In four years of doing a bridal show, there are many things we have learned…one of which is that guys don’t like bridal shows. Let’s face it- these events are pretty girly deals. Fashion shows, flowers, picking out linens…While these are all very important components to a wedding, they may not exactly be the parts of the wedding that a guy wants to plan. So since the wedding is something that should be planned as a couple, we are excited to present The Groom Room, presented by GroomsOnline. Bring your Groom and visit the Arizona Bridal Affair, September 26th, 2010 at the Chaparral Suites Scottsdale. Let him enjoy the day in the Groom Room featuring casino tables by Arizona Nights, bachelor party planning with Viajes To Go Vacations, plan his wedding day attire with Dapper Dan’s Tuxedos, try some yummy food from Salerno’s Catering, pick out his grooms gifts and more from GroomsOnline, enjoy a cigar, lounge around and even visit with the Arizona Rattlers dance team, the Sidewinders who will be on hand to take pictures, sign autographs and hand out prizes.

Grooms will also have the opportunity to participate in contests and win prizes for their wedding day. So make this a true couples event and a bridal show that you both can enjoy. 

Register online to receive free tickets for you and your groom at www.arizonabridalaffair.com/tickets . The Arizona Bridal Affair, September 26th 9am-3pm at the Chaparral Suites Scottsdale, in Scottsdale Arizona. Visit us online at www.arizonabridalaffair.com to learn more about this fun bridal event!

From GroomsOnline.com

The idea that guys don’t want to be involved in wedding planning is one of two things: Totally true or a complete cliche.

It all depends on the groom. If you’re one of those guys who’s willing to get involved with the wedding planning, here’s how to go about it:
- Tell her you care. If she doesn’t know wedding planning is something you’d like to be involved in, she probably won’t even consider asking for your opinion. At the beginning of the planning process, make it clear that you want input on certain things (or everything, as the case may be).

- Then show her you care. If you want to be involved with planning, you have to make sure you act like it. This means showing up on time to meetings, not grumbling when she drags you to yet another venue and browsing photographers’ online galleries with her. If you act like wedding planning is a hindrance, she’ll likely just cut you out of the planning process (and will probably get pretty mad at your before doing it.)

- Take charge or one or more aspects of the wedding. Quite often, the groom is in charge of the honeymoon, but it doesn’t necessarily have to be this. You can pick the DJ or the photographer — whatever is important to you. Perhaps you should take care of the transportation, as deciding between a limo, Rolls Royce or even a getaway motorcycle is fun and manly at the same time.

- Plan the things that directly affect the groom. This includes the groom and groomsmen’s attire, his wedding ring and the groomsmen gifts. After all, if you don’t care about what the bridesmaids wear and receive as gifts, why should she get too involved with what your guys wear?

- Plan it together. Ideally, you and your fiancee will just plan everything together. There’s no reason to split up the tasks unless you want to. Instead, why don’t you both browse wedding inspiration online and run everything past each other before making a decisions. When the wedding day actually arrives, you can truly call it “your day.”

Meet GroomsOnline in the Groom Room- a unique entertainment and browsing experience designed just for him! Only at the Arizona Bridal Affair, September 26th at the Chaparral Suites Scottsdale, register online at www.arizonabridalaffair.com for two free tickets.

A friend of mine is planning a green wedding for this fall- even down to the invitations! Intrigued, I had to learn more.

Plant-able invitations are a great way to personalize your big day as well as a great way to leave your guest with something more than the details of your event. Seeded paper invitations are plant-able and a decent gardener should end up with some beautiful flowers after the wedding has come and gone. Most invitations I found came in two styles- fully assembled or the DIY variety.Even the vellum used to print on  is eco-friendly; in fact the only thing not eco-friendly is the stamp.

Curious? Here’s a couple of sites to get you started:

www.oftheearth.org

www.botanicalpaperworks.com

www.greenfieldpaper.com

The inviations in this picture came from Botanical Paperworks.

