Blissed out

Handmade wedding party eye candy

Sorry it's taken me so long but I finally got the pictures from our wedding party.  I'm so pleased with them - I'm just gutted that I forgot to take a picture of the cupcake tower.  Cole and I made 100 cupcakes of different varieties and my lovely friend Mel made a load of mini carrot cake ones that we stacked in a tower and topped with edible glitter and fantastic cake toppers in the shapes of flowers, hearts and butterflies.  The whole thing looked fantastic but because we were soooooo ridiculously busy during the day, and I didn't want to put them out in the heat too early, I was still putting them out when people started arriving.  So I forgot to take a picture and had hoped Dad would have done but unfortunately he didn't either.  So that's my one regret - I'd try and recreate it (I know, very sad but I really have thought about it!) but the cake tower broke when John tried to dismantle it (prompting me to say between gritted teeth - 'I was going to put that on ebay') and the cake toppers were made for me and way beyond my sugarpaste skills (which are none!)

But I'm sure I'll survive without a pic and we have some fantastic memories of the night (and the cupcakes!) 

Here's the hall before we got too it - it felt pretty overwhelming in it's ugliness to be honest!


And here, stage by stage are the pop poms going up.



Add a few sets of net lights and a bit of ambient lighting and the place was starting to look transformed.

The table cloths are just paper/plastic ones bought cheap from the internet - I used stick on plastic table skirts to give the illusion of a long cloth. they looked ok but unfortunately had the texture of plastic baby pants!  Cole nicknamed them nappy table cloths!

I needed something cheap for table runners and found these reed beach mats on sale for £2 each.  Each one was 3 lengths sewn together so I un-picked them  and used them as individual runners.  Add some ikea candles in cheap drinking glasses  (you know, the 4 for 80p kind) and some ikea votives and  instant ambient lighting. 

I stuck more tissue paper flowers onto some sticky/reedy things in 40p stem vases and yet more tissue paper flowers on the tables.  As a final touch Cole scattered some love heart sweets on the tables which I thought looked really cute and must have gone down well because there wasn't one left at the end of the night!

It was a looooong day getting everything ready - we'd all been up at 7 and didn't leave the hall to get showered and changed until 5.30 and the party started at 7! 

But once it started it was fantastic.  We all had such a good time.

Cole and his friends ran around the place (literally -they just ran around and around the outside of the building!) like they were on drugs!  My brother had done some lovely food and John and I seemed to spend the whole night catching up, chatting and laughing. 

Oh yes, and here's the final version of the dress - I was really pleased with it in the end - and hardly anyone would believe it was my original white wedding dress.

It was so lovely that I didn't even have a drink all night - it wasn't intentional - I was just too busy having fun and kept leaving my glass on various tables before spotting someone else I hadn't had chance to speak to yet.

There was dancing (how brave am I posting that picture! and I swear - no alcohol was involved!) and at the end of the night the pom poms were pulled down, danced with, cheered with and given as souvenirs  to guests. 

It was such a fantastic night that I almost want to do it all again - so long as there's no tissue paper involved!

The Trouble With Tribbles

Do you remember that Star Trek episode (we're talking the original here) where the crew inherit some really cute little furry balls called Tribbles?  And really quickly the tribbles reproduce and the ships overrun with them?  Well, I had this fabulous idea that I'd make loads of tissue paper pom poms and flowers for our wedding party.  Only, our house now resembles the Starship Enterprise because everywhere you turn they're there.  On the dining room table...on the dresser...on the seatee...behind the seatee...under the bed...in piles next to the bed - Honestly, they're taking over my house!  Plus, I'm getting rather sick of making them (Oh that has to be the most restrained understatement of the year!)  Actually I'm getting completely pig sick of making them!  And if that wasn't enough, I've got several lovely friends coming round tomorrow to help me make more of the things! 

The pom poms do actually look pretty good - it's a bit of a headache wondering how exactly we're going to secure them to the ceiling of the hall as it's pretty darn high.  At the moment we're thinking some intricate stringing of fishing line across the ceiling.  But it could all end in tears.

I really want to thank everyone who took the time to respond to my wedding dress revamp.  I was absolutely amazed at the response - totally blown away and so flattered.  It  seems the monkey house suits me because the general consensus seemed to be that the dress is a hit.  I've been playing around with it a bit-making the flowers appear a bit more random and I'm toying with the end of losing the red ribbon/belt. 

I'm going to post a tutorial on how to make the flowers - I'll hopefully get round to it tomorrow (in between the tissue paper!)

I've been busy - honest

It's been a busy week and I've just come out of a very 'cocooning' period of not doing very much at all so it's taken it out of me a bit to be honest.

I had a lovely weekend last week at my gorgeous friends who've just moved to Heswall on the Wirral. Not only are they the kind of friends that are restorative to be around and make you feel as though everything you do is not only OK but absolutely wonderful, they also have the most beautiful house in the world.  It has tons of light coming in from a multitude of skylights, and has a fantastic view overlooking the river.  Oh, and they fed us really well!

We went for a lovely walk on Saturday and ate a whole load of cake. I'd taken some amended lemon cupcakes - thank you soooo much for the advice on frosting.  The full fat makes much better frosting than the low fat I'd been using. 

Cole and I experimented and came up with some berry cupcakes too - fluffier than the lemon with berries stirred into the batter.  I just need some ideas for frosting because neither the cream cheese or the butter cream seemed to work that well.  Answers on a postcard please as the kids TV presenters used to say!

