July 2013 brides

Hello ladies, as promised here are my wine glasses that I made for the bridesmaids and my mum too. They worked out really cheap at just over £1.50 to make each, the most expensive part was the glasses which were 60p each. I'm rather pleased with them with the exception of the green dots i've put on them, i've gone off them a bit now and think I might order some purple diamantes to stick ontop to hide them. My plan is to give the wine glasses whilst getting ready before the wedding and hopefully drink some fiz out of them.

They were surprisingly easy to make and didnt take long at all and at a small cost and I rather enjoyed the decorating of them. Hopefully the girls will like them or least be polite enough to pretend they do. Its not something I expect them to keep really but thought it would be a nice gesture to give them.

This my first flash so sorry if i do something wrong here. Some photo's aren't great but basically it has the girls names on them and the on the otherside it has either Bridesmaid, maid of honour or Mother of the Bride.

Thanks SuzyQ2, will do ours with RSVP but leave giftlist for later. Good tip re bookmarking the website.

Misselle - love your creativity, luuurrrvveeelllyy

Lola67, I live in Haverhill so about 20mins from you. We are lookin at styaing at The Angel hotel the night before and night of the wedding. Whereabouts is your venue? Is it near the centre?

Sarmar, I am going to Brighton for 1 of my Hen do's. Your OH will have to get some info on good places lol. Im also not into Strippers, although I must admit, I did enjoy watchiing Magic Mike, but I would cringe having one myself!

Misselle you wine glasses are great! well done you! I think its lovely to make stuff yourself, adds a personal touch.

Sparkle 52, we have just chosen our invites, they are a tad pricey but I struggled to find any that I really liked. I think we may send them out with the christmas cards maybe?I got my wedding shoes from Next, bargain at only £32.

Is everyone booking acrs to arrive in? Im still undecided if its worth it or not?? My work is actually a Helicopter flight school and they offered me a helicopter ride to the venue but I think my dress is too big... and I always feel ill in them lol. Wouldnt be good walking down the aisle green!

Has anyone booked cateres yet? We have paid our deposit and have a rough idea for all food apart from the evening. We was thinking a BBQ if its nice weather. What have you all planned?

Auberginepie ypur venue looks beautiful.

Helzbelz im having a green bridesmaid dress, im looking for a sage green, what shade of green are you looking for?

MissBertieB - we have just booked a car for ours! In fact it is the only other thing other than the church and reception we have sorted........Just got the one that is going to do 2 trips to the church ( BMs and then me and FOB) and then take me and new husband to the reception. We got quotes from quite a few places, but in the end went with the one that told us to come and look at the cars before we decided, We could then see the car, how they looked after their fleet etc and it really helped us to decide. It is a ford Phaeton Tourer and I cam quite excted by it!It's very pretty

The next job is BM dress shopping on monday - going to try 'highstreet' shops first. Any suggestions anyone? Was thinking about House of Fraser, Debenhams, Coast etc.

Midlandsbride2013 - I am your date twin as well. Got my 5 BM dresses from Coast. CBM is having the short dress and 4 BM's having the long one. Good luck on Monday hope you get sorted.

Hi All, I'm a newbee to the forum too, would be great to chat and get some advice....I'm feeling very unorganised having read all your posts!!!

We're getting married on 13th July 2013, church is booked, reception venue & caterers are booked, I have been for one wedding dress appointment and had a catch up with my bridesmaids on Saturday and that's it so far!!

I'm feeling like I should have done a lot more!! Struggling with the colour scheme as I love the idea of teal but think it's looking to complicated to colour match etc. so might have to rethink and go with blue or quite fancied coral! Basically I can't make up my mind!!!

Look forward to chatting with you all!

