This past weekend was filled with love. laughing, and hard work. I'm still tired from the whirlwind, and the day of the shower I ended up going to sleep at 8 pm. Still, it was totally worth it to see how happy it made my cousin.
Here I am with the bride, Emily. She had actually gotten married the day before, so she was still beaming. I was lucky enough to be one of the 8 people who got to see her get married, and it was lovely. I was so happy that I was able to give her this shower.
But now to the party. The original plan was that they were getting married in September, and I was planning a shower for early summer. Which meant I was still in idea gathering mode when they called and told me they'd moved the wedding up to February. This was like a month ago. So I had to get going stat.
I already had an idea board made up, which helped with planning.
We didn't end up using a lot of these ideas (scrapped the purple entirely), but it served as a great starting point for the feeling we were going for.
In the end, I used a ton of Pinterest ideas, sourcing from online shops, and cruising the valentine's day section for most of our supplies. I think it turned out just perfect.
The table was set with a bunch of serveware we already had that fit the color scheme, fabric from Premier Prints (one of only three physical locations is in the town my grandma lives in, and they are super sweet), and small clusters of flowers in different types of glassware. We went with carnations, mums, and daisies to get te most color and impact for our dollar. The pinwheels and paper fans on the windows were purchased on clearance from
BHLDN. I also got a huge spool of baker's twine that we used all over the place.
The menu was tea sandwiches (chicken salad and cucumber dill), greek salad, olive dip, cheeseball, fruit salad, and vanilla cake with buttercream icing. We served the greek salad and the fruit salad in little candy cups with wooden cocktail forks.
We used bakeware and fabric to create height on the table.
I loved the flowers. Carnations are one of my favorites, and I love small, tight arrangements of just one flower. The mismatched containers were so charming!
You got a sneak peek above, but here's a better picture. We served fresh squeezed pink lemonade and tea in mason jars, with cute paper straws from
Shop Sweet Lulu. We also got the cups for the salads and some polka dotted balloons for the front porch from this site.
The bride's mom had purchased glass plates and some forks from a restaurant supply close out sale. They really came in handy. I arranged the forks in my enameled colander, and arranged polka dot napkins that came from Wal-Mart (pink) and World Market (red and orange).
We had a great time and were really thankful for all of our family who came out in the terrible rain. I loved seeing so much of my family that I only get to see once a year or so. And it was great meeting the groom's family and spending time with them. I think Emily had a great time, and she definitely got lots of great presents (me and Brett went in with my parents to get her a red Kitchenaid Stand mixer. She can't wait to use it!).
It was such a fun party to put together, even if it was so much work. I think that's really illustrated in the cake. Which took about 5 hours to put together, maybe more. But when we cute into it and revealed what was inside, it was definitely worth it. I may do a mix next time, though!
So cute, right?
