Kristin and Kelvin's Wishes Wedding April 13, 2015

[kmg3366]

Hello everyone! I am super excited to say that we are in the process of planning our Disney Fairy Tale Wedding. It is about a month out before we can sign the contract with Disney World, but we have already done a lot of planning so I thought it would be a good time to start or journal thread.

Wedding Plan:
Ceremony - Casitas Courtyard at Coronado Springs
Reception - American Adventure Parlor
Dessert Party - UK Lochside
Photographer - Thirteenth Moon Photography
Videographer - Trinity Wedding Cinema
Hair/Makeup - Kristy's Makeup Artistry & Hair Design Team

We have not signed contracts yet because of not having the official date with Disney yet, April 14, 2014 I'm counting the days. So this is my dream team/dream list. So excited about this journey!

 

[kmg3366]

Meet the Couple!

How We Met
Bride = Kristin
Groom = Kelvin

Kelvin and I met on eHarmony. Yes it sounds like one of those cheesy TV ads, but it's true. Kelvin was one of the first guys I had talked to on the dating website and the only one I met in person. We spent about a month exchanging emails, discovering things about each other like we were both engineers. Kelvin is an electrical engineer and I am an electrical engineer. Kelvin then asked me out for our first date. We went to an ice cream parlor (he was known as the ice cream guy to my friends for some time after that). It was a wonderful first date. We talked for hours, and even shut down the ice cream parlor and sat outside talking for another hour. A week later we had a date at Chipotle and have been inseparable ever since.

 

[kmg3366]

The Proposal

The Gagliardi/Sheets Clan and friends Christmas carol at a local hospital every year the Friday or Saturday before Christmas. This year it was on December 20th. After singing for the patients in the hospital, the Gagliardi/Sheets Clan performed their annual performance for themselves in the lobby of the hospital, enjoying the awesome acustics.

Afterwards, Kristin was collecting her coat and purse and saw Kelvin on his knees near a chair. Kristin asked what was wrong since it seemed odd that he was on the floor.

"Kristin, I have a question to ask you."

"Are you messing with me right now?"

"Kristin, I love you and I'm all in."

"Kelvin, you better stop fooling around."

And then the ring came out. Kristin must have said "YES," but she can't remember saying it. She does remember Kelvin saying "wait I have to ask first."

"Will you marry me?"

"YES!"

 

[KristiLyn]

Very cute proposal!! Can't wait to hear all of the plans!!

 

[kmg3366]

Why a Disney Wedding?

I know many of you would think that it isn't even a question that you would have a Disney Wedding and anyone that knows me would think the same thing.

"Of course Kristin will get married at Disney! "

"She talks about Disney World all the time."

"She chose her career at age 12 so she could build robots for Disney World."

It isn't me, it's my amazing fiance, Kelvin. Kelvin has never set foot in a Disney park! Hard to imagine, but it's true.

Right after we got engaged, we started discussing where we would get married. I am from outside Philadelphia and he grew up outside of Baltimore. He isn't very religious, in the organized religion sense, so doesn't want to get married in a church. Okay so I went out and started my research. Kelvin said "Why don't we get married at Disney World? Then you'll be a real princess?" No they're expensive and I don't think that it'll work. But I went off and did some research on Disney weddings. You know since things have changed since I was 16 and planning my Disney Wedding. About a week later: Kelvin says to me, "we should get married in Disney World." My response, "I don't think so. I don't want to have a cookie cutter wedding. I want to be able to plan different parts of it." Kelvin: "Disney specializes in weddings. We aren't going to have a cookie cutter wedding, you'll be able to plan what you want." About two days go by: "Kelvin, I don't think I want a Disney Wedding." "You're crazy, it's exactly what you want. We're getting married in Disney World."

And he was right, shhh don't tell him. It is what I want. Getting married in Disney World, feeling like a princess.

No one believes me that he came up with the idea, let alone I said "no" three times.

He's a brave, brave man to take on this adventure and not know what he's getting into. He'll be a Disney lover yet!

