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Real Glö-bies

Elizabeth and Mike – Celebrating our family, our friends, and the love with wine

Meet Elizabeth and Scott. They’re getting married in the beautiful state of Colorado (my new home!), so I am pretty thrilled about that. And Elizabeth spends lots of time looking through a lens at the wedding world, so I just know that there will be lots of lovely details included in their celebration.

The Glö-Couple:

Elizabeth, a wedding and portrait photographer &
Scott, a commercial loan underwriter

Celebration Date & Location:
January 2011
Colorado Springs, CO USA
La Foret Conference and Event Center

Tell us how you got engaged:

We were sitting on our back deck, enjoying the warm summer night and a good glass of bourbon, talking about whether or not we should get married, and Scott pulled out the ring and got down on both knees and asked me to be his wife. It is a simple story, but one of the many memories that will make moving to a new home harder in the future.

What’s the overall ‘feeling’ you’re aiming for with your celebration:

It really is a celebration of our friends and family, and thanking them for the support they have given us in our love. So, we really do just want to show everyone a rockin’ good time. Also, as a wedding photographer, I’ve been to well over 100 weddings, and I’ve seen the things that just don’t matter to me, so we’re really trying to focus the bulk of our funds on the things that are important to us and what we feel will encourage people to have a good time (i.e. good food, good wine and beer, and a killer dance party,) my biggest disappointment would be if people went home and actually remembered what my center pieces looked like.

I love that last line!

Are you adding any fun twists on tradition:

We are staying pretty traditional. But instead of having just my Dad give my hand in marriage, we will be have both sets of our parents joining our hands together in marriage. I guess our gift registry is pretty not traditional, as the main things we want are romance and wine.

This pair has done something super cool and registered for a wine list! Why didn’t I think of that?!? Here’s what they write to their guests:
Scott and Elizabeth have become enveloped in the world of wine. Between the two of us we have traveled on 6 wine tours in various regions and participated in hundreds of wine tastings, experiencing some of the most amazing wines in the world. However, the world of wine is wide-ranging and can drain the wallet most expeditiously. There are a few bottles we have wanted to purchase and would greatly appreciate the opportunity to. We have created a small registry with one of the most experienced wine stores in Denver that we have come to personally love.

What was the inspiration for your Glövite Save-the-Dates and Glösite design?

I think it started with “our song” which is “You and Me” by Dave Matthews. There is a lyric in the song that goes “and when the kids are old enough we’re gonna teach them to fly,” and I just love the thought of that. But, then I thought, “well, maybe we should learn to fly ourselves first.” So, the entire wedding took on this whole “love taking flight” theme, and what better way to represent that then birds. We did send out printed Save The Dates, which had two bird at either side of a maze (which had meaning but was also a fun activity,) the site and ‘vites are 2 birds chilling on a branch together, and then I am hoping to incorporate more of a birds in flight theme for the day of…but that is still a work in progress.

Now show us your Glövites and Glösite!

If you created your own design – how did you do it?

I made it in Adobe Photoshop. It’s a combination of my photo’s and designs I found online, as I am not much of a free style designer. Scott really wanted to be a Robin, so I made his bird red, I’m not really sure why my bird ended up purple.

What’s the craziest/funniest/biggest ‘SAY WHAT?” moment you’ve had while planning?

It’s not very funny, but the moment I realized it just wasn’t important to me to have everything from the day captured in beautifully lit photograph’s taken by a very professional and very expensive photographer. Not that I don’t have a very talented photographer, its just that it was like #10 on my list.

Any good planning tips and tricks for the couples who are just starting to plan?

I still have 4 months to go, but I would say, just go with the flow, problems will happen, but there is no point in stressing yourself out and getting cranky with the person you love. It is just a single day, that signals the rest of your lives together. Nobody likes a bridezilla, not even your husband.

21 Oct 2010

Shanelle and Mike’s Camptastic Wedding with Rad Friends, Family and Pie!

I am pretty excited to introduce Shanelle and Mike to you all. Not only are they getting married on my birthday next year (yay!) but they are actually putting pie front and center in their celebration. PIE! How cool is that?!?