A few bits and bobs arrived by post today that I had ordered. Very excited. A basket for the rose petals that I will get nearer the time ... Will hang it from a beam in the courtyard where we are allowed confetti. And I got these cute little cream coloured paper lanterns that fold up and are tied with a ribbon from eBay that you put battery operated tea lights in. 48 of them that work out at under £1 each incl the candle. Ladies can take them away as an extra gift at the end of the night. They look quite good!

I've got flower girl baskets and invited arriving later in the week.

Addicted to Internet shopping .. Moi?

X

I'M A JULY BRIDE!!

6th to be exact

Only got engaged last month so maybe I'm a little behind with the planning in terms of where perhaps I ought to be at but church booked, venue saved (just need to sort insurance first before handing over the deposit), one dress shop explored, a couple of TOG's contacted for appointments next week, and a couple of car quotes... Going dress shopping again tomorrow

Nice to "meet" you all

KJH1978 you are another date twin of mine ?

I have been planning for a year already so thats why I have alot booked! I'd say start lookin at photographers soon as they can booked up really quickly. Where abouts are you getting married?

Sarmar- your necklace is lovely. Good idea asking for it for xmas. I already have some jewellery too but am still unsure about it. No I havent been to Brighton before so am looking forward to it! Thanks for the reccomendations, will definately try that ice cream. I may just book a nice taxi to take me, my dad and the bridesmaids to the venue as my dad knows someone that has nice mercedes etc. I may have a look into quotes for some vintage cars too.

sarmar, That necklace is gorgeous.

I've been thinking about buying some new Jewellery for the wedding. My original plan was to use my family Jewellery which all the women in my family have worn from my great gran down and it has a crystal and pearl crown to go with it but now i'm not too sure. I think the crown might make me look stupid. Its currently at a shop being restored because it wasnt packed securley from the last wedding 15 years ago. Also its technically my grans and at the moment we aren't on speaking terms thanks to her being a total nightmare. She is currently refusing to come to the wedding along with my cousins and aunt if my parents are there, yep this is my mums mother i'm talking about. Caused me endless amounts of stress this week along with threats and abuse so currently she is uninvited even though she wont come and for the moment i really dont want to talk to her for a few months. It will take that long for me to calm down.

Since i've been so stressed I've thrown myself into wedding mode. Made some wine glass charms for my guests and i'm talking with my TOG at the moment to arrange my engagment shoot that we got for free when we booked her. The weather sucks at the moment though.

Was considering a wedding website and I knwo some of you B2b have them. woudl you recomend them? What sort of things have you put on them?

Is anyone sending out Save the Date cards? i'm worried that if i dont people will book holidays as its July. I'm not planning to send out my invited until February but I worry that might be too early? When is everyone else planning to send things out?

Misselle, we thought about STD cards, particularly given that I am a teacher and some of the wedding guests will be teachers and therefore likely to want to go on holiday at the end of july, but in the end decided not to. We have told our close relatives and friends the date though.

Planning on sending out the day invites in january with a reply date of probably march sometime. I can then bump up some evening guests if needed once we have the day replies and send the evening invites out end of march/april.

I am thinking about wearing a necklace that my H2B bought me for my first birthday after we got together. It is quite small and understated but think it will mean a lot to him if I wear it as well

We are thinking about doing bags of sweets as favours - a bit like the ones that people have on their sweet tables but actually bagged up with personalised bags. We could then name the tables after the sweets that are the favour for that table, or for close family/ wedding party put in their favourite sweets in the bags. Actually just occured to me - do the bride and groom get favours??? I would quite like a bag of my favourite sweets to munch on if I dont get much time to eat!!

I have no idea if the bride & groom get favours, i've never even thought about that. I wonder if anyone else know's the answer to that.

I'm fully intending to eat my dinner, i'm already looking forward to it. I've had a taster at the hotel and the food was amazing although massive portions. I'll need to leave some room for our Chocolate Fountain and cupcakes which are being served in the evening along with the wedding cake and our buffet of rolls & square sausage (i'm scottish), rolls and bacon and rolls and potato scone (another scottish thing i think). I think i'm looking forward to the food more than anything.

