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The new Wedding Planning Plus website is up and it's amaaaazing!

Click here to check it out all the WPP website goodness!!

Oh the times, they are a changing...

New and exciting changes are happening on the WPP front and I am excited to share them all with you! By now you have seen the new fancy logo, hopefully you've received the newsletter (if not just e-mail me and I'll add you to the list), and you are in tune with all the improvements going on here at headquarters. Well the final piece of the puzzle is just about complete, and that is the unveiling of our new and super gorgeous website which will go live in the next few days. I have built this whole thing myself and the time and energy it has taken I hope will prove to be well worth it. Keep an eye on this blog and our WPP Facebook page for news of the actual go live moment, but if by chance you try and log onto www.weddingplanningplus.net and you get an error message that just means we are making the big switch so stay patient and check back soon!

Big thanks to all of you for your love, patience, and unending support! You truly make it possible for us to do what we love to do.

Green Weddings

Photo by Heather Bohm-Tallman

Earth Day is Friday and although I live a fairly green lifestyle everyday this is the perfect time to talk about ways you can make your wedding as green as it can be. If you think about what kind of environmental impact your big day can have it is actually mindblowing. From the travel of your guests to the waste of packaging from all of your favors it really makes sense to try and cut back on excess waste and lower the carbon footprint you're making with this one event.

I have planned several green weddings and although each bride takes it to their own level, here are some great ways you can be more earth conscious when planning your big day:

• Instead of giving your guests a disposal wedding favor why not make a donation to your favorite charity? And if you have a charity that does waste cleanup, forest preservation, or other green actions this can be even that much more environmentally impactful.

This is a photo from one of my weddings where instead of a traditional wedding favor the couple made a donation to the World Wildlife Fund to support their conservation of wildlife and wild habitats.

Photo by Bob Donlon

Consider giving your guests a favor that will impact the environment in a positive way. Here is a tree sapling that each guest was able to take home and plant in their yard. The couple even cut down on paper waste by adding their guests' names onto the favor to save them from having to use (and at the end of the night, throw out) traditional place cards.

Photo by Niki Rossi

• Get your wedding flowers from a local nursery instead of looking for exotic flowers that need to be shipped from the other side of the world. You will not only be supporting the local farmer and incorporating home grown items into your day, but you will be lowering the amount of pollution caused by the planes and automobiles that are needed to transport flowers from other countries.

• While we're talking about flowers, consider the impact of the vases used for centerpieces. By using recycled glass containers, and then arranging for the reuse of these vases after the wedding is over, you will contribute to a positive use of the glass and not add to the waste sent to the landfill.

Here is a photo from a wedding where they used peonies from a family garden to make their own ceremony baskets and centerpieces.

Photo by Niki Rossi

• Serve your guests organic food, wine and beer! Organic food may seem like an obvious choice but a lot of people aren't aware that there are good organic wines and beers out there that can compliment an organic meal quite well. So you can save the environmental impact of pesticides not only on your plate but also in your glass.

• Consider using linens that aren't dyed in harsh chemicals. There are linens out there that aren't put through a chemical dying process and therefor aren't adding to the amount of chemicals that need to be disposed of from fabric factories.

• Think eco-friendly with all of your invitation and stationery products. Having a formal way to invite your guests to your wedding is essential, but you have the option of choosing invitations made of recycled paper, going with a more compact design to decrease waste, or even choosing to go the route of electronic invitations to completely cut out not only the paper, printing, and processing waste, but also the transportation pollution that comes with the mailing of both the invitation and the guests' response cards that are sent back to you.

• You can even incorporate your green theme into your honeymoon by choosing a vacation that has low carbon impact and can include activities where you give back to the land by volunteering with environmental activities like garbage cleanup, reforestation, or other such projects. Rent bikes and ride around town, choose to not have your hotel wash your towels and linens everyday, and keep the disposable souvenir purchases to a minimum. In this way you are not only doing your part on your wedding day but also carrying the concept through to your married life.

