A little while ago I wrote this post on what you should have done and organised 6 months before your big day. There was far too much to put in one post, so here is part 2. In terms of time frame, I have used 6 months as my starting point as that is how long I have had to get ready for my wedding. But of you have longer, then rather use these as a guideline, or rather, a check list. If you have less than 6b months to plan, then get your bum moving :) But not to worry, lots of my friends have planned weddings in 3 months and under. You just have to get your 'pinterest on' (if you have not heard of Pinterest before, do yourself a favour and click here, your life may be changed forever, not to mention your internet bill!).

This was the most exciting part of planning my wedding so far. In terms of imporatnce, this was one of the first things I decided on. As we are getting married on the farm, we were really excited to incorporate a little bit of farm into our wedding (and so wooden tables were decided upon in place of tresstle tables and overlays). We are having our tables very simple, with the wood being the main feature, with lace table runners down the centre bringing in a slight Vintage touch. This not only saves money on huge amounts of overlays and draping, but I think also adds something a bit special. Poor Farmboy and my soon to be Father-in-Law have had the job of making the tables (click here to see how they are getting along) as I was unable to find the right kind of tables...fussy much I hear you asking? :)

For idea's for your theme or colour scheme, look through sites like Pinterest, The Pretty Blog and 100LayerCake which provide lots and lots of free idea's.

Your decor will very much depend on your above theme and colour palette, so once you have decided what colours you are going with, it's time to find out who can get you exactly what you want to make your special day a reality. Farmboy and I are doing a lot of the decor ourselves, a lot of people think that by doing things yourself you save a fotune in hirig costs. This is not always the case, as sourcing materials can be expensive, not to mention very time consuming. Sometimes its best to leave it to the professionals who have the most experience in dealing with suppliers. But, if like us you want to add your own touch to your wedding then be prepared for lots of hours spent researching and requesting quotes.

If you go onto sites like The Pretty Blog, a lot of suppliers advertise their business on the side, so thats a great place to start looking. Then a good old google search will help you some more. Here are a few good sites with comprehensive lists of suppliers all over South Africa:

I Want That Wedding
Celebration
The Wedding Directory
SouthBoundBride

These day's fun and creative wedding invites and Save the Dates are all the rage, and this is one area you really can save yourself a lot of money by making your own. If you are the creative type and know your way around photoshop, then why not design them yourselves. If you are wanting to go green, here is a great site that is free and allows you to customize your own wedding stationey. Paperless Post then sends you your digital copy which gets sent to all your guests. It's alovely way to make sure those oversea's guests get your invite without the extra worry about the postman not being very reliable.

But if your budget does extend, and you are looking for something unique and special, why not get someone else to do the hard work for you?! I know my way around PhotoShop, but i haven't a clue when it comes to illustrating, so we got the lovely girls over at Ruby and the Swallow to help us out with our wedding stationey. Kim and Filipa, the two braisn behind the design colective that is Ruby and the Swallow are such fun to work with, and i thought were so reasonable, I have enlisted their help in most of my wedding stationey. Just drop them a line here if you're looking for a lovely local team to do stationery for your function. Click here to see the Save the Dates they designed for our wedding, we just loved them!

Ranking very high on our list of proirities is our Photographer. After all the glitz and glam is over, your photographs are the only thing you have left to show for your big day (apart from of course a lifetime with the one you love!). I contacted about 10 different photographers for our big day, and after much deliberation, finally settled on Jacki Brunquel. Farmboy and I are very excited to work with her, and love her creative flair.

Before you even start looking, you need to decided what kind of photographer you want to cover your big day. Here are a list of wonderful photographers we looked at (all based in the Durban area) before finally deciding on Jacki Bruniquel. They were all so very helpful, and it was a very hard decision to make, but we are very excited to have Jacki and look forward to having her cover our special day!

So there you go, another list :) If you feel I have left anything out, please drop me a comment below, I love hearing from you!

xxx