Now w/proofs on page 2~ Our DIY wedding! Smithtown Historical Society, Sept. 10

OK, finally got some pics up! There are a bunch of proofs on page 2, but I'll leave up the link to the sneak peek our photographer (Angelica Glass) made for us while we were waiting...This is it.

So…hi! I don’t post very often because we went with a nontraditional venue and did a lot of things ourselves, so I didn’t have much useful info to add to the threads about catering halls, florists, etc. But I often found other brides' reviews helpful for vendor advice (and love looking at all the beautiful photos) so I thought I’d post ours. Maybe some of the do-it-yourself info will be useful to other couples who are thinking of going that route, and I highly recommend most of the vendors we did use.


Invitations: DIY (paper ordered from paper-source.com)
I designed my invitations in Photoshop and printed them at home using paper from Paper-Source.com, who get an A for gorgeous paper kits at excellent prices—I made 100 invitations, including response cards and envelopes, for a grand total of $174.80. We used the Kinwashi Sheer Booklet Kit, a little booklet with a sheer handmade-paper overlay, tied with a twig at the top. People loved them (even DH’s poker buddies noticed and complimented them). As with pretty much every other DIY project we did, it took extra time and effort, but was not especially difficult (just time-consuming) and we finished with something unique and special to us.

Tips if you decide to do something like this: They don’t come in an assembled booklet—you need to print and cut each layer separately, and assemble them. It’s a little tricky to get them perfect but the paper kit comes with excellent directions. We used one of those sliding paper cutters rather than the ones with the arm that goes up and down, which helped a lot.

Venue: Smithtown Historical Society, A (smithtownhistorical.org)

We wanted something a little out of the ordinary so we decided to hold both our ceremony and reception at the Smithtown Historical Society. The ceremony was in a field on their 20-acre property and the reception was in their historic restored barn, the Frank Brush Barn.

Having the wedding here required a lot of work, but was worth it to us because we got exactly what we wanted, and had fun making all the decorations, etc.

Tips if you decide to do something like this: They do not provide catering or rentals, so you have to get these separately. We had to clean the barn ourselves before and after the wedding, make a lot of phone calls in the year before the wedding to get info and confirm details, and the Historical Society did not always get back to us right away (which is understandable, considering weddings are not exactly their main business). FM me if you want more details on what this entailed. But the atmosphere at the wedding made it all worth it, and many people commented on the beauty of the space.

My mom and I made all the decorations, and she, DH and the bridal party set them up the morning of the wedding.

Re: Our DIY wedding! Smithtown Historical Society, Sept. 10

Alterations: Phyllis Limmer, A (gownfind.com)
My dress was a discontinued Saison Blanche sample from an out-of-state shop (Sposa Bella Bridal in Hyannis, MA). The dress needed a decent amount of work, including fixing the beading, and Phyllis did a great job for a reasonable price.

Headpiece: Eye Scream Jewelry, A+ (eyescreamjewelry.com)
I was looking for a circlet-type headchain and found something similar to what I wanted at eyescreamjewelry.com. Phyll, the artist who makes the jewelry, made me a custom version based on my idea. She did a beautiful job, the price was reasonable and she even included a matching pair of earrings for free.

Hair and makeup: Serendipity Beauty Salon, East Quogue, NY, A+
I picked Serendipity pretty much at random and really lucked out. When I went for my hair trial, all I knew was that I wanted my hair half-up/half-down; they came up with great ideas and incorporated my headpiece beautifully. On the wedding day itself, I had a pedicure as well as my hair and makeup done, and spending 3 hours at Serendipity was unbelievably relaxing. I couldn’t ask for a sweeter group of women to spend the morning of my wedding with.

Bridesmaid dresses: RK Bridal, A
I told the girls they could each pick whatever dress they wanted, but when we went shopping, they all ended up liking the same one, Jim Hjelm #4105. Pearl’s Place in Louisiana was offering the dress for $100 less than local shops, and RK Bridal was willing to match that, so we went with them. They shipped to each of my bridesmaids individually (they all live in different states) and the dresses arrived in great condition.

