Booking Vendors

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Choosing a Photographer
Let's be real: this was one of the hardest vendors for me. Being that I'm a photographer myself means I'm pretty picky, but then you add the fact that I'm also very budget conscious and that makes it even harder. A lot of the photographers whose style I really liked were starting close to double of what we wanted to pay, which I totally get, but wasn't in the budget for us. So I was really thankful when our good friend Katie (hi Katie!) one evening at Eastside Stomp mentioned that her sister is a wedding photographer and that she'd be able to fit in my budget and that she thought I'd like her style. We checked out Aspired Photography out and booked her ASAP! Though her editing style is a little different than what I usually go for, it fit well with her photos and I really liked how many good candid shots she had, which is something that's very important to me. Plus she was within our budget, which made me very happy.

Finding a Band
Well, once we officially decided to hire a band (we knew we wanted one, we just had to decide if that was what we wanted to budget for), choosing our lineup was a piece of cake. One of the perks of being in the local lindy hop scene is knowing all the best jazz musicians in the area. Without a doubt my very first choice for band leader was Jonathan Doyle. I love his arrangements and I always connect so well with his music on the dance floor. Plus he's just an all around super nice person. We decided to go with a trio for the wedding and were able to get Jen Hodge and Josh Roberts. Talk about perfect!

Picking a Caterer
Wow, food is expensive! We knew we wanted to have a smaller wedding (under 100 people), mostly because we didn't want to be too overwhelmed the day of, but also because feeding that many people gets expensive fast! One of the first caterers we ran across online when we started wedding planning was K&F Catering. We knew we wanted a taco bar (tacos are the way to my heart, friends) and they offered that for a reasonable price. We ended up getting the taco bar and sides through them, which were sooooo good! We had it delivered and came in a little bit under budget, which was nice. All of the plates, drinks, etc. we got ourselves at Costco (more on that later).

Ordering Cakes
Our main cake, which was gluten and dairy free so I could eat it, was from Flying Apron. We decided on a 9" chocolate cake with strawberry filling and vanilla icing. The icing was a reverse shell bordered with roses on top. It ended up looking soooo pretty and tasted so incredibly good. As an added bonus, because we went with a simple cake, we only had to pay for a normal cake and not the extra for an "official" wedding cake. For the rest of the cakes we got Costco sheet cakes. 'Cause let's be real, who doesn't love Costco cake?! Plus it's super affordable, which was perfect for us.

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