ebredhawk

we got our orchids at hobby lobby actually.. the only decent flower i found there! i cleaned out two store of them since i knew we would need them for bouts, centerpieces, hair flowers and possible BM bouquets. the vase in the picture is an 8 in. cylinder. the ones i have are 11 in. (tall) squares.. probably a 4 x 4 square. i think the crushed ice look would be GREAT! i tried just clear stones and it looked weird too... too reflective.. the colors they picked up took your eye away from the flowers. with the LED lights, that will look fantastic! here is how my flower lady (she'd laugh if she knew i was calling her that) explained how to get the orchids to stay in place: "The stem needs to be kept longer so the flower can be held in place with the pebbles. For a silk flower, you'd leave the stem long because it's wired. You have to leave a few inches of the stem straight (coming down out of the flower) then bend the wire and make a circle with the remaining stem (kind of like a base). This circle would sit flat on the bottom of your vase before adding pebbles to anchor it." does that make much sense? i can't tell you the difference it made though... hers look 100x better than the ones i tried to put together!!

Quote: Originally Posted by caribbeanLover Anyone have good advice for wording an e-mail leting ppl know I need to know if they are coming? i have seen people give examples before, i but i would just say something along the lines of "i hope everyone is doing well. just wanted to remind you all that the rsvp deadline for our wedding is approaching soon and we would love to hear from you so we can make sure we get all of our fun goodies and events planned!". here are some other ideas: http://bestdestinationwedding.com/forum/t11960

thanks girls!! she did an amazing job putting them together! meghan, i agree i may not even need the candles, but the vases i'm using are about 3 in. taller than that, so it may help to take up space at the top. i'll have to see once she puts them together with mine. in terms of how she put it together, if you have artificial flowers make sure you have enough of the stem that you can take the end and loop it around to make sort of a base out of it. you put that in the vase and put the rocks on top of the "base" so it holds it in place. (does that make sense??) if you have real flowers you usually have to tie wire to the bottom, make a base out of that and then go for it. i can ask my flower lady to take pictures of the steps if that would help! meghan, i am SO sorry that FI's parents are being like that. why do people have to get so combative about weddings? just be happy and the enjoy the moment, people! at least it gives you a healthy perspective as to how awesome your own fam is! yayyy christina, you can do the DIY invites, i know it!! i use our normal home inkjet printer (one of those HP printer/copier/scanner things) and it worked perfectly. just make sure it can handle whatever weight cardstock you get and you're good to go.

Quote: Originally Posted by marryinghimagain Has anyone heard from Jacilynda? I am next for the starfish but have not heard from her for quite a while. She had PMd me for my address a while back and read my return PM but I never heard from her nor received the starfish. My recent PMs to her have gone unread. I leave in 2 weeks so not sure if I will have the starfish or not. I hope everything is okay with her. She usually posts a lot. Jaci, are you out there? lol i remember her mentioning a while ago that she was going to get the starfish to you soon.. i'm surprised you haven't heard from her. do you think it's worth another PM? it looks like she was on a few days ago.

welcome kimmy!! tracy's right... you need anything, let us know! that's what we're here for! michele, i can't believe you addressed those suckers by HAND! you're nuts! did you order address labels from vistaprint? at least the dolphin stamps still have a beachy feel, right?? tracy, have you sent a reminder to them yet about the deadline? i'm honestly so surprised by how people just sit on RSVPs and wait till the last minute! these people won't realize how rude/annoying that is until they plan something like this! so my flower lady just put together a trial centerpiece for me (since my own trial was an epic fail) and i LOVE it! she said the vase needs to be bigger (hers is an 8 in. cylinder vs. the 11 in. square i have) so just imagine more space in there! plus i'm adding the floating candles too. what do you think?