We are having thistle shaped soaps as our favours but i'm worried now that the smell might be over powering and will affect the food.

I think I might try send out my invitations in January also and give a reply date of March as we need to give a room allocation list to the hotel 12 weeks before the wedding at the latest and as all of our guests are coming from a distance alot will probably want to stay.

I love the idea of giving sweets as favours and then naming the tables after them. I can see that going down a treat with your guests

Hi all,

HAG13 - hello date twin!

misselle - we are using getting married .co.uk website, really easy to use and loads of stuff like rsvps, meal choices, wedding party profiles, ask a q of guests, accomodation etc etc . Not doing paper invites so did an email STD and when website is ready going to do a You're invited email with link to website

favours - gonna make wine charms, waiting for bits to arrive but will flash once done, spemt about £16 for 150 favours!!! god love ebay

Ps sarmar - love necklace. I don't wear much jewellery so no idea even where to start with accessories!

Hi everyone. Feeling v excited as my invites arrived today. They look great and were really inexpensive. They match the design of the wedding website that I've put together through mywedding.com. Would highly recommend the mywedding website ... The rsvp functionality is excellent and will really help me manage it all. The range of designs is far greater than any other free website provider that I found. A lot of them have matching stationary. My stationary is from wedding paper divas ... All completely personalisable ... And they send through proofs electronically once they have tidied up spacing etc of text. Very impressed with their customer service and it took less than a week to arrive from the us! If you use them search for discount codes on the web. ... I happened to find a 20% off code.

Nearer the time I will probably opt for matching menus for each table and order of service for the ceremony.

Hope all is going well ... Loving the piccies and hearing about all the plans ... Good work July brides!!

xxx

Heyyyyy wanted to say - I've booked to try on wedding dresses on 1st Sept, very excited, but also scared because I'm a fuss pot - has everyone else chosen their wedding dresses yet? Any tips gratefully received!

Helzbelz ... First of all enjoy it. I loved every minute of getting to try on wedding gowns. I felt beautiful! Beforehand I was seriously intimidated but needn't have been.

Take one or max 2 trusted people ... Too many people may stress you out.

Wear good underwear ... It doesn't have to be perfect for wedding gowns but I felt big knickers were in order as they had to rummage around a lot!

If you sense any pressure from the shop assistants ... Ignore it. Some will try the hard sell and say things like they have special discounts that apply that weekend etc. really do ignore that kind of stuff. I decided not to buy my dress from them as soon as they started all that.

Try on one of every type of dress. You may be surprised at what suits you. I was! Keep a really open mind and if the shop assistant is good they will guide you a little and give you honest opinions. (some of them were clueless mind).

Try to think about wearing the dress all day ... Will you feel comfortable?

If you are short don't stand on a platform .... You will not look like that in your dress on the day (unless you can master stilts).

There are some shops where you can get liquidated stock gowns or some that designers choose not to take forward into their collection. If you are a normal height and reasonably slim then you might get a super bargain. Unfortunately I was too tall for them (am 6'2").

If you happen to be near Leeds then I can post details of the bargain shop and the fabulous boutique (they are really lovely) that I have ordered mine from.

Enjoy!!

Thanks SuzyQ2, I'm in Surrey unfortunately, I had a look on internet and found a shop near me called SWOON it does end of line designer gowns so will give that a go. I'm definitely getting more excited about looking now I know more what to expect!

Fantastic news Helzbelz. Am sure you will love it. I am from that kind of area and went to a place near reading with my mum. The gowns there were quite reasonable but just not quite what I was looking for. If you want details let me know.

X

Evening ladies!

Spent the last 2 days shopping for BM dresses. Very tiring and quite stressful! To give you some background, I have 2 BM, one of whom I have known since we were 5, and the other who I met at uni and is my best friend. Luckily they are similar sizes and suit similar styles and colours.

