Le Fleurs...

The flowers, which I really put so much focus on early in the planning, were beyond my wildest dreams! Kristen from Kio Kreations captured what I wanted perfectly --- modern styling with a summery, garden feel, and flowers that just made everything POP! She was awesome enough to blog about us here, and I stole all these pictures from her! I'm guessing that some towards the end might be from our professional photographer, Kara, so consider this a sneak peek! I sure do!

My bouquet, including the locket Tom bought me for Christmas 5.5 years ago!

I love the pin detailing she did --- lovely, but simple enough not to detract from the flowers or the locket...

Boutonnieres --- I believe Tom's is on the right:

Words cannot say how much I love this picture!

Oh my gosh. Perfection. I just wished my legs would have been a bit more tan, haha.

Love it.

Pretty.

And, lest we forget it, the infamous brick:

Why I Love My Florist

This sounds like the great beginning of an essay, and maybe it should be.

I know I've extolled her virtues and talent before, here, here , here and here, but you've got to believe me -- she really is superbly talented.

And even though I have complete faith and trust in her, I can't say I'm not nervous that I won't actually see the flowers until I arrive at the ceremony on the wedding day. So yesterday, when she posted on her blog about a wedding she did this weekend where the colors were white and light blue and encompassed most of the flowers I'm using, I was so excited to see them!

Below are snapshots of the bridesmaids bouquets --- these are essentially what we'll be doing, but with some green hypericum berries and some blue/green hydrangeas thrown in...






Gorgeous, no?

Bouquets and photographs lovingly copied from Kio Kreations

Adventures in Wilder Park

The beauty of getting married 10 minutes from where I work is that I can steal away on my lunch hour to complete wedding-related tasks.

Yesterday, I met with my lovely florist, Kristen from Kio Kreations, to view the ceremony site in full bloom and decide if we need to add any more arrangements. We decided that we really need nothing besides petals, and a piece of fabric for the arch. I'll explain that once we hit the right photo...

The entrance to the park, with the ceremony tent peeking out:



This looks like the same shot, but I really just walked to the other side of the garden (so the tent is at my back, and took a picture of the entrance.

The tent! Straight ahead is where we'll be standing, with chairs filling up the grassy area...

This is where we'll be standing in less than 8 weeks!

The black arch you see has been primed for clematis growth, but it doesn't look like it will fill up completely in time for the wedding, so we're going to secure green sheer fabric (that will match the sashes on the chairs) and stretch that across the top of the arch. It won't be draped, as Kristen thinks that will take away from the simplicity of the garden itself.

There will be large amounts of petals, however. They will line the aisle, outline the circle, and then fill it to create the "pillow carpet" that I had talked about previously.

Magic, I tell ya.

Oh, and the flowers planted behind the "altar" are white lilies, and there's a very good chance that they'll be in bloom just in time for the ceremony!

We'll just have to wait and see!

I absolutely LOVE this space!! Now, if only I can figure out the processional...

I'm Running Out of Topics...

So while this really is a trivial detail, I thought I'd share anyway.

Below are photographs from our florist's wedding (actually photographed by our photographer, Kara!)

Kristen, our florist, did all the flowers for her own wedding. This is the card holder she'll be providing for our wedding (using the same flowers as my bouquet, of course!):



Hard to see? Sorry. It's a HUGE vase (I think almost 3 feet tall), with a floral rim on the top. It's pretty, it's secure, and it's pretty obvious in person what it is.

(All photographs from Kristen's portfolio)

PS - According to the USPS tracking, my ring should arrive today, Tom's tomorrow, and our ties on Monday. Hopefully I'll be able to do a BIG, GIANT recap on Monday or Tuesday complete with photographs of everything! :)

Alternative Color Schemes

Choosing our color scheme was actually pretty easy, as we went with process of elimination. As our motto/theme was to make it as personal as possible, I wanted to avoid colors that had already been used by my sisters (goodbye purple and yellow!). As much as I would have loved to do light pink/black/gray, Tom really didn't want pink. I wasn't really drawn to orange or red for a summer wedding, either. One of Tom's favorite colors is blue, and since I really didn't have a preference, I decided to go with that. Once I saw this picture, the colors really came to life and the decision was final:



Pool blue/apple green. Awesome.


However, if we were to have an infinite number of weddings that I could design/arrange differently every time, you best believe that color would be the first thing I'd play with.

I love this scheme of pinks, oranges, yellows, browns, apricots, greens and blushes:



It would look great with a spring/summer wedding, but would also translate nicely in autumn...


One scheme that I've found recently has become my ultra favorite: Dove gray, marigold yellow and crisp white. How fantastic would some classic Jackie-O type gray dresses with some bright yellow flowers look? Again, this could be used in any season, and could look super amazing in the winter!



What other colors do you love? If you had a second chance, what colors would you use?

I'm Back! (Sorta!)

