An indispensable wedding planner with 100+ stunning photos and insights from top event professionals for couples preparing the wedding of their dreams When planning a wedding, you might feel overwhelmed by the many tasks and crucial decisions. Now, with the PartySlate team behind you, you can create the wedding day of your dreams with less stress. For this beautifully designed planner, the PartySlate editors tapped into their premier network of wedding vendors and event professionals to gather the essential information couples need to know while planning your exciting day. Inside you’ll find: 100+ stunning, professional photos from real weddings Full list of vendor credits for all 100+ photos so you can recreate what inspires you Insights from industry experts and PartySlate editors for every step of the wedding planning process Important questions to ask your venue and vendors and terms to know when you're building your wedding team A complete planning timeline so you know what to tackle when Convenient note-taking sections throughout to track ideas and choices PLUS: This spiral-bound book opens flat making it easy to use! No matter where you are in the planning process—choosing a color palette and event style, designing your event decor or creating a wow-worthy ceremony space and dance floor—this planner will be your go-to guide and then serve as a beautiful keepsake to treasure long after the big day.

THE FLOWER CHEF is a modern, comprehensive guide to floral design that caters to all readers--from beginners who have never worked with flowers before and are looking for a new creative outlet, to decorators, party planners and photographers looking to liven up their spaces. Even professionals will find ways to update their techniques! This book teaches you everything you need to know about flower arranging including tips on how to buy and care for flowers, how to cut and prepare them, and how to use floral foam, vases, and various other decorative elements in your arrangements. Filled with beautiful photographs and easy-to-follow instructions on how to create over 80 different arrangements, this is the go-to guide to floral design that every flower lover will want to add to their collection.

Learn how to cultivate the most incredible customer experiences on earth through this essential guide by Colin Cowie, distinguished purveyor of unforgettable “wow” events for the world’s most demanding clients. If you’re searching for ways to ensure your customers walk away from your company with a smile on their face and a plan to return, you found it. And any business organization can adapt the tools and techniques in this book. Colin Cowie, one of the world’s most sought-after event planners, shares the hard-won and hard-nosed advice he has learned through entertaining and engaging stories and examples. He gives readers the indisputable blueprint for creating a customer-service culture that anyone can tailor to their own needs, whether you’re a shopkeeper, corporate marketing director, or budding event planner. Upon coming to the United States from South Africa with $400 in his pocket, Colin built his highly successful catering and event-planning business from the ground up to become event planner to the most respected tastemakers and personalities in the world—including Oprah Winfrey, Jennifer Lopez, Ryan Seacrest, and Kim Kardashian, to name a few. In this book, you will: Learn how to formulate your own vision, mission statements, and guiding principles, and effectively communicate them to your team. Learn how you can align your vision with your essential mission statement. Discover the core values, including service and accountability, that fuel Colin’s customer-care ethos, and how you can apply those values to your own business. Have a renewed understanding of how vitally important it is that you take good care of the people who work for you so they, in turn, can care for your customers. Become armed to inspire and empower your team. Be guided to create your own “bible” of scripts, protocols, and procedures that will streamline customer-care situations while making every customer feel like their individual desires are being taken care of. Learn how to use every complaint as an opportunity, as well as why you should be more afraid of a client who doesn’t complain when something goes wrong versus one who does.

A companion to the popular website APracticalWedding.com and A Practical Wedding Planner, A Practical Wedding helps you sort through the basics to create the wedding you want -- without going broke or crazy in the process. After all, what really matters on your wedding day is not so much how it looked as how it felt. In this refreshing guide, expert Meg Keene shares her secrets to planning a beautiful celebration that reflects your taste and your relationship. You'll discover: The real purpose of engagement (hint: it's not just about the planning) How to pinpoint what matters most to you and your partner DIY-ing your wedding: brilliant or crazy? How to communicate decisions to your family Why that color-coded spreadsheet is actually worth it Wedding Zen can be yours. Meg walks you through everything from choosing a venue to writing vows, complete with stories and advice from women who have been in the trenches: the Team Practical brides. So here's to the joyful wedding, the sensible wedding, the unbelievably fun wedding! A Practical Wedding is your complete guide to getting married with grace.

