2014 Planner of the Year - National Association for Catering and Events

I've just returned from the National Association for Catering and Events (NACE) conference - known as Experience! 2015 - in Scottsdale, AZ. I love going to conferences, and I think continuing education is crucial in our industry. Even though I have been doing weddings for 16 years, and I have owned my own company for 13 years, I learn something new at every single session I go to. While I anticipated coming home with lots of great new knowledge, I didn't anticipate coming home with this amazing award: 2014 Planner of the Year. Wow. I'm still in shock. Especially since I didn't even know I was nominated!

Our NACE Northeast Florida Chapter President, Belinda Cottrell from the Marriott Sawgrass, secretly entered me into this category. I have no idea how much time she put into this process, but I'm sure it was many, many, many hours of digging. Having submitted awards entries for our chapter, I know how detailed and arduous the process is! So my eternal gratitude goes to Belinda and everyone else that helped her gather the information she needed.

So what is Planner of the Year? According to the pretty glass plaque (which I can't get a decent close-up photo of), this award is given "for outstanding achievement in the overall planning and production of events, as well as contributions which have made significant impact on the catering and events industry." Wow, again.  That's pretty heavy. And a lot to live up to! It amazes me that my industry colleagues think that description fits me. I am beyond humbled! It still hasn't sunk in that the beautiful glass plaque with those words etched on it also contains my name.

When I earned my Master Bridal Consultant designation in 2011, I was so honored that a panel of my peers thought that I deserved to be in this amazing group of professionals. And now, to be selected for one of the top honors in our industry, I can't believe that I get to do what I love every day and that people think I'm THIS good at it. Mind. Blown.

I have lots and lots of cool information to share that I learned at the conference, so stay tuned for more blog posts in the coming weeks. Cheers!

Steampunk Themed Photo Shoot

Last summer, I had the honor of working with Ann at Premier Bride Magazine to create a steampunk-themed photo shoot for their Winter/Spring 2015 issue. The magazine is out now, so we are finally able to share the photos with you! Not only did we get to shoot at my alma mater, Flagler College, our photographer is a fellow alum too. It was amazing working with such a talented team of wedding pros on this shoot: zach•thomas•photography, Jade Violet Wedding & Event Floral Boutique, Beautiful Faces by Erin, Jill Stonier, Professional Makeup Artist, Bridals & More, Take One Productions, Flagler College, Brooch the Possibilities, LLC St Augustine FL, The Panama Hat Company of St Augustine, Men's Wearhouse, Southern Charm Events, First Frost Designs and Simply Delicious Cakes.

And here is a great behind-the-scenes video to show how it all came together! It was so fun to think outside the box a bit for this shoot.

Congratulations, Ashleigh and Charles!

This weekend, we'll be celebrating the wedding of one of our own! It's time for Ashleigh and Charles to tie the knot, and we couldn't be happier for them. Ashleigh has written some blog posts during her wedding planning journey, and I'm sure that after some down time she'll share with us what she learned along the way!

I have gotten to witness three of our team members say "I do" - Emma, Melanie, and Lauren - and I'm so excited to add Ashleigh to that list. Best wishes to the happy couple!

Spring 2015 Internship

Does this look like fun?

We are currently seeking smart, professional and outgoing students to apply for our Spring 2015 internship! Interns must be enrolled in a Bachelor's/Master's program at an accredited college or university and provide documentation from their school stating they are able to receive academic credit for this internship. This unpaid internship will run from January through April or May, depending on your school's calendar and/or requirements.

Intern Office Duties:

• Assist with daily office operations
• Email information to prospective clients
• Follow up on inquiries and book appointments
• Create blog entries
• Work on marketing campaigns
• Answer phones in a professional manner
• Respond to emails in a timely manner
• Work with the First Coast Weddings team to create new procedures, promotions, etc.
• Use proper grammar and spelling at all times
• Maintain a clean and organized work area
• Other duties as needed

Internship Requirements:

• Minimum of 12 hours in the office each week, and availability on weekends.
• Dress in business casual attire while at the office, black suit on wedding days. Remember, first impressions are everything in this business!
• Represent First Coast Weddings in a professional and courteous manner at all times.
• Be pro-active and look for tasks to assist with when your assignments are complete
• Willingness to sign a agreement stating that all paperwork, files, vendor information or client data is proprietary and confidential
• Act as a team player
• Failure to report for a scheduled shift without notice (no-show) will result in termination of the internship. If you cannot work your scheduled shift, you must notify the lead coordinator at least three hours prior to your scheduled start time.

Application:

To be considered for an internship, please complete the application by clicking here.

Introducing Bowing Oaks Plantation

I've been keeping a secret! Please don't hold it against me. For almost two years, I've been consulting with some dear friends that had a crazy idea to build a new wedding venue in Jacksonville. And now, that crazy idea is a reality! What started as a "simple pole barn" has turned into a magnificent venue with all the amenities you can imagine! Introducing Bowing Oaks Plantation... Plantation amenities include:

• Indoor Seating for 200 Guests (with Dance Floor and Food Stations)

• Wrap-Around Porches

• Two Outdoor Ceremony Areas - Under Beautiful Oak Trees, Or Open-Air Chapel

• Bride's Suite and Groom's Cabin

• Catering Kitchen

• Fully Air-Conditioned and Heated

• Indoor Restroom Facilities

• Ample On-Site Parking

• Secluded and Private Location

Bowing Oaks Plantation is debuting this fall, with our first wedding booked for November 16th. We're also booking weddings for 2015 and beyond! I will be handling all the bookings for this fabulous new venue, so feel free to contact me for more details! Be sure to visit our social media sites for more photos and construction updates: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram

As Seen In Destination Weddings Magazine

Check out the latest issue of Destination Weddings & Honeymoons magazine, featuring my Expert Picks for three of North Florida's hottest wedding venues!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Happy Valentine's Day from the First Coast Weddings team!

Blogger Bride: Meet Ashleigh

Three-and-half years ago while celebrating my birthday, I was introduced to what I knew instantly was someone special. A friend of a friend of a friend brought my husband-to-be along for the celebration.  Charles and I instantly had a connection and were even holding hands by the end of the night. We had our first date at Bahama Breeze a few days later, and as we were getting to know each other I thought to myself, “this guy is definitely marriage material!” By the end of the summer we were officially “an item.”

The recent proposal took place in Savannah, Georgia.  Charles first told me we were going on a camping trip on those dates, but then plans had to change when he saw that it was going to rain that weekend… sneaky, sneaky.  He took me to a beautiful bed & breakfast that exuded old Savannah charm. After we got settled in, we took a bike taxi to find a place to eat for dinner. Charles mumbled the location to the taxi driver, and we arrived at a stunning square in front of The Old Pink House. Charles sat me down on a bench and recited a poem he’d written for me. I was crying so hard at the time I didn’t even hear it. Of course I said yes. The rest of the weekend, I was on cloud nine!

Over the years we’ve grown a lot as a couple. We’ve had our good times, our share of bad, gone through deaths, adopted a lab-mix together, and at the end of the day I can honestly say my fiancé has proven to be not only great marriage material but truly my best friend!

Watch for my posts about our wedding plans!

ABC Business of Brides 2013

Earlier this month, I had the pleasure of attending the Association of Bridal Consultants' annual conference, Business of Brides. It's one of the highlights of my year to see friends from around the world, and learn and grow with them.

I got to spend time with wedding planners from Latin America, Canada, Japan, Bermuda, Puerto Rico, and the list goes on and on. But even better was getting to spend four days with my direct competition. You read right, there were four wedding planners from Jacksonville attending the conference. And not only did I share a hotel room with one, I spent a total of eight hours in the car round trip with them.

I'm very proud that our town has such a great wedding community. While we are competitors, I see these wonderful ladies as allies. In fact, one of them, Tanya Hendricks of Southern Charm Events, and I did a presentation together. It was called "Playing Nice: Cultivating Alliances Not Animosity," and focused on building relationships while focusing on your own business instead of worrying what everyone else is doing. It was a huge hit, and I met some terrific ladies that came up to share stories after the session.

