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Wedding planning, from a Moms point of view!

The following was submitted by one of our recent event hosts who utilized our platform for her daughter’s wedding day:

Hi, I’m a mom to six children and my oldest daughter got married last week. It was the first wedding for any of our children.

We originally scheduled  a destination wedding in Antigua in January.  The wedding party included myself, my husband, my daughter, her fiancé and his parents only.  However due to some miscommunications etc., we realized on July 13 that hosting  a wedding there was going to be impossible.

As my daughter is a commercial airline pilot, she was on paid leave for the month of July and decided to go ahead and plan the wedding during this break she had- giving us two weeks notice. Believe it or not, we pulled off everything – including a brilliant venue,  a great photographer (who also happens to be my niece), flowers, a minister, decorations and even a DJ on Tuesday, July 28.

As the planning progressed, the wedding and ceremony guest list grew from six people to 50 in a matter of hours. The venue was exceptionally flexible, especially during these crazy times of Covid and I believe they were happy to accommodate the extra business.  When we started frantically making phone calls to friends to see if they could attend a wedding on a Tuesday night,  we had a mixed variety of responses. Some could not get off work early enough to travel to Indiana.  Some were afraid of catching Covid and others simply had made plans for vacations and other events that conflicted with the night.

When my very best friend learned that she was not going to be able to make the wedding, she suggested we look into live photo sharing. We had never heard about such a thing and she explained that they had done something similar for their recent family reunion.  Given that they also were fighting against Covid, they had many people that wanted to attend that could not, especially the elder relatives.  This led them to creatively seek out other options to involve people from other parts of the country that couldn’t travel to Kentucky.  She suggested doing the same for the wedding.

Simply put, she found a solution where people could text photos to a designated telephone number that would then show up on a live event feed.  It sounded ideal!

I first researched the vendor she had used, only to find that I could not contact them directly and after sending repeated, URGENT emails, I still received no response and was unable to log onto to their website for some unknown reason, after many, multiple failed attempts.

We then used ‘google’ search and found a list of other providers. I had no idea if they would work the same way as the original vendor, so I had to do a bit of diggin. That’s how I ended up contacting Text Event Picture and their photo sharing service.

I ended up actually calling Text Event Pics and talking directly to one of the owners and explaining my situation. He gently let me know that everything I needed was right on the website and he was correct. Even my own mother, who is not Internet savvy, could’ve pulled this off!

It was ideal for many reasons.

  • First, there was no cell phone application that needed to be downloaded on anyone’s phone. This meant my elder parents, aunts and uncles, etc could simply send in pictures without using any complicated technology.
  • Secondly, was ease of use.   There was only one thing involved and that was the sharing of a single telephone number that anyone and everyone I wanted could use.
  • Thirdly, that single telephone number would pull all of the photos into a single place for me to moderate.  By the way, the moderating was very easy. If the picture was inappropriate in anyway I simply rejected it.
  • Lastly, I was able to provide friends and family with the TEP number immediately.  In this way, before the event even started, we could include baby pictures, sporting event pictures, photos of deceased family members, and more. Most importantly, we were able to keep it a secret from the bride and the groom.

After the ceremony, we announced that folks could take their own pictures during the reception and text them immediately to our provided cell number. (It was the modern day version of what we did 20 years ago with disposable cameras on tables during wedding receptions.) Did people take pictures?  YES! Hundreds of photos were taken and were included in the slideshow real time!  Everyone was part of the party now!

People were truly amazed when they saw their photos instantly pop up onto the screen we had silently and strategically placed in the middle of the room during the reception. When people saw the photos sent earlier, combined with their photos sent only seconds before, they were amazed. People would stop and stare at the screen and just watch for 30 minutes at a time. Some people cried, some people found it hysterical, but most everyone, especially my daughter and new son-in-law, loved it!

As to the family and friends who were unable to attend, I found that many dressed up and took photos from their own home and sent them in as to be included in the reception.  Some held signs, some just sent selfie’s in their Sunday best. I think this was my daughter’s favorite part of the slideshow!

After the event, I was easily able to download all of the photos and send them off to be made into a photo book for my daughter and her husband to treasure forever. They didn’t have to worry about getting pictures developed, organizing them or anything else. They will just have a book of memories from their entire lives leading up to and including their wedding.

I would give TextEventPics a score of 11 on a 1-10 because of all the great reasons I’ve mentioned above. They  go above and beyond and frankly, they answer the phone and help you when you have questions. As a mother of the bride who was already overwhelmed, I’d highly recommend TEP, not only for weddings but for any sort of special event that you’d like to capture as easily as possible, without having to do a ton of pre-work or post work!

 

 

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