Temple of Groom

Style us pretty!

2011-07-01T10:26:00.000-07:00

Today has been great! I finally got to announce that a comedy pilot I wrote is a finalist in the NY TV Festival and is now in the hands of FOX's comedy development team. Fingers are crossed as tightly as they can be. Makes it difficult to type, but I have to do whatever I can.

SECONDLY I just got a tweet telling me that my wedding is featured on the STYLE ME PRETTY blog! So exciting. The best thing about the wedding blog world is that even nearly a year after your wedding, things like this can potentially pop up and send you back to the day you were married. Looking at CallawayGable pictures never gets old. They make me remember how great the wedding was.

Last night in bed Rebecca and I were talking about how much we want to go visit Cayucos again - hopefully we'll plan a trip to the Cass House soon -these pictures will have to do for now!

Anyway follow this link over to the Style Me Pretty blog if you want to see more pictures from our wedding!

Miss you all! Promise to try to write more

I miss getting married!

2011-03-25T13:50:00.000-07:00

Today it hit me that I kind of miss planning and stressing about the wedding. I know that sounds odd, but so does a blog about a guy that likes weddings. A couple of our friends are getting married this weekend and another couple tying the knot next weekend. Mrs. Temple of Groom and I will attend 2 weddings in June and then another in August. It's just really exciting, and I'm envious of all the couples going through this!

While I don't miss the arguments about stamps or centerpieces with my parents I do miss the constant rush you have that you're about to marry someone. That everything you've worked so hard to plan and perfect is about to payoff in the most incredible way. It culminates with the fact that you're about to embark on one of the most important life altering days you'll ever have. Again, I'd like to reiterate, there's a LOT I don't miss but ultimately, it's such an unparalleled great experience no matter what happens.

While you're planning, absolutely nothing anyone can say will convince you that things will be incredible no matter what happens, but it's true. Nothing can convince me of that more than a recent post by Bowie Bride. Her post proved that even if you walk away from the wedding and didn't technically get married (which I guess is up there with one of the worst things that can happen) the day can still be perfect. You should go take a read if you're completely stressing and need to breathe. (LINK) When you're planning, and unable to breath because the wedding is less than 2 weeks away, it's nearly impossible to realize that your day is going to be perfect no matter what happens. Rain or shine, cake or not, chicken vs fish - it won't matter. It'll be perfect.

And the truth is the stress completely helps amplify the day and make it special. The second you overcome the stress and you just let it go, is one of the best experiences and feelings you'll ever have. You need the stress to appreciate the serenity and excitement of the day. The first time I saw Rebecca during our "first look" is the moment where I just let everything go. Tears, stress and anxiety were quickly replaced by excitement and my desire to just get married to this woman and party. It's such an incredible experience. When you're planning you often forget that the point of the wedding is to get married... The day gets cluttered with "did-we-remembers...". Did we remember to get the checks for the a capella kids, did we remember to pack the chuppa poles, did we get our marriage documents to the rabbi... it's never as simple and clear as "I just can't wait to get married to you!" Sure you have your moments of "we should have eloped, I just want to be married" but it's all just verbiage you say because you're stressed and just completely over planning-mode.

I don't really know what the point of this post is. It's perhaps one of the most jumbled and least thought out writings I've done on the blog. I feel like I'm on my soapbox a little, but it's all coming from the heart. I guess I'm just writing to tell my friends to really cherish this time. Enjoy the stress, and enjoy lack of sleep. It all pays off. The more stressed you are, the more incredible your day is going to be.

Rebecca and I just picked up our wedding photo album from our photographers - CallawayGable Photography. Although we've seen the photos thousands of times now, actually having the physical gorgeous leather bound book of your pictures kind of makes you realize that it really happened. It's kind of bittersweet. On one hand you've got the most incredible memories, but on the other, you just want it to happen all over again.

SO, good luck to friend about to make the leap. I'm so excited for you all and I assure you, it will be the most incredible day, even if it's not...

AND, just because I haven't posted every picture of my wedding - I thought I would include a couple more. At the end of the night in place of throwing rice, or confetti, or bubbles at us - the entire reception made its way to the pier on the beach across the street. We lit sky lanters into the breezy night sky. (don't worry they are biodegradable and eco friendly)

(all photos taken by CallawayGable Photography)

A STD that makes my childhood happy!

2011-02-01T08:16:00.000-08:00

Came across this Save-the-Date this morning and had to repost it! I used to LOVE garbage pail kids when I was growing up. Hell, I STILL love Garbage Pail Kids.

Painted by a real Garbage Pail Kids artist, Brent Engstrom for a friend. Visit his blog if you need a moment of nostalgia! I gotta say, if I received this STD, it would be one wedding that come hell or high water, I would attend. (note: I don't ACTUALLY judge which weddings I attend based on the STD. I don't want to start an uproar)

Reaching Centerpiece Peace

2011-01-26T08:25:00.000-08:00

As I'm guessing any reading this are avid wedding blog readers, you know that centerpieces can often break the bank. When Rebecca and I were planning our wedding we'd spend time figuring out our budget and things we wanted to spend money on, then go bang our heads into the wall when we realized that we forgot to budget for centerpieces. If there's one business I'd now like to get into, it's the centerpiece business. Centerpiece business owners should probably just go ahead and read a different post because this isn't going to pretty.

So, let's think of a business model. What's something that people don't really care about all that much, but feel obligated to spend tons of money on? What's something that people don't REALLY know the cost of so we can just say it's SUPER expensive? What's something we can get for cheap, but can mark up 1000%? What's something that people could most likely do themselves, but once they really think about doing it themselves they'll say "meh, let's just pay someone else to worry about this!"? CENTERPIECES! Let's do this! We'll make a killing!

I reached inner centerpiece peace during a conversation with Rebecca. A moment of clarity during our planning. If you're looking to save a buck you only have to spend enough to make your centerpieces forgettable. We'll never be able to afford enough to make guests go home and say "damn those were beautiful elegant centerpieces" - so we just wanted to spend enough to make guests go home without saying "damn those were the stupidest/ugliest centerpieces". Just make them forgettable! That being said, I think we came up with great centerpieces, that would be classy, nice, and perhaps just 1 notch up from unforgettable.

We quickly decided not to have flowers arrangements. It was just not in our budget. We could go to the flower market and get wholesale flowers, but we questioned if they'd survive a 4 hour drive the day before the wedding and if they'd really look fresh. Plus we questioned if we'd want to actually arrange the flowers. We were lucky enough to be married in a garden, and then have our dinner/reception in an outdoor area surrounded by flowers and fresh herbs. We didn't need to spend the money on the flowers. We decided that we wanted to decorate with light. I just think there's something nice about a candle, especially at an outdoor wedding.

We went out and we found affordable glass vases and candles. Rebecca found awesome ceramic birds at a great price, and spray painted them to give them the vintage feel. Then we hit ebay and found vintage photo frames that Rebecca spruced up with high gloss yellow spray paint. Did I forget to tell you guys that I'm married to Banksy? So much spray painting before the wedding!

Our final centerpiece arrangement I think was a masterpiece. I think it was exactly what we wanted. Something pretty, casually chic, with a pop of diy. The vases were ultimately a bit beautifully forgettable, but we made our centerpieces memorable by our guests by injecting some of ourselves into the table. The birds and the picture frames that had our table numbers, which were funny pictures of our puppy. He couldn't be at our wedding, so we wanted him there somehow. Here are some pictures of our tables:

Lastly, I just want to mention that our centerpieces are now for sale! We've sold the birds, but everything else is still available. We have 12 large vases (I think they are like 20" tall), 33 smaller bubble looking vases, and 8 picture frames. Email me if you want prices! Let us help you reach CenterPEACE-of-Mind!

Our Wedding Video

2011-01-12T10:19:00.000-08:00

If you frequent my blog, you've most likely read about our videographer, Daniel Boswell. Allow me to once more get on my soapbox and shout out how badass I think this guy is. I know that posts get tired and old where you hear the writer say over and over again that you need to hire his/her vendor cause they are the best - but, seriously, you need to hire Daniel Boswell. The guy is brilliant. I'll let his work back me up - but stick around for my thoughts after the video because I'll explain to you that this was SHOWN at the freakin wedding reception.

Pretty awesome, right? Let me tell you a little bit about the process of the man that Rebecca and I would refer to as "The Boz".
Daniel and his team of 2 other shooters got to our wedding as Rebecca and I were getting ready. They were so quiet and so professional that they just blended right in. Getting ready in front of them felt natural. Rebecca told me that she even asked "When do you think the videographers are going to get here?" and they were already there shooting video! It allowed us to get ready naturally. So Daniel and his shooters film as we get, ready, we have our 1st look, we have pictures taken, we sign the ketubah, we get married, we cocktail hour, then our first dance. That's all the usual. Here's where the incredibly awesome part kicks in.... Daniel has his 2 shooters continue to cover the wedding reception while he hauls ass and edits the footage from earlier in the day. He's like a mad scientist in his lab, importing footage, editing, etc. In the time that it takes most to import a photo of their dog sneezing to upload to youtube, The Boz has already imported and edited together footage up until our 1st look. The guy is a machine.
About half way into the ceremony while we're cutting our cake, Daniel is on the dance floor setting up a projector and screen.
(remember: wedding photos taken by Callaway Gable Photography)
All our guests gathered around and watched the 4 minute video of footage they didn't see throughout the day. The awesome thing about Daniel Boswell's work is that our guests really enjoyed watching it. Even though they JUST saw us get married and have our first dance, they were still captivated by the video. They hadn't seen our 1st look, or the getting ready footage, so it was something new to them as well. I was worried that it would maybe be that cliche "Wanna see slides of our vacation" scenario - but it totally wasn't.

Friends that work in the film industry were baffled at how great the video was and how quickly it was put together. I think that they liked the video not only for content, but also for the fashion in which it was created. Family members were completely moved. Everyone loved it. WE loved it. Chris Easter from The Man Registry was at our wedding and can back up how awesome it was. "I actually was shocked when the video started playing and I realized it was the wedding that had JUST HAPPENED. Somebody give this guy an Oscar for editing on the fly!"
From day 1 I've said that the most important thing is to pick vendors that truly love the work. Vendors that aren't doing it for a paycheck, but do it because they are passionate about weddings, or the service that they provide. This rings true with Daniel. He enjoys the thrill of meeting the deadline - having to get things done in such a hurry. If you don't understand how impressive this is I'll tell you, it usually takes HOURS for someone to even load footage into a computer to edit. Additionally, once you get it into the computer, looking for shots and organizing footage can be an all day event. I'm just saying, it's fucking impressive, okay?
Anyway - that's our Same Day Edit wedding video! More wedding details to come!
BTW, if you're interested in hiring Daniel, please visit his website: http://imagiqueweddings.com/

Where the hell have I been?!

2011-01-11T09:18:00.000-08:00

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand I'm back. Wow. Hi guys. I owe you an apology. I went out for some milk and eggs, and I just never came back. No explanation. No card. I just vanished. By the way, when a person really does leave like that, why does it always seem like he/she's going out for milk? I don't drink milk, so I don't know if it's something about that beverage or not, but it always seems like on those shows when someone talks about their husband leading a double life, he always goes out to get milk and disappears. Anyway.... life has really been crazy the past 1/2 a year, let me fill you in.

As you know, I got married! Sunday, August 8th Rebecca and I became Mr & Mrs. Temple of Groom. It's a long last name, but it's a family name, so she was happy to take it. Monday morning our families took a tour of the Hearst Castle since we were married only 30 minutes away. Then we drove back down to LA. One by one our family members flew back to their respective homes and by Wednesday Rebecca and I were alone in a quiet house with our pup. (note to our families: I'm not saying that we were happy to be alone, just commenting that by Wednesday every one of our house guests had left.) Rebecca and I gave ourselves one day of pure and utter crash on the couch bliss and the next day we went to Disneyland. Which has become our ritual prior to me having to leave town..... which is what I had to do one day later.

Sunday morning Rebecca drove me to the airport and I flew to Georgia for the next 3.5 months to work on a film production. One reason I didn't really say too much about that was I didn't want to publicize that I was away and left my new wife home alone... I know I can trust you guys... but something about broadcasting that I was away didn't seem like a wise choice. I've seen one too many stories about online predators scouring Wedding Blogs and it scared me. Anyway - my new married life was put on hold for a little while.

My days in Atlanta, then 2 hours outside of Atlanta in the middle of nowhere, and then back in Atlanta were chaotic. I was working 16-18 hour days, 6-7 days a week, then falling asleep on the phone w/ Rebecca for the last half an hour of my day. The job was incredible though. Such a great experience. I was promoted. I was honored to help out creatively. I was working with the greatest people. Although exhausted, it was rewarding. I'll fill you in a little bit about the project. Did you see the movie "Role Models" with Paul Rudd and Stiffler? My boss (David Wain) directed that movie and that was our first project together. Throughout the years we've worked on other projects together, but this current project was his next big movie. It will be called "Wanderlust" and will star Paul Rudd and Jennifer Aniston. One of the movie's producers is Judd Apatow, so this film not only gave me the opportunity to meet him, but also to work with him. So I spent about 6 weeks in the middle of nowhere Georgia working with David Wain, Ken Marino, Paul Rudd, Jennifer Aniston, Alan Alda, Justin Theroux, Malin Ackerman, Lauren Ambrose, Kathryn Hahn, Joe Lo Truglio, Kerri Kenny, etc etc etc. I drank actual moonshine and I ate fried food all day every day (which is something that I totally deprived myself of leading up to the wedding). Ate at Chick-Fil-A as many times as I could. A delicacy for the Eastern transplants to Los Angeles (yes I know we finally have one or two open...)

ANYWAY, right before Thanksgiving I got back to LA. It's been wonderful. Rebecca and I had a very quiet Thanksgiving together which is exactly what we wanted. We made a small turkey and all the accoutrements and it was great. THEN about a week later, and this is pretty funny...Our place got broken into. After I proactively didn't say that I was out of town for the very reason of not tipping people off, I get back, and our place gets broken into! We see the humor in it now. Burglars made off with my computer, a plasma tv, earrings, a bag of mine containing a bunch of my things, etc etc etc....all material items that are replaceable. Funny though, when I called Rebecca to tell her that our place has been broken into and I didn't know what all was missing yet, she immediately started to panic that our brand new wedding gift Kitchen Aid mixer was surely gone. She cracks me up. Yes, the thieves couldn't wait to get their damn hands on our mixer. They don't know EXACTLY what they'll use it for, but they're just so cool looking that they had to get it on their counter at home. I'm happy to say, the mixer was not stolen. At the end of the day we're better off because now we have a killer state of the art security system.

SO, that brings us to the Holidays. We had a great quiet Holiday at home. I know that sounds boring to most, but I spent so long being away from home and just exhausted myself so much that being home and doing nothing is perfect. New Years Eve we made a great dinner for one another and rang in the new year with our new favorite cocktail. If you like Root Beer do yourself a favor and buy a bottle of ROOT. Long story short, pre-prohibition people drank Root Tea which was a blend of teas and herbs and alcohol. Prohibition happened and they stripped the alcohol from Root Tea, carbonated it, and then oddly renamed it "Root Beer". ROOT is just pre-prohibition Root Beer. SO, you take 2 ounces of ROOT and mix it with 2 ounces of Cream Soda and you have one killer cocktail.

SO, that pretty much takes us to the present. That's where I've been and what I've been up to! I'm going to start blogging again. I took time off, but hopefully you understand why. I still have lots to talk about. I never fully finished telling you about my wedding. This will be great though, I get to relive it now - 5 months later - through talking to you about it.

It's good to be back!

One of our favorites

2010-09-01T06:41:00.000-07:00

I don't think I'll have a moment to post today, but I wanted to put something new on the blog. I thought I'd post one of our favorite pics from the reception. Rebecca loves this one because she thinks it just sums up the night. I think the look on her face is priceless. You can just tell how happy we are!

(photo courtesy of Callaway Gable Photography)

Ceremony a cappella?! A ca-hellyeah!

2010-08-30T09:00:00.000-07:00

I can finally tell you about some of the little touches that made our wedding personal! Yes, I didn't tell you everything, and I'm sorry for that. You know I never want to keep anything from you baby... it's just, I didn't know who else was out there reading this blog. I didn't want my wedding invitees to know about all of our wedding details before they got there, and if one of them read my posts, well then, they'd all know everything. I hope you can trust me again one day.

The first wedding detail I want to tell you about is so cool. We had a college a cappella group at our wedding! They performed before the wedding, and then during the ceremony! It was AWESOME. People are still talking about it. It's something that I've wanted to tell you about for so long, but had to keep top secret.

A while ago Rebecca and I were talking about ceremony music. I was absolutely appalled when I saw how much money some musicians charge to come out and play for an hour (tops). When you weigh that against the price of a DJ that plays music for several hours, or even some wedding bands that play entire receptions, some of these ceremony musicians need to get off their high horses and charge a little less. You have to pick from a list of generic wedding music that they already know, and then if you want them to learn something special they charge you more money. It just seemed like a crazy expense that was an easy cut for someone on a budget. Additionally, I've never been a huge fan of conventional wedding music - ie the violins, the string quartet, etc. That's not to say that I don't enjoy it at other people's weddings - it just means I didn't really ever see it fitting into mine.

I've been to weddings where people had interesting musicians play their ceremony. A cousin of mine had a jazzy horn trio (that had a rocking tuba) and they were great. It was the first time that I really enjoyed the song "Stand by me". Her musicians stuck out cause they were awesome. It was a cool touch. Many people have the option of having a friend or a relative sit in as their musicians. I think that's a really cool idea - but it wasn't something that was an option for us.

So I thought about what type of music I would want during my reception. I wanted something fun. Something that people would enjoy while they waited for the ceremony to start, something that I would enjoy walking down the aisle to, and lastly something FUN to run back down the aisle to as man and wife! Unfortunately, and downright surprisingly, I never heard back from Ben Folds, so I had to cross him off my list and look to my backup plan. Ben DID, however, assist in helping me come up with the idea! A while ago, Ben released a cd of college a cappella groups singing a few of his songs. He hosted country wide auditions on his myspace and website. He asked college groups to send in versions of his songs.

I LOVE a cappella music. I think my love for it was conceived during my adolescence while watching "Where in the World is Carmen San Diego?" on television every afternoon. A group called Rockapella would sing us in and out of segments and then rock us out at the end of each episode. I'm a little embarrassed to admit that they were one of the first bands I typed into Napster years later when you could search for music to illegally download. I was shocked to find out that they had other songs... pop songs... classics... etc. It opened my eyes to a cappella. An a cappella group singing "No Diggity"?! Awesome. So, I love a cappella music.

Flash forward years later, and I'm searching for college a cappella groups to come sing at my wedding. It seemed like a natural fit to our relaxed, different, fun, wedding. Something that screamed us since Mrs. Temple of Groom loves a cappella as well (in fact, sorry Ben, but Rebecca listens to that a cappella cd in the car more than your original music sometimes!). So I listened to a cappella groups sing on their sites, and youtube, and sent emails out to the ones I loved. One of the groups I was most excited about was the first one to respond back to my email: Cloud 9 A Cappella from UCSC (University of California Santa Cruz). They were so excited, and very open to learning the new songs that I wanted for our ceremony.

I have to admit, hiring college students for something as important as my wedding day was a little unnerving. When I thought back to how reliable I probably was in college, and how SOBER I was in college, it scared me a little. But I have to say, Cloud9 was professional all the way. They delivered everything we asked for, and more. They set the tone for our guests. Everyone knew that they were in for a night that was going to be unlike any traditional wedding they'd ever been to. It was the PERFECT start to the day.

We told Cloud 9 that we didn't need them to sing lovey-dovey songs before the wedding. It's just not us, so we didn't require it. So Rebecca and I were happy to pick songs from their list of already performed music. For the pre-ceremony music we chose "Higher and Higher" by Jackie Wilson (you know it "your love, keep lifting me higher! Higher and higher", "Wonderboy" by Tenacious D, a mashup of "Kids" (MGMT) and "Poker Face" (Lady Gaga), and "Don't Stop Believin'" by Journey. The sucky thing is that we didn't really get to hear the music! The group sang while we signed our ketubah (Jewish marriage documents), BUT we could hear our wedding guests going wild! When we lined up for the wedding ceremony, we could hear everyone getting into the music! They were LOVING it. Clapping after each song bobbing their heads, it was a success.

When the ceremony started I walked down the aisle to another song that they already knew, but I love, and was very appropriate: "Grow Old With You" by Adam Sandler from the movie "The Wedding Singer". The song is fun, light, and in a way, oddly romantic! When it's sung by live singers, it's classic and many people came up to me and said they loved the version even more than the original.

Then in one of the most moving moments of my life the group sang the first song we asked them to learn for Rebecca's entrance: "In My Life" by The Beatles. It was unbelievable. Not only do I think that it's an incredibly touching song when it was sung live, with feeling and heart, we just got so more than I ever expected. It was overwhelming. Yes, I think I probably cried a little bit. I do know for certain that I took a lot of deeeeep breathes because I literally was so excited and so overwhelmed by every emotion I forgot to breathe! Rebecca walked down the aisle, circled me 7 times (a conservative Jewish tradition), took my hand, and we walked underneath our chuppa (Jewish wedding canopy) to the lyrics "and I know I'll never lose affection, for people and things that went before. I know I'll often think about them, in my life I loved you more." and because these kids were so professional and came to our rehearsal, we were able to PERFECTLY time our entrance under the chuppa with the end of the song - when they re-sing the last line "in my life, I love you more". It sent chills down my spine. Even the first time we practiced it at our rehearsal, we knew we were in for something incredible. Something we didn't expect to be as moving as it was. I'm not afraid to tell you that I'm emotionally moved as I type this blog post! It was AWESOME. Below, listen to an mp3 of a practice session that Cloud 9 sent us a few months before the wedding. Keep in mind this is a practice session where they were first learning the song. Listen to it!

THEN, if that wasn't enough, Cloud 9 learned one last song for our wedding march back down the aisle: "Crazy In Love" by Beyonce! When they blasted the "horns" at the beginning of the song as we ran back up the aisle, it was AWESOME. We could hear them belting out their song from back inside of the house on the venue. There was SO much energy. Our guests stood and danced, and when the group ended you could hear everyone go crazy for them. It started the day on the right foot, it brought so much energy to the end of the ceremony that we carried on through the rest of the night. It was just US. We successfully injected a little of our personality into something that sometimes either gets overlooked. (Okay, not as much of our personality as the group of people that danced to Chris Brown down the aisle, but enough of our personality without making a youtube spectacle - Rebecca wouldn't allow it.....) Before they left, we were able to go thank the group but I don't think they'll realize how special it was to us. They were moved during the ceremony and the songs, and I think everyone else was too.

So there you have it, the first detail I kept from you guys. A college a cappella group as our ceremony musicians. Something I haven't seen before, and something I kept close to my chest. I can not endorse this idea enough. Lastly, here's a couple great pictures our photographers (Callaway Gable Photography) took of the group!

(visit Cloud 9's website to listen to their music and watch videos of past performances!)

My Photographers Could Beat Up Your Photographers!

