Wed Recap: Videos and fun pages from our Guest Book

As I mentioned, I wanted to finish up the last 4 or so wedding recaps I had.  So you all know that the guest book was like one of the best parts of our wedding because it involved the photobooth.  I knew I wanted photos of every single guest (as many as we could collect) from our actual wedding day.  So we incorporated the idea of using a photobooth to offer a fun entertaining activity for the guests as well as an extra favor for them to remember our wedding by.  And the second set of photos that they took would be placed on a page from our guest book. 

Here's some video of some of the guests in the photobooth throughout the night:

Rather than using the typical scrapbook with blank pages for our guest book, I found a company called the Guestbook Store online and ordered a book and customized pages for our guests to complete.  The pages have a place for a 4 x 6 photo of the guests - perfect since that was the size our photobooth printed out.

Here are some of my favorite pages of our guest book.  (Please note that the pages are double sided but the photo only goes on one side)  :)

This couple color coded their answers so we would know which came from each of them :)

I love how Kristin even colored in the page in our wedding colors on this page:

I love how our neighbors mentioned the video from our ceremony with such enthusiasm:

I think the best 'real' advice I got from anyone was from Mr Fix It's mother who wrote the following:

I particularly liked that my aesthetician/masseuse wrote under "How do you know Stacey & John?" :  "I make Stacey feel good with my hands." 

And I thought it was pretty profound when one of Jordan's friends wrote under the 'advice' section 'Not to fight because it scares kids.'  :)

Share time:   What did/are you doing for your guest book?  Did you incorporate photos of the guests? 

TODAY'S WEDDING TIP:  If you incorporate a photobooth or guest book that may not be too self explanatory at your wedding, it's a good idea to put up a bunch of clear signs with instructions or even better, have an attendant to direct your guests on what to do and how to use the equipment. 

Wed Recap: A thank you for your eyes, feet, mouth and hands

I had mentioned in many previous blog posts about the four, count 'em, FOUR different favors that we gifted our guests as a thank you for sharing our special day with us.

My thought process when coming up with our favors was a list of things I wanted to provide our family and friends...meaning, I didn't actually set out to have more than one favor at our event, but when I thought of all the other little things I wanted to do and incorporate, the guests ended up leaving with quite a bit :)

1)  Comfort
2)  Practicality
3)  Memory/Keepsake
4)  Sweets

1)  To keep our guests comfortable, we set out a basket of flip flops near the dance floor so they could kick off their heels to keep sore feet going.  I found this idea on my coordinator's web site and loved it.  At the end of the night, there were only 12 out of 72 pairs of flip flops left so this must have been a huge hit!

My sister made these adorable flip flop signs

2)  For practicality, we wanted to provide them something useful to remember our day and us by.  There was a favor box at each place setting that contained a small keychain. The keychain also doubled as a 5 foot tape measure...perfect for purses, glove boxes or junk drawers at home. And with the help of my creative sister, we designed a little sticker for the keychain that read "Love Beyond Measure". Get it? Measure? As in, like, the tape measure...cute, I know, right?

Personal Photo

The little favor box was a  dark red colored chinese take out box that had a tag on it that we made that read 'The Beever's Blessing - Numbers 6:24-26' This little passage reference was mentioned in my toast I gave and blogged about as our prayer for our guests.

Picture of the tables set up with the favor boxes but no silver or glassware yet

By RoseAnne Rivoli

3)  One of my absolute favorite favors of the night was incorporated into our guest book as well.  I wanted pictures of our guests as they looked on our wedding day in our guest book and so I was so excited when I discovered the idea of a photobooth to take some fun shots to place in the book as well as to print out a duplicate photo for the guests to take home and also remember the event.  Here were some of my favorite sets from the photobooth:

4)  And finally, a wedding favor almost never seems complete without some type of sweet involved.  Being the ever practical and multi-tasking bride I am, I loved the idea of doubling chair shaped favor boxes as escort cards and sweet favors.   I included cinnamon flavored red Jelly Belly Beans and Turquoise and Silver personalized M&M's in the escort card boxes for the guests. 

I didn't like the 'turquoise' color they sent me.  I wish I would have picked a pastel blue instead but I still loved these little personalized gems with our faces on them :)  And they were so yummy I was eating leftovers up until about a week or two ago!

