Colour scheme mood boards for iPad, iPod touch and iPhone users!

So as I’ve recently mentioned, Mr M and I are in the process of buying a house, and yesterday I got a bit ahead of myself and started to plan the colour schemes for the different rooms (saddo, I know!). 

I was doing this on my iPad, after downloading a free app called Dulux Colour Concept, which is basically a digital scrapbook with access to all colours within their range of paints.

So what I was thinking, is that this’d be a PERFECT tool for planning and developing your colour scheme for your wedding!

You can add your own photos (i.e. you could put pictures of your venue, centrepieces etc) and then use their colour palette and find colours of paint that match your scheme! This would be a fab way of helping to decide which to go for if you were stuck between two different colour schemes!

Here’s an example of one of the ones I’ve made for our house..

And what’s better, is that you can create as many different ‘pages’ as you like, and then email them to your other half, venue or wedding planner!

Plus, as it is FREE you might as well have a go…

A little on the quiet side..

The last week or so has been one hell of a busy time for Mr M and I as we’re currently in the process of applying for a mortgage, and we’re viewing houses!

This will be our first house, and the first place we’ve properly lived together. Everything is all very new to us, and the financial side of it is quite (actually, very) confusing! We’ve seen a place we REALLY like, and viewed it last night! Annoyingly, we can already see ourselves living there, which is a pain as we’re right at the start of the process and it could get snapped up by someone else while we’re doing the paperwork! So I’m trying not to get my hopes up!

As a result, wedding planning has taken a bit of a back seat for the last week or so! But I have a day off work tomorrow, so it’ll be all stations go, go, go!!

My new favourite website

My new favourite website is dotcomgiftshop.com!

It is FAB!!!

It caters for weddings, household goodies and garden items… and its all just lovely, lovely stuff!!

Its like a kitschy-er (and probably cheaper) notonthehighstreet.com!

Love it!!!

List of photography shots

My photographer has been very helpful and sent me over a list of photography shots I can ‘choose from’, so she can make sure she gets exactly what WE want out of her services.

So I thought I’d share that list with you! I’ve added a few more different shots I want taken to the list, as there’s certain things I’d like focused on  that aren’t already on the list.

Photo shots

Bride getting ready
Bride full length shot
Bride head and shoulders shot
Bride with bridesmaids
Bridesmaids
Bride and mother
Bride and father
Bride leaving the house/hotel
Groom arriving
Groom with best man
Groom with best man and ushers
Bride arriving in car
Bride with father by the car
Bride at wedding venue entrance
Bride at wedding venue entrance with bridesmaids
Rear shot of Bride and Groom at alter after bridesmaids have sat down
Signing of register
Bride and Groom walking down the aisle
Coming out of wedding venue door
Confetti shot
Bride and Groom head and shoulder shot
Bride and Groom full length shot
Bride on own (dress arranged)
Bride and Groom with wedding party
Bride and Groom with all guests
Bride and Groom by the car
Bride and Groom inside the car
Bride and Groom walking into reception
Bride and Groom toasting champagne
Bride and Groom cutting cake
Wedding ring shot

I’ve also added onto the list things like shots of DIY projects around the reception before guests arrive, and made a list of areas inside and outside of the venue I’d like photos taken in.

My photographer said to me when we booked her ‘You tell me what you want, and I’ll do it’ as she wanted us to get exactly what WE wanted from our wedding photos, rather than have a set of photos that weren’t as we imagined.

Seating arrangement conundrum

So, I started to have a think about the seating plan for our wedding breakfast, and oh my goodness it is TRICKY!

Having to squeeze 80 guests onto tables is hard enough, then there’s family groups, friendship groups, arguments within groups, “so and so wont sit with bla bla – they hate each other” and the old age phrase “traditional”.

The top table itself is hard enough to organise; in our wedding party there is 13 people. But the width of our venue will only allow for tables to seat 10. So do I go for Mr M and myself and just our parents? Or do I go for Mr M and myself, plus Bridesmaids and Groomsmen?

Apparantly (according to my Mum), the top table should be the married couple and their parents. No offence to our lovely parents, but I think I’d prefer to sit with those we’ve especially chosen to be a part of our wedding (Bridesmaids and Groomsmen). It’d also be easier for the Best Man to do his speech if he was sitting at the top table; if he was sitting with his friends, he’d have to cross the room to get to the front, which is a bit of a faff.

But anyway, the top table still needs deciding upon, so I’ll leave that for the moment.

Then there’s the other 70 guests. And here’s my problem.

My friendship groups are very small, and none of the groups know each other. Mr M’s friendship group on the other hand is very very big, everyone knows each other, and the group is rapidy expanding where babies are being created. This pattern is also mimicked with family. So this poses problems; some of my tables for guests are quite small, whereas the tables for Mr M’s guests couldn’t fit enough people round them, so his groups are having to be split.

