A Mother and Her Wisdom will soon be imParted...(part II)

As promised, I would continue to impart some more of the knowledge I have gained about specific vendors/items/ideas/organization/etc. as I have been striving to put together a nice reception, but not have to stress myself out or sell a kidney to do it. Today it will be about addressing envelopes (this is probably one of the best things I did for time/sanity saving).

This is how this blog will run:
#1: Give an update on my last blog about Kaylee trying to sabotage Amber's wedding
#2: Share my "WOW! It's great to be ahead of schedule" story
then
#3: imParting of Wisdom (what little I have collected)

Let's start...

#1: Give an update on my last blog about Kaylee trying to sabotage Amber's wedding:
First off, I'm just makin' sure everyone was getting my humor: Kaylee never was trying to sabotage anything. After the second time of a company running out of something I wanted to order while I was on the phone with Kaylee, it just became a fun joke Kay & I would banter back and forth about. It's not that I've gotten any comments like "Wow. I can't believe Kaylee was trying to do that!", I just thought I would throw that out there for anyone that did not read to the end of the last blog, or has no humor-radar.

Secondly, since that blog was written (it was written several weeks ago, but just recently posted) there is more to update. The day after placing that frantic gold-medal-typing-performance order for chair covers and sashes, I received a call from the customer support department of the website (usually not a good sign). They informed me that the computer accidentally showed the chair covers as being in stock when they really were not (yeah, not a good sign). They DID have the sashes, but not chair covers. Knowing theirs would not be in stock in time for the reception, they suggested I try CV Linens. They are one of their competitors, but they said they rarely get customers complaining about them (i.e: I got my order from ____ and it was terrible quality and so now I am ordering from you). I looked at their website (cvlinen.com) and they did have the same chair cover, but it was $1 more per cover and I was getting 80.... ouch!! I called and asked if they would price match. They said yes, but ONLY if the other place had it in stock. I informed her that the other place did NOT have it in stock. She then proceeded to ask me what the other website was. Then she asked what the item was and their price. She then put me on hold. She came back a few seconds later and told me they would price match!!! I was shocked (due to the "we will only price match if they have the item in stock" thing). She must have taken pity. I paid for them over the phone and they arrived about 4 days later!!

I thought that was cool!

Moral of the story: If the less expensive place is out of stock, you might as well ask the more expensive place if they price match!

#2: Share my "WOW! It's great to be ahead of schedule" story:
Anyone that knows me understands that when possible, I like to be AHEAD of schedule. Being on time does not account for any unforeseen.... road-bumps (for lack of a better word) . There are the times that I run ON schedule and even, heaven forbid, BEHIND schedule, but whenever possible I try to be AHEAD. This was the case with the invitations. A couple of blogs ago (My first "...Wisdom..imParted...") I mentioned that the invitations were done and ordered. It was beautiful! It was March 4th. Wasn't planning on mailing them out until March 26th. After the 5 days it would take to complete them, that would still put them in my hands more than two weeks early!! Ahhhh... bliss! Yeah - That's what I THOUGHT! Let's just say that today is March 28th (two days AFTER I wanted to mail them out) and the invites are just getting here today or tomorrow. I'll back up a few weeks and explain....

First, on March 5th there was a road bump. Then, on March 7th there were a couple of road bumps. By the time March 9th rolled around my shocks were shot and I was ready for NO MORE ROAD BUMPS! Yeah... that didn't happen. I hit a few more. The problem was not really anyone's fault. It started with cmyk vs. rgb printing issues because I designed the invites myself, and then moved onto other things that just took time to resolve.

The point is: I am SO SO SO SO SO glad that I was ahead of schedule!! I can not imagine how much stress I would have had if we were up against the deadline.

Now, the envelopes are already addressed and stamped. That means we just have to stuff them and that won't take long. They will still go out 3 1/2 weeks ahead, and that is just fine with me. Really, the March 26th deadline was just a "give yourself some time for problems" deadline anyway.

Note to future self planning Kaylee's wedding: stay ahead on everything that you can!!! That way it isn't as stressful when the road-bumps come up.

There are still some decorations that I am making that I should get going on. I really think I can do them in one day - but then again, I thought I was done with the invites a few WEEKS ago....hmmm... maybe I have gotten behind schedule now!!

Okay - on to:

#3: imParting of Wisdom
Today I will share some of the stuff I did to make the invitations a LOT easier than they might have been otherwise. When I say invitations, I am really talking about the process of gathering addresses and then addressing envelopes. This is the one and only area that I have been working on for years, but even at that, I have continued to tweak and refine!!

#1 piece of advise: It is NEVER too early to collect addresses. Over the years I have thought to myself, "Someday I will need to send out wedding invitations to lots of people. I will need their addresses. If I have one of the addresses NOW, shouldn't I write it down?" and then, miraculously, I would listen to myself and write it down! Over the years I have told myself to do some other stellar ideas only to have me not listen and ignor myself. This is one time I'm glad I did what I was told to do! I started out with the old fashioned address book (which I still have), but have since moved to a computer.

