Including Mr and Mrs Chair Decorations

Mr and Mrs Chair Decorations

While preparing the aesthetic for your wedding reception, think about adding a set of tasteful Mr and Mrs chair decorations. Mr and Mrs chair decorations are sashes or signs that attach to the back of your chair during the reception. The signs can be homemade, but you should be extra careful to integrate them seamlessly into your day; you don’t want them to look out of place!

Mr and Mrs chair decorations make for wonderful photo opportunities, and depending on your seating chart, can make it easier for guests to orient themselves in your reception space. Use Mr and Mrs chair decorations during the reception for a fun and festive addition that guests will be sure to appreciate and enjoy.

After the reception, Mr and Mrs chair decorations look wonderful on your honeymoon vehicle (substitute a “just married” sign for re-appropriated Mr and Mrs chair decorations!). Before the wedding, Mr and Mrs chair decorations are fun additions to your bridal shower or bachelorette party (just the “Mrs” sign, of course!), and make wonderful decorations before and after the big day. When you’re setting up the reception space, just make sure you don’t forget the Mr and Mrs chair decorations!

Bridal Hair Pins for the Formal and Casual

Bridal Hair Pins

For the bride looking to adorn her do without all the fancy white fluff of a veil or tiara, bridal hair pins might just be you. Usually more casual than their beaded and bedazzled cousins (but not necessarily!), bridal hair pins are an excellent opportunity to accent your stellar look on your big day. Bridal hair pins come in all shapes and sizes, and you’re almost guaranteed to find one that fits your unique look.

So what can you expect from bridal hair pins? Often adorned with feathers, fabric, tulle, and/or flowers, bridal hair pins are a colorful and fun way to wear something in your hair without needing a separate truck for your look. Bridal hair pins are simple and emphatic, and they’ll fit right in in a church, a backyard, a beach, of even at events before and after your wedding.

Consider bridal hair pins that fit your style and/or your bridal colors. With sets of bridal hair pins, think about selecting matching pieces for your maids and a more ornate piece for yourself (imagine four white fabric flowers in the hair of your maids and an identical one in your do, plus a peacock feather accent!).  Bridal hair pins are a simple, colorful way to add to your look without subtracting from your budget.

Wedding favors are a great way to thank your guests for their attendance, though finding something that hasn’t graced a thousand other rented lavender table linens can be tough. What sort of wedding favors will guests actually USE after the reception, and what can you guarantee won’t be tossed into a drawer and forgotten about after the drive home? If you’re going to shell out a few extra hundred bucks on something special for your guests, how can you be sure it’s something they’ll enjoy? Here are a few ways to create memorable wedding favors for your guests:

Edible Favors
This doesn’t just mean another bag of bulk chocolate peanuts – try something a little different for your reception. Did you and your fiancé split a bag of Hershey’s Kisses on your first date? Fill an elegant paper bag with these romantic sweeties and be sure to print up an explanation for their existence on the side. Your guests will love the sentiment, and who doesn’t love Kisses?
This is also a great option if you want to make something special for your guests. Many couples choose to jar their own homemade jam or package mom’s winning chocolate chip cookies. Mix delicious with meaningful for favors that will whet your guests’ appetites.

Useful Favors
It’s not that symbolic wedding favors are terrible  – it’s just that you might be left with ten or twenty unclaimed boxes from couples who can’t bring themselves to shelve another knick knack. Instead of landing your guests with something they’ll have to keep on their mantle, try something new – something useful. Tea infusers, honey pot wands – they don’t have to match mini fridges or hedge trimmers in practicality, but they should be something that has a purpose other than “taking up space.”

Wacky Favors
These favors are great for events that are little more casual (or at least informal). Your guests don’t need to go home with gold wristwatches for your generosity to be appreciated, so think about doing something a little unexpected. This is a great time to hand out fun props on the dance floor, bubbles and sparklers for the big exit, or even water guns. Again, this is not something I would try to pull off in a grand painted ballroom, but might be better suited for a laid-back park reception. The pictures will be wonderful, and you can be sure that your guests won’t forget about your favors!

Wedding Signing Stones Guest Book

Wedding Signing Stones

Wedding guestbooks are becoming the new accessory to make your own in the wedding world. While traditional guestbooks are a wonderful way to record the well-wishes of your friends and family on your wedding day, creative alternatives are growing in popularity; take wedding signing stones. Wedding signing stones offer you and your guests a unique “guestbook” experience and offer several fun applications during the reception. Wedding signing stones are simply river rocks that come with a display vase for you to later incorporate into your home. Each guests receives one or more signing stones to write well-wishes on, and they are deposited in the display vase before the end of the evening.

