The Bride is Always Late: Irish Wedding Blog from WeddingDates.ie » wedding websites

Google Weddings

Ciara Crossan — Fri, 11 Feb 2011 10:09:51 +0000

The wedding world is about to have a revolution! Yesterday, internet giant Google dived into the wedding planning industry, launching a complete planning portal for brides and grooms to be. Google Weddings is a brand new site with wedding-specific templates in Google Sites, Google Docs and Picnik for save-the-dates, wedding websites, planning materials, invitations and more. Basically, you can plan and share you whole wedding now via Google. And all for free! This is going to have many wedding planning websites who charge for you to create your wedding website etc shaking in their boots now doubt!

Google has also partnered with a US based wedding planner Michelle Rago to give expert advice and suggestions on designs to use in the templates. A year ago, Google Docs began offering customized wedding templates that let users access pre filled templates to manage their wedding budget, collect addresses for invitations, compare prices for different suppliers, so this is a natural extension of that. Head over to http://www.google.com/weddings to see what it is all about and begin storing and sharing all of your wedding plans now!

Like this? You might also like:

Facebook Competition – MyWeddingFile.com

Ciara Crossan — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 14:38:16 +0000

To celebrate their first birthday and to add to their 2,000 + couples membership, MyWeddingFile.com are having a Facebook competiton and are giving away some super prizes! You know I don’t like to have any of my readers out of the loop for any free stuff that’s going around, so here’s what you can win:

Click here to enter the competition (warning: you have to become a fan of MyWeddingFile.com on Facebook to enter the competition) G’luck!

Like this? You might also like:

Fill the Honey-Pot

Ciara Crossan — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 08:30:45 +0000

I have to hold up my hand and admit I am not a fan of cash in cards for wedding presents. I know, I know people don’t want ten toasters, and others think the idea of a gift registry/ordering gifts is a bit cheeky and tacky. But honestly, what is more crude than cash?

There is a new concept knocking around, dubbed the “HoneyPot“, where wedding guests can contribute towards the cost of the honeymoon for the couple. In this way, they don’t have to go buying gifts, but don’t have the stigma with how much cash to put in the card on the day either. From the couples point of view, they can pay for the wedding themselves and have the amazing gift of a holiday from their guests.

MyHoneymoon.ie is a unique online wedding gift registry enabling guests to give couples the ‘Gift of Travel’. Here’s what the company themselves have to say about it:

Honeymoons make ideal gifts and in the present age where many couples already have their furnished house, pots, pans and Waterford Glass, we thought it would be of benefit to an engaged couple to enable invited guests to give the gift of travel online as a direct contribution to their honeymoon. We simply tailor-make the honeymoon, then create a free online honeymoon gift registry which allows them to direct their guests to the site above.

Wedding Guests and friends can make their monetary gift online and couples have full access to all payments. Couples can give as much or as little information on their honeymoon as they wish and all gifts are acknowledged on line. For example, they can specify which tours and trips they want in their package and guests can buy them specific experiences eg. bungy jumping etc.

The company also offer special gift cards on which couples can write their unique access code and include in their wedding invitations. From the day the registry is created, guests can purchase gifts. The account tracks all of the gifts and their givers for easy thank-you’s after the dream trip!

I like the concept and I have talked to a few other brides who do too….what do you think? Comments below please! :) You can find out more info on www.myhoneymoon.ie

Like this? You might also like:

Wedding Mappr

Sabrina Dent — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 08:00:49 +0000

There are a lot of nifty online wedding tools out there that simply do not work in Ireland, mostly because we lack post codes. Happily, Wedding Mapper is not one of them – just type in Cork, Ireland or any other location and you can start mapping your whole wedding.

This is a handy thing to link to on a wedding website if you have one, or you can just provide the URL of your personalised map in your invitations.

