Wedding Planning on a Budget and With Lots of DIY Love!

Monday 23 January 2012

A Felt Flower Affair!

Looking back on it i am not quite sure what the driving force was behind wanting to make a felt bouquet. I had seen some previously that i had liked and I LOVE fresh flowers... It was a project that i took on the first month of being engaged, there is not too much to do at that point for a engaged woman who had been waiting 5 years to hear those magical words "will you marry me" In any case i took on the project wih full force and when i started i had no idea what i was getting myself into. Here's a few truths about sewing your own bouquet: you will get hand cramps, many of them! Your family will give you some strange looks when you break the news that you are breaking away from tradition. It will save you money if you shop smart and make good quality choices, but DIY does mean you will have to put much more work into it, and believe me you will! My bridal bouquet alone took me 6 months to make, and as for hours... i could not even take a guess at what i would have put into it. I would say a few days worth. Regardless of all that, my bouquet is magical! Its so me, and its been made with so much love, so much enjoyment went into being able to plan every detail of a very special item. 


This is My maid of Honor's Bouquet Jilian. My family might know that I actually have two Maid of Honors, one who will be attending the wedding and the other, Jilian's twin sister Maddison will be in Africa doing missionary work and will not be able to join us. Jilians Bouquet is a deep burgendy with hints of brown and gold tones. 
This is Amanda's Bouquet, she is Calvin's Older sister, Her bouquet is made up of bright and cheerful reds, a soft chocolate brown and tons of yellow accents. We wanted to re-create the full fall color spectrum through the flowers, to keep in mind our October 6th wedding date in the fall. 


This is Tina's Bouquet, she is Calvin's Twin sister who lives in Calgary! Her Bouquet is really fun, yellow ochre and bright sunny yellows. How can you not feel happy looking at this colorful mix! This bouquet to me is the fall time, i just love it. I added tons of Orange stitching and gems to this one!


This is Makenzi's Bouquet, she is Jilian and Maddison's younger sister. I knew that Maddi would not be home in time for the wedding i wasn't sure what to do. I wanted to honor her but not replace her, for she was impossible to replace! Jilian being the wonderful MOH that she is, recomended asking her younger sister to stand in maddi's honor. I was sold and now have a 5th wonderful woman joining me on my special day! Her Bouquet is the lightest one, full of pale creams and hints of pretty yellow. 


Of course last but not least is my own bouquet. Its just the way i wanted it to look. i had even taken it into the bridal shop to try on my dress with it to see if i liked the look and i was so happy! once the wedding is over i will try to post pictures of the dress/flower combo! So without furture adiue ....


Tada! My months of hard work open for the world to see! I used tons of crystals, buttons, felt and thread! The silver leaf you see there is the pendant i wore to Tina's wedding this past fall! I love that i get to carry a peice of her special day around with me on my special daty! I should add that the stems of each bouquet is wrapped with a creamy toned ivory ribbon. They assembled using floral wire which is quite hard so each one is wrapped first with some felt to make it comfortable for the girls to hold then double wrapped with ribbon. Over all i could not be happier and now the only challenge is keeping them dust free before the wedding comes. Always something right? All my love to you all! Cant wait to celebrate our marriage~! According to my countdown we have:

8 months, 12 days, 18 hours and 56 minutes until the wedding! :)

Sunday 13 November 2011

Doing something vintage...

Calvin and Myself have chosen to go with a vintage inspired wedding when it comes to the decorating of the hall. I find something so romantic about the soft colors, the warm touches and all the fabric. The reality of saving for a wedding, a honeymoon and a house all as the same time is that we cannot afford to do everything we might desire to do with our wedding. I am a firm believer of you can have what you want so long as you are flexible, keep an eye out and are not afraid to pull out the glue gun and get creative with some DIY. We have made choices on where to spend money on the wedding, things like photography, venue, our outfits. With other things we have chosen to be more frugal opting to do things ourselves; things such as invitations, decorations and transportation. I am more than happy to craft my way into the wedding of my dreams, and Calvin i think is happy because I am happy.

A few things on my crafting to do list are as follows:

cut and sew enough fabric triangle banners to hang on the ceiling of the venue to create a huge impact for very little cost. Fabric is what i already own, all i need to do is purchase some ribbon. Any family out there that feel like sewing 100's of triangles... i will reward you with baked goods!
  • Finding vintage pieces that will create the feel of the wedding. Things like an old birdcage (possibly spray painted a robins egg blue?) to house the cards at the wedding? Things like a typewriter and skeleton keys have already been found. 
  • Creating a fun vintage feeling photo booth, i will go into more detail with that at a later date. 
  • Sewing my bridesmaids bouquets.
  • And only a million other small projects! 
I am extreemly lucky to have a grafics designer as my maid of honor so many of the big ideas that i have in my head she is able to help me create in a way that i just could never make happen. 

I am also lucky to have a grandmother who is making the table runners happen, which after the wedding will be turned into a wedding quilt. Of course i will be writing about that giving more details but for now things will be kept hush hush... 
Tons of ideas running around in my head and hardly enough time or paper to contain them all. 

Thought i would add a photo from our engagement dinner we had a few weeks back. I love that man! 




An official Wedding Date! And Venue!

After months of trying to figure out the right venue and the right date we have come to a conclusion! 

October 6th, 2012! 

We could not be more pleased! Our wedding date is lovely and the venue is everything we could have asked for. We are having a fair sized wedding. 70 people have made it onto our guest list. There is something to be said about how real booking the venue and having a concrete date to tell people that makes the wedding date feel like its on its way to becoming an actual event! I am more excited now than i was even weeks ago when the dread of choosing a date and venue hung over me. I would like to share a sneak peak of what our wedding venue looks like. 





Wednesday 13 July 2011

Shoe string Budget ?

 When I got engaged there were many things that crossed my mind, but most importantly and perhaps the one thing i thought of most often was budget. Calvin and I are not strangers to talking about what we thought our wedding would looking like, so when we did get engaged we already knew what each other wanted. Something fun, with our closest family and friends, the words we spoke to one other that day would be more important than the decorations. Something in short that would not put us into debt, and allow us to take the dream honeymoon we had always wanted.

What we decided was most important is that we had a budget and stuck to it. We would save as much as we could, and we would not rely on family to help make our wedding come together. My mother told me when she got married her parents planned the whole reception, and paid for it as well. Times have changed and its now the responsibility of the Groom and Bride to Pay. Honestly, i think why not? We are the ones who are choosing to get married why should someone else pay for it? Should someone want to help us with wedding expenses we would greatly appreciate it but it would never be expected. We are lucky to have amazing family and friends already who are looking to help. My wonderful mother has told me she would like to buy my wedding dress, and our wedding invitations will be designed by my wonderful friend Jilian who is a graphics designer.

The reason we are on such a 'shoe string' budget for the wedding is because Calvin and I both feel as though we would rather spend our money on a dream honeymoon (neither of us have ever been on a hot holiday). While centerpeices may be beautiful, and mood lighting romantic, Flowers will add color and some may need a DJ. Calvin and myself would rather spend that money going snorkling, having dinner on the beach, maybe go ziplining?

When it boils down to it, save, save, save, right now and later you can go play, and we intend on going to play someplace hot!

Monday 13 June 2011

Through the Looking Glass: Felt Flower Bouquet Tutorial.

 I come from a long line of talented women, my mother made us Halloween costumes for years, and my grandmother is a master quilter. Who has dedicated a large majority of her life to knitting, quilting, sewing and a multitude of other artistic talents. I wanted to honor them in my own wedding by creating a bouquet out of felted flowers. it might not be for everyone but i enjoy sitting down at the end of the night and creating a single flower which will eventually end up in a bouquet i am estimating will be about 40 flowers.
 It is important to have a well stocked sewing basket before you start. Have a few different colors of felt so you can have some variety in what you are creating. Best part is it does not have to cost you lots of $, just cost you in some time. As my wedding is a year and a bit away Time is something i have lots of.
 Start with cutting your basic shapes, in this case three circles. Then choose some thread either in a similar color or choose something with contrast.
 Next: you will stitch the first layer of felt to the base of your 'flower" I am using a simple stitch, but you could get as creative as you would like.
 Next: stitch on your top layer of the flower, (this would be the red layer) and make sure they are of equal distance on each side.
 As you can see in this photo every second stitch on the tan layer i am stitching through the first and second layer to create a 'petal' look. You can see one side is unfinished and one is completed. Petals can be placed closer and farther apart but i have found that two stitches per petal makes for the nicest fold.
 To make your flowers all unique and special, especially to create an over all visually interesting bouquet collect some vintage buttons, some crystals, and other things to make your flowers shine. 
At this point i roughly have 15 flowers made, here is a sneak peak of some different designs. I think the best way to make a bouquet is to try some different methods and see which flowers work for you. My bouquet will be stritcly fall colors, tones or white, tan, brown, dark browns and black.

Where it all starts, the Proposal.

 I've Always thought the proposal set the tone for the marriage, its something so special to the couple and it's something so unique and personal that for every couple its always different. Before out engagement i had day dreamed about what that would look like and how he would propose and i can honestly say that when that moment happens, its so much more magical and special than any of the day dreams you could possibly imagine!
 Calvin (Above) And I met five years ago at a local coffee shop. We started off as friends and he even took me to my graduation. Our romance started off slowly and over the years it has grown in leaps and bounds. He is not only my love, but a true friend and someone who i admire.
 We decided that for our 5th year anniversary we would take a trip to Victoria British Columbia and Celebrate our lives together with some beach combing and together time. We found ourselves on Beacon Hill Park and should you ever visit Victoria i would make the effort to go there and walk the grounds, not only as they well maintained but they are incredibly beautiful!
 This is the Beach that Calvin Proposed on, Beacon Hill Park.
 On our beach walk we found ourselves some new friends, this little crab was hiding in the rocks and had i not been looking down we might have stepped on him!
 A beach tradition for Calvin and I, something that we have done for years out at the Sushwap is to build a rainbow out of colored rocks and make a wish on them, we then leave the rainbow for someone else to discover in hopes that it might brighten their day when the find it. We decided it was only fitting that we made one on our trip and as i was taking photos of our creation, i turned around and Calvin was down on one knee and asked me to marry him. When we day dream about something, for so long, reality is certainly better than any of those day dreams combined. For myself i could not have asked for a more personal and meaningful proposal.
 Not to Leave you hanging, because i know you will want to see it. This is my engagement ring, a blue sapphire ring, with diamonds around the stone and down the band. Ever since i was young i knew i wanted a sapphire, perhaps influenced by the great princess Diana, or maybe because i am just quirky like that. Calvin picked out the ring himself and i think he found an amazing ring that is everything i could have asked for!

"Sapphires have long been used in engagement rings because the sapphire symbolizes romantic love, truth and commitment. During the 12th century, the crusaders would present their wives with sapphire rings to test their fidelity because the sapphire's color was believed to fade when worn by an impure or unfaithful woman. Many members of the modern British royal family have received sapphire engagement rings, including the Queen Mother, Princess Anne and Lady Diana Spencer."

 We made some new friends along the way Above is a small crab we found at the beach and Below is a sweet little squirrel that ran up to me from across the park no doubt to get his photo taken and to say hello.