Browsing Tag

wedding website

Register Your Way: A Great Alternative to Traditional Wedding Registries

When it comes to asking for money as a wedding gift, I’m betting even Dear Abby finds herself scratching her head and wondering what the most polite approach is. Of course, it’s something that every couple dreams of asking for; afterall, what could be better than the hassle-free reality that is cold, hard cash? But, why then, do so many newlyweds instead find themselves knee deep in wedding gifts that they’ll spend the first year of their married life returning?

The answer is obvious: asking for anything out-of-the-ordinary (especially money!) is a sensitive thing. When my husband and I were planning our wedding, we really truly didn’t need anything….except help with our home renovation.

We dreamed about creating a registry asking for money to pay for items like, “landscape lights” and “a kitchen sink.” But, we couldn’t figure out how to create that type of a registry in a tactful way and instead ended up registering for a handful of things at the usual places just for the sake of having a registry. And, of course, we were lavished with some really bizarre gifts that are now collecting dust in the “regift” pile in our basement.

Oh, if only we had known about Deposit a Gift. An easy and classy way to ask your friends and family to help you pay for things you really want or need. The approach is to be specific in what you’re going to do with the money people are gifting instead of just asking for it. On the Deposit a Gift website, you’re able to insert customized items – ranging from honeymoon extravagances to charity donations to (would have been helpful in my case) home renovation items. For example:

The gifter feels good about donating to the causes because they know exactly where their money is going, and that it’s what you truly want/need.

Here’s founder Dana Ostomel’s two-cents:

Everyone is asking what you want for your wedding and where you’re registered. If you prefer money towards specific goals and dreams, how do you communicate this in a polite and tactful way? You certainly don’t want to offend your guests, but you also don’t want them wasting their money on gifts you can’t use or will return.

A cash wedding registry is the perfect solution to create a gift list of exactly what you need! It’s attractive to you, but will it be appealing to guests? I say, it’s all in the positioning. As with any gift, givers want to feel good about it and connected to their choice. Here are a few tips for smooth sailing…

How To Create a Cash Wedding Registry Guests Will Love:

Choose a Narrative: This type of registry is an awesome opportunity to share with your guests what is important to you at this time in your life. What’s your story?

Got grandiose travel plans? Create a Honeymoon Registry.
Is your eye on the prize of home-ownership? A Home Down payment Registry is perfect for you.
Want your honeymoon to last a year? Register for a year’s worth of Newlywed Activities.
Feeling generous? Donations to your favorite Charities are perfect.

Everyone Likes Options: Admit it. When you give a gift, you want to give something that you like and feel connected to. The same is true for your guests. So create a registry with choices that will appeal to all kinds of people:

A range of price points
Various gifts from the practical to the whimsical

Gifts That Feel Like Gifts: If I’ve learned anything at all, it’s about the psychology of gift-giving. People want to give you something special that you’ll cherish and always remember them for.

Dinner at a swanky restaurant or contributions to your new flat screen TV are swell, paying back your credit card debt or supplementing your electric bill for a year, not so much. Think like a gift-giver!

Be Authentic: Don’t be afraid to really put your personality into it. The more your registry feels like a reflection of you, the more fun it will be for guests and the more likely they are to use this registry. So pop your favorite wine one night, curl up together and have some fun!

If you two love ice cream, then create a gift of 7 days worth of ice cream on your honeymoon – a new flavor every day!
If your fiancé is a beer fanatic, but you’re clueless, how about a membership to the beer of the month club and home-brewing classes for the two of you?

Be Gracious: Set the stage for your registry with a personal and gracious note at the top (something you can’t do with a department store gift list) to give context to your registry and why it will be so meaningful and memorable to you. Though gifts are not expected, they are common, and it never hurts to show a little advanced appreciation.

Here’s an example of what you could say:

Thank you so much for joining us and being a part of all the joy, love and festivities! Many of you have generously asked if there’s anything we’d like as we brave new worlds, and the truth is, we’ve got most everything we need when it comes to traditional household things. What would be most memorable for us you actually can’t register for at a regular store, so we’ve created this registry that is designed to let others make partial purchases to contribute towards those very adventures we’re embarking on: a honeymoon wine country road trip, some classes to continue learning about our love of wine and food and some weekend getaways to rejuvenate from our crazy work schedules!

