Part of the deal when booking our venue is agreeing to deal with certain vendors, that includes officiants.  Last night my wedding coordinator emailed me the list of officiants.  Now, to refresh your memory, I'm getting married on Maui.  I grew up on Maui so the island/tropical thing is not new a different to me, and my wedding will definitely NOT be Hawai'ian themed in ANYway.  So I went to the website of both of officiants and they are both hardcore Hawai'ians.  We're talking Hawai'ian shirts, kakui nut leis, blowing conch shells, the whole nine yards.  All the sample services had Hawai'ian language passages talking about the islands, etc. 

My problems aka Bridezilla moments

1. I don't my officiant wearing a Hawai'ian shirt and lei to my wedding.  My wedding is not going to be "island style".  Can I dictate what my officiant wears to my ceremony?

2. All of the officiants are Christian ministers.  My fiance is a Buddhist and I am a pagan.  A Christian minister would be totally inappropriate.  Non-denominational would also be inappropriate because that's just another word for Christian, and we're no form of Christian.  Can I ask a Christian minister to do a non-religious ceremony?  Part me of me feels weird having a Christian minister perform my ceremony, even if it's non-religious, considering I'm a pagan and if he knew he'd probably tell me I'm going to hell. 

Am I blowing this out of proportion?  Part of me feels like I'm being a bridezilla, but part of me feels like this is important.  Help!

EDIT:  Here's a couple of the officiant websites so you can see what i"m talking about
http://www.piaaluli.com/
http://www.mauivalentine.com/
http://www.hawaiianroyaltyweddings.com/

My wedding is in May and my bridal salon says it takes about 2-3 months for the veil to come in if I order from them. So if I want to order through them, I should probably do it within the next month or so, since my dress is coming in March-April.

Since I have some time off next week, I wanted to go in to try on my dress with some veils, but they told me that the dress that I ordered got sold off the rack, so I wouldn't be able to try on veils with my dress. :( Did you guys find that you HAD to try on both together to make a choice?

( in which I show some pics and beseech your opinion )

....but when it came right down to it, you weren't able to make it work. The question about the gingerbread house at the reception got me thinking.... For the married ladies (or almost marrieds!), was there something that you planned to have at your wedding/reception that sounded completely awesome in theory and planning, but when it came right down to it you weren't able to do it/it didn't end up the way you envisioned it?
( Our last minute change... )

CARD BOXES.

I woke up this morning thinking about card boxes. Like, literally, before I even had a conscious thought, my mind was running an independent dialogue with my subconscious regarding card boxes. I have no explanation for this.

Anyway, as you might expect, I now haven't been able to stop thinking about them. Our initial intention was to have a TARDIS card box, but now that I've made our TARDIS cake topper (which I STILL need to put the finishing touches on so that I can post pictures!) and we're considering putting a Doctor quote on the invitations, I'm wary of Doctor Who overkill. Who knew there could be such a thing?

So, I would LOVE to see all of your beautiful card boxes! Details on where you acquired them or how you made them would be even lovelier. Thanks!

So, I totally missed the six month mark, but I haven't had a whole lot of new ideas/purchases either.  The major stuff is all done- all that's really left to do is BUY STUFF, which is totally not the fun part for me (I love shopping but hate paying for stuff I can't even use until June!). I also have to kick my groom into gear to get his part done, because he hasn't so much as glanced at a suit yet or told his groomsmen what they should look for! Anyway, I'd like to start out with a couple of petty questions: --What's a good deadline for my bridesmaids to have purchased their dresses? I don't want to be overly pushy, but I don't want it to be a week before the wedding and have them scrambling about town looking for something. My MOH already has hers, but my other two bridesmaids aren't really even looking yet. They're choosing their own dresses and shoes; I am purchasing their jewelry and wraps.  I'd like them to have their dresses far enough in advance that they can get alterations as needed, and to give me the heads up so I can get jewelry that will look good with whatever they buy.  The wedding is June 12, so if I say they need their dress by April, would that be reasonable? --For those of you who are doing/ have done "out of town" bags, how did you give them to the recipients?  Can you typically arrange to have them placed in people's rooms or have them at the front desk, or do you have to give them out yourself?  Our guests will all be staying at the same hotel, and we expect to have about 15 rooms in our block (and therefore, 15 welcome bags), if that makes a difference. Next- Onto the progress post! ( random progress, and an awesome music question :) )

A Table in the Wilderness
Li-Young Lee


I draw a window
and a man sitting inside it.

I draw a bird in flight above the lintel.

That's my picture of thinking.

If I put a woman there instead
of the man, it's a picture of speaking.

If I draw a second bird
in the woman's lap, it’s ministering.

A third flying below her feet.
Now it's singing.

Or erase the birds
make ivy branching
around the woman's ankles, clinging
to her knees, and it becomes remembering.

You'll have to find your own
pictures, whoever you are,
whatever your need.

