WeddingDates.ie

We’re kicking off the first of our monthly newsletter prize draws in style with a fantastic romantic get away for two.

Prize: Escape to the luxurious, four-star Blarney Golf Resort Hotel & Spa. Enjoy two nights accommodation in a stylish guest room, a romantic gourmet dinner for two, and breakfast both mornings. It’s the perfect engagement get away!

All you have to do to enter is tell us what you really wish your partner would do for you for Valentine’s Day. Romantic, funny, off-beat - whether it’s candles everywhere and an intimate dinner for two, a hot air balloon ride in Paris, or getting your name inked on forever, we want to know what would sweep you off your feet and melt your Valentine’s knickers.

We’ll publish the best entries on the blog on Valentine’s Day, and pick one lucky winner of the grand prize romantic getaway. If you’d like us to publish your entry anonymously without your name, that’s fine - just tick the box to tell us so on the entry form. More than anything, we want you to be completely honest as we attempt to answer that age old question: What do women really want for Valentine’s Day?

Click here to enter, and good luck!

It’s been five months since the WeddingDates.ie website went live, but like it says at the top: the bride is always late. So we’re celebrating our launch with a launch party extravaganza on Friday, 13 February at the Cork Vision Centre, and you’re invited!

True to form, we’re throwing our party in wedding reception style, complete with snazzy invitations, champagne cocktails, live band, wedding cupcakes, and of course, absolutely adorable wedding favours.

When: Friday, 13 February, 2009, 7 PM - 10 PM
Where: The Cork Vision Centre, St Peter’s, North Main Street, Cork

There will, however, be no Chicken Dance. (Probably…)

We have 20 invitations to give to WeddingDates.ie visitors and brides, so if you’d like to get your boogie on with us on a really fun night, we’d love to send you an invitation.

All you need to do is drop your contact details into this form and we’ll send you out an invite for you and a guest to attend our big day. Invitations are limited and it’s first come, first served, but we’d love to see you - so drop your name into the hat ASAP, and we’ll get one out to you.

Here at the Weddingdates.ie Head Office (also known as the local pub - the “real” office is merely a satellite) we’ve been planning our new monthly newsletter for ages. The one thing we couldn’t come up with is a name, so we foolishly turned to the Internet and asked our online Twitter friends for suggestions.

Here’s just a few of the ideas they came up with:

• Bride to Ride
• Getting Half a Guys Stuff: Part 1
• Veiled Threats
• Bridezilla Monthly
• The Prenup Starts Here

Yes, our friends are hilarious.

In preference to “E-veil” and the like as a title, we’ve gone with the slightly less cynical moniker of “Love Letters” since, well, it’s a letter we write to subscribers every month, it’s about weddings, and weddings are about love. (Yes, they can also be about stress, money, rows and exhaustion, but Complete And Total Panic Monthly didn’t really have the right ring.)

To celebrate the launch of our newsletter, we’re delighted to be partnering with online retailer Curious Wines to offer an exclusive discount on wedding wines, available only to newsletter subscribers. These guys are truly passionate about wine and really know their stuff, so if you want something for your wedding that’s more personal than the standard hotel offerings, take advantage of their free Wedding Concierge Service and let them help you pick out personal wine selections matched to your menu and your budget.

They’ll deliver for free, and even pick up the unopened cases and refund you for what you didn’t use!

We’re also kicking off the newsletter with a cool contest with a fantastic romantic weekend getaway prize, so if you want to get your free swag on, be sure to sign up for Love Letters over on the sidebar.

If you’re thinking that chocolate fountains are not quite different enough, Irish artist Allan Cavanagh may have what you’ve been looking for:

As an alternative to the traditional guest book, Allan puts his talents to work to create a caricature signing board of the bride and groom. Mount it on poster board or in a custom matting, put it in your reception foyer, and ask your guests to sign around it. (That’s got to beat a dusty old guest book you never, well, dust off…)

And for really personal favours or just some wedding fun, he’ll actually come to your wedding and draw caricatures of your guests at your reception! The caricatures have the bride and groom’s names and wedding date at the bottom to commemorate the occassion.

I’ve never been to a wedding where this was done, but I have been to one where a professional paper cutter cut out silhouettes of each guest - and it was really fun. Not only was mine quite flattering, I also matted and framed it and gave it to my mum for Christmas one year - so double score. (Come on, mums LOVE that sort of thing!)

