Test Bouquet

I did my test bouquet today - yay for government holidays! I started with a bouquet from Trader Joes, stripped the stems, wrapped the stems together with floral tape, and then with ribbon. I think for the real thing I will want a lot more flowers, and obviously they won't be pink, but overall I'm happy with how they turned out. I'll probably use about 1 1/2 times as many flowers for the bridesmaids' bouquets and twice as many for mine. Total time? About 10 minutes.

This should be an easy project to do the day before the wedding, since we will only need to make 4 bouquets. I'm thinking that we could prepare the bouquets the night, get them cut, but keep them in water until the morning of the wedding, and then do the ribbons that morning.

Projects

I've been working hard on lots of projects! The most recent one I finished was the tote bags for the bridesmaids. I was really happy with how these turned out. I have to give Greg a ton of the credit for working on the design, but the idea was all mine. :)


A couple of weeks ago I updated my veil. I wasn't very happy with how the peacock feathers looked - they weren't sitting right on the veil. Also, I wanted to incorporate the blue tulle that I'm wearing under my dress into my veil, so it will match. I also wanted to use the artificial ranunculus I got, since I used it in Greg's boutonniere, so we would match a little. I'm pleased with how it looks, but I still want to incorporate peacock feathers into my attire somehow - I'm just not sure how. I could do a garter, but it's not like everyone will see it! So I may just end up without any peacock feathers.


I also updated Greg's bout and added the floral wire to all of them - I think it really finishes them off.

And finally, I got the rest of my jewelry finished and I got chains for the gorgeous peacock feather charms that Jessi made!

I already had the necklace I am wearing, so I was looking for earrings that would match. Since the earrings I got have little (fake) diamonds on them, I thought the bracelet was a nice touch.


And here are the necklaces that Jessi made, with the chains I just got for them.


We got our marriage license a couple of weeks ago - all we need to get married, really. The rest is just fancy trappings.

Finally went and checked out the reception site (Chez Sparks!). Rachel's parents have done a really nice job making a backyard oasis, so we won't need to decorate too much. That's what I love about having the ceremony and reception outside (assuming the weather cooperates). Still lots of planning to be done, but I should be able to get it all done in time...

Wedding Bouquets

Well, I've done a bit of research online, and I still think I want to do the wedding bouquets myself. The Knot has a seemingly simple tutorial here. I think I need to do a trial beforehand to figure out how long they will take - but the bigger issue is probably going to be storing them for a day or two before the wedding, and how they will look. Since the wedding is early in the day, and we're doing pictures beforehand, there probably won't be time to do them the morning of - unless I'm having trouble sleeping!

I'm still hoping my dahlias will bloom in time for the wedding - so far, lots of leaves but no buds. Not too surprising. Supposedly adding too much nitrogen to the soil can increase foliage at the expense of flowers, so I need to make sure I'm not over-nitrogenizing the soil! The plants are doing really well, despite the fact that I didn't do most of the things that the experts recommend (soil testing, working bonemeal in before planting...) so we'll just have to wait and see. Too bad patience isn't my strong point!

Cupcake Towers!!!

We took advantage of the beautiful weather anomaly to put together our cupcake towers. We made them by finding plates, vases and candlesticks at a thrift store, and using epoxy to attach them into towers. (Note how Soma is very interested in them, due to the chemical smell.) They probably cost about $5 each, rather than paying $30+ dollars for a plain one - and they're much cooler! It was a bit challenging to find three different sizes of plates for the three tiers that all went together, but now I have quite a few vintage plates left that I'm planning to use for a wall decoration.

I'm beginning to get pretty stressed about the wedding and how much is left to be done. Invites finally went out last week and we've already received two RSVPs, which reminds me how little time we have left! I ordered some of the reception decorations online, but still more to get. We still need to figure out what to do with the kitties while we are on our honeymoon. Our engagement photo shoot is this Friday, so hopefully the weather will be halfway decent. So much to be done, so little time!

Update

Well, we've been hard at work on wedding stuff the past couple of weeks...now that there's only 2 months to go, I am starting to feel the pressure!

We are almost done with the invite packages. I think we need to make a couple more of the actual invites, but the map cards, website cards, and RSVP cards are done. I also need to get a few more stamps. Too bad the post office has discontinued the LOVE stamps with the king and queen of hearts! Those were so cute. The map cards turned out really awesome, thanks to Greg's mad Photoshop skills. My lovely friend Tamra is going to help me address the envelopes for the invites. Hopefully I'll get them mailed off by early next week.

I took advantage of my work trip to Portland, and got a bunch of stuff at Ikea. Blankets for the reception, a basket to put the blankets in, some pretty napkins, a nice blue serving bowl that I can also use after the wedding, and a fake flower branch. I'm planning to use the larger flower on my veil, and the smaller one in a boutonniere for Greg, so we will match. :)

I finally figured out how to turn my blue tulle into a petticoat/crinoline that I can wear under my dress. I bought a half slip and sewed the tulle to the bottom of the slip. It's not 100% perfect, but it will work. Now I want to see if I can integrate the leftover tulle into my veil or something else I'm wearing on my wedding day.

I'm so excited to make our guest book! We've started pulling together baby pictures of us, and I want to include pictures of us together through the last six years, including our photobooth pics. Once we get our engagement photos, then we can put it all together into an online photo book that spans through the years, with lots of white space for people to write in.

Well, off to finish my pizza and then get some climbing in!

Finally getting around to this...

Well, I've been meaning to start a wedding blog where I can post my planning progress for awhile, but haven't gotten around to it. Now that there's less than three months until the wedding, I'm getting much more motivated!

Here is some of the wedding attire...

Birdcage Veil

This was one of my first wedding projects. I knew exactly what I wanted, but didn't feel like spending a bundle. This was actually really easy to make, once I figured out what to do. I'm still thinking of adding some additional embellishments around the feathers, once I figure out what I want to include.

My Shoes

I really loved these shoes when I bought them. I actually bought them before I even had my dress picked out. Basically I really wanted these shoes, and I figured that the wedding would be a good excuse to buy them. I figure that flats will be best for an outdoor wedding.

Ties

All of the groomsmen and Greg will be wearing these ties. I found them on sale when looking for Slytherin ties for Halloween, actually. I'm still trying to decide how to distinguish Greg from all the other guys - maybe we'll find him a vest to wear.

Boutonnieres

I made these a couple of months ago. I still want to wrap some thin wire around the ribbons, but I think they turned out quite nice, considering how much trouble they gave me. I still haven't decided if the guys should wear them on their front pockets or their collars, since they won't be wearing jackets (in August? Ugh!).

The Rings

I'm so excited to start wearing my wedding band with my engagement ring. I love the hammered texture on Greg's band - I think it looks so much nicer than plain white gold.

Favors

While part of me thinks that wedding favors are kind of silly, and most people probably don't care about them, I also think that they are fun mementos. And I love the idea of people blowing bubbles at us as we walk back down the aisle after the ceremony!

A couple of other projects we are working on:

Invites et al - we decided to do them ourselves - invites, RSVP cards, everything. They are coming along, but I do want to get them done and mailed out soon. This is a pretty big project, especially since the paper I originally picked out ended up not working. It wouldn't feed through our printer, and when we managed to print on it, the ink would smear days after unless I sprayed fixative on it. Fortunately, I was able to use it as the back of the invite, since it's such pretty paper.

Cupcake tower - I've seen some really fantastic cupcake towers online made out of retro plates separated by glass vases. So far we have two really cool plates and two vases, but we need a third plate for the center tier.

More to come in the near future!

Welcome

After 5 1/2 years, we've decided to get married! Check here for details about the wedding.