You're Invited!

You're invited to share in the Holy matrimony...

You're invited to share in the love of...

You're invited to witness the joining of two souls...

Man, it was tricky to get the wording right on the invites! We knew that we did not want the traditional spiel with our parents names but there were so many options. Once my ally, Pinterest proved to be overwhelming, so I returned to my old, faithful friend, Google. 

Our parents, while we love them dearly, are not in any way funding the wedding and so we figured it was not necessary for them to be on the invitation. The kids, on the other hand, are the centres of our universe and so they are the ones who feature on the invite. 

After reviewing a number of layouts and even online templates which created invitations using the information inputted, I opened PhotoShop and went for it. I already had my colours sorted,  so I had a good idea of where I wanted to head with it. I already had quite an assortment of fonts, so it was a matter of playing with layout and fonts until I was happy. This did not happen overnight. The invite file stayed open in PS for weeks, and each day I would have a tinker. Some days I would fuss and then undo all of my work. It was quite an organic process (said in my best hipster voice).

To maintain our privacy and to protect the innocent, I have taken some details out, but this is what our invites look like:

We also created an insert to inform our guests where they might like to stay locally, but that was it. No little RSVP cards, or wedding registry stuff, or cute rhyme about giving us money instead of a gift. Call, text, email, or write to us if you are coming or not.  

You may be thinking that there are some important bits missing from the invite, such as who the invite is actually for and what are people to wear? Well, if the invite has been sent to your household, everyone in that household is invited. Kids, babies, friend/partner, etc. What do you wear? Whatever you are comfortable in. For some people they love getting dressed up, so go to town, glam it up! But if jeans are more your thing, fill your boots! At the end of the day, we are stoked that you can make it, and if you choose to not attend, it is quite clearly going to be your loss and not ours.  

Quite chuffed with our creation, we took the invitations and inserts to Office Works (fist pumping that I have incorporated Office Works into the wedding yet again...), picked the textured paper, and had them printed. All up it worked out about $25 for the printing, $13 for the paper, $6 for the envelopes. Well, it was for 100 envelopes, so we will be using them for many years to come! 

You certainly do not need to be particularly creative to DIY invitations, and it is another fab way to save a butt load of dollars on your wedding. 

Oh yeah, and Warnie, an invite has been sent to you. We do hope to hear from you soon :) I am sure we can even arrange for a dirty pizza!  

If you are reading this and you are a social media buff, please feel free to tweet this blog post to Warnie (@ShaneWarne) and share among anyone else who may be interested. Pete would totally lose his shit if Warnie came, or even RSVP'd so any assistance in making this happen is greatly appreciated.  

Paper flowers and hand made bouquets

When I was fortunate enough to be witness at the marriage of one of my awesome friends, Mrs C, she had the most amazing bouquet. It was made from paper flowers which featured sheet music on them, as a nod to her love of music and many musical talents. 

As fate would have it, I caught her throw away bouquet at the wedding. What can I say, I am quite competitive when it comes to the bouquet toss :) 

Catch of the wedding day, well, other than Mrs C :) 

But other than the superstition that comes with catching the bouquet, I came away from the wedding with complete adoration of her bouquet and knew exactly what my bouquet would feature if I ever walked down the aisle again. 

With this in mind, I hit Etsy to find an appropriate bouquet, and while beautiful, they were asking more than what I was willing to pay. 

I was willing to spend the time to be able to create my own bouquet, but first I needed some good information or templates on making my own paper flowers. Here I found Pinterest to be the best source of information, tutorials and links. 

After I had a Bex and a lie down, being so overwhelmed with results, I firstly tried the paper flower tutorial on The Casual Craftlete  which was really easy, and I loved the modern, minimalistic look of them. But after determining the theme of the wedding, I decided I wanting something which mimicked a rose more, so experimented with the Capitol Romance tutorial, minus the water colour. 

To say I was thrilled with the results is an understatement. The only problem is that I need a LOT of flowers to make both my bouquet and the throw away bouquet. Of the many traditions we are snubbing at our wedding, the bouquet and bouquet toss are not two of them. 

