Map It Out: Another Check Off the Labrador DIY List

Bet you've been wondering where I've been lately? In Busytown, that's where. I started my final semester of classes (yay!), landed a second job (wtf was I thinking?!), and worked near full-time last week at my original job; all while continuing to plan this little wedding of ours.

We are *thisclose* to our 2 month mark and I am about to $hit bricks full of anxiety. No, I'm not being dramatic. My stomach churns just thinking about how little time we have left. But at the same time, I'm soooo ready for the day to be here! Conflicted much?

Somehow during a week full of 64 hours at work, 11 hours of class, and a coed wedding shower (pics soon!), I found the time to crank out our DIY wedding maps! I never really considered maps a priority, but after seeing Mrs. Ballet Flat make it look easy as pie, I decided to give it a try and shocked myself with the result. Here's what I came up with in PowerPoint:

Click on map for more detail!

To be completely honest, I'm no stranger to PowerPoint. Mrs. BF's tutorial was definitely thorough and easy to follow, but I'm also not a beginner. While the logistics were easy to me, it was still a tedious task! It took a few hours here and there to complete (mostly because I'm a perfectionist). Newcomers will have a tougher and longer time with it. But don't be too discouraged! If you have time to play around with it, you'll end up learning and getting better. That's how I learned PP: totally self-taught!

I won't repeat Mrs. BF's steps, but here's a run through of my project from start to finish. First up, the Google map of Savannah! "A" is our ceremony site and "B" is our reception site.


Then I traced the main roads and Savannah River. I added icons to represent event locations and lodging. I found all the icons through Google Images. I tinted them pink by double clicking on the icon, then clicking on "picture", then "recolor".


Here's my first attempt at removing the map in the background. As you can tell from the final map, I changed a few things because they didn't look quite right.


After some serious tweaking (what I spent most of my time on), I had my official map! I added the compass rose and map symbols and steam ship to give it an extra special touch. The title font is "Scriptina" free from Dafont.com and matches our save the dates! The font even coordinates with our invites, which I'll reveal very soon now that they're finished being designed and are on their way to be printed up and shipped out! :D

Our maps are more on the "cutesy" side than the super informative side. But our guests will have our wedding website for more thorough directions plus actual Savannah visitor maps in their OOT bags. I'm just hoping they'll use this map as a supplement that provides a visual pinpoint on where all the festivities will go down!


The perfectionist in me isn't quite happy with them yet. I'm stuck on the title of the map:

"The My Last Name - His Last Name Wedding
Events Map"

I think we're keeping the first line, but I'm not sure that I'm feeling the second part (Event Map). Should I keep it or change it to one of the following? [Poll]

• Event Map
• Events Location Map
• Events & Accommodations Map
  
• Just our names in the first line and "Wedding Events Map" in the second line.
  
• Just use "The My Last Name - His Last Name Wedding" title and that's it.
  
• None of the above. I'm leaving a comment with a suggestion!
  

Block Head

Source

Um, why hasn't any told me how difficult and time-consuming reserving a block of rooms for a wedding can be? Somebody has really dropped the ball on keeping Miss Lab in the loop!

I've been trying for a couple weeks now to get a hold of someone at a few hotels I'm interested in, but haven't had much luck. Either I call too late (this internship is killing all my free "business hours" time) or when I get a chance to call within operating hours, their sales teams are out for the day! I've tried leaving voice messages and emails, but no one is getting back to me. ARGH.

I was always under the assumption that hotel blocking would be one of the easier things to do in the wedding planning process. I guess I was mistaken. I mean, what's so hard about taking down my contact information and then marking some rooms as unavailable until a certain date? Sheesh. Maybe one of you hotel-savvy hive members could clarify the reason it may be hard to do?

Anyhoo, I figured that while I wait for someone to have mercy or pity on me, I'd share a couple hotels I'm hoping to snag at a discount for my guests.

I'm reserving two hotels for the wedding weekend. One will be close to our reception site and the other will be close to our after party site. Both are within walking distance of all the squares, so our guests will rarely need a car to get around and see the heart of Savannah. However, the hotels are still near a major highway, so guests will be able to make a quick escape back home the day after the wedding!