The Glö-Couple:
Shanelle, an Operations Assistant &
Mike, a Marketing Manager

Celebration Date & Location:
August 2011
Camano Island, WA;
Camano Island State Park

Tell us how you got engaged:
I actually proposed to Mike! (You go girl!) We went to his folks vacation home (which he loves) near the Canal to escape a busy period in our lives. I was a nervous wreck, so I basically blurted out a speech about loving him and wanting to marry him and then asked him if he would be engaged to me. I even gave him a watch. He said “of course” right away and then got on his knees and said sweet things. We cried and kissed and laughed and then did a shot of tequila! It was perfect.

What’s the overall ‘feeling’ you’re aiming for with your celebration:
Mike and I are pretty laid back, but love to throw rad parties, so our wedding will reflect our interests while still showing everyone a good time. The main idea is to incorporate things we love (camping, hanging out, mason jars) but still make sure others are comfortable and happy. Figuring that out right away has really helped us stay on track. We haven’t stressed about much because everything we are planning is such a reflection of us and sounds like so much fun; it is making us so excited for the big day. My favorite example is the food; Mike and I like to grill, so our caterer is a local street food vendor that makes gourmet burgers and fries. So stoked!

Here’s some of the inspiration Shanelle has collected so far

Are you adding any fun twists on tradition:
I mentioned some above (burgers and fries), but we are also omitting the traditional cake and doing pie instead. We both LOVE pie, so it just made sense. One of our best friends wil be our officiant and I have a guy on my side of the wedding party. We have to leave the main wedding site before dusk, so we will all go back to our group camping site and make s’mores and laugh. Our rehearsal dinner will be a super chill bbq on the beach. Oh! We are also walking down the isle to a Prince song (I Would Die 4 You) since we both love him. Haha!

What was the inspiration for your Glövite Save-the-Dates and Glösite design?
A friend designed our Save the Dates based on a design we had seen online; she is amazing! We just wanted everything to be clear, simple, and reflect who we are and what type of wedding we are having.

Now show us your Glövites and Glösite!

What’s the craziest/funniest/biggest ‘SAY WHAT?” moment you’ve had while planning?
I tried on a silly, frilly dress for my future mother in law and I got stuck in it! It was too funny and surreal to be embarrassing. Haha!

Any good planning tips and tricks for the couples who are just starting to plan?
Have an an honest conversation with your future spouse about expectations, ideas, traditions (wanted and unwanted) and budget ASAP. Once that is all hashed out, have fun and remember to breathe! Mike and I did a lot of the big planning within a couple of months after getting engaged and that was nice, but it has also taken some of the excitement away for the moment because we now have a while until the wedding and the little stuff can wait. I use a great blog called Offbeatbride that helps keep me calm because you can discuss wedding plans with other lucky ladies. I also suggest using a notebook to keep ideas, swatches, contracts, etc. in. Most importantly, don’t take it too seriously! It’s only one day and you already know how it will end.

9 Oct 2010

Real Glö-bies, Real Glö-Vites & Sites

Kyle and David’s Global Fiesta of Epic Proportions

You all may remember Kyle and David who shared their clever trick for creating a “things to do and see” wedding map a little while back. I’m so psyched to now share the Glösite they’ve created for their Global Fiesta of Epic Proportions. I want to attend based on the name alone!

The Glö-Couple:

Kyle, an ESL instructor, and David, a tech support guru

Celebration Date & Location:

May 2011 in Topsail Island, North Carolina (USA) at the Surfside Center

Tell us how you got engaged:

We were snorkeling in Okinawa when he randomly popped out of the water and said, “Alright, let’s do this. Let’s get married!”

What’s the overall ‘feeling’ you’re aiming for with your celebration:

We’re having guests coming from all over the world, the US, Austria, Japan, and Australia, so we’re really trying our best to make everyone feel at home. The wedding is going to be on the beach and the reception is going to be a casual fiesta of Mexican food, margaritas, and everyone getting to know each other. Since a lot of our guests do not speak English, we will be providing bilingual menus, programs, etc. It’s adding a lot of extra work for me to translate everything but it’s worth it!

