After seeing a very cool place name idea at the Confetti store in London, we bought the stuff needed to pull this off and relegated, nay, promoted, the regular name cards I had already made to escort card status!
We bought two kinds of boxes - a regular sized purple box and a smaller white box. The idea - stolen from Confetti (O_O) was to stack the white box on top of the purple box and tie them together with a printed name tag...
The boxes that we bought from Confetti were flat packed, but very easy to assemble - I sat there one evening folding and putting them altogether whilst watching the TV. Before I knew it I was done!
I looked back at my inspiration photo and didn't like the single ribbon holding the name tag - I thought they looked insecure like that, and if picked up would slip and slid apart. So I tied the ribbon as though I was tying up a parcel...
All secure!!
They looked fantastic all lined up together - no photo of the 80 I made I'm afraid, but here are 6...
Before assembling and tying together of boxes, I had a brainwave to fill the boxes with "something" to give them a bit of weight, and double up as [another] favour... the men wouldn't be left out this time!
So, in the bottom box I placed some scrunched up tissue paper and 2 purple foil covered chocolate hearts...
and in the smaller box, I put a pack of mini Love Heart sweets...
So two for the price of one - placenames and favours!
TTFN xx
I'm half Greek-Cypriot and as a child went to lots of Cypriot weddings. Every wedding that I went to, the ladies received a netted bag of 5 almonds. I knew when I grew up and got married that I would want these too. (Along with Greek wedding cake but more on that in another post.)
These favours, like I said are traditionally given to the women at the wedding as a thank you gift, and the 5 almonds inside represent Health, Wealth, Fertility, Happiness and Longlife.
Of course, it was another DIY project for me! But I was already a pro at making these, having made them for my son's baptism in 1999 and also for my friend's daughter's baptism in 2003. I loved making them then, and I was looking forward to making them for our wedding too!
Don't they look pretty? I love them, I love them even more so when they are placed in a cupcake stand...
They are so purple and fluffy!
They were easy to make once you get the hang of things and before I knew it, I had made 50!
To keep the almonds secure inside I bought favour bases from eBay. They are little trays designed to hold 5 almonds and have a stem in the centre for you to secure a decoration to if you so wish.
I also bought purple and lilac favour nets with a scalloped edge and I then found some white ribbon which said "Health, Wealth, Fertility, Longlife and Happiness" which was a great find!
Before I found that ribbon, I had made little circular inserts which I put at the bottom of each favour.
I bought the almonds from a local market and got to work.
I wish I had photos to show you the steps, but sadly I don't - I'll know for next time... （＾＿－）
Here's a step by step guide:
- Lay 1 net down and place the insert in the centre
- Put another 3 or 4 nets on top (the more nets you have the fluffier the favour)
- Place the favour tray on top of the insert
- Add the almonds
- Gather up the net around the tray - if you look at the net like a clock, I bring in from 12, 3, 6 and 9 and then pull the rest up
- Secure with a tiny elastic band
- Tie ribbon around the elastic band to hide it and trim to size
- Fluff each layer of net out one by one (it's so satisfying to see them fluff out and take shape!)
- Finally add a decoration into the centre stem if you so wish - I added a stem of white flowers.
I can't wait to hand these out at our reception!
TTFN xx
Designing the post box for cards received at our wedding reception has been a nightmare for me. I've had no inspiration whatsoever. I've attempted this project so many times without success, but today I finally cracked it.
I will say no more than that, as it's been the bane of my [DIY for the wedding] life!
TTFN xx
The deadline for our day guests was the 5th June... it came and went with only 8 people (a whole family) needing chasing up - as it turns out none of them can come as they're all on holiday... the evening deadline is 5th July - we're still waiting on about half the RSVPs for that.
So, we've got 64 coming to the ceremony and wedding breakfast, which is just perfect - the ceremony room holds 65 seated, so we couldn't have asked for more!
With the final numbers in, it means we can finalise the cold fork buffet, organise the seating arrangements and I could add the table names to backs of the escort cards.
Which I then set up on the coffee table with the little sign I have made to show the on-the-day wedding planner how I would like it to be laid out.
Having fewer guests means we actually drop from 9 tables (including the top table) to 7 tables (ditto). It also means 2 less centrepieces, and less main meals also, bringing our budget down slightly. I also rang the cake lady to reduce the size of the cake, bringing down the cost of that by £75. It's all good!
TTFN xx
My lack of blog posts has been due to me finishing off many DIY projects I had given myself for the wedding, along with a couple of new ones I'd decided would be a "good idea" o_O
We have also had to chase some RSVPs - the deadline came and went and a whole family on H2b's side hadn't replied... turns out they're all going on holiday... It brings our numbers down from 80 to 63 which is just 2 shy of the maximum that the ceremony room holds - I'm pleased!
I've been flat out depressed since coming back from holiday - the sun, the fresh air, the sea, the good times really lifted my spirits, and coming back to a dank, miserable, cold Britain has dampened them again...
I've been hitting the gym hard to get in as much shape as I possibly can for the big day, and between that, work, wedding planning and organising a couple of pre-wedding shindigs, I'm not finding the time to blog.
I promise myself that I will get back on track ASAP.
TTFN xx
It's been a while since my last blog post - two weeks maybe? But I have good reason - my sister got married on 27th May in Larnaca, Cyprus and we were out there for that. It was a wonderful day, and my lil' sis looked beautiful.
I'll be resuming blogging this week!!
TTFN xx
