Hi everyone! My name is Christine Brungard. Let me start by saying that I am so thrilled to have my wedding planning featured on Harsanik. For years, I worked in the wedding industry and helped design many different unique weddings. I couldn’t wait for the day that I started the plans for my own wedding. Victor proposed a little over a year ago and I’m already deep into plans that I’m very excited to share.
 

Victor and I have had the most random conversations. One conversation I particularly remember well was when he asked me which of the buildings in Downtown, LA was my favorite. I responded, the one with four cylinders on the side of it. I didn’t think much of it at the time. 

Throughout the years, Victor has always told me that he wanted to take me to the Westin Bonaventure so we can experience “the rotating lounge”. The idea of the lounge is very cool. The top floor of the Westin rotates so that once an hour, you have had a total 360 degree view of Downtown, LA. I unfortunately suffer from motion sickness very easily so my immediate response was, absolutely not! 

Photo source Garuda Liberty Travel

"We’re engaged!" The most exciting thing we had the pleasure of announcing. The first thing everyone was asking us was, "So when’s the big day?" Before we did any type of planning though, we decided to take engagement photos so that we could always remember how excited we truly were!

One of the easiest things I’ve done in terms of planning for our wedding is booking our venues. We knew that we wanted an outdoor wedding and wanted to do something different than what takes place during a traditional Armenian or a traditional Mexican wedding. Originally, we wanted to have our wedding ceremony and reception in Las Vegas. Among others, the hotels we had in mind were Caesars, Wynn, and The Venetian. We explored this idea for a short time but eventually came to the realization that a local wedding would be ideal for us and our families and generally Armenian style banquet halls had way more to offer.

The first time I was able to say “join me” as a bride was at the Harsanik Bridal Show. I was so excited to attend my first bridal event. My family including mom, grandma, maid of honor, and junior bridesmaids joined me at the event. I started the day at the beauty bar. What a great idea! I met Lynette who demoed her gorgeous eye lash extensions on me. I can’t wait to get mine done for my actual wedding.

The most fun I’ve had so far during all of my wedding planning has definitely been trying on bridal dresses. Until I was engaged, I never really had a style of a dress that I liked or a general look that I wanted. When talks about a dress came up, someone said to me “You can wear a mermaid dress for a lot of different occasions but you’ve never going to be able to wear a ball gown dress again.” With that said, the search for my ball gown dress was on!

The components that make up a wedding are each important; however, the two that are most important in my eyes are the music and the photographer. The different types of music played at a wedding set the mood for the entire night. Simply put, if there is great music playing, everyone will have a great time. Meanwhile, you need a photographer to capture all the memories made. Because our wedding is multi-cultural, we wanted to find the perfect DJ so that both sides of the family could enjoy what was playing.

My cousin, Armine sent me a text one day that read “Just an idea” with a photo of a couple’s save the date cards that read “Coming Soon” and their wedding date, outside of a theatre. I thought this was the cutest idea ever because of my background in the entertainment industry and I really wanted to make it come to life. I showed the photo to Victor and immediately texted our great friend, Haik, who had taken our engagement photos as well. Victor loved the idea and Haik said “Let’s shoot it!”

One thing that you will definitely learn about me is that I'm big on DIY. When it comes to paper crafts, that's my specialty. In addition to making our Save the Date cards, one thing I have already started to make is our wedding invitations. I am trying to give myself a head start since we will be making quite a few cards.

Reception music is on the top of the list for most people when it comes to wedding planning, but one musical component I had not thought about was the music at the ceremony. When I attended the 2015 Harsanik Bridal Show, I met Karina of Harp by Karina. Karina was at the bridal show with her gorgeous harp.

Photo by Vic Studios