2012 upcoming events

and many more to come, like a wedding show at the Mark Twain House & More.  Stay tuned!

Holiday Cheer

We here at ESTOccasions would like to wish you some holiday cheer.  Our offices will be closed from the 23rd until the 26th.  Feel free to send us an email during this time.  May your holiday season be filled with joy, happiness, good friends and family.  May all of your traditions continue, and with any luck we won't all gain an additional 10 lbs.  :)    
    HAVE A SAFE AND HAPPY HOLIDAYS!!

Holiday Wedding Maddness

The holiday time is really upon us.   No matter what you believe in, how you celebrate or what you do during this holiday time, there is bond to be parties, gatherings and people who are going to ask over and over again how wedding planning is going.  Not only will they ask but they may even give unsolicited advice, or opinions about your planning. 

At the office party, you will hear about your coworkers daughter's college best friend's wedding and how they just LOVED that wedding.  Or how their cousins son DJ's on the weekend, and they don't mind passing along your name. My favorite is when brides tell me after the holidays how great aunt suzy wanted to know how long after the wedding will they wait to have kids. The other wedding conversation that comes up is how much you are spending. The simple thing is that you don't need to share this information and do your best to politely just exit the conversation.  Or tell people your planning is moving along well and that you are really just enjoying being engaged.  Don't feel as though you need to explain yourself and honestly most people ask only cause they are interested. 

 

As a planner, I do tend to pick the brains of people who I meet who are engaged or just got married. I warn them first and ask them if they don't mind if I ask them a few questions.  I also state it is for research because I can learn a lot from people who just went through it or are in the middle of it.  Everyone is different, and what they end up loving and hating, I find interesting.

So good luck as your work your way through this holiday time, only a few more weeks to go.  Soon it will be 2012, a whole new year of people asking you how it is going. :)  Happy Holidays!

Taking My Own Advice

Most couples who have been planning (even if they have a planner) find one or two tasks that just seem impossible or as far away from being enjoyable as they can be.  It is bound to happen, it can't all be fun all the time.  If it was, do you think you would enjoy the good times as much?  (Not sure why I had a sort of zen moment)  Anyways I can almost always pick the two things each couple won't want to do after they start, of course each couple is different.  

I find myself saying often "it is okay", " this is just a bump in the road", "think about the big picture" , "take a deep breath" and then walking them through the issue until we find a solution that works out best for them.  I have to do the pep talk first though, I have to bring my couple back to a point where they are listening, calm and ready to honestly tackle the task at hand.  The last few weeks have been interesting here at ESTOccasions and even I, have moments of "what the hell" though depending on the issue, there may be other words in that phrase. Most of us wedding professionals work for ourselves.  It is a balancing act (which for the most part I love and makes me good at what I do.   Example: Delaying the bride by 10 minutes to ensure the rental company truck won't be in any photos as they deliver a working oven this time to the catering company, all while smiling and letting her know that we are just waiting for a few guests to sit down.  Which was true and thank goodness for last minute folks.)  I have to balance between running two businesses, a household, a family and time to just breath.  It is what I love but I found myself this morning in a bit of stress.  The boys needing one thing, only have instant coffee in the house (bad choice but better than none), a full email box, appointments later today, deadlines and thinking how in the world was this going to work today.  So I took a deep breath, reminded myself that everything really is OKAY and I need to look at the big picture.  Slowly just went back to checking one thing off at a time and being thankful that I get to do something I LOVE every single day. Now I remember why I say these things to my clients.  :)

So if you find yourself this weekend, stressing while trying to figure out your long list of wedding tasks, remember to take a deep breath.  Tackle one thing at a time.  Know you can't make everyone happy and always, ALWAYS look at the big picture.  Your friends and family are coming because they LOVE you, they want to share in this moment with you, and maybe remind yourself why you are doing what you are doing.    This zennish moment has been brought to you by instant coffee, 5 hours of sleep and a happy wedding planner. :)

5 years

The big 5...for me this was a huge deal.  5 years ago I found myself thinking why not plan my own bridal show. I had plenty of reasons why not to plan one but none of them seemed like a good enough reason.  I reached out to a few great local wedding professionals who had become friends with and pitched the idea.  No one laughed, (well except my mother but she said it was a supportive laugh:) the idea was born and forward I went. 

From the tented affair of about 65 or so to hosting over 200 guests this weekend, I really can't complain.  It seemed a bit unreal to be honest.  I love this different part of my business, and I love the vendors I get to meet.  We always have a mix of vendors who have been with us before and others who are trying us out for the first.

 The point is never to be the huge expo style event, since I've taken many of clients to these style events and really did my best to listen to what they liked and hated.  From there I took these ideas and created them into my show.  It doesn't work for everyone of course, but for the ones it does, it works well.  

There were a few delivery issues and a few missing vendors due to lack of power and damaged trucks but overall an outstanding turnout.  I thank everyone for their support, for coming out and the amazing vendors I get to call friends. 

From a simple idea, this part of the company has really grown.  We have wedworks, which are just networking nights for the vendors, a spring show, and now working on a Winter show at the Mark Twain House for 2012.  I hope to continue.   

No power, no problem.

It will be awhile before anyone in Connecticut forgets the snow storm we had the last weekend of October.  While I'm a snow lover, just love it, I have to admit it was unexpected how much damage this storm caused.  I think most of the state now has power 10 or so days later but not everyone.

I spent the storm snuggled in by the fire, thinking whew no wedding. I didn't think it would cause an issue for my couple the next weekend.  I was WRONG.  The venue was without power, then again most of the town was without power.  While this was greatly upsetting on Monday, and even Tuesday, we thought there was no way it would continue to be an issue.  Of course it was, CL &P was expecting to have power to the town of Glastonbury until the Monday after the wedding.  The hotel didn't even have power but thankfully by Wednesday they did.

We spent a few hours looking for different locations, seeing what we could do. Could we move it, could a place be found that could handle the food requests and could it be done.  Now I'll admit my bride might have been a TINY bit upset but she handle herself like pro. Upset yes, but she kept moving forward. She kept looking while we were looking and never giving up. Okay so her hair trial couldn't be held the day she wanted due to lack of power, she still found a way to make it happen.  It really was one thing after another but at the end the hotel were the guests were staying, did their best to help us out.  They gave us a ballroom, we informed all the guests and well they got married of course.  Thankfully their church was PERFECT, and had no issues. While it might not have been the wedding Maryann & Keith had been planning with us for so long, it was a wedding to remember.  They were surrounded by friends, family and so much love.  We wish Maryann & Keith only happiness and joy for the rest of their lives together. 

Been awhile

I often find myself thinking, I should blog about this. Or I should really catch up, or blog or sleep, so sleep had been winning the battle.  We have been in FULL on wedding season rush.  Every time I thought to blog about a wedding, I started to thinking this was one we were submitting to a magazine or a website.  Or this is great but I'll wait for the photos. 

Now I start to sort through all the topics we wanted to discuss, all the weddings and I'm looking at what I can start to share with you all. So many things, and I have to say I'm excited to start doing this part again.  The next blog will be a wedding that will never be forgotten