I am using a combination of Wonder Woman comics and metallic paper from Office Works. The brads which feature in the middle of each flower is from Spotlight, so I am stoked to be able to incorporate two of my favourite stores into the construction of the flowers.  :) 

A sneak peek of my bouquet

Using the same method I have created The Flash's boutonniere, and will create these also for the Mini Moos using a yet to be determined comic or theme.

Don't get me wrong, it has not been particularly easy, nor at times enjoyable. But as I have had many months to do this, by making a few flowers each week, I have been able to create my bouquet and the throw away bouquet for approx $80 (AU) as opposed to spending approx $250 for my paper flower bouquet alone if I had purchased it from Etsy. 

As with all of my DIY stuff, I will keep it at this for now, but after the big day, I will be sure to post a STACK of pics so that you can see how it all worked out in the end. 

  

Shiny, Sparkly Things

I like shiny things. Things that shimmer and sparkle.  

I think it started with Miss Kim's magic mirror,  although it could be attributed to Dorothy's ruby red slippers. I loved the Wizard of Oz as a kid (although would cower when the Wicked Witch showed up) and would watch it often. Well, that and Grease, and Singing in the Rain. There is quite clearly a pattern there...   

Shiny, sparkly things are special. Shiny, sparkly things are magical. I would love to say that was just something I believed as a kid, but I admit, I still believe it. 

One thing I have discovered as a bride to be, is that there is such a thing as too much bling. By having too many shiny things, it makes them less special, less magical. So I have exercised extraordinary self control to actively limit the shiny things that adorn me on the big day. Don't get me wrong, there is bling...measured bling. 

One of the things I have been searching for is a hair comb so that there are sparkles in my hair. Being the tight wad that I am, I refuse to pay $85 for one, especially because they are not exactly what I am looking for. 

While we were on our recent family holiday, we visited a beautiful little town called Rutherglen. I know Rutherglen mostly because of Parker's Pies, as they are the most AMAZING pies (and cakes, and slices, and tarts). But it also has many antique stores. While meandering through an antique shop, I caught sight of some vintage brooches. While they were beautiful, at that point I really had no idea what I would do with them. 

So I hit up my old friend Pinterest and looked for some inspiration, and I found this:

Originally found on Pinterest, but attributed to weddingomania.com

These were lovely, but I really could not see how I could successfully blend this with my Wonder Woman themed bouquet. I searched ebay for vintage brooches, still needing some kind of sign of what to do with my vague concept. I found a bulk lot of vintage inspired brooches, $27 for 25 pieces, delivered. 

These will be used as part of the bouquet, used sparingly (remember, too much bling is not a good thing!) I have also selected 5 of these to create my hair piece. 

Don't worry, there will be pictures, just not yet. I cannot go spoiling the surprise for everyone! But I promise I will post copious photos after the big day :) 

  

Why should you have a 'second marriage' wedding for your first wedding?

The first time I got married, I was worried about making sure everyone else's needs and expectations were met. I am my parent's only daughter and so wanted to make sure they had the wedding experience they wanted. My mother in law to be had been excluded from her other son's wedding preparations, so I attempted to include her in decision making processes. 

I wore white, despite being almost 4 months pregnant. We got married in a church, as this was important to my parents. We had a formal meal, raft of speeches, first dance, bouquet toss, etc. It was a fun day, and I gladly allowed others to have the elements that were so important to them. 

This time around, 15 years later, it is all about what we want. We are fully funding the wedding, and as such, we are able to create our perfect day, for us. 

If I knew then, what I know now, I would have had a very different first wedding! 

The best thing about your wedding, is that it is the opportunity for you and your significant other to work together on a day that you will remember forever. You may wish to call on friends and family for their assistance and opinions, but at the end of the day, it is YOUR big day. If they have a different vision, let them follow that for THEIR big day. 

I have been so inspired by one of my closest and most amazing friends (you know who you are CC) ;) who had a beautiful wedding a few years back. Also her second marriage, her and her husband were able to capture the elements of a first wedding, paired with the simplicity and purpose of a second wedding. 

