TRAVERSE CITY -- With her mom and future mother-in-law in tow, Amy Round launched her wedding planning project.
The specific date of the 2011 nuptials are still to be determined but Round attended Sunday afternoon's 16th annual Downtown Bridal Show to get started. Her first priority was finding a venue for the planned Traverse City event.
"I'm trying to meet some of the vendors and see what they have to offer, find out when people book," Round said.
Facing a growing to-do list with months of planning, choosing and organizing ahead, even with two helpers she's amazed at the scope of the task.
"I'm surprised about all the different aspects or things you didn't think about that pop up," she said.
More than 300 brides and another 600-plus friends and family members packed the Park Place Dome for the event, which also featured the ever-popular fashion show. Thirty vendors were on hand to discuss details large and small: from location to invitation color, theme to appetizers, music to photography.
Even in a depressed economy, the wedding buzz was strong.
"I've already had vendors telling me it was going really well, they've already gotten business," said Colleen Paveglio, marketing director of the Downtown Development Authority, the annual show's organizer.
Attending her first bridal show, Leia-Marie Cummings of Arizona focused on securing a venue on September 10, 2011. She and fiance Ben Herman of Suttons Bay are determined to start their new life together on 09-10-11.
One of a handful of men in attendance, Herman took his first wedding industry immersion in stride.
"It's fun, I'm more here to back up her ideas," he said. "I want to make her happy."
The Chocolate Den's chocolate fountain periodically snarled traffic flow as attendees stopped to dip marshmallows or strawberries. While samples of cakes, candies and ice cream treats were also enthusiastically snarfed up at other tables, there was something special about the fountain.
Wendy Icard, owner of the Chocolate Den, said this is an allure that carries over to weddings.
"The last wedding I did was a chocolate fountain with cupcakes," she said. "People are getting creative, I know the big thing lately is caramel apples."
Jeff Neidorfler of Morsels agreed that brides are looking beyond the traditional wedding cake. Offering up samples of their trademark "two-bite treats," Morsels owners Neidorfler and his wife, Misha, also dished their out-of-the-cake-box thinking.
"It's not just the one or two flavors of a wedding cake but guests can get six or eight flavors -- or however many," he noted. "It's fun to see people get it, that they can have what they want."
Future bride and present model Amanda Fenlon has been preparing for her upcoming wedding for a long time. Now engaged with a wedding date of Sept. 4, she has been donning wedding finery and modeling for Bay Bridal Boutique for five years.
Fenlon's experience behind the scenes helped streamline her own decision-making; she's done except for selecting a DJ and a few other details. Fenlon is eager to wear "her" gown on a day she's dreamed of since she was a little girl.
"To wear my own wedding dress, it's much more personal and more emotional," Fenlon said.
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