If you feel so inclined to help make it happen, we would be most appreciative and look forward to sharing the memories and pictures with you. Of course, the best present is having you along to share our excitement. We can’t wait to celebrate with you and are so grateful to have you in our lives!

Much love, Jennifer and Tom

So there you have it, folks; a tactful way to ask for what you really want. Thanks for sharing, Dana!

I’d love to hear fun things you’ve asked for you in your registry or hope to ask for.

Dana Ostomel is the founder and Chief Gifting Officer of Deposit a Gift, a cash gift registry service. Years before Dana got married, she wondered how anyone could store so many presents – and even if they could, how they had time to unwrap, return (often), track and use them all. Her marketing background led her to believe she could simplify the registry process – and not just for weddings, but for any big gifting event. And so Deposit a Gift, the next generation gift registry, was born. Read more about Dana. Follow Deposit a Gift on Facebook and Twitter.

17 Feb 2011

Andrew & Diann’s Scottish-Singaporean wedding in Bali!

OMG – who doesn’t want to get married in Bali? And who doesn’t want to have a Scottish-Singaporean wedding? Plus, these two are keeping the ceremony and reception location a surprise for their guests – Uber-fun! This celebration has all the necessary ingredients (not to mention a fabulously sweet bride.) Diann and Andrew sent paper invitations that guided guests to their Glösite for more information and to RSVP. Read more below….

The Glö-Couple:

Diann, a budding entrepreneur and
Andrew, an engineer

Celebration Date & Location:

May 2011
A secret location (um, how majorly fun is that?!?)
Bali, Indonesia

Tell us how you got engaged:

We made a trip to Bali over a long weekend in February 2010. Andrew and I love to travel and we try to do so every opportunity we can. Well I thought it was going to be a quiet relaxing weekend but on Day 2 of our trip, which just so coincidentally happened to be Valentine’s Day, we were having breakfast out by the pool in our villa when Andrew said he had to go back in to our room to get something. I thought nothing of it and continued eating my breakfast and before I knew it, he was by my side, on one knee, asking me to marry him. I love that he totally caught me by surprise! Later that day, I asked him why he decided to propose over breakfast instead of dinner and he said something I’ll never forget….”I wanted to have a whole day enjoying our engagement together”. And true to that, we had the most memorable day together. The phone calls and text messages we got made us feel so loved. We were amazed at how many people expressed their joy about our engagement. Thanks to our parents and some friends, word spread pretty fast! :)

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

We chose Bali since it’s so (obviously!) special to us. Even before we got engaged there, it’s always been a magical place that makes us feel so relaxed and at peace. The venue we’ve selected is a beautiful villa on a cliff overlooking the ocean. We chose it as it resounds with the “feeling” we’re going for – intimate and memorable. We are keeping the guest list very small….only our closest family and friends to share with us on this special day and we want them all to have an unforgettable time. Being a destination wedding, we thought it would be nice to have a few days of celebration since everyone’s making such a huge effort to travel and be with us. So we’ve organised a cocktail party at a gorgeous restaurant on Thursday, followed by our wedding ceremony & reception on Saturday and a casual poolside lunch on Sunday. We really just want everyone to have a great time celebrating with us and enjoying themselves. Noting too fancy, just lots of food, drink, music and dancing!

Are you adding any fun twists on tradition:

Aunt Montel’s Sugee Cake from: Cherry on a Cake Blog

Quite a few actually! For music, we’ve got a good friend, who’s a musician in Singapore, to perform at our wedding. You can’t beat live music! He’s so talented and we’re thrilled he’ll be singing at our wedding. Since Andrew and I have different cultural backgrounds, we thought it would be nice to incorporate a little of both. Besides the Scottish lads wearing kilts, we’re serving single malt Scottish whisky and incorporating some tartan for our wedding favours. We’ll also have ceilidh dancing (Scottish folk dancing) a must-have at any Scottish wedding! Our wedding cake, made from semolina and almonds, is called Sugee Cake. It’s a traditional cake made by Eurasians (my Mum’s heritage) full of buttery goodness….very scrumptious! We’re also having a very dear friend as our celebrant during the ceremony. He’s so sweetly agreed to marry us and we couldn’t be more thrilled. His wife is my maid-of-honour and their son is my ring bearer!

