Wedding Planning|Wedding Planning & Wedding Advice

Flower Motifs in Wedding Decorations

Fresh flower arrangements, bouquets, and boutonnieres – flowers play a big role in your wedding (and, possibly, your budget!). However, a Spring or Summer wedding can also include flowers in other decorating ideas as well.

Tips: Pick one type of flower and stick with it. If you do this, the flower can become a symbol for your big day and a subtle theme for all aspects of your wedding. Do not mix and match different flowers unless they are from the same group (i.e. wildflowers), and even then be very careful.

White Rose Fabric

Consider using the flower as a subtle design on some decorations – a raised pattern of white roses on a white background would be the kind of elelgant detail that people notice. For example, use a print like this one from cloaksofireland.com for the table linens (if the rose has a slight sheen to it and the background fabric is matte, it will be more noticeable.)

White Rose Petals

Use flower petals to decorate the church or reception hall. You can use fresh petals or purchase fabric petals, like these from wholesaleflowerandsupplies.com.

White Rose Stamps

You can include rose motifs right down to the smallest details, like using these stamps from zazzle.com on your invitations.

The Bride and Bloom

Tip: Keep in mind that even a white rose can have very different looks. Try to stick with the same shade of white and the same style so that your wedding doesn’t start to look unorganized.

Rose Wedding Favor

This delicate looking rose candle holder from hotref.com is made from resin and clear rhinestones (it includes the candle).

White Chocolate Rose Wedding Cake

A delicious and delightful white chocolate cake adorned with roses, from justscrumptious.co.uk.

DIY Delicious

You can make your own white roses from modeling chocolate, instructions at pastrychef.com. Leave them at each place setting as an edible decoration, or nestle each delicate rose in a favor box and send the guests home with one. Apparently, you can make them months ahead of time as long as you store them in a cool, dry location.

Wedding receptions are usually fun for adults, but can be a bore for the kids.

Keep children entertained with these great ideas.

Some online stores specialize in wedding favors for children. Kidsweddingfun.com offers table activities for 6 children in a gift basket. They have 2 different versions: one for children ages 3 – 7 and one for chidren ages 8 – 12.

Kidfriendlyweddings.com has cute themed activity kits (beach, garden, fairytale, autumn, and winter) to match your wedding. The fairytale version is pictured below: kids get to make a crown, play with a fairy tale sticker scene, and look through a magical kaleidoscope (there is a lot more inside).

Another idea: check out businesses that create loot bags for birthday parties. They might offer wedding activity sets; and if they don’t, you might be able to order something that will still work for your wedding (just take the loot bag contents and put them in a fancier bag or basket. You can order the Barbie Wedding Activity Board Book pictured above from lootlady.com. It includes the activity book, a little fancy purse, and candy.

If you’re having a kids table, consider hiring an adult to supervise and entertain the children (one talented at balloon animals or face painting would be perfect!). If you’re seating the children with their parents, you can leave an activity kit at their place at the table. A coloring or activity book with markers, a puzzle, or a craft – all great ways to keep a child entertained (and seated quietly). Small lego sets are cute, too – particularly if you can find one that matches the theme of your wedding. Stay away from crafts that include glue or paint (or anything messy).

If you have the time and inclination, you can put your own activity set together. Try to pick activities and toys that match your wedding theme and use a bag, basket, or box that matches your wedding colors.

Activity Books

This wedding day activity book can be purchased at sophiesfavors.com.

Busy Hands

This cute ‘take-along-tower’ from Playmobil is cute and lots of fun. There  is also a take-along unicorn castle available.

Here are some great ideas for wedding favors that you can make yourself! A great way to set your wedding apart from the rest – when you make your own favors they can be truly unique and customized to your character as a wedding couple. You can also save a lot of money!

Sweet Deals

Check online for stores that sell wholesale chocolate and buy your candy favors in bulk. For example, you can get a 6 pound box of delicious almond bark at candywarehouse.com. Available in white, dark, or milk chocolate – if you need more than one box, mix it up so that you can offer a selection to each guest.

