Saturday, September 24, 2011

A special surprise "Groom's Cake" moment for Luigi and Tish and Luigi's wedding

This was not only the coolest groom's cake ever BUT the way it was reveled was awesome! I am just going to let the pictures speak for themselves!!! Enjoy...  
        







Yes...he tried to hug the cake!

DIY Wedding Ideas - Here is a special blog post of DIY wedding ideas from Mallory!!! Enjoy!

Mallory win's hands down for the bride with the most cute and different ideas to add a personal touch to her wedding day! She also is one of the cleverest DIY brides I have ever met! I decided to put a special blog post together of all of her ideas so you all could see what she did and take some of them and incorporate them into your special day. The cool thing is Mallory agreed to comment on the pictures and give you details of where she found some of the items or what she did. So after each picture I will post her comment about the pictures.

This robe was an idea I borrowed from my Maid of Honor from her wedding, I bought it at Victoria's Secret. I think it just looks beautiful in photos and it was so comfortable to wear while getting ready!


I made these water bottle labels using a print at home kit from Michael's Craft Store. A set of 24 labels cost just $4.99. These worked out great for my wedding shower. I also made these for the bridal party to use the day of the wedding. If you use a 40% off coupon they are that much more affordable!


This was a gift from my dear friend Serena at my wedding shower. :)

I loved this idea and bought the hanger from Etsy. It was a suggestion from TheKnot.com as top 10 things brides forget. Your hanger will always be in your dress photos so why not make it special. I customized the hanger with a blue heart for my "something blue". It was an inexpensive and fun way to hang my dress. Best of all its in my closet and I can keep using it. This would be a great gift for a bride!


Some people would say I'm crazy but I love anything creative or customized. This hoodie was the first thing I bought after Steve and I got engaged. It's from VictoriasSecret.com The front says "The Future Mrs." and the back says "Bride". My favorite part was the wedding ring hanging from the zipper. It was just so cute. I had to have it!

This was a sweet gift from my Mother In Law who lives in Illinois. There is a cute store in Downer's Grove outside Chicago area called Wedding Etc. The store also has a catalog. She bought this from their store. We also purchased our groomsman gifts from this store and both the father of the bride and groom gifts. Their catalog is great!


I'm an Ebay fan! This is a Mindy Weiss shoe bag that came with two lavender sachet bags for your special wedding shoes. When a local store seemed overpriced I searched high and low and found this set with an adorable tote on Ebay for more than half the price. I thought it would look cute in pictures and it was another excuse "I only get to do this once..." :)


These shoes are dyeables from Alfred Angelo Roseville and the color is Scarlet.


The rhinestone ring was from a set of stickers from Michael's Craft Store. Just thought it was cute and fun.


We chose to include flip flops for a favor because we had a beach wedding. I found these at Old Navy and used a Groupon. I made little tags that said "Kick off your shoes!" And I kept the original tag on these so that guests could find their size. A polka dot ribbon helped tie in our colors.


Program Fans! My Maid of Honor and Bridesmaid helped me with the programs. I bought popsicle sticks from Michael's. The paper was from a pack of Martha Stewart wedding invitations that my Maid of Honor had no use for. I printed them from home and we tied many bows! It was a good project for the girls before the Big Day! The basket is from Marshalls.


These are our wedding guest seating assignments. I made the board with a cork board and fabric with ribbon. The name of the table was a song to be played so that guests knew it was their turn at the buffet.


I made these using candy wrapper labels (stickers) and name cards from Michael's. It was fun and easy to make.

I love these! You can buy these on Amazon or Ebay. Since we chose black sashes for the guest chairs I wanted ours to be different. They just matched our theme perfectly!


We ordered these from Hallmark while picking out our wedding invitations. I love practical things so matches seemed like a great favor, even guys love matches. It was fun picking out the design.


 My bridesmaid Rachael made these beautiful head table arrangements. When I thought the florist quote was too high I told myself I'll find a way to make my flower fantasies come true! And we did! For half the price! The manzanita branches, s...tones and vases are from the craft store. Rachael worked her magic with the flowers and I ordered the hanging glass votives from wholesaleflowersandsupplies.com this was the best and most affordable place to find them. Let me tell you, brides have a very hard time finding these votives. Don't bother with local stores, buy online! The battery operated tea lights are from Party City. I don't buy it if I don't have a coupon. So always look for a discount and at the very least ask the cashier if they have any coupons available.
 

