50th Birthday done in great taste!

In the Fall of 2013 we were invited to a close friends Birthday on the central coast of California.
Peter was turning 50 and his wife Corrinne wanted to go all out for him, and she sure did!  She spent about a year planning, organizing, making phone calls and reservations.  She pulled me in to help design a special table setting for his big Birthday dinner!    It was such a great weekend!  We spent it with old friends and new ones.
We started out by driving about 3 hours north up the 101 to Los Alamos a tiny quaint town.  If you blink you'll pass the one and only exit they have.  The one road into town is lined with antique stores full of fun and old curiosities,  and the mom and pop shops are trued gems!   We had enough people to rent the entire Union Hotel.   http://www.unionhotelvictmansion.com/index.htm     Once we arrived ahead of the birthday boy we unloaded all of our stuff, drinks, decor, and personal belongings.  We hung wanted posters of the Birthday boy in the lobby and bar.   This Hotel is like walking back in time.  You really get a a sense of what it must of been like back in the cowboy days.

Corrinne was so sweet to put on every bed a thank you gift and an itinerary for the next day.  That first night we spent at the hotel, settling in and waiting for everyone to arrive from Orange county.   Being in wine country there was no shortage there.  The wine and whiskey were flowing. 

Saturday morning we woke up early and boarded the limo bus to Paso Robles.  The mecca of wine country.   It was a day filled with wine tasting, beautiful scenery and great friends!    All of the winery's knew we were coming and accommodated our group.   We were treated like stars, by the stars.  Literally.  One of the wineries is owned by Gary Conway. 

 http://www.carmodymcknight.com/more-information/11/ 

We were greeted by him and his beautiful wife Marian.  Who hand passed her homemade crustless quiche that was delicious I must say!   After enjoying the tasting of their extensive organic wine collection we were shown to tables next to the lake where we were served an amazing catered lunch.   The warm hospitality from Gary and Mariam was something I'll never forget!  And yes, im now on a first name basis with them..lol 

After a long day we drove back to our hotel where we changed into our costumes and went out on the patio where I had set one long table for all, with florals per Corrinne's request.   Being the bling kind of gal, Corrinne is,  I loaded the table with crystal jewels, and cut crystal votives.  I submerged crystals in water that hung from the bottom of a mixed floral arrangement that sat on top of glass cylinders. 

Staying with the winery feel and romance of the old west, I used blood red roses, burgundy dahlias, antique red hydrangea and dusty miller.  I laid a generous amount of deep red rose petals down the length of the table and nestled in rose heads in the mix.   Then lots and lots of candle light to dine with.  The food was absolutely amazing!  Steak, potatoes, salad, it was plate lick-en good!   Dinning with everyone in their costumes by candle light made it feel like we had gone back in time and we were sitting with the men from tombstone!
Thank you Corrinne and Pete for inviting and including us on this memorable day! 

"I'll be your huckleberry"  ;)

Place cards

  place card tables! This area of your wedding is often over looked by most brides.  It is one of my favorite areas of a wedding, you can can have fun, be creative and show your personal uniqueness of you, the bride and groom as a couple.

Depending on ones budget, the sky is the limit.  Most brides these days are still conservative especially in this area, it is a table your guest will only be at for a about 10 min to linger, look for their name and move on.

Lets start with typical place cars, Tent cards, folded in alphabetical order on the table.   Word for the wise is you can put your names on the card by couple or family.  You can imagine if your guest count is 200 plus, you end up with a lot of cards on the table it looks squished or even worse you run out of room. Also most couples assign them to table, not by chair.  Save your self even more of a headache and assign them to just the table.

Below is a picture of a typical place card table.

Nice florals in the middle with the cards all lined up.

Suggestion for linning them up to, start in the middle and work out, that way its even on both sides, or expect it to take about a hour to line then up.  Its a pet peeve of mine to see the cards laid out then, empty on the right side... and also your coordinator is the one to lay out your place cards.   If we are all done with setting up your florals and I see the cards are looking "off" I'lll jump in and make sure they are nice, even and strait.  :)

The photo below is florals form Green Leaf Designs is  $50.00        

Table's for place cards -rectangle 6 foot tables are standard, or you can use a round like this picture.

Flowers in the center and cards laid out in a sun burst pattern.  This I like a lot, you don't see it too often. I like it because your guest can walk all the way around the table, and not be crammed trying to find their names.  Florals on this round table from us is $120.00

Now on to more unique fun place cards designs :)

This past year we have done a lot of work with CCL Wedding and special Events.  What a wonderful coordinator to work with!  

cclweddings.com/

Working with Catherine the owner and creator of CCL,  she came up with some fun idea for displaying cards.  Like the picture to the left.  We did a square arch, or structure with fabric curtain style.  A chandelier was hung in the middle with strands of crystals flanking with the place card for each guest attached down the stands of crystals.  It was pretty and different, Really fun to do! 