You can plow though Allan’s wedding caricatures and signing boards on his website, the aptly named Caricatures Ireland. He also does parties and corporate events in case you want to save this idea for later.

The WeddingDates.ie crew attended our first wedding fair last weekend, and a certain highlight was traipsing up and down the stairs to ’sample’ the delights of the two chocolate fountains that were on show at the fair. Dark brown, flowing chocolate oozed down a 4-tiered fountain like milk - are you getting a good enough picture here, guys?

Ironically, chocolate fountains are becoming increasingly popular for the bride who wants something “a little different.”  Whether or not you are having one to stand out or not, one thing is for sure -  your guests will love it.  What a fun way to keep adults and kids entertained, dipping their own strawberries, marshmallows or whatever else takes your fancy into perfectly delicious Belgian chocolate.

I met two companies at the Wedding Showcase in Cork, but there are a few of them around the country, so you should be able to find one in your area available on your all important date and within your budget.

There are different packages, so make sure you ask for all the options available, and that you are happy with what is involved.  Some companies do all the work for you, and with some you have to set up and dismantle the fountain on your own. (Be sure you have someone on the day who will do that for you - its not like you are going to want melted chocolate all over your white dress…)

Some ideas for dipping foods include:-

• Strawberries
• Marshmallows
• Profiteroles
• Pineapple
• Peaches
• Banana
• Grapes
• Fresh Coconut
• Mini Doughnuts
• Crystallised Ginger
• Jelly Babies
• Nougat
• Rice Krispy treats
• Chocolate Chip cookies
• Fudge

www.chocolatefountain.ie are based in Mitchelstown in Cork and have a variety of options available.  They say; “The list of dipping foods is endless and only limited by your imagination. Foods not suitable for dipping can have chocolate poured over!”

www.ilovechocolatefountain.com just started up a few months ago, and the owner Lorna is very excited about how their chocolate fountain can enhance your wedding by being an unforgettable conversation piece.

Anyone out there have experience of a chocolate fountain at your wedding or event?  Or any choc-disaster stories to tell?

We’re off to our very first wedding fair as an exhibitor this weekend and we’re so excited we’re practically drooling on our own tulle. If you’re around Cork, come by the Silver Springs Hotel and have fun with us upstairs at booth #F11.

We’ll have an amazing photo booth where you and your girlfriends or fiancé can have your photo taken to share with your friends or family, a fun prize draw, and of course, we’re happy to talk our hats off about venues for your wedding reception.

Where: Silver Springs Moran Hotel’s Convention Centre [Website]
What: Over 130 wedding specialists exhibiting
When: Saturday 10th, Sunday 11th January from 11am-6pm
Cost: €8 per adult; €3 per child
Info: Download the details

If you can’t make it this weekend, dont fret - we’ll also be at the Wedding Journal Show, Citywest Hotel, Dublin from 16 - 18 January, and the Wedding Journal Show, Green Glens Arena, Millstreet, Cork from 24 - 25 January.

These crafty and sassy mini-notebooks are all the rage; the matchbook style presenation is a nod to the days when smoking was not included on the list of Seven Deadly Sins and couples actually had match books custom printed for their big day as favours because absolutely everybody on the planet smoked.

Ahh, those were the days.

Anyway, Eva and Alice at Piping Hot Papers make these adorable matchbook notebooks in a range of sizes, running from $5 to $8.40 US for every pack of 10. They come in fantastic mixed but coordinated, double-sided papers so you can match them to your colours, theme or venue. Gorgeous!

You could of course DIY these, but shipping from the US is a very reasonable $4.25 for the first batch plus $1.25 for each additional set - meaning you can get 200, delivered, for under €150! Piping Hot Papers even takes custom orders.

(c) Peter Sweeney 2009

I began working on the basic concept for weddingdates.ie back last January when I attended my first ever wedding fair.  As I wandered around through the stalls, met with the hoteliers and other wedding suppliers and talked to the eager brides, I realised that there was potential for a business in this “Wedding Industry”.  From way back in those very early Market Research days, did I think I would have achieved this much in 1 year?  While 2008 was still technically the “pre-start up” phase, I began trading with a fully live functioning website in late October.

I’m delighted to have the website off the ground, and to have close to 50 of Ireland’s top wedding venues featured on the site.  The traffic stats are growing, we are getting wedding enquiries from brides and more hotels are contacting me to sign up.  All in all a fantastic result for a site that only went live just over 2 months ago.

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