Wedding signing stones can be distributed in a number of ways, such as placement on each guest’s place setting, distribution by ushers when they enter the reception space, or even with the escort cards at the front display table.

After guests write their sentiments on your wedding signing stones, the display options for your home are nearly endless. You can keep your wedding signing stones in their vase, decorate the vase with flowers or other projecting keepsakes, or even scatter them artfully on your mantle. Enjoy your wedding signing stones!

Wedding Shoes: a Pair for Every Reason

Wedding Shoes

A bride doesn’t just wear one pair of wedding shoes during her big day. After all, the big event is more of a marathon that requires something a little sturdier than a pair of heels to make it through. Wedding shoes for the day of your nuptials will range from a pair of special fuzzy embroidered slippers (because everything should be personal and beautiful on your wedding day), wedding flip flops (don’t ruin that pedicure!), wedding slip-ons (for the dance floor), and a good solid pair of honeymoon sandals. Your wedding shoes will carry you down the aisle and beyond, so be prepared!

First, some wedding shoes that will help you make it through the morning will be your slippers. Think about getting a few matching pairs for you and your maids so your “getting ready” pictures will look cute and unified. They’re also a great gift if you get them embroidered!

Your next pair of wedding shoes will be your flip flops. These wedding shoes are great for a beach shindig or just the trip from the salon to the car – again, these wedding shoes are also great gifts for your maids.

Slip-on wedding shoes can be shared with your wedding party or even your entire female guest list if you’re feeling generous. Slip-on wedding shoes that fit comfortably in a makeup bag will keep your tootsies comfortable all through the night.

Don’t forget your favorite pair of wedding shoes: honeymoon sandals! No beach vacation is complete without some bragging rights on your feet!

Bridal Party Shirts for Any Time

Bridal Party Shirts

Your bridal party will be together on several occasions as one unit before the big day: think bridal showers, rehearsal dinners, and any late nights where you’re frantically calling your maids to help you finish hot gluing ribbons to programs. Everyone will also be together on the morning of the wedding, primping and preening to look their best for your nuptials. A great way to get everyone a fantastic gift (and promote unity and a team-like attitude) is to spring for bridal party shirts! Bridal party shirts are a great gift for any part of the planning process: get them for the girls the day before the wedding so they can wear them during the morning, or hand them out when you first select your wedding party. Bridal party shirts work any time, and “transfers” make it easy to make any shirts bridal party shirts!

The great thing about bridal party shirts is that everyone will look like a team in candid photos – during the bachelorette party, the rehearsal dinner, or even under the hair dryer! Bridal party shirts aren’t just for the adults in the group, either. Most flower girls love feeling like they’re an important part of your day, and bridal party shirts will make them feel included. Don’t be surprised if you see your flower girl wearing bridal party shirts to school even after the wedding!

Sometimes a wedding can feel more like a mud marathon, especially with the weeks and months of pre-wedding parties to plan and attend. Sometimes these parties can be a weird etiquette gray-area, so how do you know who plans what? Who decides the guest list for the bridal shower? Who needs to be invited to the bachelorette party? Is it EVER okay to throw yourself an engagement party? If you’re lost, read on!

An Engagement Party
Who Will Host?: Typically, the engagement party is thrown by the parents of the couple, though no one is obligated to throw one. This isn’t one to plan for yourself; you really should wait for someone to volunteer.
Who Will Go?: An engagement party is often just family, though you should always be careful to try and invite only those who will be invited to the big event. The one hosting and funding the event is the one who decides the guest list, but you might want to be conservative in your recommendations if you’re asked.
Etiquette: An engagement party isn’t a very common pre-wedding shindig, so breaking etiquette isn’t a big concern. If you’re being thrown an engagement party before wedding plans have really started, you probably haven’t created a registry, so it’s unlikely that guests will ask for that info.

A Bridal Shower
Who Will Host?: It’s possible that several people will volunteer to throw you a bridal shower, but you should try to accept only one or two.
Who Will Go?: Again, this is an event where only people invited to the wedding should be invited. You aren’t obligated to invite every female guest to the shower (cramming 50 women into a kitchen is logistically difficult).
Etiquette: Thank you cards are customary for bridal showers, just be sure that you aren’t having guests fill out their own addresses on envelopes as they watch you open gifts. Take the time to thank each of your guests with a lovely card, as this is an event where gifts will likely be “showered” upon you.

A Bachelorette Party
Who Will Host?: This is usually one for your bridal party, though your Maid of Honor doesn’t have to take the lead. Usually the maids split the bill, but that isn’t a requirement.
Who Will Go?: Bachelorette parties are often much smaller than showers, and many brides like to keep them for quality time with the bridal party before the big day. Again, make sure that everyone invited will also be invited to the wedding!
Etiquette: Try to keep your focus on your own party instead of checking on your fiancé all night via text. This is supposed to be a night for you and your girls – enjoy it!

A Rehearsal Dinner
Who Will Host?: You and your fiancé do! The rehearsal dinner is your time to thank your wedding party for their participation in your wedding, and this is one event where the bride and groom usually foot the bill. Sometimes the parents will take the check, but don’t count on it – try to throw your own rehearsal dinner.
Who Will Go?: The people in your wedding party – that means ring bearers, those doing readings and prayers, the families, the bridesmaids – everybody.
Etiquette: No one is asking you to host a dinner at the fanciest restaurant in town; a backyard picnic is more than enough. This is your opportunity to gather everyone involved with your wedding together and thank them collectively. If you’ve prepared gifts (or some members of the wedding party want to give a speech, and there isn’t enough time during the reception), this is the perfect time.

Tell the World with Honeymoon Swimwear

Honeymoon Swimwear

Once the stress of planning a wedding is over, many brides can’t wait to kick their heels off and slip into something more comfortable for a week or two. A couple’s honeymoon is often their first chance to relax after the higgledy piggledy of the last few hectic months, and they’ll probably be slipping into their honeymoon swimwear as soon as possible.

Of course, not every couple will find honeymoon swimwear appropriate for their vacation needs (snow skiing usually calls for something a little sturdier), but honeymoon swimwear is some fun post-wedding apparel that any beach getaway calls for. So why indulge in some honeymoon swimwear?

Well, your wedding is often when you’ll look your best. You’ve probably spent months refining your body to its absolute peak – show it off with honeymoon swimwear! You might also want to show everyone poolside exactly why the two of you are so snug in the hot tub. You only get to be newlyweds on your honeymoon once, so honeymoon swimwear is a great way to show it off. Honeymoon swimwear is often emblazoned with “JUST MARRIED” or “BRIDE,” so you’re always a little more likely to get that Long Island on the house.

With so many reasons, what’s keeping you from strutting your stuff in some brand spankin’ new honeymoon swimwear?

The Memorial Candle: A Subtle Tribute

Memorial Candle

A wedding is a time of joy and celebration for a family, but those times can sometimes be marked by sadness at the loss of someone close. A bride and groom don’t want to undermine the happiness of the day with excessive grieving (after all, a wedding is a celebration of life and love), but remembering a lost friend or family member is often just as important. A memorial candle is a subtle tribute of remembrance that acknowledges and respects a loss without altering the celebrations of the day.

A memorial candle is easy to integrate into any of the day’s proceedings; it’s all about how the couple wishes to proceed. Often, the memorial candle will have a special place at the ceremony, either at the entrance to the ceremony space or at the altar. A memorial candle might also find a place of honor at the reception venue.

A memorial candle isn’t the only way a couple can give homage to a lost friend or family member – many choose to incorporate a memorial vase of the deceased’s favorite blooms or they might play a favorite song during the reception. Some even add the deceased’s name to the wedding program and may ask for a moment of silent prayer during the ceremony – in addition to a symbol such as the memorial candle. A memorial candle isn’t a necessity for respect and remembrance: those lost are always in our hearts during our times of great love and joy.

Wonderful Wedding Programs

Wedding Programs

Wedding programs are an important part of the wedding ceremony lineup, and how you decide to craft and distribute them can be just as important. Many brides choose to make their own wedding programs, and kits for wedding programs are always a safe and fun way to take the DIY route. So how should you make sure that your wedding programs are available to all of your guests? Are there any fun, unique ways to make and distribute wedding programs?

The short answer is “Yes.” Wedding programs in fan form are the most popular design for the quirky bride who wants to assure her guests’ comfort. These wedding programs often come in kits and are easy to assemble in use. Arrange a get-together evening with your maids a few nights before the wedding for a quick and easy assembly line that will have your wedding programs put together in no time. Any wedding programs that come in “kit” form are bound to be less expensive than a trip to the printers, and they’re often much more fun to assemble.

Now, in order to make sure all of your guests receive wedding programs, there are two sure-fire strategies: you can either have an usher hand them out at the entrance to your ceremony, or you can have them placed individually on guests’ chairs. For an outdoor ceremony, it might be wise to have something that weighs the wedding programs down to keep them from flying away, such as river rocks. If you don’t like that style but aren’t employing the use of ushers at your ceremony, you can always display your wedding programs in a decorative basket at the front. Make sure they’re nice and noticeable!