Oh. My. Goodness.

Its tiring me out just thinking about it!

We are presuming here that all the guests we’ve invited will actually say yes to coming; if anyone cant make it, then I’ll have to have another think about possible seating arrangements!!

I’ve given the draft version of the seating plan to Mr M to have a look over for me, so I’m sure he’ll find a load of things that need changing because of ‘so and so, and bla bla’….

Today has been a great wedding DIY day!

I have spent the majority of today on the computer, designing various different stationery items for our wedding. And I have to say its been quite successful!

I’ve got quite a large (and expanding) list of crafts going on at the moment but I have managed to make a nice dent in the list by getting on with it today!

So far today I’ve designed all the place cards for on the tables, created a possible seating plan, designed the menu for on the tables, edited the Order of Service sheet and a few other little bits and bobs! I haven’t printed anything yet, as firstly, I’m all out of ink, and secondly, all these things may need to be edited nearer the time, so there isn’t much point in printing them all out just yet! But it will have made it a lot of easier in the run up to the wedding knowing its ready to be printed!

The downside to getting on with it all? I’m running out of DIY projects : (

Sweetie buffets

Mr M and I went to a wedding back in August 2010, and the Bride and Groom had organised a sweetie buffet. Looking back it was pretty immense, but in all honesty, we found it near to the end of the night (pretty poor positioning in the reception room) and my general memories were looking at it in awe, and then stuffing marshmallow ropes and jelly snakes into our mouths. Classy, I know.

But now, sweetie buffets are becoming more popular and organised affairs, and it’s kind of something I want to be a part of.

So on my journey to deciding whether I want to create some kind of sweetie table on our wedding day, I though I’d share with you some of my FAVOURITE photos from other couples weddings! I’ve also included photos of the labels they’ve used to name each of their sweets – I love a good set of labels (and possible DIY project at that!)!

One word: YUM!

My small crafting business page

I’ve just set up a little craft business making lots of different stationery pieces for those ‘not-so-crafty’ Brides out there! 

Here’s the link!

https://www.facebook.com/PoppyDaisysCraftCreations

Branching out..

Okay, so at the moment, work is a little sparse on the ground for me (odd job!) so I’ve decided to branch out and get into my second favourite pastime a bit more seriously – I’m starting up a small craft business.

I won’t be doing invitation sets or anything big like that, I’ll just be concentrating on the smaller things like menus, sweetie jar labels, seating signs, place cards and other little stationery pieces.

I love crafting, it’s one of those things I do when I have a spare couple of hours, so I thought I’d try to help out other Brides who are perhaps not as ‘crafty’ as me!

I’m really looking forward to getting my first order in, but in the meantime I am going to carry on making things for my own wedding, and use my DIY projects as part of my photographic catalogue!!

If anyone is interested, my Facebook business page is Poppy-Daisy’s Craft Creations! 

My RSVP cards and wedding website cards have arrived!

Two weeks ago I ordered our RSVP cards and our wedding website cards from Vistaprint, and they’ve arrived over a week early!

And……..I LOVE THEM!!!

None of our stationery ‘matches’, but each element of the stationery comes under the colour scheme we’ve chosen.

Both our day and evening invitations are gold and ivory (but different designs), the RSVPs are plum purple like the Bridesmaid dresses, and the website cards are ivory and brown (the men’s suits will be brown)! So it doesn’t look like a proper matchy-matchy set, but it works well with our gold, plum, ivory and brown colour scheme!

I did have the opportunity to have a matching stationery set, but I couldn’t warrant spending all that extra money on something that will in reality just be thrown away once the day has passed, so Vistaprint was a better option! I was also able to customise the wording whilst in the design process, so that saved a lot of DIY time that can now be spent on making the bouquets and buttonholes. Plus, the money I’ve saved from getting my non-matching stationery from Vistaprint can now go towards something more long lasting, like our wedding rings.

I did also consider getting little cards with our gift list wishes made, but thought it might be one card too many for our guests to receive, so I’ve decided to put that on our wedding website instead! Hopefully the wedding website cards we’ll include with our invitations will direct a lot of our guests onto the site. We’ve put quite a lot of information onto it to help our guests and we will update it nearer the time with weather updates etc – you never know if snow will arrive in December!  Hopefully it’ll also answer a lot of questions our guests may have about things like directions and local accommodation so we don’t get bombarded with hundreds of repetitive questions near to the day!!!

Wedding themes - creative or crazy?

Okay, so when I first started planning our wedding, the only ‘theme’ I thought weddings were based on, was colours. But now, over a year into planning (6 months pre-engaged, 9 months properly engaged), I’ve realised this most definitely isn’t the case!

