My Invitation Link

Ricki was an East Coast girl with a large extended family scattered all across the United States, Canada and Ireland. She worked a routine 9-5 job, had never married and lived at home. Over the years, Ricki’s parents begged her to “do something with her life” and broaden her horizons. Yet Ricki’s response was always “I know my job is boring but it pays the bills. I hope you people weren’t expecting the next Bill Gates.” Secretly, Ricki felt stuck and didn’t know what to do.

When Ricki was 46, her mother died suddenly. Ricki was devastated because they had been so close. One night when preparing for bed, she burst into uncontrollable tears. As she cried, she heard her mother’s voice saying “It’s now or never Ricki. Now or never. You’ve got to Go for It.” In that moment, Ricki realized she had to break out of her self-imposed prison and ‘Go For It’……whatever ‘It’ was.

Fast forward one year later and Ricki was in Ireland on a photography junket with a group of wildly adventurous photography buffs. The leader of the group was a tall, handsome Irishman named Ryan. He and Ricki were immediately smitten and fell deeply in love over their six-week tour of picturesque Irish countrysides, remote castles, quaint farm towns and lively pubs. The day Ricki was supposed to fly home, Ryan bent down on one knee and tearfully proposed. Ricki accepted.

As Ricki and Ryan planned their wedding in Ireland, they selected MyInvitationLink.com to announce their wedding plans to family and friends across the globe. The couple loved the idea of a digital wedding invitation they could personalize with their own unique love story, music and multiple photographs and then share with family and friends all over the world. Having an elegant digital wedding invitation was the perfect solution to expensive postage and long delivery times. The ease of emailing their digital wedding invitation and being able to update it, should last minute changes occur, made MyInvitationLink.com’s digital wedding invitation the ideal choice for them. Ricki and Ryan were very pleased with how beautiful their digital wedding invitation looked and how much time and money it saved them.

J. Kelly Chase
MyInvitationLink.com Contributor

Most couples will agree that from the moment they met, their first meeting was different. On that day, circumstances lined up in a unique, wonderful and highly memorable way. Instead of saying to themselves, “Oh no this is not the person for me,” their brain automatically told them “Yes this is THE ONE or someone so close I would love to spend the rest of my life with him or her.” Instinctively, they knew that the man or woman standing in front of them was the one they had been looking for…perhaps praying for…..and definitely dreaming about.

Executing a wedding, whether large or small, can be overwhelming for most couples. All of a sudden you are both dealing with finding a venue, caterers, photographers, invitations, florists, etc. Things you both must have to make your wedding day unforgettable are being mutually agreed upon. Budgets are being created. Guest lists are being reviewed. In reality, your wedding is your first joint venture. This is the project you will both stamp your joint characters, tastes and preferences on months, if not years, before heading up to the honeymoon suite. During this time, there could be some really awkward, frustrating moments but the physical, mental, emotional and spiritual support you offer one another will make the wedding day that much sweeter. During this time, it is important to endure through the challenges and share the joyful moments with friends. Sharing your story, sharing your love brings happiness to those around you. It expands the circle of love. MyInvitationLink.com is built around more than just an invitation. It is about sharing those happy times.

Love is a gift that we bestow upon our spouse. Marital love grows richer with time, working through life challenges and accomplishing goals. It is not by chance that we draw to us the perfect spouse to help us learn and grow. We soon realize how blessed we are to have found the person who allows us to blossom in ways that produce deep happiness and personal transformation. Marriage is a sacred journey uniting two people who become bigger and better than they would have been walking the path alone.

J. Kelly Chase
MyInvitationLink.com Contributor

Traditionally, wedding invitations are mailed in double envelopes. The inner envelope may be lined, is not gummed, and fits into the outer envelope. The outer envelope is gummed for sealing and addressing. More recently, the inner envelope is often left out in the interest of saving money and postage.