2010-08-24T09:00:00.000-07:00

Let me just say how extremely happy I am that we chose to go with Callaway Gable Photography as our wedding photographers. The way I see it, a good photograph will transport you back to the moment it was taken. You'll feel it with all of your senses. That's what Brian and Allie gave us. I can't say enough good things about these two. If you're serious about having photographs that you'll actually look at for a lifetime, artistic images, beautiful wedding shots, you need to add Callaway Gable to your contact list. At least give them a call and talk to Brian. Let them work out a package that best suits you. This goes so far beyond me saying "hey, I think I had a great wedding, and you should use my vendors". This falls into the category of, "Look, if you're someone that's looking for a photographer you can trust and with whom you'll feel absolutely comfortable - I've done your homework." Prior to our engagement session, Rebecca and I had probably about 2 nice pictures together that we liked. I'm telling you, the two of us never thought we photograph well, and when we try to take a picture together it usually looks mediocre at best. We figured that in our wedding pictures we'd look fairly awkward and posed. I was completely afraid that we would never look like a wedding couple. Instead, two kids playing dress up. Callaway Gable proved us wrong. While they both have the eye it takes to be a photographer, Allie really knows the right poses to highlight your best features. We looked like ADULTS. We looked like models. And most importantly, we had a blast. Brian and Allie were EVERYWHERE and yet they felt like they were nowhere. They were complete pros. Again, if you don't at least contact them then I have to assume you aren't really serious about your wedding photography needs.

I've decided not to do one massive photography post, but also to mix in their pictures throughout all of my wedding recap posts. Any picture you see was taken by them. I figure instead of just telling you about wedding details, I'll show them to you!

I feel like Brian and Allie drove up the coast not only to shoot our wedding, but to be with us as well. Over the last year and half, these two became our friends. In fact, the first time I called Brian to inquire about our wedding photography I was on my way to Vegas for a friend's bachelor party. We spent roughly an hour on the phone talking about wedding photography, my blog, what we wanted out of our pictures, and about life in general. I have to admit, before the call I questioned why Brian couldn't just correspond over email, but AFTER the phone call I was so happy that we spoke. It made me realize that Brian wanted to know me as a person instead of just an email address. We became friends. I instantly trusted him, and knew that he was a wedding photographer because he loves the work, he loves weddings, he loves LOVE. A work done by a vendor that has such a passion for what he/she is doing is always going to be better than the work by a vendor that is doing it for a paycheck. I felt Callaway Gable was perfect. They aren't photographers that pigeon hole themselves into one style. So many photographers I was looking at either did that "photo journalistic" approach OR traditional photography. The way I would describe their work is a casual approach to high fashion images. On their blog they call it "New Fashioned Wedding Photography" I like that a lot... it's basically capturing life the most beautiful way possible...

Brian and Allie got to our venue and immediately started casing the joint... they walked around and got a lay of the land and you could get a sense that without even having taken one picture - they knew every shot they were going to get that day. I didn't have one of those "I hope they do well" or "I hope they take a picture of..." moments, because I knew we were in good hands. I'm sorry - I know I'm rambling on and on about them, but in a moment you'll see why.... Brian and Allie came to me before I started getting ready for the day and chatted for a while. Just about cool details I had planned for the day and about how excited we were. Then they said they'd been driving around town for about 30 minutes and found incredible spots (fields, barns, etc) and if I was up for it, they'd like to go off site to do our wedding portraits. I was down because I knew if they thought it was cool - we'd love it. They went and asked Rebecca. She was game because it took her mind off of being nervous and anxious before the wedding! Below are the incredible images of us getting ready for the day, our first look, and our pre wedding portraits. Later I'll post pictures when I talk about specific parts of the day (ie, when I talk about the ceremony I'm going to post Callaway Gable ceremony pictures, when I talk about the awesome dance party that the reception turned into, I'll post Callaway Gable reception pictures....).

Before I Was Spoken For...

2010-08-23T11:00:00.000-07:00

I'd like to think that we were pretty damn prepared. The week before the wedding I continuously emailed our coordinator (With Bells On Productions) and asked her what we were forgetting. We did well... we were on it. For some reason though that seemed to stress me out even more. I was stressed that I was leaving something out, and spending restless nights trying to think about what I was forgetting seemed to be my business leading up to the wedding.

The week before the wedding we had family come to town. They all stayed with us. All together 10 people at our house for the few days leading up to the wedding. Family that had never even met one another, living in close quarters. We went 0 to 60 QUICKLY. Thank God we each have friendly families, because that could have been bad. MRS. Temple of Groom's family was the first to arrive to our house, then my family filtered in. Reality quickly set in that the wedding was coming. Mistakenly I figured that the days leading up to the wedding would be filled with lounging and relaxation - feeling more like when we go back home for the holidays and less like a hurricane of wedding related content.

We decided to have a huge bbq for extended family that was in LA at our house 3 days before the wedding. With the help of our families we pulled it off, and it was a very nice night. Looking back though I kinda have to ask ourselves if we're gluttons for punishment! We could have spent that night relaxing with our families...but it was their first time with one another - it called for celebration. Additionally one last large detail that needed to be planned - our parents really wanted us to turn the guest house at the Cass House Inn (where we got married) into a hospitality suite. The night before the wedding, we had a meet & greet and invited anyone that was already in Cayucos to come have a bite to eat, have a drink or two (or 5), and hang out with my family. Also, they bought enough alcohol to stock in the suite so anyone that wanted to party after the wedding reception was over, could filter in and get his/her drink on - This proved to be a LOT of work for our families. Well all the work was worth it, the meet & greet the night before the reception such a nice evening and a way for our families to meet one another. Maybe planning two huge parties before the wedding was not the best idea - but it was the first time we had our entire family together - so it just seemed like we should take advantage of that fact.

Rebecca and I did a good job organizing everything we needed for the wedding into our storage room, but when you added all the hospitality suite necessities to the mix, it was overwhelming! So much stuff. Luckily my sister-in-law brought her boyfriend who was trying to make a good impression on the family and seems like an overall workhorse was "happy" to do the heavy lifting when it came to loading the car! While I wouldn't do anything differently if I got to relive the week over again, I do wish that there had been time for our family to just be with one another and relax a little bit. Rebecca and I were getting no sleep due to the wedding jitters and spending the nights on the couch. It was making for a pretty stressful week even though we had everything under control. That's the worst part of weddings. They are more stress than just about anything and you tend to take your stress out on loved ones. At least they understand.... it just sucks. The whole thing is so backwards - your family comes to town BEFORE the wedding, and you want to scream because you've got so much to do - then you have the wedding and it's perfect, then when you're so relaxed and calm, the family leaves. It seems so backwards. Our families left right when we were ready to just veg out and enjoy them! Alas, that's not how things work out - and it's a good thing that they are family and can understand we're just at our wits end w/ stress.

The night before the wedding I actually slept pretty well. I'm not sure if that's because I had my own room, with a bed, instead of the couch, or if it was because I knew that everything I worked SO hard for over the last year and a half was about to pay off in a major way. It was so weird to say goodnight to Rebecca and then leave her in her own room. I like the fact that not sleeping with one another the night before the wedding and not seeing one another before the festivities start builds anticipation, but it's just so weird to be apart before such a monumental occasion. Before bed I considered writing my last blog post as a single man, but i just decided to take in the moment. So many people have given me the advice to relax and try to take in everything because it will blow by so quickly. So that's what I did. I laid in bed by myself and just relaxed. There was not one nerve coursing through my veins that was nervous about marrying Rebecca. Instead I was nervous/excited to see what the day would look like. For a year and a half we spent so much time working on each individual detail of the wedding - it became hard to step back and see the big picture. I was so anxious to see what the entire day was going to look like. Would the details that we'd come up with really going to pay off, and would our guests think they were as cool as we did? I couldn't WAIT to see everything and everyone come together. It almost felt like it was never going to happen. I feared that something wouldn't go as planned. It's been my experience, with most events, that there's bound to be a hiccup somewhere. Murphy's Law rears its ugly head somewhere and things don't go exactly as planned.... what would that detail be that didn't pan out? Right before bed I took one last stroll outside around the grounds of the Cass House. I walked down the lawn where we'd be married, and around to the opposite side of the house where our reception would be. The calm before the storm. A chilly central California coast night. I was glad that we upped the amount of heaters we needed. That walk around the house got me so excited, and made me realize that no matter what - if Murphy's Law bites us in the ass, everything will still be okay - we will still get married, and that's the most important element of the day.

I'm Married!

2010-08-23T09:35:00.000-07:00

I haven't posted anything for a while. My last post was so long ago that I'm a completely different man than my previous posting self.... Now I am MR. Temple of Groom. That's right. I'm MARRIED! What an awesome whirlwind the last few weeks have been. What an incredible release of stress. I can't wait to tell you everything. Ceremony details, things I learned, etc etc... I think this week will be filled with blog posts!

There's so much to cover. I can now give you details to things I didn't want to talk about on the blog, which wound up being a smart decision. I quickly realized that more of my invited guests read my blog than I originally thought. The fact that I broadcasted that I was going to wear converse shoes with my suit caused more confusion with my male invitees than it should have. "We know that the invitation says 'cocktail attire' but we also know that David plans to wear converse with his suit, does this mean we can wear t-shirts?" I'm slightly exaggerating, but it did cause issues. SO, I left out a lot of my wedding details with the knowledge that soon after the wedding happened I would post about them. And it will keep me blogging for a little while.

I'm trying to think of the best plan of attack to post everything....do I do one huge post about the wedding, do I post about things in chronological order?

For now, I just want to post that I'm married. It was the best day of my life. Everything was so perfect. The day was flawless. The day couldn't have been more catered to Rebecca and me.... god, I wish we could do it all over again.

Bubble Boy

2010-08-02T12:30:00.000-07:00

The wedding is officially "THIS WEEKEND". You have no idea how in-fucking-sane that feels to say that. I'm getting exponentially more excited as each day passes, but at the same time I'm getting exponentially more scared.

It's definitely not nerves or cold feet - I'm scared that I'm going to either physically or cosmetically fuck myself up before the wedding. By the way, I'm totally writing this blog post as I wear a crest white strip on my teeth. I have 27 more minutes to finish up before I have to go take this off.

People, I'm downright nervous to leave the house. Every time someone cuts me off on the freeway I ask myself if this is the asshole that's going to ruin me for my wedding. I keep waiting for that giant underground zit that I get on my nose from time to time to rear its ugly face. So, I wash my face thoroughly... but can I overwash my face? I'm scared of that too.

I've been taking a vitamin that my parents got me a few months ago called Purple Defense. I have no idea what's in it, and for all I know it could probably just be crushed up kool aid powder - but honestly it helped me fight off a sore throat last week. I haven't gotten my annual cold yet this year. When I get a cold, I get a fucking cold. I do it right. I'm anticipating getting one on friday and it scares the shit out of me.

A few weeks ago I planned my bachelor party. I will post more about that later this week, but basically I rounded up about 20 of my friends on a saturday morning and we played flag football on a high school football field. Oddly enough I wasn't really scared that I would hurt myself there because it would be TOO perfect. Of course the groom that schedules a football game when he's lost 85% of his athleticism would get hurt at the party... it was just too perfect so I actually wasn't scared. BUT you can bet your ass I was afraid running down the stairs of my house to leave for the game. A trip and a fall because I was too excited to go play ball seems like it would be perfectly fitting. Side note, the game was fun and I couldn't move for a week because my muscles were so sore, but it was great.

Lastly I'm completely fearful to go outside without a proper SPF because I do burn pretty easily. That's what I want, my face to be peeling the morning of my wedding. On the complete other side of the spectrum I'm nervous to stay IN the house because my white pasty face can and will only get pastier... there's no way to win here. I guess the only way to win is to stay inside and then get someone to come in and fake tan me! You think I'm joking but I'm completely serious. I recently had a conversation with Chris from The Man Registry about tanning. He said that while he doesn't want to out any of his friends, he's known quite a few guys that have tanned before the wedding. I think it's a pretty solid idea. I'm worried about looking orange, but I think I've found someone incredible that could potentially do a great job. Her name is Jenna and she runs a company called Here Comes the Sun. The name is worth hiring her alone. She'll come to the house so I don't have to be seen sneaking in and out of a tanning salon. I'm really considering this because she PROMISES me it'll be completely natural. A few weeks ago she tanned the wedding party of a wedding I attended, and they all looked natural.

SO, all that being said, I'm kind of ready to purchase a giant bubble, a hazmat suit, or ANYTHING else that will shield me away from society for the next week. I refuse to touch shopping carts with my bare hands, and prior to eating food from any restaurant, I think I'm going to need to talk with the cooks to make sure they aren't, haven't been, or getting sick. I'm seriously freaked out. Is this normal before the wedding?

Comment away. I'm going to go take off my crest white strip and I'll be back to see if you all think I'm crazy.

What to do?

2010-08-02T09:50:00.001-07:00

I've got so many damn things to post about. Just a few days away from the wedding I don't have any shortage of things to talk about. So many awesome great things to type and the excitement is really setting in.

That being said, I need to get something off my chest because right now I'm really upset. One of my all time best friends just wrote me an email telling me he's not coming to my wedding. Thanks for the 6 days of notice. He says he's just got budget issues right now and can't afford to come out here. That would have been a great and fine excuse had it come 2 months ago when our invitations were sent. I definitely understand and empathize. However, all this tells me is that he obviously had no intentions to come if he's looking to score cheap airfare a week before the wedding. Of course it won't fit in your budget if you're just planning the trip now!

My question to you, is do I write him an email to let him know how I really feel? Tell him how upset this makes me, or do I just swallow this, and type back something along the lines of "okay, we'll miss you"? I keep going back and forth in my head. On one hand what will an email really telling him I'm upset accomplish? He'll feel bad, will I feel better? Is it worth it? On the other hand, what he did isn't okay, and he should know, right? I just don't know what to do. This really sucks that I have to even think about this a few days before the wedding.

What should I do?

Let There Be Cake

2010-07-30T13:07:00.000-07:00

Okay, I'm a hypocrite. At least I can admit that though. If you've been a blog follower of mine for a while now, you'll know what I'm talking about.

That's right, we are having a wedding cake. HOWEVER, it's only a cake for us to cut into. All this being said, let me get defensive for a moment. We are on a very tight budget. We literally had to turn pennies into dimes. I say literally because for the last year and a half in my basement I've been working on a machine that turns pennies into dimes. See the big stores only have pens that check if a $100 bill is fake, but they don't have pens that check our dimes! Of COURSE we get odd looks from our vendors when we pay for everything in dimes, and yes, a couple of them have called us out that the dimes are a weird coppery silver color and don't have a real shape to them, and YES I may have drawn Roosevelt's face with crayon on top of Lincoln, but results are results. We're getting married in 9 days and it's all thanks to my penny pincher (which is a trademarked name).

Oh my god, what am I typing? Wedding stress has gotten the best of me. Oh, right, cakes. Okay so yes, we're on a budget and the main reason Rebecca and I weren't big on cake is because there's usually a big budgetary concern that comes with having a cake. Not only is the cake expensive, and rightfully so for some of these awesome works of art, but also, sometimes the wedding venue slams you with fees such as cake cutting fees, bringing in cake from outside vendor fees, etc etc.

That being said Rebecca and I definitely wanted some sort of desert to feed one another. A macaroon is a favorite of hers, so that would work, a tartlet, anything. It just didn't matter. But, at our last meeting with our venue, as we were working out our wedding menu the issue of cake came up. They asked us if we wanted a cake, just something small to cut into. We said no, that we'd rather have other desserts. Then they said a magical word that changed everything, "free". That leveled the playing field. I realize that there won't be enough cake to go round. Not everyone is going to get a slice. But you know what?.... fine! I'm okay with that. We've got plenty of other incredible desserts that will be on that table, and people will be happy. Rebecca and I aren't deny ourselves to partake in one of the most typical wedding traditions there is. I wouldn't have been devastated or even saddened if we didn't get cake, but I can admit that it's really nice that we'll get to cut a cake and feed it to one another. Of course it won't be as grand and artistic as if we went to a genuine wedding cake artist (Fantasy Frostings) but it will be perfect for us.

What an excuse!

2010-06-29T08:24:00.000-07:00

As of our RSVP by date (June 20th) we were missing answers from about 30% of our guest list. I'm not sure if that's normal or not. I've only planned one wedding before so I'm a little new to this. Maybe it's because our wedding is a destination wedding to about 50% of our guest list and some are still on the fence about trekking out here? At any rate I started emailing a few people who I knew I most likely wasn't going to hear from unless I emailed them. I had a pretty good feeling about each person I emailed, but it's always good to get something in writing so we can start to finish this wedding planning! (I know it's TOTALLY unrealistic, but it'd be great to just be done with everything so we can relax for a few weeks before the wedding... does that ever happen?)

So I emailed one of my friends, and the answer I got back as to why he hadn't yet RSVP-ed was not a complete surprise (based on everything I know about him), but was probably the most appalling/great excuse I've heard. There's definitely a group of guys that I'm worried about putting near an open bar, but at the end of the day it's going to spell fun. Here's his excuse:

"I was drunk at my house and Stacie goes "fill this out now and send it" and then I was like fine and then made a bunch of rude, crass and unfunny jokes all over it. Like "food preference: fresh poon" and then Elizabeth and Stacie were like,

"That's pretty ballsy considering their parents will probably see it" and I was like hell yeah I'm a badass!

And then I woke up the next day and threw it away so it would never accidentally get sent because I don't know what my drunk self was thinking.

I'm coming to the wedding."

The unfortunate thing is had he been sober in the morning, he would have seen the envelope was addressed to US, not our parents.

At the end of the day Rebecca and I realized that since we're having a family style dinner w/ each table getting a meat, veggie, and fish option that putting a spot on the RSVP that said "Dietary Restrictions: _____" was a tad unnecessary. I didn't know it would lend us to getting answers like "Fresh Poon". However, while I'm on that subject, it's just speculation, but if that is indeed where he wrote on our RSVP, does that mean that he CAN'T eat that and only prefers stale? Okay, I'll stop - this is a wedding blog... class it up Dave...

Not just a videographer!

2010-06-28T09:15:00.000-07:00

Scratch another major item off of our wedding checklist. A few weeks ago we hired a videographer for our wedding! Daniel Boswell joins the Temple! Welcome to the family! Calling Daniel a wedding videographer doesn't even scrape the surface, or enlighten you as to how talented the guy is. His videos are cinematic! I really want to introduce him to you all.

When I was a kid, my dad was always the one with multiple cameras strapped around his neck. He had multiple regular photograph cameras as well as video camcorders. Every milestone, play, sporting event, birthday, etc etc was captured onto video. Recently, after watching many home videos, I realized how special they are to me, and how important they are to have. I just watched a video of myself at 3 years old holding my baby sister for the first time asking my mom if she had a vagina - then laughing. A memory that would have been lost forever had it not been captured on tape. Photographs are extremely important, and to me, video is equally important as well.

Saying all of that, when we first started our wedding planning a good videographer was absolutely something in which we wanted to invest. However, as we've been planning and searching for a videographer we watched our budget dwindle. Soon we realized we didn't have two pennies to rub together and videography was starting to look unrealistic. I know this isn't an option for everyone, but because I live in Los Angeles and have friends that shoot behind the scenes footage for DVDs, I turned to them. I figured I'd get two guys to come shoot the wedding then give me all of the footage and in my "free time" I'd edit our wedding video together. When we started factoring in all of the expenses of getting these shooters to the wedding it seemed just as expensive as hiring actual wedding videographers. I also researched buying lots of FlipHD cams, having friends shoot the wedding, loading all the footage to a hard drive, wipe them clean, then returning the cameras to Walmart. I was just too worried the cameras would get damaged, or lost, and I really worried about video quality and sound quality as well. It seemed to be a lost cause and a black day for Temple of Groom.

That was until I saw a video of Daniel's work. Watch it, then keep reading:

Um, what? Wedding videography can look like that? Seriously? I have to have this. It's so important to me. I HAVE to have this. I. Have. To. Have. This. After watching this video twice, getting chills and choked up watching the wedding of TWO STRANGERS, I decided to do some research. Surely this is extremely out of my budget.
When I got to Daniel's website I realized something very innovative and incredible - the video posted above is not something that Boswell took home edited over a couple weeks and sent the newlywed couple - it's something that he shot on the day of the wedding and EDITED on the day of the wedding and projected AT the freaking wedding! Two shooters (Daniel included) come to the wedding and capture everything up until the cocktail hour. Then while the other shooter continues filming everything, Daniel sneaks away and edits all of the footage. It's called his cinema reale package. Unbelievable.
So Rebecca and I reevaluated our budget and moved some things around in hopes that we could hire Daniel. We crossed some things off... x's and o's... DIYed a couple more things.... did the math... crunched numbers... carried the 1 - then emailed Daniel a hail mary "please let this work" email.
He called back shortly after. The impression I got from him immediately is that he, like our other vendors, is extremely passionate about his work. He does it, because he loves it - not because the wedding industry is a great place to make money, but because he genuinely loves the rush he gets from shooting, editing, and watching everyone's joyful faces as they watch his work. It's so special. Then, unbelievably, as if the wedding hand of God touched our phone conversation, Daniel's rate fit into our modest budget. It was, perhaps, one of the happiest moments I've had during this whole planning process.
If you're looking for a special wedding video, look no further.
PS. If you'd like to see the video of me holding my new baby sister - get your friends to follow Temple of Groom! If I get 7 more followers to subscribe to the feed on the left side of the page - I'll post the video.

My Gift to Ben the Groom

2010-06-24T16:42:00.000-07:00

This weekend a fellow groom blogger is tying the knot: Ben the Groom. First and foremost, congrats to one of our blogging brothers! I think this is the first groom blogger I've seen get married off since I started blogging!

Ben is faced with a dilemma that in less than 2 months time I'll have to figure out myself: where do groom bloggers go once married?! Hopefully Ben will stick around long enough to show us pictures of his wedding and fill us in on everything he learned from the wedding!

I figured that I would get something for Ben... my gift..... the gift of song. (click play on the youtube video then read my lyrics starting at :15 along with the music).

"Ben the Husband" in the key of "Ben" by the Jackson 5

Ben, we hope that you will blog some more

You finally reached what you were posting for

Grooms can sometimes feel alone,

The Knot won't throw us a bone.

But you, my friend, helped me

you were my Wedding Bee. (you were my Wedding Bee)

Ben, you're always posting everywhere,

about what guys should wear as underwear.

If I'm ever in a bind

and don't know where to find

Your posts, one thing I know

You're twitter's where I'll go (you're tweeting all the time)

I used to say - wedding industry

never had, guys like me.

But I was wrong, obviously

Now it's "us", now it's "we"

Ben, most people would turn you away

People don't listen to a word grooms say,

Tweens don't tweet half as much as you

making weddings work for you

I'm sure you'll post again

as a husband blogger Ben

DIY? Ok, np!

2010-06-24T13:42:00.000-07:00

This weekend we saw a major DIY win at the Temple of Groom household. Very exciting when one of these diy projects actually works as planned.

We finally crossed the escort card board off our list. Not going to lie, Rebecca did most of this project, but I was there when we bought everything and I'd like to think I helped out a lot.

