I am so excited to be participating in the Queen Bee Market again! If you have not heard of Queen Bee, it is a killer handmade & vintage boutique in Southern CA.

The next boutique is on Saturday August 6th in Downtown San Diego and I cannot wait! I am working away on banners, tags and a couple of fun new products. If you are local, you definitely want to come. So much cute stuff!

Here are the details:

Saturday, August 6th
Bayfront Hilton Downtown
1 Park Boulevard
San Diego, California

9:00-6:00

Let me know if you are going to be there so I can say hello! Also, you can enter to win a $50 gift certificate to the market by spreading the word. Make sure you mention I sent you- then we both get entries!

My class is now up on Cricut’s website! In it, I talk about trends and give project ideas including vase wraps, labels, snack cones, a cute card box idea, drink stirrers and many more. Then I give step by step instructions on how to many adorable scalloped escort cards and table number signs.

Ignore the bad quality of the photos above. They are screen shots of the video. I want to give a big thank you to Amanda Phelps for the beautiful calligraphy on the escort cards.

The video is totally free and you can watch it here any time!

**To make things even more exciting for me, the wonderful team at Provocraft gave me some cricut cartridges to give away!!*** I will be splitting them into two giveaways.

The first will be a set of 3 fun cartridges that are great for everyday crafting and weddings as well:

Paper Lace (my favorite new cartridge!)

Damask Decor

and Carousel

Next week, I will be giving away a set of four wedding related cartridges too!

You can enter to win these three cartridges in 3 ways:

1. Comment on this post, telling me how you would use the cricut for a wedding. Or- if you did use the cricut for your wedding decor- I’d love to hear how!  Also, if you watch the DIY class, let me know what you think!

2. Tweet or post on Facebook about this giveaway. Once you have, comment with a link back here.

3. Blog about the DIY class and the giveaway. Once you have, post again here with a link to your blog post.

You can enter each way only once. You can enter until midnight on Thursday, July 7th. I will announce the winner on Friday the 8th.

Have a wonderful 4th of July weekend everyone!

I first met with Alison and her mother at the beachfront property that had been in their family for over a century. They had hoped to have the wedding there, but did not know if it was realistic. I took one look around and said that there was no way they were not going to have it there! The sweet beach house lies right on the sand on the Balboa Peninsula in Newport Beach and is filled to the brim with family memories. Trophies from the Christmas Boat Parade from 1918(!), photos and heirloom pieces fill the shelves and I was literally giddy walking around dreaming of ways to incorporate it all into their seaside wedding.

With a color palette of white, tan, celery green and ocean blue, Carissa of JL Designs and I worked together with the couple to design a classic, comfortable, non-cheesy nautical wedding, reminiscent of a summer vacation in the Hamptons.

Alison was such a stunning bride!

I loved the bouquets that Carissa created- each bridesmaid had a bouquet made out of a different crisp green bloom and the made of honor carried a mixture of all of the flowers. The blue of the bridesmaid’s Ann Taylor dresses made the bouquets pop in such a gorgeous way.

The ring bearers carried the rings on pieces of grapewood adorned with white peonies:

When Carissa and I met at the house for our design meeting, we walked around asking Alison and her mom, “can we use this piece? Can we pull that table outside?”. I loved being able to use the antique furniture that had been in their family for decades and decades, including this cute little table we used for the programs. Carissa did such a great job with the wreath hanging above it and I found the perfect little knot balls on clearance at Target to pull in.

Another fun find from the house was this huge (& heavy!) steering wheel from a ship. I knew it would be the perfect detail to greet guests.

In order to have enough room for the ceremony and reception, Alison’s dad spent months building out there beach. It was incredible to see the process from beginning to end and it definitely paid off- the beach was just the right size and the day was perfect. A harpist played as Alison and her father walked down the sand she grew up playing on.

I created a sweet and simple “just married” banner for their family boat, which the sailed away on at the end of the reception.

The cocktail hour took place on the front lawn while we completely turned over the ceremony site into the reception. When I started working with the couple, they were living in the Caribbean for Christopher’s job, so we tied in that part of their story by having a steel drum player entertain the guests throughout the cocktail hour.

When thinking about their decor scheme for the wedding, I could not get the idea of a vintage dingy out of my mom. After telling Alison to be on the lookout, they ended up finding the perfect barnacle-crusted dingy in the garage of the property! I literally cheered out loud when I saw it. We hung escort cards made by Posh Paperie across ribbon and it became a focal point of the wedding.