We looked at many many dresses in lots of shops! We tried high street stores but lots dont go up the right sizes ( one size 16/18 one size 18/20) and then bridal shops.

We kind of have it down to two. one from debenhams and one from Romantica. What do you think? (apologies not sure how to flash so copied the links!)

It is the dress on the left and will be in a violet/purple colour

http://www.princessgowns.co.uk/romantica-bridesmaid-dresses-tracey-echo-and-gaby/

http://www.debenhams.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/prod_10001_10001_008010721053_-1?breadcrumb=Home%7EWomen%7EDresses

thanks

Hi midlands bride. Wow ... You really are ahead of the game! I love both dresses, but I wonder if the debenhams one might be more flattering. Only you know though as it depends on how it suits your best girlies.

I am wondering about what to do for my bridesmaids. One is a slim 6"1' model figured gal and the other is normal height and although would ordinarily be slim size 10/12 she will have had a baby 6 months before (took her a while to lose the baby weight last time) and will still be breast feeding! So I guess that means she needs something flattering on the post baby figure and easy/discrete access for breast feeding! I am thinking of giving them a paint chart with all the tones of our purple that would go and let them have different dresses. Otherwise we will have to go for a compromise and I would rather they have something they feel comfortable in and perhaps might wear again.

Any views or advice ladies?

X

Not that organised! more the fact that all three of us work in education and once term starts I will be busy until the next holiday! We looked at chiffon dresses as they are cooler for when it is a gloriously hot day(!) and also hangs nicely over their figures. There are lots of tones of purple too! I looked at loads....... The fabric you have also will affect the colour so we looked at the 'cadburys' purple which I thought personally was too shiny and bright for me in the satin type dresses but it looked lovely in the chiffon which dulls it down a bit.

One of the debenhams ones has a side zip which although may not be suitable for public breastfeeding would be easy for her to undo herself I suppose ( not having ever breastfeed !!) It will also depend on what type of dress you are having. I have not got mine yet ( need to get a move on there!) but it needs to compliment that. I am only 5 foot tall and a size 8/10 so the fuller BM dresses in a size 18/20 would have looked 'bigger' than mine so we looked at the chiffon styles. For covering a tummy up, look at the chiffon ones that have vertical pleats at the centre of the front. We found these hung really nicely!

I know this message may sound a bit garbled but I have had a really long two days

Thanks sweetie. Good thought about the material needing to match and how they will look with my dress. I have picked mine so that should be easy enough to deal with. Let us know what you go for!

X

Hey ladies, Been absent from the forum for a while due to work pressures and pressure trying to get my save the dates made and sent out. Finished them all last night and posting them all tomorrow. Hopefully if some people know they can't make it they will let us know now and we don't then need to send an invite.

Having a bit of a grrr moment with my venue. I should have learned my lesson to get everything in writting but I didnt and now i'm being stung.

We booked our venue back in 2010 and was told at the time we would get it at those prices. We didnt sign anything and just got a letter to confirm we had booked and paid a deposit.

Got an invoice through today and the prices quoted are for 2012 with an increase forecast for 2013. Queried it with the venue but because we didnt have it in writting they are saying we will be charged the 2013 prices and denying the agreed otherwise.

Feeling really let down by it to be honest. Its added an extra £500 onto our budget which we could do without and means we now need to cut corners elsewhere so the caketopper I wanted is now out of the window. The only luck we had on our side was that back in 2010 we emailed and got a price for a menu we wanted and got that in email so they've backed down and said they will honour that but won't for the rest.

I know it sounds stupid but its sort of tainted the venue for me now. Up until now I thought they were wonderful and the service was great. Top that with the rooms which should have been allocated to us for the night before haven't been and now there are only 2 avalible and we are having to ask family to stay at another hotel the closest being nearly 20 miles away. The family are already traveling up from the North East to Glasgow for the wedding so I'm peeved at having to ask them to stay miles from the hotel especially as they can't even check in at our wedding venue until after our ceremony.