Saturday morning was spent at Michael's getting our ketubah put on stretchers and wandering through the aisles for a few hours. One of the larger items on our to-do list is the escort card board.

Obligatory rant: Okay look, I get that there needs to be escort cards, or some sort of cards that tell everyone where they should sit. I just think it's one of those things that we easily start to stress about. Oooh, what's a cool way to tell people where to sit? Look, I love all the little details as much as the next guy, strike that, MORE than the next guy - because I have a wedding blog and the "next guy" doesn't. It just seems like one of those details now where we have to think about what we're going to do, and make it look nice and presentable, because if we DON'T have it, mass chaos ensues. And you know what, I will say this, I wasn't incredibly helpful during the planning stages of our escort card board. Instead of having a definitive idea, and executing it, Rebecca shot so many ideas my way. And you know what? I liked them all. They were all fine. It was something I just wanted to get done, and I didn't really care what the finished product was: cute little paper chairs with people's names printed on them, just printed out little cards, etc etc etc... It was something that I said, and I admit this goes against the nature of my blog, "If you like it, I'm totally behind you". That being said, I do love the end result.

So here's what we got:

Michael's: 18x24 picture frame (50% off!), magnets, small paper flowers, spray paint, chalkboard spray paint

Home Depot: large piece of sheet metal

When we got home I fixed the pool shed roof that I fell through a couple months ago and Rebecca started spray painting the picture frame a high gloss white. Then she cut sheet metal down to 18x24 and sprayed it with chalkboard paint.

I came in with an 18x24 piece of plywood that we mounted the sheet metal onto and then fit it into the frame! "We" made an awesome framed magnetic chalkboard. Then Rebecca took the small paper flowers glued them onto the magnets. Once we have our guest list finalized and our seating charts done, I'll print names out on small pieces of paper and we'll use the flower magnets to put them on the chalkboard.

Sure we could have bought something exactly like this online w/o having to spend a day working on it, but we have such a connection to this damn chalk board now! It's great. At the end of the day we did save money too. We love it. We'll hang it in our kitchen when the wedding is over. Who would have thought, I'd love an escort board?

It's just nice to have a DIY win!

Did you miss me?!

2010-06-16T10:50:00.000-07:00

Wow. It's just been a completely insane couple weeks for me, and unfortunately the blog suffered. I apologize! Let me fill you in on what's going on.

SO, let's start with all things wedding. Each wedding bullet point I've got to tell you guys about deserves its own blog post, but I'm being realistic and know I may not get to write 10 more posts this week. SO, I'm going to briefly tell you about a lot of stuff with hopes of elaborating later. I really promise to blog more.

I am less than two months away from making an honest woman out of Rebecca! I can't believe that. We've had a longer engagement than anyone I know, and I can't believe it's coming to an end. I'm extremely ready for it to come to an end. I can't stress that enough - I'm just ready for this wedding to happen! I know it's cliche to say, "it'll be here before you know it!" but that's totally what happened. I guess things are cliche for a reason.

The RSVPs were rolling in about a month ago, then they mysteriously stopped. We now only get one every other day! The RSVP by date is this Monday and we're still waiting for 41 responses! Not really sure what people are waiting for. Maybe they feel bad RSVP-ing no? We're missing responses for nearly 30% of our guest list! Did this happen to anyone else?

We booked a videographer and he's fucking incredible! He's an addition to the wedding I'm extremely excited about and I can't wait to tell you all about him. He will get his own blog post no matter what. BUT, just a spoiler - his name is Daniel Boswell and he's ridiculously talented.

The latest big project I've been working on is a DIY photo booth(ish) station at our wedding for our guestbook. It's a pretty ambitious project. The pictures will be taken with my computer's camera. This is something I'll definitely post about - but basically I've got a program on my mac that all the guest has to do is enter his/her name and it takes 3 continuous pictures, formats them, and sends them to a small little portable printer! Our hopes are that guests will take their pictures, sign them (write notes on the print outs), then put them into a little metal birdcage we bought that will serve as our guestbook! Right now I'm just researching feasible ideas for backdrops (do I even need one?) and little photo table lights because our reception is outdoors at night. I've got my bar mitzvah guestbook and I don't think I've ever looked at it, but if I had photo booth pictures of my guests I think it'll be something I like to look back on. More on this idea to come.

I tried on my suit the other night and I fit in my suit pants! I've lost 20 pounds since I went on my "I will never forgive myself if I'm this fat for my wedding" exercise/diet regiment. That was a big victory. I've got two ties that I'm trying to decide between. I may wear one for the ceremony and one for the reception because one is more casual than the other. I think I'll post pictures of them both and ask for your help. To-do post #3! I've gotta go get my suit altered a bit - that's something kind of big on my list right now.

Rebecca spray painted a ton of these mini ceramic birds to accompany our centerpieces. They look pretty awesome. I'll post a picture soon. We just need to figure out what to fill our big vases with. Rocks? Sand? those little jewel things?

We've been adding songs onto our "To Play" and "Do Not Play" dj lists. This is pretty fun. Thank you google docs. It's an immediate hotline to our DJ (DJ Evoke AKA TeamBride). She's been awesome. We have a meeting tonight with our coordinator who I'm sure will remind us of about 600 things that need to be done before the wedding. That should be fun.

Now, onto my regular life.... I started a new job last week. It's awesome. I just realized I've never talked about work on my blog. For the last few years I've assisted a film/tv director named David Wain. He was on the 90's comedy show The State and directed one of my favorite movies "Wet Hot American Summer". I got a job with him a few years ago on the movie "Role Models" and have been with him ever since. For the last 1/2 a year though I had to take another job because he wasn't working on anything major. Last week I finally got the call to work on his next movie "Wanderlust" which will star Paul Rudd and Jennifer Aniston and is being produced by Judd Apatow. I'm extremely happy about the new job. It's been extremely busy though. David and his writing partner Ken Marino have let me sit in on writing sessions, and meetings, and rehearsals, and it's just given me so much self worth again. I'm really enjoying it.

Now for the chaotic part - I'm going to have to move for a while. Last week we thought I was going to have to pack up and move on Monday to prep this movie in NYC. I would leave - fly back to LA for my wedding in August - then immediately turn around and fly to Georgia where we'll shoot the movie. It definitely freaks me out to move before the wedding, but I'm happy to do it for this job. The move is definitely still up in the air and could likely happen, so I don't want to breathe a sigh of relief yet.

SO, every free second I've got has been trying to cram things in before I leave, IF I leave and spending some time with Rebecca and the pup because we'll definitely be apart for at least the last quarter of the year.

Oh, and I had a birthday! I turned 28. I cooked a big 9lb pork shoulder cuban style with rice and black beans! It was incredible. I drank the entire day, and it was just perfect. Rebecca and I got wasted and tried to out-embarrass one another in front of our friends. Chris, from The Man Registry, was there and I'm a little surprised that he spared me from a comment or a tweet about something I said or did. I think that was probably his birthday gift to me, and a delicious 6 pack of Fat Tire.

Which reminds me, I'm knee deep in my wedding beer tasting "research" and it's going very well. I let a few friends taste some beer options on my birthday and all were well received.

Man, this post just made me realize that I need to get back posting. I have so much to talk about. I've missed blogging, but hopefully you understand!

Glad to be back(ish).

Four Weddings, One Angry Blogger

2010-05-25T16:13:00.000-07:00

*Spoiler Alert - many words in this post will probably be in CAPS*

Usually I like just about anything on TV. I watch everything from the critically acclaimed Emmy winners to the guilty pleasure reality shows (c'mon Rehab at the Hard Rock.. best show ever... anyone with me?). About 9 times out of 10 I can find something redeemable about any show I'm watching. I just love television.

That's how I felt until this last Saturday when Rebecca and I watched TLC's "Four Weddings". In-fucking-furiating! When I think about that show.... show.... make.... David.... ANGRY!!!!!!! MUST PUNCH SOMETHING. (breathing into paper bag so I can write the rest of this blog....)

For those of you that aren't familiar with this show, allow me to tell you about it. Actually let me give you an unbiased description of the show. According to TLC, "Four Weddings" is a show in which "Four brides have agreed to attend- and score- each other's weddings. They'll be judging the food, dresses, venues and overall experiences. The bride whose wedding rates the best wins a fabulous five-star honeymoon."

Wow, well reading the description this sounds pretty good, right? At one point or another we've all gone to weddings and silently judged them to ourselves... not for prizes, but sure, we've left and said, "Gosh, it was a beautiful day, but the prime rib was SO bad!". Even though not to one another's face like "Four Weddings", that is judging... so this show, in theory, should be great.

Then I watched it.

First of all the major flaw of the show is that they pitted a woman that had a $15k wedding against a woman that had an $80k wedding. Look, I'm not saying that the woman with a 15k wedding can't win and can't have the best wedding in the world because look, my wedding is WAY WAY WAY closer to that amount than to 80k and I think we could easily be planning the best wedding in the world, BUUUUUUUT come on, this is not a very level playing field. I'll get back to the monetary discrepancies in a bit because the other problem I had with this show were the women on it. Oh my god, did I DESPISE the women on this show and the terrible things they would say about one another's happiest day ever. Their fucking FAKE friendships they had with one another, their over the top judgements, their "I'm on TV I should wear my emotions on my sleeve, and their "if I'm not having fun I should look like I'm being tortured" attitudes. These ~~women~~ were so fake and so unfair I couldn't believe it. The woman that had a $45k wedding had a SPREAD for her cocktail hour: many different food selections, lobster, etc etc etc. But because the woman that had a $15k wedding had a much more modest cocktail hour she OBVIOUSLY didn't try hard enough. What bullshit. Look, I will say this, in defense of the women (I can't believe I'm defending them) the bride that had the cheapest wedding really could have stretched her dollar further. She had no entertainment for her guests, there was no dancing, the food didn't look very appetizing, the wedding looked bland. And if you're in a competition where I'm forced to judge you, then your wedding lacked. But you know what, when you go to this woman's wedding, you can look a little happier. It's a few effing hours, you don't need to sit there acting like it's dental work. Some people wear their emotions on their faces and can't fake excitement - it's so immature. A few women on this show fit that category. I wish I could have shaken these ladies and told them that the bride didn't REALLY want you at her wedding. She wanted the chance to win an awesome honeymoon (the episode I saw it was a great trip to Bora Bora). There were most likely guests the bride had to cut from her invite list....legitimate family and/or friends that were were on the bubble, so she could accommodate three absolute STRANGERS for a chance to win a great honeymoon. The least you could do is blend in instead of sticking out as a woman nobody else knows TEXTING AT A GOD DAMNED WEDDING CEREMONY. (counting backwards from 100 so I can complete this blog post)

If I've laid out reasons 1 and 1a why I hate this show, here is reason 1ab (because I hate everything about it EQUALLY): the women refuse to accept any cultural differences! Like I mentioned before one woman was TEXTING during another bride's ceremony because "the whole ceremony was in a different language and therefore completely boring and according to her, they should have hired someone to translate." Um, REALLY? You're an adult. You can't enjoy experiencing a wedding that is culturally different than yours? You can't take ANYTHING out of a new experience? Furthermore she bagged on the bride's religion saying that she would never set foot in that denomination's church again because the ceremony was too long and if she was ever invited to another wedding of that faith, she'd skip it and only attend the reception. The bride then gave her rival a low score for her "long, boring, different language" ceremony. Later in the show, at another bride's reception she surprised everyone with a huge band of bagpipers, drummers, and authentic Irish dancers. It was a great personal touch and an excellent surprise for wedding guests. It was a pretty awesome experience for everyone EXCEPT for one of the rival brides! This woman complained that the performance wasn't appropriate for a wedding and not everyone likes bagpipes. Oh REALLY? Hey fuckface, you had STEEL DRUMMERS at your wedding and everyone went with the flow. I know that it's still a competition so you want to diminish your rivals' accomplishments, but at the end of the day this is their WEDDING. It's personal. You are a guest. Temper your judgements.

On that note here comes reason 1abc I hated this show. The women took it beyond judging the wedding. They started judging one another. One woman didn't like another woman's dress because it still showed her tattoos. Look (expletive) the other bride is different than you are! She has tattoos and even if you don't like them, SHE does. If she had worn a gown that covered all of her tattoos you would have complained that she was wearing a burka. One of the women was a bit older than the other three and her wedding was shit on because "the guests seemed a little on the older side, so there wasn't much dancing". I'm blind with anger.

If this show's aspiration is to give an immediate gut punch to a bride who thought everyone enjoyed her wedding then it succeeded with flying colors. I know that the person with the lowest point total at the end of the day claims, "I wouldn't have changed a single thing about my wedding" but she's going home thinking that 3 people truly didn't enjoy her wedding, and if THOSE 3 didn't like her wedding at all, who else didn't? That's horrible! I know she signed up for that abuse.... but nobody deserves that. I've seen how hard this wedding planning is, and how time and energy consuming it is and that's not fair to do to anyone... well maybe to the woman who lost because her wedding WAS the worst. OH GOD! It's rubbing off on me... I'm becoming horrible.

At the end the show they crowned their victor and it just reinforced everything I absolutely knew I hated about it:

1st Place Winner budget: $80k

2nd Place Budget: $45k

3rd Place Budget: $30k

4th Place Budget: $15k

Fuck you TLC. If you're going to have such a large monetary disparity maybe go the extra mile and find women that don't think the only way to have a successful wedding is to have a culturally bland wedding with a raw bar, live band, and a princess ball gown. It's extremely possible to have a $10k wedding outshine a $75k wedding so maybe do some leg work and talk to brides who are doing work to make the day special despite having a small budget. I'm a firm believer in the fact that a backyard wedding can be as magnificent as a black tie formal ballroom wedding. How bout trying to enforce that TLC? Additionally I'm not casting judgement on people that can afford big budget weddings! I'm fine with a big budget grand wedding too! They are great, and I love to attend them. I just think they should maybe have women that all spent $60-$80k go against one another instead of continuously beating the small budget wedding every episode (Rebecca commented that she's seen the person that spent the most win the other times she's seen the show).

One last note before I hit "publish". This is something I don't usually do. When I talk about someone, I usually make it as anonymous as I possibly can. This time I've decided differently. Nadine, I sincerely hope that you are into googling yourself. I hope that you do a search for "Nadine, Four Weddings, Blog" just to see if anyone has commented on your wedding. You ragged on 3 other women who had only nice things to say about your wedding. You were terrible. I hope you read this.

Anyone else ever seen this show? Anyone else have as many issues with it as I do?

Kudos, Ladies!

2010-05-20T11:17:00.000-07:00

One thing I've learned the last year or so wedding planning is that this stuff is EXHAUSTING. It's all encompassing and completely consumes your life. As soon as one task is crossed off the list, the joke is on you because it only gives way to hundreds of other new tasks. It's the most wonderful exciting vicious cycle of to-do's that I've ever seen. Of course it culminates with a glorious day tailor made to everything you love, but for most, that day doesn't come easily.

It's for this reason that I really want to say thank you to all of you, and especially to the bride-to-be bloggers. I honestly don't know how you do it. Rebecca manages to look at EVERY single wedding item posted on the internet and then somehow also finds time to cross things off our wedding checklist. You all blog continuously and yet when I check my twitter feed you've managed to comment and retweet and joke amongst yourselves all while planning. Again, I don't know how you do it. You post new content when you can't find content about which you want to share your opinion. And you do this all while you're planning a WEDDING. It's unfathomable to me how you accomplish this.

When I see a time-dependent task approaching on my wedding checklist I tend to take the "all hands on deck" approach to make sure that it gets done. Somehow you take the "all hand on deck" approach, but unbelievably another hand comes out from under your shirt and you blog about the task, multiple ideas for the task, ways you would maybe do the task differently next time, an eco-friendly way to do the task, a DIY way to do the task, a budget-friendly way to do the task, tweet it, follow people on follow friday, and then craft a 3-armed shirt for sale on etsy. I don't know how you do it. You somehow make blogging a full time job while you have full time jobs, and still find time to wedding plan which is absolutely a full time job. I don't even want to delve into doing guest posts on other sites, because that shit just isn't human.

At the end of a long day of wedding planning all I want to do is collapse on the couch with a beer that I'm "taste testing for the wedding" and turn off the wedding-planning thoughts in my head. I just want to tune out for an evening and relax. The next day, or at the end of the week, I'll come up with a cutesy tweet or post apologizing for my lack of posting and I'll let you know what I've been planning with Rebecca. In the time it took me to enjoy those first sips of my beer on my night off you gals have already found a new engagement session, commented on it, and then posted opinions on making your engagement session personal to you.

Look, I don't want to sell myself short. I've crafted a wedding blog that I hope is entertaining, and I like to think that where I lack in pure quantity I thrive in quality. I really have enjoyed planning the wedding with Rebecca. I am definitely more involved in wedding planning than anyone I know...but I haven't given her enough credit. I don't have the excel spreadsheets, and the crazy to-do lists like she does.... like most of you have... I just am here helping plan every step of the way which I think is pretty damn good. Comparatively.... it's a start.

I exist to give you all a fresh take on wedding planning, and I really do hope that my blog somehow inspires guys to lend a helping hand. It's not a "gay thing" (as I imagine guys see it) to want to help plan, and I hope that this blog helps them realize it. The last year has really just opened my eyes to the fact that WE should be that third arm poking out of the etsy shirt hole. There are more guys wedding blogging than ever before, which I think is really cool. A site like The Man Registry churns out wedding content daily and is something that never existed before. I'd like to think more men are getting involved because of sites like it and the grooms blogs like you see in my blog roll. I feel like we're revolutionizing the way wedding planning is going to happen in the future. I can only imagine more and more wedding blogs popping up soon. I'd love to think that the men in my blog role are the forefathers of bearing some of the wedding planning load.

Anyway, in the past few days that I've taken a breather from my blog it's just become completely apparent to me that you women are not human. It's unreal. As suck-up as this post sounds, something needed to be said. Thanks for the help - Rebecca, the wedding bloggers out there, and even to the countless women who just READ wedding blogs because I know you're reading them ALL and planning as well. If you take time to read groom blogs, you're helping the groom revolution thrive. Support us, and we'll support you! Your daughters will walk hand-in-hand with wedding planning grooms.

Gocco for Sale!

2010-05-17T14:56:00.001-07:00

I really hate to use my blog to sell something, but right now we could REALLY use the money for wedding budget help! A few weeks ago I told you about my experience with the Gocco and why I decided not to use this awesome looking Japanese screen printer. I finally took an inventory of everything I've got and I thought I would post it on the site.

SO... here we go. I bought this very lightly used Gocco PG-5 straight from Japan. It has not been used by me and is basically immaculate. I have a lot of extras to sell with the Gocco as well as everything that comes in the original box. I promise you won't find a complete package like this anywhere else on the internet right now as the Gocco and its accessories have become hard to find. Here's what I've got:

(1) Gocco PG-5 + original items that come with it in the package (Riso pen, manuals, template books, vhs instructional video, ink blocker, positioning sheet)

(6) Screens

(22) Bulbs

(32) Tubes of ink in various colors. As far as I can tell there are only a few that have been used. Nearly all of them are unused and in their original boxes. Many different colors. (email me if you want to know about a particular color)

I really want to sell this as a package and don't really want to sell off parts. I'm worried that I'll have a harder time selling off the odds & ends that you don't want.

Email me if you're interested and we can talk about pricing. To give you a heads up of what I'm thinking regarding price - the base model with a few extras sells for around $250 right now. I'm not looking to make money off any of you, I'm going to jack up the price on my craigslist listing, but if anyone in the wedding community wants this I'll just sell it to you for the amount I spent on it.

Email me if you're interested: templeofgroom [at] gmail dot com

Please forward along to anyone you think may be interested!

Robot Presides Over Japanese Wedding

2010-05-17T09:41:00.000-07:00

This is a tad too on the nose... I mean even though I've never seen a robot presiding over a Japanese wedding, I feel like it's already been done a thousand times. On a monday morning I can't even come up with a good "Japanese people getting married by a robot" joke because I feel like this is already a caricature of itself. I've got nothing - leave your best robot priest jokes in the comments.

Ben Folds plays my wedding! (3 months early)

2010-05-14T10:44:00.000-07:00

Rebecca and I went to a Ben Folds concert on Wednesday night here in LA. It was AWESOME. We shouted "Temple of Groom" several times, but I don't think Ben heard us. It was such a fun show.

Even though for the first part of the show a 6'5" guy decided to barrel through the crowd and camp out nearly in front of us, we had a blast. Look, total side note to that guy, I KNOW that it's not your fault you're so damn tall. We get it... you were born that way. But at least realize that if you're that effing tall, people are going to get a little upset when you push your way to the middle of a general admission show. The 5'4" girl next to me had a right to say something nasty to you because you pushed her out of the way so you could stand in front of her while your drunk girlfriend didn't even watch the show. She literally had her back to the show the entire time. You have a right to stand where you want, but at least get to the show a bit earlier so the shorter people can plan accordingly. And while I'm at it (sorry for the rant guys)... a quick shout out to the guy that pretends he spots a friend towards the front of the venue so he can push his way forward. Your acting is going to have to get a little better than that. We knew there was no "Adrienne!" 30 feet in front of us. It's a great idea though, people were parting left and right, but try to end up in a spot that is physically capable of human occupancy. Don't wedge yourself in between two people less than a foot apart. You seemed like a pretty good guy but I didn't love the taste of your shampoo!

ANYWAY... It's always great to see a Ben Folds show. If we didn't have such a great DJ booked for our wedding, then I probably would have printed Temple of Groom cards to hand out at the show, and would have thought out some way to let Ben know about the campaign I launched a few months ago. He may not be at our wedding, but his music will be there at some point.

Well, to wrap things up, at the end of the night Ben took a picture of the audience so he could tweet it later... check it out!!!!!!!!!!

Click the pic to enlarge!

The Battle to Please: Birthday vs Wedding

2010-05-07T13:50:00.000-07:00

On my way to work this morning I was thinking about weddings in general and the desire to try to please as many people as you can. I know it's an age old wedding cliche "you can't please everyone, remember, it's your day... worry about pleasing yourself" but I've really yet to meet anyone that hasn't considered his/her guests at all. There absolutely is a desire to make everyone happy during planning.

So I'm on my way to work this morning and it occurs to me, why do we constantly try to make everyone happy on your wedding day but tend to focus solely on ourselves for our birthdays? It seems like we're very much more selfish with our desires when we plan birthday parties rather than wedding receptions. Both days are referred to as "your day" yet when wedding planning I find that we always straddle the fence thinking about what you want vs. thinking about what you think your guests want.

For instance when planning a birthday party if you decide to do everything in a mexican theme - you do it. You don't consider a slew of guests that you know don't love mexican food. And you know what? They show up anyway, and they have a good time. A few years ago (admittedly only 1 year removed from college) I decided I wanted a beer pong birthday party. So you know what I did? I scheduled a beer pong birthday party. I'm absolutely positively sure that the majority of girls AND germaphobic friends I invited to this party did not like beer pong and most likely didn't play beer pong that night. But you know what... I didn't even consider that at the time. It didn't even occur to me.... because it was my birthday. Additionally that birthday was a BLAST. Long story short, Rebecca got so drunk she fell out of a cab in front of my Dad after meeting him for the first time. It was hilarious and will go down in history as one of the best birthday parties ever..... and it was planned by someone who only took his necessities into consideration.