What was the inspiration for your Glövite and Glösite design?

We initially decided to do a website as an easy way to communicate the many events we’re having. We did consider putting an insert into our paper invitation but it seemed too cluttered. So having a Glösite just made sense, especially for RSVPs. It’s made everything so simple for me! From the initial idea of using it for RSVPs, it’s grown to be quite informative, providing details about Bali such as flights, accommodation, restaurants, and attractions. All important info for a destination wedding! We chose a simple design from the templates available and so far, we’ve got lots of compliments from everyone about how great the site is!

Now show us your Glövites and Glösite!

These are Diann and Andrew’s Paper invitations:

and here is their Glösite:

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

Time really does fly so try to be as organised as possible! It can be difficult but the best thing I’ve found is to keep notes somewhere….be it an actual notebook, an app on your iPhone or an Excel sheet. It just helps to pen down thoughts as they just seem to come randomly and sometimes they can be the best ideas you don’t want to forget!

28 Jan 2011

Inspiration, Spice up your Site

Adding a forum for conversation to your wedding website

Your wedding website is a great way to build a connection with your guests, but what about when your guests want to connect with one another? As we say around Glö HQ – there’s a widget for that! In this case, the widget is a forum.

A forum is a perfect way to facilitated conversations between guests who may not know one another, be friends on facebook, etc. It’s perfect for organizing rides from the airport, spare beds in hotel rooms, and other travel logistics.

One forum provider who appears popular with Glö-bies is Nabble. With a few steps, you can get a forum up, running and embedded onto a page in your Glösite. Here’s a quick overview:

1) sign up for a Nabble (or another forum) account

2) Customize appearance, etc.

3) Grab the embed code

4) On your Glösite – choose a page where you’d like to add your forum. Click on the “html” button on the text editor and paste in the code, or paste the code in to the widget box at the bottom of the page. Save

5) Enjoy your forum!

26 Jan 2011

Real Glö-bies, Real Glö-Vites & Sites

Rowan and Kevin’s Vermont Weekend

I’m so super-pleased to introduce Rowan and Kevin. These two met in Alaska, were engaged in Ireland and will be married in Vermont later this year. With the support of the adorable Kinsey and Roxy, this couple is sure to throw an amazing celebration for their friends and family.

The Glö-Couple:

Rowan, an environmental lawyer and
Kevin, a veterinarian

Celebration Date & Location:

September 2011
The Alerin Barn
St. Johnsbury, VT

Tell us how you got engaged:

The official engagement happened while we were on vacation in Ireland, at a misty lake with sweet words and an amazing heirloom ring that was Kevin’s great grandmother’s. The actual engagement happened a couple months before when we were talking about moving, and Kevin wanted to move me again (I already followed him once cross-country). I was pretty hesitant about it and he asked if it would be better if we were married. I said yes, it would help and he wondered aloud if he should ask at that moment or wait until Ireland. I told him to wait but considered us engaged at that point (although I waited to tell everyone until the official “will you marry me” happened).

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

We are focusing on what would make it a good party for us and for our guests. We are trying to downplay the “show” aspect of weddings. So no colors, not too worried about centerpieces, we’re not having a garter/bouquet toss, and we may even skip the first dance. It’s important to me for it to be pretty, but it doesn’t have to be amazing and super coordinated.

Are you adding any fun twists on tradition:

Kevin and I will be walking down the aisle together. Nothing against my dad (or mom since I would have them both walk me down the aisle if we went that route), but I feel like they “gave me away” when they dropped me off for college 13 years ago. Since Kevin and I have been living together for awhile now it feels right that we will be walking down the aisle together. I hope it will relieve some of the anxiety of first seeing each other if it’s done in private and that it will take some of the attention off me (I have never really liked being the center of attention).

What was the inspiration for your Glövite and Glösite design?

For the Glosite, I used Glö’s templates and just modified from there. I’m not tech-savvy AT ALL but it was super easy to create and embellish. I am particularly proud of the slideshow I made and love the pac-man game.

Now show us your Glövites and Glösite!

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

The Save the Dates are a photo taken by a friend of ours which I uploaded and then wrote over (easy)!