 

[kmg3366]

Very cute proposal!! Can't wait to hear all of the plans!!

Thanks KristiLyn!!

 

[kmg3366]

Ceremony Venue Change

My mom and I went to a local bridal show yesterday because we are planning on having a reception at home with all of the family and friends we couldn't invite to Disney. We also started talking about what hotels we should choose for the block. The original plan was to stay in wherever the ceremony is being held. We also were only going to offer that hotel as an option so that we won't have to provide transportation to and from the wedding ceremony.

After looking at the pricing of the rooms at the Boardwalk Inn, we decided that it was just too expensive to only offer the Boardwalk as part of the block. So we started doing some research, what other hotels are near by, we should choose a moderate and a value resort. You know all of normal questions you have to ask yourself when planning a Disney Wedding.

We came across Coronado Springs. I have stayed there before and I think the rooms are gorgeous. I love all of the dark wood. We started talking about how perfect it would be if they had a courtyard venue. The resort would be the right price to only offer the one and the only reason I wanted the Boardwalk was because of the courtyard. The Boardwalk is really not my style and our theme is Beauty and the Beast, it really clashes with that.

I contacted Pam, our wedding consultant, and asked her if there was a venue there. By the way, Pam is great, she has answered all of my questions super fast and she is super nice. Anyway, this morning she let me know there is a venue and sent me some pictures. We have now moved to the Casitas Courtyard for the wedding ceremony. I am so excited! Things are falling into place!

 

[elphie101]

Congrats! You and DF look so cute. And it looks like your ceremony location will be beautiful! Won't that be so convenient for your guests that stay at Coronado.

Have you contacted any of your vendors to see if they can pencil you in? I know the photography people we're using (Root Photography) pencil in or contract at 14 months - that way they can at least give you a heads up if someone is looking for your date, or let you know if they've already been booked. I wouldn't even call Disney with a potential date until I knew The Roots were available! (And we're using Trinity too - hooray Trinity!)

Can't wait for more!

 

[kmg3366]

Congrats! You and DF look so cute. And it looks like your ceremony location will be beautiful! Won't that be so convenient for your guests that stay at Coronado.

Have you contacted any of your vendors to see if they can pencil you in? I know the photography people we're using (Root Photography) pencil in or contract at 14 months - that way they can at least give you a heads up if someone is looking for your date, or let you know if they've already been booked. I wouldn't even call Disney with a potential date until I knew The Roots were available! (And we're using Trinity too - hooray Trinity!)

Can't wait for more!

Thanks so much, elphie!

I am very excited that the location worked out, even better I booked Trinity last night!!! I am so happy that I am working with them. They are even helping us have some video to show at the reception we are having back home. I have spoken with the photographers and they know how super interested we are in working with them. I did just send an email asking if we could do the same sort of thing Trinity does, where we pay the deposit with the option of changing to another weekday if Disney changes it on us. We'll see. I am just super happy that things seem to be coming together. Do you have a planning journal?

 

[KristiLyn]

I love CSR! That's where we are staying for our trip. I don't think I've seen anyone have a ceremony there, so I can't wait to see your pics!!

 

[kmg3366]

And the Videographer is . . .

Okay so I have already mentioned who I want our Videographer to be and I actually already mentioned that we booked them in an earlier post, but I wanted to write a post on them. We have booked David and Kristina with Trinity Wedding Cinema! I am so thrilled!

So my first priority has always been to pictures. I'm a scrapbooker, I love looking at photo albums and making photo books. It's just who I am. I've always known I would want the very best fit for us when we picked our photographer, especially since Kelvin has Asperger's (more on that later). My plan was always to just have someone set up a camera for the ceremony and that would be that.

After watching scores and scores of wedding highlight videos and full length wedding videos, I realized there could be a lot more to a wedding video then just the ceremony and a shaky camera footage of people running around the reception. These videos brought me to tears and I don't even know the people! So I started doing my research. I contacted quite a few letting them know I needed to work within a budget and figure out how we could work everything out. David called me out of the blue one afternoon on my way home from work and I started speaking to him about what we were looking for. He told me he would send me over a quote and we could customize the package and see how everything would fall into place.