Looking for invations for your special event? Visit the Arizona Bridal Affair, September 26th 9am-3pm at the Chaparral Suites Scottsdale! Register online for free tickets at www.arizonabridalaffair.com

We all want important life moments — like graduating from school, getting married or having your first baby — to be perfect. For many couples, your wedding is a chance to celebrate with everyone you care about; it’s also the largest, most complicated party you’ll ever host. From tracking guest RSVPs, to picking the right florist, DJ and caterer, to coordinating every last detail with your wedding party, it’s no surprise that the process can become overwhelming and expensive.

After proposing to the woman of my dreams with 100 red roses, six months ago I started planning my own wedding. My fiancee and I decided to use Google Docs to manage every aspect of our wedding, starting with shared budget, guest list, to-do list and venue-tracking spreadsheets and keeping all our docs in our “Wedding” shared folder. I ended up talking to other couples who planned their weddings using Google Docs and discovered I wasn’t alone in thinking that it helped save time and avoid headaches.

Today, I’m happy to share this knowledge in the form of over 20 wedding templates available in the Google Docs template gallery. These tools make it easy to estimate and track your wedding budget, collect addresses for invitations, compare vendors and much more. For example, take a look at the address book template below. Instead of emailing hundreds of guests and copy/pasting hundreds of addresses into a spreadsheet, you can send a Google form and collect addresses in a spreadsheet automatically:

Because these documents, spreadsheets and forms live online in the cloud, you can easily get help by sharing them with your parents or bridal party, and you can access them from the bakery, bridal shop or anywhere around town using your smartphone. Plus, you never have to worry about versions and email attachments, because everything is always up to date.

Having the tools to plan a wedding is a good start, but you also need to know what questions to ask when interviewing vendors and which factors to consider when inviting guests or choosing music. To give you a leg up, we’ve teamed up with StyleMePretty.com, a popular wedding blog, to add tips from wedding experts to each template. StyleMePretty is also hosting a sweepstakes and asking engaged couples to share their wedding planning experiences. One randomly selected winner will receive free consultation with celebrity event planner Michelle Rago and a $500 gift certificate to Wedding Paper Divas.

We’re excited to give more engaged couples tools to make the wedding planning process easier and more fun. To learn more about simplifying wedding planning with Google Docs and Style Me Pretty, check out docs.google.com/wedding.

Posted by Peter Harbison, Product Marketing Manager, Google Docs

http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/02/simple-wedding-planning-with-google.html

Couldn’t help but share because this is pretty neat! Way to go, Arizona Weddings!

P.S. While you are at it, check out our ad too!

Visit the Arizona Bridal Affair on September 26, 2010 at the Chaparral Suites Resort in Scottsdale, Arizona. Register online for your free tickets at www.ArizonaBridalAffair.com

How exciting! Your close friend is now engaged and asking for your advice on her big day! If you are not already married, this presents an opportunity to live out your own wedding fantasy, and if you are already married now you can re-do what you didn’t like or share your two cents on what you did like. But, should you? Although I am by no means an etiquette expert, I implore you to remember one very important thing: this is her day. It’s just that simple. This is your friends day, her wedding, and her one chance to do what  is her dream to do.

A few years ago, our good friends were getting married and shared with us some of their thoughts one night over dinner. They found a location they loved, they called The Farm and the groom really wanted a breakfast menu with ice cream cake. Instantly my husband and I started with the jokes about eating waffles while watching a goat cross our path and the cake smooshing torture of an ice cream cake. Little did we know while they decided to go with a tradtional menu, this would turn out to be one of the best weddings we had ever been to and all of their ideas once realized produced one truly amazing event. The color scheme of pink and orange was beautiful- and one I still see around today. The Farm at South Mountain was amazing- very beautiful, tranquil, completely amazing.  While I think it is a farm, it is also a beautiful green, grassy location with beautiful mature trees and someplace I would have loved to get married at ourselves. When my husband and I were married, we had to resign our dreams of a green, grassy ceremony because we were locked into a very hot summer wedding with my in-laws schedule, and just could not find the perfect green, grassy place. Here my friend had been able to carry out that vision, and yes I was a little jealous.