Now, something else that should be noted here is that The United States postal service issues a love stamp each year specifically denominated to cover the double weight of the invitation and reply (a rate slightly less than the cost of two regular stamps). My personal favorite is a little gem designed by some Ethel Kessler of Bethesda, Maryland. At 61 cents, it will cover the cost of the extra weight of your wedding invitation:

So the Facebook “Events” application is kinda Neanderthal in it’s ability to send a unique invitation. As a result, you’ve decided to send your cleverly designed and well made wedding invitations to all 972 of your Facebook friends. Don’t worry, the cost of postage will only set you back $592 dollars or so.

Now, let’s talk about dead mail. Those sad little envelopes that never get to the intended recipient and for some reason can’t make their way back to you? That’s called dead mail – it goes above and beyond just the regular tragedy of “Return to Sender”. You sent an invitation to your über-rich second-cousin-in-law that lives in Rhode Island because you knew she’d 1) be hurt if she wasn’t invited and 2) send you a large large LARGE and pricey present. But she never received the invitation. And you never got it back in the mail. It wound up in the dead letter office, a facility that houses the 100+ million letters that are undeliverable as addressed. The 61 cents you spent on that double enveloped piece of artwork you called an invitation is down the drain. Officially.

A better choice is OBVIOUSLY to save yourself the cost of postage, not to mention the hassle of addressing each envelope by hand (in your best penmanship, I might add). Why not create a slick and savvy electronic invitation? Send out the link in any way you see fit: Post it on your blog, put it as your status, tweet it for crying out loud – but let your friends know just how good looking your spouse-to-be really is. Your wallet (or your daddy’s wallet as the case may be) will thank you, and you can stash the cash in your nest egg fund to begin your new life.

RSVP is an abbreviation for the French term “Répondez s’il vous plaît”. Literally translated, “respond if you please”. RSVP’s are often requested for any formal event, but are also common for many informal events. It is considered proper etiquette to RSVP when requested, even if you are not planning on attending the event. The guest list gathered from people who RSVP, gives the person hosting the event an estimate of how much food or supplies they should buy. It also confirms that the invitation was received and appreciated. It is polite to RSVP quickly after the invitation is received to make sure that the host meets any deadlines that they may have in the planning process.

Our new RSVP feature allows the wedding couple to compile a guest list all in one location. To use the function, just change the “Enable RSVP” option to Yes on the “Create My Invitation” page. Because you can use MyInvitationLink.com for more than just your wedding invitation, there is a brief form that appears to gather information about the event that you are requesting RSVP’s for. It includes the date, time and address of the event. This information will show up on the RSVP page when a guest views the invitation and clicks the RSVP button.

The list will get long and needs to be easy to manage. We created the ability to add additional guests who may RSVP in other ways than through your online invitation. This way, you can keep your guest list in one easy to access place. You can also edit your RSVP list to ensure that there are no duplicate or miscounted entries. Once your list is complete, you can export the list to Excel and print it as a count for your caterer or planner.

This new RSVP function will be a valuable feature for current and future users of MyInvitationLink.com. We are excited to offer this service without any additional charge. It is included for free with your invitation. I invite all users to use the new RSVP function. Taking advantage of this great function will be enough of an RSVP for me.

The day came and went and we did make a glorious haul. House décor, a bbq grill (from my friend and his family) a bunch of cash and there were three or four cheap toasters. As I was counting my riches, my wife came to me with a couple of pens and a stack of Thank You cards. NOOoooo! I had done the math, but I hadn’t calculated everything that I would pay for all of the gifts. The thank you notes took us hours, but I was glad we did it.

When you receive a nice gift, it deserves a genuine show of appreciation. Which leads me to the question, “Is it bad ettiqutte to send email thank you notes for wedding gifts received?” ABSOLUTELY! When someone gives you a nice gift, they should receive a hand written expression of your gratitude in return. An email is not appropriate. Withholding a gracious thank you is rude and unacceptable. As I tell my kids now, if you don’t appreciate what you get, I will just take it and give it to someone who will appreciate it. Showing gratitude is a form of appreciation. If you can’t take three minutes and send a hand written thank you to the people who spent their money and love on a gift for you, maybe I should take it away and give it to someone who will appreciate it!

So when is emailing a thank you appropriate in the wedding world. Here’s an idea. Send a thank you email card to everyone who attended the reception. Ask for people to sign the guest book with their email addresses. Then load some fresh pictures from the reception into your account at MyInvitaitonLink.com and send it out to everyone who came. Your thank you email can be full of pictures and expressions of love and gratitude for their support. They will love to see the pictures of the reception and honeymoon. Make sure you recall the highlights, the toast, the first dance, the cake, the decorated car, the first kiss as husband and wife, the wedding party and more. They will be delighted and moved to see and feel the emotion of the event that they were lucky enough to attend. But make sure that everyone who gave you a gift receives a hand written thank you. Except for the toaster givers, they all deserve it.

First, start with a picture with a clear image of your faces. Sure there are a lot of cute pictures of you both wrestling, but people really want a good look at that cutie you’re engaged to.  Remember that you have lots of slides to show your personality, but first give us a good look at your face.  Pick a picture where you both look great.  This should probably be the same picture you would send with your paper invitations.

Now it is time to show your creativity.  Your favorite pictures tell a lot about your relationship.  Find a good picture of you both at Halloween. . . or faces painted at a sporting event. . .one taken with a camera phone of your first date. . .this is the time to put in a good smooching picture.  Pictures can say, we have so much fun together or look how happy we are together.  In all of your fun, just remember one thing, this is still a wedding invitation.  Make sure that the picture is appropriate for everyone you send it to.

We have seen some really creative invitations.  One couple used pictures of themselves as kids and then used a photo editing software to add text to the picture.  Seeing the couple as children was fun, and it was nice to see their ages at the times the pictures were taken.  This picture is an example of what can be done with some software and a touch of design.

No matter what pictures you pick, make sure that they say what you are trying to tell about your relationship.  I don’t know if all pictures are worth ten thousand words, but you certainly can illustrate your story.  Pictures will excite the people you send the invitation to.  The right pictures will have them watching it over and over.

As we continue down the speed track towards the digital bend, it is inevitable that email wedding invitations are going to creep further and further into the center of the road. Many couples still have reservations about sending an eCard as a wedding invitation. For such a formal event, is an email appropriate? The answer is a resounding YES.

YES. Okay, okay, please don’t stop reading here. I am not suggesting that you should yell out “stop the presses”! Don’t dial up grandma and tell her to check her facebook page for info on your upcoming nuptials. Do not, I repeat, DO NOT clear your refrigerators of all of the cute sunflower magnets in anticipation that you will have nothing to hang next spring. Call the professional photographer, pick out the right paper, select a professionally designed invitation. Address the envelopes by hand, include your RSVP cards, seal, stamp and deliver the necessary traditional invitations. There, feel better now? Now that the traditional invitations are done, lets look at digital eVites. What about all of your friends that you only keep in touch with through email? Did you track down the address for your roommates that have moved off to Michigan? Missouri? Montana? Are your friends in Europe planning dropping a grand to cross the pond for the big day because you were willing to spring for the international postage? Introducing the solution. Digital Wedding eVites. Digital eVites make a great supplement to beautifully designed, traditional wedding invitations. Let’s face it, the world runs on email. The only mail that makes the rusty hinges on my P.O. Box squeak are wedding invitations and credit card offers (not that I would give either of those up). Now you can announce your love and commitment to more than just those you can scratch up addresses. Digital eVites are for your Web 2.0 friends. The ones who you have never met their sister, but you’re in their top 8 on MySpace. That friend who moved to South America and won’t make it, but will be upset if they are not invited.

No. Don’t cancel the traditional invitation. Don’t send out only a Digital eVite. Give grandma something to put on her fridge. Call the mailman and put him to work. Then, send your Digital eVite to everyone you know.