Cake topper addition

I recently found Wedzu which is just like Etsy, but only for wedding related items. Whilst browsing through the products, I came across these cake topper banners by the seller Ready Go.

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How cute are these? I think our cake toppers would look really nice under one of these banners, possibly the just married one, because I think couples can sometimes go a bit overboard with sticking their names on everything wedding related!

These are £20 from Wedzu, which is a ridiculous amount of money to pay for a bit of card and some skewers! I reckon I could make one of these fairly easily - just print out the words with a banner clip art, cut it out and stick it on some wooden skewers. Then we can just stick in into the top of the cake, above the bride and groom toppers. Simples.

I'm going to keep an eye on Wedzu, because I think it will probably be a brilliant source of inspiration for DIY projects.

I love you more than....

A while ago, I found the website for the I love you more than blank  project, which is run in New York and based on the belief that you can never really measure something unless it is compared to something else. They ask you to submit an end to the sentence "I love you more than..." and you can see other peoples answers on the website too.

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I spent literally hours on this website, reading through the answers. Some of them are funny, some are really sweet, and some of them are sort of sad.

When I first found this site, I started to think about how the idea could be used at a wedding. I really liked the idea of asking each of your guests to complete an "I love you more than..." heart and stick them into the guest book, or pin them to a notice board, or even string them up like bunting. It would be lovely to read all the comments and it would be a nice, different memento of the day.

We probably wont use this idea for our wedding, just because I don't want to plan too much for our guests to do, what with a photo booth and guest book frame already. However, I might decide to make some sort of display with "I love you more than blank" hearts, just made up of our own answers, possibly just as decoration. Maybe.

Anyway, here's a couple of answers that we came up with ourselves. As you can tell, we were being a bit silly!

• I love you more than chocolate covered pretzels
• I love you more than finally being able to sneeze
• I love you more than a "70% off Shoes" sign
• I love you more than  I love Gibbs
• I love you more than John McCain loves shooting things
• I love you more than I love Coca Cola 
• I love you more than Barney Stinson loves suits
• I love you more than a hot water bottle in bed

Anyway, have a look at www.iloveyoumorethanblank.com to see more hearts.

Aisle Decorations

Recently I have been thinking about ways to decorate our aisle at our ceremony site. I was unsure whether we needed to add something, since we are getting married outdoors and so, in theory, we could let nature provide the decorations.

However, I think it might be nice to add a little colour to the aisle and I really like the look of pomanders handing from the chairs.

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Right now, I'm not sure what the ceremony chairs will be like, but I'm sure we woud be able to hang something from them.

Pomanders made from flowers would work out crazily expensive, even if I used silk flowers, so I think I'd definitely go down the tissue paper route. I found this tutorial on Project Wedding and they sound like they would be time consuming, but fairly simple to make. If I can find the polystrene balls for cheap enough, I think I'll have a go at making these.

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I love how nice and fluffy they look!

Another option that I think is quite cute for lining the aisle is paper lanterns:

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These would be much easier than the pomanders, and give a similar sort of look.
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I also really love this idea, although I doubt we'd be able to have it at our venue:

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How cute is that? And I love hay bales for seats too!

I'm going to keep looking for more inspiration for something to line the aisle - something cheap, simple and pretty. If I can find the balls to make pomanders at a reasonsble price then I think I'll be sold on that idea, but I have ages yet until an actual decision has to be made!

Pumpkin Inspiration

Since it's getting close to Halloween, I thought I'd share some pumpkin wedding inspiration that I stumbled across. 

How gorgeous do these pumkin lanterns look?

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I almost wish we were having an autumn wedding, just so that we could have carved pumpkin lanterns!

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I would assume that these would be fairly cheap - but I suppose it depends on where you get the pumpkins from. Can you buy pumkins wholesale?

It would probably take a while to carve them, but it wouldn't be difficult and it would be so fun! Plus, you could make all sorts of pumpkiny recipes from the scooped out insides.

You could even carve your names or monogram into them

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Or how cute is this?

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I think these would look so gorgeous lining a path or grouped together outside. I think I may have to convince an engaged person I know to have these!

Oh, and speaking of engaged people - it seems to be catching around here! I breifly mentioned that my younger sister is engaged, and 2 of my best friends are also engaged. But now, my older sister is engaged too! Hurray!

Now, which one of them can I convince to have pumpkins...?

Mustache on a stick - version 2.0

OK, everyone has seen the good old mustache on stick. They are the bread and butte of wedding photo booth props. I personally love a good fake mustache. I think it makes every picture 10 times better!

For example:

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Amazing. Anyway, Delightfully Engaged posted about these possible photo booth props from PhotoJoJo, which are the new and improved, futuristic version!

