Saturday, January 31, 2009
Engagement Pictures are in
We got our engagement photos back today and were very excited to see how the rest of them turned out. We started of at McCory gardens on the SDSU campus and then to a few places downtown. Randy and I are really happy with how they turned out. I've included some of our favorites below. These are in addition to the great ones that Erin previously posted on her website. We really liked those ones too!
To party all night long!
I had a little trouble when it came to looking to pick a DJ. How do you find a good one? How do you know they are going to play good music and keep people dancing and entertained all night. At least when we were looking for a photographer I could go to their web site and see their work. Not a DJ. It is either word of mouth, someone you have seen, or take a chance on someone you have never heard of.
Final decision...Signature Sounds out of Rock Rapids, IA. We were able to see one of their DJs at my cousins wedding this May - Mike and Lyndsay's. We like him well enough, and the price was reasonable. Their dance went until 2 am, and people were still asking for more when he quit playing. We decided that had to be a good sign and we had a blast at the dance!
We are able have the DJ for 8 hours which includes light dinner music during the reception, mics for us to use for speeches, light show, and an awesome dance. The one thing we extra we decided to include with this DJ is a picture slide show of the dance. Two guys show up 1 takes care of the music and the other one takes pictures of the guests and everyone dancing and uploads them to a projector and a slide show plays all night. As new pictures are taken, the slide show gets up dated. At the end of the night we get a disc with all of the photos taken. So when a stranger comes around and asks to take your picture, smile you will be on the big screen soon!
We did talk to other companies, but either we were going to pay $1000 for a 4 hour dance, and anything and everything was extra. Other places we talked to were either booked on the day of our wedding, or the people we talked to really didn't appeal to us. Quite a few places had 14 different DJs on staff so you have no idea who you are going to get. I wasn't interested in leaving the dance up to total chance.
So there you have it. Now we just have to start putting together "Play" and "Do Not Play" lists and keep our fingers crossed the dance is a hit.
Final decision...Signature Sounds out of Rock Rapids, IA. We were able to see one of their DJs at my cousins wedding this May - Mike and Lyndsay's. We like him well enough, and the price was reasonable. Their dance went until 2 am, and people were still asking for more when he quit playing. We decided that had to be a good sign and we had a blast at the dance!
We are able have the DJ for 8 hours which includes light dinner music during the reception, mics for us to use for speeches, light show, and an awesome dance. The one thing we extra we decided to include with this DJ is a picture slide show of the dance. Two guys show up 1 takes care of the music and the other one takes pictures of the guests and everyone dancing and uploads them to a projector and a slide show plays all night. As new pictures are taken, the slide show gets up dated. At the end of the night we get a disc with all of the photos taken. So when a stranger comes around and asks to take your picture, smile you will be on the big screen soon!
We did talk to other companies, but either we were going to pay $1000 for a 4 hour dance, and anything and everything was extra. Other places we talked to were either booked on the day of our wedding, or the people we talked to really didn't appeal to us. Quite a few places had 14 different DJs on staff so you have no idea who you are going to get. I wasn't interested in leaving the dance up to total chance.
So there you have it. Now we just have to start putting together "Play" and "Do Not Play" lists and keep our fingers crossed the dance is a hit.
Tuesday, January 13, 2009
Engagment Pictures - Preview
We got our engagement photos back yesterday. Well, the proofs went up online. We were so excited to see them! We went out with our photographer Erin Smith (Life in Picture Photography) on Saturday to have our pictures taken. We started off at McCory Gardens on the SDSU campus, then moved to downtown Brookings. Randy and I are really happy with how they turned out. I've included the preview photos from the Internet. It will be about 2 weeks until we get our CD with all of the shots. They might be a litt blurry because of how I had to copy the online proofs, but I will update them with higher-quality pics when we receive the disk in the mail. Erin has been great to work with so far... she is highly recommended by us if you know of anyone that needs a photographer!
Friday, January 9, 2009
Engagement Photos Tomorrow
Earlier this week I contacted our photographer to try and get something booked for engagement pictures. I keep thinking that the sooner we get them taken and get proofs back, the better chance we have of actually doing something with them.
Honestly, engagment pictures, what do you do with them? I like the idea of using a few in a picture frame at the wedding in place of a guest book. Mom & Dad would probably like a couple, and grandma & grandpa would put a couple around there place too. But other than that, do you create a shrine for yourself somewhere on your wall? I have to wonder if engagemetn pictures didnt come with our photographers package, would we even do them at all?
Whatever my opinion is on what we are going to do with them, we are braving the elements and having them taken tomorrow afternoon. The snow around here was looking a little nasty as it has been warm enough for some to melt, then it refreezes and 1/2 of it is covered in dirt. As I was walking out of work last night there was a nice light snowfall coming down. Everything is now covered with all new white snow. Good deal, now on to the next dilema...what are we going to wear?