Photographer: Angelica Glass, A++ (angelicaglass.com)
I can’t say enough great things about Angelica. She was the first photographer we met with and we booked her right away. Her work really speaks for itself (you can see some proofs on page 2) but it's worth mentioning that she is also energetic, creative and imaginative, hugely talented and most of all fun to work with. Previously I posted a few of the engagement shots she did for us (click here to see them)... I do NOT consider myself photogenic so I was especially impressed with these, and the wedding photos are even more amazing. The colors are beautiful and she really caught the fun, joyous atmosphere of the day. The crazy thing is that she was so unobtrusive throughout the whole ceremony and reception that we honestly didn't see her for most of the evening, and yet she captured the whole thing start to finish--even the moments that by now I'd completely forgotten happened. It was really nice to remember those moments when we got the proofs back. I recommend her wholeheartedly.

Day-of coordinator: Candice Benson, The Finishing Touch, A++ (thefinishingtouchevents.com)
Candice is remarkable. We hadn’t planned on hiring a day-of coordinator, but at some point we realized that doing so many things ourselves and using separate vendors for the venue, rentals, caterer, etc.—plus not having a maitre d’ or bridal attendant as you would at a catering hall—meant that people were going to be asking us 10,000 questions on the day of the wedding. This did not sound like a lot of fun.

I spoke to several day-of coordinators and found many of them to be pushy or overbearing, but Candice was the complete opposite. She was smart, organized, professional and intent on facilitating rather than taking over. She didn’t blink once at all our weird/nontraditional ideas, she made up an unbelievably comprehensive timeline for the day, drove all the way from New Jersey to visit the venue with me, and was great about hashing it out with vendors when necessary. She stayed from nine in the morning, when we began setup, until almost the end of the reception. She even set up last-minute decorations my mom didn’t have time to do (like arranging the place card table). On the day of the wedding, she brought us water while we were having photos taken, got everyone organized, handled every problem that came up—the day was smooth as ice cream and I can’t recommend her highly enough. She was an absolute pleasure to work with.

DJ: Mark Weinberg of High Voltage Sounds, A+
We were afraid a “big personality” DJ and a huge sound system would overwhelm the barn, which is smallish and intimate. In the end we decided to have a DJ after all, and I’m happy we found High Voltage Sounds. Their prices are very reasonable, and when we booked, Vinny was great about not pressuring us to get a big package.

The DJ they sent, Mark Weinberg, was perfect for our wedding. He was low-key and fun, played all our requests, and was great at being in tune with the party and what people were into. He was totally sweet and clearly having a great time without any of the loud “DJ talk” we had been afraid of. He also played a fun variety of music, everything from big band to disco to Motown to the 90s alternative we requested. Not many DJs would have the courage to play “Smells Like Teen Spirit” at a wedding, but he was great at gauging what was right for our particular party and everyone was really into it! I get the feeling that at another couple’s wedding he would have played whatever was right for that specific occasion and would have found a totally different but equally great set of music. At the end of the night he even gave us a CD of our requests and our wedding song.

Caterer: Elegant Eating, A (eleganteating.com)
Many of our guests told us we had the best food they’d ever tasted at a wedding! Every time we went to Elegant Eating’s offices to discuss the menu or anything else, they served us delicious hors d’oeuvres or cookies. They were very flexible and we were able to choose every item individually to make exactly the menu we wanted. We had ordered special wafer-paper leaves on the internet to decorate our wedding cake, which were apparently hard to work with, and they handled it with grace. There were a few minor glitches (they didn’t serve tea with the coffee, there were no salt and pepper shakers as they’d said there would be) but no one really seemed to notice. They did an absolutely beautiful job setting the tables and putting out the favors and centerpieces. Every single menu item was phenomenal. We bought our own alcohol (which saved a lot of money) and they even provided a bartender along with the catering staff.

Rentals: Family Time Party Rental, B (familytimeparty.com)
Family Time had the best prices we found, and were very nice in all our interactions, as well as patient with our many changes. However, they get a B rather than an A because they kept trying to change the agreed-upon delivery time and they messed up on a few details (e.g., they delivered one fewer table than we had ordered—and it was the table my mom and grandparents were supposed to be sitting at! Once again, I’m happy we hired a day-of coordinator because she made sure they took care of this).

