The Amber Events Army will soon take over the world

This photo makes me happy--it looks so regimented yet festive! I imagine that any second they're going to bust out into a regimented choreographed dance ala the dancing tea cups & saucers from Beauty and the Beast. I have these pins made out of bottle caps for my interns and assistants to wear on the wedding day to look not only official, but sassy.

Wedding Industry Experts Question # 10

Q. What is the most unexpected thing that has happened on the day of a client's wedding?




A. I had a groom get tangled up on the dance floor with his six year old niece and in trying to prevent her from getting hurt he completely dislocated his kneecap as he fell down. As awful as it is to say, thankfully this had happened to him in the past and instead of having to be rushed to the hospital, he snapped it back in to place before it started to swell. The guests were in a frenzy with worry and the silent room was becoming more uncomfortable by the minute.

Immediately I got him ice and pain killers, sent an assistant to the pharmacy to buy a knee brace, kept all guests/family members away from him and his wife as he attempted to compose himself, and I got the party started again per his request. He and his wife stayed outside for almost an hour due to the pain and his intense disappointment at this happening on a wedding day.
When they cut the cake, he gave the MOST incredible speech to his new wife and his guests. He said that while they were outside together Alexis told him that they had promised each other that day “for better or for worse”. Steve said that while he was not expecting the “for worse” to come so quickly, he realized that the most important thing was that he was married to the most beautiful woman in the world and he couldn’t understand how he got so lucky.
He went on his honeymoon with a full leg brace. Two years later these two are still madly in love (with a new baby girl!) and I think that the way that they handled the incident so gracefully together set a precedent for their marriage. The way I see it, because of the way they came through it, they had a perfect wedding. Something is perfect only if you see it as perfect.

To read stories from the other wedding planners, click HERE.

Wedding Industry Experts - Question # 9

Question #9: What are you most proud of in your professional life?

My reputation amongst my peers in the wedding industry. It makes my day when a fellow vendor tells me that I'm one of their favorite planners to work with or when a new vendor I have not met yet tells me that they're excited to work with me because they've heard such good things about my events, my clients, and  my work ethic.

Wedding Industry Experts - Question # 8

Q. What do you do to prepare for a first meeting with a client? 

A. Initial consult meetings are done after a bit of email exchange or phone time, after the bride or groom has been informed of  my planning rates, and after  he or she has filled out a questionnaire that helps me gauge if they are realistic or not. I don't have time to meet with clients who have impossible budgets. In this pre-meeting stage I'm also sniffing out the crazies--if you text me on a Sunday morning why on earth would I sign up to work with you for one year???? You crazy.

Once a meeting is actually set I have a pretty good idea that this is the type of couple I want to work with, but sometimes I do get surprised. In order to do a great job I have to genuinely LIKE my clients! I'm happy to say that I truly adore my clients.

Meetings are a combination of getting to know the couple on a personal level, showing my portfolio, and seeing if we are the right fit for each other. I believe that this is a chemistry based relationship and we all have to be on the same page. As much as they are interviewing me, I'm interviewing them and sometimes I have not accepted a client because it did not feel right.

Wedding Industry Experts - Question # 7

Today's answers are hilarious but make my stomach turn at the thought of some of those things happening to me! Check out the Wedding Industry Experts to see what everyone else had to say to this week's question.

Q. What is the worst thing that has happened at a wedding and how did you deal with it?

A. One wedding day I awoke to the sound of my cell phone ringing and my groom Matt telling me that a part of Broadway Street was being shut down for the Golden Dragon Parade. Uh, oh. Marvimon, the fabulous venue where their wedding and reception was being held, is located on Broadway, right on the edge of Chinatown . I pulled up maps of the parade route and breathed a sigh of relief when I saw that the parade ended 1/2 of a mile from Marvimon. I knew it was still going to be a sticky traffic situation, so I emailed all of the vendors and told them an alternate route to take to get there.

I asked one of my assistants to pick up a few dozen Krispy Kreme doughnuts on her way in that morning as I wanted everyone working that day to be hyped up on sugar and happy. The vendors started rolling in on time and things were looking good. At noon, the situation took a bad turn. Traffic police pulled up in front of us and started setting out cones to shut Broadway down right where we were! Big problem. I started getting calls from the servers who were trying to get to us and they said that there were blockades north of us as well. Huge problem. We were barricaded in!

Jeff, the Marvimon site manager, and I went to talk to the traffic officer to explain the situation. At first he would not relent, but after begging, asking to talk to a supervisor, and finally bribing him with doughnuts and red velvet cupcakes he gave us permission to let our valets park cars on the blocked off street. One crisis solved, now to get our guests through the barricades...

Jeff spoke to the officers north of us and finally got permission to let the wedding guests onto the closed street, and once we routed out a way get them to us, I called Matt's mom and asked her to spread the word to the guests.

People had trouble getting to us, but once they arrived, things just fell into place beautifully. We started the ceremony 10 minutes after our scheduled start time.

Wedding Industry Experts - Question # 6

Wedding Industry Experts asked this week: 

Q. What type of people make the best Wedding Event Planners or Wedding Designers?

A. A person who can be a chameleon but stay true to them self.
A person who can juggle multiple clients who all have different personalities and ways that they need to be treated.
A person who can work closely with vendors yet still maintain their loyalties to their clients.

A person who can handle client family issues and know when to shut their mouth and when to give advice.

A person who can know their value and not accept less than they know their worth.

A person who can figure out a way to balance out their personal and family life in order to prevent burnout.

A person who can ok with 14 hour days, intense manual labor, and the loss of weekends.

A person who possess tact, speed, composure, grace, propriety, intelligence, a backbone, a sense of humor, and incredibly thick skin.

A person who truly cares about people and provides the type of support that the client needs.

A person who knows that nobody is going to build a business or a career for them.

And a person who will work very, very hard. 

Flying high!

Yesterday was my husband Eric's birthday and instead of buying him a present I planned a day of fun for him. I surprised him with a trapeze class with Richie Gaona at his elaborate trapeze set up in his backyard in Woodland Hills. It was adrenaline fueled fun and athletic Eric was a natural at flying! After swinging through the air on the flying trapeze we headed up to MalibuFamily Wines for a picnic and wine tasting.

 For the bachelorette or bachelor party that has to stay local and short (as in, no 3 day cruise to Ensenada or weekend in wine country) this trapeze class would be a fun and bonding experience for you and your crew.

Granted, you probably won't be able to re-catch the bar on your first lesson like Eric did because he has unreal ninja-like skillz, but you'll love the feeling of flying and cheering your friends on. Just don't do this within a few days of an important event where you have to walk gracefully (ahem, wedding)  as your calve muscles will be so sore you'll hobble. It was worth it though!

 

Now I'm of to join the circus....

Eric's mad skills 

 

My fabulous tumble 

 

Wedding Industry Experts - Question # 5

Today on the Wedding Industry Experts weekly question I used the word "barf". How 'bout them apples?


QUESTION # 5


Q. What is the name of your business and why did you choose it?  Do you have any advice for people trying to decide on a name for their Wedding Planning or Designing business? 


A. My clients are highly educated and powerful career women so I knew I could not have a cutesy name like "Precious Dream Fairytale Diamond Rose Platinum Princess Weddings" that would make them barf, so I chose "Amber Events". It's clean and easy an it doesn't limit me to just weddings. It doesn't hurt that it starts with an "A" either.  

Wedding Industry Experts - Question # 4

Q. When you first started your business, if you could have done one thing differently what would it have been?

A. Nothing. I approached this business with the goal to learn from others, maintain humility, ask for help, and to build my business without debt. I've made small mistakes here and there, but overall I'm happy with everything so far.

Check out all of the other planner's answers HERE--they're so interesting!  

pre-gaming for the wedding season

Ah, Springtime networking events....that magical time of year when it really does seem like those of us in the wedding industry lead glamorous lives! Right now we have manicures, 8 hours of sleep a night, and cute shoes when we see each other. Come August we see each other on our 9th wedding in a row in our orthopedic support shoes with bags under our eyes. And sleep? Ha. Ha. HA.

But 'tis the season to be out and about! I don't know what it's like in other cities but in LA it is done RIGHT. We hop from party to party and consume lots of (free) booze, air kisses, beef sliders, dessert buffets, and photo-booth photos. Every event has a photo-booth. I think it's a rule.

I was looking at my calendar and in the past 10 days I've attended not only multiple breakfasts, dinners, lunches, and happy hours with my fellow wedding industry colleagues (along with all of my client meetings) but also the cocktail party at the SLS Hotel for the Wedding Salon, the Utterly Engaged Leap Year Party, The Reveal at Casa Unici, and The Cream Event, the grand opening for Jen O'Sullivan's new studio.

