Location/Caterer: Athenaeum at Caltech, Pasadena - HIGHLY RECOMMENDED
We grudgingly made an appointment here because it was at the very top end of our budget and are so glad we did! We fell in love with the Athenaeum the first time we saw it. It fit our main criteria--outdoor ceremony space and reception area full of ambiance. Added bonus is that our parents loved it too. Phew! We knew that booking the Ath would stretch our budget, but we made do by skimping on decorations (which I think turned out fine because the courtyard is so pretty by itself.) For the first year, we were in contact with Allison, who we thought was a bit distant and not that helpful. A month before our wedding, we were switched over to Nellie and are SO thankful! She was awesome--very knowledgeable, friendly, helpful at pointing out where we could save $, and great at responding to our emails (a huge plus for us since we were planning from SF). The day of the wedding we go a ton of compliments on the venue. The food was, for the most part, good. Unbelievably nice staff. But we were annoyed that the steaks didn't come with truffle butter, which we had at our tasting and was printed on our menu. The other problem we had was caused by a photo permit, which we didn't get but is apparently needed in order to take pics past the Athenaeum lawn. Nellie had asked us if we wanted one, but Christine Marie told us we didn't need it (she shot at the Ath before and never had to get one.) Lucky us, during our photo shoot, we were stopped by a mean security guard! Nellie was very apologetic and didn't point fingers at us at all. She and Christine later worked things out (and Christine paid for the permit). But I think in the future, Nellie will push other brides to get a permit in order to avoid what happened to us.

Photographer: Christine Marie - HIGHLY RECOMMENDED
Christine Marie is great. She's friendly, upbeat, professional...everything you'd want in a wedding photographer. She and her assistant Lance worked tirelessly on our day. And I love enough of our photographs tha t I think she was worth the money. I don't blame her at all for the photo permit snafu since security didn't stop any of her other shoots. And we were happy that she paid our permit. That said, I wish I had given her an exact list of what shots I wanted. We didn't get photos of our signature drink (sangria) being passed around. There's no portrait of just my mother or MIL by herself. There no photos of our polaroid guestbook, or our picture table showing our parents and grandparents wedding photos. Also, none of our photos were made with interesting/wide-angle lenses, which I'm bummed about since I adore those shots. Those are things I thought Christine would have covered, but the lesson learned is not to assume anything, especially on a wedding day when things are really hectic!! So, for all you knotties, please learn from me and give your photographer a list of stuff you definitely would like to see in your album.
UPDATE:
Just received my albums yesterday and they're gorgeous (which they better be, given the price!) We ordered the magazine style albums: one big one and two smaller parents versions. The small ones are ultra-cute and I wouldn't mind trading in my big hefty one for one of those. Christine was totally sweet throughout the entire planning process and was very accessible by email and phone. Her album style is much more traditional that I would've thought, because I compared her page styles to others I found online and her is more simple and classic (not too much clutter on the page), which I really like. It took longer than expected to get the albums, so she gave me a small discount. All in all, I'm really happy we went with Christine Marie. I've compared her album pricing to other vendors and they seem reasonable for the high quality you get.

Save-the-Dates and Invitations: DIY
My favorite compliments on these were that people thought they were professional. Made it very worthwhile! And I love that they're a totally unique design that FI and I came up with ourselves.

Flowers: DIY
We didn't want to overextend ourselves, so we DIY'd only our bouquets and bouts using mainly roses and snapdragons from the flowermart. Spent $120 the day before the wedding on flowers (about 40% were used for centerpieces), and had a ton leftover. Thanks to helping hands, we had the bouquets and bouts done in about 3 hours altogether. NOT HARD at all!! Just need to have the time, friends to help, and refrigerator space.

Centerpieces: DIY
Centerpieces were large Pottery Barn hurricane lamps with a terracotta base--found on sale at the end of summer for only $6 each. We filled it with a mix of gray rocks and salt chips (MUCH cheaper than rocks) and planted a white pillar candle in the middle. All around it we put votives, rose petals, and some cut tigerlily flowers. Table numbers were also DIY--photos of FI or myself at the age of the table number. Since both of us are twins, we had a pic of us with our twin and left it so that people could guest who was actually getting married that day. :) Estimated cost: $12 per table. Huge money saver and again, very doable because we had friends help us set it all up.

Cake: Jacqui's Cake Creations - RECOMMENDED
Love Jacqui's cakes. To me, they were the best we tasted because, growing up in an Asian household and snacking on desserts made out of beans(!), I hate super sugary things. Plus, I like my cakes moist with very light frosting. Jacqui's frosting is almost like whipped cream! She's also very reasonable so we booked her. We spent $600 on a 4-tiered cake with 2 flavors, fresh strawberries, and delivery. It was supposed to feed 175 people, but we have the entire first layer leftover for our first anniversary. The one problem I had with the cake is that it was slightly crooked.

