The invitation saga

So I know I've been pretty much MIA recently, but when you hear about my story you'll understand why.

The past few weeks have been pretty crazy.  I moved out of my apartment and into the one that K and will eventually share.  I've also been fighting with the woman who's been designing our invitations for the past 4 months.  Yes, that's 4 months I said.

To fully grasp the craziness that ensued, I will have to start from the beginning and tell you the entire saga.  Back in April of this year, I started looking into invitations.  We found ones we LOVED from this one designer but she was super expensive and we just couldn't justify spending that much on invitations.  So I started looking on etsy to see if I could find a reasonable alternative and I stumbled upon a shop that had gorgeous invitations.  So I contacted the seller and told her that I loved her invites and asked for more detailed pricing.  I told her we were on a budget so wanted to stay as inexpensive as possible.  She sent me pricing and we eventually came to an agreement. 

We asked for references and contacted them, did a lot of searching to see if anyone had written anything negative about this seller and things looked pretty good.  So we decided to go ahead with her.

Now, I thought she would set up an individual listing on etsy so we could purchase it through them but she said she doesn't take PayPal.  She only takes check or money orders or a credit card for a 15% up charge so we decided to just mail her a check.  Okay, in hindsight and since you all probably know the ending of this story, you'd say that was our first mistake.  I'm inclined to agree with you looking back.  But at the time, we had no reason to suspect her and had gotten reviews from people who used her without issue. 

As soon as she received payment she started working on our proofs.  This process was a lot slower than I has expected but we still had plenty of time to get the invitations.  Our wedding is in October and it was still April.  Over the course of the next 3 1/2 months we finally came up with proofs.  I had originally told her I wanted to send them out in mid-July so I expected to have them in my hands by then.  But July came and went, and still no invites. 

After August 1st rolled around, I started to get nervous and angry.  We had paid her in full and she had no sense of urgency about this.  About 3weeks ago she told me that she sent a paper proof and the envelopes so I could get started on calligraphy.  About 1 week ago, I received the envelopes but still no proof.  After a couple heated emails, she finally sent me an email with a delivery confirmation for the invitations.  She told me that she'd refund my money for anything I hadn't received to date so I told her that I'd like my money back for the programs and thank you cards.  I had already purchased thank you cards at Target and contacted another woman in Georgia to finish up the rest of our paper for the wedding since, clearly, this woman is incompetent. 

I checked the delivery confirmation later that day and it wasn't in USPS's system.  I figured maybe she sent it too late in the day and checked the next day.  Same error message.  Pretty sure she sent me a fake confirmation number because she never actually sent the invitations.  So now, she is no longer responding to my attempts to contact her.  Her etsy shop which was ExposuresPD has closed and she has opened a new shop called EXPandD.  She's also on facebook as Exposures Photography.  Her name is Nicole Price.  I want everyone to know about her so that this doesn't happen to anymore brides.  Planning a wedding is stressful enough without having to deal with this.  We do plan to take legal action against her. 

Here's the thing, after googling her now we've found a lot of information that we somehow didn't find before.  She apparently has been scamming people on ebay, selling designer purses and then either sending a fake bag or not sending one at all.  While I think that's a terrible thing to do, I'm going to say that my story is much much worse.  It's not just screwing someone out of a couple hundred dollars and a purse.  She's messing with my wedding.  Clearly this woman has no heart and no conscience. 

I have since found someone on etsy who she sold program fans to who actually received the product that she paid for.  Guess we're just unlucky.  I'm not sure if she set out to scam us from the beginning or if she just used our money and then didn't have any money left to print and send our invitations.  Either way, we're out quite a bit of money with just a bunch of envelopes to show for it. 

So, we're dealing with it.  Yes, it sucks and yes we're both upset and mad at this woman.  But we at least have a solution and are taking care of it.  So for those of you who haven't gotten an invitation from us yet, this is why.  I realize they are very late and my sincerest apologies for that. 

I will say one more thing.  The woman that we've contacted here in GA has been AMAZING.  She just opened her small business in the past year and has completely taken over for me.  I've told her my whole story and all she wants to do is make it better.  So, if you're looking for someone to do your invites and in you're in GA her website is here:  http://www.especiallyyoursdesign.com/  and I HIGHLY recommend her work.  She really has been a pleasure to work with and has put my mind at ease.