Reality TV programs such as Four Weddings, My Fair Wedding, even the blasted Kardashians set unrealistic expectations of what a wedding looks like. Pinterest and Etsy further fuel the hype of what your perfect wedding day must contain.  

Traditions, while lovely, are not for everyone. Some traditions can be symbolic and beautiful, while others bear a weight of expectation. 

This time, we are having a very short ceremony. Our celebrant is amazingly quirky and specialises in small, no fuss ceremonies. My fiance and I have agreed that we do not need lengthy vows, we tell each other and show each other every single day how much we love each other and for us, there is no need to publicly declare or detail this love. This ceremony will either be in the large foyer area of our venue, or on the large balcony (depending on the weather, and we can made this decision on the day). This decision has saved us both the expense of booking a venue for the ceremony, but also took the worry out of having to have a back up venue in the event of bad weather. 

I am wearing ivory. I did struggle with this in the very beginning but I am so happy with my dress, and my decision was more about looking fabulous than adhering to any kind of tradition. My boys will be walking me down the aisle. 

Sorry Dad, you have already had a go... 

We do not have a 'bridal party'. But rather two witnesses who get their name on the official certificate. If there were spaces for three, four, five, a dozen, we would have our nearest and dearest's names on there too :) 

There will not be a chair cover in sight. Nor chair sashes. The tables will be adorned with plain white tablecloths and glass jars, many of which have held the contents of past dinners (pasta and stiry fry sauces) or have been gathered from dollar shops or second hand stores. I will eventually get around to blogging about them too. 

There will no 'first dance'. My fiance does not like to dance and so we asked ourselves why should we put ourselves through something that we do not want to do, just because it is a tradition? 

Bonbonnieres. Nope! 

Bridal cars. Nope!

Open bar. Nope!

Long range weather forecast before locking in a date? Nope! I don't mind if it absolutely pisses down. It was a dreadful June day when we had our first date, so why should our wedding day be any different? 

It is incredible how many things I found myself doing at my first wedding, that really aren't important this time. Don't get me wrong, I still want to have an awesome wedding day, but I am really just stoked to be marrying The Flash :)    

I have just read in a bridal group on Facebook, about a bride to be (or b2b) who is looking to spend over $10,000 on a photographer and videographer. If you have the cash to spend, go for it. But I can tell you from experience, that a  $1000 photo package gets divided/ceremonially burnt in the same way as a $10,000 package does if the marriage does not work out.

And I guess that is the point that I am trying to make. Rather than starting your lives together with mountains of debt and expectation, marry the person you love, the way you want to. Every marriage is a half chance of going the distance, so why not focus your time and energy on your relationship in the long term, than on one day? 

Not so sensible shoes

When my family and I travelled to the USA a few years back, I purchased two pairs of Wonder Woman Cons. 

I had coveted them online prior to our trip, and was blown away by the difference in price between Australia and the US. So it would have been rude to only buy one pair, right? I have worn the other pair a few times but have kept the high tops in mint condition. 

After I said yes to my dress, I had to consider the shoes I would wear for the big day. I knew for sure that I did not want to tower over my groom and so mega high heels were out. Not to mention, I did not want to have to switch out a glamorous pair of heels for a more practical pair of pluggers for the evening's festivities. I am greatly anticipating dancing with my friends and family and would prefer to do this in comfort.   

I trawled ebay and etsy, looking for a cool pair of kitten heels. I found quite a few superhero themed shoes, but ranged in price from about $80 to over $200. Being the tight arse that I am, I could not justify spending this kind of money on shoes, no matter how awesome they were.  

However, I was inspired by the shoes on etsy. I had considered how I could recreate them myself, for cheaper. Then it hit. My mint condition Wonder Woman Cons! There are a nod to Wonder Woman, I already have them, they are flat and comfy! 

My decision has been met with mixed responses from my friends, but I figure they will not be seen under my dress and there is very little that is conventional about our big day, so why should my shoes be?