Wedding Vendor: The Venue

OKC Farmer's Market 

My venue. It was one of the very first decisions I made. It is a really cool venue...not in the greatest part of town, but I love how big it is and it has an amazing view of downtown OKC. I wouldn't say that I regret having my wedding there....BUT I kind of wish that I would have shopped around a bit.

I'm not writing this post to put the Farmer's Market on blast...at all! But, I want to share with you my wedding planning process, and venue was a major one.

We chose the Farmer's Market for many reasons. One, it was a huge space, and I wanted to get married and have the reception in one place (less decorating, right?). Two, they provided a lot! DJ, alcohol, soda, water, tea, 2 bartenders, security, tables and chairs (that they would set up for us). Three, it was such a cool and unique venue.

All of those provided were great (if you were there and saw any one of my family members, you KNOW the alcohol was working :) )... except that the chairs were super dirty and we had to wipe them off.

Our venue is not specifically just for weddings. It is a farmer's market, antique store, concert hall, roller derby rink and apparently and MMA fighting ring. Through the entire 10 months we were told we could set up the Friday before. That way on Saturday we could somewhat relax. Well...the week before the venue told us there would be an MMA fight held the Friday night before our wedding, til 2am (it was supposed to be the weekend before, but was rescheduled due to weather). (Cue my one, major freak out of the wedding process...sorry, Jake!) So, we gathered my family and friends and worked our asses off Saturday morning getting everything prepped. It was a lot of hard work, but in the end, it came together because we had some ALL STARS helping us out. It sucked, but stuff like that happens, and again....if that was the worst thing to happen during the wedding planning process, no big deal in the grand scheme of things.

Another thing that bothered me was one of the staff called my mom a few days after the wedding and "scolded" her because our guests wiped Vaseline on the bottom of some of the chairs. Now....lets take a second and think about this one. Who at a wedding uses Vaseline? No one. Who at an MMA fight uses Vaseline? Everyone. Mystery solved. Maybe if they had cleaned the chairs in the first place, they would have figured that out.

Like I said before: our venue was so cool looking and unique. Here are some of the reasons I chose to get married there:

Giant windows with great light....

 

Great architecture...

and string lights everywhere that made our night magical...

All photography by the fab Caroline Rentzel Photography

Wedding Decor: Geronimo Balloons

Who knew helium would be such a big struggle during my wedding planning process. I don't think I ever cried because of it...(actually....I think I only cried like twice during the whole process....I have limited emotions....what can I say?) but they were a very stressful aspect of the wedding.

My little 2013 - Pinterest - wedding loving heart just could not NOT have giant balloons in her wedding!

I never thought that I would write a blog post about a chemical element....but here it goes.

The Helium: Helium is REALLY hard to find for decent prices. I called countless places trying to rent a tank but it was either way too expensive, or the company didn't have access to helium anymore.

In a perfect scenario, we would have blown up the balloons on site. Since we had 20 36 in. balloons (if you couldn't tell from pictures...my venue was HUGE!); it was going to be impossible to transport all of them to our venue without some geronimo fatalities. After many phone calls, we realized that our only option was to have them blown up off site and transport them ourselves (while holding our breath, of course). A lot of the decor and furniture was transported from Odessa to OKC, so we had an empty U-haul that we ended up using. Shockingly, that part was a success!

Since renting a tank was no longer an option, Homeland or Party Galaxy were what I had to choose between. I tried places like Dollar Tree but they would only blow up their own balloons, and wouldn't order what I wanted.

The Helium Source: Both Homeland and Party Galaxy would blow them up, but PG wasn't giving me straight answers on pricing or helium availability. Since I had such a large quantity of balloons, they were going to charge me more. So, Homeland it was. Plus they were willing to order the balloons for me! Score! (So I thought).

Issue #1: A few days before the wedding they called to let me know that instead of gold, they were sent silver balloons. In the grand scheme, not that big of a deal...but still, disappointing when you have a certain look in mind. Looking back at pictures, the silver balloons were fine. No one but me, my mom, or Tiffany and Taylor (our awesome planners) would have even known if I wasn't telling you now.

Issue #2: The other issue was that Homeland didn't fill the balloons up all of the way. Meaning that when we went to attach the tassels, they weighed the balloons down. That was frustrating, to say the least. Again, big scheme....no big deal. But it's one of the many reasons I wanted to blow up the balloons ourselves. So, we ended up having to pair the balloons in groups of 3 to be able to hold the weight of the tassels. (Tissue paper tassels, they were not very heavy in the first place!)

So, after saying all of that....here is what I WISH I had of done (or had the guts to have even tried!)...