 

 Clear, pocket sized paddles with pictures printed on them! Very cool, and very funny. These would be amazing as photo booth props, or even on your tables for guests to play about with. They could even be bridesmaid or groomsmen gifts. I like the fact that they are clear, so you don't have the big stick in your photos, and I also like that they can be used closeup on yourself, or you can hold them up to use on people who are further away, meaning you could get some hilarious shots of people without them even knowing.

At $10 each, or the whole set for $30, I won't be buying them (I'll stick with my DIY, cheap and cheerful mustaches, thanks) but they are still very, very cool and they would certainly add something special to your photos!

Badge Madness!

Ever since I saw this picture on Offbeat Bride, I have been a bit obsessed with badges.

Isn't that a really cute way to personalise a buttonhole? I really like it, and immediately started looking for a cute badge for Karl's buttonhole. Unfortunately, he is the pickiest man on the planet, and everything I suggested was shot down.

So I'm still looking and he is thinking about what he would like a badge to say.
I also think it would be nice to have a badge attached to the stems of the bouquets, so that the bridesmaids can tell who's is who's. I've since some really nice charms on bouquets, with the girls initals, but since 3 of my bridesmaids have names starting with K, this wouldn't really work.

Anyway, I found some really lovely badges:

Wedding Party Badges

I like the style of these, but don't think I would want everyone to have a badge with their role on it. I'm not sure why...

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These are from Folksy, from the seller Maushaus and are the cutest things I have ever seen! You can request personalised ones, and they are all handmade too. I also really like the ones that say "eek" on them, since that is exactly how I imagine I'll be feeling!

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While looking at all the badges, I started to think that it would be really cool to have a load of badges to give to the guests, as an extra little favour. I got very excited when I found some very cool pictures of couples who had done just that!

 

Like I said, I'm a bit obsessed! I even started thinking about what our badges could say and came up with a few designs.

We had loads of fun thinking of what to put on the badges! Some of them I am unsure about, since not everyone will get them. For example, the Gibbs badge, with WWGD? (what would Gibbs do?) - some of our friends will love this, since they are also big NCIS fans, but everyone else might be a bit confused. Same goes for the "Haven't you always wanted a monkey?" badge - this is a line from our favourite Barenaked Ladies song - I know my family will love this, but it won't be as funny for people who are not BNL fans.

I am loving the "Team" badges though - I would be very interested to see who ends up on which team!  I originaly thought about attaching a badge to the place cards, but then realised that that would mean choosing which badge to give to which guest - which I just couldn't do! Instead, I think we would probably have all the badges in a bowl for guests to choose their own - probably by the guestbook or something.

Unfortunately, these badges might never happen. The cheapest I can find personalised badges for is 70p each, which for 100 badges is £70! That's more than we are spending on our current favours! If these were going to be our main favours, I would spend that much, but we already have the vodka favours brewing. I even looked into a badge making machine, but they are about £150, so unless I can find someone who alread has one and is willing to let me borrow it, badges for the guests will remain just a fantasy :-(

However, I will continue to think of more designs for our badges, on the off chance that we are able to find them for cheaper. And I'd still like to have badges for the buttonholes and bouquets. Karl thinks that the Team Karl and Team Kayleigh badges should go on the buttonholes and bouquets, but I'm not so sure.

Maybe if we win the £112million on the lottery tonight, we could have badges for everyone!

Iris Inspiration

So we went shopping today, and bought this gorgeous bunch of Irises:

I love irises - I remember my mum growing them in our front garden when I was younger, and the colour of these is gorgeous, and happens to be the exact shade of purple I want for the wedding.

It made me realise that we could have iris heads as the flowers in our wheatgrass centrepieces - I don;t know why it didn't occur to me before now, since the original tutorial for the centrepieces I found involved irises!

from lindseyrose on WeddingBee

 Anyway, as far as I know, Irises are available all year round, so getting them for our wedding shouldn't be too difficult. The bunch we got from Tesco was £3 (well actuallly it was reduced to £1.95, but it should have been £3) and has maybe 8 usable heads. I wonder if it would be worth finding out how much a huge bunch from a florist would be, since we will need about 5 or so heads per centrepiece (possibly 3, I've not decided yet). It might work out cheaper to buy one big bunch, as opposed to lots of small bunches form the supermarket. 

The other option, of course, is to grow our own. I have no idea if irises are difficult to grow or maintain, but I might do some research. It would be lovely (and cheap!) to grow them ourselves, but it would add the extra stress of worrying about whether or not the flowers will turn out ok.

Either way, I definitely like irises for our centrepieces - and as an added bonus, the song I'm walking down the aisle to is also called Iris! Just a little detail that absolutely no-one else would ever notice, but it makes me smile!

P.S. I have decided that we need to have that ring bearer book in our wedding somewhere! I will update soon with an explanation of how I'm going to make a few changes and includ eit in the ceremony!

Instructables DIY Wedding Competition

If you are looking for some DIY inspiration for your wedding, check out Instructables DIY Wedding Competition - they asked people to submit creative DIY ways to personalise a wedding, and you can see all the tutorials and vote for your favourite.

