Wedding Craft Tour, Part Two

Back for Part Two of my wedding craft extravaganza. Are you sick of it yet? I'm not! (But let me confess.. oh my GAWD was a sick of it by the time the big day rolled around!)

I went back and forth on my bouquet forever. I always wanted to DIY them, but I couldn't decide on a tutorial. At first, I thought I'd do the book page flowers we used in the centerpieces, but those were so labor intensive! I couldn't imagine making 50 of them for the 4 bouquets I had to make. And what about boutonnieres? Corsages? I was knee deep in wedding craft hell when I finally saw this tutorial and felt a wave of relief pass over me: 

Fewer, giant flowers meant a big impact with much less work. Here's what mine looked like. Because of the stage of the planning process I was in, I opted for bouquets for myself and bridesmaids and no one else. I don't think they were missed: 

Side note: I managed to WAY over order the dark pink, light pink, and green crepe paper I used for this project. I've got like 8 rolls of it left and no idea what to use it for. So if you've got a project that could call for it, let me know. I will give them to you! Throwing a spring party? Want to make your mom a giant, hot pink bouquet that will last forever for Mother's Day? Someone help me out here. 

Often, I found that an idea I thought was original had been used in many, many weddings before mine. And that was great because it helped me clarify details that were too hazy in my mind at first thought. We cleaned out the basement of the building Brett and I lived in when we were first engaged and there were all these old doors that appeared to come from a school. We snagged them to use before I even knew what I would do with them. They became the altar and helped create a "wall" in the barn as well. 

Here they are in the barn, with some other DIY decor: 

Fun fact- I didn't have to purchase a single piece of vintage "shwag." It all came from my parents house- mason jars, vintage boxes, old pop bottles. Major score. 

After we had our collection of doors, I found this image that inspired how I wanted to set up the ceremony: 

Our programs were another example of a not-so-original original idea. I had seen the idea of printing on brown bags for a Valentine's Day project I did: 

It was easy to apply this same principle to our wedding programs.

Of course, lots of brides applied this principle as well! Our programs were basically the baby of these three ideas: 

My step-ma committed to making her delicious pie cocktails pretty early on and I won't lie, the thought of them got me through on some of the tougher days! She picked up these fancy dispensers at Sam's Club and I jimmied up some drink labels. 

I got the idea here: 

Our wedding night was unseasonably cold. Way colder than we expected. Luckily, we planned to have a bonfire all along and it provided some much needed warmth for our lovely guests. We also did up some s'mores for their frozen enjoyment! 

I loved these jars of s'mores goodies and made my own version above: 

Favors were another element of the wedding that I had a really hard time deciding. Should I buy them? Make them? Include them at all? My step-ma's mom gave me a bunch of medium sized mason jars to use for whatever so we opted to create drinking glasses with chalkboard name tags. We painted the lids with black chalkboard paint, drilled a hole in the top, and tied them around the mouth of the jars with twine. Simple! 

I got the idea here: 

I looked at endless photos of barns. I loved the whimsy of putting up white curtains at the door.

I saw the idea here first: 

I wanted to include really personal touches to our wedding as well. I framed love letters and hung them on an extra door inside the barn. 

Which is an idea I saw here: 

We didn't really want a flower girl or ring bearer because neither Brett nor I are particularly close to any small children and we didn't want to include some random kids in our ceremony! My little brother and sister Ty and MaKenna were a pinch too old for those roles but I wanted to include them by carrying our "Here Comes the Bride" sign! 

There were lots of sources of inspiration for this. I liked this sign a lot: 

I did borrow one idea for our ceremony that I fell in love with. I'm so glad we included it because it made me feel incredibly close to our wedding guests and solidified their role in our married life. It was a ring warming ceremony: 

Here is the original link where I found the idea.

My entire wedding was a birth of so many creative ideas, so much help from my friends and loved ones. My dad and stepmom were incredibly supportive during this whole process and my stepmom Shawn did more for me than I could ever thank her for! 

I love my photos so much and it's great to look through them and remember the story behind each and every project. Thanks for following along!