Sorry for the rant but I thought it best to come on here and rant instead of chewing off my poor OH ear for the rest of the night.

Hi Misselle. I totally understand where you are coming from! I too would be pretty narked actually the issue about the rooms would make my blood boil! Have you tried asking if they could let your guests have access to 1 room before the ceremony so they can put their bags down and maybe change into their wedding outfits? It seems to me that the convergence of business (them) and life event (us) is sometimes a little incompatible! But they are business people at the end of the day. Well done for holding them to the food costs.

I had an issue with my venue too over them wanting to charge corkage (£2+VAT per person!) for minature sloe gin favours that I fully intended would be taken away by my guests and enjoyed at home.

They made up some nonsense about it being due to needing to protect the health and safety of our guests (and you can't have someone getting poisoned by our handmade stuff) and to do with licensing restrictions. When I pointed out that it was interesting that the £2+VAT would take away these issues they backed down. I just found the whole thing really upsetting ... got me all flustered and heart racing etc. Now I'm worried that they won't look after all the little bits and pieces I would otherwise expect them to and perhaps I'll be treated as a second rate bride? Well, here's hoping that they behave in a professional manner and take it on the chin.

I just felt that they were taking enough money off me (£6K to use the venue before any food/drink etc) and they were having a greedy moment.

Do you have the same worries about your venue now?

Hello ladies - I'm an OM July bride and got married on 7th July this year ? it was an amazing day and I loved every minute of it. Enjoy the planning stages and try not to get stressed out (I know it can feel impossible at times). I loved having out July brides thread going on Hitched an we even managed to get over 1000 posts on it - are you ladies up for the challenge of keeping it up?!

Have fun ?

Hi JLS,

I think we are up for the challenge!

Thanks for the advice ?

Definately up for the challenge!

We booked our TOG today slowly getting there!

How is everyone else getting on with planning?

Thats good, what sort of package have you gone for?

I think we are on track, sometimes I feel like we have ages away and then other times I think, god its only 10 months, I remember when it was 2 years!

So far I have these things booked and deposits paid:

Venue, Caterer, TOG, Registrar, DJ, Florist, Dress, shoes and accessories. We have also got lots of little decorations such as hanging hearts and tea lights, card box, guest book etc. Chosen invites but not sure when to order?

Oh my goodness. I feel so un organised looking at all of this. I have booked the venue, done all of the legal side and bought my dress but that is it. I want to book more but my fiance is of a very laid back attitude and wants to wait until next year, but I know I will be so stressed by then. When are you all sending out your invites?

Im nervous already lol xxx

I'm getting married on 6th July 2013!

We got engaged July 2010 but we have only just began organising everything. We've booked the church, reception and photographer so far. Stuck when it comes to choosing colours. I love the idea of having orange in my bouquet but at the same time we have seen some lovely dusky pink suits for the grooms men. So we're constantly changing our minds.

MissBertie - we have not finalised the package yet as I am undecided whether I want photos of me getting ready! But we definately have the TOG from the ceremony at church, through the wedding breakfast etc and then up until first dance/ cake time. We get a CD of all the photos ( she normally takes over 1200 she says) with the copyright, and also a dvd of the photos of us made into a video and then a 60 photo album thrown in. TBH we are more interested in the CD of the photos than the album but the TOG said she will take the price of the album off the package if we decide we dont want it!

All in all, very pleased with her as she is very nice and flexible ( she even brings her own sandwiches and flask so will not require food!) and I think we are paying a reasonable price.

I dont seem as organised as others! I decided that my aims over the summer hols were to get the car, TOG and my dress sorted and start BM dress shopping. Got the car and TOG done, started dress shopping and got other appointments booked in a couple of weeks with mum and have looked for BM dresses. Quite pleased with myself but really need to get on with finding my dress!