Vintage Revivals bought these disposable tanks. They sell them at Hobby Lobby and Party Galaxy, and you might be able to use a 40% off coupon at Hobby Lobby. Anyways, according to the box and everyone I asked said that the tank would only fill up about 3 balloons, making it way too expensive to even attempt! Vintage Revivals said she got about 7 1/2 balloons filled with each tank. Too bad she wrote this post a few months after my wedding! Geez!

Balloons: Amazon has always been the best price I could find for the 36" balloons.

So, there you have it. What we did....where it went all wrong....and what I still wish I did today!

*I kind of feel like I should add to each Wedding related post that I realize all "complaints" are on the surface. None of these wrecked my wedding. I am still married and will remain married to my husband regardless of the outcome of some balloons, or the venue or any of the "pretty" things. I'm just sharing my experience with you, so that you don't make the same mistakes I did. Or you're reading because you have a general interest in my wedding planning process!* 

All photography by Caroline Rentzel.

 

Vanilla Wedding Favors

For our wedding favors we decided on little, 1 ounce tinctures of cooking vanilla. We both enjoy cooking and baking, so we thought this would be something fun and USABLE for our guests to enjoy.

There are about one million great wedding favor ideas out there. But most of them either seemed really expensive or something that would just be thrown out at the end of the night.

My budget was about $1 per guest.

Bottles      28 cents each
Caps         22 cents each
Vanilla      19 cents (for 1 ounce of vanilla)
Label        11 cents each (These were designed by my wedding planners, Tiffany & Taylor)
The twine is from Hobby Lobby and we already had that....but even if we had bought it, it would have cost about 5 cents per bottle - at the most.

Total: 80 cents per guest! 

Mom and I used turkey basters to fill up the bottles and it took us an evening of watching TV to do about 220. Extremely easy, but a little sticky.

We had them at each place setting during the wedding. The ONLY downfall was that some of the guests didn't grab them on their way out. So, I now have  A LOT of really cute bottles of vanilla that I bake with on the reg. If I did it again, I would probably just put them on a table by the exit. Then again....I'll probably never have to buy vanilla again in my life...so maybe it's not that bad of a downfall!

Wedding Invitation Suite Cost Breakdown

Today I'm breaking down the final costs of our Invitation Suite. While crunching the numbers, I got a little stressed out all over again! Man...planning and budgeting weddings is TOUGH!

Below you can access the four previous parts of the Wedding Invitation Suite.

 

Total: $181.88

 

Total: $263.98

 

Total: $314.43

Total: $224.37

Groupon for Vistaprint ($25 for $100 worth of product) x 4 = $100

Total: $1,084.66 (Including Postage & Guestbook)

Now, if I went with my first choice from Wedding Paper Divas, getting everything the same (buying their gold envelopes, postcards for RSVP's, etc) and using their 25% OFF coupon* my total would be: $1230.92 + $312.50 for postage.

* 25% OFF your total order was the best coupon I could find.  

 So, here it is! We saved $458.76. Now, keep in mind that when I say DIY I mean using Etsy, using our own printing sources, friends, etc. Looking back I could have easily done this for much cheaper by ordering fewer quantities, going with "free options" like designing them myself, printing them myself or using free templates offered by sites like Wedding Chicks.

Hope everyone has safe travels, and a wonderful Christmas! Jesus is the reason for the season!
 

Wedding Invitation Suite: Programs

Let's talk about our programs! For awhile, we were not going to have programs and do a big chalkboard sign instead. Then I stumbled upon B is for Brown's Etsy page through Pinterest. Not only does this girl make some pretty sassy programs, she is from Oklahoma City!!! SOLD!

Here is how they turned out: (You can see that they printed out different than how they look on the computer. With the help from our wedding planner, Taylor, we sent over the exact colors we needed to match our coasters and other prints.)

I loved how personal they are, especially since there are usually a good amount of guests who are your parent's friends who just don't know you as a couple.

Design: I just can't get over how fun these were. I love getting to know different people's quirks, hobbies, etc...So I assume people would like to know more about us.

Cost Breakdown:

Design: $35

Printing: $113.37 for 225 (from Cat Print. Honestly, I overpaid...I should have stuck with Vista Print)

We also had her design a "Love Libs" we used as our guestbook. The guestbook was another tradition that I just wasn't really feeling. At all. I've seen a bunch of fun varieties (both at actual weddings and Pinterest) that were cute, but wasn't my taste.

These Mad Libs were pretty funny. Some people didn't fill them out a all, some people wrote serious things in the blanks and others, um, well...let's just say they were Cards Against Humanity worthy :)

Design: These were a pretty last minute decision. I could have probably done without them if it came down to the cost (especially since we have SO MANY left unfilled).