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

The wedding planning is an excellent time to start asserting yourself as a unit and figuring out where you want to compromise in order to please others. So while some things may feel trivial and “just an extra 20 people to keep the peace with your mother” it also can set the tone for future dealings. You may want to let her invite her friends because it really would make her happy and it doesn’t really matter to you. Or those 20 extra people might tip it from being a small intimate celebration to a large one you don’t want or can’t afford. Figuring out where to compromise and when to assert yourselves will happen over and over (planning where to spend a Christmas, deciding whether or not to baptize your baby, etc.) and wedding planning is a great time to set yourselves up as a unit and practice saying [gentle] no’s to invested people. Also, step away from the bridal magazines. They will only make you feel bad and buy stuff. Find a few blogs that inspire you and ignore the rest.

13 Jan 2011

Glö-nouncements

Glö designs now available in paper!

Since our launch, many Glö-bies have expressed the need to send a few paper ‘vites to older relatives (we did the same!) or for paper invitations to match their save-the-dates. Soooo, dum da de dum..all Glö designs are now available in paper in our Glö Zazzle Store!! All of the designs come in 2 sizes: 5″x7″ and 4.25″x5.5″ depending on what you fancy. The default paper is made from 100% post-consumer recycled content (but you can change it up if you’d like.)

Plus, you can order printed designs from 10 different countries to ensure you receive the best shipping rates: USA, UK, Canada, Australia, Japan, Germany, Spain, Brazil, Portugal and France.

To personalize and order paper stationery to match a paperless design you are using on Glö, here’s what you do:

1) To match your Glösite

In Manage Glösite, click on the new “Order matching paper stationery” designs button

2) To match your Glövites

In Manage Glövites, click on the edit icon next to your Glövite of choice. Scroll to the bottom of the page and you’ll see a button for “Order matching paper stationery”

Verify your design, choose your shipping country, pick your size and click. You’ll be transported to our Zazzle store where you can customize and order matching stationery. Once on Zazzle, you can simply personalize the wording on the paper invitation or else click the “Customize It” button to make more involved changes (like adding new text boxes, changing the font color, font type, etc.)

11 Jan 2011

Real Glö-bies, Real Glö-Vites & Sites, Real Glö-Weddings

Ilene and Victor’s Celebration of Cherished Friends, Family (and Golf)

Look at this amazing wedding! I’ve loved working with Ilene and Victor over the past months – these two planned a wedding while practically on a world-tour. That was enough to tell me how put.to.gether these two are. Let’s get reading!

The Glö-Couple:

Ilene, an angel investor &
Victor

Celebration Date & Location:

November 2010
The Lodge at Ventana Canyon
Tuscon, Arizona USA

Tell us how you got engaged:

Vic first said that if I parred our last hole in a golf tournament we were in, he would ask me to marry him. I did! But the real story was that he realized that sanctifying our relationship with marriage was important to him. He was going to surprise me at his “surprise” birthday party, but he could not wait and asked me to marry him in our kitchen! We planned the wedding in less than four months as we traveled around the globe from California to Tucson to Israel and Piemonte, Italy.

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

Our cherished friends and family are the center of our lives and were the center of our wedding. The natural beauty of the outdoors set the stage for the ceremony. Dancing and good food set the stage for the celebration. It was elegant!

Did you add any fun twists on tradition:

As an older couple, we chose to have our grandchildren walk down the aisle. They were spectacular!

We not only had a cake dessert, we had a Gelato Cart! (mmmmm)

Now show us your Glövites and Glösite!

What’s a favorite moment or memory from your celebration?

Ilene says that the lovely words she received from their guests after the celebration was one of the best parts. I encouraged her to share some quotes, so here are some of the fabulous things their guests wrote to them:

Thank you so much for this weekend! It was so awesome!! It was great to be part of it, you guys did a superb job with hosting us all and the wedding was so beautiful and moving, planned to the last detail !! Your wedding weekend was such a joyous one, and we are so happy to have been here to share it with you.

The garden and dining room last night was filled with such love. And all the little things went well too: you both look fantastic, all the kids/grandkids get along swimmingly, and the gelato…nice touch!