Last night we tried on 1/2 of our closet. Sweaters, button up shirts, you name it, we tried it. We figured short sleeved anything was out of the question - come on have you checked the forcast...Brookings tomorrow high of 16. We pick out 2 different outfits that hopefully will do the job.
Honestly, engagment pictures, what do you do with them? I like the idea of using a few in a picture frame at the wedding in place of a guest book. Mom & Dad would probably like a couple, and grandma & grandpa would put a couple around there place too. But other than that, do you create a shrine for yourself somewhere on your wall? I have to wonder if engagemetn pictures didnt come with our photographers package, would we even do them at all?
Whatever my opinion is on what we are going to do with them, we are braving the elements and having them taken tomorrow afternoon. The snow around here was looking a little nasty as it has been warm enough for some to melt, then it refreezes and 1/2 of it is covered in dirt. As I was walking out of work last night there was a nice light snowfall coming down. Everything is now covered with all new white snow. Good deal, now on to the next dilema...what are we going to wear?
Last night we tried on 1/2 of our closet. Sweaters, button up shirts, you name it, we tried it. We figured short sleeved anything was out of the question - come on have you checked the forcast...Brookings tomorrow high of 16. We pick out 2 different outfits that hopefully will do the job.
Thursday, January 8, 2009
Happy New Year!
About 8 days late...Happy New Year everyone!
We hope everyone had a fun night and managed to make their way home safe and sound. We decided to stick around in Brookings and went out with some friends. Brett & Meghan were back from Chicago, Ashley (Casey's wife) was up from Omaha, and other friends from Brookings met us at Skinners - downtown Brookings.
Here are a few pictures from the evening...enjoy
We hope everyone had a fun night and managed to make their way home safe and sound. We decided to stick around in Brookings and went out with some friends. Brett & Meghan were back from Chicago, Ashley (Casey's wife) was up from Omaha, and other friends from Brookings met us at Skinners - downtown Brookings.
Here are a few pictures from the evening...enjoy
Decorating
We have a small problem when it comes to decorating for our reception and dance. The Days In can only guarantee us that we can be in at noon on the day of the wedding. Yep, you read that right...decorate for a wedding starting at noon. Please tell me how anyone can even begin to get that done.
I talked to the event coordinator at the Days Inn a few weeks ago and she gave me a little more info. Basically as long as there is not an event in the room Friday night we can be in there to decorate at 8am on the day of the wedding. A little better, but something tells me that I will have other things to do that morning.
So Tuesday evening Randy and I met with a couple people that come in and do the decorating for you. She has done several weddings at the Days Inn and has this down to a science. They go in at 8am and get to work and then about 11:30pm they come in and tear everything down. No worries about getting anything cleaned up and taken home.
She has a bunch of lights, white fabric & tulle, table mirrors, vases, and a few other things. She also has access to a wholesale flowers & fabric. If you want, she will order the flowers, arrange them, and make sure they are ready to go for you. What she doesnt have, we can rent in Brookings for pretty cheap. They have a backdrop for behind the head table, ideas for centerpieces, ribbon, cake stands, and about a million other things to choose from. The thing I really like about renting is you don't have 45 centerpieces, 100 strands of lights and who knows what else left over. I can get the renal stuff on Wednesday, the week of the wedding, get everything to the decorators & my job is done.
We need to discuss the price a little further and look a little deeper into how much the rental stuff is going to cost, but I think for the price, we should book her. We are not going to have time to do it...that is the bottom line. Why not have someone come in that knows what they are doing and have it done right. And better yet, we wouldn't have to worry about it.
I talked to the event coordinator at the Days Inn a few weeks ago and she gave me a little more info. Basically as long as there is not an event in the room Friday night we can be in there to decorate at 8am on the day of the wedding. A little better, but something tells me that I will have other things to do that morning.
So Tuesday evening Randy and I met with a couple people that come in and do the decorating for you. She has done several weddings at the Days Inn and has this down to a science. They go in at 8am and get to work and then about 11:30pm they come in and tear everything down. No worries about getting anything cleaned up and taken home.
She has a bunch of lights, white fabric & tulle, table mirrors, vases, and a few other things. She also has access to a wholesale flowers & fabric. If you want, she will order the flowers, arrange them, and make sure they are ready to go for you. What she doesnt have, we can rent in Brookings for pretty cheap. They have a backdrop for behind the head table, ideas for centerpieces, ribbon, cake stands, and about a million other things to choose from. The thing I really like about renting is you don't have 45 centerpieces, 100 strands of lights and who knows what else left over. I can get the renal stuff on Wednesday, the week of the wedding, get everything to the decorators & my job is done.
We need to discuss the price a little further and look a little deeper into how much the rental stuff is going to cost, but I think for the price, we should book her. We are not going to have time to do it...that is the bottom line. Why not have someone come in that knows what they are doing and have it done right. And better yet, we wouldn't have to worry about it.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