Live the principles of Earth Day everyday, including on your wedding day. If you are interested in planning a Green Wedding or are looking for more information on the topics above feel free to e-mail me at shannon@weddingplanningplus.net.

Check me out on the NYWB blog!

My friends at the New York Wedding Boutique just conducted an interview with yours truly and the blog post is now up for the world to see! Check it out!!

Click here to check out my exclusive interview!

Hot Wedding Trend - Uplighting!

Photo by Tracey Buyce

There are so many ways to wow up your reception room, but none might be as great a bang for your buck as uplighting. You can take a simple (or even drab - eek!) room, throw some strategically placed uplights around, and you just made the room feel like a completely new space. If you want to add color, depth, texture, or interest to your walls then uplighting is a great way to go. There is always the option of pipe and draping walls in full length fabrics, or creating camouflages to ugly sections with plants and other barriers, but if you want to stay simple and stay reasonably affordable uplighting is a great way to go.

Popular lights used now are LEDs that can be set or rotated to any color on the spectrum. So you want to start with a cool blue during cocktail hour, a calm amber during dinner, and then fire up a hot magenta pink when you're on the dance floor - you can do that!


Photos by Tracey Buyce


And you can also use uplights to add beautiful dimension to outdoor spaces by shining them up under trees or natural elements around the property.

Check out some of the photos from my past events where uplighting was used simply and beautifully. On fabric draped walls the color almost dyes the white material a completely different color and transforms the whole rooms to a bright glow. Even white light in the black and white picture below can add a warmth and brightness to a dark outdoor reception. The great thing is you can have fun with uplighting, and build a color, look, and feel all your own.

Photo 5 - Gallery 9 North
Photo 6 - Belathee Photography
Photo 7 - Shannon DeCelle Photography

Vegas here I come!

I just signed up for the Wedding MBA seminar in September of this year. I am super excited about this conference because there will be three days of intense morning to night sessions from topics spanning the whole realm of wedding planning and wedding business ownership. There will be professionals from all over the country there, and trade shows to see all the new cool products on the market. And did I mention this was taking place in Vegas?? Very exciting stuff!

This isn't just a conference for wedding planners, so if there are any wedding vendors out there who would like to join me please let me know!

Reminder - Our Invitation Sale Ends Soon!!

This is just a reminder to everyone that our invitation sale is still on but it is ending very soon! We are offering 10% off your entire invitation and wedding stationery order but you must place the order by April 20th! With a full selection of traditional, classic, colorful, and funky items there is something to fit ever couple's style and taste. Appointments are super easy - I take care of all of the wording and ordering for you, so there is really no reason not to check us out. E-mail me today to set up your free consultation - shannon@weddingplanningplus.net.

To see the original post with more information on the sale please click HERE.

Place Cards, Escort Cards, Seating Assignments - Unique Options

Photo by Michael Grace-Martin

Unique Place Cards

For some people traditional is not enough and they want to look for unique or different ways to tell their guests where their seat is at the reception. There is honestly an endless number of ways you can do this, and really the only limit is your own imagination. Above is a picture of one wedding where they combined two wedding elements to make one very special presentation. For anyone who is familiar with the concept of "The Warming of the Rocks" you will know this is where each guest holds a rock, makes a quiet wish to the new bride and groom, and then places that rock into a container with the rocks from all the other wedding guests. Then after the wedding the bride and groom take that container and all of the warmed rocks and they place it in a special place in their home like a fireplace mantel or feature shelf. Then the container and the rocks give off all the positive energy of the wedding guests and fill the home with all the wishes from the people they love. In the photo above the couple put rocks on top of each place card so that each guest would get their seating assignment and a rock to warm at the same time.

