Are the holidays over yet? I love Christmas but I haven’t had a normal work schedule in so long that I kinda forgot what it was like to work. The weather here has been extreme so I’ve been spending most of my days sitting online on my couch and IT WAS SO BORING.
I noticed that a lot of my vendors shut down until after the new year so after the 1st, everyone kind of kicked into high gear. Everyone, myself included, seems to have put everything off until now, and now that it is officially the year that we are getting married, it is CRUNCH TIME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Our coordinator at MGM set up a call with us to go over a few things. Normally I would hate that because I hate talking on the phone but there are just some things that you have to go over together that don’t translate as well through email. My event designer/florist had told me to ask for a diagram of possible layouts for the ceremony and reception, which hadn’t even crossed my mind. It was a great idea because you can see for yourself exactly how the room is going to be set up and change whatever you want before it’s too late. The diagrams included seating arrangements for round tables, rectangular tables, and a mixture of both, and included different areas for the tables to be set up. It’s weird to think that those diagrams are for our wedding!!
I have been going back and forth for months with the person in charge of drapery at MGM. I had a quote that I was working off of for the drape, and then when I contacted him to get everything finalized, he said that they didn’t have enough of the same drape for what I wanted to do so they would have to rent additional drape for $4,000… and that doesn’t include the cost of labor. I really wasn’t understanding why all of a sudden there was this crazy extra charge, so he gave me an alternative which was much more affordable. I told him I wanted to do that and to send me a quote. Only at the end of our several conversations did he say “oh and if there is another event earlier that day you can’t have drape.” Um, no. I already had to concede the ceiling drape that I wanted because for our particular venue you have to pay for insurance, and the space would need tons of drapery and tons of laborers, so it would cost a fortune. I was not about to lose this one too. I emailed our coordinator my concerns and frustrations, which is when she suggested we speak on the phone…and she made it happ’n cap’n. So now the drape situation has been resolved and I will actually be paying less than what I was originally quoted. BRIDES: if you aren’t happy with something, speak up. And don’t wait a few days like I did stewing over it.
Joey is an extremely busy business owner, so I now schedule appointments with him (at his request) to go over wedding materials. It’s the only way to get his full attention. Our latest meeting was for our Save the Dates. You’d be surprised how hard it is to find a modern design for them. Every site I went to had the same boring designs. Finally I found minted.com and used a couple of their designs, moving around the wording and changing the fonts to fit perfectly with our photo. I am a perfectionist so I spent more than a couple of hours doing a few “mock ups.” Also I felt important saying that I was doing “mock ups.” Just a couple weeks until we receive them and then it’s time to start sending them out!
The Life & Times of a Realist Bride 
Hurray for getting what you wanted cheaper – That’s so exciting!