The Idea Book. The How-to Book. The Everything Book. It’s the ultimate wedding planning bible from the ultimate wedding planner. From getting engaged to getting to the altar to taking off for your honeymoon to preserving the memories forever, this is the book to help you bring your dream wedding to life, no matter how big or small your budget. The Wedding Book is: Your fashion consultant, menu planner, etiquette expert, and floral designer An insider source for stretching budgets and negotiating contracts A digital-savvy friend for making the most of Instagram, Etsy, Pinterest, and wedding planning websites and apps A wise shoulder to lean on when sticky family issues come up Whatever the subject—cakes, stationery, dress shopping, lingerie, tents, Uber, insurance, porta-potties, party favors, the toasts, looking great in photos, tipping, and thank-you notes—The Wedding Book has the answer. Includes lists, schedules, budgeting tools, and timelines.

Whether planning a lavish celebration or opting for a smaller event, this is a guide for creating flower arrangements on the day of a wedding. Which colours to pick, blooms that last, understanding cost restrictions, information on seasonal flowers and grouping flowers effectively are all covered. Practical information on arranging bouquets, pew-ends, marquee displays and table decorations show which mechanics to use for each.

Indonesia suffered an explosion of religious violence, ethnic violence, separatist violence, terrorism, and violence by criminal gangs, the security forces and militias in the late 1990s and early 2000s. By 2002 Indonesia had the worst terrorism problem of any nation. All these forms of violence have now fallen dramatically. How was this accomplished? What drove the rise and the fall of violence? Anomie theory is deployed to explain these developments. Sudden institutional change at the time of the Asian financial crisis and the fall of President Suharto meant the rules of the game were up for grabs. Valerie Braithwaite's motivational postures theory is used to explain the gaming of the rules and the disengagement from authority that occurred in that era. Ultimately resistance to Suharto laid a foundation for commitment to a revised, more democratic, institutional order. The peacebuilding that occurred was not based on the high-integrity truth-seeking and reconciliation that was the normative preference of these authors. Rather it was based on non-truth, sometimes lies, and yet substantial reconciliation. This poses a challenge to restorative justice theories of peacebuilding.

One of the biggest problems with modern democracy is that most of the public is usually ignorant of politics and government. Often, many people understand that their votes are unlikely to change the outcome of an election and don't see the point in learning much about politics. This may be rational, but it creates a nation of people with little political knowledge and little ability to objectively evaluate what they do know. In Democracy and Political Ignorance, Ilya Somin mines the depths of ignorance in America and reveals the extent to which it is a major problem for democracy. Somin weighs various options for solving this problem, arguing that political ignorance is best mitigated and its effects lessened by decentralizing and limiting government. Somin provocatively argues that people make better decisions when they choose what to purchase in the market or which state or local government to live under, than when they vote at the ballot box, because they have stronger incentives to acquire relevant information and to use it wisely.

There is growing interest in Israel's political system from all parts of the world. This Handbook provides a unique comprehensive presentation of political life in Israel from the formative pre-state period to the present. The themes covered include: political heritage and the unresolved issues that have been left to fester; the institutional framework (the Knesset, government, judiciary, presidency, the state comptroller and commissions of inquiry); citizens' political participation (elections, political parties, civil society and the media); the four issues that have bedevilled Israeli democracy since its establishment (security, state and religion, the status of Israel's Arab citizens and economic inequities with concomitant social gaps); and the contours of the political culture and its impact on Israel's democracy. The authors skilfully integrate detailed basic data with an analysis of structures and processes, making the Handbook accessible to both experts and those with a general interest in Israel.

Master the techniques you need to create astonishing cakes using wafer paper. Stevi Auble of innovative boutique bakery Hey There, Cupcake! demonstrates how, using a few sheets of edible paper and some basic cake decorating tools, you can take your skills to new creative heights. Illustrated with over three hundred photographs, this lavish guide will take you step-by-step though how to make eighteen exquisite paper flowers and leaves, plus other decorations such as bows, wreaths and cake toppers. You’ll also learn how to create some incredible textures in wafer paper including ruffles, lace and metallic effects. Once you’ve mastered the skills, twelve simple yet spectacular cake decorating projects will show you how to put the wafer paper elements together into contemporary cake designs, and excel your cake decorating repertoire!