Quote: Originally Posted by Tam ebredhawk, I love your bags!! Was it expensive to get done? we paid a small fee to have the design set up and then they just charged us per item. maybe $25 to set up the design and $60 to get 25 towels and 12 bags embroidered. i love how it turned out so i'm super happy we did it! Quote: Originally Posted by nsbride2010 Erin you are doing the iPod thing? I'm wondering how this goes down ladies... like I want to have a reception dinner (gold package I believe), but what else does this entail? Is there the expectation of a dance afterward? FI and I were just planning to do a supper with everyone and then hit the disco.. hahaha i am doing the ipod thing... we're juts doing dinner, toasts and dancing until we have to leave so with the ipod we can easily control all of that (separate playlists, etc.). we're also not doing first dances, intros or anything like that so that takes a lot of the complication of timing out of it. the one thing i'm trying to do is take out the awkward silences between the songs so they flow into one another. there's a thread in the music section of the forum about that i believe. Quote: Originally Posted by lrdavis23 Those are super cute, where did you get those from ? I love them the towels are from Beach Towels wholesale manufacturer of custom embroidered monogrammed bath towel for corporate events. i got the bags from the lady who did the embroidery.. she had a whole catalogue, but i'm wondering if they may have a website. she gave us a good discount too since we got so many. they were normally $25 a bag and i think we paid $15? we're only doing 12 though so we could spend a little more. Quote: Originally Posted by lrdavis23 Thanks for all this E, I have been on the save on crafts website but had no clue about the florals website. Thanks for the head up about putting together centerpieces, your right it does look easy, and I have never actaully put one together lol.... so now you've really got me thinking I need to work on this asap lol.... I too am using orchids, so do you think I should choose another flower ? Actually I just thought about something, will I put these together or the WC ? hmmmmmm need to ask Sharron or Deyanira about that too. before i would have said to use another flower, but it's super ironic that we were talking about this because i JUST got a picture from my flower lady! she used an 8 in. cylinder vase and said it was too small, but my ones at home are 11 in. squares so it won't look so cramped. i'm also putting a floating candle on top of these and spreading votives all over the table. what do you guys think?

also.. thought you guys might want to see these! i posted them in the april 2010 thread, but realized i never put them here! these are the OOT bags and towels we got for everyone. they are embroidered with the punta cana/dr and the flower from our monogram:

Quote: Originally Posted by lrdavis23 Hey E, since your not having a DJ, what have you decided to do as far as music goes ? i'm doing the ipod thing... we are only having 20-25 guests so it won't be a big deal if people want to change songs or anything. that's what we always do at the parties at our house anyway.. it will just be a pain to make the playlists! we already decided on our ceremony music and our dinner music, so that's a first step! Quote: Originally Posted by lrdavis23 OH yeh one more thing E, I am thinking of doing my flowers too or ordering real touch flowers. How are you doing your flowers or where did you order from or what store are you getting them from ? sorry I know thats alot of questions try Save on Crafts, Wedding Supplies, Flowers, Tulle, Lights, Decorations & Discount Craft Supplies Save-on-crafts first.. their flowers are amazing quality. if they don't have what you want, try Silk Flowers, Silk Wedding Flowers, and Floral Supplies. both great places.. that's where i got all of mine from and they have been beautiful! my mom's friend does floral arrangements so she's going to be putting them together for me. Quote: Originally Posted by lrdavis23 I agree I too like the idea of knowing exactly what I'm getting and I can re-use the flowers for TTD pics and the AHR too. I am ording from linens direct too they are the cheapest that I have found and I have checked alot of websites, so I'm ordering chairs sashes, table runners, and maybe a tabel cover for the cake table. I am still working on exactly what I want my table decor to look like, but I think I'm leaning toward cylnder vases filled with water, marbles, a LED light, flowers submersed in the water with a floating candle. I am attaching a link to what I'm thinking of. what do you ladies think ? oh yeh also attached a pic of what I want my bouquet to look like. toya, i am doing the SAME thing for my centerpieces! a word of warning... they are not as easy as they look to put together! i tried one myself and it didn't turn out too hot, so my flower lady is going to do them for me! (she did them for her own daughter's wedding) make sure you use natural colored stones in the bottom.. the colored ones tend to fight with the flowers. also, i believe your flowers have to be secured somehow unless you get some that look good just floating there. i did mine with orchids and it just looked messy. if you put one together make sure to post it! i'm glad i'll have someone to bounce ideas off of as i figure this out! Quote: Originally Posted by SSNM Hi Amy, I found the link where someone else (I think ebredhawk from this forum as well) asked this question and the answer was 72 inches; round table that seats 10 people. woo.. that was me! i was told that a table runner 72 in. or longer will work for all of their tables (depending on how much you want hanging over the edges.. if any). also, if you ladies haven't signed up for the dreams forums.. do it! they don't have nearly the frequency of activity that BDW does, but there is a lot of useful information you can search through! also wanted to add where i got my chair sashes since wedding linens direct was out of my color... 50 Hot Pink satin sashes chair bow ties wedding decor - eBay (item 230380326836 end time Oct-21-09 18:41:42 PDT) if you are going to make your own either 7'' or 8'' wide is a good size, and i think 108'' long is the standard.. that way you don't have to worry about how big your chairs are! Quote: Originally Posted by xxashleyxx007 Are any of you also bringing the stuff to make your own centerpieces or am I the only idiot? LOL i'm right there with ya! want to make sure i know what they look like before i get there!! plus, they are SOO expensive!

