Task 4 Continued - Decoration - Where to buy

You have picked your theme, had a good look on Pinterest for inspiration and ideas and you have planned the layout of your venue.

Now for the FUN bit..... SHOPPING 

I had such a great time exploring both the high street and the internet looking for pieces that would make my decoration unique and personal to me. I found pieces in shops I would never expect and have probably never even thought about shopping in. 

I am now the proud owner of a glue gun, a button pot, Spray mount and endless amounts of ribbon, craft stamps and fabric.

It has been exciting seeing it all come together and I am very excited to see the end result.

I wanted to buy everything cheaper than it would cost to hire. I also wanted to buy pieces that I could get creative with to give my decoration that personal feel. 

Buying also gives you the opportunity for people to take bits home with them or for you to re-sell or re-use.

Here are a few pieces that I found whilst on my travels that I thought would be suitable for a good mix of wedding themes.

These Metal Pitchers make lovely centrepieces or can be used to decorate feature areas like fireplaces.
To personalise them add ribbon to the handles or a transfer on the front and fill with flowers.
available from DiscountUK Small £1.99 Large £3.99

The 3 above pictures are all from B&M. B&M always seem to hold bulk quantities so fantastic if you have lots of tables to decorate. Again all can be personalised and made to suit your chosen theme. The hollow heart would look lovely hanging from beams.




Oversized glasses have been a very popular choice over recent years. I came across these ones in The Range in Stevenage. They were a nice sturdy quality and would look lovely with various different things in them. Autumn leaves for a Fall wedding or mini baubels for a Christmas Wedding.  

   





Ikea is a fantastic place to pick up bulk products at very affordable prices with small vases from 65p and larger vases from £1. I also love the big paper decorations. They create a fun focus. 

Vase £1

I found these tin Beer coolers in 'The Works' £7.99
Fantastic for inside and outside use - welcome drinks - just fill with ice and beers :)

All you need is love - Asda £7 Great for decorating a card / cake table.












This was one of my Favourite finds from Wellpersonalised £12. They have a lovely affordable selection of products. Take a look at their fingerprint guestbook. 



Don't forget to look on Ebay and Amazon.
I managed to buy my cotton chair covers on ebay for less than the hire cost and I am currently searching for some fabric to sew my own napkins. I will keep you posted!!


And remember you can always get creative and personalise items to make them your own.

Have fun CREATING!! The Wedding Assistant x

Bridesmaid Dress Shopping

Bridesmaid Dress Shopping <3
Last Saturday I took my lovely bridesmaids shopping for their dresses. I have 6 bridesmaids, 4 adults and 2 junior bridesmaids so wanted to try a selection of options to see what looks worked best. I wanted just a casual ideas shop where I could freely get the ladies to try on various styles and lengths so that I could see what look suited them to help narrow down my search.
I chose to take a look on the high street rather than a bridal shop to give me the freedom to basically be a nightmare... try on take off.... try shoe's...try different dresses... swap this swap that...take measurement's... be noisy... so yes high street it was...
I had a good look on-line to see the product ranges that different stores had to offer and found that BHS had a dedicated bridal department and had by far the strongest range of styles so that is where we began our search.
In my head I already knew the style of dress that I wanted so I started with that. I wanted a strapless full length chiffon dress that went to the floor. When they tried it on, it looked lovely but it didn't quite work for the look that I wanted to go for so I picked up a different style that I liked which was a deep V neck chiffon dress which was more of an empire cut.
As soon as they put on the dresses I knew that that was the dress that I wanted them to have and they all really liked it. They all looked really elegant and the shape complimented every one of them (although the dresses needed an extra few inches in the length).

Bridesmaid dresses £95 available in various colours

I then popped out of the changing room to get a pair of shoes for each of them so I could try shoe sizes on them and see what heel height we were looking for.
As I looked through the racks of shoes a strappy pair of gold sandals jumped out at me.... I had been searching for a pair of gold strappy sandals to suit all of the bridesmaids needs for months and had been struggling to find ANYTHING!! so when I saw them I grabbed each of the bridesmaids sizes and quickly got them to try them on. They Fitted and they had every size that I needed in stock. I thought that the sandals were meant to be and swiftly purchased them.

Shoes BHS £23

While I had all of the girls in one place I took all of their measurements so that If I saw any dresses on-line or in any shops then I had all of their measurements to hand to see how each size works out in relation to each companies size guide as a size 10 can vary greatly from one shop to the next.
So the adult bridesmaids were nice and easy...

now for my junior bridesmaids..   
My junior bridesmaids are age 10 and age 12 which is a difficult age to find bridesmaid dresses for. Looking around the shops, bridesmaid dresses either catered for very young or adult age groups.. nothing really in the middle.
The young dresses looked too young and princess like where as the older ones where obviously too big...
The older junior bridesmaid looked very pretty and elegant in the adult dress but they are just not made for a young girls frame. I also wanted them to either match the adults or match each other.
We all had a lovely time and it was very interesting to have a try on and see what styles work. It was funny to see that the dress I had in my mind was not what I wanted and what style would suit the younger girls best.
I now feel that I know exactly what I am looking for. Don't be put off if a shop doesn't have the colour that you would like as finding the style is more important. The bridesmaids tried on a variety of colours none of which were the colour that I was looking for.
I would strongly recommend BHS for their product / price range. The dresses are beautiful and if they had the colour in stock that I wanted and at the length that I needed I would have purchased them there and then.
For the younger ladies I think that a bridal shop would have been the best bet as the cater for the 'junior' age bracket.

