photographer #1 and wedding relief

Then on Sunday we had a super busy day, not only did we have to drive home that night, but we also had two separate meetings set up. First we finally got to meet with the day of coordinator, and she seemed really knowledgeable and I know I will feel so much better on the wedding day with her there to decorate and make everything run smoothly. She was really nice, and she had alot of ideas about things and is going to meet with us again in August and actually come to the reception and ceremony locations to see them and help us with ideas for setup, which I thought was really nice of her. She seems to get what we want from the ceremony setup and everything, and I'm pretty confident that everything will run smoothly with her. At first I was debating on having a coordinator, but doing weddings for a living really has made me appreciate them and since I want my poor mom to actually ENJOY the wedding and be there when we are getting ready instead of putting flower petals in the aisle and setting up chairs, this was probably one of the best decisions we made. And Adam is excited to have her too, which is always good.

After that meeting we headed out to the opposite end of Springfield to meet with our first photographer of the day. She's new to the wedding scene but has shot portraits for a while and has a really unique eye and editing style. I could tell she was a bit nervous about the whole thing, but I'm confident that she'll do a great job and she had some neat ideas about everything and hopefully since we only have her for the first part of the day she wont get too overwhelmed. Also, since she is new, I wont feel so bad when I hand her the, well, book I am pretty much putting together of the different pictures I want. Hahahahaha. Yeah, I'm going to be hated by the other photographers, but I dont think this girl will mind. :)

Next time we come up will be even busier, since the time after that will be the actual wedding. We have to meet with the coordinator again, meet with the caterer and pick our menu, meet with the videographer, have my hair trial, have my bridal pictures (if there is time), get my dress altered, go to the rental company and pick out the linens and whatnot, and do any other detail that I'm forgetting. Ahhhh!! I'm getting stressed just thinking about it. It's super hard when we only have a Saturday and Sunday to accomplish all of this, since we cant take off work, which is really what needs to happen. Hmm...depending how stressed I get closer to the time, perhaps I will take off that Friday and go down Thursday after work...that adds an extra day and a half, which may make a world of difference...

Anywho, that was an insane weekend. From here on out I can just sense that it is going to go by insanely fast and be really hectic. Hopefully it all turns out in the end, but I just wish I had more time to devote to simply planning! It's hard having to work on other people's weddings and push my own aside, when I want to go all out and spend hours on it...

engagement pictures!

We booked an engagement photographer!

We went back and forth alot about where to get these done- do we do Omaha, where we grew up? Where we are now? How about Springfield, since that's where the wedding is? Well initially we wanted Omaha. However our photographer from there, well, we dont like (long, long story there) and while we initially had an engagement session included with them, changing our date made us change our package and now we dont. Our ceremony photographer in Springfield we just booked for a set hour package, so we are back to square one. So we had to search for yet ANOTHER photographer, and one that gave a print release and all photos on a DVD because I want to make us a picture guest book.

After many days searching and getting price quotes, we decided to get them done right here in KC. Since this is where we are now, plus- there are so many kicking places to get them done here, we just had to take advantage of the awesome backdrops. Through my advertising site I found Christina Sandberg- and I love her style. She seems like a really cool person with a similar view on things photography-wise as us, and even though she is a bit pricier than we had hoped to spend, I know our pictures will be worth it. I'm super excited to get them done!! Adam, not so much...but he'll come around! :)

pretty pictures

I swear I went through about 50 different photographers for the ceremony. Apparently all photographers in Springfield are either ridiculously expensive, or charge a flat fee for all day coverage. I just wanted someone who would be there for about 6 hours, get the getting ready and the ceremony, edit the pictures, and then give me all of them on a DVD. No albums, no extra frills- I know what that all costs to make and when I can do that myself, I'd much rather put that money elsewhere. I finally narrowed it down to 3 different people, and in the end decided on Heather Hoadley. Again I feel so lucky, because I think I got really, really lucky with her. She worked with me on the price, mostly because she is fairly new to the wedding scene (she specializes in portraiture) and is giving me all of the images on a DVD with a release. I'm really excited. I chose her in the end because she just seemed like the nicer person, was open to changing things up, and I'm a big fan of her editing styles. It's incredibly hard to find someone who works with textures in their editing who doesnt charge thousands of dollars. So this major hurdle is over, thank god.

Now we have to concentrate on the reception site. This is becoming an absolute major headache...I'm really starting to worry that we wont find anything down there and it's really depressing me. So far the art galleries have been a bust...there is one I want to look in to more, but the others are either too small or dont rent out their space.

We are much less than a year out now, we definitely need to decide this!!!