Quote: Originally Posted by taratoons Hi guys! I've been MIA lately (we bought a house, and we move in less than a month, so wedding planning has been replaced with house planning!). Everything is looking great on here! Thanks for sharing photos of centerpieces, bouquets, etc, they are very inspiring! Ebredhawk, where did you get your towels/bags? I want to do something like that instead of a favour, like a customized mug or something, but I'm having a hard time finding anything reasonably priced. welcome back!! i got my towels and bags fdone rom a local embroidery lady actually. i ordered my towels from Beach Towels wholesale manufacturer of custom embroidered monogrammed bath towel for corporate events and the bags from the actual lady. if you have a shop near you that does things like that you could easily do something similar. Quote: Originally Posted by doblauvelt erin- congrats on your ring being done! did you design your ring? my mom wants me to have a shower but fi and i have decided on a no-gift policy... is anyone else doing this? how is a shower possible with no gift giving? i didn't design my own ring, but the jeweler helped me find the right one for my e-ring. it's a unique shape and they thought they were going to have to make one custom, but he ordered a similar shape that was meant to be paired with a different e-ring and it fit perfectly. total fluke, but it saved me about $500. my wedding planning philosophy is: forget tradition, anything is possible. if you don't want gifts, tell people that.. you can always suggest something else instead (echo mentioned bringing a dish to share). FI and i already have a lot of what we need, so our registry will have a LOT of giftcards Quote: Originally Posted by jerseykitten right now I have my invitations in my living room and need to address them but I can't get motivated to do it! you can do it!! as soon as you send those bad boys out your guests will be lining up to book! Quote: Originally Posted by echo2_62 First - I apparently am the poorest person with etiquette so I can see why its suggested that you don't even mention it. I guess it all depends on who is planning your shower and how good they are at passing on messages to your guests verbally. i'm glad someone else is in my etiquette boat!! call me tasteless or tacky, but i can't tell you how much i would love for people to just give us cash instead of gifts! (so as to not sound greedy, my parents are paying for everyone to come to our wedding so my guests don't have that expense... if they did i don't think i'd want them to get us anything) we have dishes, we have appliances, what we need is to pay our mortgage, get FI a new car to replace his hunk o' junk and put a new roof on our house! Quote: Originally Posted by GregsBride Thanks for all the encouragement on the home-buying process... That has been a whirlwind in itself!! I never knew we were going to move so fast with the process... Within a matter of a week my FI and heard about a program our county was doing that gives up to $20K in down-payment and closing assistance to First-time buyers in order to rejuvinate the housing market. So we met w/ a realtor, looked at homes, found the one, got a pre-approval, and put in a contract in about a week's time!! Needless to say I had to get educated about the process really quickly!! We are still waiting to hear back to see if our offer has been accepted, and we hope to hear something soon!! Before my hiatus I did get a few things accomplished, I hope to soon have a list as long as the rest of you soon. As of now I have: My dress (which is being kept at a friend's house) My shoes My jewelry Ordered flowers Booked photographer/videographer Bought FI shirt and tie Picked out BM dresses Bought most of the BM gifts I'm sure there are some things I'm missing, but all my wedding related info is on my laptop at home!! The next item on my agenda are my formal invites which need to go out immediately... I planned to DIY them, which will defintely be a huge undertaking!! Am I crazy for trying this?? I just don't want to spend tons of cash on them... not too bad for taking a hiatus!! and sign me up for wherever you live!! we bought our house last year so i completely missed out on the first time home buyers credit (at least the one you don't have to pay back) and we def don't have anything awesome like that around us! fingers crossed your offer gets accepted! also, DIY invites are excellent.. you'll save money and be proud of yourself when you're done. the forum has all the info you'll need! Quote: Originally Posted by echo2_62 I found that doing a little bit every night has worked fairly well and I'm finally seeing the results! you've got that right!! can't wait to see what yours look like! hopefully seeing them come together will help motivate you to finish and get those bad boys out!