Minister: Rev. Kate Lehman of the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship in Stony Brook, A+
Kate was extremely nice and let us completely design our own ceremony. She gave us a thick packet of readings and sample ceremonies to start us off with ideas, and when we sent her our ceremony she helped us pull it together and fill in the blanks. She was patient and, once again, open to our particular ideas of how we wanted things (like a nontraditional processional order, and both DH and I being walked down the aisle by both our parents). She did a fantastic job taking charge of the rehearsal, keeping it moving and not letting it drag on—we were in and out of there far more quickly than I’d expected. On the wedding day, the ceremony itself went beautifully and she seemed really happy for us, which was very sweet, especially since we’d met her only a few times before.

Centerpieces: DIY
We did all our own centerpieces. Half were cranberries and floating candles in bowls of water and half were flower arrangements (see below for more info on flowers). Tips if you decide to do something like this: You can’t get fresh cranberries in early September so I stocked up on frozen cranberries for a year—I probably bought 15-20 bags total, to use in both kinds of centerpieces—and then the day before we made the centerpieces, I dumped them all in a big bin full of water so they could defrost without getting wrinkly and squished.

Re: Our DIY wedding! Smithtown Historical Society, Sept. 10

Flowers: DIY (flowers themselves ordered from onlinewholesaleflowers.com; we did all the arranging)
From the very beginning I wanted to do our own flowers. My mom and I are kind of crafty like that, and it seemed like a good way to save money (which it was…I ended up spending about $750 total for 10 centerpieces, 6 decorative flower arrangements for the walls, one bridal bouquet, four bridesmaid bouquets, 7 corsages, 8 boutonnieres, and enough rose petals for two flower girls and a rose petal toss for all our guests, with flowers left over at the end). I researched several online flower sellers and the best prices were at Online Wholesale Flowers (www.onlinewholesaleflowers.com).

The flowers came out fantastic, but Online Wholesale Flowers gets a C+ at best. I ordered the flowers several months in advance, to be delivered the Thursday before the wedding (to give the flowers a day to open up before we arranged them Friday).

All the flowers that arrived were in beautiful condition….but nearly half of the roses were never delivered. The cream-colored roses came; the 250 rust-colored Leonidas roses didn’t. Bad news, because we needed them for the centerpieces. It’s a long story, but they were “delayed” several times and in the end they never arrived, with no good explanation from Online Wholesale Flowers. My grandmother had to run out to King Kullen at 5 pm the night before the wedding to buy 7 dozen fall-colored roses! It was still worth it for the pleasure of making my own bouquet and doing our own flowers—but I wouldn’t recommend this company if you need a specific type of rose instead of a general color. They have great prices and a wide selection of flowers, and as I said, the flowers we did receive were gorgeous, and lasted for 2 weeks after the wedding—but if you’re not willing to make a change of plans at the last minute it might not be worth it. And they still have not sent us a refund for all those flowers!

Tips if you decide to do something like this: Bouquets and centerpieces were not hard—there are plenty of how-tos on the internet on how to make them. Corsages and bouts were trickier—a friend of my mom’s is a florist and showed us how, but there are also guides for this on the internet. With six people we were able to do all the work in about 4-5 hours, but we did it on Friday morning (the day before the wedding) in case something went wrong and we needed more time. Also, I didn’t think to get water picks, but it turned out OK--we just left the bouquets in water as long as possible, waiting until the last minute on Saturday to wrap them with ribbon so they’d stay fresh. Also, if you’re doing a rose petal toss, don’t bother ordering rose petals; just use the ones you’ll inevitably pull off the flowers as you’re working—we ordered five gallons of petals from them and that turned out to be not nearly as much as we needed, but it didn’t matter because we got 10 times that much from the roses themselves.

Favors: DIY
We had 2 favors for each guest: a little bag of leaf-shaped maple candy (candy from eBay, bags from janeweddings.com) and a whoopee cushion.

Why whoopee cushions? It just made us laugh. It has no special significance other than we wanted our wedding to be a fun party, and we thought our guests would have fun with them. DH came up with the slogan “Whoopee, we’re married!” and I set to work making them. How we did it:
1. I created a design in Photoshop,
2. ordered a custom rubber stamp using my design from creativemode.com,
3. ordered whoopee cushions in bulk from zymetrical.com,
4. picked up a permanent inkpad from Michael’s and
5. stamped 100 of these babies.

Tips for making whoopee cushions: Order extra because some will inevitably get messed up as you stamp them. Blow the dust off the whoopee cushions before stamping. Use a Staz-On permanent ink pad and press it evenly all over the surface of the stamp, which will be bigger than the pad. Clean the stamp often to avoid stray lines.


