Toilet Paper Rolls: A Must Have For Any Wedding

When I first told my FI that I wanted to some of the elements for our wedding to be DIY to add a personal touch and save some money, he agreed... and actually thought it would be a great idea. What I don't think that he realized, was that my neurosis would kick in to high gear or that I would be so very scavenger-like in my attempt to do these projects. Exhibit A: saving our TP rolls. I got this idea from Weddingbee bride Mrs. Strawberry to use TP rolls for ecofetti or lavender buds.

(The ones on the left were the actual ones the Strawberries used the day of and the ones on the right were prototypes)

She had a couple posts where she talks about using ecofetti and also had a post about how the entire thing panned out. And I must say, it turns out quite lovely. So, with nothing better to do on New Year's Eve we invited over a couple of friends and fashioned up a couple of our own prototype tp ecofetti rolls, with rather successful results.




Here we have my lovely bridesmaid JT being all crafty. We did a couple different paper and ribbon combos, and tried out a couple different lengths. I would definitely recommend wrapping paper or scrapbook paper over the tissue paper, it can be a bit pricier but the results are so much nicer. Our favorites were definitely the Martha Stewart wrapping paper that we found on clearance at Michael's for $1 a roll, which saved me some serious ca$hmoney. Here are the end results of our collective craftiness. I think we definitely prefer the longer ones, they look a bit better, but the short ones are adorable too.

Sparkly Details

Now that I have shoes for the wedding day, I want to find some equally fabulous jewelry to go with them. Initially, I planned on wearing the pearl necklace and earrings FI bought for my birthday a few years ago, from a boutique out in Las Vegas called Agatha, which is a jewelry boutique originally based in France. Needless to say, I love that set, its simple classic and understated... kind of like my dress, which has a lace applique across the bust and bodice. So I began to wonder, since my dress has more of an understated look should I amp up the jewelry?

I first had other ideas when I came across Knottie Mrs Reem Avenue's profile, and she was wearing this absolutely beautiful bracelet. All of her jewelry was gorgeous, but this bracelet in particular struck my fancy.

My initial impression was: gorgeous but a bit big for my style and personality. Then I come to find out via the most popular Wedding websites, that its a Haute Bride bracelet, and not just a Haute Bride Bracelet, but pretty much infamous and highly coveted. Oh. I had no clue! So I started searching for something similar, but not as big or pricey. I was pretty smitten with the Haute Bride line of jewerly. There weren't any local boutiques in my area (slim pickings here in the midwest sometimes) and found a couple different online sites that carry their jewelry.

The first one I stumbled across was Perfect Details. They carry several different lines of designer jewelry, Haute Bride among them. And I found these lovely earrings and bracelet. I love that the bracelet is as beautiful as the bracelet with 5 strings of pearls, but smaller and less expensive. Which definitely fits my personality AND my budget. And although both pieces are a bit more sparkly than I would typically wear, if there were one day to go all out, wouldn't my wedding day be it?

These same pieces and others are also available at the online boutique Leftbank Jewelry, as well as other Haute Bride pieces. The Perfect Details website offers returns on their pieces that aren't custom made, and Leftbank Jewelry offers a return policy on their items as well.

Such Great Heights

My FI is a (sort of) genetic miracle. His mother is maybe 5', as is everyone else on her side of the family, and I'll give his dad the benefit of the doubt and say he's 5'8 but is the tallest by several inches on that side. So I guess its pretty a-mazing that FI is 5'9 or 5'10. I'm about 5'6, and have never had a problem with the somewhat slim height difference, even when I wear heels. But then once we got engaged, I started wondering should I try to preserve those precious 3 inches?



During the first part of our engagement, I became convinced that I wanted to be shorter, and did some low to mid-heel sleuthing. But I began to realize that I prefer a taller heel, all of the shoes I remotely liked (with a few exceptions), were clocking in at 3 inches or so. The first pair that I really adored, were the Kenneth Cole Rich n' Post shoes, I rather fancy the champagne and silver satin ones.
















I really liked these shoes, and was rather partial to the bow on the side, but I wanted something a little more sparkly, but not glittery everywhere. So I thought I might buy some sort of brooch or earring set and affix them to the shoes, something like these earrings from White Aisle

Then, I fell in love, as I am prone to do, which solidified my decision to wear higher heels. And these babies will kick me up about 3 inches, and I'm totally fine with that, because they are gawrgeous!





Please excuse the inordinately large picture of the shoes. Its just because I love them. They're from J.Crew, which isn't much of a surprise, as I tend to be pretty smitten with most of their things, but these I really love. When looking at other shoes, I was somewhat non-committal, they looked nice but if I'm going to have a dress that is "the one" then I want to have the same for my fab footwear. I simply adore the bow and open toe, and like that they have a little extra sparkle without looking as though I went on a Bedazzler frenzy. The added bonus is that I would definitely wear these shoes loooong after the wedding. The one caveat? They're a bit pricier than I anticipated for wedding shoes, but I'm sure I'll talk myself into buying them within the next week.

BEE my LOVEBUG

Valentine's Day is just around the corner, and although the FI and I aren't prone to massive celebrations on this day, I just recently discovered this adorable gourmet & artisan chocolates called John & Kira's. They have the most precious chocolates in the shape of bees and ladybugs.