tam - i think my pricing will be similar to toya's w/ a few changes... a little less for food since we won't have nearly as many guests as she will, we aren't using a DJ and we are doing our own flowers at home so the price will be lower. i have seen a lot of people ask why the reception is more when you're already at an all-inclusive. the response i've seen makes sense to me... that they are having employees (bartenders, servers, etc.) that are being dedicated specifically to your reception. normally, if you have a big group you can't all sit together at the restaurants or have reservations like what you get for the reception. it doesn't bother me one bit because the resort does such a good job of keeping the costs competitive (some of the lowest around and they include a ton of things!). i haven't heard of a single resort anywhere that will do a private reception without charging extra. it's counter-intuitive since it's an AI, but i'd gladly pay extra for that special time with all of my guests!

Quote: Originally Posted by caribbeanLover ooohhh... I already have my wedding band, so I know how exciting it is to get them. Congrats, can't wait to see some pics!!! Aww.. thanks... I am considering doing the bouts too.. however they are pretty cheap at the resort ($6) so I may just stick with that. If I decide to do them, I'll post pics and how i did it. oooooooohhh a shower, that sounds like so much fun, yeah my mom wont let me get away with some of the traditional things like shower, she would even like me to get my rings blessed before we leave for DR! She was upset with me at first when I told her we were doing DW, she's happy now because I told her we were doing AHR! I can't wait to see pics of the shower as well. When will you have it? or will it be a suprise? you can't beat $6 a bout.. that's a great price. i'm lucky that my brother is getting married before me. my parents have seen all of the ridiculous little details that, in the end, may not have much meaning other than making other people happy and i have been able to get around a lot of them! the shower should be the first weekend in march. it's definitely not going to be a surprise since i've already been informed that i have to help prepare for it! it won't be anything big though.. no games or anything like that. just food, presents and good company!

just got a call and my wedding band is done!! i get to go check it out on saturday! so far i have only seen it in the really raw form (not shiney, wrong size and no diamonds) so i can't wait to see the finished product and compare it with my e-ring! tracy, you should def be proud of doing those flowers yourself! are you doing bouts for the guys too? my mom decided this weekend that she wants to throw me a shower and i'm SO happy. there are a lot of traditional wedding things that i didn't want to do, but that was one of the things i wanted. my brother is getting married in a month and she went to his FI's and was inspired! i guess that means we really need to register at some point... FI's going to LOVE that! (note the sarcasm)

Quote: Originally Posted by sammysgirl I would love to get in on this! Would anyone have a starfish available for a May 14, 2010 wedding?? we could probably fit you in for the clear starfish as well, depending on your color preference (if you look on page 30, mummergirl posted a picture of the starfish in her bouquet). i get back on May 1st, so as long as you don't leave super early in May or get back really late, we should be able to fit you in before future mrs. kt ellis. 1 ) marryinghimagain - October 15 - Dreams Puerto Aventuras 2 ) meli122 - November 7 - Royal, Playa del Carmen 3 ) angruck- December 12 - Dreams Tulum 4 ) cdnvb9- December 29 - Dreams Huatulco 5 ) kpuckrin- January 12 - BlueBeard's Beach, St. Thomas 6 ) ebredhawk - April 28- Dreams Punta Cana 7 ) future mrs. kt ellis - June 19 - Southern CA 8 ) breeze616 - December 10 - Iberostar Rose Hall Beach, Montego Bay

i'm doing the symbolic ceremony just to avoid all of the headaches. also, to put FI and his daughter on my benefits at work, i need a marriage license within 30 days or else i have to wait until the end of the year... definitely don't want to do that since it takes so long to get your license from PC. toya, i haven't heard of anyone doing this, but if you can that's definitely a way to make sure you know what you're getting into! have you found any other DJs in PC besides DJ Mannia?