Cost Breakdown:

Design: $20

Printing: $56 for 200 from Cat Print. WAY OVER ORDERED!!

Total: $224.37

 Next up is the final cost break down of everything we did vs if we went with a more popular site's Invitation Suite.

Wedding Invitation Suite: Respondez, s'il vous plait

Oh, the RSVP. It's a love/hate relationship with them and the world. Some people are wonderful at it, some (my family) are horrible! Since my wedding, I've made a vow with myself to never forget one again. Since I'm not a super organized human being, I'm sure I'll miss one again....or maybe, just maybe I'll concur my ongoing goal/resolution of becoming more organized. (I think the most I've ever accomplished was organizing my Pinterest boards two years ago!)

I had two RSVPs. If it were up to me, I would have only had one. But my mom insisted on having a few traditional ones for those who we knew wouldn't quite get it. If there was one thing that fit my personality the most about my wedding, it would be this RSVP card. Seriously....it's sassy, sarcastic and hilarious. I think they let our guests know that we're not taking ourselves too seriously, that we'd have fun, dance, eat, drink and enjoy our friends and family.

                              

Design: Keith designed this postcard for us, based on an RSVP I saw on Minted. I had him tweak a few words and he made it fit my design idea. My cousin used the song recommendation on her RSVPs and I thought it was an awesome idea!  It was actually really fun getting them back and seeing what songs people would suggest, or which box they would check; it made one of the more drab parts of wedding planning enjoyable. However, not everyone has my sense of humor. A few people didn't check any boxes; some wrote out why they wouldn't make it and the rest just wrote "No" on the front by their names. Oh well!

Design: These came with our invitation from He Saw Sparks. We sent these out to those we assumed wouldn't "get" the funnier RSVP. I fought my mom big time on this. I basically said "If they don't "get it" then they shouldn't come!" Bridezilla anyone? :) It's one of the reasons I'm glad I'm blogging post wedding. All of my crazy emotions have been sorted out, and I can think back and be glad we chose to do two. Obviously, I should have sent out more traditional ones! :) 

                              

I created this envelope on Vistaprint for the traditional RSVP.

We included this Accommodations card to those who would be traveling out of town for our wedding. Nothing too exciting here...just wanted to show off more of Keith's talent :) 


Cost Break Down:

Design: Funny RSVP - $33 by Keith
             Traditional RSVP - "free" since it was included in the invitation design
             Accommodation Card - $33 by Keith

Printing: $159.43 - We had run out of our Groupons by this time, and we were cutting it close. But I 
                                 did WAY over order! I could have easily knocked down my quantities.
               Qty - Funny RSVP - 250
                        Traditional RSVP + Envelopes - 50
                        Accommodation - 150 

Postage: $89 for both types of stamps. 

Total: $314.43

Like I said, I could have gotten fewer total quantities of each RSVP, plus I could have gotten more Groupons for Vistaprint, which would have made it cheaper as well. 

Next I'll share with you our programs and the final budget breakdown!



             
                               

Wedding Invitation Suite: Invitation

On Sunday I talked about our Save the Dates and went into all sorts of details about price, design decisions and the internal struggle I had between choosing online invitations and using postage.

Today, I'll share with you our main invitations for our big day.

These were designed by He Saw Sparks, who I found through Etsy.

He Saw Sparks was awesome to work with. They added the chalkboard background for me and I absolutely fell in love with the font! I'm a pretty big snob when it comes to fonts (snob might be too strong of a word, I think picky would fit it best) and ultimately was what won us over on these.
 

 front

back

Before we stuffed 220 of these in envelopes, I rounded the corners with a punch I got from Hobby Lobby.

Didn't Caroline Rentzel Photography do an amazing job? These are some of my favorite pictures from the day!

Let's break down the cost:

Design: $70- $35 for the basic design, $10 for the back design, $15 to change the background to chalkboard, $10 for the extra proof (in case we had any last minute changes...aka insurance for our invites!).

Envelopes: $60.00 for 250 (I'll show these gold, sparkly bad boys off later)

Postage: $115 for 250 Invitations

Printing: $18.98

Total: $263.98


If I were to do things all over again I would have tried to see if I could add a little watercolor floral in the bottom left corner. If I could merge the font of mine with the idea of this invite from Wedding Paper Divas I would be a happy camper.

I also like the idea of the "hand lettered" look that you can get made custom. Rightfully so, that can be a more expensive option. These beauties are done by one of my faves, Shannon Kirsten.

Apparently I still have plenty of ideas. Anyone else out there getting married? We need to chat!