In addition to pinpointing your wedding and reception locations, Wedding Mappr is really useful for out of town guests. You can use it to show them helpful information like local hotels and restaurants, not to mention the best pubs to pass the time in between your wedding and reception. And after the wedding, you can use it to map and review your venues and vendors to help out other local brides, too.

Like this? You might also like:

Recessionista Wedding

Ciara Crossan — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 09:00:52 +0000

Sarah Traynor, the author behind “How to Have a Champagne Wedding On a Bucks Fizz Budget” and Aisling Mackey the force behind DIYWedding.ie have recently launched BudgetWedding.ie which is packed full of practical tips and articles for the budget-concious bride. You can read up on DIY-ing your own Flowers, Favours and Stationary; and she also poses some great questions as to whether you should even consider DIY elements, particularly with the stress-factor involved. Sarah, like me is a big fan of putting your personality into your wedding and she shares some great tips and insights.

If you want all of this in one neat little package, then hop over to Amazon and buy the book. The great thing about this is it is all Irish-focused so very relevant to all of those planning a big ol Irish wedding!

Soon to be added to the site is a supplier directory of budget wedding suppliers, so keep an eye out for that in the coming weeks!

Like this? You might also like:

The Elephant in the Room

Ciara Crossan — Wed, 06 May 2009 10:15:02 +0000

We’ve mentioned wedding website s here before, and here is another I came across today that might be of interest to you. Totally FREE to use, you can create your “event” ie, your wedding, add a guest list and send out email invitations and updates, and allow people to RSVP online. You can give guests all of the info about the day of the wedding and any pre or after meals/events you are having around the big day itself. You can give them links to accomodation, read what you can do in the area etc etc. View a sample custom-built wedding website here.

Visit http://www.eventelephant.com to check it out and create your own web page from scratch!

Like this? You might also like:

Grooming the Guy

Ciara Crossan — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 07:00:33 +0000

While this blog is pretty focused on you brides-to-be, I thought I’d been neglecting the fellas out there who may be searching the net and struggling with the whole marriage thing. From deciding on WHEN to pop the question to wedding budgets and future plans, the man of the moment is faced with huge life-changing decisions and is often left resource-less while the ladies are laden down with glossy mags telling them in exacting detail EVERYTHING they need to know about the preparation for the big day itself and indeed what to expect out of married life in general.

Today I stumbled across www.groomgroove.com, a website with heaps of articles and information for the grooms out there. While it is an American site, I haven’t found an Irish one to match it in terms of content and relevance just for the boys. There’s also plenty of info on there for the best man and the groomsmen – make sure they all know what their duties and responsibilities are!

So – pass this on to newly engaged guys out there or indeed any prospective grooms-in-the-making!!

Like this? You might also like:

Bride poking – Ireland’s newest craze?!

Ciara Crossan — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 18:00:17 +0000

There are currently over 400,000 people in Ireland registered to Facebook and over a million users of Bebo on this fair isle, so we know there’s plenty of you out there who like poking each other and tagging photos! I have recently come across a brand new site to apply the wonder of social networking to wedding couples. This is already hugely popular in America as it allows brides & grooms-to-be to share all of their plans with the people in their lives.

My Wedding File is an all-Irish company that offers couples a free wedding website when they register. Similar to the likes of Facebook and bebo, it allows you to create your own wedding page with details on how you met, the engagement, google maps to give guests directions, all of your wedding event details (rehearsal dinner etc), introduce the wedding party to the other guests, upload photos yourself, or allow guests to upload photos after the big day, a guestbook and a countdown clock to when you tie the knot!

As a bonus for this month, if you register (it’s free, so why not?) before Friday 13th February, you will be entered into a draw to win a honeymoon! The lucky couple will stay in the luxury 4 star hotel, Caol Ishka, in the beautiful Siracusa, Sicily. Direct flights, transfers and 7 nights luxury accommodation are included in the prize.

All you have to do is visit My Wedding File and register to be included in the draw. The winning couple will be announced on Valentine’s Day Feb 14th, 2009.

Like this? You might also like: