inspiration strikes again

First off - I hope you all had a nice weekend! Wedding wise, mine was pretty successful - I've got tons to share this week.

I'm sure you've all probably experienced finding inspiration when you least expect it. Something really great popped out at me in the entrance to Hobby Lobby this weekend. I was there with my mom and she stopped to peruse the craft, hobby and DIY books at the entrance to the store. Books that I would just pass on by. But we were already standing there, so I started browsing and I found the PERFECT option for our flower girl basket. On Friday, I told our florist that we could use whatever he had available. It certainly wasn't something in the forefront of the crafting/DIY section of my mind. Seriously, though. This was too good, and too easy, to pass up.

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A flower girl basket made out of a crocheted lace doily! All you do is take a doily, drench it in fabric stiffener and shape it over the bottom of a bowl. Add a ribbon handle and fill with flower petals and Voila! I bought a cheap-o test doily and some fabric stiffener at Jo-Ann's. If my test is successful then I'll move on to use one of the nice doilies I have. So excited.

Where are some of the places you found inspiration when you weren't expecting it?

a-tisket, a-tasket...

a green and yellow basket (please tell me I'm not the only one who remembers this nursery rhyme)

After some thought, I decided to go with a basket and flower petals for our flower girl instead of the bouquet I made a few weeks ago. After scouring the aisles at Michael's, I purchased this gold basket at 50% off - score! I already had a few cans of white spray paint lying around, so it was a pretty quick fix.



And with the addition of some pretty ribbon and flower petals, my project was complete.



I hope she likes it and has fun "practicing" with her little brother for the big day! When I was little I always wanted to be a flower girl and would have loved receiving something like this. What about you?

and some flowers for our flower girl

Meet M, my soon-to-be niece and big sister to E:


Like I did for E, I purchased M a book - The Little Flower Girl:

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And made her something she can practice with, too:


As much as I LOVE this bouquet, I have a few issues.

1. I'm a bit nervous about it's kid friendly-ness. The flowers are attached to floral wire, which could come loose and poke out if the bouquet takes a beating. Also, the floral tape I wrapped the wires with is extremely sticky. Unless you only touch the bouquet where the hankie is, it will get allll over your hands.

2. Sorry, this reason is purely selfish. This bouquet took so much more time and energy (and needle pokes in my fingers) than I anticipated, whereas the ring bearer pillow was a 10 minute job. Is it wrong that I would rather keep this one for myself (perhaps to use as a rehearsal bouquet) and make something else for M?

Right now, I'm leaning towards making a new bouquet (using my glue gun instead of a needle and thread) with the easier to make mums (the pink pom pom flowers) attached to either wooden dowels/skewers or green pipe cleaners. Or I could just make, or buy, some fake flower petals and put them into a little basket. My mom made a good point that petals might be more fun for M anyway because she could practice scattering them "down the aisle".

What are your thoughts? Should I just give her the bouquet I already made or make something more kid-friendly?

a pillow for our ring bearer

I don't think I have introduced you all to our ring bearer yet.

Meet E, the future mister's nephew:




Adorable. Don't you just want to pinch those cheeks?

Anyway, since we've had a super long engagement, we haven't yet officially asked E or his sister, M, to be in our wedding party. But we're now past the six month mark (!) and will be seeing them for Christmas. The future mister and I have set quite the precedent with asking the rest of our wedding party, so I thought it only appropriate to put on my creative thinking cap and come up with something cute for the little ones, too.

For E, I purchased The Best Ever Ring Bearer book:


And this weekend, I made him something he can practice with:


For the pillow, I used my hot glue gun to adhere two pieces of felt, left a little opening so I could stuff some polyfill inside, and glued on some felt leaves, a flower, and a piece of twine. I think I might check at Michael's or the Dollar Store to see if they have some plastic rings to complete the look.

Did you do anything special for the little ones in your wedding party?

forever young - him

You've already seen my baby photos, so now it's time for the future mister's. It's one thing to look through your own pictures and reminisce and a different experience altogether to look at someone else's photos and listen to their stories.

Way back when, while we were still in undergrad and our relationship was brand new, the future mister and I were studying at his apartment when he handed me a three ring binder and told me I could read it. It contained page after page of his childhood stories, written lovingly by his father. Some were touching, most were funny and I was incredibly honored to be given that glimpse into his past. Also, I took that as my sign that things were getting serious, because you wouldn't let just anyone read something so personal!

This past winter, while we were going through his photographs, I experienced similar feelings - a visual glimpse to corresponded with the stories I read a few years before.









Adorable! Do you remember the first time you saw childhood photos of your significant other? How did it make you feel?

forever young - her

One of the other projects I've been working on recently is our growing up slideshow. Since I have a background in communications and digital media, I have elected to doing it myself. In the winter the future mister and I started collecting photographs from our families and this summer, during a particularly slow wedding planning month, I got started by scanning in a bunch of photos. My mom also helped out with her scanner at home and recently sent me another batch.

Maybe it's just me, but I really enjoy looking at other people's baby photos. So here are a few of mine:

newborn

1 year

3 years

4 or 5 - my brother and I ate breakfast in this chair together every morning

first day of kindergarten with my Barbie lunch box

my favorite color was pink

7 years - anyone remember the game Pretty, Pretty Princess??

8 years - visiting grammy and pop pop

10 years - boys will be boys

I'll stop here since the awkward pre-teen/teenage years don't need to be posted to the interwebs.

Honestly, though, I could immerse myself in old photographs for days on end. I love revisiting old vacations, milestones, events and emotions. And I've found it very difficult to narrow them all down! As you can see, these are mostly photos of me and my brother. For our actual slideshow, I've been trying to include photos of me with the various members of my immediate and extended family and friends. I think it's more fun for the viewers when they have a connection to the photographs.

Those of you who have done slideshows, did you enjoy the process? Did you find it difficult to pick your favorites?

Next time, I'll show you a few of the future mister.

the great kid debate

To have kids (at the wedding) or not to have kids? I'm not sure about other couples, but this has been one of our biggest debates during wedding planning so far.

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I LOVE children. I have been babysitting since I was 13, worked in various day cares, volunteered at the boys and girls club, and minored in Human Services in college. Despite this fact, I don't want children at my wedding (except for the ring bearer and flower girl). My reasoning is that we have a fairly limited guest list - 150 max. When you take into account that our extended families are on the large side, the numbers add up pretty quickly. In my opinion, having children at our wedding would take invites away from many adult friends and family members that I really want there to share in our love and marriage. Now I do remember attending a wedding when I was maybe 8 and I had so much fun! But there were less than 10 children there. Our number is closer to 50 or 60. Of course I know that not all parents would choose to bring their kids, but I don't want to take my chances.

Well, at the moment we are in the midst of working on the guest list. Although we had cleared the no kids issue with both of our parents months ago, concerns are being raised. What do you do if a person you really want to come to the wedding more than likely won't come if their child(ren) can't come as well? Do you make exceptions? My thoughts are no because if you make exceptions for one person you have to make them for everyone or risk upsetting/offending people.

While trying to come up with a solution, I came across a website for an event babysitting agency. They will send 3 or more CPR certified sitters to your event or even off site at a hotel. Now it is not in the budget for us to fork over the money for group sitters. However, this agency will also set parents up with individual sitters that will stay with their child in their hotel room.

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Do you think that this would be considered more of a meet in the middle? Or should I try to rearrange our budget to hire group sitters? Where do you stand on the great kid debate? Any thoughts, suggestions?