FINALLY! It is unbelievable how difficult it has been to find a location for our wedding and through sweat and tears, I have finally found the perfect place!
James asked me to marry him on March 13th, 2012 and since that night I have been looking for the right place I have imagined for our wedding to take place. In the evenings, I sat down and searched the internet for all outdoor locations, I then would write the one's I liked down, think about it over night and make phone calls the next day to the one's I was still interested in. I was so lost in what I was really looking for, which most of you will understand, so let me tell you how I did it all.
First off, sit yourself down (invite your partner if it helps to think aloud) and think about what kind of wedding you want. What date have you decided for the wedding or what time of the year would you like the wedding to take place? Would you like it to be indoors or outdoors? Small or large amount of people? Traditional church or on the beach in Maui, Hawaii? Really think about this because this will help limit down your search (Not by much, but it will help). From the moment I met James I knew I wanted to marry him and I remember when I began my Wedding Planning career I found places that I put on the list of who I would contact when we got engaged. Funny thing is I never thought about money, but not to worry we will come back to that $topic$. A large majority of women I have assisted and helped plan their wedding have done the same as I, dreaming and planning their wedding before they are even engaged. Trust me when I tell you, plans will change whether you thought you had it all planned out and the funny part is that it will be no one else who changes the ideas but you. As far as money goes, it is best you have a budget in mind! Now, James and I have 4 months until the wedding, so we have to be quick about our plans but he told me to plan everything out and worry about the money later. Well, I like structure and most of all I enjoy budgeting, which you should too because if you actually stick to your budget you will feel very proud of yourself. We met with family the week after the proposal and a few family members decided to give $2,000 towards the wedding. I immediately told myself "Okay, $2,000 is perfect and I am going to make that the whole budget for the wedding!". Don't believe me? Continue to read my blogs and you will see how I do!
So, James and I decided that the wedding will be on August 19th, 2012 and we wanted an outdoor wedding. We have not decided what time the ceremony and reception will be and we are still working on a theme but we have picked out the colors. Ladies, just to warn you, don't freak out when your fiance looks at you like you're crazy when you ask him if he likes the colors you've picked out. He really doesn't know what you're envisioning, where the colors will go, what's dominate and what is just a hint of color. Once you start putting the invitations together, he will start to see how the colors will come into play. Colors are not majorly important yet, but of course you can't help but think about them! Now that you've got the date planned (You should really pick three different dates) you can check out the following sites for the best results to finding some locations. Even though I did not find my location through the websites, I did find the largest amount of results or locations for the best prices. First I searched http://www.agrandwedding.com/home/ which gave me results for venues under $1,000 however I could not find a venue that would accommodate the amount of guests I would be inviting. I continued on to Seattle Met Bride and Groom http://www.seattlemetbrideandgroom.com/index.php to find 17 long pages of venues. Do what I did: Pour yourself a glass of wine, sit down in bed or on the couch before bed, copy each link to the venues website, paste in either a word document or an email you will send to yourself, think on it, and call the locations that you were still interested the next day. Keep a clear budget in mind for what you would like to spend on a location and don't hesitate to tell the event planner your budget or negotiate, but remember they don't know who you are and may not immediately trust you when you say you will clean up as if you were never there. FACT: Your rental fee for the space will increase if you have alcohol and need use of the kitchen onsite. Now, if you would like to save big bucks, you can rent on a weekday during the off season (January, February, and March).
I still could not let go of half my budget that easy, so I looked at parks and recreations in all the surrounding cities (Determine what cities you are interested in and search for the 'The city of ________' and look for the parks and recreations link on their websites). When you find a park you like DEFINITELY go check in out in person. We found one we really likes and it was just as beautiful as it was in the pictures, however I about killed myself trying to walk down the steep path to the gorgeous lawn, and I would prefer to have no hospital trips for my guests or even myself on such a wonderful day.
I still could not find anything I liked, I really wanted a location to make me feel at home, comfortable, and familiar. I wanted to have the wedding in someones backyard, so I headed over to craigslist and searched through the vacation rentals around my area. Another great site to search through if you are interested in the same thing is http://www.vrbo.com/ which is a website that will let you pick the state you want and choose from every city to view all of those rentals. Make sure to call each of them and ask if you can have the wedding there if their page does not mention anything about weddings. Most of the people I called and spoke with said they've never had weddings there before but were willing to try! I again could not find anything that fit my needs, which was beginning to make me feel hopeless and a bit too picky. I knew I wanted a backyard wedding and I thought I didn't know anyone with a large enough backyard, but it was mentioned that I check out my Aunt's yard. Sure enough I did and I KNEW! This was it and I was done searching from here on out, I definitely wanted the wedding here!!! Moral of the story: Ask around the family and do not be afraid to ask some of your members to reach out to other family members and even friends.
All in all, this was the most stressful part of planning so far and my advice to you is don't rush into it! Take your time and don't look for locations 24/7 like I did because it will wear you out by the first week if you haven't found anything and it will no longer be fun. If it helps to look at other things, then so be it but try to also stick to planning one thing at a time.
Thank you to all of you who helped me find the right location, thank you Apagi for the most perfect recommendation, thank you James for being patient with me and thank you to the others who just listened to me whine and stress!
Feel free to head over to the following sites I used to get great inspiration:
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