Are you adding any fun twists on tradition:

Rather than doing a bouquet toss, we will be doing a bouquet pull. These are very popular in Japan and are cool because it combines the ideas of a bouquet toss and the US Southern tradition of a charm pull. Basically you have a bouquet with lots of ribbons coming out of its base. But only one ribbon is attached to the bouquet. Friends and family choose a ribbon and on the count of 3 everyone tugs on their ribbon. The person with the bouquet attached to their ribbon is the “winner” but each ribbon has a charm attached to it. I figure though that these days most people aren’t interested in charms so I’m planning on attaching things like Amazon and iTunes gift cards to the ribbons.

I love the idea of a boquet pull, so I looked all over for some more info on this Japanese tradition, and found this great photo below on flickr

What was the inspiration for you Glösite design?

I want something that is easy to navigate and provides all the information people need in one easy spot. It’s fun, casual, and easy to use!

Now show us your Glösite!

How on earth did you make the crazy-cool wedding party images?

For my wedding party section, I made the template in Adobe Photoshop. I took a picture of a folder as the base. Then I used this tutorial to make the poloroid photo. Next I put a white box for the “paper” and wrote in the information about each person in the wedding party. Voila!

Any good planning tips and tricks for the couples who are just getting started?

MS Onenote is my savior. It helps me keep all of my ideas organized in one place. I really recommend that anyone with the MS Office suite open it up and take it for a test drive. It saves me so much time when I’m going through my wedding notes.

25 Sep 2010

Real Glö-bies, Real Glö-Vites & Sites

Crystal and Scott’s meaningful, intimate and brightly coloured celebration of our love

Wow, it’s been awhile since we’ve featured a real Glö-bie vite and site! So I’m super pleased that this post is about Crystal and Scott – who are adding all sorts of fun twists on tradition for their wedding celebration…read below to find out more!

The Glö-Couple:

Crystal, a small business owner (we love female entrepreneurs!) & Scott, a power engineer

Celebration Date & Location:

The Eagle Tree Lodge in Agassiz, BC, Canada in September 2010

Tell us how you got engaged:

We pretty much knew when we met that we were going to end up getting married and sort of skipped the whole proposal thing. I don’t even have an engagement ring as we chose to get a puppy instead! (major awwww!)

What’s the overall ‘feeling’ you’re aiming for with your celebration:

We are aiming to have a day that is totally reflective of who we are and the things we enjoy that we can share with our friends and family. Keeping this in mind has allowed us to get past any fear of “what people will think” and just do what we want. Hot pink wedding dress? Why not? Mismatched, brightly coloured table runners made from Indian sari fabrics? Sure! Already some of our family members don’t seem to know what to think of the whole thing but I hope that when they see it all come together it will erase any doubts they may have had.

Are you adding any fun twists on tradition:

We’ve removed anything that didn’t fit with who we are- the garter toss, the first dance, the white dress, etc. I’m having a hot pink, 50s/60s style gown custom made. (We can’t wait to see photos!) We’re walking each other down the aisle as we have been through a lot in our relationship but have always faced everything together. We’ll be walking down the aisle to a Tegan and Sara song that is meaningful to us (“Take Me Anywhere”). Just to name a few things.

Now show us your Glövites and Glösite!

Any good planning tips and tricks:

I’m not especially well organized and am prone to procrastination so I highly recommend doing the opposite! There are a lot of things I wish I’d done months ago and not left until the last minute. The big day sneaks up on you quickly. I am glad we chose to use a Glösite/Glövites because it is so easy to keep track of guests.. it’s truly my only semblance of organization!

What’s the biggest “SAY WHAT?” moment you’ve had since you started planning:

I really love all things Indian so I had it in my mind to get some brightly coloured/possibly sparkly fabric to make some table runners out of. I figured I could just go into an Indian cloth store and pick some out. After finding about 10 different fabrics that I wanted a few metres off of, we were not so kindly informed in front of everyone in the store that the fabrics were sold in sets of 3 prints to make the different parts of a suit and that we could not just buy a metre here or there. We were pretty embarrassed and not sure why they waited that long to say something when we obviously didn’t know things worked differently. We ended up finding a second store where the staff was much friendlier and helpful to make our purchases.

