DIY Invitations

The invitations were really my labor of love during the whole wedding process. The process started shortly after we got engaged. Hours and hours and hours were sent searching the internet for invitation inspiration. And where did that get me? I found out that I had expensive tastes, but not the budget. My mother is an avid scrapbooker and having designed a few invitations for work functions myself, I felt confident that we could do them ourselves (Just to make sure though, we tested the waters with my Save the Date cards).


So, what did I want? 1) I wanted pocketfolds as I discovered early on in the search. Nothing else would compare. All the information right at the guests finger tips, held together by a cute little envelope with a pocket. PERFECT! 2) I wanted them to look professional.


What did I end up doing? Stamped and embossed pocketfold invitations with three inserts: Accommodations, Directions, RSVP.



One Sunday afternoon, my mom hosted an Invitation Making Party at her house where me, my mom, bridesmaids, and three friends spent 5 hours stamping, adding embossing powder, heating, matting, stuffing, tying, and addressing 125 invitations.


What was the result? They were PERFECT!!! Even better than I could have ever expected. (Sorry, but a couple of these pictures aren't that great. Maybe I should learn how to use my camera)

The Hair!

(I know, I know. I am not terribly creative with the titles, but it gets the point across.)

So, my last few weeks have been filled with finalizing details and trials. I schedule hair trials with two separate hair stylist, my normal stylist and a friend of my mother's. Armed with a collage of inspriation photos I headed off to each.

Inspiration photos included:

I saved all these pictures so long ago that I don't know where I got most of them. A couple came from here. I am willing to give credit if anyone can tell me who to give it to.

For as long as I can remember I knew that I wanted a head full of curls for the wedding ceremony and kept that in mind while searching for inspiration. The photo of Carrie Underwood was my favorite. But shortly after I began my search I realized that a June wedding and a head full of curls didn't sound like a good combination to me since my head sweats like crazy when I am hot. I began to envision a sweaty and uncomfortable bride.

I was determined to still have the head full of curls but wanted a second style, an updo, to wear for the reception. And it had to be simple enought that my Matron of Honor could put it up for me after the ceremony.

So me, my mom and my sister (MOH) headed off to the stylist, inspiration photos in tow, to get a trial done. In my surprise my hairstylist said that the second 'do' was no problem what-so-ever. I am so very excited about the way it turned out, I couldn't be happier. It is exactly what I was looking for.

Stage one - head full of curls:

The only thing that I decided that I didn't like was the bangs off to the side. Since my hair is naturally curly the slightest bit of sweat would have made me look like I had a horn growing out the side of my head.

Stage two - up do (seriously, all it took was a twist and a bunch of bobby pins.):

Mom got her hair done too:

I think her 'do' turned out super cute too. The only thing that I think we will need to add is a couple of rhinestone bobby pins for a little flair.

So, we booked the date before we left the shop. She is actually going to come to the hall the day of and do my hair, mom's hair and all the bridesmaids hair while we are there decorating and pulling together the last minute details.

The Rings!

So Troy and I went last week to get our wedding rings. It felt like a big milestone in the wedding process. It also made me realize how close the big day really is. As my sister so happily pointed out---I am getting married next month!!!!

So, back to buying the rings. I had jewelry stores. I am the type of person that likes to go in, browse, and not be bothered by someone hovering over me trying to pressure me into buying something. I had found the ring that I wanted on-line for a really great price, but missed out on the sale and told Troy that he had to be the bad guy and barter the price down as close to the sale price as he could possibly get it.

I don't know what came over me when I walked in the store, but I took the whole ring buying/bartering job over. In the end I was really proud of myself and ended up getting us really good deals on our wedding rings.

Photos

This band perfectly accents the baguette diamonds that accent my engagement ring.


I was surprised when Troy picked out this ring. It wasn't exactly what I had pictured but I love it. It is made out of tungsten which doesn't scratch or anything. The only problem with tungsten (and titanium) is that it cannot be resized so we had to order the ring in his size and it will stay that size forever. We did find out however, that we can return the ring to the jewelry store and get the ring replaced if at any time it does not fit.

I am so excited to finally have this taken care of. Been fighting off the urge to wear it ever since.