Now nearly 5 years later I'm helping plan our wedding. I can unequivocally say that we've put way more consideration into pleasing our guests than I have planning any other event. Even though we loved our venue the moment we saw it, we agonized putting our deposit down for weeks because it may not be the most convenient option for our guests. If this was a birthday party, we would would have put our deposit down on the spot told our friends to come, and not thought twice about it.

The good news is that looking back at our wedding plans and details there's really nothing I would change. At the end of the day we've spent the majority of our time assessing what WE want and I feel like we've done a beautiful job conjuring up a wedding that is very "us". The only thing that I think we would have gained had we viewed our wedding as a birthday is peace of mind. We maybe would have made a decision, stuck to it, and never looked back. Instead of thinking about our menu, rethinking our menu, triple thinking about our menu, saying, "Hmm, do you think people at the wedding will eat duck at the wedding, we REALLY love it but do you think others eat duck?", we would have said "It's our birthday and we know we love duck! Tell everyone we're having duck! If they don't like duck they can pick around it and eat salad and whatever else they can get full on - or they can fill up on alcohol!".

So my question to everyone out there, why is there a difference between birthday party planning and wedding planning in terms of desire to please everyone? I know that a wedding is a celebration that is shared by our parents so a lot of times we take them and their friends into consideration as well. In our case both sets of parents have constantly said "Do what you two want! We'll love it". At the end of the day, we have... we've stressed and rethought things 100 different ways, but at the end of the day we definitely have crafted a day that's uniquely ours. I know that in a lot of scenarios you're asking people to fly cross country or travel to your wedding and you're asking them to spend their hard earned money to come to your wedding...I completely get that. Is it because we're so concerned with presenting ourselves perfectly? Is it the competition and the constant one game of outdoing someone else? So what is the the real reason? Is it because we have a birthday every year? If we completely fuck one year up, it doesn't matter... we always have next year to make it better. 50% of the time this is the only wedding you're going to plan. So there's more stress to not just screw the pooch... is that why there's more stress and more desire to please everyone?!

Gocco-a-No No

2010-05-06T12:55:00.000-07:00

I mentioned last week in my post about string lights that some things are just going to defeat me when it comes to wedding planning. We took the smarter route with our string lights, and at the end of the day it will prove to be an excellent decision. Some things I guess are just going to be FDDIY (fucking don't do it yourself!) projects for me. I'd love to tell you the next chapter in the story of getting completely OWNED by one of our wedding ideas.

Pretty much EXACTLY a year ago I somehow got it in my head that not only was I going to design the save-the-dates, the wedding invitations, the programs (if we had them), and the thank you cards, but I was also going to do the printing all by myself as well. Then in a stupid fucking game of one-ups-manship with MYSELF I raised the stakes and decided to screen print the invitations as well. "Oh, computer printers are for chumps. When people get our screen printed invitations and can feel the ink on the paper, they'll be so impressed." So, like a naive little idiot I packed my bag and began trekking through the internet to far and distant lands to buy a Gocco machine. (cue the Japanese gong) The little machine looks incredible. To this day, I'm still very very intrigued by it. It's like an easy bake oven meets a serious screen printer. I did my research... I read that I needed lots of bulbs, I read that I needed lots of screens, I read that I needed lots of inks.... so I found them all.... from a nice man in Japan. I was prepared. Nobody was going to pry that Gocco ebay auction from this groomzilla. I woke up at 3am to outbid people at the last possible second. After my win, too giddy to go back to sleep.

I got the machine a few weeks later, and even took pictures unpacking the highly coveted printer from the cardboard boxes with text in a different language. I held off on posting said pictures because I figured it would make more sense to post a big huge "these are my gocco-ed wedding invites" post. The Gocco was our first wedding related purchase. In many ways it kicked off wedding planning. It summoned the beginning of the wedding planning chapter of my life (cue the gong).

Months passed and I continued to do research about Gocco tips. Before using screens, put them in the fridge or the freezer, make carbon/photo copies of what you want to print - computer print outs won't work. I was preparing myself while Goco-zilla silently slept in his cardboard box in the linen closet. When it was time to start thinking about printing the save-the-date Rebecca and I finally decided on an idea that proved to be much too intricate and complex to screen print. It was much too graphic (see our STD here). Rather than setting ourselves up for inevitable failure we let Goco continue to sleep in his lair and got the STDs printed at an eco-friendly printing company.

So the STDs went out and I immediately began preparing for the wedding invitations. I designed our invitation with the Gocco in mind simpler design with only 2-3 colors needed. Here is where the problem beings to occur. I don't know the first thing about actually printing anything (screen printing). I guess I'm the equivalent of an armchair quarterback for photoshopping invitations... sure I know the ins and outs of photoshop/illustrator and I get by with what I believe to be an above average knowledge of photoshop & illustrator, but I could never go pro. I don't know enough about graphic design. Going into the design phase of the invitation here's what I believed would happen. We'd use grey paper purchased at a store, I would print black, white, and purple onto the invitation.

I finished the design for the main invitation card and figured we should buy paper asap because I knew the actual printing would be a arduous trial-and-error project that would take time to perfect. So we made our way to Paper Source with a computer print out of our invitation - sooo ahead of the ball, nearly 2 months before invitations needed to be sent.

The Paper Source girl ruined everything. Well she saved everything too, just depending which side you're rooting for. If you were rooting for the DIY miracle Goco win, as I was, tough luck. This is where my lack of experience came to bite me in the ass. She started throwing out terms like bleed, negative bleed, offset this and that jibber jabber that. I was clearly overmatched. I was so proud of myself when I told her that I made the image larger than it should be to compensate for borderless printing. But then she asked what I was planning to do for the white text if the paper is gray. Um... just use white ink? I was then informed that there's no such thing as white ink. Is that true? I mean, it makes sense I guess. I just assumed that the ink was like paint. There's white paint. So then we got schooled in the ways of screen printing. To do my design we'd have to get a white piece of paper Gocco it gray leaving the white text un-Gocco-ed. Holy shit... seriously? That would never work. I kind of went dead behind the eyes. The rest of her telling me how difficult my design (that took me about 2 weeks) would take was falling on deaf ears. It was like listening to someone underwater....just plain ol' screwed.

Then Ms. Paper Source came to the rescue. She said that my design was so nice, why don't I just have it professionally printed at her friend's printing company for less than I ever imagined it would cost to have something printed professionally. Granted, we went for the cheaper laser printer method instead of having them screen printed by a professional. It was a good idea to do this, but I was so so dejected. Just felt like I was beaten despite the fact that it was pretty much a win - a win meaning less work/stress for us and not TOO much more expensive.

Over the next week or so I finished all of our designs - sent them to the printer and got a proof. The Gocco watched silently from afar judging me. We decided to buy a nice paper that had a shimmer to it, and have our invitations printed on that instead of just plain white paper. When printed on plain nice heavy stock - the invitation looked a little dead. With the shimmer paper it gave it a pop and made it feel a little less "home printer-y". Seriously, like two days after approving the proof and letting the company know they should commence printing I left the shop with our invitations. It would have taken me months to screen print them.

So, in the end it all worked out. Our invitations are BEAUTIFUL. I really and truly effing love them. I'm so proud that I designed them, Rebecca tied them with ribbon, we printed our envelopes, stuffed em up, and mailed them out. I'm REALLY really pleased, and I still have that sense of DIY accomplishment. There's just a slight part of me that died the day my hopes of Gocco-ing were exterminated, but it was for the best. I guess the real moral of the story is: Sure DIY, but be realistic... and if you can PDIY (partly do it yourself) that's not such a bad thing either. We still saved a boatload of money!

SO my Gocco is going up for sale (cue the Japanese gong)! I know I didn't exactly paint a great picture of it with this post, but it's right for SOMEONE - just not me. I bought a package with a bunch of bulbs and screens and like 30 inks. I've got it all. If you're interested, email me. Look the things are popular for a reason. They're supposedly awesome - I just can't vouch for them!

LASTLY, I wanted to post some quick low quality pics of our invitations. When we take actual nice pictures I'll post them too, but for now I wanted to show them to you all!

Vendor Love - Enter my happy place.

2010-05-03T16:25:00.000-07:00

I haven't really gotten burnt out wedding planning lately. One thing that's certainly helped is that things are coming together pretty well, and the high-stress stuff is done. Most recently, we got our invitations back from the printer and they look great. All that's left to do is print the envelopes tie ribbons around our cards and mail them. Things are really coming together. Right now we're trying to figure out our centerpieces and that's kind of driving me up the wall. I mean why on Earth should we have to spend so much thought about something so insignificant?! Nobody remembers the centerpieces unless they suck so much or are overly awesome. We don't have "overly awesome" money, so we just have to spend enough to make them not suck. It's a CROCK that we have to spend just enough money on them so they don't suck so they are forgettable. Thinking about this makes my blood begin to...not boil cause I'm not really THAT mad or concerned that it won't get done... but let's say simmer. My blood is simmering.

Whenever I start to get in one of these moods, I've figured out the remedy to get my blood back down to tepid: think about the vendors that we've committed to. I happen to LOVE our vendors and think that they are so passionate about what they do and they do what they love, that the excitement can't help but to rub off on me. Thinking about my vendors ultimately makes me happy about the wedding and makes me wish the wedding was less than 100 days away (can you believe it, 100 days!!!!). I've blogged about each of our vendors in the past but today as I was trying for a 4th time to complete a blog post about something else and kept getting frustrated, thinking about them put me in a happy place. SO, I just want to take a second to talk about them out loud.

The Cass House Inn: My love for our venue is no secret. The town it's in, the aesthetics of the grounds/building, the food, it's the whole package. Unbelievably the Cass House worked in our budget. Though it's a small trek from LA, I'm looking FORWARD to that. I really like it here in Los Angeles, but I'm excited that the wedding will not take place somewhere in town. I'm not making a dig on anyone that chooses to get married here, because look, there are some INCREDIBLE spots in town, I'm just saying that Cass House is Rebecca and me incarnated into a bed and breakfast. The owners put so much attention into every detail at the Cass House. They couldn't be cooler with the wedding and forming the wedding menu. So far, they've just been awesome. We'll get married on their lawn in their flower garden, then have our reception in their herb garden. It's going to be awesome. A smile on my face.

Callaway Gable Photography: Brian and Allison are geniuses. How cliche would it be of me to say a picture is worth a thousand words.... super cliche?.... okay... but guys, seriously - their wedding pictures aren't just photographs, they are art. The first conversation I had with Brian we clicked. He said something that kind of stuck with me about his photography - he said that a good wedding photograph will make you remember the moment with all of your senses. It's such a cool thought. If you can remember the smells and the tastes of a moment by looking at a picture, then your photographer has really done his/her job. Brian and his wife Allie are a phenomenal duo. Brian's work has appeared in countless magazines and he has such an incredible eye for composition. Allison first appeared on the cover of Teen Magazine when she was 13 and went on to have a very lucrative modeling career. It's for this reason that she knows the do's and don'ts of posing and making a couple look the best they possibly can - she also knows the best angles to capture a moment. The two work flawlessly together. They can do it all. Lastly - I just want to show you some recent engagement sessions pictures that they just posted!

DJ Evoke: I've told you about Samantha aka DJ Evoke a few times already, but she's totally great and I just wanted to talk about her a little more again. Even though a while ago she was preparing for her move from the LA/Beach area to San Francisco she managed to make time to get a mix to me. She wasn't thrilled with her mix because of technology/time constraints so instead of just shelving the whole mix project until she got settled up north, she somehow found the time to make an entire playlist of music for Rebecca and me. We listened to over 2 hours worth of music she sent to us on a car trip up to our venue. At the end of the playlist Rebecca and I both realized that she totally gets us. It was exactly what we want for our reception. I'll fill you in about Evoke from time to time, but I can already see that this is going to be an awesome collaboration between two bloggers! (in case you've forgotten Samantha is a wedding blogger and you can follow her on twitter too! @teambride).

With Bells On Productions: I never thought we would have wedding planners/coordinators. I figured it was a luxury that was just never going to happen. That's when a friend/coworker/honorary family member named Sissy swooped in and made my dreams come true. I've worked with Sissy (co-founder of "With Bells On") on and off for the last 5 years. She hired me on my first Los Angeles job fresh from college. Here are a couple of things I know about her: she's SO meticulous and has an eye for detail like no other human I've ever met, she knows what needs to be done on a minute-by-minute basis, she's got mad skills at planning parties, she's got an unparalleled passion for party planning & coordinating, and she keeps in excellent company with Rachael (the other co-founder of "With Bells On"). I can't tell you how much weight is off our shoulders knowing that "With Bells On" has our backs on our our wedding day. Just the fact that they'll make sure everything is happening and set up, and... I know you get it, but just know that this is probably another entire post about how great this is going to be to have them there.

I'm sorry if some of you think this post is a little infomercial-ish. But look, the way I see it, I've done so much homework for any of you that need excellent vendors but don't know where to turn. I'm telling you, just thinking about any/each of these guys makes me feel so much less stressed because I know we're covered. One of the best parts of wedding planning is just knowing that you don't have to worry about something on your day. You can just trust that it's going to get done and you don't have to think twice about it. Each one of these vendors has done that for me. This weekend we had a slight centerpiece fiasco (I'll blog ya about it later.... that was such a stupid way to say I'll post about it later) and I could have easily lost my shit... instead I put myself in my happy place and thought about how great everything is going to be with our vendors.

Oh, and a beer while lounging on our new outdoor furniture (wedding present from Rebecca's grandparents) is also my other new happy place. Who's coming over for drinks this weekend?

I need a drink!

2010-04-26T11:06:00.000-07:00

My wedding reception is being held at a venue that only serves beer and wine. That's right, no hard liquor at the wedding. While that may piss some people off, as soon as they realize that it's 2 more free alcohols than they had before they came to the wedding, they'll be fine with it. I've been to several beer & wine weddings, and had a blast. In fact, one of my favorite wedding memories ever - my buddy Paul getting blasted and doing the Harlem shake on the bus back to the hotel - stemmed from a beer and wine only reception.

That being said, I LOVE beer. My last semester at college I luckily only needed 1 regular course and 1 elective course to graduate. The elective course I chose to take: Beer Tasting. I'm not trying to make a, "In college, I majored in alcohol management, and horticulture if you know what I mean" type of joke, I'm actually serious, I took a beer tasting class. Thanks to UNLV for having an incredible course under their hotel management school. It was in this class I learned about beer for about an hour and half, then spent another hour and a half tasting beers we just learned about. Many people would take a sip of the beer, swish it around in their mouths, and dump the rest in the discard bucket. Not my roommate and me (and actually the teachers as well). We quickly established ourselves as the class ~~drunks~~ beer enthusiasts. It was in this class that I honed my love of beer. I cultivated it. I owned it.

Unfortunately at most weddings, I usually pass up my beloved libation. I think the only reason that's the case is because of limited beer selections. When given the option to drink Bud, Bud Light, Miller Light, Amstel Light and maaaaybe, if I'm super lucky a wild card beer like Stella Artois, I tend to go vodka tonic or Jack & coke. I'm not trying to be a beer snob at all, but I think the reason a lot of people shy away from beer is because you present them with options that all taste very similar. If you don't like the taste of one of those options listed above, you probably aren't going to order beer at the reception mentioned above. Weddings usually offer at least 2 varieties of wine that taste distinctly different from one another. Why should your beer be any different? In my eyes giving someone the choice between Bud Light, Miller Light, and Coors Light is not giving them an option. You wouldn't serve 3 different but very similar Pinot Noirs, would you?

So, I'm left with the decision of what beers to have at the wedding. Our venue has a really awesome outdoor kitchen that has a couple drafts that pop out of their granite counter top. So when I say I can get a few kegs, I don't want you to think this is a college keg party. Additionally, some (most) beers just taste better when they're not served in bottles. Plus, don't we all just love having a pint glass full of beer? So I was thinking that I would get a couple small kegs to have beer on tap and then also potentially buying low quantities of many different beers so people could try various brews through the evening.

After watching a documentary called Beer Wars this last weekend, I would really rather not have any Anheuser Busch beers at the wedding. Before you throw your arms in the air and start calling me a snob, or an elitist, please know that it's for the exact opposite reason. I'd much rather introduce people to the little guys out there fighting to at least coexist in the industry. I'd love to show my guests fact that there are other options, and let them know that the Bud Lights (American Style Lagers) are only ONE variety of beer out there, not the definitive and only style. After all, some keywords that we've used when planning our wedding have always been: fresh, local, relaxed, small companies. Why shouldn't our beer reflect that as well?

I do, however, have one concern. If my selections are too far "out there" I run the risk of ostracizing people that just like Bud Lights because they like Bud Light. If I don't supply beer that is familiar, and they genuinely don't care for any of the selections I've picked, they're left with nothing. There's no jack & coke or vodka tonic to fall back on. I'm going to have to find at least one beer that while it isn't Miller, Coors, Bud, still tastes familiar. I seem to remember a beer by the New Belgium Brewing Company (they make Fat Tire) called Blue Paddle that was their answer to the Pilsener Lager. So there are beers out there that would allow my guests to take baby steps into the beer garden. Maybe I need to get back into beer tasting. It'll be horrible for the diet, but it'll make for an enjoyable reception.

If you have any beer suggestions please leave them in the comments!

A note about photographers

2010-04-22T17:29:00.000-07:00

A good photographer is worth his/her weight in gold. It's one of the best splurges you can make for yourself on your wedding day. A good photograph is timeless. It's something that will be passed down for generations. A good photograph can transport you to the exact moment it's taken. Can make you smell things, taste things, feel things, etc. That's why I feel so at ease and confident with Callaway Gable.

On the flip side, I came across this wedding photo, and wanted to show what a BAD photographer will let you do.

The dreaded duckface. It's become quite the fad lately and can be found in nearly every ~~drunk~~ high school or college student's facebook photo albums. Some know the look as Zoolander's "blue steel" others know it as stupid...

Gather round kids, this was Grandma on her wedding day. Didn't she look so beautiful. Classy and regal! Oh, that?...that's Grandma's duckface. All the hot girls were doing the duckface back in the day. You hadn't "arrived" till you brought the duckface out. Oooh and the next picture, that's Grandpa getting photo bombed by a groomsman with his penis out!

To see beautiful photography go to: Callaway Gable Photography

To see more duck faces visit: Stop Making that Duckface!

To see photo bombs visit: This is Photobomb

Lights

2010-04-19T16:49:00.000-07:00

In the key of Journey's "Lights"

When the lights go up at the reception

and they brighten up the spaaaaaace...

Do I want to set them up at my wedding?...

Oh oo oh

Ohhhhhhhhhhhh oooo ohhhhhhhhh

Oh oh oh.

So you think renting's costly...

well my friend I think it's costly too.

Do I really want to DIY it on the dayyyyyy?

Oh oo oh

Ohhhhhhhhhhhh oooo ohhhhhhhhh

Oh oh oh.

It's sad, oh there been mornings

where I thought I could set up you

without a harm

Oh oo oh

La La Lights

La la La

Oh oo oh

Ohhhhhhhhhhhh oooo ohhhhhhhhh

When the lights go up at the reception

and they brighten up the spaaaaaace...

Do I want to set them up at my wedding?...

Oh oo oh

Ohhhhhhhhhhhh oooo ohhhhhhhhh

Oh oh oh.

SO, right now these twinkle string lights for our outdoor reception are at the forefront of my mind. If you follow my tweets or facebook statuses you know for the last few months I've been either bitching about lights or stressed about them. These beautiful little bulbs of illumination are completely bending me over and having their way with me.

When we first started planning our wedding we decided that we wanted to decorate our reception more with lights and candles than with flowers. We thought that this would be a much cheaper option. Both Rebecca and I really love the look of string lights hanging overhead at a reception and this just seemed like a no brainer.

Flash forward a few months and we meet with our vendor who sends our world into a downward spiral. The rental companies all charge for lighting per the foot. Additionally, built into the cost of the lights is a set up fee. It really makes sense, and I completely understand it, but it's something we completely overlooked (see: no shit moments in wedding planning). It makes something we thought would be relatively cheap a rather large expense.

We made the executive decision to buy the lights and set them up ourselves the day before the wedding. The price difference (not including the poles) put a couple hundred dollars back into our pockets. Not to mention we can most likely resell our lights after the wedding. We enlisted the help of our family to set everything up with us. My side of the family is Jewish and has never strung lighting before, but I felt totally confident when Rebecca's uncles were going to help us out. I know it's a total stereotype to think that all Christians know how to string lights because of Christmas, but they HAVE to have better knowledge and experience than I do! I got really excited that we had this dilemma figured out!

UNTIL the contact at our rental company graciously gave us tips on securing the poles, something we hadn't even thought of. She could have said "good luck guys!" and sent us on our way to eff this up, but she was nice enough to guide us.

Unless we drive each pole into the ground (something we hadn't asked our venue if we could do) each pole holding lights would have to be weighed down. Suppose someone bumped into a pole early in the evening and yanked down the lights because we didn't weigh it down properly?! I know that's a pretty big "what if" but when alcohol is introduced into the equation, those "what if" scenarios become exponentially more likely. It's more like "when someone bumps into it" not "if".

So at the end of the day, do I want to be on a ladder driving a 10ft high pole into the ground the day before the wedding a few hours before the rehearsal? No. Well, I take that back, I think I'd definitely do it, but the question is, do I have the ABILITY to do it?! You're reading a blog written by the guy that... wait, that sentence says enough... "you're reading the BLOG of a guy..." I'd venture to guess most male wedding bloggers aren't exactly handy at manual labor.... but anyway, yes, you're reading a blog written by a guy that 3 months ago fell through his pool shed roof as he was trying to tie a tree up in his back yard. Enough said. Okay, so driving the poles into the ground, while a sturdy option, may not be allowed or feasible.

Second option is weighing down the base of the poles. This is what we'd have to do. I've spoken to many people (including our rental contact) and they all suggest weighing down each pole with 100-150lbs of weight. Wow, really? Maybe I can have friends just man a pole throughout the night. I'll be sure that servers bring them food & drinks if they just stand on the base of a light pole all night. Even though it's MY day and my guests should WANT to do this for me, I guess I'm not going to ask anyone to do that. So we've got to get sandbags. Heavy expensive sandbags. We either need to buy them, rent them, or make them.

It was at this point in the light dilemma contemplation that I realized the expensive fee for the string lights is worth the price. By the time we factor in purchasing lights, poles, sandbags, and factored in the stress of hanging the lights it seems like we're just overmatched. Were we really going to make our own sandbags? I mean we're across the street from a beach so there's plenty of sand, but carrying burlap sacks of 100lbs of sand the day before my wedding sounds more like a cruel bootcamp story than the day before a wedding.

I'm all for DIY when it saves you money but doesn't overload you with anxiety and stress the day before the wedding. For instance we're still doing our own centerpieces. Brilliant - we've got this! Our invitations - done, by us! We're taking on a lot. The lights I just saw as a wedding day disaster waiting to happen.

