Planning Your Dream Wedding

We are approaching our one-year anniversary (7 days!) and I just wanted to say thank you, AGAIN, for making the wedding of my dreams (and maybe my mom’s, too ?) come true. I was not the fairytale-wedding-dreamer type, but you somehow managed to take my hazy vision of the event and truly make something magical for Christian, me, and our families. I cannot thank you enough for your ability to flex-and-flow with our changing plans and for your boundless optimism. I felt completely at ease with you and your team at the helm!!

We plan to visit Smoke Tree Ranch over this Thanksgiving holiday and hope to make it a yearly routine. Maybe one day we’ll have a ‘wedding reunion’ with all of our friends and family! I watched our highlights video again today and it made me think of you…I hope you and your family are having a wonderful fall and start of winter. And that you are not too busy ?

No need to write back- I just wanted you to know that I am grateful!

Dear Lisa,

I had intended to write you a “real” thank you note after the wedding but with seeing guests and family off, assembling and dispersing all of the wedding paraphernalia, etc. time got away from me. So I’m back to email, our favored form of communication in the last year.

The testimonial was not difficult to write because, really, I could not say enough good things. The girls were deliriously happy with their wedding—as were Winston and I and Lucy’s parents, the Clarks. Virtually all of our family and friends—from England, east coast, mid-west, even southern California—were wowed by the O’Donnell House. And you: you are truly the best—organized, efficient, responsive, good humored, and SUCH a hard worker. All qualities that are so rare in combination. I enjoyed working with you so much and already miss you.

I wish you all the best.

Debbie (MOB)

Laurie,

Aww man… I’m already getting emotional just writing your name! We are back from the honeymoon and settling into “real life”, lol. We are still floating on clouds…

Our wedding was amazing. I kept walking around thinking “wow… it’s perfect”. The flowers were perfect, the lights, the dance floor, the stage, the band was amazing, the food also amazing, the staff, the linens…everything. We had so much FUN!

Even with Mike’s fainting spell which cut the rehearsal short..yikes!… the ceremony flowed smoothly. The reception was amazing, I can’t say enough about the staff at STR, sooo awesome! Lisa S. kept everyone on schedule and didn’t bother me with all the backstage drama (I heard there was a little) ha! The past year was so much fun for me. I am actually one of those brides who likes to plan a wedding. But I know that the key ingredient to making the process less stressful… was YOU! All of your ideas were the right ideas, and all of your advice was taken! You are an incredible party planner, and a lovely person. We enjoyed our time with you and I will miss our weekly emails!  I hope to keep in touch every now and then! Looking forward to the vow renewal….  ?

I just got back online which is why you haven’t heard from me since I got to LV. You know, you are really excellent. You continue to amaze both of us. Your calm harmony and exceptional interpersonal skills, your network of universally admiring vendors and clients (very well deserved as far as we can tell), your professionalism, knowledge, experience, your incredible generosity, and finally your loving nature, are all so exceptional, Laurie. We are wondering what we did to deserve to have you on our team or to even know you. Thank you from the bottom of our hearts. Your impact has been essential. Thank you!!!!!

Oh my goodness, can I just say how amazing you all are over there?  The day was amazing and we will never stop raving about you guys to everyone we know who wants to get married in Palm Springs.  It was just magic and your team made the day run so smoothly…everyone kept telling me that they didn’t think weddings were supposed to feel so easy like ours did.  I know you all work so hard and we can’t thank you enough.

We cannot thank you enough for helping us have our absolute perfect wedding day!

All your work and efforts and all the back and forth is SO appreciated. We feel so grateful to have met you. Every vendor you connected us with surpassed our expectations. Thank you, Thank you!

Wishing you the all the best in 2014.

Hi Lisa! I just wanted to say hi and thank you one more time for making my day run soooo smoothly! It was the perfect day thanks to you and your amazing team! I loved working with you and you really made me feel so special and comfortable through the whole process! Hope you enjoyed your holidays and happy new year!

-Karli

As you can see from the emails that I have copied you on, I have taken a few moments to thank people who played a role in making Devin and Tim’s wedding pretty darn perfect. Although I am emailing you last, you are the main reason why we feel their wedding was everything we could have imagined. Thank you Laurie! You helped us settle on the best possible venue; you coordinated countless details for us; you gently pushed us to get things done; and, you worked with us through a crisis that threatened to derail the entire wedding. You did all of this with style and grace. We could not have asked for a more professional event planner. Your patience, expertise, availability and warmth meant a great deal to us. You were the perfect consultant, mentor, crisis manager and friend. Thank you from the bottom of our hearts! You were wonderful to work with and we credit you with making our daughter’s wedding an memory that we will forever treasure.

We just returned from our honeymoon to raining Northern California. I wanted to tell you that we couldn’t have had a better time in Palm Springs at Smoke Tree Ranch. Everyone is raving about it and you were a HUGE part of that!
I thought you enjoy seeing a few of the wedding photos. I can’t thank you enough for all the work you did to make our wedding the best day. We truly had an amazing time, as well as the rest of the guests.

I am just so very grateful for all of your help with our wedding. (And Marko is too!!!).  As you remember, I was a little hesitant about using the Events Department’s full services.  And now I just look back and laugh.  I can’t imagine our wedding without you or your fabulous team.  From the small details to your ability to say yes to my last minute requests, I felt like no matter what you were going to make sure that Marko and I had the wedding we envisioned from the beginning.

I’ve heard nothing but rave reviews from ALL our guests to how great the venue looked to how smoothly the entire night went.  And it truly did!  Marko and I look at our pictures with such tremendous fondness (and there’s not a single picture with a worried look on my face).  I was able to really enjoy the day and “be present” during the ceremony and reception because of all you had covered.

I wish you so much success ahead.  I will recommend you to ANY couple even considering hiring a wedding coordinator.

I will forever remember our wedding as one of my best days.  And I know that you were instrumental in making that happen.

Thank you for coordinating the day of Rachel and Ryan Foltz’s beautiful wedding at the Sherwood Country Club, May 18, 2013.  Your promptness, attention to detail, ability to move things along, and staying power through wrap-up were very much appreciated.

Grace under pressure and a willingness to pleasantly and cooperatively flow with changes as décor and timing are tweaked before and on the day of the wedding are traits needed in an event coordinator.  Good listening skills and careful records of the families’ timeline wishes make the planning process smooth.  Understanding and accommodating the amalgamated styles of the family, even when at variance with the coordinator’s personal style, requires delicacy and good humor.  It’s not an easy assignment.

We thank you for balancing all these demands, Peggy.  It was such a relief for us to hear that you told the groom’s parents about ten minutes after the guests left from the wedding, “Go home.  I’ve got this handled.”  I don’t know how long it took you to get everything out the door, but it was speedy.  You put in a very long day with your able assistant.

Your dedication to doing your job with excellence is very commendable.

Wow. It still all feels like a dream. I can’t believe how fast the whole week/weekend went. Everything was just perfect. I wouldn’t change a thing. And that is in large part because of you. You were so wonderful from day one. I appreciate how quick you are to respond to my emails, no matter how small or silly the question. I never felt overwhelmed at any point and that’s because I knew I had you in my corner. I know it was by chance you ended up in our lives, but we are so thankful. I can’t imagine the last year without you there to guide us every step of the way.Ben and I hope to vacation at Smoke Tree in the future. It will always be such a special spot to us.Thank you again for everything! I feel like I just can’t say it enough.