How crazy-fun does this wedding sound?? Congrats you two! We can’t wait to see all the brightly coloured photos! For those of you who are drooling over the cute countdown these guys used on the front page of their site – check out TickerFactory where they made it.

10 Sep 2010

Real Glö-bies, Real Glö-Vites & Sites

Tim and Mo’s Garden Wedding Vites and Site

The Glö-Bride: Melissa, Educational consultant

Her Glö-partner: Tim, Landscaper

Celebration Date & Location: August 2010 in Melissa’s sister’s backyard in Junction City, Oregon/Lane County, USA

Tell us how you got engaged:

I have been friends with Tim’s sister for over 20 years. Tim and I recently met again after many years and sparks flew. He proposed over a picturesque bridge on bended knee, and I, of course, said yes.

What’s the overall ‘feeling’ you’re aiming for with your celebration:

We’re celebrating in my sister’s beautiful garden with many, many lush blooming plants. The overall “feeling” we’re going for is casual garden party.

Are you adding any fun twists on tradition:

We have wonderful cooks in the family, so we’re doing potluck.

What was the inspiration behind your Glövite and Glösite design? How did you make it?

My sister’s garden and her cats were the inspiration for the invitation and website. We also threw in an eagle to honor Tim’s totem animal.

I have to confess, I had to do a bit of research to learn that a totem animal is a personal spirit that helps watch over and guide you. Pretty cool stuff! I took a little quiz and found out that I am either a Horse (neigh!) or Dog (woof woof!)

My friend, Merisha Lemmer, designed our invitation. (You can email Merisha here)

Now show us your vites and site!

Any good planning tips and tricks:

Get e-mail addresses early. Also, have a plan for those who have yet to join the twenty-first century and don’t do e-mail or can’t access the Glösite.

If you have guests who aren’t on email, consider sending paper invitations that match your Glövite designs. If you choose a Glö design, we can arrange for you to have matching paper invitations printed. Just contact us at Glö!

I discovered that Melissa and Tim were using some other nifty tools to help with their planning. The first is a travel booking site called Hotel Planner where you find group discount rates on hotels. A SUPER big help if you have numerous guests coming from out of town. You can even specify that the event you’re planning is a wedding. After the hotels are chosen, you have a landing page on the site that lists all of the hotel options for your guests. What a great way to make it nice and easy for them! Melissa and Tim simply included a link to the site on their ‘Travel’ page.

Melissa and Tim also registered for their honeymoon using Travelers Joy. And although the google map couldn’t seem to find Mexico (??), I’m sure the pilot will have better luck! Registering for a honeymoon is a great option for those of you who have what you need for the house already.

12 Aug 2010

Real Glö-bies, Real Glö-Vites & Sites

Lindsay and Graham’s Big Celebration!

The Glö-Bride: Lindsay – Teacher, Head of Dept

Her Glö-partner: Graham – Whizzkid @O2

Celebration Date & Location: 29 October in Staffordshire, UK

Tell us how you got engaged: We had just been travelling around the world for 3 months after being together for about 3 and a half years. We got back to the UK and found another place to live. Graham SAID he was going to work the Monday after we moved in, but he really went to Hatton Garden in London to buy a ring! He came home, told me to put on a nice frock coz we were going out to dinner – and then popped the question!

What’s the overall ‘feeling’ you’re aiming for with your celebration: We really want to have a fun, relaxed, happy atmosphere, and we certainly do NOT want a circus, with mega money and gluttony. Graham is part Scottish so is going to wear his family kilt – so there’s a bit of highland fling going on!

Are you adding any fun twists on tradition: It’s a bit of a secret – but we are having personalised favours which are things that come from places we come from. We are also going to put a ‘one-liner’ or ‘interesting fact’ about each person sitting at each table to get some funny stories/conversations going during the meal.

