Reminder Bands

A new favor idea I've seen is to have custom made rubber bracelets. AKA Reminder Bands. These aren't so much my style, but the idea is really cute. I do buy them regularly to support causes, but typically they end up with my nephew to be, and he wears them everywhere. They're popular with the kids these days apparently. I did think they were really cute favor ideas, and I also stumbled upon a site that will make them for you. ReminderBand.com has many different styles and options to choose from, including, but not limited to:




One cute invitation idea I saw online used these bracelets:


Of course, the more you buy, the cheaper they get, and it depends on the style you pick, and any other options you choose.

My Invitations

Well, I've been going through the invitation ideas a lot lately. Since I'm going to be handmaking them, I want to have a pretty good idea what I want pretty early to have lots of time to work of them. But I'm having trouble deciding exactly what I want, there are a few options that I've seen with this style:

Casey: Ribbon in top half. Contrast paper backing/matting.

Holli: Ribbon in Bottom half. Contrast paper backing/matting.

Jana: Ribbon in top or bottom half (top shown). Single sheet cardstock, no matting/backing.

Here is a quick and horrible MSPaint representation of my colors put onto one of these invite styles.

Any advice or comments would be greatly appreciated.

My Mood: Stressed

Invitations: Research and Development

I posted before about my favorite type of invitation style. I've done a little research, and I've figured that I'll need probably (aka... so far) almost 200 invitations. To order them from the company that offers that particular style, I am looking at $799.00 for 200, with envelopes. $126.00 if I want them to print 200 RSVP cards for me. Now, I priced it out to buy all the supplies and them print and make them myself. I priced out cardstock, envelopes, and ribbon, enough to make 200 (plus extra) invitations and reply cards. I got a price of $80.00. Now am I the only one that is absolutely shocked by this difference? $80.00 compared to $925.00. It sure made my decision to invest the time into making them much easier, plus by making them I am no longer restricted to their colors and options. I can print whatever I please and use the bold colors that I want.

My Mood: Shocked

Wedding Planning Software

I stumbled upon a fantastic program today for wedding planning, ElmSoftware's iDo Wedding. They have a version for couples planning their own wedding that has a 30 day free trial. I downloaded it at home during my lunch hour today and it is FANTASTIC. I am very happy with it. It has options that you wouldn't imagine and a very easy to follow online tutorial to show you how to use it and all the added features you might not find without the tutorial. For $30 you can buy the product key for the downloaded program, or for $40 they will send you a CD copy. I am really considering buying this program at the end of my trial. It does almost everything. When you first go to use it, it asks for the name of the bride and groom, the wedding date, and a time. These all can be changed later if need be. It then asks if you would like to see the tutorial. It is long, and I'm going to go through it in parts as I need them, but it is very helpful.
Main Screen

You can then start entering contacts. Contacts are entered as individuals, so man, wife, children, are all entered separately. This seems tedious, but it helps out greatly and saves the address when you say "Save and Add New Contact" so you just enter names until you need to change the address. This helps greatly for later on when one is trying to arrange a seating plan and everyone is listed as an individual. It also gives you the statistics on your list, such as total numbers, numbers on groom's/bride's/both's lists, A / B lists, the number which do not have an entered address, etc. This is compatible to upload a list from Excel or Outlook.
Contact List

After that, you can start into the invitations. It asks you to select the people out of your list for all your invitations, then in the end gives you the total of invitations, how many (and which) people haven't been assigned an invitation, and even creates the wording for addressing your invitations and envelopes. It will print your labels from your invitation list right from this program. It then prepares your RSVP list, where as they start arriving, you can enter in the information for those coming and not, and even enter and keep track of meal choices (if needed). With the RSVPs you can enter names of escorts that were previously unknown. You can make changes to the RSVP list at anytime if needed.
Label / Report Printing

Once your RSVPs are in, then you can check out your attendees page. From here you can coordinate hotel rooms, flights, table seatings, etc.
Table Seating Arrangements

If has other features including a checklist, budget organizer, gift recordings - which also keeps track of your thank you notes sent out, time lines, events calendar, vendor organizer, etc.
Checklist and Timelines

I highly recommend this. I'm almost done putting my tenative guest list in here and it's fantastic because it does all the counting and thinking for you. I now know that most of the guests are my fiances, that he doesn't know many of the family members on his mother's list either, and that I have a lot of addresses to find. But I love the calendar feature and how everything is mapped out perfectly.

My Mood: Impressed

Invitation Wording

I don't know if anyone else has trouble with the wording of their invitations, but I sure am. Dan and I aren't formal people, and neither will our wedding be overly formal, so a formally worded, fancy calligraphy, uptight wedding invitation is not our style. Would make us feel, like I said there, uptight. I don't think that when I see other people's formal invitations, but that's the way it feels when I try to relay it to us. But how do you word a casual wedding invitation??

Paper and More has solved this problem for me. They have tons of sample wording for absolutely every style one may be looking for. They certainly have helped me out and here I post my praise to them and I hope to help out someone else needed wording ideas.

My Mood: Impressed