Pretty cute, no? The bee chocolates are filled with caramel and the lady/love bugs are filled with a dark chocolate ganache, um drool. I've decided for Valentine's Day to get FI a box of chocolates (but let's face it its as much for me as it is for him!). I bought the "Bee Hive Tower", which includes the yummy caramel-filled bees, as well as a 15 piece set of their every flavor box. What's additionally lovely about snacking on these delectable treats, is that the only thing you have to feel guilty about is the calories! Most of their flavor chocolates come from some sort of socially responsible background. The mint for the mint chocolate is grown by elementary and highschool age kids in Philadelphia as part of a nutrition program, the Strawberries & Raspberries are from a small family-owned farm, and their chocolate with coffee beans is bought through a fair trade program.

Not only do they have adorable, tasty and socially responsible chocolates, but they also sell them as favors! You can order favors in 2 or 4 piece sets, that are individually wrapped and tied with a bow (how cute!). I think they're adorable, but a bit out of our price range for favors, but still, it never hurts to look.

You Wish You Were My Bridesmaid!

I have a profound admiration for bridesmaids, all of them really. It takes a true blue friend to be a bridesmaid. Its easy to be happy for someone when they tell you they're getting married, but its an entirely different thing to get sucked into the bride's world of planning. Its also an expensive thing to boot. You figure with attire, a shower gift, a bachelorette party gift a wedding gift, and all the travel expenses for any or all of these things can equal some serious ca$hmoney.

I not only have a profound admiration for MY bridesmaids, but a whole lotta love. That's why I'm going to try them as much as I can, and here are some of the things that I'd like to do for my lovely ladies.


I've always liked the idea of giving gifts in a tote bag, and was going to get the uber-popular L.L. Bean tote bags, when I spotted these trendy little bags at Old Navy.


But now that I've gotten them these lovely bags, I have to fill them with something. I decided that I would fill them with a few different things, but try to stay reasonable with the amount that I spent. I previously posted about the brooches the girls will be wearing the day of, but here are a couple of them again, they're all from the fabulous online store White Aisle which has lots of amazing wedding things from invites to jewelry to socially conscious sashes. I love that all of the brooches are similarly made of pearls and crystals, but each have their own distinctive look. This way all of my girls have a slightly different detail to this accessory.














The next gift for my girls is probably my favorite. I was feeding my daily Weddingbee addiction last week, when I came across Miss Hydrangea's post on these lovely bouquet crosses from Room Service Home. I thought these were both beautiful and incredibly meaningful gifts.



This first set, is from 2007 and represents Faith, Hope, and Love. The set below represent Purity, Strength, and Beauty. There is one of each that perfectly represents each bridesmaid, and I was thinking of getting these and attaching a little note that says what their own cross represents, and why I chose it for them.



When I first thought about gifts for the girls, I decided that flip flops were a must. They're not much, but will be much appreciated after a day of 3 inch heels. So I bought 6 pairs of shimmery white flip flops from Old Navy. I'll probably tie a green bow on them (of course, they have to match!) and a little note. Something little that I'd also like to include are these button soaps and sachets from White Aisle that are, well cute as a button!

Marooned

So. Sad.

Over the holidays, I stopped by our Country Club reception site with FI and FILs, and since we'd last been in the summer, they've redone the carpet. Before, it was a medium shade of gray, there probably couldn't be anything less offensive. It had a bit of green shade to it as well, which again, not so offensive as our wedding colors are predominantly shades of green. But alas, that's all changed now. The new carpet color? Maroon. Maybe Burgundy. I'm not really sure what you'd specifically call the color, all I know is that it is DEFINITELY not in keeping with our wedding colors. How dare they, right? (totally kidding, although it is a bit disheartening)

This is the bar area before, its still a very beautiful space, and the large windows, and high ceilings will help take some of the attention off the carpeting. In all honestly, I'm actually not really too upset, I prefer to think of it more as a challenge. People don't really look at the floor anyways, and I'm trying to think of more creative ways to decorate the space so that it draws the eye upward.

The first thing I've come up with is the tried and true canopy that the Club already offers . But I definitely want to have a little more decoration on and around it. So, I plan on employing another of the most popular wedding trends, the played out but oh so adorable paper lanterns. The pictures above are from The Knot, but I think there are a few too, ok, way too many paper lanterns for my taste in the picture on the right. But still, I'm rather fond of how they make any space seem playful, and will definitely draw attention away from the floor.

I'm thinking of getting a few flower balls made to put up with the lanterns, kind of like the pomanders that flower girls carry, only these would be bigger, like Flower Girl Pomanders on 'roids. Or, I have a growing fondness for the Martha Stewart Paper Pom Poms. I like the mixture of paper poms, lanterns and flowers, and that they're all varying shapes and textures, but still spherical.

Out of City, Out of Mind?

I love love love getting mail. There's nothing more exciting than that feeling I get when I open my mailbox and letters, magazines, postcards, and yes, even junk mail come tumbling out. Its the highlight of my day, because someone, somewhere cares (even if it is a salesman trying to sell me something I don't want today).

But, today I got something in the mail that made my heart skip a beat, it was a fabulous little post card for the Veils & Cocktails event on January 30th held by Fabulous-Bridal Boutique, The Madison & Cincinnati Wedding. But, le sigh... I live over 3 hours away, which is a bit much for a Wednesday. Not that there aren't bridal shows in my area, but they're normally at the same place and have no illusions of grandeur... and there are only so many vendors that are really helpful up here since I'm having my wedding so far away.

I suppose for now I'll just have to live vicariously through the posts of brides like Miss Penguin and Miss Cherry Blossom on the Weddingbee, since I can't make it home for something a little bit swanky. So, I'll leave you with some pics of the lovely things I will be missing in a few weeks...

(all images courtesy of Fabulous-Bridal)