Having the opportunity to work with such great bridal businesses, and even better- to get to know many of these great businesses on a personal level, I am often asked my two cents on everthing bridal. I was a bad friend to Becky- I am sure I didn’t just give her my opinion, I am sure I expected her to live out my wedding dream that I could not pull off. What came together was the perfect day for our friends- their perfect day.  What I ended up with was my own dream of a wedding, which actually came together to be quite an amazing day as well once we found the perfect indoor location.

I love sharing my experiences with vendors and especially when I know their personalities and feel they will be a perfect fit for a friend. I love also talking about new ideas I have seen, and new options for weddings that weren’t really around when I was planning my day. But, I am also working hard to keep my thoughts on how others should do their day to myself. It is after all, their day, and what I or you, as the friend think would/could/should happen should make no difference to someone who has had this wedding dream in their mind.

So be a good friend. Focus on her ideas and vision and most of all enjoy her dream become reality.

Planning a wedding? Visit the Arizona Bridal Affair on September 26, 2010 at the Chaparral Suites Resort in Scottsdale, Arizona. Register online for your free tickets at www.ArizonaBridalAffair.com

Ready to dance with Dad? Get Married shares our top ten picks for your father daughter dance!

Your Dad’s probably been thinking about this moment since the day you were born, so make sure it’s as memorable for him as it is for you. Our top ten song picks for your Father Daughter dance.

1. “My Girl” (The Temptations)

A sweet crowd-pleaser for the fun-loving bride and her Dad.

2. “Walk With You” (Edwin McCain)

The latest hit from the much-beloved Edwin McCain is perfect for dads and daughters.

3. “Isn’t She Lovely” (Stevie Wonder)

A classic hit that expresses the sentiment every dad’s feeling on his girl’s wedding day.

4. “The Way You Look Tonight” (Frank Sinatra)

The traditionalist’s choice-How can you go wrong with Frank Sinatra?!

5. “How Sweet it is to be Loved by You” (James Taylor)

Unexpected, with an added bonus-it’s easy to dance to!

6. “I Will Always Love You” (Whitney Houston)

Bold, dramatic, and sure to be a showstopper!

7. “I Hope You Dance” (Lee Ann Womack)

A little bit country…a whole lot of perfect for a dad-daughter dance.

8. “Forever Young” (Rod Stewart)

A non-traditional choice, but hey, that’s never stopped you before!

9. “When You Say Nothing At All” (Alison Krauss)

Listen to the words…a total tear-jerker!

10. “When I’m 64″ (The Beatles)

Bring a bit of Beatlemania to the dance floor-a quirky, sweet option.
From GetMarried.com http://www.getmarried.com/articles/?id=701 Photo Credit: Arden Photography

What a fun night! The Arizona Bridal Affair is a proud member of WEN, otherwise known as the Wedding & Event Network. These events are always a blast, and give us moms behind the bridal show a chance to mingle and meet other wedding industry professionals. Last nights event was prom themed and some of the exhibitors really came dressed to impress! The yummy catering was provided by Mi Catering and was perhaps the best yet, although I am still thinking about the pasta station at the last WEN event which was hosted by Special Moments Catering. Living Energy Events provided the music, Pour Masters provided the bar, Largo Photography took pics, and The Self Portrait Station provided a picture station which was so much fun! The event was held at Encore Creative, which could be a blog post all by itself- this place was amazing! It was not a ceremony or reception venue, but rather was a huge warehouse of decor- think The Stagers for you HGTV fans out there. Only this warehouse has linens galore, an on-site floral studio, an on-site seamstress and so much more! They had decor like you wouldn’t believe- couches, rugs, chairs and ottomans for lounging, cages for go-go dancers, ginormous poker chips for a casino themed event, tiki stuff, old western stuff, Morrocan stuff, retro stuff- 50,000 square feet of stuff! And, they can also help with entertainment that you might need for your event, such as casino tables, cigar girls- you name it. Basically anything you could ever want is here. Just walking around the place can help to give you ideas about your big event, and I could not encourage you more to do at least that.