As for me, many small hands
issuing from a waterfall
means silence
mothered me.

The hours hung like fruit in night's tree
means when I close my eyes
and look inside me,

a thousand open eyes
span the moment of my waking.

Meanwhile, the clock
adding a grain to a grain
and not getting bigger,

subtracting a day from a day
and never having less, means the honey

lies awake all night
inside the honeycomb
wondering who its parents are.

And even my death isn't my death
unless it's the unfathomed brow
of a nameless face.

Even my name isn't my name
except the bees assemble

a table to grant a stranger
light and moment in a wilderness
of Who? Where?

Hello all!

Name and/or LJ userID: chemical_lover. the groom is soul_assassin11, although he's not really an lj fan and probably won't post here.
Wedding Date: TBD
Bride/Groom/Other (please specify): I'm the bride
Age: We're both 24
City/State/Country you live in: I'm in Kingston, ON, Canada he lives in Ottawa, ON, Canada
City/State/Country you're getting married in (if different): Probably Waterloo, ON but it's still TBD
Your song/First Dance song:Y Sister Hazel - All for You is our song, so it will either be that or Coldplay - Green Eyes
Wedding Colors: I'm sure a scheme will emerge eventually, but at this point we'll probably do Blues for me, Greens for him and let the rest work itself out.
Formality: Come in your Sunday best! I have a feeling a couple people might show in jeans but most will arrive in something at least business casual.
Theme (if you have one): I said theme to FH and he gave me a strange look and said 'getting married', so let's go with that.
Number of guests: probably 50-70, but I'm hoping to keep it on the 50ish side of the scale.
How'd you meet your fiance?: We both were in Honours Chem Co-op at the University of Waterloo. He swears we met in the 2A Analytical Chem lab, but I don't remember meeting him until 3A Physical Chem Lab. He was flirting with both my lab partner and I, but I caught him in the end!
How long have you been together?: Just under 4 years, I'm sure no one here cares about the exact amount.
Do you have a personal wedding website?: nope... maybe he'll make one, he's on better terms with the internet than I am.
Have you read the community rules before posting this survey? I have indeed!
Anything else you'd like to tell us?:

I've been reading about all of you for a while now, but finally I can join the fun!

We got engaged Saturday and I'm on cloud nine! We are trying to tell as many people as possible in person over the holidays (but we already phoned our parents), so we haven't changed facebook. I can't tell anyone at work since I'm waiting to hear where my permanent placement will be in January, and I don't want this to affect their decision. I'm hoping that you guys can help answer some of our preliminary questions and help me get passed the surreality of it all before I can yell it out to the world. 

So I guess our first question is can anyone recommend any websites they used for budget breakdowns or planning timelines. FH doesn't believe in long engagements (his words not mine, I'd love to have lots of time to plan and save) so we're thinking about next June when his family will be over from England anyways which means we need to get on with the planning!

Thanks for all your help ladies and gents!

I know we've got ceremony music tags, but this is a little strange so I thought I'd just post.

I really want to have something interesting for our ceremony music (processional/recessional). My cousin is singing with acoustic accompaniment. Which is great...except I have no songs for her.

I would really like to do an acoustic version of a popular song. I think it's fun and pretty, but I need ideas. Right know the top of the list is an acoustic version of Knock You Down, but I am open to other ideas.

Tl;Dr: What are your suggestions for popular music that would sound lovely acoustic during the ceremony?

Here's a random question... Who traditionally sends the STD's? And for that matter, who traditionally sends invites?

I'm thinking about ordering custom envelopes and I'm not sure what return address I should put on it. Thanks.

My fiance and I were supposed to go out and sign a contract/drop off a deposit for our venue this weekend, but we got snowed in.  Luckily, I don't think anybody is going to steal our date (July 10th, 2010) out from under us.   We're having the ceremony and reception at the Irvine Nature Center in Owings Mills, MD.  There are several places on the grounds that they do ceremonies, but we're pretty sold on the gazebo/overlook.  You can't really tell from the pictures on the site, but the view is really breathtaking, even in winter.  I can't wait to see what it looks like in summer when everything's green.   The ceremony site is a short walk through the woods from the exhibit hall and the tented patio where the reception will be, but I think everyone will be able to handle that.  They also have a golf cart to drive any guests who might not be able to do the walk.  They also don't really want to bring out chairs to the gazebo area, so it will be standing room for anybody we don't specifically need chairs for.  I'm a little bit nervous about that, but I figure we'll keep the ceremony short, and no one will mind too much. I'm also concerned that we only 4.5 hours (plus 2 hours for set up and one for clean up) for ceremony and reception.  We can buy an extra hour fairly cheaply, at least.  I think we're going to have the ceremony at about 7:30 PM (telling guests to arrive at 7:00, and having some apps and drinks available).  Sunset isn't supposed to be until 8:30 that night, so if we wrap up the ceremony by 8, I figure it won't be too dark on the trail (and it's really a short walk, like 3-5 minutes). I'm excited.  This place is everything we wanted.  