Personal Photo

Here's the picture our photographer took of the escort card table after half the

 guests had already taken their boxes

I absolutely LOVED all of our favor ideas.  And the guests did, too from what I could tell and heard.  We incorporated our wedding colors and the graphic design from our invitations throughout all of these items.  Oh, and there's still one more favor box I'll have to share with you in a future recap about the kiddos :)

What were your favorite ideas or favors that you have received or given (will give) at a wedding or party?

TODAY'S WEDDING TIP:  Try to do something fun and unique and different for your guests as a favor.  You definitely do not need more than one favor as I had, heck, you don't need any if you don't want.  But it is nice to offer something.  You can handmake cookies or bookmarks, just about anything.  My keychains were only $1.15 each and the flip flops were only $1.25 each including S&H and tax.   You can even have a friend stand and take digital photos of your guests as they arrive, print them out at a cheap site like shutterfly.com or at a Costco and send them back with your thank you cards for your guests. 

EXTRA WEDDING TIP:  If possible, purchase and assemble favors as soon as possible.  I bought the keychains and the flip flops a good 6 to 8 months before the wedding and once I had a good idea of the guest count I assembled them in front of the tv and packed them up.  They were all finished a good three months before the big day.

Photobooth photos courtesy CheesyPhotoBooths
Unless otherwise indicated all other photos by Robert Mullins Photography

Wed recap: Photobooth fun (Seriously tons of pics!)

I don't care what you do, if it all possible, the one thing I highly encourage you to have at your wedding is a photobooth.  I know it's trendy and overdone nowadays but it is only because your guests absolutely LOVE it!  Whether you make your own 'faux-to-booth' or rent one like we did from a company like Cheesy Photobooths, it is the best investment you'll make for entertaining your guests.  And it also serves as a great favor for them to remember your special day by.  I personally loved it because it also served dual purpose as part of our guestbook so we'd have a pic of all of our guests from our special day. 

But seriously, the entertainment value alone is phenomenal and ours was packed all night long.  So without further ado, here are just some of the many, many different types and styles of people and photos we discovered after browsing through our photobooth photos:

You'll get people of all ages:

 20 Somethings:

 Teens:

 

Moms (mine and my sister's mother-in-law):

Parents (of the groom and their friend):

Families:

Even sleeping babies!

By the way, how freaking cute is our banner at the bottom of the pictures?

And of course, you'll get the silly photos and crazy shots:

Little Miss and her dad:

The kids were in that thing all night long - like 20 times each! 

(Our Junior Groomsmen, Mr Fix It's nephew)

Budget brides: Don't forget to use your wedding coupons!

So over the summer I was having SO much fun purchasing all of the little things online.  Here's what I have so far:
* Black Gloss Gable Boxes for Out of Town Guest Gift Bags

* My Memorial Vases courtesy of Jean M products (a small one for my fiance's mother and the larger one for my grandmother, grandfather and aunt)

  

* My toasting flutes courtesy of Get Married's shop

* Bridesmaid Gifts:  Jewelry Rolls (from Amazon.com) and Blue Parasols

 

   

* My Guestbook (Super excited about this fun idea from a previous blog post)

 

* Favor boxes (chinese takeout boxes) from http://www.papermart.com/

I made all of these purchases online and I always suggest taking plenty of time to browse the internet and see what you can do to 'bargain shop.'  But here are my latest tidbits of advice for wedding shopping:

Use the net and use your coupons!

That's right, I said coupons.  I recently discovered that you can do a google search for coupon codes by putting in the store name and the words 'promo code'.  I was able to get free shipping and save 5%  by using an online coupon I found and I saved 10% off my Guestbook by using a code that I found online.

Another great site I used to find a lot of my little detail items is http://www.thefind.com/. This site will let you type in a description or item name and it will bring up literally hundreds of stores online that are selling the items.  Don't get me wrong, it takes some leg work to find the best deal...I found a site that had my favors for 88 cents each but once I saw what the shipping costs were, the site was actually not that cheap. But I did find a site to buy my placecards from!  Definitely play with this site.

And I already mentioned in a previous post about why it's a good idea to buy items sooner than later for your wedding needs.  But another reason it's a good idea to start shopping sooner than later is that once you decide what you want, you can take your time browsing the net and your fave sites for when sales come up.

I listed a lot of information above because these are sites that I have found have the best deals for a lot of items that many of you may need...trying to save you some leg work.  The gable boxes for example - I bought 50 of them from this supplier rather than the 25 I would probably need because it was actually cheaper to buy more from a wholesale supplier than to try to buy the amount I needed from gift stores and such.