The competition is now closed for entries, but there are 85 DIY ideas for you to lust over.

I particularly like these LED acorn lanterns

 

 and these lovely shell candles

But my favourite is this Tin Can LED Lantern:

Very cool looking - and they would be perfect to have on the outdoor deck at our recpetion since the venue won't allow open flames. I think it would be quite cute to have your initials or monogram as the pattern too. 

Check out the Instructables site for more brilliant DIY ideas!

Ring Bearer Book

We decided not to have a ring bearer, partly because if we gave a role to one child, we would have to give a role to the other 6 or children of a similar age. As much as we love them, there just isn't enough room in our wedding for all of them. So we decided it would be fairer, and cause less problems, if we stuck to just adult attendants - so no flower girl, no page boy and like I said, no ring bearer.

This was a decision that never really bothered me until I found this tutorial on Offbeat Bride - showing how to make a ring bearer book:

From Offbeat Bride

I absolutely adore this idea! I don't know if it's because I love reading, so the idea of having our rings stored inside a book really appeals to me, or because when I was younger I always wanted a secret hiding place, like a book with a hole hidden inside.

Who am I kidding? I still want that now!

Doesn't this make a really cool alternative to a pillow? And I think the rings would be safer inside the book than an a pillow!

The tutorial is really clear and the book looks so simple to make - plus I could probably do it for under £1! I would probably have to pick up a book from a charity shop, but I might have an old one lying around that would work. And depending on what design we wanted on the front, I'd probably have to buy a sheet of wrapping paper or something similar.

The only thing stopping me from making this right now, is that we are not having a ring bearer, therefor there is no one to carry it up the aisle, and so really no reason to have it at all.
I mean, we could give it to the best man to hold the rings in, but there isn't really any need - he is perfectly capable of keeping the rings in their box. Plus, the book would probably just be too awkward anyway, since it's not like the best man could just put it in his pocket!

But I love the idea so much! I think it would be so cute to leave a few pages free and have our wedding vows and the readings from the ceremony printed on them.

I am very tempted to just make one anyway, and even if it's not used for our wedding rings, I could just hide things inside it!

Another gorgeous wedding

Another gorgeous wedding on Style Me pretty caught my eye today. I love how its looks quite simple but still beautiful and elegant. I am completely in love with outdoor weddings (although I'm possibly a tiny bit biased) and I also adore all the lights at their reception. I'm also a sucker for a fake moustache...

So pretty, *sigh*

Cheap Centrepiece Idea #2

Following on from our decision to have non floral centrpieces, I have been trawling the internet for inspiration.
I think it can be difficult to find centrpieces that look elegant without spending a fortune, so the plan is to make them ourselves. This means that we're looking for something cheap and simple that will still make an impact.

Here's a few of my favourite ideas so far:

Candle bags from Martha Stewart

I quite like the idea of using herbs as centrepieces. I think give a fress and natural look to the table, and we could make it a bit more colourful by putting them in bright containers. Plus they would smell amazing!

I've mentioned using limes before, and this lemon centrepiece looks quite striking. However, when Martha Stewart does it, it looks classy and unique. When I do it, it looks like a bunch of fruit dumped in a bowl...

I love this idea, from Martha Stewart (again!). It's family photos printed on really thin paper and framed. You stick 3 frames together to make a triangle, then put a candle in the middle. Simple, but very cool.

Fabric flags (in purple and lime for us, obviously) stuck in a jar. So simple, but I actually quite like the look of this.

I think I saw goldfish bowls somewhere - maybe at a wedding fayre? At first, I thought it was a very unique idea, but when I actually think about it, I'm not sure I like it...
What happens to the fish afterwards? Is it cruel? What if a fish dies during the day? Can you imagine - a dead fish floating in the middle of the table?? Eurgh!

Wheatgrass! I've never thought of grass as a centrepiece before but I love this photo so much! I know it has flowers in it, but only the head and I could buy a bunch from Sainsburys on the day, lol.

So far, wheatgrass is definitely my favourite idea. I'm off to find some more pictures!

Cheap Centrepiece Idea #1

I am gobsmakced at the cost of flowers for weddings! If we have real flowers for our boquets and centrepieces, I will be speding more on flowers than on my dress! I love flowers, but I'm not sure I love them that much.

So my solution is to either use artifical flowers, or not use flowers at all.

At the moment, I'm leaning towards non floral centrepieces. My first thought is Candles:

I absolutely love the look of candle centrepieces. They are so simple, but the effect is very elegant. My only fear is that it would still be daylight during our meal, so it might look a bit odd to have a table full of candles and no need for them to be lit...

Also, I think i'd like a bit more colour in our centrepieces. Of course, we could always use coloured candles - I love this picture:

From Martha Stewart