These people below? These gorgeous (and crazy) fillies are the gals who professionally execute your wedding days. Me, Cat from Next Exit Photography, Kristeen from Kristeen Labrot Events, and Jen from B and G Photography. 



The wedding season needs to get here soon because all of the skipped gym days, happy hours, and dessert buffets are causing some problems and I don't know if I'll be fitting in my black wedding day pants come wedding season.....

Amber Events in Bridal Guide Magazine

I'm so excited to be featured as the West Coast expert for the article in Bridal Guide Magazine titled "All-American Weddings - how brides are celebrating from coast to coast"

Behind the scenes of a destination wedding

I am SO excited about this blog! Throughout Mark and Jessica's 4 day destination wedding at the phenomenal Rosewood Mayakoba in Playa Del Carmen, Nira and I made ourselves take the time to document the production process to show the behind the scenes of what it took to pull together a multiple day event that was 5 months in planning. There was magic fairy dust sprinkled over the entire weekend it came together so smoothly! A gigantic shout out to the staff of the Rosewood Mayakoba for working so hard and being so awesome. We can't say enough great things about the staff there.

Note: these are just the production photos. We're saving the pretty stuff from the official photographer, Elizabeth Medina--they're going to be gorgeous!


DAY ONE

6:30 AM. Heading to the airport

7:30 AM

5:00 PM. Our sweet, sweet, ride, a Chevy Cavalier. We actually did get all of those boxes in this car! Also shown, our chef, chauffeur, and sherpa, my husband Eric.

8:00 PM. Dinner at El Fogon in Playa del Carmen!

9:30 PM. Shopping at Mega for welcome bag items

DAY TWO

10:00 AM. Meeting with Rosewood Mayakoba wedding specialist Arianna. She got us set up in a conference room to use as our work room. She rocks!

My "office"

Unpacking the boxes & suitcases

Putting together the welcome bags for guests

Welcome bags included water, snacks, Margarita mix, bubble bath, bug spray, gum, chapstick, candy, and a welcome letter with an itinerary

4:00 PM. Setting up for the welcome dinner. Mexican food, Margaritas, and Karaoke awaited our guests when they arrived!

8:00 PM

One of the chefs and our lovely bride & groom!

DAY THREE 

 4:00 PM. Wedding Rehearsal!

Pretty photos around the property

DAY FOUR

9:00 AM. Loading the guests up for a day of fun at XPlor Adventure Park

DAY FIVE  - WEDDING DAY! 

9:30 AM. Transporting all of our decor down to the beach

10:00 AM. Set up commences

Unwrapping & filling up the oil lanterns

Our lovely friend tried to give us Pina Coladas. When we told him that we couldn't because we were working he brought us virgin ones. We love the staff at the Rosewood!

LED light up dancefloor about to go down. It was a hit that night!

Escort cards were tied to the sea glass  bottles and displayed amongst family photos & flower arrangements. Twas pretty.

Taking a photo break

2:00 PM. Videographers (Loyd Calomay) and Photographers (Elizabeth Medina) arrive to capture the bridal party getting ready

3:00 PM. Dressed and ready to wed!

3:00 PM. Decorating the ceremony site

4:00 PM. Ceremony!

4:30 PM. Recessional and cocktail hour music

7:00 PM. Attempting to keep the oil lanterns lit. The wind was just too strong and it didn't work. I was sad about that.

DJ Ivan doin' his thang

9:30 PM. Videographers Kyle & Loyd taking a break.

10:00 PM. The cake has been cut, the party is raging, and Arianna and I have our own dance party.

11:00 PM. Pack up time.

Sneak Peeks from our photographer Elizabeth Medina!

 

DAY SIX

10:00 AM - 1:00 PM. Breakfast and 2 hours on the beach for Nira and I. Multiple Pina Coladas consumed in those two hours. No photos of that. It ain't pretty.

4:00 PM. Repacking the luggage as to not get charged a $200 over-limit fee. We got the suitcases .4 lbs under and carried on the rest. 

Two days later we produced a formal reception for Mark & Jessica for 140 of their friends and family at the gorgeous Bel Air Bay Club here in LA. Stay tuned for those photos!