Decor

Fall Weddings – Embrace the Season

 in Decor / Guests / Wedding planning / Weddings  tagged fall colors / fall weddings / weddings by

Fall Weddings offer beautiful colors and relief from the heat of summer, but have challenges of their own. September and October have become some of the busiest months for weddings in our area. June and July, traditionally the busiest time, have been uncomfortably hot in recent years, helping drive the interest in fall gatherings.

September weddings can be particularly tricky as some of our warmest weather has occurred during the first weeks of the month. I remember an early September ceremony in the lower gardens at Plummer House that had many guests scurrying to look for some shade. While we think of September as part of the fall season, especially if you’re planning a wedding early in the month, you’ll want to be prepared for heat, too. Consider options for shade for your guests. Provide paper fans and/or bottled water to help them stay comfortable. And remember the potential for really hot weather when choosing attire for your wedding party. Short dresses for women, and shirts and suspenders for the men may be great choices.

Embracing the colors of the season

Later September into October brings changeable weather to our area. You’ll want to be prepared for anything from high 40’s to mid-70 degree temperatures. And don’t forget the wind, which turns cool and can make it feel downright cold. But you’ll also get some beautiful fall colors at this time of year. You may choose typical fall colors of golden yellows, reds and oranges, purples or browns for your decor and ceremony colors. Vines and leaves, even pumpkins and gourds can be utilized to bring the season into your wedding experience.

Fall weddings can be as fresh and lovely as the weather. Brilliant colors bring a festive tone to pictures, especially if you are graced with a sunny day. Embracing the fall season and incorporating it into your wedding theme will make for a memorable experience.

Connecting Elements of Your Wedding Day

 in Celebration / Ceremony / Decor / Guests / Personalization / Rituals / Unity Rituals / Weddings  tagged wedding / wedding ceremony / wedding guests / wedding rituals / wedding theme / wedding venues / weddings by

Connecting elements of your wedding day together is a great way to tie your ceremony, your social hour, your dinner and your reception into a cohesive unit. Better yet if you connect the elements in a way that is meaningful to you as a couple. You can use thoughtfulness and creativity to accomplish a truly memorable experience by connecting elements of your wedding day in a meaningful way.

Begin by choosing a venue that represents a shared interest or has significance to you. Perhaps you enjoy wine. Choosing a vineyard or winery as your venue is a great start. Or for the railroad enthusiasts among you, perhaps renting a train for your wedding day is the way to go. Let’s create connections using those two examples.

The vineyard/winery venue offers a ceremony venue among the vines, with wine barrels in place of tables for the unity ritual or program distribution at the ceremony. Include a wine sharing or love letters and wine box ritual in the ceremony, and you’re on a roll. The social hour can feature your favorite wines which can follow through to dinner with wines selected for each course of your meal. Perhaps your cake is decorated in the colors of wine (reds, blushes, and creamy whites) or has a wine themed cake topper. Consider a takeaway for the guests of a wine glass or even a bottle of wine, and you’ve succeeded in connecting elements of your wedding day from start to finish.

For the railroad enthusiasts, you can hand out train whistles to your guests to serenade you as you share your first married kiss at the end of your ceremony. Those whistles can be used at the reception to call on you to kiss, and then be the guest takeaways at the end of the night. You might have a model train running around the cake table or the buffet table, and even choose a train themed song for your first dance.

Many of the ideas for connecting elements of your wedding day are not expensive, but require a bit of time and creativity. They serve to personalize your day and share a part of who you are with your guests. Each couple is unique, so celebrate who you are on your wedding day!

Make Choices That Reflect Who You Are

 in Celebration / Ceremony / Decor / Guests / Personalization / Trends / Weddings  tagged authentic / ceremony / personalized wedding / wedding / wedding ceremony / wedding traditions / weddings by

“Make choices that reflect who you are and what you love, and you’ll have an end result that you can feel super proud of for a long time.” That’s a quote from Allison Davis of Davis Row, a wedding planning company. I encountered that quote recently while reading an article on upcoming wedding trends for 2019. I think it is one of the most important and helpful observations for you to keep in mind when planning your wedding day.