I will admit that it has helped a LOT that I send out holiday cards because you need to have addresses for those. AND, anyone I love enough to have been sending a holiday card to all these years, I am most likely going to want to send an invitation to my daughters wedding reception too. I have made a few "tweaks" to my system over the years, but now I have it in a way that works great for me. That does not mean that is how YOU want it, but I can say that it has made a HUGE difference for me. After much trial and error through the years here are things that are helping me now:

• Keep your addresses on the computer (but always make a back up). I use Microsoft Outlook. If you do not have it, I suggest you get something. You can even keep track of them in Excel, or some other spreadsheet. BUT make sure it is one where you can categorize!!! (see two bullets down) When they are on a computer you can print labels or do what we did - print directly onto the envelope. The most important key here: It's never too early to start. I've had some addresses on my computer for over 15 years. As the years go on, my system has gotten more and more refined, but you have to start somewhere. Even if your oldest kid is 10 - when the wedding rolls around you will be SO glad if you start doing this now.
  

• Enter them in correctly the first time! Example: If your friend is John Smith, but you know that when a holiday card or wedding announcement gets mailed out you want it to read "Mr. & Mrs. John Smith" or "The John Smith Family", then enter it in that way for the initial entry. I had to spend a bit of time "cleaning up" contacts that I did not enter correct the first time. Sometimes the initial entry (that may have been a few years ago) was just an email address, but I still put them in the "Wedding" category if I knew we would want to send them an invite. It sill put me ahead as far as collecting names, even if I had to hunt the address down now. Also, if you don't want name of states or "Lane", "North", "South, "Drive", "Apartment", etc. abbreviated on a card or announcement, don't abbreviate it when you put it in the first time!! (I just recently realized this. Luckily there is a "Find & Replace" in Microsoft Outlook - saved me TONS of time!)
• Make categories for your contacts. This is really where you can hit gold! I contact many different groups of people for many different things and "categories" in my contacts list have saved me over the years. I am the "Choir Mom President" and I have a category for each of the choirs. If I need to send an email out to the Concert Choir parents, I open that category and select "email all". Works like a charm!! Many of the choir people are also my friends that get holiday cards and will get an invitation to the wedding. Those people would have several categories assigned to them. The real pay off for this will show up when I talk about "Sort" in about two more bullet points.
  
• Get correct postage on out-of-country addresses. (I learned this one the hard way) When I did my holiday cards this year I mail-merged and printed all of my envelopes, stamped them & mailed them. A few days later I got one of the envelopes back because it was the the Philippines and we did not put correct postage on it. We had just sat and smacked stamps on them and did not pay attention to where they went. This is EASY to fix with the following....
  
• Sort smartly and you'll be... happy (so disappointing! I was wanting a lovely alliteration of "S" words but couldn't come up with anything) First of all - don't let this part make your head explode. It might sound overwhelming, but it is SO underwhelming, but one of the most useful "organizational" things I have done. To explain it, I will tell you my nightmare and then my dream. Nightmare: While stuffing 400 addressed envelopes where names are in random order, we accidentally miss adding the ceremony invite to some crucial person - like my brother or Grandma!! The dream: Categories and addresses that allow me to sort!! Here is how the dream worked for me: I have had a "Wedding" category in my contacts list for several years. As stated above, if I was entering in an address of someone I might want to send an invite to, I just did one click of the mouse and added them to that category (takes less time than entering a zip code). Since starting on this wedding I have further refine that, and now I have 4 wedding categories (you'll see why later): ceremony, luncheon, map, invite. It REALLY was still as easy as a click, click, click of the mouse. When a new contact was entered (because there were still tons of contacts we had NOT entered yet) I just assigned them a category at the same time I put the address in. It really was only one more click of the mouse. Before printing my envelopes I did three quick things: 1st, Sorted by country (took around .5 seconds). 2nd, sorted by category (took around .5 seconds). 3rd, sorted each category by last name, then first name (took about 3 minutes, no, probably 2). Then I mail merged and printed them directly onto the envelopes (easy to do with the "help" guides of most software, or by calling me). Now, all envelopes going out of the country are all together and not mixed in with the others. I can now make sure they all have the proper postage. I also have all of the envelopes going to people we are inviting to the ceremony all together - no accidentally missing brothers or grandmas! Same with those with those invited to the luncheon, who need a map, and who are receiving an invitation. I hope this does not sound complicated!! Trust me, it really is not AND it saves SO SO SO much time. Mitch's mom in technology-challenged so I made a spread sheet in Excel for her. It was easy for her and worked great and I was able to sort her addresses too. If you are really serious about this, email me and I will send you the spread sheet for you to get started. It is SOOOO easy!!
• You can find who you have on your list! This is another way it can really save your sanity. When you are a month or so into planning a reception and gathering addresses and all the other stuff, you will stop and think, "Is great-aunt Mary on our invitation list?". I PROMISE YOU, this will happen! If you have your list on a computer, all you need to do is have it listed alphabetically and it only takes a moment to go to your list and check. If you just have it written down, you have to slowly look through THE WHOLE LIST (sometimes more than once) and really, there are better uses of your time!
  

hmmm........ I hope I didn't scare you away with that last one. Sometimes it can sound so overwhelming to non-technical people. I tried to explain it in a way that made it sound easy (cuz it is!!) and I hope it did. All I know is that it works and is easy for ME - But my mind is damaged in the way where stuff like that brings me peace and happiness :)

That is my imParted Wisdom of the day. I hope it helps someone :)

Now, here's hoping I don't get a call from the customer support department of the company who is printing our invitations!!!