It was probably in the pre-engagement period that I started to notice ‘themes’ appearing in magazines (Alice and Wonderland, country fete etc), but I didn’t really take much notice of it. I thought it was just something super creative people did, or they were simply posed and set up for the magazines. But no. Themes exist. And I am now a wedding theme convert.

It has taken me up until the last month to actually admit that though. I’ve always been worried that people will walk into our venue and think “how childish” or “she’s obviously put more thought into the decor than the life changing experience she’s about to undertake”. But I don’t think either applies to our wedding (and it definitely doesn’t apply to my attitude towards marriage).

Our theme reflects US as a couple; where we met, our hobbies, our passions and pastimes. Its not something we’ve just plucked out of a magazine and thought would be fun. Its just us; a bit old fashioned, a bit away with the fairies, a bit hippy-ish (I never thought I’d describe myself as hippy-ish but I am beginning to see some elements forming..!), a bit rustic, and a bit different. It’s got US written all over it.

But do weddings need themes? No, probably not. Weddings aren’t about the party or the pretty things, they’re about the marriage. But I think the worry that many Brides have nowadays is that everything has even done before and no one wants to look like they’re coping someone else so they feel they should put their own slant on it. And that’s when themes evolve.

I admit, I am one of these people. When it comes down to this wedding, I am being extremely protective and secretive. But the thing is, wedding themes are no longer unique. However original you think you’re being, you’re guaranteed to find someone on Google whilst browsing photos who has done it before you.

Despite saying that, I am transitioning into a bit of a Bridezilla – with our wedding being one year and eight months (and two days) away, it means that there is at least 611 chances of aspects of our wedding that I’ve ‘claimed’ being used in someone else’s wedding, if there were to be one wedding a day for the next 20months. Not to mention the fact that 4 of our friends are getting married before us. Awful isn’t it?! Weddings are turning me crazy and irrational!!!!

But additionally, all the craziness and secrecy aside, I just REALLY want our wedding to surprise our guests. Not in the sense that we want to horrify them, but surprise them in terms of “oh my goodness, they’ve kept this quiet!! Isn’t it just totally THEM?!”.

Bridezilla tendencies aside.. theming your wedding is definitely fun – the theme doesn’t have to be OTT, it can be as subtle as a particular flower being used throughout your decor and stationery. Alternatively you can go all out and create something amazing like a full blown carnival which you use for the basis of your evening reception (LOVE this idea by the way!).

But once you choose a theme, stick to it. Have as many different colours in your colour scheme as you like if you think it works (I’ve got 4!), but choose just ONE theme – mixing themes is never good (think Disney paired with Wild West – eeek!).

And remember, it doesn’t have to be expensive! Research suppliers thoroughly to get the best deal, use and abuse eBay, recycle and reuse, raid charity shops (not literally), ask friends and family to save you unwanted items (jam-jars for example), not to mention the fact that Google is your photo inspiration BFF when it comes to giving you cheap and affordable DIY ideas…

BUT, if you are planning to theme your wedding, do it properly! Guests won’t understand why you’re making the odd reference to something if it isn’t consistent. You don’t have to go overboard, but make sure you incorporate your theme into everything.

The most important thing to remember? Theming your big day CAN be done on a budget!!!

Gift Lists

Mr M and I have just started to think about gift lists for our wedding.

There are plenty of companies which organise gift lists for relatives to buy the newly wedded couple a present to celebrate their marriage. Debenhams is always a popular one, John Lewis do one, B&Q do one, Not on the High Street do one (YAY!) and there are hundreds of others which specialise in different things.  There are even websites that guests can access to pay for your honeymoon or activities for you to do while you’re away!

Mr M and I will have lived in our own house for around a year by the time we get married, so we probably won’t need all the things a traditional gift list offers like pots and pans, so we are thinking of asking for money instead to put towards our honeymoon.

We are hoping to go to either Australia or USA for a few weeks in 2014 for our honeymoon and we’d like our guests to contribute towards this.

I’d like to point out that we don’t expect our guests to give us a gift or some money; but family and friends have already mentioned it to us so we know they have plans to do so.

I do like the idea of a traditional gift list, but there isn’t much we will need by the time the wedding comes round, so I think their kindness would be better used by giving us a well deserved trip away! Of course, if our guests contact us and say they’d rather give us a tangible gift as opposed to money, then we’ll give them some suggestions and direct them to a few different websites (we’ll most probably direct them to Not on the High Street first off!).

To inform our guests of our decision, we have put a little note on our wedding website reading;

“Your company, conversation and dance moves are the best gift you could give us, however, if you wish to give us a present, then a gift of money to put towards our honeymoon would be gratefully appreciated!!”