So I know I said I was taking a quick break, and I still am, sorta. Instead of taking a complete hiatus, I'll just layoff talking about some of our specific details/arrangements until everything is a bit more refocused.

Enough about that --- on to the pretty things!

How sweet is this??


(via StyleMePretty)

Plus, if you removed the ribbon, you could always use those as centerpieces at the reception. This way, you won't have to sacrifice fresh flowers for the sake of the budget! :)

Apologies...

...for my lack of posting, lately.

Between the upcoming holidays, regular bills, and the demand for wedding deposits, our wallet has been stretched pretty thin, which always leads me to feel uninspired.

However, I think a brief recap may help to remind me of all the "good" that has been accomplished lately.

• Still in talks with the caterers. There are 2 definite possibilities for the cocktail reception, and 1 definite possibility for a sit-down affair.
• Met with a florist on Monday. Got a great quote for everything I wanted, proving that small budgets don't necessarily mean giving up what you want.
• Will be meeting with a "linen specialist" soon. She's quoting us 60% less than the caterer. Talk about a markup!
• Both the comb and my earrings arrived. I pulled my trusty dress out of storage (hiding under my bed!), and held them up. They both match perfect and I'm super excited that I bought them.
• On a whim, bought paper to line the envelopes for the invites. It's a small touch that will probably mean a great deal of work, but I don't mind doing it! :) Plus, I got all the paper I need for $2.75. Total spent on invitations so far = $35.00. All I need now is the paper for the programs and I'm done...
• We've almost finished our Christmas shopping, with the exception of one grab-bag for Tom and our parents. I just bought Tom an AWESOME gift, and I'm bursting to tell him. :( I can't wait to post some pictures of his gift after Christmas!!! :)

The DIY Crazy-Train

So in my fairly naive state, I believe that I'll have time to make the centerpieces for the reception. Why not, right?? If we keep them fairly simple, there shouldn't be too much work involved...

These are a few inspirations:

Don't you just love those yellow ones??? The bride actually did all of those herself. No, really!

I'm thinking small-ish, 4x4" square, low vases, with the banana leaf wrap inside the vase (like the ones above) filled with fluffy white hydrangeas and some green hypericum berries, so they mimic the bouquets. If we go with blue table linens, then we have the entire scheme all wrapped up. :)

Plus, I'm thinking these could be fairly cost-effective, as hydrangea stems are usually around $3.50/stem, and we'd only need 2 per arrangement. The filler would obviously be low cost as well, and with Hobby Lobby/Jo-Ann/Michael's selling vases for under $4, these will definitely help us stay within budget.

know some of you are probably thinking, "Why not just do candles?" Well, if the reception begins before 3:00 pm, and ending before 8:00 pm, there's really no need. The room is almost ALL windows, negating the "glow" that candles would give off.

Any spectacular centerpiece thoughts out there??

As Promised - Bouquet Pictures

#1: Bright, fresh & bold



#2: Subtle yet striking



#3: A hybrid of both

Putting the Cart Before the Horse: A Discussion of Flowers, Invites, Themes & Colors

So it's fairly obvious that I'm on wedding overload right now...My thoughts are swimming with flowers, cakes, invitations, photographs, tents and more right now. The good news is that we (I) have a basic plan/theme in my head, which should make bargain shopping that much easier! :)

Based on the location (Lake Katherine), our (my) initial thoughts are to stick with a floral/garden theme without looking like Better Homes & Gardens visited. I'm not really a floral/garden type of girl, so this should be fairly interesting. I should also point out that I'm going to shoot for classic/preppy/contemporary all at the same time, lest it veer towards the "old bedspread in a cheap motel" look.

With that in mind, here are some of my initial thoughts for the following:

Invites: I'm all about keeping this simple & organic (can't you tell by my penchant to make everything difficult?!?). These invites are done by a freelance graphic designer in MN, and are fairly straightfoward...The colors would be similar to the "Cyan" and "Leaf" in the color chart...

Flowers: There are actually three links in this, as I can't figure out what I'm leaning towards. One is a very clean, modern bouquet of bright blue hydrangeas and green berries, while the other is more of a dusty blue hydrangea that still has the specks of green. One is bright and fresh, Two is soft and romantic. Then there's this lovely hybrid of both, which seems fresh but subtle. Ugh, the choices are seriously endless. The even scarier part of this whole mess is that this is only the bridal bouquet...there's still bridesmaid bouquets, boutonnieres, corsages, altar arrangements, and centerpieces to consider.

So I don't think I stated it outright, but our "color palette" will be an apple green and a pool blue. Now I don't want these colors to permeate, just like the garden theme, I merely want this all to have a common chord. For instance, while you might see the table linens being that color, I promise that I won't serve "blue" cheese on the green salad, or anything crazy of that nature. I personally think that's a bit irritating and over-kill, and am aiming for something subtle and tasteful, yet bold.

Question for the day: Can something be subtle and bold at the same time, or have I just been looking at waaay too many color swatches today?