You can also combine the idea of a place card in with your wedding favor. In the photos below you can see how couples have used a take home element to the place card and essentially covered the needs of both elements in one. In the top photo pewter frames hold a 'photo' the displays the guest name and table name for everyone at the party. The one below it shows bright blue candy boxes with the guests' names and table printed on the outside. And the third photo shows a tree sapling that has a tag attached that lists the place card information.

Photo 1 - Heather Bohm-Tallman
Photo 2 - Shannon DeCelle Photography
Photo 3 - Niki Rossi Photography

Guest Seating Charts

Lastly there are ways to communicate guests' seating assignments without the use of a card of some other grab and go method. A new trend in seating assignments is using a seating board or a seating chart like the ones shown below. This is a very clean way to relay this information to your guests, and can avoid the hassle of having to write out or print out individual place cards. The downsize to this method is that any last minute adjustments can't be made as easily because once the board is printed no changes can be made. But as long as you have the time and the faith then this is a very classy look for the entrance to your reception room and a great visual to display the colors, design elements, and other fun information for your guests to see. And if you have a high guest count, say 150 or more, consider having two printed so you can avoid having a long line waiting at the door.

Photo 1 - McGarry Photography
Photo 2 - Tracey Buyce Photography

Place Cards, Escort Cards, Seating Assignments - Traditional Options

Photo by Out of the Ordinary Photography

Whether you have 5 guests or 500 you will need to provide some sort of guide to tell everyone where they need to sit at your reception. There are many ways to go about relaying this information - a traditional tented paper card that lists the guests' names and table assignment, an individualized marking at each seat where guests can walk from table to table to find their spot, or a board or poster mounted at the entrance to the reception room listing out each guest and their table. As the bride and groom you can choose to keep your place cards as basic as you want or as elaborate as you can imagine. Here are some examples to show you options for your perfect place cards.

Traditional Place Cards

The most traditional and basic way of doing a place card is by using the tented paper cards where you list the guests' name on one side and the table they are sitting at on the inside or the back of the card. Use a standard table with linen and line up all of these cards on the top with the guests' names facing out. It is important to list these in alphabetical order and not in table order or you will have each guest searching for several minutes trying to find their card. When it comes to adding the information on you can either utilize the help of someone with very neat handwriting, you can find cards that come in sheets that can be run through a home printer, or you can hire a calligrapher who will write out the information in beautiful calligraphy. Please see below (and the picture at the top of this post) for examples of each.

Photo 1 - Tracey Buyce Photography
Photo 2 - Rob Spring Photography
Photo 3 - Jill Kaiser Photography
Photo 4 - Finer Image Photography

You can even fancy your cards up by adding accents that are fun and colorful. The first picture below had a daisy theme so the bride added tiny adhesive daisies to the corner of each card. The picture below that had a strong green theme and the small green ribbons helped bring another aspect of color to their event.

Photo 1 - Ilana Ben Harav
Photo 2 - Bob Donlon Photography

Another fun way to spice up the traditional place card is to find a fun way to display them. The two photos below used boards to hang their cards on. The top photo shows a couple who brought out their wedding colors of chocolate brown and orange by using covering the board in a dark brown fabric and using bright orange cards instead of the traditional white or ecru ones. The photo below it shows several different color ribbons run across the board that the cards were tucked in to. This gave a nice organic look and feel to the card placement.

Photo 1 - Tracey Buyce Photography
Photo 2 - Emma Dodge Hanson


And finally here are some of your standard place cards but instead of being displayed in bulk on a separate table these were addressed to each individual guest and were set up at each individual place setting. This method is the most time consuming and sometimes the most difficult to work through because instead of telling 8 or 10 people to work out their own arrangement at a table you are telling people they need to sit in a specific spot that has been preselected for them. This works best with small weddings of 50 guests or less because there will be less settings for guests to need to search through when they are looking for their own. If you want to do this with a larger group then it is best to have a list at the reception room entrance listing each guest and the table they are seated at, and then when they get to their table they find their personalized card on a specific setting.

Photo 1 - Belathee Photography
Photo 2 - Tracey Buyce Photography