A Perfect Card Box Giveaway!

- 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

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

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?!?!

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

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!