We want to print our invitations off Vistaprint, mainly because they're not *that* important to us, and there's also some amazing coupons that one can find on Google that give you 50% off, etc. However, our theme is "peacock," and I'm not liking any of the default designs Vistaprint has to offer.

If I *had* Illustrator, I would do it myself, but I am wondering, for those of you who have done this: who did your original graphic designs for any online templates that you used? Were they expensive? Basically, how did you avoid using the default designs?

And to keep this theme going, show me your unique graphic designs used to create your invitations, plus the creator and price (for the design, not for the printing of the invitations), if you're comfortable doing that!

i_hope_that
For many of us, the holidays can be kind of rough. If you're searching for a network of understanding friends, this ultra-nurturing community encourages you to express your heartfelt wishes and offer other members encouragement and acceptance. Not for the terminally snarky or emotionally-challenged, this is a good-spirited place to lend comfort and support.

diygifts
Feeling crafty? If you've got a few last folks on your holiday gift list, this is a great place to seed your creativity and generosity. You'll also discover wonderful DIY tips to decorate your home and entertain guests. Offering a no-frills-no-skills attitude that welcomes the cash-challenged and arts-phobic, you're sure to get ideas and make friends in the process.

cooking_club
A fun and friendly community dedicated to those who love to cook, whether you're a meat-and-potatoes type, an aspiring gourmand, and/or a vegan. In search of a brilliant dish to use up those weekly leftovers? Post your ingredients and you'll be whipping up a feast by dinner. You can also share favorite recipes. For Type A chefs, you can spice up your culinary repertoire with exciting cooking challenges.

Intro
Progress

Now that its less then a week away from the wedding, everything seems like its falling into place.  My "to do" list is pretty much all checked off, other then the things that I need to do at the rehearsal and final confirmations with vendors, only things left to purchase are the guest book pen & alcohol, which my parents are picking up.  I may need to buy a garter, because the one I ordered online still has not arrived - the company said it would be here by today, so I'll wait and see, otherwise I'm hoping that Michaels carries some cheap ones.

My dad has printed out the ceremony programs and is printing the table tents and place cards. Hyrule (below) is my table - we chose locations from videogames, books and movies to name each table and have a corresponding picture for using on both the table & place cards.  We also have a diagram for the table to pick up the place cards that shows where each table is in the room.( Hyrule & Diagram )

Unfortunately my grandma is currently in the hospital and her doctor says that she cannot attend the wedding, so I'm trying to figure out how to still include her in the day.  She's probably getting moved from the hospital to a rehab place in the next couple days, which will be around 20 mins from both the church and the hotel where I'm getting dressed.  I'm hoping to go visit her after I'm all dressed up, so she will see me in the dress and we'll get some relative to videotape the ceremony and our reception entrance/first dance.
Do you have any other suggestions of ways we can include grandma in the wedding, when she cannot attend?

( Day of Timeline )

Now on to packing for Christmas, wedding and honeymoon!

EDIT: Thanks for the advice on finishes! I've decided to go with linen because I like the idea of the texture. I didn't want to make another post so ( here are my invitations so far! )



I'm currently designing my wedding invitations (as in, on the website right now lol) through Vistaprint since I was so happy with the quality/service I got with my save-the-dates. As a major control freak I also like the idea of being able to use their template but change it however I want. Easy customization :)

My question is: what is the difference between Matte finish, Glossy finish, and Linen finish? Linen only costs an extra dollar (the other two are free) so it's definitely not breaking the bank, but I have no idea what it means or why it would be more expensive than the other two...

Anyone who has used Vistaprint for their stationery, what finish did you use and were you pleased with it? Any other tips for Vistaprint invitations?

Thanks in advance for advice!

I just paid for our ( Save the dates )

We also booked our photographer earlier this month. We're going with Andree Kehn. Her website is here: http://www.andreekehn.com/. She did a co-worker's wedding and her photos and demeaner are fabulous. I interviewed her for an hour by phone and we were lauging like old friends by the end. :) She has a very liberal printing/use of your own photo policy. (When I asked her about it she said she doesn't like confrontation and so the use rights are just built into the cost, I think that's pretty rad. I'd like to be able to post my pictures to Facebook and LJ without being a thief.)

Planning a wedding this far out has been pretty nice so far. Spencer was able to go back and forth about fonts as much as he wanted with Renee without my head exploding. We've been able to take our time finding vendors we really want to work with and all of the big decisions have been made already. Now I have some time to relax... and design the rest of the stationary with Renee. :)

Does anyone have a florist recommendation in Maine? Preferrably near the Bar Harbor area? All of the suggestions on The Knot have pretty terrible websites or are way south of where we're getting married.