At the end of the day I feel like I was a little defeated by the lights, but I also feel such a sense of relief from laying down and letting this one go. I know that this solution may not work for everyone because budgets are too tight to rent. Believe me, we're kind of there ourselves. At this point we're robbing Peter to pay Paul with our budget. We decided to go even smaller with our already cheap centerpieces to help pay for lights. We made our own invitations to help pay for the lights. It was just important to us, and at the end of the day it's something that I don't want to have to stress about the day before my wedding.

By the way, this is not the first project/dilemma that's gotten the best of me and beaten me. Stay tuned to hear how the Gocco bent me over as well!

A Perfect Card Box Giveaway!

2010-04-14T10:35:00.000-07:00

- GIVEAWAY CLOSED -

CONGRATULATIONS TO BRITTNEY!!

For those that didn't win, now is the time to buy a Perfect Card Box. FREE Shipping promotion happening as we speak!

I'm thrilled to announce another Temple of Groom giveaway. This time I'm giving away something that you can definitely use at your wedding - The Perfect Card Box. Put this card box on your gift table and you don't have to worry about misplacing any cards (especially ones with cash!). Your table will just look nicer with the perfect card box instead of a bunch of cards strewn around. It's just a nice finishing touch! It's all about the details, right?

This is a great way to display a couple of your engagement session photos, or maybe just some of your other fun pictures. The box locks, so if you've got that one friend that loves to get blackout drunk and steal stuff (who doesn't have a friend like that?!) you won't have to worry that the honeymoon fund you were counting on will disappear. The winner will get his/her choice of white card box or black - a $79 gift for FREE! Hop over to The Perfect Card Box to take a look at what they have to offer.

TO ENTER THE PERFECT CARD BOX GIVEAWAY:

1. If you aren't a follower of the Temple of Groom blog, follow it (on the left side of the screen there's a section titled "Become a Temple of Groom Follower") - if you already follow the blog you can skip this step.

2. Leave a comment on this post!

3. Email me: templeofgroom@gmail.com (this way I can easily contact you if you're the winner)

The contest closes on MONDAY (April 19th) at 4:00PM. I will enter every entry into the computer and let it randomly pick one of you! Good luck!!

A tough sad lesson

2010-04-13T12:25:00.000-07:00

Other than details about Rebecca or myself, I try not to divulge personal information about my friends or family on the blog. Some bloggers are smart and never tell their friends about their blog and can therefor post about every facet of their lives without fear of phone calls from irate friends. They post behind a cloak of anonymity that I unfortunately don't share.

When friends and family are such a big part of life and the wedding planning process, it's hard to keep them off limits. Sure, I've put up several blog polls the day after blowout fights with my parents to settle the score (ie do you need cutesy stamps for a save-the-date?), but that's as much as I've brought anyone into the Temple of Groom world. I think I've been successful while keeping them out of it... until now. I recently learned a lesson and it's something that I feel should be written to perhaps keep readers from going down the same path as I did. For the first time I need to bring my friends into the Temple for a bit, and I'm praying they don't mind.

The past few months have been a difficult for several of my friends. A couple of my close buddies are going through relationship breakups right now. It's the worst. I hate seeing them sad and mopey. Breaking up is the worst. It's the hardest thing to do, but it's so completely necessary sometimes and usually it works for the best. It's just impossible to see that while you're going through it. If my friends are reading this, I really hope they know that they can call at any hour of the day and I'll be at the bar waiting with shots in hand if they need it.

I'm sure you're wondering what the meaning of this post is. The sad lesson I learned: Don't book your buddy's girlfriend to be a wedding vendor. Believe it or not 2 of my friends had girlfriends that were professional makeup artists that could do hair as well. Months ago they offered to do Rebecca's wedding day makeup and hair. We happily accepted. It would save us money and we'd get to use people we know, loved, and trusted. Without lifting a finger we had a makeup artist AND a backup makeup artist. Flash forward and our friends' relationships have unfortunately hit much harder times. Our wedding is so insignificant to the feelings of our friends that when they apologized for the loss of our wedding makeup artist it was almost comical. It's really the LAST thing I could care about right now. However, I feel like it's a very valid lesson to be learned. Think twice before you just assume that your friend's girlfriend can work your wedding. In our scenario, both friends' relationships were in very good standing when we originally spoke to the girls about helping out on our wedding day. Relationships are just obviously very tricky and breakups can come out of nowhere. Unless someone is engaged or married it makes it difficult to depend that they will still be around when the wedding comes around. It's something that we didn't even consider. We'll find another makeup artist, but more importantly, anyone out there looking for an awesome Temple of Groom approved guy? My friends are awesome.

Shower time

2010-04-13T10:39:00.000-07:00

In a couple weeks Rebecca is going to have her wedding shower. She really wasn't sure if she wanted to have one or not, but as we've gotten closer to the party, she's getting pretty excited. She really didn't know if the get-together/games thing was her. I think that a lot of the silly games kind of turned her off and made her think that bridal showers were just not "her". BUT when she realized that it was just a party to alleviate the stress of wedding planning for a day, and just let her relax with her family and close friends back home, AND it makes her feel like a bride for the first time she recognized that a shower could be a good thing. Last but certainly not least, we've gotten our first taste of getting items off our registry. We have a pavlovian salivating response every time we see the UPS truck go by. It's been awesome.

I wanted to post Rebecca's invitation to the shower because I think it's really great.

With a little help from Ernie, Rebecca created the entire invitation herself (I cropped out the details of the party: where, when, etc). She did all the photoshopping. Believe it or not Ernie's shower cap used to be pink and I kind of demanded that we change the color... she really got bit by the DIY save the date/invitation bug. OR maybe it was all that whispering I've been doing in her ear when she's asleep "Rebeeeeeecccaaaaaaaaaaa youuuuuuu want to make your shower invitation! Youuuuu can do it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

117 days and Rebecca has a work trip?!?!

2010-04-13T10:15:00.000-07:00

I have 117 days until my wedding. Wow. Last Thursday marked the 4 months out mark. The wedding nightmares have started to become more frequent. Every time I wake up I wonder if I'm the only guy that has the type of wedding nightmares I'm having. They aren't the kind where I don't know if I've sowed my wild oats, or I don't know if I'm ready to get married... they are the kind where I realize I forgot to invite 2/3rds of my guest list, or that I screwed up with the venue and told them the wrong date of the wedding. Do other guys have these types of dreams before the wedding. I guess the majority of guys probably have "I'm late to my own wedding" dreams since a lot of them are only responsible for showing up on time when it comes to wedding planning.

Rebecca left today for a 2 week business trip. I know that it's probably not a great thing to blog about someone not being at the house but a note for all burglars: whenever Rebecca is gone I like to let our shotgun sleep in her spot in the bed beside me. I also get a chance to set up all my "Home Alone" booby traps without getting yelled at by the fiance. Am I kidding... who knows? What are the odds that a geeky wedding blogger sleeps with a shotgun? Who sets up "Home Alone" Rube Goldberg-esque booby traps? Is it worth finding out? That's really your call.

ANYWAY (sorry for the tangent) that means that I'm kind of on my own for wedding stuff for the next few weeks. Most likely it just means that nothing SOLID will get planned but there are things I need to cross off the list when she's gone. I wonder if this is one of the first times in history that the groom has been in the driver seat all alone wedding planning. Granted, I'm probably just going to let the car idle for a little, then maybe put it into neutral and let the wind push it down the street, but I will be driving the wedding planning for the next few weeks.

I've got a lot on my mind right now and I thought about cramming it into one massive post - but I think I'm going to split it up. Wow, a multiple post day. Haven't seen one of those in a while.

I can't believe I'm getting anything done when my pup's daycare has a webcam I could be watching!

Just the Tip

2010-04-07T11:58:00.001-07:00

Rebecca and I are working through our wedding budget right now and something that we've had in the back of our minds, but really haven't accounted for, is tipping. SO, we've been cutting back on our up front wedding costs so we can appropriately tip vendors as needed.

My question to anyone that has wedding experience, or anyone that is engaged and has been thinking about tips: Who do you tip and how much should one generally tip? (let's assume everyone hired does a geat job!)

I know that I'll most likely get a comment that just has a link to another wedding site w/ a blog titled "Here's how to tip!" but I would really love to hear your thoughts on tipping your vendors. It'd be great to get any personal advice you may have! Help us!

Romance Novel Save The Date

2010-03-31T13:44:00.000-07:00

A friend of mine sent her save the date to me a few weeks ago, and from the moment I saw it I knew I had to put it on the blog. It's kind of the best save the date I've ever seen. The delay in posting it was only caused by my pure jealousy that I didn't think of doing this first AND because I wanted to give it a few weeks before it totally dwarfed my Facebook inspired std.

SO, without further ado: Adrienne & John's romance novel save the date! Below you'll see their faces photoshopped onto an incredible romance novel cover they found. Excellent photoshop work!

(click the awesomeness to enlarge it!)

Apparently John proposed via text message. I've been told it's a long story! One of these days I'll make her tell it to me, but on top of wedding planning she's also planning a cross country move! Btw, I blurred out their website address because after you see how awesome their save the date is, I know a lot of you are going to want to see what their wedding is like. Can't wait to see the pictures. Good luck Adrienne!

Need a band? Call your Synagogue!

2010-03-26T14:55:00.000-07:00

I can already feel it - these guys are gonna blow UP! Maybe we should have asked our Temple if they have a house band we could hire. Orthodox Jewish band covering Lady Gaga's "Bad Romance" at a wedding of Shia and Perry. (Love how they incorporate the names into the song)

Well I've always heard, Ain't no party like a Hassidic Jewish party cause a Hassidic Jewish party don't STOP (unless it starts on Friday morning in which case it does stop for shabbat)! Oh man, I have like a million of these! Leave your best Orthodox Jewish band covering Lady Gaga jokes in the comments below.

Damn, one more, I can't stop: Wow, I know Lady Gaga loves shocking us with her wardrobe, but really, putting on a beard, yarmulke, and peyas is a little anti-semtic.

Now I'm done. Enjoy the video.

Tracking my "over-it" level but getting excited!

2010-03-24T16:42:00.000-07:00

Have any of you hit the point where you start to doubt or second guess everything you've planned for your wedding? That was me several weeks ago. Maybe it's the fact that we're most likely going to exceed our budget, or that I feel like we're just working our butts to the bone planning and stressing, or maybe it's just run of the mill general second guessing that comes from contractually agreeing to many different people that it's hard to see the big picture! Anyway, I hit the wedding wall. My "over-it level" was at about 90%.

One thing that helped me get exciting again was a visit to our wedding venue - Cass House Inn. A few weeks ago Rebecca and I drove up the California coast to our wedding venue for the day. We needed to see our reception area for some measurements, have a food tasting, and look for rental vendors (for tables, chairs, linens, etc). Over-it level 92%.

When we got to the small town where we're getting married it immediately made me feel like we'd made the right choice in venue. The town is so peaceful and it just helped mellow me out. I could hear myself think. I could hear the ocean. It was so nice. Over-it level 76%.

Even though I'm on a diet (probably something else that's contributing to my hostility and irritation) we walked over to the Brown Butter Cookie Company. We've decided that we're not having a cake at our wedding for dessert. If you actively follow the blog, that won't be a surprise to you, but if you don't - let me fill you in quickly about my decision - cake is completely overrated, the end. So our venue is going to make small bite size desserts. You go over, you pop a truffle in your mouth, you have a glug of wine, and you get back to dancing. Sounds awesome. Well, Rebecca and I found this cookie company next to our wedding venue that makes some of the best cookies I've ever had in my life. They're made with brown butter, and sea salt. They're awesome. We decided to work with the 2 sisters that own the cookie shop, and in addition to the desserts our venue will make, we're also giving out cookies. I like sweets, sure, maybe not as much as people that would call themselves chocoholics or people that need a sweet fix, but I'm telling you, these cookies kind of make my knees buckle they're so good. Over-it level 53%.

Rebecca and I met with the owners of our venue, and they are just so easy going and cool. The chef (one of the owners) came out and talked to us quickly about our wedding dinner menu. He can basically do anything we want. He just needs a few keywords to go by, or needs to know what we like/dislike - needed to know who we are, etc. SO, we just told him that we've been going to the farmer's markets lately. So we're kind of on this whole eat fresh, eat local kick. He and his wife smiled and let us know that that's exactly what they're about. We told him we're also adventurous and while we will have many people at our venue that aren't we do want to introduce unconventional wedding ingredients to the menu. We were talking about small passed appetizers and the chef said "Pizza from our wood fire oven, but how about we do a duck and caramelized onion with brie and a balsamic reduction?" Um... Over-it level 39%.

After our meeting we had to drive about 25 minutes to the rental company that our venue suggested. Before we hit the road though we swung by our favorite sandwich spot in town. We ordered some sandwiches for the road. Ruddell's Smokehouse is a small sandwich shack that makes the most amazing smoked fish sandwiches I've ever had. I desperately want to buy sandwiches or tacos for everyone coming to the wedding the night before the big day, it just unfortunately doesn't fit into the budget. Sad. The sandwiches are awesome. I had to pull over to shove mine down my throat because the windy mountain roads weren't easy to navigate while trying to eat a Smoked Albacore sandwich. Plus I wanted to savor the sandwich. Delicious. Over-it level 22%.

We had our meeting at the rental company. It went well, but I quickly realized this is going to slam our budget. Damn it; over-it level 28%. The woman at the company couldn't have been nicer. I think I just underestimated how much goes into weddings. I think I just underestimated how much this stuff costs. Stuff sounds so cheap when you say it's only 45 cents per plate, but then when you multiply it in your head and then add it to the list of other stuff you need... damn it. Over-it level 31%. Again I want to reiterate that the company we may use couldn't be nicer. She's working with us... it's just AHHHHHH!!!!!!! FUUUUUUUUCK!!!!! (sorry, I really try not to curse on the blog because I don't know how you guys feel about it... but seriously... fuck... ) That felt pretty good. COME ON though... lights are so much more expensive than I thought they were. We're not having flowers.... lights are cheaper... right?! Yes, but still super expensive?!?!? DAMN it. This fork vs. that fork... round table vs. straight. It's so much to think about. The company couldn't have made it easier, but I just realized that there's so much to planning that I hadn't even thought of. Over-it level 34%.

I got back in the car... over-it level still relatively low compared to where I had been at the beginning of the day! Immediately I ate a cookie. Over-it level 30%. Lights and forks? What lights and forks. Me want cookie.

To cap off the day Rebecca and I headed back to our venue to do a dinner/tasting. Since the chef doesn't have a set wedding menu and will really work with us to make whatever we want, our venue doesn't do a conventional wedding tasting. IE here's your meat option, here's your chicken option, here's are your appetizer options. So we did dinner, and they also hooked us up with wine pairings so we can see how they roll w/ their food & beverage smarts.

GOOD GOD the food was awesome. I won't completely bore you with course by course details, but holy eff the food was good. They started us with an amuse bouche (amuse the mouth, a small little bite to start the meal) that was a king crab fritter on some type of aoli sauce with a piece of parsley on top. WOW. So that's how you do things here, huh? Over-it level 22%. Then we had about 5 courses, each one better than the last. My steak was unbelievable. Perhaps one of the best steak dishes I've ever had. It was perfection. I can easily be a self proclaimed foodie snob when it comes to food so I'm not just giving props to our venue because we've put a non-refundable deposit down. Over-it level 12%. The wine pairings... oh man... all of these wines were very very good but then once you began eating the dish the wine was paired with its flavor transformed. It made them GREAT. The food and beverage just worked so harmoniously together. 5 glasses later: over-it level 3%. I decided that it was probably smart to have some coffee for the trip home. French press (see post below) awesomeness.... over-it level 1%.

As I walked to the car to head back to Los Angeles, I really felt so great about every decision we've made so far. What a great feeling. You know what? Before we hit the road, let me go back into our venue and go to the bathroom real quickly.... oh man, even their SOAP is awesome.

Over-it level 0%.

TEMPLE OF GROOM - GIVEAWAY!

2010-03-22T11:17:00.000-07:00

- GIVEAWAY NOW CLOSED -

STAY TUNED TO THE BLOG FOR MORE GIVEAWAYS!

I've been a little nonexistent in the blogesphere the last couple weeks (did I really just use the word blogesphere?) so I wanted to do something a little special for my return!

I'm pleased to announce the first giveaway on my site! Very much thanks to a company called CSN Stores for hooking up one lucky follower of my blog. CSN has over 200 stores on the web that sell: kids bedding, furniture, cookware, barware, etc. Basically everything. If you want it, CSN Stores sells it.

One lucky Temple of Groom follower will win this awesome 5 Piece Primula French Press Coffee Set.
I'm telling you right now as I type this at 2pm on a Monday that I wish I had this coffee set in front of me right now. Daddy's day is draggin!

To enter you must do 2 of the following 3 things by noon on Friday (3/26):
1. Become a follower of the blog (click the "follow" button on the left side of the page under "Become a Temple of Groom Follower")
2. Leave 1 comment on any post in the blog!
3. Email templeofgroom@gmail.com - it doesn't have to say anything in the email - I just want to be sure I have a way to contact you! BUT if you want to say something in the email, it would make my day because I don't have caffeine to keep me awake.

Randomly one person will be picked and will win.

Good luck!

UPDATE: Congrats to the winner of the giveaway: Dana! Thanks to everyone that entered. I'll hopefully have another giveaway and you'll win that one, I promise.

Time Flies!

2010-03-04T13:35:00.000-08:00

Exactly one year ago right NOW I was on top of a mountain (Masada) in Israel. Crouching down on one knee, ring in hand. It was the best day ever. Our first day in the last week w/o rain (who knew it rained in Israel?!), and our first day after our bronchitis had started to clear. God said, "Let their be light so this poor fool can propose to his girlfriend".

An entire year has gone by? That's nuts to me. It feels like it was yesterday. Each day in Israel thinking that would be the day I would propose, but the moment never presented itself. Now a year later and we're in the homestretch of our wedding planning process. So much has happened this year that I'm truly thankful for. Our engagement, our pup Ernie, our house, this blog, our family and friends, anyone that reads this blog, etc. etc etc. It's just been an overall great year. So many great blessings. The best part is that we are about to get MARRIED this year, so it's not like things are dwindling down and going to get any less exciting any time soon.

I know this post isn't quite what you all have grown accustomed to on my blog, but I thought it was necessary!

Game. Set. Match: DJ!

2010-02-25T14:07:00.000-08:00

We booked a DJ! What a long crazy ride it's been. How did this happen?!? How'd we get here? Sit back and I'll tell you about one of the best decisions we've made for our wedding.

[cue music: Song TBD by our DJ]

Chapter 1: Splurging all over dueling pianists!
When we first started planning our wedding we were pretty positive we were going to book a band. In one of my first blog posts, "Band, DJ, iPod?" you don't have to be in the FBI's behavioral analysis unit (god I love "Criminal Minds") to tell that I was very pro-band. I had high hopes that I would book some sort of dueling pianos set up. Although live musicians are very expensive we tagged "reception entertainment" as one of our "splurge items". We would definitely watch our spending everywhere else, so we could spend a few more bucks on musicians. It was a perfect setup. So I set out to find a dueling piano act, and I found one. It was, perhaps, a little more expensive than I figured it would be, but I was ready to pay for it.

That's when paranoia set in about the dueling piano act. Is it danceable? And I know they say they can rein in the kitsch factor of their shows, but could they REALLY? I was prepared to take my chances with the kitsch (certainly I could have put something in the contract), but I still wasn't very sure our guests could dance to a few pianos. It would be a good show, but not for dancing. So I looked into adding a drummer to the piano show which raised the already high price. Then I figured while I was adding a drummer, why not add a guitarist.... I realized that I was just building a rather large band - one with 2 baby grand pianos.... and completely out of our price range. I had to let the dueling pianists go. They were unobtainable. It would have been fun, but just too much money. I wasn't prepared to spend that much, and at the end of the day, it seemed like thinking outside of the box was just too expensive. There's a reason there's an inside of the box.

Chapter 2: Counting all my Benjamins (so far, 0)
So after my failed attempt to sign a dueling pianos band I decided to further disappoint myself and try to reach out to the real reason I wanted a piano band in the first place. I desperately wanted to book Ben Folds for our wedding. In my head it made perfect sense: he'd somehow find the blog, see how awesome Rebecca and I are, and it would make him remember why he got into the music industry in the first place. He'd want to play a free 3 hour show for sure. I don't think I need to make this chapter any longer than it should be - we all know the outcome - it was short lived, kind of a joke, and didn't pan out the way I expected it to.

Chapter 3: Finding a band OR How do I stop bands from repeatedly calling my cellphone?
I hit up GigMasters, and spent hours and hours searching for a band. We were wading through a pool of punny band names mixed with a glorious level of so-so talent (disclaimer: there are some really talented bands on GigMasters, I'm not saying they are all bad). I really want to tell you some of the names, but would that be too mean? Should I? Oh man... fine. Phat Chants, The Ringtones, Buster Groove, and about 50 bands w/ some variation of the word Sensation in the title. I read profiles for bands that made my day they were so ridiculous (like this one). It seemed like a high quality band that was capable of playing 3 hours worth of music that we liked was going to cost us at least 1/2 of our wedding budget. And for the most part, the bands that we liked were a little too "glitsy" for our laid back & casual wedding. For instance, ones that came with dancers, or ones that sent me riders about needing a green room w/ specific foods & specific stage requirements needed for their show... Seriously?! You're not playing Dodger Stadium, you're playing a Bed & Breakfast in an off-the-beaten-path beach town in central California. Your deli tray, m&ms, and skittles are the LEAST of my worries on my wedding day. (The rider w/ specific foods is not a joke - one band included this with their quote!)

There were a handful of talented, young, & fun bands that were close to our price range. So I requested quotes. All the bands got back to me and were willing to work with their rates, but at the end of the day they were just all a bit out of our price range, AND at the end of the day we just weren't excited enough about any of them to splurge!

Currently I have the awesome fortune of getting 3-5 voicemails a week from all of the bands asking me if I've reconsidered, or if I've booked anyone else, or if I just changed my mind. Today I got a phone call from a band and it stated (verbatim) "I left you a message on January 18th, February 4th, and February 15th, this will be my last call..." Um really?! Do you promise?! I've already spoken with you and let you know I've gone a different route, but you still call! Take a hint, we broke up... move on. (BTW, if you're the guy from a band that's been calling me and you're reading this, I know you're just doing your job, you seem like a really nice guy, and your band is one of the ones that I liked, but we just can't book you, I'm sorry.)

Chapter Four: Ripping the band-aid off quickly and painlessly!
So Rebecca and I kicked up a lot of dust in our multiple band quote request, and once the dust settled and we saw the bands we could afford, we asked ourselves, "Why do we want a band anyway?". The ones that we could afford generally sounded a tad cheesy/campy, and when we thought about our wide wide tastes of music we realized we would be asking way too much of a band to be able to adequately play everything we like. We started to look at bands' playlists and saw a lot we liked, but at the same time saw a lot we didn't like. Bands in our price range just couldn't play enough music we love. At the end of the day we realized that if we were able to find a DJ... the RIGHT DJ..... one that we could trust and felt comfortable with - that would be the best option for us. But with my trust issues that would prove not to be such an easy task.

