KXXV-TV News Channel 25 - Central Texas News and Weather for Waco, Temple, Killeen | 10 hot wedding save-the-date ideas

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Make a great first impression with your wedding guests with one of these new save-the-date trends.

Your wedding save-the-date cards will be the first thing people see regarding the style of your wedding so you want to make them cool and unique, personalized, or reflect the colors and theme of your wedding day.

There are hundreds of design ideas and new trends are popping up daily, but here's a glimpse of what we see going on across the nation today.

Design Ideas

Whatever you choose, make it fun and you're sure to get a favorable response. Here are 10 ideas to get you started:

1. Use bright, bold colors that will make an impact and your wedding date will stay in the thoughts of even the most absentminded guests.

2. Include graphics or colors that make sense to the locale and date, such as pink and red flowers if you plan to marry in the springtime in a rose garden, or a card tied up with a baby-blue gingham ribbon for an oceanside summer soiree.

3. Your save-the-date cards can be as simple as a postcard or as elaborate and interactive as a magnetic puzzle.

4. We're fans of a picture taken shortly after the engagement (think holiday cards).

5. Some brides favor save-the-date cookies, although you may have to send out a second reminder to all your sweet-tooth friends who might munch before they mark down your date!

6. We absolutely love the idea of save-the-date stickers that will fit into those tiny boxes in appointment books or on desktop calendars.

7. Refrigerator magnets -- ones with just your names and wedding date -- are cool too.

8. We like pretty save-the-dates like ones designed on fans or better yet, pinwheels!

9. An all-time favorite done many different ways is the calendar. Invitation designers are creating cards that look like a mini calendar month with the date you've chosen circled or decorated or knocked out with a mini three-hole punch.

10. The hottest trend is a photo strip (the kind you create yourself on a beach boardwalk) with funny faces and the wedding date. In each of the four pictures, hold up a sign. 1) We're getting married. 2) Save the Date. 3) June 5. 4) Be there! (You get the idea.)

How To Make Them

Your save-the-dates do not need to be created by your invitation designer. In fact, you can save money on these by stopping in at your local stationery shop and picking up some cute note cards, then hand-writing each notice.

Some already crafted save-the-dates, from big-name designers, will be sold there too. You might also consider making them yourself by designing them in the word processor on your computer. Pick a font and a couple of favorite colors; buy cardstock at a local paper store; then bring both your design and paper to a neighborhood Kinko's to have them printed.

For those who do have the budgets, you may wish to have save-the-dates specially made for you from a couture invitation designer. Start researching local wedding invitation designers and stationery stores.

-- Allison Micarelli

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