Hey all you excited and nervous brides,
I just wanted to get back on the sites that I relied on so heavily when I was planning my wedding. Since my own wedding, I have also attended 3 of my friends' weddings and have so recommendations.
My AWESOME services:
Church: St. Simon the Apostle Catholic Church - very beautiful and feels large but has a shorter aisle. I wouldn't use the pianist as the singer though.
Reception: Tapawingo Golf Club - super beautiful, scenic views, really laid back (whatever you want works with them), were flexible with what we could bring in. They have 2 caterers to pick from: Andre's or Genesis.
Genesis is DELICIOUS! definitely get the beef!
Photographer: Kelly Manno was so great to work with. She took creative pictures, allowed us copyrighted cd of all our pictures so we can print off our own pics, and had great quality work. She also had a quick turn-around. We had our wedding pics probably within a month or so of our wedding. We tried to save a little money by putting our pictures into an album ourself (which we have yet to do).
http://www.kellymannophotography.com/http://kellymanno.blogspot.com/ Florist: We used a family friend:
Carol's Forget-Me-Not Florist in Highland, IL. She delivers to St. Louis and was super accommodating. She even met me at her flower dealer so we could pick the color flowers together. The flowers were absolutely beautiful and cheaper than any other place I looked (Walter Knoll, Schnucks, Dierbergs, Sister's Flowers) My friend also used Carol's and she had also been to a few other florists and she was still the cheapest. Beautiful bouquets!
Videographer: DO NOT USE: Millenium Video. We are coming up on our 5 month anniversary and they still have not completed our video. They have had little communication with us, rarely return our phone calls, and give excuse after excuse of why its not ready yet. Each time we call, they say it's almost ready, but then we call 3 weeks later and they tell us the same thing.
DO NOT USE MILLENIUM VIDEO. They take your money then take their sweet little time getting you the final project.
Baker: MMMMnnnnn. Don't waste your money on McArthurs. Go to
WEDDING WONDERLAND. They are super affordable and their cake is absolutely delicious!
DJ: We had a great party with
Complete Music. They catered to our requests, we could select the type of DJ we wanted, and they made the party fantastic. They even brought us drinks and cake when we were so busy going around and visiting with people and couldn't get a chance to step away. Above and beyond.
Limo: We loved our party bus and getaway car with
St. Louis Limos. I think they are a combination of a couple different limo companies. Our driver was very nice and it was a great affordable fun time.
http://www.stlouislimos.com/Dresses: I got my wedding dress from
David's Bridal. Very beautiful. After visiting a lot of other bridal stores, I'm sure I could have found something nice anywhere. I absolutely loved the bridal party dresses from
Simply Elegant Bridal.
Other words of wisdom: I found a lot of my extra pieces (unity candle, garter, hair piece, etc) online and was very pleased with what I received. We did a lot of DIY stuff that made our wedding very personal (my SIL drew our wedding invitations, I designed the programs & invitation inserts, my friend and I molded all the chocolate star candies) It was a lot of work, but it was stuff that we could do whenever I had extra time.
Don't make it difficult on your bridesmaids, they are a precious part our your wedding and the less Bridezilla you are, the more both you and them can relax and have a good time. Don't stress and just remember to have fun. I laughed and smiled so much during our ceremony just because I was so happy and my husband and I were all about having fun. There were a few hiccups along the way (no violinist showed up, my train got stepped on and the button popped off, and probably other goofups that no one told us about) but who cares, have fun!
I know this is a lot of information, but I just wanted to share our great services and help out my fellow bridess. Have a great wedding!