The Final Chapter, Chapter 5: I'm starting to sound like a Groomzilla
Ms. Temple of Groom and I set out to find a DJ. Friends recommended a few. Some seemed too cool for school w/ their house trance music mixes and some seemed really good, but overpriced. After all, we were trying to save money by hiring a DJ. We went on a wide rampage looking for DJs. Hell, I even went to a DJ's website that I found from being in traffic on the 101. He was the car in front of me, and had his DJ bumper sticker advertisement on his back window. Something told me that DJ Dandy wasn't going to be the right fit for us, but I still had to see his site. If you're bored, and want to see it, you can click here - spoiler alert: the front page has an english bulldog in a jester hat.

So needless to say, I became more and more hesitant about entrusting our wedding reception to a DJ. Sure they are a little less expensive than a band, but at what cost? I've been to weddings where the DJ seemed to have his own agenda no matter what the he and the bride & groom agreed to. I've seen some DJs literally do magic tricks for the party. I've heard horror stories where DJs made the night about themselves talking on the mic at any given chance, or played the chicken dance. It just seemed like such a risk. I started to think I didn't need a DJ, I needed a music babysitter. I don't think I could come up with fun playlists on my iPod for the entire day, and I don't think that a pre-made playlist can match up with the energy of any given moment. I would be stressed about it all evening. I think that reading energy + manipulating it is something so beneficial that a DJ brings to the party.

SO, I found some DJs close to the venue, and I started drafting my emails to them - bitchy bitchy bitchy groomzilla-esque emails. Ones where I would tell them I didn't want them to speak. Ones that asked them if they'd honor a "do not play" list and would use their judgment and not play songs similar to songs on our do-not-play list (IE if we said no "macarena" you shouldn't play "come on ride the train"). I was proofreading my email and I felt dirty. Like a mean person. I didn't like it, but I just don't want to be burned. Before I hit "send" I sent out a tweet that changed everything:

Oh man, I'm drafting an email to potential DJs and I can't help but come off very groomzilla-esque. I need to sound more positive!

Mere minutes later I received a tweet in response to mine from someone named @TeamBride. It said: @TempleofGroom I can help you out if you want...I wouldn't want you to sound like a groomzilla and I'm a DJ...

Wow. Someone was coming to my rescue to give me DJ advice. Not just SOMEONE, a wedding blogger... a bride-to-be that sends out tweets that I follow... and she was going to help me sound like a better person.

So we started instant messaging, and talking about our weddings, and talking about music in general and TeamBride (Samantha) is extremely knowledgeable and extremely willing to help with any questions I had. During our chat I started reading through her blog, found her top 10 songs at the moment - I love them all. Then it hit me... Samantha is a DJ, I love her taste in music, and she seems like she's completely on the same page as us in terms of what we want our wedding to be. I wanted TeamBride/Sam/DJ Evoke to be our DJ.

By far one of the smartest decisions I think I've made during my months of wedding planning is confiding in and entrusting a DJ that also happens to be planning her own wedding as well. She truly understands my fears and what I want my day to be. More times than not, I don't think the DJ really understands the importance of the day for the bride & groom. Not only because he's single and living in a basement of his parents' house (kidding kidding), but also because he's most likely a guy that doesn't worry about weddings or wedding planning. He may have just "shown up" on his day if he's married. Samantha truly GETS it. I couldn't feel more confident in our decision. Rebecca and I already had a disagreement on what music to play during the cocktail hour - so we got in a chatroom with Sam, and she diffused that bomb so effortlessly. She's truly the best. I'm so happy to welcome DJ Evoke to the Temple of Groom family.

The beauty of it all is that I didn't even have to send 1 bitchy email out to potential DJs. This was just meant to be. Very excited.

Here's what's going on:

2010-02-24T11:48:00.000-08:00

Wow, I'm in awe of how wedding bloggers can juggle daily life, work, wedding planning, and STILL find time to blog. Not only do some of you find time to blog, but yo also find time to find awesome and interesting wedding stuff online, THEN blog about it! [slow clap that builds to a standing ovation] I have not been that good! Perhaps I overvalue sleep.

So, we're steadily moving forward with our wedding plans. It's 165 days away. Which seems like such a short amount of time, but I've realized as friends have gotten engaged then married within the time we've been engaged, is plenty of time to get things done. No need to panic about things that aren't done yet!

We've made some progress in the last couple weeks or so! As you've read, we finished registering which took way longer than expected. We also came up with the idea for our E-Session photographs (you'll have to wait and see). I think we potentially found our wedding ceremony musicians, and our reception DJ. OH! I bought my wedding suit! That was awesome. Thanks to a blogger named BowieBride (http://www.bowiebride.com/) who gave me the tip that Barney's Warehouse sale was happening. The suit is beautiful. As soon as I can fit into it, I'll take pictures. Kidding, I can fit.... kind of. Okay, I confess, I bought a suit that has pants that are a little snug. It's my inspiration to lose weight....it's working. Anyway - it's a Michael Kors 3 piece suit. Awesome. Now I just need to find a great shirt, and my sneakers.

On our plate right now we're thinking about videography. I think I came up with one particularly great way to cut costs which I'll share with you later if it comes to fruition. One thing I decided I'm going to do to help combat the astronomical rates I've seen on some of these videographer websites is edit the footage on my own. I know that it's most likely a LOT to chew, but I think that I could easily lay "I had the time of my life" over some reception footage as well as the next guy. Capturing moments on video has always been very important to my family so it's something we need to book, but we're having trouble budgeting it. My dad has been converting all our family videos to DVD and he's been sending me copies. It's been awesome to watch them all, and it makes me realize we really need a videographer.

We're also trying to figure out what our tables are going to look like. I'd really like to go with that "casually eclectic looks effortless but really wasn't" tablescape. SO, at some point we're going to hit up some flea markets and look for cool mismatched vases and potential knickknacks. Also, we're thinking more candles - less flowers.

Which leads me to the next morsel of business! We're going down to the flower district this weekend. Any fellow wedding bloggers out there want to meet us? We'll most likely buy our chuppa poles - and I think Rebecca wants to get some ideas for flowers to carry. I also think she wants to buy flower seed to potentially make her own bouquet.

I know I'm forgetting a whole bunch of stuff we're doing. We need to start designing our invitations. I'm so worried I've bitten off more than I can chew with Gocco. I know we'll eventually understand it, then fall in love with it - I'm just apprehensive. We also need to make time to get up to our wedding venue and meet with rental houses about certain things. Wow.

Oh man... So much to do. Anxiety and panic setting in. Overtaking body. I need a brown paper bag to breathe into. Maybe I can find a cool vintagey decorated one on etsy, or better yet regretsy.

Save the Date!!!!

2010-02-18T09:56:00.000-08:00

Our Save The Dates went out last week, and I'm pretty sure all of my guests have seen it already - so I figured this was a great time to let you all see it too!

(Oh, um.... look, if you're finding out that you didn't get invited to the wedding this way I'm really sorry.... we're trying to keep the invite list WAY down for budget purposes, and dude, you're totally the 1st one we're inviting as soon as we find out someone can't make it!)

SO, here it is! Our facebook inspired save-the-date. I did everything in Illustrator. Nothing was taken from the actual site!

(CLICK IT TO ENLARGE!)

The blurred out sections are where I put links to our wedding website. I thought I would keep that private for now. Also, everyone featured on the save-the-date is in either one of our immediate families. The two couples that "like" the status update are our parents, and the two girls that left comments are Rebecca's sister, and MY sister Rebecca.

What do you guys think?!

Registered

2010-02-11T11:41:00.000-08:00

Over the last couple weeks Ms. Temple of Groom and I have registered for our wedding. Registering was something I looked forward to ever since I got down on my knee and asked Rebecca to be my wife. Needless to say, I was excited!

So after all the dust settled, the registry guns have cooled, I have just one question: Is it just me, or does anyone else think registering is totally overhyped?! There were moments where we had a blast registering, however I wouldn't say that we were skipping down the aisles of the stores, but we were on a roll, finding stuff we liked, and zapping it.

While we were trudging down the aisles of Bed Bath & Beyond, I did come up with some ideas that I think would make the whole registering thing more enjoyable for an engaged couple.

1. Use real guns, then tell the store to go tally up everything with a bullet hole and THAT'S what you want on your registry. (kidding)

2. Jump start your registry online before going into the store. This is my biggest morsel of advice for you. If you've already started your registry online you don't have to go through the store clerks hour long lecture about how registries work. He'll do 15 solid minutes of registry humor that will leave you miserable. Then you get to tell him the entire story of how the two of you met, and when you're getting married. If you're like me, and generally get annoyed pretty quickly, this will put you over the edge. It honestly tainted the entire day. I'm guessing that a lot of you women out there have much more patience for this than us guys, but keeping your fiance happy and attentive will make for a better registering experience.

3. Register for everything, everywhere. If you're going to multiple stores, don't kill momentum by standing in the middle of the aisle thinking "Did we like this food processor more than the one we registered for at the other store?" just zap it! You can decide which one is cooler online later.

You should either go into each store with a specific list of things you want (IE. Crate & Barrel get accessories only, Bed Bath & Beyond get kitchen things only, etc) or just go in prepared to gun just about anything that looks appealing that you want with the assumption that you'll get online later and clean up your registry list.

4. Take turns playing with the gun. If you want your fiance to help, you should let him get some target practice as well. It's only fair. Additionally, even if you know he's breaking the gun, let him figure it out. Rebecca did a good job of sharing the gun and that was much appreciated.

5. Get online. I really have enjoyed managing our registries online. It takes pressure off of being in the actual store and forgetting things. Additionally AMAZON's registry has been incredible. You can add anything that's for sale online into your amazon registry. It's been great. Let your guy make a list of cool items he wants that you may not find in the stores you're registered. Then perhaps you can weed out items like the 3 video game systems and the Monkey Art off the list, and narrow it down to that awesome Popsicle machine he found.

5a. Some stores are just better online than in person. When we went to Bed Bath & Beyond, we had a terrible time registering. We couldn't get out of the store fast enough. Spoiler Alert: Readers that work at the North Hollywood Bed Bath & Beyond should skip down to tip #6. First of all, even though we registered online - they STILL made us go into some seedy room for 40 minutes to talk to a "Registry Specialist" who showed us Bed Bath & Beyond's website on a 10 year old monitor. It was a little less fun than I'm making it sound. We had perfect intentions to look for everyday casual china, but much to our dismay when we inquired, she brought out a binder with terrible picture printouts of the plates. That's when we got to watch her browse the internet looking for better pictures. Then we had to make chit chat with her before she gave us our gun. Rebecca also told me to add a tip not to drink too much coffee before you go to these things...I digress...

Finally when we got out into the store, we quickly realized that Bed Bath and Beyond only shows about a quarter of their inventory in the store. We asked for multiple items only to be told "Oh, you have to register for that online!" While it's mandatory that you see specific items in person - china, linens - there are a whole lot of items you can just register for online. Plus you don't have to deal with screaming babies and people that just seem to stare at the ceiling and lights when they walk around the store.

6. Not all stores are created equal. Sometimes it's cool to register at a store that nobody you know registered, HOWEVER, more times than not there's an absolute reason nobody has registered there.

Here's my note to you, SUR LA TABLE. Get with it! People love your store. I LOVE your store. Your registry division is a JOKE. Your website is not navigable. Rebecca and I went to register at one of the most popular store locations in LA. When we stepped foot in the store we got excited about registering for the first time! Everything we saw we wanted. It was the feeling we were looking for. When we asked for a registry gun, the store apologetically told us that the ONE registry scanner they had was broken. ONE?! Really?! So we went to another sur la table store, and while their gun was working, the clerks certainly didn't know how to load our registry into the computer. We had to go through and tell them everything that we wanted, and everything that was on our list that we did NOT register for. It was a mess. So we went home, checked our registry online, only to discover that on the site they don't include thumbnail pictures and adequate descriptions for every item. Nobody will want to buy us an item they can't see, or don't know what it is. No joke, one item was called "Made in Thailand" and it didn't have a picture. Needless to say, we wound up deleting our Sur La Table registry. So my advice is to stick with the stores that seem to know what they're doing. There's a reason you haven't seen people use certain stores.

7. Spoil yourself. Originally we didn't register at Bloomingdales because I figured it was just way too overpriced and I took my guests pocketbooks into consideration. However when we went into the store last week it was completely competitively priced with other places we registered. The best thing about Bloomingdales was the layout of their store. They had everything displayed nicely, and most of their inventory is out and you can touch it (they had every color kitchen aid, every le creuset item, china, everyday plates, etc). Additionally, the store was much calmer than a Crate & Barrel. We had such a fun time picturing everything in our house and deciding what to get. Another definite pro of going to a finer store was that the sales staff knew the product. They were very knowledgeable about every item we asked about and when we asked for suggestions they were able to supply opinions. Whereas at another store we went to coughBED BATH & BEYONDcough when we asked for a suggestion we got this as an answer "You know, you can really do whatever you'd like. It's like you either like this plate or you go a different route and get something totally different. The thing to remember is that it's your registry so you can like get anything you want! It's like you want to look for a plate, and you can totally go to our website to see everything!" Go to a nice place. You'll be shocked at the serenity... you'll enjoy the service... and you'd be surprised that it's not more expensive.

8. Add some fun items to your list you don't think anyone will buy. There are a couple of items that I really want that are obviously crazy overpriced. Look, there's really only two things that can happen - your friends get a good chuckle that you registered for a $5400 photograph of a monkey (monkey 1 or monkey 2) or someone is going to be crazy enough to buy you that monkey photo! Okay, maybe the latter is never ever going to happen, but there are most likely some items you think are a tad excessive to put on your list that others wouldn't think are all that bad. Or maybe you have a couple relatives that will go in together to get the big ticket item. The moral of the story is don't hold back. You have nothing to lose.

A potential wedding band?!

2010-02-08T12:39:00.000-08:00

I think I may have found our wedding band. Great idea to reunite a family member's band!

Things I learned from my 1st Vegas bachelor party

2010-02-05T14:51:00.000-08:00

I recently attended my first Vegas bachelor party (and actually my first bachelor party total). In the grand scheme of things it was tame compared to what I’ve seen in movies – no animal “shows” or sacrifices, no high speed chases or little Asian mafia men jumping from car trunks. Just a lot of drinking, gambling, and a few strippers sprinkled on top. Nothing really had to “stay in Vegas” that I couldn’t bring back to me in California though (which isn’t a such a bad thing). I think it was a more realistic version of what we see in movies or on TV. So I’ve come back with a six pack of tips for the newbies on the block who don’t really know what to expect.

1. Pay more to get your own bed. This was something I should have been more adamant about. Because most of my friends are on a TIGHT budgets, we opted for the “how many guys can we cram into this room” approach. Sure it was great that we only owed $40 for the room at the end of the weekend, but it really wasn’t worth sleeping with my ear infected buddy on top of me for a night. During the bachelor party planning stages, you need to do everything in your power to insure that you will get your own bed. Even if you only sleep for 45 minutes over 2 days like I did, it’s at least a COMFORTABLE 45 minutes. Additionally, it’s not enough that you simply suggest this to your buddies (this is my fatal error), you seriously need to make this your bitness. If that means you put a few extra dollars down, it’ll be money well spent. Find someone else that feels the same way and split a different 2 bed room with him. Additionally, and this may be tip 1a, when picking a bed at the end of the night if you’re sharing a room, don’t assume that the bed with the messier sheets was the one that got “slept in” – do a more thorough ocular investigation.

2. Get a key to your room. This was another fatal mistake I made. I thought when I was ready to go back to the room certainly one of the guys w/ a room key would be next to me. Looking back, I can’t believe how dumb I was for thinking I’d be able to track down 1 of 2 drunk friends in VEGAS while I was also extremely drunk. If you get your own bed, or your own room, you most likely don’t have to worry about this, but if you’re like me and pile into a room with guys, don’t be surprised if the lone key bearer is nowhere to be found at the end of the night. You could get screwed out of a bed all together if your name isn’t on the reservation and your buddy goes missing.

3. Bring your own soap. This one is kind of a no-brainer, but I promise you, when you’re stepping into the shower, you’ll quickly smack yourself that you didn’t think about this sooner. Also, it’s a good idea to go grab a towel either from the front desk or the pool. Sharing a bed with a couple of guys is bad enough, sharing their soap is inexcusable.

4. Bring more cash than you think you need, but not more than you can afford to lose. The only faster way to lose your money in Vegas rather than the slots is the casino/strip club ATM machines. At the strip club, there was a $12 fee to take money out of their ATM. That’s insane. More often you’ll find yourself digging into your pockets for CASH not your credit card, and when you’re out, the only option is the ATMs. It’s brutal. If you’re out of cash, take your smart friends that brought cash out to lunch and pick up the bill on your credit card. Your friends don’t charge the ATM fee.

5. Drink 5 Hour Energy. This product got me through the weekend. No harsh crash when it’s wearing off, and the taste wasn’t bad!

6. When you’re at the strip club, “the truth will set you free.” I found that there was no really nice extremely polite way to get the strippers I wasn’t interested in to leave me alone. If I told them I wasn’t ready for a dance, they’d say “well I’ll wait next to you till you are ready.” If you said that you just got there, they’d say “so what?” There is just nothing you can say or do to get a girl to quickly stop badgering you except “I’m sorry, you’re pretty, but you’re not my type.” Most of the time after saying this, she’d give me a nasty look, but the fact that she would leave me alone was a pretty fair trade.

Engagement Session Ideas

2010-02-03T15:05:00.000-08:00

As if I needed another reason to love our photographers (Callaway Gable Photography) they've gone and posted the most beautiful engagement session ever. While the session has made the blog world rounds, I thought I would post it here just in case any of you missed it.

A couple 1940's loving clients wanted a session that displayed their love of the era. The photographers delivered. Take a look:

So now Rebecca and I are mulling over what we want to do! We wish that we had a favorite pastime other than laying on the couch with our dog and watching television! It's not very photogenic.

I think I want a hint of humor in our pictures since we're not very serious people, but I really can't come up with anything good. We want our pictures to be creative and different and special, but we're having trouble figuring out what we should do. Does anyone have any good ideas. I mean this probably helps if you know us, but even if you don't maybe you have something creative up your sleeves!

Proposal Story

2010-02-03T10:09:00.001-08:00

Check out my proposal story on Engagement 101 Magazine's blog! It was also featured in their current newsstand issue of the magazine along with the article I wrote about "Taking the Plunge."

For Your Enjoyment: 1988

2010-02-01T12:56:00.000-08:00

As promised when I hit 100 blog followers, I'm uploading a few embarrassing videos of myself. More will come when I hit 150, then 200, etc etc etc.

The first video is from my great aunt & uncle's 50th wedding anniversary party. Apparently I wanted to showcase some truly great impressions. It's a tad hard to hear due to flawless 80's technology, but you almost don't need to hear it the impressions are so uncanny. I'm one of those people who transforms into the person he's impersonating. In case you can't tell what's going on first I do Yogi Bear then my dad gets mad it's not one of my better impressions. Next up is Robin Leach, ALF, then I end my set with Pee Wee Herman.

The second video was one that happened to be on the same vhs tape as the previous. Rebecca thought this was more embarrassing and that I'd be doing my followers wrong if I didn't add this.

Let me set this one up... it's 1988. It's a roller skating birthday party. It doesn't highlight my coordination. At some point during the party I must have seen some "cool" roller rink worker do a move where he skated extremely fast then enjoyed the wind in his hair while gliding resting his body on his knees... At the end of the day, I guess I was professional enough to give that a whirl.

Want to see more videos equally or more embarrassing than these? Click "FOLLOW" on the left side of the blog under "Become a Temple of Groom Follower"

Navy Seal Proposal - yay, nay, or effing NAY!

2010-01-29T14:20:00.000-08:00

I came across this video today of a Navy Seal proposing to his girlfriend at the premiere of the "movie" 'When in Rome'. Apparently he won a contest from Robbins Bros and decided it was a great idea to propose on the red carpet.

Look, I know the guy could pummel me to a pulp, but I think this is a proposal FAIL. I have to know what you all think. It doesn't even seem like the fiance is happy.

Look I'm protected behind the beautiful cloak of the internet so I can say what I'd like about this guy and unless he REALLY wants to use his navy seal talents, I'm safe. She looks horrified and looks like she doesn't know what to do. As if watching 'When in Rome' wasn't torture enough, she's going to have to figure out how to tell this guy she only said 'yes' because there were hundreds of photographers taking her picture.

Lastly I just think the "hey, will you marry me" line just didn't seem well thought out. OR maybe it was EXTREMELY thought out - and that's all he could come up with - and it's a terrible proposal....

Oh! But if you are the Navy Seal that just happened to stumble upon this post cause you googled yourself and wanted to see the coverage you're getting... jussssst kidding!!!!!!! Congratulations on your engagement! You two are PERFECT for one another. SO romantic. I'm misty eyed!

It's fate. Another Ben Folds post.

2010-01-27T16:18:00.000-08:00

I was putzing around the internet today, and I came across this video.

Um, Ben doesn't even have to learn Hava Nagilah for the wedding. Now I'm determined this is fate.

Anyone have any great ideas on how to take this campaign viral? Videos? Song parodies? Little people punching me in the nuts as I beg on webcam? I'll listen to just about every idea you've got!

I've neglected you

2010-01-26T19:23:00.000-08:00

I'm truly sorry that I haven't posted in a few days but I have an excuse... I've been working on our wedding website all week. Instead of getting one of those ready made sites, I took on the task of designing the site myself.... fuuuuuuuuuuuuun.

I'll be back soon. I'm not cheating on you. I promise, there are no other blogs out there. No, those aren't keystrokes on my collar. I always come home to you. I love you.

sidenote: Dad put my embarrassing moment dvd in the mail today. You'll get my standup soon!

The Best Video Save-The-Date EVER

2010-01-22T12:00:00.000-08:00

Watch this. I don't know these two, but I want to. I am so excited for their wedding and I'm not even invited! Suddenly my save-the-date that I spent hours on a few weeks ago (coming back from the printer any day now) are lame. Bravo to these two....

[slow clap quickly escalating into a standing ovation]

Stay tuned for something embarrassing!

2010-01-19T16:16:00.000-08:00

I hit 100 followers today. As promised I will soon post something that will embarrass me.

I just emailed my dad to send footage from my great aunt & uncle's 50th wedding anniversary. I was probably 6 years old and I did stand-up. *Spoiler Alert * It contains impressions of PeeWee Herman, Robin Leach, and Alf.

If I can't get that to you in a timely manner, I will post a clip from a Christian cartoon where my pre-pubescent voice can be heard.

You will get something, followers, I promise.

Dear Ben: Save our Wedding!

2010-01-18T15:19:00.000-08:00

I'm about to wrap up the 1st month of the TOG + Ben Folds wedding campaign. And while I haven't heard from Ben, don't be confused, I'm not quite ready to pack up and call it a day at campaign headquarters. Even though I was quite certain that a quirky photoshop and a heartfelt letter was enough to seal the deal, I'm quickly realizing that good things come to those that show great persistence. Nothing ever comes easy, and the past month has shown me that the saying rings true when trying to book super famous mega successful musicians. Who would have thought?