Overall it was a gorgeous and magical day...beautiful weather, the ceremony was wonderful, the party was fun, and at the end of the day I was married to my best friend, so what more could we ask for?

Proofs are on page 2...FM me if you have any questions!

Re: Our DIY wedding! Smithtown Historical Society, Sept. 10

You look beautiful; I remember seeing your e-pics and really liking them. Congrats; your wedding seems perfect and I commend your originality!

Re: Our DIY wedding! Smithtown Historical Society, Sept. 10

congrats!!

Re: Our DIY wedding! Smithtown Historical Society, Sept. 10

The sneak-peek pics are absolutely beautiful-- I can't wait to see more! Congrats!

Re: Our DIY wedding! Smithtown Historical Society, Sept. 10

This wedding looked like it jumped off the pages of Martha Stewart weddings.

Bravo - you did an amazing job.

Re: Our DIY wedding! Smithtown Historical Society, Sept. 10

The sneak peak looks amazing. What a great day!
Congrats!

Re: Our DIY wedding! Smithtown Historical Society, Sept. 10

Congrats!! Your pics are beautiful!!

Re: Our DIY wedding! Smithtown Historical Society, Sept. 10

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Posted by Ronkonkomonga

This wedding looked like it jumped off the pages of Martha Stewart weddings.

Bravo - you did an amazing job.

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I couldn't agree more. I loved reading about your DIY projects and cannot wait to see more of your pics! It sounds like your wedding reception was truly magical and special. Congratulations!

Re: Our DIY wedding! Smithtown Historical Society, Sept. 10

looks beautiful!!!!!!

Re: Our DIY wedding! Smithtown Historical Society, Sept. 10

Wow! I love your pics! I wish I was creative and hands on enough to do alot of things myself. Congratulations!!! Sounds like you had alot of fun!

Re: Our DIY wedding! Smithtown Historical Society, Sept. 10

Your wedding sound like a lot of work, but sooo well worth it! I sounds and looks so beautiful!
Please post more pics when you get them! I would love to see everything in more detail!

Your DH is adorable... Whoopee! We're Married!

So creative! I love EVERYTHING about your wedding!

Re: Our DIY wedding! Smithtown Historical Society, Sept. 10

great review!!! Sounded like a lot of work, but fun and well worth it!! Can't wait to see more pictures.....the ones you have are amazing!!!

Re: Our DIY wedding! Smithtown Historical Society, Sept. 10

Congratulations! You did a beautiful job. Please post more pictures when you get them.

Re: Our DIY wedding! Smithtown Historical Society, Sept. 10

Jen,

Everything looks so beautiful!

Your wedding is an inspiration for my fiance and I. Really, it's refreshing to see a couple with very similiar sensibilities to us.

Thanks for the DJ suggestion before. We are DEFINITELY checking them out.

Kim

Re: Our DIY wedding! Smithtown Historical Society, Sept. 10

Sounds so great. I bet the whoopee cushions were a big hit!!!! It's not a bad idea for OOT bags, either!

Re: Our DIY wedding! Smithtown Historical Society, Sept. 10

Those photos are *gorgeous*! It sounds and looks like you did such a wonderful job. And thanks for the thorough review. It's so nice to see the results of such an 'indie' event.

Re: Our DIY wedding! Smithtown Historical Society, Sept. 10

Congratulations! Thank you for your review and I'm glad everything turned out exactly how you would've liked. It looked absolutely beautiful!

Re: Our DIY wedding! Smithtown Historical Society, Sept. 10

I was hoping you would post a review and pics of course!

your review is awesome and will be a great help to other DIY and non-reception hall brides (like me!) - thanks for posting it.

your pictures are fabulous! I love them, and I can't wait to see more. When I met w/Angelica she mentioned your event and how excited she was to photograph it. And I was thinking, 'hey I know that girl from LIW' but I didn't say anything cause it seemed weird to say out loud. Ha. Anyhow, they are breath taking and I am so pleased that she will be shooting our wedding. If my photos are half as good as yours, I will be fully satisfied. You looked amazing, in fact everything looks and sounds amazing. I love it all, reaffirms my decision to go the non-traditional route because all that work is so worth it in the end.

I need to see the rest of your pics (and that album)! Post when you get them!

congrats