This post is a follow up to the previous budgeting inspiration, and I hope you can use it to help you with your planning or to get ideas....isn't that whole point of this blog?..hmm.. Throughout our planning process we have been quite creative when it comes to little touches that I think will make all the difference on our wedding day. We have decided that our theme will be "The Story of Us," making a personal connections with all of our guests and for those we may not know as well, giving them a little insight to who we are.
I wanted our guest book to reflect our theme in a way that truly represented us as a couple and as individuals. From the get-go (with some help from Pinterest) I thought it would be great to have a photo book as a guest book so that we can display it even after the wedding.
Now obviously a photo or picture book will need pictures..but we didn't plan to have an engagement session with our photographer, and with our schedules, we never know what will happen at any given moment. And then, just like it was meant to be, I got an email from Shutterfly.com with an offer code for a FREE photo book!! We would only have to cover shipping and taxes (around $10) and obviously provide the pictures. But how can we get nice pictures without hiring a professional that would cost a fortune? Our total budget for the guest book was only $50! Let the brainstorming begin!!
I did some "research" on Pinterest for engagement shoot poses, repinned the ones I liked best and also came up with a few that I thought would complement the ones I had chosen without it being obvious that we were posing for the picture. I went for more of a relaxed, easy going, not as formal type pose...because honestly, that's what our personalities are like. Once I had all the poses I wanted/thought would be nice, I had to think of a way to get the pictures taken. A professional was WAY out of the question, most of our friends work and wouldn't have time, and we both have such random schedules that sometimes it's a miracle to see each other before bed time! Finally, I thought, why couldn't we take the pictures ourselves?! My fiance and I are both into photography as a side hobby and enjoy taking pictures and being outside. For our 6th Christmas together I bought him a really nice Cannon DSLR that we use quite often for numerous occasions, and since then he has become the official photographer for both of our families. If anyone in the family wants/needs a nice picture or family portrait they call him.
GENIUS!! Now all I had to do was convince him that this could all work....that was the hardest part! It also doesn't help that neither of us enjoy getting our pictures taken, hence why we are always taking them. After some explanation and convincing, he agreed and we set a time that weekend to go take the photos at a local park. The photo books from Shutterfly can hold from 500-1000 photos depending on path you choose to create your book. I figured we'd need about 50 shots so that we could fill the book and have enough room on the pages for our guests to sign their well-wishes. With all of that in mind, we decided to have multiple outfit changes to have some casual and some more formal shots throughout the book, and it made the photos more interesting. We each brought clothes we already had so there was no cost associated with that either.
Carrying the clothes from the car for our outfit change
Once we got to the park, we scouted the perfect location and set to work on taking the pictures. We had a BLAST!!! This was probably one of the most fun "dates" we've had in a while. Because we were taking our own pictures, it was very relaxed and comfortable, no working with a strange photographer or worrying about what they would think of your outfits or wanting to change 3 times. We also had unlimited time to take the pictures, we planned to be about 1.5-2 hours and wound up spending 3! In total we took about 300 pictures, but with "bloopers" missed timers, blinking, poor lighting, laughing, and such only about 150 were "keepers." Once we got home we went through all the photos and chose the ones we liked best to put into the photo book...we didn't have to edit many at all which saved a lot of time. For the cover we chose a picture Greg had taken of a tree that he carved our initials into almost 8 years ago, very fitting with our rustic touches we're incorporating, and the last page is a picture of the tattoo we got for our 5th anniversary. Again, keeping with our theme.
Here's a few "bloopers": We wound up using a few of these in the book because they were fun and more candid :)
It took us so long to get this timer right!!
Tri-pod
"Working Bride" as Greg says
Take one...I missed the timer..
Take 2..I LOVE the lighting!
Making me laugh
Lining up the shot...before
After
I absolutely LOVE how the book came out and think it will be a great "story"for the gift table! Here's the link to view our Photo Book. Total, the book cost us $8.63, for a savings of $41.37 on the guest book budget!
If you don't have an account with Shutterfly I HIGHLY suggest you create one! They are always have specials or give always and are very reasonably priced for personalized and unique gifts.
Let me know what you think! Is this something you would consider doing? What are you doing for a guest book? Your comments are always appreciated!
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