Now show us your vites and site!

Save the Date Glövite

How does your Glövite and Glösite design fit with your celebration: We wanted the site to be very user friendly as we have a very mixed demographic using it, from young professionals with iPhones to Aunty Flo and Grandma Freda! It needed to show our character (simple tastes but fun at heart) and also be informative for guests. The design fits with the celebration with the colour blue.

Any good planning tips and tricks: The Glövites are quite simply an absolute GOD SEND!!! We are both young professionals with very little spare time – and the last thing I wanted to be doing with my very little spare time was cutting and sticking things to invites to send out in the snail-mail! Our guests have been really positive about the experience of our Glövites and Glösite and think the idea is really cool – but best of all, we love the fact that you can track and see who has opened the invite from their emails, and also see who has RSVPed. Plus you can ask tailored questions to suit your own needs.

Aw shucks guys…we’re so honored! One more thing we had to share was this super cool little widget from Jajah that Lindsay and Graham added to their ‘Contact Us’ page. It lets guests call you for free.Very clever.

6 Aug 2010

Real Glö-bies, Real Glö-Vites & Sites

Jillian and Terence’s Slayeriffic Vites and Site

You all are going to LOVE these email save the dates and Glösite from Jillian and Terence. They sent over some spectacular words about their upcoming wedding celebration – so rather than me try to do them justice…..

Tell us a bit about your upcoming celebration

We did not consider ourselves the wedding type and always talked about not getting married. But on our five-year anniversary, Terence surprised me with a proposal that went along the lines of, “I know you don’t want to get married, but I though maybe you’d consider marrying me?”. It was very irresistible. In the beginning, we weren’t sure how to go about planning the wedding we never really wanted to have. We knew that we loved each other, wanted to be together and to build a future together, but kept questioning why we needed to legitimize our relationship through a legal marriage, and with the formality (not to mention, expense) of a wedding. In the end, we decided that we could decide to legalize our marriage when and if it was right for us, but in the meantime we just really wanted an excuse to bring our friends and family together and celebrate our commitment to each other, with the people who were nearest and dearest to us. We basically just wanted to throw one really amazing party with all our family and friends. How often do you get a chance to really do that?

We totally agree guys! How many times DO you get to have all your favorite people in one place at one time?

What was the inspiration for your Glövite and Glösite design? And how did you make it?

Jill would describe her technological abilities as being “slow to develop”. Terence has dabbled in flash and web stuff, but not really enough for us to make a functionally fabulous site of our own. That’s when we discovered Glö (yay for Jill’s obsession with wedding blogs!).

Terence loves music and has been dj-ing for years so we loved the idea of a red, white and black themed event- inspired by vinyl records! We found a Glö template that matched our colour scheme and looked pretty rad and used it.

We’re mostly excited about the option to design and upload our own invitations and save-the-dates. We wanted to do something really un-traditional that emphasized what we want our wedding to be- a unique and memorable night that is above all else- LOADS OF FUN! Our save-the-date was inspired by our joint-love of movies, and by Jill’s obsessive love of Buffy the Vampire Slayer! Terence has a background in fine arts and he drew the original design, scanned it, worked some photoshop magic and voila!

Check out this bad-boy of a save the date – crazy coolness!

What nifty things are you doing on your Glösite?

Jill (the technologically challenged part of this pair) did most of the webiste since she is on vacation and Terence is a slave to his office. But using the very helpful tips and suggestions on the Glö page, she successfully added a weather widget so that her out-of-town guests can see the forecast for Toronto and a countdown to the wedding! We are also adding a photo slideshow.

What fun twists on tradition are you adding to your wedding celebration?

We liked the basic template of most weddings, with the ceremony and some food and dancing, but we wanted ours to be a little more unexpected. So we kept some things traditional and added some of our own twists to the evening.

We set our date in December so we could take advantage of the holidays, without waiting for another summer and fighting for a venue during the “wedding season”. Off-season is definitely the way to go! We booked a restaurant where we will host the whole event- from the ceremony to the singing and dancing at the end.