It is so easy to get caught up in all the wedding trends articles, all the pins on Pinterest, all the internet wedding forums, and all the interesting things you’ve seen at weddings you’ve recently attended. The truth is, you can’t include every interesting thing you see. And you really wouldn’t want to. Your budget and your time will put limits on what you ultimately decide to include in your wedding day, but there is good guidance in that opening quote to help you make your decisions.

When you make choices that reflect who you are and what you love, you ensure an authentic, comfortable and unique wedding day. A personalized wedding ceremony can be a great way to kick off your celebration and share your story and your love with your guests. Selecting attire, a venue, flowers, music and even your photographer to match your style and priorities will help ensure that your personalities shine throughout the day.

Remember that you don’t have to accept hardly anything about your day as a “given”. Perhaps you don’t want to have a wedding party at all, keeping you as a couple in the spotlight. Perhaps you’re not a flower person like one bride I worked with who really wanted to carry her video gaming laser gun instead of a bouquet. Go for it! Or like a recent couple I worked with, perhaps you’re not into the whole wedding dance experience. Take a page from their book and offer board games, card games, a huge Jenga game and a couple of bean bag games to entertain your guests. In their case, they included background music to add to the party atmosphere and guests really enjoyed being able to really converse without shouting over loud music.

Whatever your personality and preferences, make choices that reflect who you are and what you love, and you’ll have a happy, comfortable, and memorable wedding day to launch your new adventure called marriage.

New Ideas for Ceremony Backdrops

 in Ceremony / Decor / Weddings  tagged ceremony backdrops / wedding decor by

New ideas for ceremony backdrops can focus and freshen your ceremony venue. Outdoor ceremony spaces, while wonderful and green, can be so open as to be unfocused. If a natural backdrop – a row of evergreens or colorful flowerbeds isn’t available – there are ways to create a focal point for your ceremony.

You may think indoor ceremony spaces avoid this issue, but in many cases you would be wrong. I’ve been in many ballroom spaces where the wall behind the ceremony space is spattered with lit exit signs, banks of light switches, or even in one unfortunate space, restroom doors. These serve as distractions for the guests, but also mar every picture taken during the ceremony.

This article from Brides.com offers some new and creative ideas for ceremony backdrops.

Ceremony backdrops can also provide an opportunity for you to personalize your ceremony space. Use of color, materials and images that are significant to you as a couple allow the ceremony backdrop to both frame your ceremony and communicate something about you. How wonderful to capture that as part of your ceremony message.

Taking Your Ceremony Space Up a Notch

 in Ceremony / Decor / Weddings  tagged ceremony decor / ceremony space by

Taking your ceremony space up a notch doesn’t have to be difficult or pricey. With a little thought, planning and creativity you can make your ceremony venue especially memorable. It can be a bit of a challenge to create a special ceremony space in an open area outdoors. You want to focus attention on the space without overwhelming the natural beauty that likely led you to choose the venue in the first place.

Here are some simple, relatively inexpensive ways to define and focus your outdoor venue:
1. If you don’t have a natural “wall” of greenery, stone or other natural material backing the ceremony space, consider creating the illusion by hanging fabric or picture frames from a tree branch. Then position your wedding party in front and you’re ready to go.

Picture frames and simple greenery decorate outdoor ceremony space

2. Inexpensive decor options that define space include satin ribbons or gauzy fabric tied to guest chairs, or ribbons hanging from trees or positioned in a simple large frame. Simple baby’s breath or greenery gathered with a ribbon, raffia or burlap can also be tied to chairs at a fraction of the cost of floral arrangements.

3. Another flexible idea is to use a freestanding door at either the back or front of the ceremony space. Positioned at the back, it can create an impressive entrance for the wedding party. Used at the front, it can frame the ceremony action.

Doors can define the front or back of your ceremony space

4. In a large area, consider signposts to direct your guests from parking to the ceremony space. A large sign or chalkboard with the order of the ceremony can be an attractive focal point at the back of the ceremony space and eliminate the need for ceremony programs.

And finally, there are a couple of things I see at ceremonies that can probably be eliminated altogether: bubbles and bells. These props are supposed to be used to celebrate the couple as they leave at the end of the ceremony, but are usually forgotten, ignored, or intentionally avoided. I suggest you save your money on those items and use it elsewhere in your wedding budget.