I also got to spend time with Monica Bernhardt of To-Doers Event Planning, and my fellow Master Bridal Consultant Lisa Burnett of Elegant Weddings By Lisa. While we see each other at local networking events, we don't often get to spend that much time together, and it's always great getting to know these ladies a little bit better.

The conference theme, Palm Beach Chic, was inspired by Lilly Pulitzer, so lots of bright colors greeted us at each breakfast, lunch, and break. With the exception of one - The White Party, a welcome reception where everyone donned their white resort casual wear for a great cocktail party. The bar from Just Bars was an amazing focal point - I can wait to use one of these at an upcoming event!

And the speakers - wow! Matthew Robbins of Matthew Robbins Design was our design speaker. As a contributing editor for Martha Stewart Weddings, he had lots of great insight on finding inspiration for an event theme. Plus he shared photos from his own wedding!

We also heard from Susan Southerland, who we are happy to have as a top-notch Florida wedding planner - she owns Just Marry! in Orlando. She is a phenomenal speaker, and all-around great person.

And lastly, we were reminded of our brilliance (his word, not mine) by Simon T. Bailey. If you haven't read his books, go buy them now. I'll wait. I think that all of us in that room have made changes (some significant) that will affect our lives forever. If you ever have the chance to hear Simon speak, don't hesitate.

But in addition to these fabulous keynote addresses, there were over 25 amazing breakout sessions. I attended "Modern Jewish Weddings," and "Are You Ready for the Storm? Disaster Preparedness for Wedding Professionals," both of which gave me great information to bring back to our team.

I can't say enough about how great it is to be in a room of 300+ wedding professionals from around the world. Every year, I come back energized and renewed, and ready to tackle the year ahead. If you are a wedding planner and aren't an ABC member, or you are a member that doesn't attend conference - call me! I'd love to share more about the experience.

Happy Birthday To Us!

On November 8, 2002, I filed the official paperwork creating First Coast Weddings and Events. Whew. I actually had to call the IRS and talk to a real person to get a taxpayer ID number, because they didn't have a way to do it online back then. My, how things have changed!

And talk about changes... sometimes I look back at a file that has my original logo on it. What was I thinking?! And my first website - you don't even want to know what that looked like! It had a marble background, very corporatey looking. Not me at all! I'm so thankful that I learned early on that I needed to be myself, and that I would attract clients that are like me. I am still amazed that I managed to book any clients with that original website - but I did.

As I was typing this, I decided to actually show you that hideous old logo. And it took quite a while to find!

It wasn't on the two external hard drives I normally use for backup/old files. It wasn't on any flash drives. Guess what I finally had to dig out to find it? Yep, one of these bad boys:

The Iomega Zip 100mb. The precursor to flash drives. Now 90% of my files live in the cloud, not even on a physical drive. Mind. Blown.

Well, enough of this stroll down memory lane. I'm happy to announce that our current logo got a little tweak. Not a huge change, but I hope you like it!

I changed the pineapple a little bit and updated the font on the bottom line. I've wrestled with this for a long time - I even hired a designer to create a completely new logo last year. But I could never bring myself to start using it, even though I loved it. So I've been playing around with it for about a year now, and I think I'm finally happy! I'd love to hear your thoughts in the comments below.

And here's some other cool stuff that's happened this year - Lauren got married, moved back to Jacksonville, and rejoined our team! Emma give birth to her second child, a sweet little girl that we all adore! And just last weekend, Kari got engaged! So it's been a pretty spectacular year for our team. We can't wait to see what the next year holds.

Premier Wedding Expo Bridal Show - This Sunday!

Looking for a great way to meet lots of wedding professionals in one place? Stop by the Premier Wedding Expo this Sunday! We have been proud to help produce these great events for many years, and they keep getting better.

• Over 100 exhibitors
• Great discounts and prizes will be available for brides planning their weddings
• Each bride gets a bridal bag when entering the show

The event runs from 1:00 pm to 4:00 pm at the UNF University Center (12000 Alumni Drive). Tickets are $10 at the door, but if  you purchase the online in advance they are only $7! Be sure to visit the show's website, www.PremierWeddingExpo.com, to learn more.

