Ultimate All Things Included (Utah) Wedding

Saturday night was a great time. Hiring the right people makes all the difference in how your wedding turns out. I'm not just talking about the decorations, food and DJ either.

I've gained such a different perspective of weddings such I've started doing this. Now that it's a job, I see how it could work instead of how it did. I see how making the night and day of the bride's and groom's special day becomes even more important. Each day I become more and more convinced that my new role is more essential than luxury.

Here's what I'm talking about. No matter how well some brides and parents try and plan, their are some things that just fall through the cracks. In this case it would have been the send off (but I saved the night). Brides are all twitter-patted and building 3-6 months worth of foreplay. They forget they have a job that they took on. Parents are busy trying to finance everything and then eagle-eyeing the groom to make sure the kids make it to the temple worthily. The night of, when they say they'll take care of the details they are too busy impressing friends and family with their recent accomplishment to remember details like the first dance and cutting the cake. The best man...HAH! Saturday night the best man left before the cake was even cut!

Things like this is what I'm finding happen that keep the evening from being eveything it otherwise could have been.

Here's some pictures.

Wub...True Wub is what brings here today

So I just finished up my first wedding what a great time! Everything went really well. There were a few items that I had forgotten to bring with me and had to send Rachel to the store to pick them up, but the client never knew anything was missing or not perfect, so all's well that ends well.

Instead of going into a bunch of funny writing about things that happened the odd behind the scenes like fights between the Valet and Guests because the Valet didn't want to give a guest his keys that was too drunk to stand let alone too drunk to drive, I thought I'd just post a couple pictures that Rachel had taken. You'll have to visit my other blog at blog.allthingsincluded.net once I get the official wedding pictures.

Puke here, Puke there, Puke Everywhere

Last night we cashed in on Kimball and Heidi's offer to babysit our kids so we could enjoy a nice night at the Jordan River Temple. Except I got to enjoy the session while Rachel had to excuse herself. I found out when the session was over, 2 hours later, while I was standing in the celestial room that she was not doing so well. She had thrown up 5 times in the last couple hours, plus had a number of bouts of diarrhea.

I went downstairs, picked her up from the first aid room and took her home. (Funny I didn't even know the temple had a first-aid room. Apparently, neither did a couple of other sisters that I asked for directions.) At home, she continued to thrown up well into the night. I could hear her from downstairs as I was working on a couple of contracts for the next day's business.

In the morning Zander refused to wake up because he went to bed so late. Keagan and Sadie both slept in too. It turned out Zander had picked up whatever Rachel had and he spent today moaning and wailing while hovering over the throne and laying on the couch, but never actually threw up.

I don't know what was in the air last night, but this wasn't something that had just hit my family. My 11:00 merger was postponed to Friday because she had come down with the same thing. My assistant Natalie came down with the same thing at the end of a long day doing bridal pictures. What a crazy thing going around.

I too haven't been feeling tip-top tonight, but I took a couple of Tylenol and that helped subside the headache and bodyaches. Rachel mentioned while I was doing that, that she had never in the 10+ years of marriage and courtship seen me throw-up. I hope this doesn't come to an end tonight.

All Things Included

So some of you may know that over Christmas I was deciding if I should expand my business practice from corporate event planning to wedding planning. After some deliberation I decided to go ahead with the move. I will say that this decision must have been inspired, because everything just seemed to fall in to place during the planning phase.

On Sunday I made the final decision. Monday morning I made the call to the organizers of the Bridal Showcase held at the Salt Palace. Monday afternoon I was told I might be awarded the prestigious planner spot for the Ultimate Utah Wedding (see details on www.ultimateutahwedding.com). Monday I also developed a new logo. Tuesday, I developed literature, booth, and business cards, plus ordered some super cute key-rings for swag. Wednesday I proofed the prints, Thursday everything arrived and Friday I set up my 10x10 space at the show. Friday I found out that I did get the planner spot and it was solidified. I met the couple and their parents later that day and we were all excited to be working together (especially the mom, because she thought she was going to have to look over everything.)

When it ended Saturday night at 7pm I had handed out close to 250 business cards, about 200 literature pieces, took in 100 leads, and booked more than a dozen appointments for initial consulting spots this coming week! OMG!!! What a weekend! I also hired an assistant to help me take care of everything. Oh yeah. This is funny too....I had 3 other girls come to my booth and ask me for a position! haha. That was great. Two from bridal shops, one from a reception house. Good times.

I've uploaded a picture of my booth. The massage chair was my brilliant marketing plan to hold brides and mothers captive while we talked, and explained "this is how we'll pamper you through the planning process." The cardboard standup was allowed in our booth as promotional propaganda for the Ultimate Utah Wedding, which helped as a conversational piece too.

The real disappointing part of the whole weekend, which may destroy a friendship of more than 5 years, happened when I had asked for the help of a friend who owns a bridal shop. Prior to the show I was mocked and told I didn't have any business doing this. During the show this friend's family (bridal shop) told me "no way", and nearly ignored me during the show. Though I did get to talk with them for about 10 minutes during the show, the conversation left me feeling defeated by what I thought was going to be an ally in this new venture, even though in the end he said unconvincingly he'd stick a couple of cards on the desk in the event somebody happened to ask. Oddly enough other bridal shops were just as obstinate, while others still were great to work with and I was able to form some great partnerships.

A really funny story on this note is I was speaking with a lady from a bridal shop in Bountiful. She wasn't super friendly and then just stopped speaking to me and said the show started, good-bye. I said, oh...I'm sorry I didn't realize the time and then looked at my watch and politely said enjoy the day, to which she didn't respond. The best part of this, was there wasn't anyone on the show floor yet. Later on she sat across from me at the lunch table. We were the only two there. I said, hello and asked how the day was going. Her response, was she stood up and walked away. WOW! I've never had the cold shoulder so hard in the 100 or so shows I've been to over the years. Crazy business.

Over all...though it was a great show, and I had far more amazing experiences than these two bad experiences. But the bad experiences are always good for a laugh after the fact.

Santa Claus is Coming to Town

We went to our church Christmas Party Saturday night. It was great fun, and the kids got to sit on Santa's Lap.

As usual I did a week or two's blogs in one day. So, read the others below.

Tra-LA-LAAAA!!!!

This happened awhile ago, but I keep forgetting to post it so ya'll can see it. If any of you have ever read Captain Underpants then you'll find this particularly funny. Otherwise, it may just amuse you. One day getting ready for bed Keagan was took off his clothes as usual, but then instead of putting his jammies on, he put his cape back on, and paraded around in his cape and underwear. Rachel asked Keagan, what are you doing? He said, I'm Captain Underpants!! Tra-La-LAAAA!!! Love this kid.

Silver Bells are Ringing

Ah, the sweet smell of Christmas is in the air, here at the Gonzales home. I finally got our Christmas lights up yesterday evening. The kids were so excited to see them glowing when they came home from the Grandparents. Zander exclaimed, and we have the best lights on the street too. In fact, they are the only external sign on our street that it's Christmas. Zander was excited about that too.

As is customary at our home we usually are awaken to either Keagan or Sadie vying for our loving embrace in the middle of night. Last night was the same on that note, however, I woke up around 3 or 4 to Keagan singing Jingle Bells in his sleep. I was laughing so hard I had to wake up Rachel so she could enjoy his song too. I only wish I had got up to get the video camera.

Zander's school held their Christmas Concert the other night. Those are always an adventure, and even more so with Sadie and Keagan. Check out the video and you'll see what I mean. There is a picture of Zander below too. He not trying to grab our attention is he?!