We took about 20 over there only to find that my friend had made the most fabulous carrot cake.  I'm a woman who knows good cake (I don't think I ever met one I didn't love!) and believe me, this was good cake!  So suffice to say, I ate a LOT of cake over the weekend - the diet re-started on Monday as it was fairly well shot to pieces in the face of all that!  Still, what's life without being able to enjoy cake?

Then on Sunday evening I went to see Radiohead with another friend and it was fantastic.  I've not been to a concert in ages and was a bit worried that, although I love the band, it might be a bit dour.  It was also forcast for rain and an open air concert - now isn't that a sign of age?  Worried that it might rain?  But thankfully it didn't - in fact the sun came out and the atmosphere was so joyous and upbeat that we had the best time.

One of the best things about the weekend was that both my friend on the Wirral, and my friend I went to the concert with have had multiple miscarriages and either now have a baby or are well into their pregnancies.  And I found that so healing and hopeful.  I'm still struggling a bit at work with my colleague but it is getting easier - I'm not wincing as much every time her pregnancy's mentioned (although I do still feel like I'm some awful pariah foretelling doom and misery when I'm around. A bit anyway.)

We've got the invitations printed for our wedding party.  I love them and thought that a few little sequins would set them off really well (and give them that slightly home made look which, as you know, I always love!) I just need to get them posted out now.  And I've ordered lots of tissue paper to make tissue pom poms for the hall. 

I'm slightly concerned about lighting - how do you light a hall (and it's a very basic church hall) that, as far as I know, has no accent or ambient lighting? (it's florescent strip lights or nothing from memory)  We've not got a huge budget (it's rather teeny actually!) and I've thought of having fairy lights on the tables in bowls and some net fairy lights hung on the walls but will this give off enough light once it goes dark?  I'm really struggling with this one so any help or advice will be really gratefully received.

I'm off on a course this weekend so more busy, busy.  Who knows, I might actually get time to do some sewing or knitting soon (fingers crossed!)

Jo x

I Feel Like I Dropped Off The Side Of The Earth

I did say I was had some news didn't I? Well,  I've been slowing climbing back up the hill of happiness and taken a bit of a road trip along the way.  It's nice to be back on planet earth - I did feel like I'd fallen off there for a while.

And I don't just mean a metaphorical road trip - I really did take one.  John and I booked a couple of flights, hired a car and took off across California. 

And it was great.  We saw the most beautiful scenery imaginable - totally breathtakingly, jaw droppingly gorgeous.  We saw the pacific coast highway with fantastic cliffs and coastline, the stunning waterfalls and trees of Yosemite, the desert of death valley and a million other wonders.

What resonated with me most the vastness of the place and how long those mountains and trees and deserts have been there.

It was very healing in that 'life is so much bigger than me' sort of way.  It made me think of how many women had lived, married, had babies, lost and loved and carried on  - just like me.

John was fantastic and did all of the driving but it's not like driving in the UK where you're on a motorway for hours (Usually stuck in traffic to boot!) with very little to see outside.  We were passing fantastic views almost all the time and don't think we got stuck in traffic once.  In fact, in lots of places (particularly in the mountains and the desert) we went for ages without seeing another car. Yes, we did a LOT of miles (I think one day alone we did nearly 600)We spent most of our time in the car but it was really comfortable and just nice spending that much time together, feeling like we're on some big adventure.

 

And while we were over there we popped across death valley and stopped in Las Vegas.  And as there are  3 things you really should to do in Vegas - eat lots, gamble and get married - we decided to go with the latter!

It was very spontaneous and last minute and it was the best fun ever.  John and I had such a lovely day.  Despite (or maybe) because we didn't have a lot of time to choose outfits (I spent a morning in San Francisco finding a dress) and in the end I went with a really simple cotton sun dress from JCrew.  As I knew the day before we left that it was a possibility we'd be getting married, I did take with me some vintage pearls I'd found second hand and a headband I'd wire wrapped with refashioned vintage pearls.

The wedding chapel (Little Chapel Of The Flowers- I can highly recommend it) had a live web cam so our families were able to watch it back home (sat drinking champagne) and then called us afterwards with congratulations.  And even though the wedding chapel must do 25+ weddings per day they still managed to make us feel special and as if we were the only people that mattered (and we even got the listen to Elvis doing the wedding ahead of us!)

It was exciting, and special and a we had a blast!  I'm so glad we did it and it felt like we were making something nice from what had been a horrible situation.  I was glad I wasn't sat at home in Stockport, missing my little boy who was off on holiday with his Dad for the week, thinking 'I should have been getting married this week.' (Not to mention I thought I'd be showing a nice baby bump by now.) Instead I was driving across California and getting married to the love of my life.  So there is my news - I'm now a Mrs!  I've still got to organize a party for our family and friends and next week I've got to face going back to work (finding that idea a bit of a struggle still.)  But for now I'm just trying to enjoy the feeling of being a newlywed and trying to get used to the idea of having a new name - it feels very strange at the moment - how long do these things take - come on, I know there are lots of gorgeous married ladies out there - help me out on this one (and don't even get me started on signing - I spent an hour on our wedding day practicing it and it still hasn't stuck!)

So I'm sorry I've been quiet of late and I've not been making much but I've had a good excuse - and I'm already planning all the things I'm going to start making next so I'll have lots to show very soon - promise!

Jo xx