DIY Flower Girl Basket

When I began thinking about details, I always would think, "what am I going to have the flower girl carry?" I was not a fan of the generic silk baskets that were gleaming white, they did nothing for me.

So, in October, I went to the local Good Will to look for some clothing for my Halloween outfit. When looking over by the housewares section they had a ton of baskets, literally a ton! I found a perfect round woven basket. It was marked $1 but was 50% off, so I bought it for a whooping 50 cents! Being the horrible blogger that I am, I have no pictures of my purchase of its transformation process...for that I apologize, but I do have a final product picture...so just tag along.

I started off by taking some white spray paint laying around. I coated it twice, since the wicker soaked up the paint like no one's business. Then all I did was take some of my left over purple satin ribbon from my DIY unity candle, and wrapped it around the handle. Then on each side I added a bow.

My original idea was to have our flower girl throw petals down the aisle...alas, our church or any church in the area for that matter, does not allow that anymore. So we are going to put a stem of hydrangea in the basket for her to carry down the aisle.

Here is the finished product. (You know the drill, crappy Blackberry photo)

This was a super easy product that really cost me only 50 cents, since I used other products that I had already bought beforehand. 

Did anyone else have a super easy DIY?

The Sound Of Bagpipes Revisited

In this post from a while ago here, I talked about how we decided we wanted a bagpiper for our ceremony and found one in the shape of a 10 year old boy, he will be 11 in a week.

Well, last night we had the pleasure of going over and listening to him play. It. Was. AWESOME! He is so good! We were both impressed and got goosebumps. He played a whole array of songs for us. Being that we didn't have a clue about songs or what we wanted, we let him do his thing. After about a half an hour of playing we picked the songs for the ceremony.

He will arrive about a half an hour before the ceremony and play outside while everyone is entering. The prelude music will be Scotland the Brave, Roman Tree, and Wings.

For when I walk down the aisle we narrowed it down to Blue Bells or the traditional Bridal Song. They were both good it was hard to decide. Listen for yourself.

"Blue Bells"

"Bridal Song"

I think in the end we will pick the Bridal Song, for a little bit of tradition, but will have him slow it down a little.

There will be two times during the ceremony that he will also play. Those songs will be Sleeping Tune, and our favorite, Marie's Wedding.

Then the recessional will be Bonnie Dundee and Steamboat.

We are so happy to present some of our heritage through our ceremony. I think the bagpipes will be a welcomed treat for everyone and will be something people have not experienced that often.

Are you straying away from an organ for a church wedding?

My Whole Life, My Whole World

Early on in the planning stages we knew we were not going to have a ring bearer. Although we have plenty of younger male cousins that could do the job, neither of us are very close with them. We didn't see why we would ask them out of the blue to share in our day.

So then came the question, what to do with our rings?

We thought about having a ring warming ceremony.

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But with a guest list of around 200, we didn't think they would make it up to us in time with our short ceremony, and were worried about them being dropped.

We then decided that it would probably just be best to have the best man, his brother, hold onto both of the rings throughout the ceremony. But having him just keep them in his pocket made me nervous. I saw these ring pouches early on in the planning process.

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But then the sensible me thought, what a waste. Especially you have them personalized with names and dates, when would you ever use them again? It would be a purchase that would sit in a box.

Then, like many other brides, I came across the Etsy seller, palomasnest. I became obsessed! Those cute little ring bowls were just so darn cute. And although they could be personalized, they would have a life after the wedding.

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I take all my jewelry, besides my ring, off at night. And then my ring when I shower and work out. This would be perfect to keep my jewelry safe...since I am notorious for leaving a different piece in different places of the house.

We decided on putting lyrics from our first dance song on the bowl (which is actually our song, and will be the longer version of what we have engraved on our rings) along with our wedding date. Here it is!

I will add a dark purple satin ribbon instead of the twine. We will tie our rings around it and then the best man will keep the bowl in his hands throughout the ceremony.

DIY Unity Candle

Like many other brides, I found a bunch of great sellers on Etsy that would make our Unity Candle. The problem was, I didn't want to spend $30 on something I knew I could do myself.

I started by purchasing a vellum sample pack from cardsandpockets.com, because I wasn't sure what color or thickness I would need, and didn't want to buy a whole package of vellum.

I then went to Michael's and purchased a purple and silver spool of ribbon ($2 each with my 50% off coupon). I purcahsed the tapper candles from the Dollar store for $1.08 for the pair, and then the pillar candle from Walmart. They didn't have a tall unscented one so I went with Fresh Cotton.

Here were all my supplies:

I then printed out my design for the pillar candle and two tappers on one sheet of vellum:

I then cut out the three areas I would need with my paper cutter. I first tried gluing the vellum to the candle but that didn't work. In retrospect I'm sure hot glue would have done it but I didn't want it to be lumpy. So I just tapped the back with regular tape.

Once that was on I took my purple ribbon, which would be the base, and put that around to hide where the vellum meets the candle. But first I took a flame to melt the edge of the ribbon so it wouldn't fray.

I then took the ribbon, wrapped it around the top and bottom, and just glued both ends to the backside of the candle.

I then did the same with the silver ribbon, and placed that in the middle of the purple ribbon, and again glued it to the back. I did the same with the tapper candles. Now we have a beautiful unity candle set!

Including The Fur Babies

We do not have a dog (although I am still waiting for my bull terrier that I will deem Bosco), but love pictures of man's best friend participating in your day. With a lot of people not understanding that a shared pet is like a first child and grows on you like a friend, it is important to some people to include them on their wedding day...or get some adorable pictures with them!

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Is anyone including their pet on their big day? Whether it be a part of the wedding party or just taking pictures with them?

The Sound of Bagpipes

Although an organist is the traditional instrument of choice at weddings. The FI and I wanted to do something a little different that incorporated our heritage. My aunt had brought up the fact that she knew people that played the bagpipes, and it would be something different to the bring to the wedding. I loved the idea! A couple of weeks later I watched my brother graduate from SUNY Oneonta where everyone was lead in by a local bagpipe group with pipes and drums, the sound gave me chills and I knew that that sound was what we needed at the ceremony.

So we have decided to have a piper at the ceremony who will not only play the processional and when we are leaving the church, but will play the entire ceremony! How can you not love a kilt at the wedding anyway?

After contacting a handful of different groups and organizations in the area it didn't look too promising. Because pipers main goals are to compete, they couldn't give me a definite answer, because they would choose a competition over a wedding. So they told me to look elsewhere or wait until April to see if anyone was available.

Well I am a closet OCD, and can not put something off for that long. As luck would have it, an article was in the paper in December about a local boy who just won a bagpiping competition. Reading more into the article I realized that this boy was the son of my old highschool principal, who I am actually on good terms with. I contacted him and asked him if Misha would want to/be able to play the pipes at our ceremony in July? He wrote back within minutes saying that he would love to and would even come to the rehearsal to practice and make sure everything was just right. 

I couldn't believe it! I was ecstatic and still am actually! He's young (like 10 years old young!) but you should hear him play, it gives me chills! And here is our little bagpiper! 

Did anyone else have their heart set on something they didn't think was going to work out?