We’re both super big vegan foodies (well Terence is vegan 90% of the time, except in the presence of really good-looking dessert) so we arranged to have an all vegan wedding menu! The chef at the restaurant where we are celebrating was happy to accommodate, which is freaking fantastic. We’ve taste-tested his creations and they are spectacular enough to knock the socks off of even our most carnivorous guests! We are having some of our close friends and family bake red, black and white vegan sweets to adorn our dessert buffet table, which will also include a tower of vegan cupcakes. I’m drooling as I write this. We are also really into sustainable living and will be serving mostly local and organic wine and beer. We love our city!

Other fun twists:

We are walking down the “aisle” together and we have decided not to have a wedding party

Our centerpieces, decorations and favours (cd’s of love songs) are all diy- homemade!

Terence’s band Cobra and/or two of our friends are going to sing a few songs live at the event

Jill’s little sister is a film graduate and is making a surprise wedding video (which includes interviews with Terences and Jill’s family and closest friends) to be shown for the first time at the wedding!

We are hoping to rent a karaoke machine for the later part of the evening

What more can I really say? We can’t wait to see the wedding photos!

29 Jul 2010

Real Glö-Vites & Sites

Hayley and Ryan’s ‘Make a Move’ Themed Celebration

I’m in love with Hayley and Ryan’s chess themed designs! Hayley made the design in Photoshop with a google-searched image and a free font downloaded from Dafont.

Hayely and Ryan's Chess Themed email Save the Dates on glosite

Hayley and Ryan’s Chess Themed Email Save the Dates

I asked Hayley to tell me a bit about her inspiration, and here’s what she wrote:

I came up with the tagline ‘He made his move, please save the date!‘ while i was riding the bus. This tagline actually helped to decide my overall theme for the wedding. The inspiration was a couple things; 1) My man is chess obsessed! 2) I think STD’s can be cute and flirty and this idea that he ‘made his move’ on me is so sexy!

Hayley says she felt the tagline set a masculine tone for what is normally an overtly female event. She made a couple of versions and sent it to her sister, mum and sister-in-law for review and feedback. (Kuddos to Hayley for that ‘move’ — honest feedback from some trusted sources is always a great help in the design process!)

Hayley & Ryan’s Glösite

Hayley and Ryan are hosting a nighttime cocktail wedding, which will feature a homemade, over-the-top mad tea party dessert table – including a chess board cake with sculpted chocolate pieces and lots of wine! Hayley send through a few mouth-watering photos to give us an idea of what she’s planning.

Planned treats! Including chess cake, sugar cookies, cheesecake pops, guinness pudding, rice krispie cones, and white chocolate brownies.

22 Jun 2010

Real Glö-bies, Real Glö-Vites & Sites

Kerri and Michael’s curly-whirly Big Barn Shindig save-the-dates

I couldn’t help but share this incredible, design that Kerri created for their email save-the-dates and wedding website on Glö. Kerri is a graphic designer by trade, so there’s no surprise that she’s made my head whirl in delight.

I think my favorite part of their celebration may be the description of the wedding and reception! I have no doubt that their guests are in for one rockin’ boot stompin’ of a good time:

The Hitchening

An epic event eight years in the making!
We know what we mean to each other: now we’re making it
public for all of you to witness, and at the end of the
ceremony, we’ll be married. Yay!

The Big Barn Shindig

An afternoon of fun for everyone!
There will be dancing, lawn games, food-on-a-stick, beer, and cider.
And also cake. You know you want some cake. The cake is delicious.

4 Jun 2010

Real Glö-bies, Real Glö-Vites & Sites

Maya & Freddy’s Aqua-liscious Invites

We just love these matching Glö-vite and Glö-site designs that Maya and Freddy created for their upcoming wedding, which will take place on the shores of Lake Zurich, Switzerland.

Custom Glövite created by Maya & Freddy

So adorably simple and to the point. Make us wonder – now why didn’t I think of that?!?

Custom Glösite from Maya and Freddy

5 Apr 2010

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