The Cake!

I am truely blessed to have one of the most talented cake artists for an Aunt. As long as I can remember I have had dreams about Aunt Barb making my wedding cake and am so excited for that to finally happen. My problem, how do you decide what you want when you can have anything you could possibly want?

For the last year I have been searching the web for cake inspiration and believe that I have finally narrowed it down. I know a couple of things: I have decided that I want something simple, I would like 4 tiers, square, with flowers trickling down the sides. Here are a few inspiration picutres (photos from The Knot):




I love the swirls that crawl up the side of this cake and the ribbon along the bottom of each layer.




Again, love the ribbon, swirl design on every other layer and the Monogram/flowers on the top.




Love the flowers trickling down the side and the swirls. Don't particularly care for the big gold dots though.


Love the randomness of the flowers on the different layers of the cake.

I am so excited to get to sit down with my Aunt at the end of this month to work out the details of the cake.

Visit two to the Venue

After months of searching on-line and stalking many blogs I had developed a plan for my centerpieces and ceremony decorations. So, my mom, sister and I headed to the venue to do a trial run. We packed up candles, ceremony decoration supplies and bought a bunch of flowers from the store. The trial went so much better than I could have imagined and I fell in love with my decoration ideas.

The Centerpieces
Our florist will be designing a "Bouquet" that will be placed in a vase on the table, slightly off set. My mom described it best by calling the look 'naturally simplistic'. When talking with my florist, my ideas was a look something like walking out to the garden, picking a bunch of flowers and placing them on the table. Understanding that water would be a concern she proposed that we set a bouquet of flowers in a larger vase so that they lean to the side. I plan to set all this on a mirror surround by candles. I posted earlier about my DIY candle holders, but since then I have decided that having three different candle designs was too busy so I will have 5 votive candles with ribbons and embellishments on them.

We decided that we need something else on the table to sprinkle around so I am going to look on the wonderfull World Wide Web for some of those plastic diamonds to place around.

Ceremony Decorations:
This is how the ceremony site will be set up. The overhead door behind the alter will be open to give a feel of being outside.
The florist will be creating a customer flower arrangement for the arch which contains the same flowers that are in the centerpieces. The 8 pillars to the sides of the arch will each have a fern on them. The ferns are huge and specially grown for the Community Center (A free ceremony decoration, county me in.)

I contemplated for several weeks what to do with the pillars linning the isle. I knew two things: 1) that I wanted something simple and 2) the white was too much. I found on our trial run that the vases are glued to the top of the pillars. Here is what we decided on to dress up the pillars:


I am really excited with how the trial went. In additon to finalizing ceremony and table decorations we were able to meet with the Event Director to get answers to some lingering questions that we had. All in all it was a great experience and we walked away feeling very positive.

Bridesmaids

To begin the updates I will start with the Bridesmiads. I really wanted each bridesmaid make the look there own. When selecting their dresses I gave them some pretty loose criteria. They all had to pick the same designer, select a tea length dress of their choice (preferrably a chiffon fabric), in the color I selected from that designer.

They all ended up going for David's Bridal Dresses, in clover green-I really think that the clover green will make the bright colors in the bouquets pop.


1) Mistelle's (MOH). 2) Mandy's Dress. 3) Brandy's Dress.
Source

I love them all. Each dress fits each girls own personality and am excited that everyone has said that they will wear their dress again. They will be wearing silver shoes and jewelry from lia sophia.

Update...

So, I said that I was going to create this blog as a way to keep organized, and a way to keep important people up to date, and what has gone and happened???? I completely abandoned it. I feel horrible and really wish that I would have kept up on it. So much has been going on:

• My dress is in - fittings will begin mid-May. I posted about my dress previously.
• Girls dresses are all ordered and two of them are in.
• I held an invitation making party yesterday and got all the invites stuffed.
• I have ordered most of my accessories including veil, hair comb, and shoes.
• Gathering pieces for favors.
• Decided on centerpieces and went for a trial at the hall.

I just can't believe how much I have done already in just a few short months. Even harder to believe how much other stuff I still have to do. Since it is coming down to the nitty gritty, I am going to make sure that I keep this blog updated.