We Won! 2013 Wedding Industry Expert Awards

The results are in for the 2013 Wedding Industry Expert Awards. We're honored to be selected among the top wedding planners in the country again this year! Winner: Best Wedding Planner - Jacksonville Winner: Top 5 Best Wedding Planner - Jacksonville Winner: Top 10 Best Wedding Planner - Jacksonville Finalist: Best Wedding Planner - Florida - Ranking: 3 of 3 Finalist: Top 5 Best Wedding Planner - Florida - Ranking: 3 of 5

Jacksonville Wedding Venue Tour

We had a great time last Sunday participating in the first Jacksonville Wedding Venue Tour, hosted by our friends at The Wedding Loft. The premise is that brides and grooms visit four venues, all set up as they would be for a wedding, and they get to enjoy food and entertainment while meeting great wedding professionals. It's like a bridal show on wheels!

We were at The Carling, which is an interesting historic venue in Downtown Jacksonville. The building was formerly the Carling Hotel/Hotel Roosevelt, built in 1925; now it's home to gorgeous apartments! Restored architectural features include Palladian windows, terrazo floors, and a beautiful marble staircase to the private event space.

Thanks to J'Adore Studios for the fun photos! To see more photos from the tour, check out Liz's blog post.

The Jacksonville Wedding Venue Tour attendees on the bus!

At the entrance to The Carling

Design and florals by Blush 129

Cake and cupcakes by Choux Bakery

Food by D'Vine Cuisine

Celebrating 10 Years

In November, we celebrated the 10th anniversary of First Coast Weddings and Events. I put together a small dinner party for our team, and I'm excited to finally share the photos with you! There were so many gorgeous images from Kris Graham Photography that I had a hard time narrowing it down!

Thanks to Rose of Sharon European Florist, D'Vine Cuisine, Kirby Rentals, and Classic Cakes for making it all happen. And of course, to Emma, Melanie, Kari and Ashleigh for being such an amazing team!

Happy Holidays!

2012 is almost over - can you believe it?! We've celebrated our 10th anniversary, we've added two amazing ladies to our team, we've moved to a new office, and we've celebrated the weddings of some spectacular clients! We wanted to take a moment to thank you for your friendship and love this year, and we look forward to many more joyous celebrations in 2013.

November In A Nutshell

So... I haven't been blogging very much this month. Sorry! But here's what has been going on this month. First, we celebrated our 10th anniversary. We had an amazing company dinner at a beautiful riverfront home at sunset. I don't have the professional pics yet, but here's a little sneak preview:

Huge thank-yous to D'Vine Cusine, Rose of Sharon European Florist, Kris Graham Photography, Classic Cakes, D'Land Productions, and Kirby Rentals for making it all happen.

A day later, I left for Colorado to speak at the Association of Bridal Consultants' Business of Brides conference. I always love getting to see my fellow wedding planners and friends at the annual conference. We got to hear great ideas from industry leaders Donnie Brown and Rebecca Grinnals, see new products and trends, and learn about all sorts of topics. I met a wonderful woman, Yehudit Steinberg, from the Jewish Interfaith Wedding Network, who specializes in creating custom interfaith ceremonies for brides and grooms. Plus, I attended a session called, "Special Needs Weddings for Visually, Hearing, and Mobility Impaired."

To make it an even better trip, I got to spend a few extra days in Colorado, enjoying Estes Park and Vail.

Before I knew it, Thanksgiving was here, and now it's already November 30th! This month has really flown by - I hope yours was as great as mine was.

We're 10!

Today is a very special day - it's our 10th birthday! Sometimes it feels longer, sometimes it feels like just yesterday. It was November 8, 2002, when our corporate paperwork was officially filed and legal. We've seen hundreds of weddings, lots of our couples have children now, and some of our brides and grooms are doing amazing things! We love to keep up with everyone, and it's so much easier with Facebook and Twitter.

We've worked with so many talented wedding professionals over the years that it would be impossible to name them all. Having a great team really makes our job a lot easier!

And we've added to our own team over the years - including a some babies of our own. We're celebrating with a small dinner party this evening, but we'll be sure to share photos soon. It's been an amazing 10 years, and we look forward to many more! Cheers!