So ladies - any other suggestions for how to bargain shop?

My Idea for a Unique Guestbook (Part 3)

So I've teased you long enough.  And now I'll finally share what I came up with for our guestbook from the suspenseful precursors I posted here (Part 1) and here (Part 2).  Mind you, don't get all worked up...it's really not anything hugely spectacular.  But what I have found is the perfect combination of all the ideas and things that were important to us in a guestbook:

1)  Something with pictures of our guests so we can remember what they looked like on our special day.
2)  Something more than just their signature or well wishes but a place for them to write (and draw) out some fun and personal answers to and about us.
3)  Something they will actually *want* to participate in and sign.
4)  Something entertaining and serves as a favor as well.

So after talking about my scrapbook idea with my sister, I started randomly browsing the internet and found it...The Guestbook Store!

The Guestbook Store offers a book that has pre-printed personalized pages that you can select from for guests to take a page, fill out some fun answers to questions and then we can later add a 4x6 photo on their page. The pages are front and back and you have a couple different options of the styles (formal or casual) the types of questions you want them to answer (wedding memories or predictions) and how many pages you think you'll need for your total guests. You can also select pages that don't need a photo on them.

As a surprise for Mr. Fix It and our guests, I have rented a photobooth from a company called Cheesy Photobooths and I got a great deal on a rental for 6 hours which includes a 4x6 color photo of 4 photos. Each guest will have 2 copies of their photobooth shots printed...one to take home as a favor and another to leave with their completed guestbook page for us to mount in our book.

I LOVE this idea and can't wait to get back from the honeymoon and read all of the special things our guests will write along with their fun and hopefully goofy photos. I am asking my sister (MOH) to take the guest book and pages and photos home and mount them and assemble it while we're on the honeymoon as a favor.

Here are some photos of all the fun details which I am hoping the guests will absolutely have a blast with!  I went to a Halloween costume store a few weeks ago and bought several props (hats, noses, sunglasses, wigs) at 50% off and am also making mustache props out of felt for the guests to use in the booth.  The company also provides some props as well and I am looking to find/make a couple chalk boards, too.

  

Front page of guestbook (photos: the Guestbook Store)

Back page of Guestbook

I can't even imagine what silly and stupid pics our guests (and especially family) will draw of us in that top right corner :)  And I love that it asks them to write something we should remember about this day...I am hoping we get all different perspectives on things that went on throughout the wedding that maybe we didn't see or won't remember years from now.

They even have the option of ordering extra pages for you to mount a sample of your invitation and add extra details like what the weather was like, what the bride and groom remember about the day and other blank journal pages if needed. You can also order special scrapbook type colored pens and select from a ton of different colors and styles of book covers.

A sample courtesy of Cheesy Photo Booths showing the set up.  I love that people outside can see how silly the people inside are being.

A sample from Cheesy Photo Booths of what the finished 4x6 prints look like:

We even get to add our logo, monogram, verse or thank you message to the bottom of all the prints! And you get to pick the color of the backdrop and the colors in your monogram so you can match your theme if you'd like. How cool is that?  Here is what I have come up with...the design is taken from our invitations and will be incorporated throughout stationery at the wedding/reception.

And we have the perfect location for this type of setup at our venue. Right off of the reception room and cocktail area is a back covered patio:

 

Now let me just remind you that you don't need to spend a ton of money to pull off something like this.  There are lots of DIY ways to incorporate something similar without spending the money I did on it.  You can ask a friend to take digital shots of guests as they arrive or turn in their guest book pages and then later print the 4x6 photos to place in your guestbook yourself.  You can also create the pages yourself using a basic computer program and then insert them into your own binder as well.  (I even saw someone who created pages almost exactly like the book when I did a google search.)  So be creative and don't feel these ideas aren't attainable on a tight budget.

And if you *do* have the money, then there's plenty of photobooth rental companies out there to look into.  One that I looked at even did video recording as well as photo strip printing.  And the bride and groom get a DVD of all the pictures and videos recorded after the event!  Our own company will provide us a CD of all the photo images so even if a guest takes a couple extra shots in there and tries to run off with the photos, we will still get to see and print them later!  (wink, wink)

So what do you think, ladies? What are your guestbook ideas? And definitely check out the Guestbook Store! And use the word THANKS in the coupon code when checking out for an additional 10% off :) FYI - they also have books for showers, anniversarys, birthdays, etc.