After a couple of weeks of discussions with my mom, we got the go ahead to book the videographer. Trinity has a great program that if you are a Disney bride with a weekday wedding, that you can reserve the date before your contract is signed with Disney and we can shift the date if Disney makes it necessary to do so. So we have our dream videographers booked and there is no danger if Disney decides we need to move the date!

So I'm super excited and this gave me the idea of asking if other vendors would consider doing the same thing. I have not heard back from them yet, and I have no hard feelings if they decide the answer if no. They are running a business and that is their prerogative.

Our package includes a highlight video, a wedding day video, and a documentary cut of the ceremony. We negotiated having the highlight video and the documentary cut of the ceremony for the Home Reception. Since David and Kristina are a husband and wife team, they personally edit all of the footage so the final wedding day film may be finished too far after the wedding to show at the reception, but that's completely fine. Right now, the plan is to have a reveal of the highlight video at the home reception for everyone to watch and to have the ceremony on loop in a side room for anyone to watch the whole thing if they are interested.

In conclusion, I am so excited that we have booked Trinity! Their videos are amazing and I can't wait to meet them in person and travel down this journey together!

 

[kmg3366]

Hair and Makeup!

Hi everyone!

I know it's been a little bit of time. I keep bouncing around with what to share on the thread because I did a lot of planning before starting my planning journal. So I want to share the new stuff and the plans I've already made.

Anyway, this is a new update. When I first decided that I wanted to book Thirteenth Moon Photography (we're penciled in, but still not official), I asked Rachel what her recommendations for other vendors were. She told me that if it were up to her, that she would have brides only use Kristy and her team. With such I high recommendation, I decided to do a little research.

Kristy and her team, at Kristy's Makeup Artistry & Hair Design, do hair and makeup and airbrushing is standard for the makeup. They were very reasonably priced and responded to all of my questions super quickly. I asked her about the idea of having a floating day with her since the wedding is so far out and she agreed. Yay! So that was really exciting. I sent her the deposit check and am waiting to hear if she received it. Right now we have my hair and makeup and my two bridesmaids' hair. There will definitely be more since I will have at least one more bridesmaid, maybe two. And I would like the bridesmaids to have their makeup done, but my MOH doesn't like other people doing her makeup, so we'll see.

Also off topic, I just accepted an offer for a new job. I'm very excited! I start in two weeks!!!

 

[elphie101]

That's quite exciting! Congrats on the new job (and better now than this time next year, am I right? )

Thirteenth Moon does great work, so happy for you that you got them. And hooray for booking hair & make-up (and finding someone outside the usual suspects).

 

[kmg3366]

The Long Delayed Recap of "Kristin's Big Bridal Day"

Can I just start by saying, my Maid of Honor is amazing!? She is so wonderful and she planned and scheduled appointments for an entire day of me trying on wedding dresses. The whole day was my mom, Lindsay (MOH) and me. So much fun!


Kelvin, Me and Lindsay

Lindsay started us off by sending us an itinerary for the day.


So we had the plan. We had the best day! We started by having brunch at Panera. Lindsay gave me a wedding planning binder from the know, it is awesome and helps keep track of everything, I am super excited to use it. I currently do not go anywhere without it because I never know when I'm going to need it. After Panera, we walked to the Alfred Angelo boutique. Ahhh, so exciting! I couldn't wait to try on all I've been looking at in catalogs and online for what seems like forever. When we first walked in, the manager greeted us and she wasn't the nicest person in the world, but the sales woman, Samantha was very nice and loved Disney so we had a lot to talk about.

I tried on the "Belle" dress! It was beautiful! (I think my mom still has the pictures of me in the Belle dress, I can't seem to find them.) I was so glad it looked great on me, but looking in the mirror, I realized it wasn't what I wanted. The skirt didn't have any sort of decoration and I found that I was a little disappointed it didn't have anything. So I got into the next dress. It was "the" dress, just what I pictured.

