Archive for October 6th, 2008

When planning for invitations, there are a few hidden costs that you don’t think of right off the top when you’re doing things like choosing stationery, font, colours, theme and layout - mainly, postage.

It’s proper to send a self addressed stamped envelope for the RSVP with each invitation, so that immediately doubles your postage costs for each invite.

Jen and I are only going to be sending out 40-50 invites, so that’s only an additional $25 for return postage, but if you’re having a big wedding, it can quickly add up, especially when you factor in reply cards and extra envelopes.

But, as with anything, there are many ways to cut costs when it comes invites.

You can simply email your guests and sort their responses on your own for nothing. You can step your presentation a bit by creating an eVite which will let you add a little bit of wedding personality to your invitations, and it will manage your responses for you - again for free.

If you want to go traditional and have actual printed invitations mailed to guests, there are still ways to save.

Jen and I are wanting to try something a little more traditional, while still having a new media flare. So we’re choosing to mail invitations, but have the RSVPs handled online through a personal wedding website. (I’ll tackle the personal wedding website in a future installment)

I tossed the question out on Twitter one night, and got an instant response. “Use a Google Form for RSVPs, will populate a spreadsheet of guests,” wrote @dougsymington.

I tested it. It’s brilliant. I can ask guests to choose menu items, provide email addresses, give us information about special needs, and have it all instantly populated on a spreadsheet for easy viewing and management.

The Google Form is free, it’s embeddable in our wedding website, it’s totally customizable and it’s thorough in its managing of information.

When it comes to saving money on the invites, doing them yourself is the easiest way. I can take a photo with special meaning to Jen and I (definitely not the one below!) and have it printed on a postcard with iPhoto on my Mac.

With iPhoto, you can add all the fancy scripty font and then you just put the wedding website and RSVP address on the bottom.

Going the postcard will mean we dont have to buy envelopes to mail the invites, and we can keep the design to just one card (saving paper costs). By having the RSVPs online, we dont have to buy extra reply cards, envelopes and postage.

Total cost for invites, including postage, would be about $2 each!

What are your secrets for saving on wedding invitations? Let me know.

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When you join Team Diabetes, you get all the support and help you could possibly need. From fundraising ideas to training, they make sure you hit the goals you’ve got in front of you.

The training is in the form of free clinics with The Running Room. If you live in one of the major centres in Canada, you’re free to attend the clinics held at the store nearest you. If you have a busy schedule, or dont have a Running Room near you, you can sign up for the web clinics.

The web clinics are easy, each week you receive an email with some training information/inspiration and then a running/walking schedule. Here is my week one schedule:

Week 1 WDW Half Marathon

1:45/3:00 Half 2:00/3:15 Half 2:30/3:30 Half To Complete
3-Oct OFF OFF OFF OFF
4-Oct 3K (1.8) Steady 3K 3K 3K
5-Oct 7K (4.2) (LSD) 7K (LSD) 7K (LSD) 7K (LSD)
6-Oct OFF OFF OFF OFF
7-Oct 3K (1.8) Tempo 3K Tempo 3K Tempo 3K
8-Oct 4K (2.4) Tempo 4K Steady 4K 4K
9-Oct 3K (1.8) Steady 3K 3K 3K
10-Oct OFF OFF OFF OFF
11-Oct 4K (2.4) Steady 4K 4K 4K
* numbers in ( X) are distances miles
*Steady = Walk breaks are optional

The introductory email details what steady and tempo and fartlek means, and how to train properly.

The emails also include lectures from guest speakers meant to give training tips and motivation.

My name is Steve Price and along with Kevin Findling we will be e-running with you for the next 16 weeks!

On-Line Clinics are a new and exciting way to train and they also allow you to obtain a lot of information. As well, each week we will send you an email and introduce the Clinic Topic, some guest speakers and then include some training schedules for various paces. Please note that you are able to build your own schedule by entering your estimated completion time under the Training Schedule tab.

My training is including piece of the web clinics, along with a plan I’ve made with a Smart Coach from Runners World Magazine.

Deadline for joining Team Diabetes runs in Prague, and Australia are coming up at the end of October. So join now!

The Blog According to Buzz. Spread the word, ya heard?