Wednesday, February 29, 2012

Our Wedding: Keeping Organized

Weddings are becoming bigger and less traditional as of late.

The emphasis now seems to be on making the day a one-of-a-kind shindig that the guests (and internet!) will be talking about for months to come.

With so many unique elements floating around the interwebs, there's bound to be some good ol' copying going on. That sounds like it defeats the purpose of making a wedding unique, but I think it's more to do with how the couple puts together all the different elements in unique ways.

Our wedding is no exception. While Im not ready to share what our theme will actually be, you can probably get a little feel from the teaser I posted here.

In order to keep everything organized and as a way to unload my brain every now and then, I have a few places where I keep my inspiration, ideas, notes and lists.

1. The first is my wedding binder. I knew right away that I would need a central place to keep all the contracts and jot notes as we go through this planning process. While attended a wedding planning class this past weekend, the organizer offered binders to the brides for $10 each. I had brought mine with me and I don't think there's much difference. Mine is a white binder that I had used previously while attending university. I added some plastic sleeves to hold business cards, samples and anything else that's not hole punched.

Then I divided the binder into sections like 'save the dates and invitations,' 'attire' and 'ceremony.' Each section has a plastic sleeve or two and paper for all the notes that I've been taking. Really, this is my number one planning tool as I can take it anywhere with me.

2. Obviously for inspiration Pinterest has been invaluable. You can see my wedding pin board here. I love that when Im board I can click on the weddings tab and see what everyone else is finding around the web.

3. The Knot. This website if full of wedding inspiration, checklists and other tools like a guest list manager and a budget calculator. Im not sure Im a big fan of the guest list manager yet as it takes forever to add everyone, but I do really love the budget calculator. It is so easy to overlook some cost when you're planning your budget so this tool is awesome to really get the full picture.

4. The wedding bee blog. I have the wedding bee blog added to my google reader so that I can keep up with all the posts there from the various brides. What I love about this blog is that there are so many brides planning so many different weddings. The budgets are diverse, the locations are diverse and the couples themselves are diverse. It's a great place for tutorials and inspiration as well.

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