So, in another attempt to reach out to Ben, I'm posting my second letter right here on this post. As always, I'm also reaching out to you, Internet, to work your magical ways of getting this to Ben. Do what you do. You brought us Susan Boyle, Tay Zonday, piano cat.... there's no reason you can't bring us Ben Folds.

Dear Ben,
Hey man, it's Dave again. I think that I may have just missed a call from you. I just totally realized that my answering machine is out of tape. The problem is now they don't really make the message machines that take tape anymore, so it's a lot harder to replace the tapes than you would think and then figuring out how to hook the entire contraption up to an iphone, it's just difficult... anyway - you obviously didn't come here to hear about my 15 year old answering machine technology.

I'm going to get serious for a second, I need you to save our wedding. Last week we sat down and tried to financially figure out a lot in regards to our wedding. After crunching numbers for hours, I just don't see a bright future for our wedding reception music. We want a band, but it's just not looking like it'll ever happen. Then there's no dancing at our wedding, so nobody has fun, and I feel terrible. It's a wedding day disaster.

Remember way back when you were getting your starts and you would play small bars and venues like that, but it was some of the most fun you had. I imagine that would be almost identical to our wedding. The only difference is instead of an unappreciative smelly bar owner sending you on your way at night, you'd have nearly 80 wedding guests showering you with love, and whatever catered dessert we decide to have (we aren't having wedding cake... we just think there are other options we'd like more). This will be one of those feel good moments of your life where you go home happy and realize that you made a difference in 2 people's lives that will last forever. This could be part of your legacy. People will talk about this forever.

I guess that's all for now. As always, feel free to email me if you've got any questions OR if you have any dietary restrictions let us know and we'll make sure our venue makes something you can eat. We'll iron out all the details later.

Talk to you soon hopefully!,
Dave

PS. We have a save-the-date we'd love to send you... let me know where to send it, and I'll get it in the mail!

Raining in LA

2010-01-18T12:37:00.000-08:00

Right now it's pouring outside. It has me thinking. Has anyone ever been to an outdoor wedding where it's rained, and the wedding couple had no backup plan? Has there ever been an outdoor wedding that just happened in the rain? Part of me thinks if it happened in the summer, and there was nothing that could be done, it could somehow be kind of romantic. Maybe that just stems from seeing so many cinematic kisses in the rain.

I just google image searched for some rainy wedding day pictures, and I've got to admit, they seem kind of nice. Look, I understand that the bride's hair and makeup will most likely be ruined and nobody HOPES for rain on his/her wedding day... I'm just saying that there's kind of a neat element to it!

Anyone else agree?

Trimming the Guest List

2010-01-15T12:16:00.000-08:00

I'm not a hoarder, I promise, but I do have trouble throwing things away. When we moved last September, Rebecca "helped" me donate a lot of clothes and items I haven't worn or used in years. I somehow grow these emotional bonds with THINGS.

Me: You can't throw those away, those were the first jeans that I ever bought that made me really start to like jeans again!
Rebecca: When was the last time you could fit into them?
Me: My junior year of college.
Rebecca: They have a giant hole in the crotch, even if you could fit into them, you wouldn't wear them.
Me: We're keeping them. I loved them.

That conversation happened over and over again with item after item: electronics, shoes, magazines, movie tickets, etc etc etc.

Now, I'm at a crossroads. We need to carve into our invite list, but I don't know how to do that. Our perfect guest list, with which I've grown attached, needs to be trimmed. Each guest is on that list for a reason - we consider them close friends or family. That being said, we need to get rid of some people. I'm not good at this.

Does anyone have tips on how to weed through the guest list? I need help.

The Entertainment Machine

2010-01-13T12:15:00.000-08:00

I've dedicated a chunk of time today attempting to find bands online. I'm sifting through tons of pages, and watching demo videos. To make things a little more fun I'm pretending I'm a high level record producer looking for the next big band. Unfortunately, I haven't found it yet.

But one listing COMPLETELY caught my eye, and I've been obsessing over it for the last hour or so. I've laughed pretty steadily since I saw this listing, and it's just totally made my day. It just tickled me the right way. So the band I found advertised themselves with by saying:

"With our band, you're not only getting several bands in one but literally an entertainment machine."

This sent my mind into a frenzy. I know they're describing themselves as being an entertainment machine, but I've been laughing since reading this imagining the band showing up with a LITERAL (as they said) entertainment machine. I've been wondering what the entertainment machine looks like. Will it clash with our centerpieces? Do I have to worry about the safety of my guests? If left unattended is there a chance it could enter attack mode? SO, I know I'm an ass, but I couldn't resist myself - I emailed the band and inquired about the entertainment machine. Here's my letter:

Hi! I'm very interested in hiring your band to perform at our wedding reception in August, but I've got a few questions regarding the entertainment machine you bring. Space is an issue at our venue, approximately how large is the machine and is it aesthetically pleasing? If not, is it something that can be hidden so guests don't see it? I assume that it's needed for your performance but if it's not, is there a way you can please work up 2 price quotes - 1 with the entertainment machine and 1 without? Lastly, I'm a little concerned about power for the entertainment machine. Does it run on regular 120v power? If not will you supply a generator?

And finally, here is what I picture the entertainment machine to look like!

DIY Save the Dates & a short rant

2010-01-05T19:10:00.001-08:00

I've been working on these "Save the Dates" all day today because all of a sudden it feels like we're behind. We're still a few days shy of 8 months away but it seems like other people who have weddings AFTER ours have their stuff (not the original word I was going for) together.

To those people I say, "Stop it. Seriously, relax. You're making us all look bad. You've got more than 8 months till you're wedding and you're already over prepared. Just enjoy being engaged. Please. My parents already have me thinking the wedding is falling apart, and my relatives can't believe I haven't told them where to book hotel rooms yet. So stop. Everyone benefits. You get a few days away from yelling at vendors, and I get an anxiety free day where I realize we have a lot of time left."

Anyway - I think the save the dates are coming along nicely. I should be finished soon, and then can jump onto stressing about something else. How is it possible that I was the one that wanted the wedding! Rebecca would have been fine eloping! That's not looking so bad right now. Courthouse pictures could be nice w/ our photographers shooting it!

PS. If you aren't like us (idiots) and just want a ready-made Save The Date, check this cool one out from The Wedding Chicks by clicking here.

Happy New Year!

2010-01-04T15:55:00.000-08:00

AHHHHHHHHHH I'm getting married THIS YEAR!!!!!!

That thought just sunk in and now I'm going to mildly panic all day about the stuff we haven't done or thought of.

I just attempted to take a funny picture of myself freaking out, but after 15 minutes, I couldn't take an acceptable one where I didn't have a double chin. Which brings me to the fact that I still have weight to lose.

This is going to be a GREAT, busy, fast, exceptional, stress filled then released (mind out of the gutter please) year!

Happy 2010 everyone.

Ben Folds + Our Wedding = My Impossible Campaign

2009-12-22T13:33:00.000-08:00

As of right now, I give myself an F.... maybe a D minus for effort.... I haven't booked a musical act for the wedding. It's the ONE task that men across the globe want to help wedding plan. Sure, I've had a lot of great ideas, but I haven't pulled the trigger.

It's late at night and I'm in bed thinking what music I want at my wedding. A name blazes through my head so fast it's like a big fast name that's on fire, and it's evidently all I can think about because I couldn't even come up with a good metaphor for something that's fast and blazes! The name is Ben Folds. I know it's impossible and it will never happen. So I roll over and wake up Rebecca to try to get her opinion. It's absolutely no help that she wakes up and groggily says she wants Ben Folds too. So instead of sleeping, I spend hours trying to figure out where I can find an affordable band to replicate that sound. The problem is, it can't be done. Such a band does not exist.

So I'm coming to you internet. As cliche as it sounds, stranger things have happened. Maybe one day Ben Folds will get bored and google his own name. Maybe I'll be somewhere on that list and he'll click. Let's somehow get my plea to him. I'm sick of wasting my time trying to figure out what I can find to replace Ben... now I'm onto wasting my time trying to reach out to him. Today I launch my campaign to get Ben Folds perform at my wedding reception. With your help, let's make this impossible task happen! If you run a site, post a link! Help a brother out! The campaign begins today!

TEMPLE OF GROOM
OPERATION: GET BEN FOLDS TO PLAY OUR WEDDING
DAY ONE

Task 1: Reach out to Internet
Task 2: Letter to Ben Folds (see below)

Dear Ben,
Hey dude, what's up? Did you see the series finale of "Monk?" I don't really watch that show, but I think it was pretty good. Cool, cool....So look, obviously you know I didn't come here to talk about "Monk" and I know what you're thinking "Dave only writes to me when he wants something." Look, you're not completely wrong. I feel terrible about it. But now I'm swallowing my pride because I'd be forever grateful if you could just do me this one solid: play at our wedding in August. Before you scoff, and turn away, I do want to say that you kind of did this to yourself man. You're too good. You've made it impossible to like any other music. Nothing will do.

I don't want to bore you with details about Rebecca and me, but you'd really like us. We're fun, and we're going to have a great wedding. The food should be awesome, and you're totally welcomed to eat with us. We've been fans of yours for a very long time. I've loved your music for the last 12 years when I first heard you (I was living in Charlotte at the time). We're definitely fans, but we're not the type you have to be afraid of (we've never thought about wearing your skin to see if it makes us better at the piano!). BUT, we are the type of fan that thought that your concert was the best way to spend our 3 year anniversary last year (@ the Wiltern).

On TV, I just watched Oprah surprise her best friend Gayle by having Josh Groban serenade her at work. I think you're easily 10x cooler than Josh Groban. I'm not saying that we're any better than Gayle, but between you and me...well, I just think you'd have a better time at our wedding than hanging with Gayle (although I hear that she makes an awesome spinach and artichoke dip). You seem like someone that would want to make a wedding on a tight budget the event of a lifetime because it would mean so much to the couple. I don't know how true this is, but years ago a friend of mine that went to UNC claimed he saw you talking to a homeless man for over an hour. This proves that you're awesome and caring. This is why I think I have a chance, albeit a 0.04% chance.

Alright, I don't want this to get too beggy, or too long so I guess I'll wrap this up. If you've got any questions, please don't hesitate to write. But before I go, just think about all the website hits you're gonna get from people that read my website. I can guarantee probably about 20-30 a day....a DAY. You'll blow up. Lastly, let me say that Rebecca and I love you and we hope your family is well and having a great holiday season.

Hit me back whenever you get a chance,
Dave

PS. If it makes a difference I can promise that you won't have to play "Rock this bitch" at the wedding!

We have a photographer!!!!

2009-12-15T15:37:00.000-08:00

Last week we booked an awesome duo that will shoot our wedding! I'd love to introduce you to Brian Callaway and his wife/shooting partner Allison! Together the two of them make up CallawayGable Photography.

Rebecca and I are in love with them, and their work. The pictures they take are beautiful, artistic, and memorable. Allison is a former high-fashion model and utilizes the experience she has by knowing how to pose the bride and groom. She knows all the best angles. What I've learned by looking at some people's photography, even if you're looking for that "photo journalistic" style - if the photographer is shooting you from the wrong angles or you're recreating a moment posed in the wrong angle, the picture is useless. Brian has such a great eye and looks to capture as many senses in each photograph as he can. The dude even makes iphone pictures look incredible.

Best of all, the two of them couldn't be nicer! I'm so excited about having them shoot our wedding. I feel comfortable with them, and even though I've only known them for a little more than a month - I feel like they're friends! I trust them, which is so great. One thing I definitely don't have to worry about on the day of the wedding (ie "did the photographers get that?! UGH!)

Check out some of their pictures. I'll post some engagement session photos whenever we get them taken. Can't wait to have these two photograph us!

(I mean REALLY?!? look how awesome that posed photograph looks w/ the wedding party! I don't love traditional staged photographs, but I'm dying to have one of these a la a Vogue magazine picture, or something you see on a billboard advertising Gossip Girl!)

Only 10 more followers...

2009-12-01T13:51:00.000-08:00

...and I post the first in a series of embarrassing pics and videos of myself.

Every 50 followers I'll post something I've kept hidden away for years!

Note: My parents just told me about footage they have of me doing stand up at the age of 6. It includes impressions of Alf, Robin Leach, and Pee-Wee Herman. This is not off limits.

Asking the guys to join the party.

2009-12-01T09:49:00.000-08:00

I have a question for anyone out there with answers: Is there a non-cheesy way of asking a friend to partake in your wedding?

I've been sitting staring at a blank unwritten email for the last few days trying to craft a letter to a few friends about the wedding. There is absolutely no way to do this that doesn't sound like I want to make love to each and every one of them. Funny thing is that I don't even want them to be in the wedding (we're not having a big wedding party) I just want them to hang out with me during the day of, get ready with me, be ushers at the wedding, and take a few photos with me.

I'm getting married in August, so is it too soon to send out this email? I'm afraid that it's going to launch us into a thread of making-fun-of-me emails with speeds Nigerian spammers would be envious of. (Which reminds me, before I send out this email to my guy friends I need to claim money that an unknown relative left me in Nigeria, I'm apparently the only heir to the millions.)

Is this something I shouldn't even ask over email? Do guys actually pick up the phone and have a heart to heart with someone before asking him to be in the wedding? That sounds worse than the email! Do I need to schedule something kind of overly masculine with them and sneak the question in somehow? For instance maybe I should pull a belt off my car's engine, have a friend over to fix it, and then be like "Dude, this fan belt is like insane. We should hang out on my wedding day." This is almost WORSE that I'm not asking them to be in the wedding, that would be a nice honor... instead I'm asking my friends to hang out with me and take pictures with me so I can verify I do, in fact, know people and have friends.

Help.

Ten Thousand Only exclusive interview!

2009-11-27T15:31:00.000-08:00

Days after I got engaged I found a blog that opened my wedding eyes. It not only got me more excited to plan my wedding, but it got me in the blogging mood. The blog is called "Ten Thousand Only" and it followed one girl from pre-engagement to present day (post wedding). It was so fun to read about a fellow Angelino on a tight budget ($10,000 - obviously) who wanted to throw a fun party. In a way, I loved it because I felt like she did a lot of the leg work for our wedding planning. I already knew the spots that were going to be too expensive, and she's given us ideas on where to cut corners. All that being said, I'm a fan and I was thrilled to score an interview with her and thought I would share it with you guys.

- Why did you start your blog?

I had been reading a few wedding blogs as part of a long list of daily detractors. i realized that there were weddings i liked reading about and ones that turned me off. i gave myself a dream budget* and thought it through. if i researched as much as the ladies on these blogs, could i do it? could i possibly throw a $10,000 wedding? a $10,000 wedding i would l-o-v-e? could i would i?

- I've already purchased my Gocco, and foresee a lot of DIY projects on my horizon to help cut costs, what were your DIY successes? Was there a project that you tried and wished you just spent the money to have someone else do it (aka a DIY disaster?). I really hope it wasn't the Gocco.

can i just tell you how much i LOVE the gocco? i love it. i don't know how to do anything fancy with it. but i'm a whiz at the basics. there's something about printing your own stuff that makes you feel like the craftiest craftmaster on the planet. when you're clearly not.
i've gocco'd invites, thank you cards, note cards, paper, anything i can get my hands on, etc...and i haven't come across a project i've regretted yet. and now i've just jinxed myself.

- How active was your fiance (the groom)? Did he help you plan?

he wasn't the driver, really ever, during the planning process because i'm the one who'd been researching all this wedding stuff for a year before we even got engaged. he'd been following the blog so he kind of knew where it was all headed. i think he sort of took a step back to let me just do my thing. and when i needed his help, he was right there. it worked for us.

- What decisions, if any, did he make? Was there anything that he wanted to take charge of in planning?

there wasn't a project he wanted to own. we kind of just did things together, made decisions together. neither of us was ever staunchly against what the other person wanted. lucky, huh.

- What's the best advice you could give an engaged couple about to have a wedding on a tight budget? How about a couple living in LA looking to have an LA wedding?

to the engaged couple on a tight budget: be flexible.
to the LA couple looking to have an LA wedding: be flexible.
one of the dumbest/smartest things i learned was that...you can't have a $50,000 wedding on a $10,000 budget. and yes, i had to learn that.

- What is your favorite time travel device (ie the Delorean, the glowing spinning time warp wall, the giant old timey metal contraption that spins till it disappears, etc)?

hiro isn't a time travel device but he's the master of time and space. so...hiro.

- Now, if you were to use that time travel device to go back in time and change one thing about your wedding, what would it be?

i wouldn't change any aspect of the wedding itself. but there are some details that were overlooked that i do regret. first, i would confirm the ceremony program with our officiant to make sure that we were on the same page (we so weren't). second, i would make sure we formally thanked all of our guests (we got caught up in the frenzy and didn't make the announcement we wanted) and went around to greet each of them (we only got to half of our guests. double argh). but, i couldn't help the logistics that got swept out of my control. that's just the way it is. everyone says the time is short and it totally is...and i absolutely couldn't wrap myself around the fronts and ends of everything that was happening. plus i was trying my best to just soak it all in. so...i was kind of busy.

- What's the best thing that's come from your blogging?

what a loaded question. a million things.
there were a lot of times while i was planning when i felt cautious, worried, anxious. if i do this, what will people think. if i don't do that, what will people say. over and over and over again.
and what TTO offered was some of the most sane, wise, encouraging advice through readers and fellow bloggers. it was pretty amazing. i mean, i wasn't an experienced or inspirational blogger of any kind...i was just a stranger who jumped in and started blogging blindly and anonymously without knowing much about anything.

but in the end, the blog was a major influence on how our wedding turned out. and we were so effing happy. and in the best possible way.

Some great pictures from Ten Thousand Only's wedding!
pictures taken by Max Wanger.

My Kidney is Staging a Walk Out

2009-11-25T13:40:00.000-08:00

I know this isn't wedding talk, but I thought I would share anyway. For the last few days my right kidney has been royally pissed at me. I don't know if it's because I love steak and iced tea way too much, haven't babied him enough, but whatever I did Kidney ain't happy. I'm not really sure what the problem is yet, but I'm thinking stones. So, I'm in for a fun filled Thanksgiving weekend. The good news is that I have plenty of Vicodin and tryptophan to ensure good times!

Things I learned from my 1st Vegas bachelor party

2009-11-20T11:44:00.000-08:00

I wrote a guest post for GroomsAdvice.com with tips I picked up by attending my 1st Vegas bachelor party. Check it out here (or click the image to go to their site!).

Updates

2009-11-19T15:05:00.000-08:00

So, we just moved our wedding date 2 months earlier! We were sitting at lunch the other day and I asked Rebecca "why are we waiting till October to get married?!" Neither of us had a good reason. I think somewhere in the mix we decided that we wanted to get married at night time, so we picked a month where it gets dark earlier. When we decided that we didn't really care about that anymore, we kept the date. We should have moved it a long time ago.

I'm really happy with our new date: August 8th, 2010. It looks nice written out. This is going to definitely be our date. I'm done moving it! Now the fun begins. We just lost 2 months of procrastination!

Here's my current to do list:
- lose weight
- start designing our wedding website/save the dates/invitations
- find music!

There's plenty more on the list, but those are the things at the front of my mind. This is starting to get fun. I finally have more stuff to blog about! Stay tuned.

America's Coolest Small Towns: Cayucos

2009-11-16T09:39:00.000-08:00

Just a repost, but a cool one. Cayucos (where we're tying the knot) got voted one of America's coolest small towns by budgettravel.com. Check out this article!

An awesomely geeky invitation!

2009-11-05T13:02:00.000-08:00

Thanks to my friend Ben for sending this to me. And before I post it, I just need to give Ben a few props - this is one dude that finds some cool wedding stuff online! One day maybe he'll start posting stuff on Temple of Groom.

Anyway - check out this invitation. It's one of my favorite all time invitations. I love people that actually take time to think about how to make their wedding THEIRS. They aren't trying to impress anyone, they are just thinking how they can inject themselves into every aspect of the wedding. I love it.

Suit Shopping

2009-10-30T08:24:00.000-07:00

I'm not ready to buy my Wedding Day Suit, but I at least want to start browsing what's out there. I know that I want something more tailored and form fitting yet a little on the casual side. Something I can wear with sneakers. I've always seen myself in a light gray suit. Rebecca is hoping for a 3 piece suit, and I think that sounds good too, but I'm not opposed to a 2 piece if it's the right suit.

I do know that I want the suit to be something special though. Anyone have any cool places to look for a suit other than the usual Nordstrom, Bloomingdales, K&G, JCrew options. I think I saw something on Etsy where you can have a custom suit made for a REALLY great price...I'll have to find that seller again.

Guys, what did you wear to your wedding? Gals, what did your husband wear?

Wedding Report!

2009-10-27T09:31:00.000-07:00

I went to a wedding last weekend in Virginia. We had a great time. The wedding was a really nice event. Every wedding I go to I come away with a few more tips, or ideas. It's the best way to figure out what you want for your own wedding. Here's what I have to report:

- At the tail end of the ceremony the woman officiating commented that golf is a big part of the groom's life. The groomsmen lined up horizontally facing the Chesapeake Bay and in a salute each took a shot off into the water. Then they lined up with their golf clubs and raised them like military swords. The bride and groom walked under the swords and back down the aisle.

It was a great idea for someone that loves golf. A 10 man golf salute. It was the talk of the reception. It really showed me that we should find a way to make the ceremony OURS. Instead of something sterile, we should somehow inject some of US into it.

- So another chapter in the DJ vs Band debate. The band at the wedding was AWESOME. They had a great sound and everyone seemed to enjoy them. I heard "the band is great" multiple times. HOWEVER at the end of the day, more people hit the dance floor when the band took a break and the bride's ipod playlist was plugged in. The guests at the reception were young. A lot of people in their 20s and 30s there... and they LOVED dancing to popular music from right now. The band played music that was a bit older. SO, it showed us that having a band was really great, but music selection is every bit as important.

- The buffet was full of great food. The highlights were lamb chops and a great beef roast. Because there was no seated dinner, that meant that there were no assigned seats. This was nice, but at the end of the day, once you got your meal you had to scurry to find somewhere to sit. The feel of the wedding was very much more cocktail hour-ish as I got the feeling the bride and groom wanted us to get up and dance more than sit down and eat. The vibe was very young and fun.

All in all it was a really great love filled event. You could tell they focused on making sure everyone was having fun. The bride was the first one in the dance circles and yet she made a great effort to go around and talk to everyone in attendance. It was great.

HOWEVER, a quick note to all of my non-Jewish friends out there. Take time and buff up when you go to a Jewish wedding. You will have to lift the bride and groom (and usually their families) up in chairs during Havah Nagilla. When they are lifted in these chairs, you're required to hold them safely in the air... not drop them to the floor. Unfortunately at the wedding this last weekend I witnessed someone get dropped from about 8 feet up... Unbelievably this was the first time in my life I've ever seen someone get dropped. I've been going to bar/bat-mitzvahs and weddings for years and never saw this happen. I'm now incredibly paranoid. I'm going to go on a diet to help you all out, but please do your part and try not to drop me. If you have weak arms, perhaps you sit this one out....

Another Wedding this Weekend!

2009-10-22T16:19:00.000-07:00

My cousin is getting married this weekend and I'm excited to get to another wedding. It's always great to see family, but I'm also excited to see the wedding.

I'll report to you on Monday!