Another design with CCL is this again an arch fabric curtain style chandelier again, but this time you can see the names were on paster board and in frames on easels.  Wow, so simple and so stunning! I LOVED this one! Both of these designs run in the $200.00 price range.

Below is a manzanita branch display.  The place cards were broken up into 3 groups to hang from the branches. We placed frames in front of each pieces breaking down the alphabet for guest to find their names faster. Like A-H   I-Q  R-Z.  Loved the skeleton key attached to the card.  This couple did use one card per couple and used a gem to indicate their meal. youk now beef, chicken, what not.  :) 

Another CCL design. We had nothing to do with this one, but we added florals around her lanterns.

It was so cute I had to share! 2 old rustic ladders, string and attached the cards with small cloths lines pins, and viola! Super cute rustic place card display, now go rummage threw grandpas garage and find some ladders, who else know what you can find in there!  And remember Green Leaf Designs likes to barter!   You  might also find old window panes in there too.  Use a sharpie to write your guests names on, really cute and rustic. ours go for $20.00 each and if we are not using them you can take ours to write on 2 weeks before the wedding. 

Having a beach wedding?  Use our place cars box, it fits perfectly on a 6 foot table.  We will fill it with sand, drift wood, cylinders floating candles and florals to match your wedding, and you have an instant beachey feel for your place cards. $75.00 

Simple and pretty petals down the rows of place cards.  $30.00.  So simple but I still love this older idea.  Who doesn't love a bed a red romantic rose petals?    This couple had their wedding at Rancho Las Lomas.  For those of you that don't know its a very upscale venue with their own zoo for your guest to walk and amongst.  They had their invitation maker make and match the pace cards to the animals there at Rancho Las Lomas. Really cute idea! 

So now you can see some traditional, and non traditional ideas for your place cards.  Don't forget this table, it can be as a low as $30.00 or up to $200plus.   So many ideas, so much can be done. Im always looking for new fun way to show off the cards too.  Keep your eyes open too, who knows where you can get inspiration from! 

Working with your venue

So last summer we had the pleasure of doing a wedding for Tiffany and Nathan.
I wanted to blog about this one because I really think they nailed it!  Like most people they were budget conscience but still really wanted a gorgeous wedding. They came in about 6 month prior to their big day where we went over all the details and came up with a plan.
Tiffany had already bought her centerpiece containers from TJMAX,  they were white ceramic pitchers of all different shaped and sizes. Don't worry about them not matching, you don't want everything to be matchy matchy anyway.  This gives your table's a little more character.  Plus all the tables had rope knot type balls on every table to act as the table flag "number"  stands.  Super cute!  And each table had candles with shells. Doing this pulled them all together.

I really love how they worked with their venue.  Playing off the look and feel.  The wedding took place at a beautiful church literally across the street from the reception, And the reception was at the Newport harbor Yacht club.  Im not sure if you need to be a member here or not but if you do want your wedding at a club don't think you have to be a member to have it there.  A lot of clubs will let the public rent out the ballrooms.
The club its self here is really cute!  Its location is on the Balboa Peninsula.  The building is from the 1950's with a great beach bungalow architecture.  Dark blue carpet, brown wooden walls with white trim, crown moulding and white frame windows.  So with this being the colors of the venue this is what Tiffany and I decided on for her wedding colors.  Navy blue, white, and we added some yellow for some summer fun!
So with Tiffany buying her own containers and us filling them with wild field type flowers as a pretty base then adding just a couple garden roses and white hydrangea her centerpieces ended up being really inexpensive! Roughly about $40.00 each!  And with the wedding being a day time wedding, I know they got a big discount for that as well.

So in the end I say work with your venue, try to tie in the colors at least, working with it it really will help the over all look and feel of your wedding to be more classy and elegant.  You don't have to follow the theme, if you like it then sure but at least try to match the colors.

Happy wedding planning~

Super preppy and cute wedding party

Darling flower girl and ring bearer

Brides maids bouquets

Groom

Table labels.  I love this they used nautical flags to "number there tables"  So cleaver! 

So find your name and your table

Flowers were wild field flowers mixed with garden roses and hydrangea

I just love all their nautical flags and trophies 

The guys cruisen up to dock

Don't they look like an add... J Crew? 

I love this style of photography

And the classic feet shot 

Yummy cake! 

Im so in love with these invitations, I love how they carried the entire look of the wedding from the start.  From when the guest first received their invites they had a peek of what was to come.

Over the threshold

And into the sunset 

And the Nike Us open of surfing is closed.  We were honored again to be apart of this years contests. 

 Favorite local band of course is Hindu Pirates

 Me and Kendra

 Me and my little brother

 Signing of the winners check~

 Me, Erika and Melody

 Enjoying the last day,