So big thanks to Curtis Whipple, the man behind WEN. Thank you also to all the great professionals showcased this time, and super big thanks to Mi Catering for not asking me to refrain from serving up thirds, fourths and let’s be honest- I probably visited that food table ten times.

Hello World of Blogging, it’s nice to meet you. I know we’ve been acquainted for a while, but really I have longed to know more! Really! Why? Because our goal, is really to be a resource, a valuable to resource to not only Arizona Brides, but hopefully post information that if useful to brides or businesses everywhere. And, I suppose if we are going to do that effectively, it is time to give a little background. So cue the music- let’s pretend it’s not Behind The Music, but Behind the Bridal: Meet BizEWorks.

Who is BizeWorks? The Arizona Bridal Affair is produced by BizEWorks, and the mission of BEW is to connect local business and the community in the Phoenix metro area. Building great relationships and offering a true service to the community is not only important to us, it is vital. Without it we wouldn’t be in business.We truly value your business whether you are a bride, or a professional looking to showcase your services. Our single goal is to produce a successful event, where the couple leaves feeling informed and rejuvenated with ideas, and feels like they have had FUN; and likewise we want the vendor to feel appreciated and supported by us  providing an event where they can really connect with the couple and create a relationship themselves.

The Arizona Bridal Affair is now in its 4th year and in those four years we have had the pleasure of working with some really great vendors, and this year with their help we plan to make the show better than ever! We are so happy to once again be working with the Tarr family of Fresh Look Images, who will be offering FREE engagement portraits at the event, Arizona Nights will be back this time in our “Groom Room”, a space just for the guys, as will Viajes To Go Vacations, Salerno’s Catering and AZ Photo Fun. Jennyvi Dizon Couture will be back for the third year, this time holding a sample gown sale where brides can score a couture wedding gown for 50% off, or work one on one with Jennyvi and have her design your gown also at a discount. Jennyvi will also be producing the fashion show, which will have a fun, high fashion, fast paced feel. We are excited to also be working with  Stephanie and Juan Sandoval of AZ Celebrity DJ and Let’s Pose Photo Booths.We have also made some new relationships that will help to bring even more to the married couple by offering the Groom Room which is sponsored by  the expert in all things wedding- Mark Walerstein with GroomsOnline.

So mark your calendars for the Arizona Bridal Affair, Sunday September 26th from 9am to 3pm at the Chaparral Suites Scottsdale, and see how hard we have worked to bring you a truly amazing event! Register online for two free tickets at www.arizonabridalaffair.com

Can’t wait until September for a bridal show? Then be sure to mark your calendar for this weekend when the W Scottsdale will be the site of an exclusive Party & Bridal Experience showcasing top event vendors from Arizona and California! The show runs from 11 am – 4 pm. The W Scottsdale is located at 7277 East Camelback Road, Scottsdale. Party & Bridal Experience 2010 is ideal for newly engaged couples to jump-start their journey down the aisle. It boasts an impressive and diverse array of premier wedding, mitzvah and event professionals. Each trusted vendor has been hand-selected based on their uncompromising creativity, impeccable orchestration and unparalleled expertise to create a total event experience. This show not only concentrates on the brides but also showcases what these creative exhibitors can do for Bar and Bat Mitzvahs, dinner parties, corporate event and galas and much more. Party & Bridal Experience exhibitors include bridal and formal menswear, caterers, photographers, videographers, florists, entertainment, décor designers, cake artists, invitations and linen specialists. In addition, specialty vendors include photo booth, green screen, air brush artists and much more! Tickets are available online for $15 or $20 the day of the event. Guests are invited to register online to win a video montage at www.partybridalexperience.com. Sponsors of the Party & Bridal Experience include W Scottsdale, Tri-Rentals Events Specialists, Phoenix Bride & Groom Magazine, Arizona Weddings Magazine, The Wedding Chronicle, Arizona Bride Magazine, Southwest Meetings & Events and Jewish News of Greater Phoenix. Party & Bridal Experience 2010 is produced by Amy Petrovsky, Sensational Events, 602-696-4646; amy@sensational-events.com.