Videographer: Today's the Day Weddings - HIGHLY RECOMMENDED
We received the video after about 3.5 months and I think my expectations were too high. I'm being very honest---I wanted to LOVE the video because Joe and Mike are awesome vendors, but truthfully, I only LIKE the video. The video IS good, especially the full-length version. Kevin and I teared up when we saw it. But I watched the highlights version immediately after and was left feeling empty because it didn't feel like it had as much oomph as I imagined it would. I was disappointed in several shots, like the camera they had set up to show the whole ceremony scene wasn't in focus so all those shots were blurry. :( But like I said, maybe I'm being too harsh because Kevin, and all of my friends and family really liked the (full-length) video. My twin sister, whose opinion matters a lot because she pretty much always has the same thoughts as I do, said she honestly liked the video too. So that says to me that I'm being silly for being disappointed. In any case, Joe was really nice about my comments and he and Mike incorporated the few changes I asked into the final edit. They also gave me a lot of copies to pass to friends and family. I give them an A+ for professionalism and communication, but an A- in the final product because, well, it'd be a lie if I said I was totally blown away by the end product. I'm still super glad that we went with TTDWeddings, and I know I'll treasure having a video of my wedding for the rest of my life.

Officiant: Friend - HIGHLY RECOMMENDED
My college roommate, who was there when K and I are started dating, was our officiant. Having her perform the ceremony made the wedding that much more special to us and I will forever be thankful to her for doing us the honor.

Dress: A beautiful, flowy strapless sheath gown by Isabella Bridal from Paulette's Ambience in Pasadena - RECOMMENDED
I had second doubts about my dress after I bought it, but I'm so happy that I kept it. When I first went dress shopping, NOTHING looked good on me. I'm very petite (5'0 and less than 100 lbs) so everything I tried on made me look like I was playing dress-up. When I tried on this dress, it was like 'oooooh, so this is what brides feel like!' I bought it and then had to wait a year for my wedding. Within that year, I saw a ton of other stuff I liked...but I didn't have the heart or budget to buy something else, so stuck with the dress and I'm so glad I did. Looking at the wedding day photos, it fits my frame very well.
Paulette's is a nice, cozy cottage store in Pasadena. We worked mostly with Susana on the purchase and alterations. She's great! Her sewing work is fantastic. She somehow managed to get my dress (a sample size 8) to fit my skinny stick frame. But I would caution that Paulette's is overpriced. I was able to talk my dress price down because it was a sample, but the other dresses were a few hundred dollars more than the price at Pebbles in Woodland Hills. Highly recommend shopping there for the fun of it though, and I recommend susana for alterations.

Hair/Make-up: Sherrie McAnnelly from On Location Beauty - RECOMMENDED
Sherry is awesome. Super sweet and very good at putting make-up on Asian features. I really liked working with her during the trial and the day-of. She made me feel like me, just a bit more glamorous. Other than the lipstick, everything else stayed put throughout the day and night.
Just a note of caution to other knotties: She also brought over 2 assistants and while we liked her make-up assistant, we weren't wowed by her hair assistant. The hair person seemed to know how to do BM hair, but not MOB or MOG hair. My mom wasn't happy with her hair, and Sherry had to fix what the assistant did with my MIL's hair.

DJ: Jaime from Edge Entertainment - HIGHLY RECOMMENDED
I can't begin to tell you how many compliments I got on Jaime!! She's great! I was scared she'd be a little cheesy but she wasn't at all. She was fantastic and a great MC. The best compliment I can give her is she made sure our dance floor was usually full, a HUGE feat in my mind considering 70% of our guests are Asian folks who don't dance.

Honeymoon: London, Paris, Brussels, Brugge and Amsterdam - HIGHLY RECOMMENDED
I always sigh happily when I think of my HM. We used our frequent flier miles to get flights to Europe, and other than our pre-booked hotels, nothing else was planned. It was the absolute right thing to do and best of all, it made me fall in love with my husband all over again---there's nothing like being adventurous together! Of all of the cities we visited, we fell in love with Paris (our first time there) and can't wait to go back. We don't speak a lick of French, but got around fine and enjoyed just walking everywhere and taking in the sights. If you need a hotel rec, consider Hotel Henri IV Rive Gauche in the Latin Quarter across the street from St Severin Church. It's also a block from the Seine, on Rue St. Jacques. If you want more info on the HM (ie, hotel recs) just page me and I'd be happy to discuss.

Favors: Mini bottles of Martinelli's sparking apple juice with our own labels (DIY)
Easy peesy! We bought the bottles on sale at Gelson's for 75c each. Made my own labels and printed them on regular white paper. Soaked the bottles in water and then rubbed off their label. Fixed on our own labels with spray adhesive. That's it! Between my mom, aunt, and 2 BMs, we got it all done in less than 3 hours. Got a lot of compliments on the favors too.

Rehearsal Dinner: Saladang Song (in Pasadena) - SORTA RECOMMENDED
The manager, Ricky, is pompous and not very accomodating. They told us we'd get one side of the patio, and when we got there, had us right smack dab in the middle. I had to argue with them to change it. We substituted mango with sticky rice dessert for the chicken dish, and they charged us the same price. How are they the same price? Whatever. But the food was fine, the guests seemed to enjoy it, and it was cheap. For 35 people, we spent about $900 so I can't complain too much.