Girls In Tech

seana/jonathan wedding

It’s that time of year: wedding season!

I was lucky enough to get engaged last April. The proposal was fitting for us. I had been away, staying in San Francisco for the week during Web 2.0. One night I joked around with my then boyfriend, Jonathan, about the tech crowd and being a ‘girl in tech’ at some of the networking events. It wasn’t long before Jonathan was wondering what I thought about a promise ring… long conversation short, when I got home from the conference he took me to dinner and proposed as soon as he had the chance.

The romanticism from the proposal went away really fast. Wedding planning is not easy, especially if you are doing it yourself, so I wanted to share some tips that made it a little bit easier for me.

First off, I used WeddingWindow.com for our wedding website. This was immensely helpful in organizing my tech-savvy bridesmaids, family members and friends. Wedding websites are a great way to make all the details that surround your wedding visible to everyone. My bridesmaids could log into the secure portion of the site and communicate about the bachelorette party, wedding shower, wardrobe, etc. In case you didn’t know, telling people where you have registered without them asking is considered bad etiquette, but, inviting people to take a look at your wedding website where you list your registries is not. You can find wedding websites ranging in price just by Googling but I do recommend WeddingWindow. I would also recommend going to BloggerBrides.com, starting an account and sharing all things wedding related with the community there.

I read so many books and subscribed to Real Simple and Martha Stewart Weddings. Martha had a great to do list and timeline that I followed and found really helpful. One book I can highly recommend is Wedding Chic, by Nina Willdorf, which does a great job in breaking down everything you need to know running the gamut from DIY to having no budget.

Jonathan an I grew up here in Santa Cruz so we already knew most of the vendors and wedding locations. We decided on Bargetto Winery in Soquel. They have this beautiful little patio in the back overlooking Soquel Creek (and really great Pinot Grigio). Bargetto’s is about 5 minutes from our house so the quaint setting and proximity were huge selling points for us.

We picked our caterers because we heard so much through word of mouth but I would recommend choosing a location with an on-site kitchen because no matter how great your caterer is, having them cook off-site and bring the food to your location is not a good idea.

We also went old-school with invitations. Ours were Crane and the were gorgeous… anyway, back to tech tools for wedding planning…

I read ModernBride’s ’50 Best Websites For Your Wedding’ and the first thing I did after reading this piece was forward Bachelorette.com to my bridesmaids! I know they used the site to help them find the perfect favors.

Slacker Radio, I kid you not, was the HIT of the wedding. I hired a DJ for the ceremony and reception but we had a good chunk of time in between the two where people were mingling during cocktail hour. I had the team put my Slacker G2 on the non-vocal Jazz station and it was such a hit. I can’t tell you how many people asked me and our DJ who was responsible for that music! Slacker Radio has an enormous music library (over 2.4 million songs). I have the Slacker Radio Plus service (no ads) and it really was great.

In order to get in shape for the wedding I enlisted fellow twitterer, Jennifer DiDonato of MadeFitTV. I read about Jenny in a bridal magazine and downloaded a few of her podcasts that included everything from fitness training tips to healthy recipes! Jenny even responded to an email I sent her asking her how to make my butt smaller and arms more toned! She was really helpful in keeping me motivated and on track even though she is in Detroit and I am in Santa Cruz!

A great idea for a registry is registering for your honeymoon. What better way for people to contribute then by helping you make the most out of YOUR special time together. We ended up looking all around the web for the right site to host our honeymoon funds but they all wanted to charge us a percentage of what we made &and I mean, in this economy, 10% of $5k is a lot. Especially when it comes to foreign travel. When we finally found HoneyFund.com we got really excited. Honeyfund.com will host your honeymoon wish list without charging you anything. From time to time they ask for a donation if you haven’t already contributed to their service and even then they only ask for what you can afford. Nice, right?

Some other great websites we used:

• For monogrammed stickers for our favors: Zazzle
• Wedding shoes: DSW or Zappos
• Bridesmaids dresses: Nordstroms
• White Christmas Lights for the mood (super hard to find in March): Christmas Depot
• Pretty butterflies & other delicate decorations: Floraltrims
• Davids Bridal
• Registries: Macy’s, Crate & Barrel, Bed Bath and Beyond, Williams Sonoma, Pottery Barn

If you are planning your wedding or getting ready to start, please feel free to reach out to me. I would love to help with the knowledge that I have accumulated over the last year (seana at girlsintech dot net). If you have the time, take a look at our wedding photos on WebShots!

Good luck!!