never do it again. Hopefully the females at the wedding will think it's worth it! ;)

And here are all 45 pairs in their glory. Do I think that they will all be used at the reception? Probably not, but at least they will be available. And I can either sell any unused ones to another bride after the wedding, or donate them to a charity.

Did you have a flip flop basket so your ladies could dance the night away?

Make up counter vs. Airbrush

I don't wear much makeup on a normal basis, and will be looking for a little help for our wedding. As you may remember, we technically had two engagement sessions. For the first one, Mama Elephant hooked me up with a specialist at the Clinique counter. Janice did a wonderful job, but unfortunately there were some parts of it I wasn't a huge fan of.

I think the thing I didn't enjoy the most was the foundation. I know that African American skin is prone to being more oily then other races, but I was almost embarrassed when Lynn (our amazing photographer) would have Mr. E put his nose to my cheek. When he pulled away there would be a brown spot on the tip of his nose that I would have to wipe away. On my wedding day I do not want to have to worry about hugging anyone, or make up coming off on something white... you know, like my dress ;)

I didn't take any pictures after the Clinique make over, but here's a couple refreshers from our engagement session (excuse the sleepy eyes in the second picture).

When Lynn asked for a mini sunset session, I jumped at the chance. This time I had an airbrush trial scheduled, so it worked out perfectly because I was able to make use of the trial rather then just going home and watching Wednesday TV.

Here's the before picture (warning! Wayne and Garth extreme close-ups coming)

Personal Photo

And the after shot. Sorry for the crappy bathroom lighting!

Personal Photo

Airbrush makeup is more expensive, but for me it was well worth it! It was a very light, barely there feeling. Kristin (the make up artist) also added some false eyelashes, that really stood out. You'll also notice that we went with a lighter shade of lipstick, thanks to mom for packing some samples in her purse to the trial. What would I do without Mama E??

And here are some refreshers from our second session. Notice the eyelashes in the second one? So much more defined then my actual lashes.




*All photos from Lynn Michelle Photography unless otherwise noted.

If you are getting your makeup done for the wedding, have you looked into airbrush makeup? Any tips for keeping down on the shine from oily skin?

Check: Photobooth

We just booked our photobooth!! So excited to have yet another splurge checked off the list!

We did our fair share of searching the web up and down to find a photobooth that was decent and could fit into our budget. Let me just tell you, as if you didn't already know, a photobooth will cost you a pretty penny. While this is a splurge, this is something that Chris and I really wanted to add to our wedding.

I'm already thinking up unique ways to display the extra set of strips that we get to keep (along with a disk of all the photos in case we want to print more out) similar to what Martha did in her Winter 2010 issue.

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If you had a photobooth, did you have any unique ideas to display the photo strips?