First up, the magazines! I loved those 400+ page volumes with their ads galore and an occasional article thrown in. I loved to pull pages out of them and file them away. Here are the ones I read...
Martha Stewart Weddings (1-year auto-renewal)
What isn't Martha and her team of minions an expert on? I loved Martha Stewart Weddings even if the ideas were insanely too DIY, fussy, or just plain expensive. It's a great magazine to get dress ideas from, just don't get too attached if you're on a dress budget of say less than $5,000. I actually got my subscription free from My Coke Rewards. Finally, my Coke addiction got me something!
Bridal Guide (1-year auto-renewal)
Bridal Guide is a good resource for all brides. I found lots of good inspiration in this magazine and they actually acknowledge that not everybody wants to spend $25,000 on a wedding. I got this subscription free too. I think it was through one of those free magazine websites where you fill out a survey to qualify.
Brides (1-year auto-renewal)
I actually had a subscription to Modern Bride (through My Coke Rewards), but when they stopped publishing Modern Bride, they sent me Brides. Lots of pretty ads and the occasional helpful article. They can get a lot out of budget range, but there are always was to do things cheaper.
My mom wanted to buy me a wedding planner when I got engaged, but I just ended up using the free wedding planner from Russell & Hazel.Check out their wedding planning templates HERE. I just printed the ones that were relevant to my wedding and organized them in a 3-ring binder I bought at an office supply store. Super cheap and actually helpful! More than one vendor marveled at how organized I was with my binder.
My mother did insist on buying me a book, so I picked out this one
The Knot Complete Guide to Weddings in the Real World: The Ultimate Source of Ideas, Advice, and Relief for the Bride and Groom and Those Who Love Them.
I liked it because it had things to look for and questions to ask vendors. I read through it a little and did refer to those questions when planning vendor interviews, but other than that I didn't use it much. I passed the book onto my brother's fiancee when they got engaged.
After checking it out of the library, I really wished I had gotten this book:
The Knot Book of Wedding Lists
I loved having checklists and lists when wedding planning and this book is full of them! It has lists for every aspect of planning and I really found it helpful since I really had no clue what I was doing! It also had those vendor questions I loved so much from the other book.
To be honest, most of planning and inspiration came from the internet. I had organized folders on my computer full of pictures I had saved from the internet. I had a bookmark folder of wedding websites I read I started using a Google Reader to keep up with the wedding blogs I found. The internet is a bride's best friend. It's how I found most, if not all, of my vendors.
Here's my list of wedding websites that I still read nearly 8 months after my wedding.
- Weddingbee - Can I just gush about my favorite website for a minute? Real brides, in various cities around the world, planing every kind of wedding imaginable and they share it all with us! I found lots of inspiration from the Bees and I still read it. I love their message boards. I am still posting there only now I'm sharing my own wedding. I had dreams of becoming a Weddingbee blogger, but it turns out I was a terrible wedding blogger and I just couldn't do it. Ok, I'm done...on with the list!
- Once Wed
- Style Me Pretty
- Snippet & Ink
- Ritzy Bee Blog
- The Bridal Wishlist
- Project Wedding Blog
- Elizabeth Anne Designs
- Southern Weddings Magazine
- Wedding Chicks
Have any wedding resources I missed? Share them in the comments!
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