Engagement Pics and Vendors

Before I even got engaged, there were 3 vendors I knew I'd HAVE to have when I got married.


1) Landon Jacob Productions - photography
When I moved to the Earlewood area of Columbia, I met my neighbors, Landon and Jordan Thompson, a husband and wife photography/genius/crafy duo. If you look through their blog, you'll quickly see why I wanted them to be our photographers. Their work is so amazing and has been featured in Charleston Weddings, Southern Living- Wedding, Style me pretty, Ruffled, Get Married, and Southern Wedding Magazine. To view our Engagement Pics, click here!

2) Cricket & Kyle - catering
Every April, Summerville holds the Flowertown Festival the same weekend as the Bridge Run. Stephen and I went with Erin in 2010 and stumbled upon one of the food stands serving made-to-order crab cakes. Shut the front. door. They were hands down THE best crab cakes I had ever had in my life. And that is a TAAAALL order to fill coming from a girl raised in Charleston and a boy raised on Maryland blue crabs. I took their business card and promised them, whenever the time came that I got married, I would most definitely be booking them...on their crabcakes alone. I've carried that business card with me for 2 years! Luckily for us, turns out all their food is AMAZING! The company is actually named after the owner (Keith's) children. Keith is the nicest person, and gave us a sampling of every single food item we wanted at our wedding, no charge. I can not wait to have everyone at the wedding discover just how awesome this family owned, local company is.

3) Sinclair Ray - DJ
I have been to my fair share of weddings. No other DJ has been better than Sinclair Ray from Mandy and Robert's wedding back in October. He was so much fun and very professional. So as soon as I attended one of the Charleston Bridal expo's with my mom, aunt, and MOH, I made a BEE LINE to Sinclair to book him!



As far as all other vendors, I truly plan on doing most other things myself! I have the time to plan, I consider myself pretty crafty, and most of all, I know the little details will be most important to Stephen and I if we put our own thoughts and ideas into them.

Insert with bookmark attached

The Save the Dates were printed and put together ourselves, (and we plan on doing the formal invitations as well).

the insert with bookmark flipped up

coming to a mailbox near you!

I'm getting an old friend and awesome cake decorator to bake our cake (and decorate them with these). The flowers, we will all be putting together from Charleston flower market ourselves. And the centerpieces will all be DIY as well! We've already nearly finished cutting all the wine bottles!

 

Paper Flowers DIY

Many of you know that Stephen is a Geography major and you can find many maps hanging in frames around our house. We wanted to incorporate this somehow into the wedding decor, without creating a theme that revolved around maps/travel. I remembered my parents still had all of the road maps they used before the age of GPS and online turn by turn directions!

I found the maps, and got a little creative:

Not entirely sure what we'll do with them yet. Perhaps put them on the cake, or use some of the large wine bottles we have to put branches in and attach these flowers to the branches. Either way, I'll be sure to post the final product!

My Bridesmaids

I chose 5 special ladies as bridesmaids, and the way I wanted to ask them needed to be just as special! A phone call would just not do it! So I started scouring wedding blogs to see what other girls had done for their bridesmaids, then I stumbled upon this at Once Wed. I did something really similar:

My army of bridesmaids!

Each girl was designed to match their individual hair styles...it took about a month to finish them all and cut each tiny little updo! Pretty sure I have arthritis now.

the final product

And now for the girls:

Teresa Womersley

Teresa has been my friend literally every day of my life. Our parents are long friends, our older brothers (both 7 years our senior) have been friends since they were kids, and so we were pretty much born to be friends! Growing up, she was at every single one of my birthday parties and she hasn't missed one yet..how many people can say that about a friend?

Erin Glenn

This picture was taken just days after we met. As you can see...instant friends! Erin was my roommate when I met Stephen. She was there the first night Stephen and I had our first "unofficial" date...and our second, more official double date, and was one of the first to learn of our engagement!

Ashlyn Staples

Ashlyn is one of my cousins, but she is more like a younger sister. We grew up very close with each other and I can not say enough good things about her. I've been blessed to be able to watch her become someone beautiful inside and out.

Lauren Feetham

Lauren is Stephen's sister--we met on my first trip to MD to "meet the parents" and to go on the family trip to Colorado. Every time we are all together, it is always alot of fun. She's made Stephen and I even HAPPIER to find out we will be sharing our special day with a baby nephew due in May! (woah that rhymes) We are really excited :-)

Morgan Kniesche

Morgan is one of my cousins from Colorado. She was able to spend a year in SC and we grew so much closer! Hopefully, Morgan will make Charleston her permanent home :-) We have gone on so many adventures together, hiking, taking a road trip to adopt my dog, Mika!, downtown adventures, and coming in May: we'll be competing in the Athleta IronGirl triathlon!

A few more random pics of my bridal party:

Stephen and I with Morgan, Lauren, and her fiance, Luis (groomsman)
 at Christian's (groomsman) regatta

Stephen and I with Ashlyn, Morgan, and Christian

Ashlyn, Morgan and I at Angel Oak

Erin and I in the Bahamas