One of the antique pieces we grabbed from inside of the house was a huge buffet and hutch that we used to showcase family photos and sweet little arrangements that Carissa made. Later on in the night, we removed the pictures and used it to display all of the cute mini desserts that 24 Carrots served (mini cobblers, candy apples and creme brulee spoons, among many other tasty things).

For the reception, we lined up tables perpendicular to the ocean and the resulting set up was so stunning and yet comfortable for the guests. It felt  almost like a big family dinner. Khaki colored raw linens were used to create a clean and natural base to the tables. Carissa did such a killer job with the florals- mono-botanical arrangements were elegant and clean, but striking all together.

I made Mr & Mrs chair back signs using cards that Posh Paperie created to match the stationery. I sewed them onto linen fabric and loved how they turned out!

Sometimes, Plan B ends up working better than Plan A. The bride and groom named tables after locations that they had traveled to together and Posh Paperie made signs to indicate each table, which were to go into small little stands. Because of the wind, the table signs would not stay upright. I made a quick decision to tie them to a chair at each table and it ended up looking so cute!

24 Carrots, as always, did an incredible job with the food, including a sushi station.

Sweet and Saucy shop made three delicious rustic style cakes which were displayed in front of a khaki linen backdrop that Carissa hung. Alison & Chris used heirloom silver champagne cups and cake servers.

The bride is a licensed sommelier, so the couple gave their guests bottles of wine with custom labels as their favors, which was a huge hit!

At night, the reception glowed and was like a scene out of a movie. Guests danced to an awesome Bluegrass band from San Luis Obispo, the Cuesta Ridge Mountain Boys. This was especially sentimental because the couple was watching the band play at a street fair the moment that Chris realized that he wanted to marry Alison. Touches like this made it so that guests left the wedding knowing more about the couple’s story and their backgrounds, which I absolutely adored!

I mean, does it get more dreamy than that?

I could plan this wedding every day of my life. The couple and their families were so wonderful to work with and they fully trusted the dream team of vendors we recommended.

Here is that amazing team:

Photography: the lovely and talented Meg Perotti

Planning & Design: Us

Florals & Design: the insanely talented Carissa of JL Designs

Rentals: Classic Party Rentals (always wonderful)

Catering: 24 Carrots (Jami & staff are a dream to work with & the food is so tasty!)

Stationery: my girls at Posh Paperie

Cakes: Sweet & Saucy Shop (my favorite, and I don’t usually say that)

Band: Cuesta Ridge Mountain Boys (They could have kept the entire guest list dancing until 4 AM. So good!)

Cigar Roller: Cuban Cigar Factory (always a hit)

Steel Drummer: Nesta (Created such a fun atmosphere!)

Harpist: Pamela Brown (absolutely beautiful)

Shuttles: Beach Cruiser style buses from OC Cruiser

Valet: Lighthouse Parking (My go-to valet company- they are great!)

Just Married Banner: Joyful Joyful on Etsy

And a big thank you to Leila from Be Inspired PR for getting this wedding into The Knot Southern California!

The incredible Jose Villa released a book of his gorgeous images and he included one of my favorite PR guru, Leila of Be Inspired PR, and her hubby at their wedding, holding the banner I made them. It sweetly says, “all my days”. Here is a peak of it, taken by Leila.

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The Knot also released their Ultimate Wedding Lookbook and photos from two weddings that we designed made it into the book. All of the images of our work were shot by the amazing Michael Norwood. I’ll let you play I Spy and find our work in the pages

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We are so grateful to have our work included in these great books!

You will be seeing much more of this sweet couple soon!

Side note: Please excuse my extreme lack of posting. My hard drive decided to die on me, so we’ve been going through the painful process of trying to pull everything off of it in the midst of taking care of our new little guy.. Lesson learned: if you have something that your computer automatically backs itself on, make sure it is actually working

We should be back on the ball soon!

Their wedding took place at the Bernardo Winery- a cute little hidden winery in a residential area of Rancho Bernardo. Matt and Ashley envisioned a sweet, rustic wedding with vintage touches. The venue was the perfect location to match what they were looking for: a beautiful outdoor setting, rustic covered patio and countless vintage knick knacks placed throughout the grounds. With a color scheme of light pink, navy blue and grey, their wedding day was brought to life with countless handmade touches- both made by the couple themselves and purchased from an array of etsy crafters. I am so excited to give you a peak into their wedding day, with photos by the super fun Lyndzee and Rog of EP Love.

Flowers were done by my good friend Holly Horn.

Aren’t they a beautiful couple?