First up, the Hampton Inn & Suites in the historic district:

All photos found at their respective websites!

This hotel is literally right around the corner from our reception site. Our guests could just walk there and back if they wanted to. The Hampton is Savannah's newest hotel, so it's definitely clean! It's the only hotel I've visited from my list of possibilities and the entire staff was incredibly friendly (even those sales wasn't working that day).

I loved the chandeliers and southern decor they had in the entryway and lobby!


The rooms were all very clean and modernly dressed in neutrals.


Who doesn't love a free breakfast bar?!?


Our next top choice is the Inn at Ellis Square downtown. The building is simply stunning:



And it's located close to River Street where we'll hold our "after-party"! Again, no ugly super-busy-color-clashing-gaudy printed comforters on the beds. Always a plus!


I'm keeping my fingers crossed on these two in hopes of scoring some discounted rooms in the price range we want for our guests. Of course, Savannah has a plethora (I love that word!) of hotels, some chain-owned while others are historic and/or bed & breakfasts to choose from. Our guests will be welcome to pick any hotel they want, but we wanted to make sure we provided them with some affordable and conveniently located options. Not to mention that I love when hotels are researched and choosen for me, so I'm guessing our guests will appreciate that as well.

We're expecting 75 OOTs, so we're planning on about 25 rooms (a mix of single and double beds) at each hotel. We'll be suggesting on our wedding website that friends share rooms to cut down on travel costs (a lot of our single guests are friends and/or co-workers who won't mind sharing).

I haven't found much information concerning how many rooms to block according to guest counts and when the deadline for reserving should be before releasing extra rooms. Any suggestions so when the sales managers finally call back, I've have a better idea what to ask for?

Joint Bachelor & Bachelorette Party....in VEGAS!!!

I am extremely excited to announce that our wedding party is currently in the very early stages of planning a joint bachelor and bachelorette party in Sin City! One of Chris's groomsmen may be able to use his hotel points to put us up for free (he's racked them up from traveling for work). Then everyone would be responsible for their own travel, food, show tickets, and alcohol bills. We've been keeping an eye on airline rates and today a lot of the Atlanta airlines announced price cuts due to the economy. Their loss is our gain! We found tickets for as low as $129 each way non-stop. Thing is, we only have until March 5th to book the tickets. Does anyone know if this is as good as it gets? I haven't been on a plane since 2001 and I didn't purchase the ticket, so I have no idea what a good deal is...

We're tentatively planning to leave from Atlanta early in the morning on Friday, October 23rd. By the time we arrive in Vegas it will be roughly the same time that we left from Georgia because of the time zone change. We'll spend all of Friday doing the typical "Vegas checklist" stuff like pictures in front of the world-famous welcome sign and all the "city" hotels.

Friday night the real party gets started! The guys and girls will split off and go their separate ways so we can have our true bachelor and bachelorette parties. Then Saturday we'll end the weekend with a bang by combining the parties for one insane night out on the strip!

If anyone has been to Vegas lately, please don't hesitate to give me tips and advice on how to have the absolute most fun with the least amount of money!

In the meantime, here are some of the things on my "perfect bachelorette extravaganza wish list"!

Like my custom sign? haha

Have to go to all the "must sees" like the Fountains at Bellagio!

The main attraction during the girls' night out. The hotness that is the Thunder From Down Under! Click the pic to see more! :D

I'd love to do this class with my girls! Maybe the "workout" will keep us from feeling guilty after hitting the buffets. Not to mention, I just may learn some tricks for the honeymoon! ;) Click the pic for more!



Of course I can't forget the gambling...



...or the shopping!!!



And maybe Chris and I could stop by a 24-hour chapel for a little dress rehearsal? ;)

Btw, we had our engagement photo session and party this past weekend. Both of them went really well! I'm waiting on pictures from Lindsi and my friends so I can update fully about them. This weekend I'm heading to Savannah with my MOH, Amanda, for the Savannah Bridal Expo. We'll be staying with my future sis-in-law, Leslie. I'll be looking for several vendors and also visiting my reception site. Can't wait for Friday!