 These water labels I chose to have printed online. For a wedding size party I found it more cost effective and less time consuming to order them. I found these at foreverwedstore.com with a 20% off coupon. Each label was about 75 cents. These are smudge proof and waterproof which was better than the print at home templates. These do require you to assemble at home with double sided tape. The best water bottles for these particular labels is Nestle brand from Safeway...long story! :)
 

‎*The nutrition label won me over on these water bottles and you can totally customize your label just for you!


These labels are again from foreverwed.com, great website! Fast shipping!


These are signature drink signs. I made these with crafty supplies from Michael's Craft Store. The frames are from Bed Bath and Beyond and matched our cake knife set.


Our guest book is a collection of engagement photo's from A Moment of Joy photography! I made the book as a keepsake for our guests comments and notes that can easily be laid on a coffee table or placed safely on a bookshelf. The photo stand is a premade design from the craft store that I added a wedding dress and tux sticker to as well as our actual wedding invitation.


Our Photo booth! Rocketbooth was our photo booth company. They traveled to Lake Tahoe from Sacramento. The booth was so fun and the company brought a scrapbook for the photos as a keepsake for Steve and I to take home. We loved looking at these silly photos after the wedding! It was nice to see how much fun our friends and family had that night!


I made these for our smallest guests. They were free online and I just customized the book to our names and the information inside as well. It was easy and free!


These napkins are again from the craft store. I bought enough for appetizers and cake.



 I love sweets! A Candy Bar was a must! I bought all the vases from Michael's using 40% off coupons! They only let you use one per purchase so I called in the troops! My parents stood in line with me and we made two separate trips. The candy is from Winco in bulk. The little frames are from Target dollar bins. Scoops and adhesive polka dot ribbon are from Michael's. It was so important to ask for help! I knew I couldn't put this together the day of the wedding myself. My cousin and his wife put this together for me. I just boxed it all up with a photo of what I wanted it to look like. The fabric was stitched by my aunt.
 


I chose to only have red and white candy to stay with our color theme. I am glad I did. It tuned out classy but fun!



 I bought these "Happy Socks" for Steve from Nordstrom. I admit it, it was a picture thing. I thought it would be cute! :)


I bought these boxers from Old Navy and we gave them to the guys at rehearsal dinner. Another fun picture opportunity and who knows if they forgot their underwear? Men's Wearhouse doesn't give them any but they do include socks!


We chose to hand every guest their dinner plate rather than greet them at tables. Eventually everyone eats so we thought this was a wonderful way to say hello to each guest and thank them for coming. It also made having a buffet more personable. We received so many compliments for this and it was such a simple gesture. We enjoyed every minute of it.


Behind the Scenes Sounds DJ brought all of these keys for a fun game where all of the women had to give back the key they once had to Steve's heart. The DJ played fun music while all the women lined up and gave back their keys to me in jar. The DJ and MC made me a special key with hearts on it as a keepsake as I now hold the key to Steve's heart. It was a complete surprise to me and I thought it was such a fun idea!


I hope you enjoyed this fun blog post! Mallory and Steve's wedding post will be up soon...and thank you Mallory for taking the time to comment for me on these pictures on Facebook so I could blog them here!!!


My dad made these shepherds hooks for our wedding. We bought the pails from Home Depot for about $10 each. The hooks were also from Home Depot and about $12 each. You can find them less expensive from other stores but we chose these because they are durable and tall. My dad filled the pails with cement and stored them upright to dry. The pails were filled with rose petals from our florist and the pomanders were also made by our florist. There are definitely ways to get the guys involved in the preparations and planning process. My dad did an awesome job! The best part is that we continue to use them on our porch and in our backyard for hanging plants.
 

Thursday, September 22, 2011

Another Happily Ever After Story!

Another Happily Ever After Story!

Jose and Vivian had their baby girl Sophea in July...isn't she beautiful! Here is her 1 month old photo shoot.



Soon, my baby blog will be updated with both of their belly shoot and Sophea's 1 month shoot in full. I will update the link here.

Here are some past shoots of Jose and Vivian since I met them 2 almost two years ago on the blog: