Thank you bloggers!!

I was super duper pleased on Friday and Saturday to find that Golden Apple had been featured on not one, not two, not even three, but FOUR blogs over the two days!

Big thank yous to Military Wedding Discounts, Plans & Presents, Cake Toppers and Ruby Weddings for the lovely features!






























Click the links below to read the posts...
Military Wedding Discounts
Plans & Presents
Cake Toppers
Ruby Weddings

Leah x
twitter: @leahgoldenapple

Golden Apple
Creative design, Stationery & Wedding Invitations Leicester
Click here to visit the site

One Big Family {monday musings}

Morning all :)

So it's Monday again, and after a hectic weekend (without a day off since 25th June!) I have just treated myself to a very naughty breakfast from McDonald's. I'm now sitting at my desk in the sunshine enjoying a nice glass of orange juice, with the breeze billowing through the viole curtain, listening to this...



..I hope you're having a lovely Monday morning too!

It was an eventful weekend - I spent Friday night drinking delicious Prosecco in the garden with the best mate before going on to a party to watch my boyfriend DJ - the first booking through his new company, Scratch Wedding & Event DJs.

I then had two consulations on Saturday before working Saturday night, which was completely fully booked! Yesterday was more of a quiet day, with a relaxed brunch shift followed by an amazing Sunday lunch.

It's a bit of a short blog post today, as I have a big chunk of my TO DO list to tackle today, including 3 logos to design, typewriter wedding invitations to create and a website to complete. I am then off to my second job at 7pm!

Speak to you later!

Leah x
twitter: @leahgoldenapple

Golden Apple
Creative design, Stationery & Wedding Invitations Leicester
Click here to visit the site

I DON'T LIKE SPAM!!!

Spam. Greasy, fatty, slimy, weird meat type stuff... it's GROSS.

But that's not the kind of spam I'm talking about in this post.

I'm talking about the "please become a fan of my facebook page" spam that keeps getting slapped onto my facebook page.

And it's not just me.

LOADS of wedding businesses / bloggers have been complaining about it recently.

Some are even resorting to removing the walls from their facebook pages so that spammers can't post onto them, which is really unfair - it stops our actual fans from communicating with us!


I don't want ANY spam!

If you aren't fully aware of the correct Facebook etiquette regarding this, here it is...... DON'T DO IT!

It won't help your business - it will just annoy the people whose pages you're clogging up with your spam. I have almost 600 fans on my page, which by comparison to others who have 1000's isn't that many, but I got them by working hard to promote my business, so why should you get to just post your business on my page for all of my fans to see?

I'm not being selfish - I think that one of the most important things is promoting and helping each other, but you have to ASK first! If I like your business and I want to help you out (which I probably will if you approach me in the right way, by sending me an email to introduce yourself,or meeting me at a networking event or wedding fair) then I'll post it myself, or maybe even do a supplier feature on you! I'm sure the same will go for any other supplier that you might feel the need to spam.

OK, rant over - I hope that you enjoyed the Monty Python video - it made me laugh anyway! :)

Leah x
twitter: @leahgoldenapple

Golden Apple
Creative design, Stationery & Wedding Invitations Leicester
Click here to visit the site

Aimee & Mike's lovely Leicester city centre Wedding!

As soon as I spotted this gorgeous wedding whilst browsing facebook this morning I knew that I had to feature it on my blog, as it combines two things that I love - Leicester and Weddings. I am one of the very few people who is from and lives in Leicester that actually loves it - it's steeped in history and there are some really beautiful places to be found in the city if you just keep your eyes open for them!

The wedding took place at Leicester's Town Hall and afterwards at the stunning Maiyango Boutique Hotel & Restaurant. I love the little glimpses of Leicester's history that can be spotted throughout the images, and the cobbled streets on the walk between Town Hall Square and Maiyango are the perfect setting for this gorgeous shoot.

The Bride looks stunning in a cute and pretty 'short' wedding dress, which has beautiful floral detailing, accessorised with a chic and simple bouquet and gorgeous shoes. The flower girl is adorable in a little pink dress, and the groom looks dapper in a simple but effective smart blue suit.







































































































































































































What a gorgeous couple - I hope you had a wonderful wedding day :)

Thank you to Gary from SMD Photography for sharing these beautiful images - they are stunning!

Be sure to check out his website for more, and you can also follow him on Twitter & Facebook!

Leah x
twitter: @leahgoldenapple

Golden Apple
Creative design, Stationery & Wedding Invitations Leicester
Click here to visit the site

At the River {monday musings}

Urgh, it's a bit grim and grey today isn't it?!

Hope you all had a lovely weekend and took advantage of the sun whilst it was around :)

I started a part time job this weekend to help me save some pennies - I am determined to go on holiday this year! It's at a gorgeous restaurant in Leicester, Entropy, and I've loved it so far. The food is amazing and I was also really excited to see that they stock Teapigs tea, as I've been mad about Teapigs for ages! You might remember that I came runner up in their Drink Real Tea poster competition last year. Find out a bit more about Entropy here.

To encourage the sun to make an appearance my song choice for today is Groove Armada, At the River, which also coincides well with my dreams of a lovely holiday. It was also playing at work yesterday whilst I was serving up amazing Sunday lunches and mouthwatering breakfasts!



I have an eeeenormous To Do list this week, which as well as some invitations and stationery orders includes creating report samples and an exciting project for the Wedding Reporter, planning & promoting the Leicester Wedding Club summer Garden Party, finishing a website and also finishing a couple of other logo design orders.

I'm also attending the Creative Coffee networking event on Wednesday (sticking to mid years resolution number 3) followed by coffee with my old boss which should be nice!

Look out for my very first real wedding on the blog later on, a really lovely Leicester City Centre wedding from the fantastic SMD Photography.

Hope you have a lovely week planned too! :)

Leah x
twitter: @leahgoldenapple

Golden Apple
Creative design, Stationery & Wedding Invitations Leicester
Click here to visit the site

Sunday ♥

This song + sunshine + garden + cocktails + friends + good food = perfect sunday.

If only I were actually doing the above - maybe next week!

Hope you're having a lovely day! :)

Leah x
twitter: @leahgoldenapple

Golden Apple
Creative design, Stationery & Wedding Invitations Leicester
Click here to visit the site

{Design Case Study} Military Wedding Discounts logo and website design

I have recently finished working on a really enjoyable and rewarding project for the lovely ladies over at Military Wedding Discounts.

The Military Wedding Discounts is a lovely idea that has been created to help members of the Armed Forces in both the UK and USA save money when planning their wedding.

They also donate 50% of the advertising fee to charity - Help For Heroes (UK Suppliers) and Operation Gratitude (USA Suppliers), so i think you will agree that this website is for a fantastic cause, so I was very pleased to be able to assist them with a fabulous new look for their brand.

♥ The Logo ♥

When creating the logo I wanted to ensure that I incorporated the military aspect in some way, whilst still finishing with an end product that was both pretty and attractive, and also relevant to the wedding market and appropriate for a wedding blog.

I put together a selection of ideas for them to choose from (one of them featured a camouflage wedding cake!) and they chose this one, which was also my favourite:
























To create the design I chose an elegant and delicate font that would contrast well with the bold army style font, alongside an illustration of a bride and soldier, on a pretty vintage blue background, which brings the design together really well!

♥ The Website ♥

Before:
Whilst the existing website was pretty enough, it was a little lackluster and didn't really reflect the style and feeling that they wanted to go for from the site.












After:
After creating the new logo, I then went into the site to give it a bit of a facelift, with a new banner incorporating the logo (featuring pretty lace detail,) a new background, a more attractive font, and new buttons and icons.












♥ The blog badge ♥

I also put together this additional blog badge, which will go out to all suppliers who feature on this fabulous site:
























Emma and Terri were so pleased with the end result, and there has been an amazing response to the new design from lots of others via twitter and facebook! I hope that you like it too :)

What's more, if you're looking to have a new logo designed for your business I'm offering a super duper discounted rate throughout the summer! Click here for more details!

Leah x
twitter: @leahgoldenapple

Golden Apple
Creative design, Stationery & Wedding Invitations Leicester
Click here to visit the site