We just got home and have not stopped talking about how lovely the wedding was. Everything was perfect, especially the bride and groom. The wonderful feelings that were at the wedding and throughout the entire weekend were sheer joy to be a part of this union. We were thrilled to be there. We wish you many wonderful years continuing to share your love.

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

I have to confess that I was totally chuffed to find out how helpful Glö was for Ilene and Victor when planning!

I don’t know where to begin – there are so many features on Glö that made our planning seamless. I will use Glösite for all celebrations in the future! In particular, Glosite prevents duplicate RSVP responses, unlike Evite. It allows for multiple activities, such as Rehearsal Dinner, Sunday Brunch, Golf Tournaments, etc in addition to the wedding, to be sent to targeted guests. Extremely important was not only the choice of meals capability but also the ability to put open ended questions such as “Do you have any food allergies?” We were surprised at the severity and number of allergies. Our Chef John was grateful to have this information in advance. Then the ability to learn any glitches in our email addresses or people not receiving the Glövite for any reason gave us confidence that everyone would be included. Most important to us, as our time frame was truncated, is the ability to manipulate the RSVP data responses both on the Glösite and also once exported to Excel. The support at Glösite helps make it the best site. Being a VC, we learn to bet on the jockeys as well as the horses – Glösite has a winning team.

Now that I’m thoroughly blushing…let’s see some of Ilene and Victor’s amazing wedding photos:

Photos by SpencerBoerup Photography

17 Dec 2010

Inspiration, Spice up your Site

How to: Adding photos to you Glösite is easy-peasey

I’ve had a few questions about how to spice up a Glösite with extra photos in the past few days. So I made a handy-dandy video explaining exactly how to do it. Just in case you have the same question..I hope you enjoy!

10 Dec 2010

Real Glö-bies, Real Glö-Vites & Sites

Alejandra and Horacio’s Mexican-Argentinian At-Home Celebration

Over the past several weeks, I have had the joy to get to know Alejandra. Not only is Alejandra a rockin’ female engineer studying along with her fiance Horacio at my own alma mater MIT, but there is Mariachi music involved in their engagement story. Plus, their streamlined-elegant ‘vites and ‘site are a great example of how to tackle the challenge of dual-language guests!

The Glö-Couple:

Alejandra, a Mechanical Engineering PhD student &
Horacio, an Economics PhD student

Celebration Date & Location:

March 2011
Alejandra’s home,
Mexico City, Mexico

Tell us how you got engaged:

Horacio is (was, I should say) the worst with secrets. He tended to get over-excited with stuff, and managed to blow off many surprises over our first years dating. So he got a warning: if you ever propose, you’d better do it right. Then, the getting married talk started to get serious. So during our spring break vacation in Mexico (my home country), he suggested going together to a small silver-mining village called Taxco to get the rings (he’s Argentinean, and in Argentina both fiances wear an engagement ring). None of us had ever worn a ring before, so it made sense we got them together to make sure they fit. As soon as we got the rings, in his very very transparent way of saying things, he told me “ok cool. Got the rings. I don’t think I’ll be able to talk to your dad in this trip, so I’ll try to come up with a way of calling him from Boston… and then I’ll probably propose sometime in summer…”. Great, he had just forgotten to tell me the proposal date to perfectly ruin a hardly-attempted surprise.

A couple of days later, at 7am we woke up to Mariachi music. At first I thought I had forgotten somebody’s birthday (at home we usually play a mariachi CD to wake up the b’day person)… to later conclude it must have been the neighbor serenading his wife (and, by passing, not letting us sleep). Horacio, of course, pretended like he had no clue what was going on (of course! what does an Argentinean know about mariachis anyway?!). It was only until I got out of bed and looked out the window that I realized that the mariachis were pointing at my room!! He then he knelt down and proposed. To make things more exciting, half way though “the question”, my dad rushed into my room with a poncho and sombrero in hand, and shouted “Horacio, this is a Mexican serenade, you should be singing downstairs!!”. And so he did, and it was fantastic. I later learned that he had secretly talked to my parents the night before, and that they were the ones picking the mariachi playlist! It was the best surprise I’ve ever had.