Embroidered, beads, pick-up skirt, long train . . . perfect. I fell in love, but since we had a whole day planned, I thought it wouldn't hurt to try more on. I tried one more gown and it had a great silhouette, but it was plain so we moved on.

Next we went to Cameo Bridal. I was expecting a cute little plush boutique shop. Not the case! After driving around in circles, we finally found it. A small shop in a strange strip mall. It was super busy and the wedding dress selection sucked. We couldn't take any pictures so everything was kid of a dud, but no big deal. It was still fun. Lindsay tried on a bunch of bridesmaid dresses, so I got lots of ideas and had fun with that. Finally, we went to Vivace Bridal. Oh my goodness! It was ridiculous! A mall shop that has crazy tacky prom dresses and even crazier bridesmaid dresses. I will let the pictures speak for themselves.


On a side note, a couple of weeks before, my mom and I went to David's Bridal. Here are a few pictures from that trip.

 

[kmg3366]

That's quite exciting! Congrats on the new job (and better now than this time next year, am I right? )

Thirteenth Moon does great work, so happy for you that you got them. And hooray for booking hair & make-up (and finding someone outside the usual suspects).

Thanks, Jenn! The contracts are all signed for hair and makeup and I can't wait to get a contract with Disney so we can officially book Thirteenth Moon. I stalk their Facebook all the time to see their new wedding pictures. 17 Days left until the contract!!

Also, thanks for the congratulations about the job. I'm super excited and can't wait to start. Kelvin will also be starting a new job soon so there will be a lot of changes in our lives in the next couple of weeks.

 

[kmg3366]

When Something is Meant to Be . . .

I feel that I need to share this part of the story very soon after sharing about the Bridal Dress Day.

I picked a dress. An Alfred Angelo dress. As many of you know, an Alfred Angelo dress doesn't have the kindest impact on your wedding budget. I came home from the Bridal Day all hyped and excited. Now, I should have mentioned before that we got engaged in December, but Kelvin was refusing to talk about dates at all until February! I was already to start the ball rolling on everything and I couldn't get him to even talk about it. There were personal reasons for this that are kind of hard to explain without a page long explanation. We had the Bridal Day on February 1st, so I came home ready to talk dates and dress budget and all of that good stuff.

I walked in the door and Kelvin had a spreadsheet to show me. It had all the numbers of how much we could save for the wedding over what amount of time and how picking the date affected that. I started to see my dress slipping away. Then we got a phone call from his parents pretty much saying that they couldn't help with the wedding. We started talking and I lost it. Full out tears. It was heart breaking. I thought I had a plan and it all had slipped through my fingers.

Well after having my emotional episode, I decided that I can get what I want within our budget. I just have to get creative. I started researching used wedding dresses. No it isn't ideal. My MOH thinks it's bad juju, my mom thinks that if you can get a good price it's worth it, Kelvin was fully supportive of saving some money. With all the in mind, I googled.

I found preownedweddingdress.com. I had a style and color of dress I wanted and started looking. In not too long I found it! My dress, in my color, in my size. I didn't want to get too excited. Maybe I was reading something wrong, so I emailed the seller. The response: "Yes it is the color you are looking for and the dress has never been worn. Oh and yes, you will save $1000 getting this dress." Okay she didn't actually say that, but it was implied by the list price. Why was it never worn? "I bought out a bridal shop that was going out of business in 2011 and I'm selling off the dresses.

Sign me up!

I paid for the dress, and only a few days later I got it in the mail.


It's perfect! Of course, I'm short so I have to go find an awesome seamstress to alter the length, but we'll figure that one out later. For now, I have the dress and even got it way under budget.

I know sites like preownedweddingdresses.com won't necessarily get the same results for everyone, but if you aren't against the idea, I would recommend at least seeing what is out there!