We also had a look in;
Monsoon 
TK Maxx
House of Fraser 
Debenhams 

BHS have a 20% off event for card holders at the moment so take a look at their bridal section before it ends :)
http://www.bhs.co.uk/en/bhuk/category/wedding
  
How was your Bridesmaid shopping experience? Where did you go? and where would you recommend?
Share your story below..

The Wedding Assistant 

On The Road - Wedding Ring Shopping

Yesterday was my 6 year anniversary. To celebrate we went shopping for our wedding rings.
We both went with a clear idea of what we wanted. I wanted a white gold wedding band quite plain and engraved. My Fiancé also wanted a plain wedding band engraved.
I really liked the idea of matching rings and I wanted mine to be quite classic.
We went to a large town centre that had a wide range of jewellery shops so we could have a look at as many different options as possible. We decided not to rule anywhere out and to just wonder into every jewellers that we passed.
We started by going to F Hinds. The majority of the stock was displayed in the window so you had to shop from outside.
We walked into the store and asked to take a look at the wedding rings as we had trouble spotting them. The response from the sales assistant was welcoming but lacking any kind of service. She explained that the rings were on the bottom row... We gave up and moved onto the next jewellery shop.
The next Jewellery shop was Goldsmiths. We had a warm welcome and the team member gave us her full attention. She encouraged us to try on different styles and suggested different rings that would sit nicely with my engagement ring. They had a really good product range on display and catered for a wide range of budgets.I enjoyed the experience but wanted to visit other places so we said thank you and went carried on shopping.
The next shop we went to was H Samuel. A team member introduced herself and showed us the range of rings on offer. They had a good selection from lower budget to premium rings, which is something that I was not expecting. I used to visit H Samuel for little stud earrings when I first got my ears pierced and wrongly associated it with just that. 
The service was very informative and I liked that the team member had enough confidence and product knowledge to give her own opinions. This was my favourite experience so far and we both left feeling really happy.
On to the next shop... Ernst Jones. My approach was delayed and the service I received was very minimal... I feel that even if my dream ring was there I would of thought twice about buying it as the experience and care was not what I expected...
We looked across the way and there was another H Samuel which was a lot larger than the other one so we popped in to take a look at the product range. We were greeted and given a warm welcome. The lady took us over to the wedding rings and asked lots of questions to try and see what it was that we wanted. She was full of suggestions and ideas and you could tell she really enjoyed her job and the products. We tried on a lot more rings on and finalised our ideals. The lady was really friendly and the whole process was a really happy experience.. I would recommend them to anyone looking for wedding rings as they really do cater for all budgets from the very small to premium and the personal touches can be introduced along the way.

When you are shopping for rings be sure to set your budget before you go and stick to it.. It is very easy to get caught up in the moment and over spend.
We had a 10 minute break after visiting each store to make sure that we discussing our options and had some time to reflect.
Consider what look you are going for, what metal your engagement ring is, what shape your engagement ring is and any engravings or personal touches you would like to add.
Have a look at each retailer on-line so that you have an idea of what each store stocks and the price ranges they cover.  
Do not panic if the ring you want in your mind doesn't look right in reality... I wanted a plain white gold band and ended up getting a completely different ring which is also the exact opposite to my fiancés. I would compare the feeling to wedding dress shopping... you will try on a ring, fall in love and then you will stop looking!! Just keep looking until you get that feeling.
Make a day out of ring shopping. It's a personal day and should just be about the two of you. 

Please share you wedding ring experience below. It would be lovely to hear a few more stories.

Have a nice day 

The Wedding Assistant x    
   

Activity - Save the dates <3 Glue and sewing thread at the ready!!

There are so many exciting ways to ask people to save the date. 
you can gather lots of inspiration from Pinterest and Google Images. Try searching for unique save the dates, DIY save the dates, hand made save the dates, spring wedding, Summer Wedding, Easter Wedding and so on.

When we had finalised the guest list and set the date, we ummed and ahhh'd on if we should spend money on save the dates or just not have them.

But with all the Excitement of the date being set and all of our friends and family wanting to know the date and have a tangible item to show that they were invited, we thought that save the dates where the way to go :)

I wanted Save the Dates that would fit in with our rustic / vintage theme but also be affordable. 
After a brainstorming session and a good browse through Ebay I decided on creating these.

Luggage tags £3.99 for 100 tags ebay 

Rubber Ink Stamp £16.50 ebay

We wrote all the information on the back to inform our guests of times and locations and saved money by sending them to our day guests. To post them we gave them out gradually as and when we visited people and we popped the rest into our family Christmas cards.

I love the little luggage tags and they are ideal for people to hang on notice boards and are a cheap and effective way of spreading the word.

You Don't even need to buy a rubber stamp. Just use your finger tips to create a heart that is unique to the two of you.

I discovered a few other ideas that I fell in love with whilst searching for ideas;

If your having a music themed wedding then how about getting some small badges personalised 

There are so many different creations you can try when you come away from the norm.

I also saw (which swooshed my creativity into a whirlwind) 

100 small fridge magnets for £3.49... you could sew, stick or make things to create unique save the date fridge magnets.

Over the next few days I am going to create a range of save the dates with templates and directions on how to create them.

Tomorrow I will be baking some save the dates and will post my results on Sunday

And over the next week or so I will be sewing some!!

keep a look out on Monday.

Let me know how you get on with your save the date creations and share your pictures!!

Have fun with your creativity.
The Wedding Assistant.