You can buy favor bags and boxes online as well, or check out your local dollar store, craft store, or discount department store for sales. Sandscripts.com offers a wide variety of fabric bags, gift bags, and gift boxes. You can also order customized ribbon for your event for a very reasonable price.

Cookie Cutter Wedding

Another idea – invite a few of your friends over for a cookie crafternoon. Bake the cookies beforehand if possible, and then get together to decorate and package the goods with your friend (ask them to bring over some bottles of wine to get the creative juices really flowing). Check out sweetopia for instructions for these beautiful butterfly cookies, as well as lots of general tips and links to other online resources for cookie decoration.

If you’re not confident about your cookie skills – bake and decorate simple cookies instead and then focus on presentation, instead.

Or, buy cookie cutters in bulk, attach your favorite recipe and your wedding date with a beautiful ribbon, and you’re done (no baking required!). Tip: buy the cookie cutters from an online cookie cutter store rather than a specialty wedding store for better prices! Check out cookiecutter.com for lots of options: flowers for a spring wedding, hearts, brides and grooms, etc.

Today we feature my favorite kind of wedding favors.

I feel very strongly that wedding favors need to be useful – they should be more than a useless knickknack. I love wedding favors that are edible or wedding favors that can be planted in your garden.

But most of all, I love wedding favors that serve double duty – they are perfect for the budget conscious bride. What do I mean by double duty? I mean favors that also serve as a place card or, when displayed on the table, become the centerpiece. Here are some of my favorites:

Picture Frame Favor – Place Card

This pink rhinestone frame from hotref.com is used as a place card for guest seating and also functions as a cute wedding favor that guests can take home.

Bamboo Wedding Favor – Centerpiece

Group these individual pots from natureperfect.com together on each table to make a unique centerpiece. Guests get to pick one and take it home afterwards!

Shot Glass Wedding Favor and Special Toast

Serve filled shot glasses, like these ones from favorfavor.com to the guests and ask them to participate in a special toast. Perfect fun for a destination wedding where you can use the local specialty (tequila, grappa, jagermeister…). Then they get to take the glass home as a wedding favor.

Custom Dice Wedding Favor and Reception Ice Breaker

A cute favor for the Las Vegas wedding or geeky couple who love to play yahtzee. Create custom yahtzee score paper and include a cup at each table so that your guests can have some fun getting to know each other while the wedding party is off getting photos taken. Provide prizes to the winner at each table or reward them by forcing them to sing a song or share a story about the happy couple!

What’s Halloween without candy?

Some might argue that candy is the best part!

Last month we shared some sweet ideas for how candy can spice up your wedding in our article “Weddings Sweet as Candy”.

A Halloween themed wedding, or even just a wedding that takes place near October 31st, should definitely involve some sweet treats! Here are some ideas…

Treat Table

I know I already featured candy stations (a.k.a. candy buffets) in my candy feature last month, but since then I’ve discovered the candy station crackerjack of all time, Amy Atlas of Atlas Events. Here’s a sneak peek at a Halloween dessert table she created - visit the ‘eye candy’ section of her website for more tantalizing photos and be prepared to be blown away, they are the best thing I’ve seen in a long time.

Wedding Favors

Proof you can be eerie and elegant at the same time, Martha Stewart tells you how to make these Black and Orange Take-Away Truffles – they would make excellent wedding favors!

marthastewart.com

Another option: handcrafted personalized chocolates from Recchiuti – picture your names on one chocolate and a spooky image on the other…

recchiuti.com

Edible Seating Cards

Another sweet idea, use these cupcakes as placeholders for your seating cards! Place one cupcake at each table setting with a table card placed into the icing (or attached to a stick).

fancyflours.wordpress.com

You could print your guests’ names on card stock paper and then attach them to these bat picks with a dab from a glue gun.

shopbakersnook.com

Candy Cocktails

You might offer a sweet specialty drink at your reception to get the party going. Here is a photo of a chocolate martini, rimmed with a mixture of chocolate and sugar – the heart shaped strawberry garnish is a nice touch, but you could also use a candy of course!

chocolatezoom.com

Don’t forget to provide some delicious snacks to go with the drinks – perhaps some squishy spiders made from custard filled profiteroles and crunchy pretzel sticks…

ishouldbenapping.com