Quote: Originally Posted by doblauvelt Erin- I moved after first grade, lol. I told you, it was long long ago that I've lived there. I used to visit every christmas/thanksgiving to see the rest of the family but now that my brother and I are older my parents have stopped visiting. I guess they figure if we wanted to visit Cincy we would do it on our own.. which is pretty much how it happens now lol. At my cousins wedding they had the drowned flower in a vase centerpiece. From the looks of it they just dunked a flower into a vase filled with water. I guess there is more to it because even before everyone was seated at the reception I noticed air bubbles on the stems/flower... it wasn't pretty lol. Is this what you are referring to, with it be tougher than it looks? you mean you don't want to come back to cincy whenever you have free time?! i can't imagine why not... yeah, it's something like that... i was under the impression (like you said) that you just drop the flowers in and "voila!" it's all gorgeous and pretty. to get the flowers to stay in place and look right you actually have to secure them somehow unless you have a WHOLE bunch. that doesn't bother me though.. that way at least i know it'll look right, and i really love the ones that have the one single bloom sitting on the rocks on the bottom.

Quote: Originally Posted by SSNM Yea I was told $350 when I sent a pic similar to the one with the people in it, but I have a feeling that when they set it up it will just be very basic without flowers and if I want the flowers and streamers off of it then it will be extra. If I end up going the beach route and use the chuppah, I think I will take the same picture I sent her and make sure that is what I get for $350 and not pay any more. i'd definitely do this! print out the email she sent with the picture you attached and make sure it's no more than $350. honestly, i think the $350 includes flowers. their centerpieces are $90 (!!!!!!!) and i have to believe that they've got this setup and the fabric hanging around some where and if you don't add any extras they just put it up and take down the arch. maybe that's wishful thinking though? i plan on asking my WC (once one gets assigned to me) what the price will be w/out flowers and then i'll let you guys know!

thanks for posting those ashley!! i definitely like the one without the people better.. we don't need to be messing around with any blowing fabric while we're getting married!

look at you lady!!! it looks like that dress was made for you! the detail on the bodice and train is gorgeous!

thanks tracy!! the logo on the bags and the towels are all embroidered.. there's an embroidery shop in our meijer grocery store and she ordered the bags and did the logos. she gave us an amazing discount on everything since we were doing it in bulk. meghan, we got 12 bags since we expect about 20 or so people and we wanted to make sure we had enough! since we are doing so few, we decided to get a nicer quality bag since it could still fit in our budget. this way our guests can use them for a while! michele, i am on my way over to your dress thread right now! can't wait to see how it looks, although i'm sure it's beautiful!! i was not a big fan of the centerpieces i put together last weekend, so my amazing flower lady (also my mom's friend) is making up some samples for me this weekend. i'm sure i'll have pictures to share with you all and get your input! i thought the whole drowned flower look was super easy, but it turns out there is a lot more involved in it than i thought! hopefully it's just the mechanics of it and i won't have to buy any other supplies!

almost forgot!! ssnm, good luck with your date! when are you trying for? are you doing symbolic or legal?

ash or nat, could you send me the huppah email?? can't wait to see ones that they actually have done! anything has to be better than that arch!!! [email protected]

WOOOOOO NAT!!!! congrats on the judge confirmation! took them long enough.. sheesh! i'm right with you girls!! here is the one that i found that i like the best... i'm a clean lines, simple decor kinda girl and this would work perfectly for me. nat, if you hear from deyanira, let us know!!

here are the personalized towels and bags we got for all of our guests (one bag per couple). we used the stargazer image from our monogram and took out our wedding date so it would have a little more "mass appeal" for everyone. here is the inside of the bags.. don't know if you can tell from the picture but there's a zipper on one side and a pocket on the other and it's a really nice, waterproof material that should wipe down easily if it's used as a beach bag...

both my grandma and my best friend/MOH have chron's so i know ALL about remicade! tracy, the centerpieces look fantastic with the clear stones now!! and your BM bouquets are beautiful too... did i read that right, that you made them yourself? the thing i would caution about green ribbon is that if it's the same color as the stems, it can end up looking like a big stick in front of your dress. i went to a wedding where the bride's dress was white and her flowers were wrapped in green and it looked like a stick with a bunch of flowers attached on top! i FINALLY uploaded some of my pictures... give me a minute and i'll post some...

Quote: Originally Posted by nsbride2010 Oh I am beach all the way!! Thats the whole reason we are doing a DW, since we could theoretically do a gazebo wedding at home. Just us though!! We are so laid-lack and casual, it really fits our personalities! The chuppah would be awesome, I hope it works out this is the same reason we're doing the beach! the one thing we wanted in a DW was to get married on the beach.. no exceptions! i've been scouring the internet for pictures of the perfect chuppah... the beach can be really windy so i'm trying to find one that doesn't have a lot of things hanging off it.