Ashley got these cute little clutches for her girls on etsy:

They had the cutest littles in their wedding. The flower girl outfits were some of my favorite- they are so cute!

Ashley and I wanted to fill in unused space in a wooden structure just to the side of the ceremony. During the reception, the sweetheart table was placed right in front of it, so I made a gigantic “Just Married” sign to hang above them and accented with large mason jars filled with babies breath and candles.

I hand embroidered most of the signage for the wedding day, including the card sign, placed in a vintage train case, and the reserved signs on the ceremony chairs saved for family.

One of the super cute ring bearers carried a custom Paloma’s Nest ring bowl:

For the other little guy, I made a ring bearer flag, incorporating in doilies. I made it double sided, so one side read our usual “yay!” and the other had the couple’s initials. I loved how it turned out!

For the ceremony, the couple wanted to keep decor natural and simple and were married under an arch made completely out of eucalyptus.

I was so thrilled that the ladies of Be Inspired PR featured Matt & Ashley’s wedding yesterday. You can see more of the wedding on their blog. I will be back tomorrow with all of the darling reception details and a full vendor list.

]]> http://joyfulweddingsandevents.com/blog/2011/02/16/matt-ashleys-rustic-wedding-at-the-bernardo-winery-part-1/feed/ 5 http://joyfulweddingsandevents.com/blog/2011/02/09/a-bow-tie-baby-shower/ http://joyfulweddingsandevents.com/blog/2011/02/09/a-bow-tie-baby-shower/#comments Thu, 10 Feb 2011 02:02:23 +0000 Courtney http://joyfulweddingsandevents.com/blog/?p=2656 Back in the fall, I was honored to plan a baby shower along with Carissa of JL Designs and Melody of Sweet and Saucy Shop for our dear friend Jesi Haack. We decided to celebrate her new little man by having a bow-tie themed party. Posh Paperie’s invitations set the tone for the clean, cheery decor.

Guests were greeted with a little ribbon bow-tie clip I made, which everyone wore throughout the shower. Instead of a guestbook, Carissa of JL Designs wrote a mad lib to fill in about the baby, which was a lot of fun.

For the decor we incorporated in pops of mustard yellow, kelly green and baby blue. Carissa used a variety of white ceramic vases to keep it light and modern and filled them with an array of monobotanical arrangements using our theme colors – white pom pom dahlias (jesi’s favorite), white hydrangea and yellow ranunculas. Wrapped around each vase was a striped or polka dot “bow tie”, which I created using striped and polka dot ribbons in coordinating colors. To deviate from the standard diaper cake, I crated a bow-tie garland using diapers and ribbon.

For lunch, Carissa, Melody and I made light options including bow-tie pasta salad, chicken salad sandwiches with coordinating ribbon picks and tiny sized tomato basil soups. Melody of Sweet and Saucy Shop created an adorable spread of desserts, including Bowtie Sugar Cookies, a Pumpkin Cake w/cinnamon cream cheese frosting & salted caramel w/ruffle buttercream & fondant bowtie, Mini Pumpkin Cupcakes w/cinnamon cream cheese frosting & salted caramel, Red Velvet Cake Lollipops and Lemon French Macaroons.  Drinks were served in mason jars with ribbon bow-ties and striped paper straws.

The shower was recently featured on Hostess With the Mostess- thanks Jenn! And a big thanks to Jesi for having sweet Maverick early so that we could hang out with him at the shower!

Vendors:

*Photos: Gabriel Ryan Photographers
*Floral and Event Design: JL Designs
*Event Design and Planning: Joyful Weddings & Events
*Dessert and Hostess: Sweet & Saucy Shop (adorable cake stands from Sweet & Saucy Supply)
*Invitations: Posh Paperie
*Cute “Baby Haack” bag & Logo Onesie: Wedding Chicks
*Sandwich picks: Joyful Joyful

In Wedding Wire’s words, “this award recognizes the top 5 percent of local wedding professionals from the WeddingWire Network who demonstrate quality and service excellence in the wedding industry”. Yay! Recipients were selected by an extensive survey of newlyweds and also recent reviews on the site. Thanks to Wedding Wire and to our past brides who have left us such sweet reviews

I was so honored when I was asked to share some fun and unique planning tips for The Knot Southern California’s featured planner section. I got to brag about some of my favorite San Diego vendors, like Posh Paperie, venues (The Parker Palm Springs), rehearsal dinner locations (Stone Brewery) and sweet treats (Fiji Yogurt). You can find the article in The Knot’s Southern California Spring/Summer 2011 issue, available now.

A big thanks to Leila from Be Inspired PR for making this happen!