The Importance about having a GREAT Photographer at your Wedding

I always thought, "Wow, these photographer's now a days... they charge A LOT!" But now I know why. I found this little breakdown and wanted to share it with you. Let me know what you think, ENJOY!

"Why I Hired a Professional"

Same wedding. Same moment. Same lighting. Same Editing programs. Same Camera.

These pictures were shot feet apart at almost the exact same moment with identical cameras and very similiar lenses.

Why the big difference?

the one on the left was shot be a photographer with hours and hours of experience, thourough camera knowledge, and solid photography training.

The one on the right was shot by your friend.. with a great camera.

Venue Options in the Desert (On a BUDGET)

I've been at a stand still and it's pretty frusturating. Since we don't really have much money to spend until the end of the year, we are pretty much just studying, investigating and following up with different venue options for our wedding. The 3 I've come up with are:

Moortens Botanical Garden

Genuine Draft Ranch

Joshua Tree State Park

Remember, our wedding has to be as close to nature as possible and all 3 of these venues gives us that option. I want some natural, sandy, cactus and sunset wedding pictures and I cannot wait to visit Genuine Draft Ranch and Joshua Tree State Park. I'll be taking photos and posting them! I can just feel it, I'll be a little bit more settled as we start putting down venue deposits!!! Until then, enjoy some pics so you get a better understanding of the venue grounds. Take care xoxox!

Joshua Tree

Moorten Botanical Garden

Genuine Draft Ranch

P.S. I think all of these have potential to work!



Wedding Planners vs. DIY

Many people ask me why I decided to go with a wedding planner? My answer is always, "because I want everything done FOR ME on my wedding day". I've been to many weddings where I see the beautiful bride still "conducting" the wedding from behind that lovely veil. I really do not want to do that, I want to walk down the aisle and see everything in place, perfect, while my gushing groom is admiring how beautiful his wedding day is. I have been meeting with my wedding planner monthly and going over little details, talking about venues, developing how we want the menu, how many people we want in our wedding party and how many guests we will be inviting. I sure do not want to be the one doing all of the legwork, getting on the phone, leaving numerous voicemails, haggling prices, etc. I just want to help her see my vision, give her ideas and let her do what she does best... EVENT PLANNING! She's wonderful at what she does and I trust her with my special day 100%!

Here's too the wedding of our dreams!

Events By Renee

Events by Renee Blog

How We Met and Other Musings

I met Pathrick on a hot sunny day in July, 9 years ago. My, my, my, how time flies! I started at a new job and this cute young man avoided me like the plague! Hmm... I guess I have to kill him with kindness, I thought. I started greeting him every morning at the time clock and you can tell he was a little thrown off by that. But I secretly loved it. I knew the instant I laid eyes on him he was, "different". Little by little, he grew more comfortable around me during our time at work and one day he asked me out to lunch. "Yes!" From there on we were iinseparable. I lived 45 minutes away and he would drive to meet me morning, noon and night... I loved how he would drop everything to see me even if it was for a little while. We would steal kisses at work when nobody was looking, it was totally cute. We would be in love forever after that.

And They Lived Happily Ever After... 

Beautiful for him, Beautiful for Me.

This post is kind of my little rant and rave around the dieting dilema for soon to be brides. The typical, "I want to fit into my size 3 wedding dress on my wedding day" mindset often finds it's way to even the most confident of women. Well I'm here to say that I've caught this disease too. I started my pre-wedding diet last week. July 23rd, 2012. I've given myself roughly about 10 months to shed as much weight as possible. I believe the key is to not be too unrealistic to what you can obtain and to choose a healthy diet. (Crash diets DO NOT WORK!)

I don't expect to look like a Victoria's Secret model, but I do expect to look good! I really want to feel and look gorgeous on my wedding day. I want my husband to be to glow when he see's me walking down the aisle! I want to be able to look back at my wedding pictures and think, "wow, I looked beautiful". With that said all I can do is hold on to the hope, and keep going with the determination. Keep letting my wedding motivate me and learn that a diet is not only to lose weight and get healthy, but to actually adopt a completely new lifestyle.

So keep calm, don't stress and learn to love to be active. Choose things you enjoy doing like: hiking, biking, wii, gym, dance, running around with your kids, yard work, etc. Find something, choose anything that will keep you active and moving. I'm working on it daily, sometimes I struggle because I'm human and it's HARD but at the end of the day I'm still "TRYING"!

xoxox ~Amber

Desert Chic - My Wedding Theme

Can it be done? This "Desert Chic" theme I have all planned out in my head...
I'm in love with Palm Springs, CA. I've moved back to this hot and windy place on earth that I call heaven more times than I'd like to admit. It's the only place that I feel at peace and grounded. I've placed my roots down in this sandy place and I fondly call it home. What a better place to have your wedding, than your home? Many people travel from far and wide to bask in the warm, perfect weather we get 9 months out of the year... the other three months I don't want to talk about! (haha, HOT HOT HOT!)

Our wedding date was originally, June 28th, 2013. Umm... NOT GONNA HAPPEN! As we traveled around the valley looking at promising venues for our special day I could slowly see us melting in the summer heat. How could we do that to our lovely guests while they watch us wed? I will not subject them to grueling, sun baking weather just so they can watch us wed. So we've decided to go back to the calendar and see what other date we can come up with. With that said I'd love to share some of my theme ideas! Here are a couple of pictures; they are all borrowed and are linked back to the original owners if you go onto my pinterest wedding board here: http://pinterest.com/madypie/wedding/.

I really do think this theme can work, I just hope our budget will be able to fund what my dreams look like!

Wedding Band - The Symbol for Eternity?

The wedding band is said to come from ancient Egyptian custom. The fourth finger, or ring finger, was believed to have a special vein that connected to the heart, and plant rings were fashioned to symbolize everlasting love.

Our American Tradition:

The saying "closest to your heart" has become popular as that is where the wedding band should be placed. Though an engagement ring can symbolize a "staked claim," a wedding band symbolizes a lifelong commitment.

So my question is, do you need 2 rings or is it more just "tradition" or "status" to have the engagement and wedding ring? I personally would love a wedding band because I believe it symbolizes a never ending cycle, eternity and commitment. I have a few friends that would beg to differ, even my fiance thinks we should do the wedding ring along with my engagement ring.

I'm pretty torn, but in any case we are still browsing :) I mean who hates to shop for jewelry right?! (*cough *cough, NOT ME!)

I'm going to keep it simple since I absolutely adore my engagement ring, it looks similar to the picture below.