Raining in LA

2009-10-14T10:22:00.000-07:00

So, our wedding is in October of next year, and I must admit - this rain (in October) has me nervous about our outdoor wedding.

Dress Code

2009-10-10T09:11:00.001-07:00

Can someone please explain to me what all the different dress codes mean? I mean I know that black tie means dress fancy, but what falls under the category of black tie? Tux? A dark suit with a white shirt and a black tie? If it says "Black tie optional" what are my options?! I know I can probably find this online somewhere if I google it, but that wouldn't be fun for the rest of us and I would be depriving people all over who are as clueless as I am!

Black tie, black tie optional, semi-formal, cocktail attire, formal, semi-casual, business attire.... the list goes on and on... Someone please come to the rescue and solve the riddle!

Wedding Checklist

2009-10-06T07:47:00.000-07:00

I got the email from "The Knot" - we've got 1 year until our wedding. While many people will scoff and say that that's an eternity of planning time, I start to feel like we're behind. Is that ridiculous?

Here's what we've gotten done:
- Picked a wedding date
- Committed mentally & financially to a venue
- Rebecca has her dress
- We've both got our wedding rings
- We have a Rabbi
- I bought a screen printer to do our invitations
- Picked colors

Here's the major stuff we have to do:
- Book a photographer (anyone know any good up and comers that need a wedding under his/her belt and would love to get some good ol' blog advertising?!)
- Book dueling pianist (see above parenthetical)
- Create invitations, wedding info website, & save the dates
- Think about wedding decorations (centerpieces, chupa, etc)
- Register for gifts (how far before the wedding do people do this? I'm thinking it's when the save the dates go out?)

I'm sure there's a ton that I'm forgetting that we have to do... and I bet Ms. Temple of Groom will remind me of stuff that we've done that I didn't list. This is just the stuff that's on my mind.

So, don't hold back... how behind are we? Tell me like it is... I don't need you to sugarcoat.

MOVING!!!!

2009-09-24T19:42:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone - I just wanted to post to tell you that I miss you and that I think about you often. I'm in the process of renovating my house and getting ready to move in. We move this Saturday and I just can't believe it. The house isn't QUITE ready but, we want to move in NOW!

If anyone wants to come over to help paint tonight I'd really appreciate it. I've been working at the house for about 14 hours a day, and I just haven't been able to blog lately (as you can tell). The good news is that I just got internet here today, so everything is ready for when I move!

Miss you all.........

How to Get Your Fiance Involved: Chapter Two

2009-09-09T08:01:00.000-07:00

Compromise

Missouri did it, why can't you? Am I right, or am I right? Ahhh, 1800's history humor, gotta love it.

As the dawn of the football season approaches, think about how you feel every time we squash our Sunday plans for 16 straight weeks (not including playoffs). At first you are cool with letting us go to the bar to watch the game. Then by the 3rd or 4th week, it's grown a bit stale. By week 7 or 8 you are enraged that we've ruined one entire day of your weekend and don't understand how and why we want to do the same thing every weekend. Then by week 9 you completely give up. You stop trying to plan things on Sunday and just accept that this is the way it must be for another couple weeks. You join us and celebrate the Superbowl because you're so happy you only have 1 hour of actual football playing time (which in girl time translates to roughly 2 days) left in the season.

With weddings, it's the exact same thing for guys. The first few suggestions we make, we understand why you shot them down. We get it. You didn't want me to wear rocket shoes to propel myself down the aisle. The video woulda gone viral, but yeh, understood. The next few ideas we've got that get shut down we start to get annoyed. Is she just cutting me out of planning all together? Once you shoot down the 3rd batch of opinions we've got, we get enraged, but it's completely silent. You misconstrue our silence as us not caring. When we get enraged about getting everything we suggest shut down, we shut off. We stop worrying about wedding stuff all together. We attend the wedding (aka the Superbowl) because we're so happy we have a few hours left of listening to stuff about weddings.

So, how do we avoid this shutdown all together? The answer is compromise. I think that a lot of the problem is trust. Ladies, trust your groom a little more. Take a look at your left hand. He just picked out that rock for you and you LOVE it. He managed to do that by himself. You should trust that some of his ideas may not be so bad. And guys, realize that not EVERY one of your ideas is going to get accepted. It's just the way things work.

If you find it hard to compromise, fear not, I've invented a great rule to live by. Whenever I started researching weddings on the internet I started looking up articles on how to plan while you're on a budget. The majority of the articles are all the same. They suggest picking out 3 items to splurge on (ie the venue, the food, the entertainment) then completely scaling back everything else. I realized that the same can be said about wedding decisions and compromising. Brides, pick 3 things that you will absolutely not compromise. A few items that you want to have done your way. Then, compromise everywhere else. If you desperately had your heart set on a certain centerpiece or wedding colors, or a venue, mark those off as your definitive decisions. Every other decision, you let him help. This doesn't mean that you let him plan everything else. I'm not saying that. But, what I am saying is that you've just given him an open avenue to spitball his ideas. This will have him actively thinking about the wedding in between times he's setting his fantasy football roster.

What do you do when he suggest you have nachos and hot wings at the wedding? You already picked your 3 "I pick only" items and food was not on the list. You can't shoot him down immediately but you don't want to turn your reception into a dive bar. You can still tell him no, but be a little political in the way you do it. "I don't think we should do nachos and hot wings, but I get what you're going for... you want familiar items like bar food at the wedding. Wouldn't it be fun if we did some sort of passed appetizer that's a play on a hot wing? Maybe fancy version of a hot wing?" This is what he hears "she's not saying no, she's not saying no....FANCY HOT WING!" Take his ideas and make them work for your wedding.

The bottom line is that there are things you should and shouldn't fight for. I wear my low top converse chucks just about every day. That's who I am. Rebecca made a great move when she was excited for me when I wanted to wear them with my suit at our wedding. She could have said "Oh man, it'll ruin the pictures!" But she chose her battles wisely. She knew that this would be a personal victory for me and I will continue to help her out planning!

At the end of the day, I admit, we have some pretty bad suggestions, but you have to realize that we think you have some pretty bad ideas too. When we both can admit that, that's when we'll harmonize and come up with the best wedding possible.

stay tuned for chapter 3...

It's Official!

2009-09-07T09:05:00.001-07:00

We took a day trip to Cayucos, California yesterday and booked our wedding venue and date! Cayucos is a beautiful small beach town about 3 hours and 15 minutes north of Los Angeles. We're going to get married and have our reception at this awesome bed & breakfast called The Cass House Inn. They're awesome, and PLENTY of more details about them will follow on this blog. The venue is just us. We also locked in the date October 3rd, 2010. So we got a lot done yesterday! See guys, when I don't post and I tell you it's because I'm busy, I'm not lying!

Also, if you ever find yourself in Cayucos do yourself a favor, go eat at Ruddell's Smokehouse . It's a fish smokehouse. We ate there yesterday and the sandwiches we had easily cracked our top 10 sandwich of all time list. It was smokey, and sweet, and just incredible. Once you're finished with your sandwich, walk over to Brown Butter Cookie Company for a couple cookies. Their honey & sea salt cookie is quite possibly the best cookie I've ever had in my life.

stay tuned for pictures & more details...

Sorry!

2009-09-04T10:29:00.000-07:00

I've got so much on my plate right now (wedding related & other stuff) that I have abandoned the blog for a week! I'm so sorry, there just aren't enough hours in the day. Which is another thing, I think I need a prescription for some ambien. I'm not sleeping at night!

On the top of the "to do list", we're about to get possession of our house, and it's jut been a LOT of prep work! I promise I'll be back blogging soon. Hopefully I will write something later today. I just want to give everyone QUALITY. Sure I could post a thousand times a day, but you guys deserve better than that.

In Case You Missed It: View from the Bay Appearance!

2009-08-29T09:51:00.000-07:00

If you missed my appearance on "View from the Bay" yesterday, here it is! It was my first in-studio TV appearance, so go easy on me! For all my friends in my fantasy football leagues, feel free to rip the footage and edit it!

TUNE IN TODAY!!

2009-08-28T08:22:00.000-07:00

If you live in San Francisco, tune into ABC 7 @ 3pm (pst) today. I will be interviewed on a show called "The View from the Bay".

If you DON'T live in San Francisco you can watch live online by clicking the link below! For all you people on the east coast, it's 6pm-7pm. West coast, it's 3-4pm.

How to Get Your Fiance Involved: Chapter One

2009-08-24T07:44:00.000-07:00

Prologue: I've received quite a few emails from brides-to-be asking how to get their fiances involved in the wedding planning. It's not an easy task, but it can be done. I've decided to write a manual on HOW it can be done. I think the majority of women are forcing and pulling help out of their men the wrong way. If you follow a few easy steps, you'll find the help you're looking for.

Chapter One: You're Overwhelming Us With Details

Dear Women,

We're very excited about getting married too. We wouldn't have asked your hand in marriage if we weren't excited to get married. As much as you don't think we're stoked, we're actually looking forward to the wedding too. We're interested in everything you're showing us in "Modern Bride", "Martha Stewart Weddings", and "In Style: Weddings" but you've really got to slow down.... you're overwhelming us.

Love Always,

Your Fiances

It's true. You're throwing too much in front of us as soon as we get engaged. After I got engaged, I quickly realized I should have given my fiance the ring AND a stack of wedding magazines. Don't get me wrong, I'm not criticizing your enthusiasm. I'm just saying we're a bit different. We're about to enter a world of wedding planning where just about everything looks foreign to us. We've never even really thought about our weddings and you've been planning since you were a little girl. If you want our help, you should start slowly.

The best thing you can do is tell your fiance that he's about to throw one of the the biggest parties of his life (I don't know how much your man partied in college). While it's more upscale than his "red cup" parties he threw in the past, you want your wedding to be fun and memorable. He'll help you with that!

For now, let's skip details like colors, centerpieces, and what flowers to use. Let's start with things we're really interested in: musical entertainment, food & alcohol, and the photographer.

Let him give his advice on whether to hire a DJ or a band. I promise he'll have an opinion about the music. Tell him to start making one of his famous playlists. Chances are he probably gave you a mix tape/cd when he was trying to win you over - let him start making one for the wedding. Discuss the broad strokes. For example, pick the type of music/band/dj you want, let's not stress about "first dance songs", or father/daughter son/mother songs yet.

Give him the task of finding a great signature cocktail for the wedding. While everyone drank the Jungle Juice at his parties in the past he'll know that he's got to find something more widely liked (and less alcoholic than turpentine). Ask him what TYPE of food he envisions at the wedding. Does he see a sit down meal or a buffet? Has he ever eaten something at another wedding he liked?

Wedding photography has come a long way lately. I didn't know that some of the photography could look so cool. Let him know that you can have traditional portrait photography or the more candid journalistic style. Show him the difference. I was shocked to see that some photographers out there have really turned your big day into art. Looking through other people's great photos actually got me more excited about my wedding too.

Starting slowly will get us more involved in the long run. We're not looking to be talked to like children, but we don't have opinions on wedding details yet! We've just gotten over the mammoth task of proposing. Give us a small breather. If you start slowly we'll want to voice opinions in other places later down the road. Even if we don't... and chapter 1 is as far as you make it with your fiance... it's still more help than you had before.

...stay tuned for chapter 2...

Panasonic Camera & TV Giveaway!!!

2009-08-13T12:34:00.000-07:00

Panasonic Living In HD (LiHD) is having a GREAT contest that you should all head over and enter! All you have to do is upload an inspirational summer wedding photo and you'll have a chance to win your choice of an awesome $1500 SLR Digital Camera, or an $1800 50" Plasma TV! The theme will change every week - "Great American Roadtrip", "Vacations for Two", and lastly "Food Creations". You can enter once a day for the next 4 weeks, but the "Wedding" theme ends on the 16th. Hurry over there now!

Check it out!: End of Summer Celebration Giveaway!

Your close friends are DRUNKS! (Poll Results)

2009-08-11T13:20:00.001-07:00

Poll Results are in! The question asked was "Who is likely to get the most intoxicated at your wedding?". Your Close Friends were the run away...victors? ....no.... drunkards! Here are the results:

1. Close Friends (31%) - I figured they'd be up there! It's really the reason we all go to weddings for our friends, right? First question is always "are they having an open bar?".

2. Best Man (25%) - You gotta get a little "loose" to give that best man speech, right?

3. Parents (10%) - Hey, the kid is not your responsibility anymore, right?! Time to celebrate!

4. Bride (7%) - All you brides who said "I'm only going to have one or two drinks were lying, huh?.

Aunt/Uncle (7%) - Glad we didn't have to pay for this wedding! Coulda been our kid!

5. Cousins (6%) - We got drunk at their weddings, why shouldn't they get drunk at ours!

6. Groom (3%) - Thought this would be higher up on the list, it was going to be my excuse - "Groom came in 3rd in the poll! Why can't I get drunk?!!?"

Maid of Honor (3%) - Guess the girls don't have to get as drunk as the guys to give the speech!

7&8. Someone that got a pity invite & Other (2% & 1%) - who cares....

Btw, I thought I'd post a picture from the future... this will be me at the next wedding (only I'll be wearing nicer clothes)

Embarrassing Myself for Followers!

2009-08-07T10:01:00.000-07:00

Do you want to see pictures of me pre nose job? Hear what I sounded like at 12 as a voice in a Christian cartoon? How about seeing my high school senior picture, or WORSE pictures when I had long hair?

I've decided that every time I reach 100 new Temple of Groom followers I will post something completely embarrassing from my past. It could be a terrible picture of me (there's one that's been described as looking Gilbert Gottfried-esque), embarrassing childhood footage, there is no end to the amount of stuff I wouldn't want to show! BUT, I'd love to see the blog successful, so I have to make this sacrifice!

Sign up to follow the blog - it's easy and will only take a second. Under the facebook logo, on the left side of the blog, you'll see "BECOME A TEMPLE OF GROOM FOLLOWER!" You can log in with your google account, your instant messenger name, your yahoo account, or blogger account.

Right now I have 61 followers. 39 more followers and you all can laugh your ass off. Forward the blog to your friends! Thanks!

Whistling?

2009-08-06T09:38:00.000-07:00

Does anyone actually like listening to someone else whistle? To me, it's by far one of the most irritating sounds ever. It's so much worse than nails on a chalkboard.

I know, this has nothing to do with weddings, but there seems to be an abnormal amount of whistling on set today!

To Drink or Not to Drink...

2009-08-05T07:57:00.001-07:00

My poll got me thinking... will I drink at my wedding? Ms Temple of Groom vows that she'll likely only have 1 drink (probably just a glass of champagne). I, on the other hand, am leaning towards being a little buzzed. How often will I ever have all of my friends and loved ones in one room together partying? I think I'm definitely going to keep myself in line, but I think I'm going to let loose a little. If I have to dance all night, then I better be tipsy...I find my groove WAY easier.

Anyone have an opinion about this? Did you drink at your wedding?

"The Daily Buzz" Interview!

2009-08-04T12:07:00.000-07:00

If you missed it, here it is!!! Temple of Groom hits on TV. Enjoy my first, but hopefully not my last interview.

(fast forward to :34seconds to skip all the promos)

It's an exciting day at TOG!

Top Chef - Top Centerpieces

2009-08-02T18:09:00.001-07:00

Check out these awesome centerpieces from Top Chef Masters last Wednesday night! I've always been a big fan of candles over flowers. It seems like a good way to save money, and I just love the way they look. After I saw this, however, I'm ready to add flowers back into the mix if we can afford it. I love the combination of flowers AND candles, and I LOVE the light bulb chandelier over the table. (Anyone ever seen this chandelier for sale, or is it just something you can DIY quite easily?!) I thought I'd share this with you all because I think it's pretty stinkin flawless.... kudos Top Chef.

TOG Official Trainer: Jonathan Beran

2009-08-01T21:17:00.000-07:00

Getting in shape for a wedding is mandatory. I want to look great on my big day. I know myself, and I can't do this without calling for help. Well, Temple of Groom brought in the big guns.
I'm stoked to announce that personal trainer Jonathan Beran has joined the team and he's here to help ALL of us that want to get in shape.

Jon trained Hayden Panettiere (the cheerleader from "Heroes") and she looks pretty good! He will post on the blog from time to time and give us helpful information on getting in shape. Whether it's for your big day, or just because you want to shed some weight, his info is great.

LASTLY, and probably most importantly, Jon told me that he will give SPECIAL LOW RATES to any Temple of Groom follower! Also, and this is a great idea, Jon is giving very low rates to engaged couples! Visit Jon's site to get in contact with him. Just mention the blog to get the low rates.

Lastly, I asked Jon to come up with 3 VERY easy tips for an out of shape guy to look better in a suit (let's start simple). Here they are:

Split your big meals into 2 smaller meals, and eat small meals every 3 - 4 hours instead of big meals every 5 - 6 hours.
Even going for a 45 minute walk can help! Getting to a gym is obviously the best, but putting forth any effort a few times a week DOES help!
Make sure your suit fits and stand up straight! Any guy can make a suit look good as long as it's properly tailored to fit you well.

If anyone has questions or comments for Jon, feel free to email me, or leave them as a comment! Welcome aboard Jon!!

Jon's site: http://jonathanfitness.com/

What's in a name?

2009-07-31T14:58:00.001-07:00

Anyone else hate the word "fiancé"? I mean look at it. It even LOOKS smug.

Every time I talk about Ms. Temple of Groom I despise knowing that somewhere in the upcoming sentence I'll have to use the word fiancé. I really wish there was another word that described what she is.

Possible options presented to me have been terrible. Future wife and bride to be seem to be the alternates. Terrible. She's going to kill me for this, but I'm totally guilty of calling her my girlfriend after we got engaged. Not on accident either. Because I feel like SUCH a jerk when I say "fiancé". I'm definitely not hiding the fact that I'm engaged, and I truly love that I am, so if this is one of the rules in "He's just not that into you" give me a break.

Does anyone like this word? I even hate typing it on my phone because it keeps auto correcting me and adding the damn accent over the "e". What a jerk this word is. Any suggestions other than "get over it Dave"?

TUNE IN MONDAY!

2009-07-31T11:24:00.001-07:00

Just a quick shameless plug for myself because I'm excited!!

I'm going to be on a nationally televised morning talk show called "The Daily Buzz" on Monday morning. Tune in @ 8:45am EST. Check your local listings for which channel it's on, but if you don't get the show, you can always tune in online @ http://dailybuzznow.com/.

The show reaches 58% of the country and over 66 million households. Thank god I scheduled a haircut tomorrow. I literally have a helmet of hair on my head right now.

Additionally, I'll be on the show via skype... if anyone has any good hints for looking good on webcam, let me know!

Awkward + Wedding Photography x 2

2009-07-27T08:44:00.000-07:00

Happy Monday morning to you all. Well, in a small game of "one-upmanship", Ms. Temple of Groom has bested my "most awkward wedding photo". This one doesn't even need a caption to make it funny. Enjoy.

Awkward + Wedding Photography

2009-07-24T09:49:00.000-07:00

One of the most awkward wedding photographs I've seen in a while! Candid?...maybe. Staged?...probably. Weird? definitely!
Submit your best caption in the comments below to win a prize!!

I now understand why rehearsals are needed!

2009-07-23T14:19:00.000-07:00

While we're on the subject of the Rehearsal Dinner, it got me thinking, why even HAVE a rehearsal?! I mean we've all seen enough weddings to understand how it all works. He walks, she walks, they listen to the Rabbi (or priest or friend that got his license on the internet), then they walk out together smiling... easy. I'd like to think that I'm fairly good at walking. I mean, I haven't gone PRO, but I think I could have - anyway, I never understood why one needed to rehearse...

....until now. Check out this video. It's GREAT.

Totally worth all of the rehearsing. I love it all. I bet that was a really fun reception.

ps. before I get yelled at in the comments, I do understand why to rehearse the wedding, and Rebecca, I know I'm not going to have a dance party down the aisle procession

Rehearsal Dinner guest list

2009-07-19T13:16:00.001-07:00

Who gets an invite to the rehearsal dinner? While the true answer is "invite whomever you want", there seem to be several schools of thought on the issue.

Invite only those in the wedding party
Invite those in the wedding party and out of town guests
Invite those in the wedding party, close family not in the wedding, and out of town guests
Invite everyone

It seems while the economy has fallen on tough times, the rehearsal dinner is something that has fallen under the budget cutting knife. People seem to be scaling way back on the rehearsal dinner. Right now I see and agree with all sides of this debate. One minute I understand the importance of having a big rehearsal dinner with a large guest list, then the next I question why you have to throw a mini-wedding reception the night before the wedding reception. That's why I'm turning to you... help me. What are your thoughts on rehearsal dinner guest lists?

Attending a Wedding While Planning a Wedding

2009-07-16T10:25:00.000-07:00

This past weekend I attended a wedding while planning a wedding for the first time. It's an entirely different ballgame. You assess and critique EVERYTHING. The usual Post-Wedding Hungover version of myself normally has no clue what my fiance is talking about the next morning when she remembers the dresses, the centerpieces, the programs, etc. The morning after, I'm lucky if I remember the wedding colors, and am doubly lucky if I don't puke from the overexertion of trying to remember colors mixed w/ alcohol poisoning. I kid, I kid...

Even though I drank as much as I normally do this last weekend, I can recall every detail of the wedding. I assume that's because this is the first time I really SAW them. Even though we got drunk enough for Ms. Temple of Groom to randomly talk in a renaissance era accent (I'm not joking, at one point she couldn't find me so she was asking all our friends where her "liege"was) I remember everything. I feel like a superhero after the accident that gave him all of his super powers. In this case imagine a giant wedding planning book dropping on me from space in a vineyard (that's where the wedding took place). I climb out in a tattered suit and yell "I REMEMBER EVERY DETAIL!!!! THE COLORS WERE BURNT ORANGE AND CREAM! PASS ME ANOTHER FRIED RISOTTO BALL!!!" I admit, not the sexiest superpower, but it's a start.

Anyway, yes, attending a wedding while you're in the early planning stages is totally a different experience and it's actually an extremely beneficial experience too. You're looking for new ideas, seeing what worked, seeing what didn't work. You learn so much. Perhaps the best thing I saw at this wedding was the table assignment cards. Instead of getting a piece of paper w/ your name and table assignment on it, the bride and groom wrote a really heartfelt letter to each person/couple. It was such a nice touch. I've never seen that before. What are the rules about stealing this idea?! Another great tidbit I learned from the wedding was born from tragedy. Apparently before the reception the venue noticed the centerpieces kept blowing over (the winds in central CA are pretty gusty!) so the bride had them pull the centerpieces from the tables. That taught us if we're going to DIY our centerpieces, and have an outdoor wedding, we need to take wind into consideration. Also it showed me that a table didn't look lost w/o a grand centerpiece. A centerpiece can be small, simple, classy, and sturdy and be just fine! Lastly, Rebecca and I have always worried about planning something after the reception, or having ideas for our friends who want to afterparty. After the reception last Saturday we realized we no longer have to worry about that. If you have booze hungry adults they will find alcohol on their own. We got them as far as we needed to take them, they are responsible for the rest. WE were able to find the one bar still open in Solvang w/o the bride and groom worrying about us! So we'll do the same.