You know, I’ve never been to Arizona, and until I started working for Style Me Pretty, I never really thought much about it. But now, thanks to photographers like Erica Velasco Photographers, I dream of The Grand Canyon State daily. I blame it on Impact Events and weddings like this unbelievably soft and romantic one. But don’t worry Impact Events… I’m not even a little bit mad!
From the stunning bride… Jason and I had a blast planning our wedding! We enjoyed the planning process immensely. We loved making decisions together. Our first decision was where to have our celebration. We knew we wanted to showcase our desert lifestyle. Jason is from Ohio and I grew up in Florida. We have grown to love our new home state of Arizona and we were excited to show off Arizona’s romantic beauty to our guests. This was the catalyst for choosing Sanctuary on Camelback, a boutique resort at the base of Camelback Mountain as our wedding location. The views of Camelback Mountain along with the surrounding area were breathtaking. The location was serene and beautiful; the perfect desert location. I love looking at Camelback and thinking that is where we were married!
After choosing a location, we needed a vision for our affair, thats where Impact Events and Rhonda Rush came into play. I initially wrote in our wedding questionnaire for Rhonda, I always gravitate towards slightly more organic/vintage style weddings, but I still would like classic elements and to avoid anything kitsch. There were times I may have strayed from that vision (you can thank Pinterest for that), but Rhonda managed to keep our vision in focus. In addition, she efficiently took care of all the logistics so Jason and I could focus on the fun parts of planning, choosing awesome vendors and details (If you couldn’t tell we love Rhonda)!
Rhonda led us to awesome vendors who were great matches for us and helped us realize our wedding vision. We loved everyone involved in our wedding from Cantor Schpall to Ray the DJ. Erica Velasco was an amazing photographer who became a friend. We loved having her presence at our wedding in addition to her photos! Erica wouldn’t have had much to photograph if it wasn’t for the beautiful flowers and styling from Flora Bella. They ran with the few pictures and basic descriptions of flowers I provided and created an amazing backdrop for our wedding. I knew I wanted an organic chuppah for our ceremony and Flora Bella needed no more information than that to create a memorable and beautiful first home for us. The Flora Bella meetings were the few meetings Jason decided to not attend; luckily it was my moms favorite meeting! So I was really glad during our wedding day that Jason kept commenting on how much he loved all of the floral details and how the flowers popped against the desert backdrop. I don’t think a paragraph about wedding vendors would be complete without mentioning Celebrations in Paper. I remember reading it was important to find one aspect of the wedding to really focus on and for me it was paper goods. I love stationery and knew this is where I really wanted to make the perfect choices. The time paid off and Rene at Celebrations in Papers created beautiful pieces that set the perfect tone for our wedding and let prettiness penetrate throughout every part of the day.
With the help of such amazing vendors, Jason and I were able to focus on our favorite part of the wedding planning process, the details. I knew DIY wasn’t going to be my thing, in the words of Jason, I attempt to be crafty, but I am better at buying Etsy products. I definitely lived up to Jason’s description throughout our wedding. I constantly scoured Etsy to find fun and unique details for the wedding from our custom cake topper to the Morse-Code bridesmaid necklaces to custom pieces (hairpiece, belt flowers, and garter) from Mignonne Handmade. Jason and I also wanted personal touches scattered throughout the day. Jason attached his grandfathers tallis to the chuppah and wore Ohio State socks. I wore my grandmothers diamond as a necklace and sewed a heart from grandfathers favorite sweater into my dress.
Our wedding day and all that lead up to it was amazing. We loved the process of beginning a life together and we cant wait to be together for like ever!
Photography: Erica Velasco | Photography: Erica Velasco Photographers | Event Planning: Impact Events, LLC | Flowers: Flora Bella AZ | Wedding Cake: Classic Cakes And Confections | Ceremony Location: Sanctuary on Camelback | Reception Location: Sanctuary on Camelback | Entertainment: Ray The DJ | Bridesmaid Necklaces: History of the Heart | Ceremony/Cocktail Hour Entertainment: Allegro Quartet | Garter & Hairpiece: Mignonne Handmade | Linens: Wildflower Linen | Paper Suite: Celebrations in Paper | Petit Fours: Honeymoon Sweets | Wedding Bags: Wedding Chicks