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

We’re excited!!! We are getting married in my house (right where the serenade happened), which means it will be a small outdoors celebration. The religious ceremony will take place at a chapel a few blocks from my house, in the middle of the woods. Both Horacio and I are really simple, so we’re aiming for good food, good music, and minimal monetary and material waste. No bridesmaids, no groomsmen. We’re avoiding things like fancy furniture or silverware. We’re sticking to functional instead of elegant. (Actually, the wedding color is blue because the cheapest chairs we found were blue… and we realized that to turn them into the cutest chairs, we only had to make everything else match their blue — from invitations to decoration.) My family has always been pretty much DIY, so my sister will be helping out with decorations and dad will be in charge of building a platform to fit all of our guests. We’re hiring friends to take care of the music, photographs and baking…

Are you adding any fun twists on tradition:

We are trying to combine Mexican and Argentinean traditions to the ceremony and the party. For instance, we’re both going to be wearing traditional Mexican garments, and we will introduce the fabulous Argentinean concept of dessert table to the party. Our philosophy is: the more sugar we give the guests, the longer they will dance. Within our simplified life and minimal waste philosophy, we decided to send Glövites instead of paper invitations. People in Latin America are not used to the concept of wedding websites, so our Glösite has definitely been a twist for most of our guests!

What was the inspiration for your Glövite and Glösite design?

We really wanted something simple and pretty… and blue (matching the chairs, remember?). The website really came from the invitation itself, all blue and white. As for the pictures, we tried to keep them as informal as possible, to give people the impression that they’re really coming to a human celebration, more than a place with fancy tables and high heels. That, and the fact that we really don’t have any formal pictures of us!

Now show us your Glövites and Glösite!

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

Our inspiration came from a design we found at minted.com and a tablet pc. We liked the handwriting of the design, because it couldn’t be more simple. So we downloaded the font from the web, and I did some scribbles on my tablet until we liked one. We made it all on word and then took screenshots of it. Fairly primitive.

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

Ohhhh, that one will have to wait til after the wedding, because Horacio is not allowed to hear dress-related stories just yet!

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

1. Read A Practical Wedding on a weekly basis. That’s where I found out about Glösite (the best tip we could give!), and about so many other things. It’s a fantastic blog that brings you down to earth, and reminds you that the wedding isn’t about a 5K dress, but about the bride and the groom starting a new life together.

2. Friends are dying to help out with something. Our friends in Mexico have been extremely helpful at finding stuff for us that can’t be found online.

3. Having a good DIY magazine is crucial to having an idea of what is realistic to do yourself, and what not.

4. Get both involved in the wedding planning process. Making the groom understand (and feel) that it’s as much of a celebration for him as it is for the bride. Let him help out with the website, give his opinion about colors and music, decide what hairstyle fits the bride best.

5. Most importanly, promise yourselves from the moment you get engaged, that no matter what family craziness surrounds you during the planning, it should help you to build a stronger marriage, and not one full of family drama.

10 Nov 2010

Real Glö-bies, Real Glö-Vites & Sites

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

Inspiration, Spice up your Site

Custom HTML on Glösite pages – did ‘ya know?

We recently asked several Glöbies to fill out a survey to help us understand what you think about Glö and how we can improve. One comment I saw was a request for custom HTML on Glösite pages. The person didn’t leave their name, so I thought I’d just broadcast to everyone to let you know that this is possible! Using the HTML function, you can add photos, widgets, text, etc anywhere within the Glösite page. If the idea of HTML totally scares you, you can also continue to paste in widgets in the “widget box” – these will simply appear at the bottom of the page.

Let’s go through a quick step-by-step using a PacMan widget that I found on Widgetbox (My total go-to source for fun widgets!)

Go to ‘Manage Glövites’ > edit page and scroll down to the text box area. Here you’ll find a button labeled HTML.

Click that bad-boy and another window will pop open.

Now, flip over to the browser window with the widget you’re coveting and click ‘get widget’

A box will pop up with the code you need to capture, so click ‘copy’

Now, flip back to the browser window with glosite.com open on it (if the HTML box has gone away, you might need to click the HTML button again.) Put your cursor inside the widget box and paste in the code you just copied, then click ‘update”

Scroll to the bottom of the Edit Glövite page and click ‘Save” – that’s it!! Now head on over to your Glösite to see the fabulousness you’ve just added! If you’ve followed these directions, you’ll now see this:

I, of course, spent an hour playing before I managed to publish this post!

14 Oct 2010

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