So, on Saturday April 2, 2011 at 3:00 in the afternoon on the beach in Manhattan Beach California, I married My Mike in a magical ceremony that turned out even better than we had imagined.
He made me an aisle out of plywood, with a white runner, and had tiles leading up to it which made it possible for my 4" sparkly pink heels to never touch the sand.
The arch ended up being rented after the one I worked on for hours fell apart in transit. But that led to an even better arch and great memories of me and my brides maids sitting on the lawn taking all the flowers off the old arch, un-doing tulle, pipe cleaners and wire. And although I stayed up the night before the wedding putting flowers and tulle on the rental arch on the hotel room floor until 2 AM it came out great.
We had mishaps but they were more funny then aggravating like setting off the smoke alarm in the hotel room when we steamed the dress.
Our reception looked so fabulous and everyone really had a blast, including us! We danced so much (in my 4" heels) that the next day I was basically crippled.
I will be posting pictures soon but wanted to share the last minute DIY details and bargains.
The day before the wedding we went to The Flower Mart in downtown LA at 7:00 AM, had to be back for my lunch shower at Creme De-La-Crepe and the guys golf outing at the beautiful Trump Golf Course in Pales Verdes. What a fun place, The Flower Mart , and the smell, heavenly! We filled our entire truck with flowers and spent little over $200. This was enough for several small arrangements on each of the 9 tables at the reception site and several large vase arrangements for around the room and 8 bouquets! We had tons of fun putting the flowers together that night after the rehearsal dinner and my daughter/Maid of Honor, (AKA The Teen Fashion Police), designed all the arrangements. They came out absolutely beautiful. The hotel gave us the Bridal Suite which had a big Jacuzzi, that we used for the flowers. (But we did try it out the night before). And the bouquets spent the night in the sink!
The Flower Mart
A tub full of fragrance
Yellow and White Roses
Happy Daisys and Mums
Gorgeous China Mums
Bridal Bouquest of Hydrangias
Bouquets spent the night in the sink
Table arrangements
Transporting to the reception site a bit tricky
Re-doing the rental arch the night before!
Finally got this July date off my camera!
Remember my glass 'message in the bottle' bottles? (DIY Wedding Part 2) they came out great with everyone's name and table number inside the bottle. We stuck them all in an old wooden salad bowl that we filled up with sand and decorated with shells (free & free). In keeping with the beach theme we printed pictures of shells and fish and used them as the table names which sat in glass crabs given to me by a friend. We also used small vases on each table between the flowers and candles filled with sand and shells.
Pearl pins where $1.00 for the pack and I made corsages for the Mom's with corsage holders that they sold in the Flower Mart for 69 cents! The buttoners were Tulips wrapped with floral tape and pinned with a pearl.
We added yellow Tulips to our gorgeous black and white cake. The groom wanted cupcake too. I had searched for football cupcakes but at $4 a cupcake they would have almost cost as much as the cake! So I home made them copying a picture I found on line. Total cost for 60 football cupcakes $12.00.
xoxo
Happy DIYing
