We did it! We're back to the real world, already paying bills as Mr and Mrs, and tonight we just got our professional photos back.
This post is the promised list of vendors we used in our wedding and prep!
-DJ: Peak Entertainment
Now, I will note that while these guys are rather expensive, I would not have gone with anyone else in retrospect. The DJ was professional, courteous, unobtrusive, and played the PERFECT mix of tunes. I can attribute some his understanding of our music tastes to the fact hat our friend Michael coached me on what popular dance tunes we absolutely needed to include - I noted a bunch of preferences on their song list, and the DJ did a great job in "filling in the blanks" as to what else we would like. Additionally, they have this funny (and totally true) statement in the info packet (paraphrased): Your event isn't a music appreciation class. Great music is not as likely to get people dancing as something with a strong beat and catchy tune. Knowing this, and having selected the right "base" mix of tunes, we had a great experience with Peak.
-Cupcake Baker: Keri's Cupcakery
Keri Hart is a long time friend of Steve's family, and she recently started selling fancy cupcakes on the side. When we settled on cupcakes instead of standard wedding cake for our guests, Keri was a logical choice, and we are so glad that she accepted the (rather gigantic) job! She met with us well before the date to taste test various chocolate cupcakes, and then a week later to test various lemon cupcakes. She let us mix and match the styles of frosting, filling, and cake, until we had two perfect selections. Additionally, she kicked total butt in researching a gluten-free chocolate version for our gluten-intolerant guests. The 200 cupcakes were gorgeous, delivered perfectly on time (without any casualties), and tasted like heaven.
Bride and Groom Cake Baker: Maureen's Sweet Treats, in Barre VT.
After unsuccessfully trying to order a cake through a hoity-toity baker, I wandered downtown and stopped into Maureen's in the early days of their presence on Main Street. I immediately felt like I was walking into a Pinterest/Martha Stewart/DIY success - the location is sweet, welcoming, and staffed by the baker herself, Maureen (and a friendly dude who might be her husband. If he's not her husband, the guy clearly cares about the business, 'cause he's been there whenever I've gone in). Maureen sat down with me right there, and in less than 10 minutes we'd planned the perfect, simple wedding cake. The final product cost less than her estimate, and was perfect. She even matched the blue of the flowers to our wedding colors. Win. Total win.
Photographer: Isaac Wasuck, Wasuck Photo
The real star of our vendors list is definitely our photographer, Isaac, and his team. All of the photos in this post are from Wasuck, and we couldn't have been happier with the attention and quality (and sheer quantity) he provided.
We came across Isaac after being unexpectedly "dumped" by our planned photographer 28 days before the wedding (not really her fault, there was miscommunication and an apparently missing deposit check - photographers don't work on promises alone, do they?). Through the recommendation of a friend of my Maid of Honor, we contacted Isaac and found that not only is he super talented, but was also available on our date. His base package was more than twice our original photographer, but due to lower guest numbers than budgeted, we decided to swallow the cost in favor of what we knew would be beautiful photos.
Isaac blew us away. We paid an additional fee for a photo booth and ended up getting a THIRD on-site photographer as part of it. All three were the epitome of professional - Steve's mother can't recall seeing them around during the ceremony, they were so discreet. When it came to photo processing and the final product, Isaac drove down to Barre to give us the files, and presented the two flash drives in a theme-appropriate box with a few "teaser" prints on different types of paper. As of this moment, I'm having trouble stopping myself from constantly perusing the files, they're just so great.
He caught us all in candid moments, lovely poses, and even captured little unexpected details (flowers, hats, table decor, the spaceship/time machine).
You'll see more photos in the blog as we roll out all the details - if you're not convinced that you need to hire this guy yet, just wait.
And that ^ is just a tiny fraction of what we got. Put these photos to good music, and it's almost like I've gone back in time myself...
