The Finished Product! (Part 2)

That said, I wouldn't mind doing it for someone else! It is a job that encompasses everything I love!

The Finished Product!

Well it's all over and I definitely learned a few things. Such as the planning gets less and less fun as you go along. That it's twice as much time, money and stress as you think it will be. That in the month or so before you'll just want it to be over, and a couple of things will absolutely go wrong. But I'm definitely happy with how it turned out, and even happier being married. Some photographic evidence of all my (our) hard work!

Floating Carnation Test

I had a feeling that the amazing florist who was working up an estimate for me was going to come back with an amount several times higher than my budget. And she did. About 5 x my budget. While I would love to spend lots of money on flowers (I really would, I am so into flowers that I still think about becoming a florist AT LEAST once a week!) it's just not in the cards for this wedding. And part of the reason I wanted to do a garden wedding was to avoid spending a ton on flowers.

So I may see if she wants to just work on the personal flowers instead and over the weekend I visited a local florist/ nursery in Malibu to see if they could order me carnations in bulk/ wholesale prices, which I could then make garlands out of of and scatter in the pool and on the lawn myself - enlisting friends and family to help of course which would save money and add to the feel I want of us really hosting this wedding and making it fun and collaborative.

The local florist was very helpful, and while I'm still waiting on a price, she did give me a great suggestion: do a flotation test first. She said sometimes when you see flowers floating in pools they're attached to leaves to ensure they'll float, and wouldn't it be awful to try it on the day and they all sink?

So I bought some hot pink carnations last night so I could do a test. The florist suggested pulling them open a bit so they were as wide as possible, and that turned out to be SUCH a great tip! I found that no matter what length you snip off the stem - really close or leaving on an inch or two - they float perfectly if you just pull them open a bit first.

See photos of my test below, I'm loving the combination of hot pink and turquoise!

Balinese Temple Umbrellas

Speaking of Balinese Temple Umbrellas, I don't know if I've said this before but I love them.  We used to have one in my house growing up, and I want one for our apartment now (especially since we have 25 foot ceilings in our living room!).  I found a place in Downtown LA that sells them (Sweet Smiling Home) and they're quite reasonable.  I just re-found this photo from my inspiration collection and it reminded me - they would make excellent framing for the ceremony, no?  See below from a wedding set up in Bali.  Something to keep in mind...  

Vision... crystallizing

The venue stuff has gotten über-stressful.  I'm sure it will work itself out in the next week or so, but in the meantime, I thought I'd focus on the fun stuff for a little while!

I've blogged about lots of different styles, and things that I like, but my vision has really crystalized over the past few months and so I thought I would have a go at defining it again, using words and images, some I've already posted, some new, to try to convey my vision.  Who knows if I'll be able to make all of this actually happen, but here's what I'd really love to do.

I want a large green lawn.  Funnily enough this is the one thing I actually will not budge on. Everything else, I will compromise if I have to, but I must have grass underfoot.  So yeah, a large green lawn, ideally with a city or ocean view.  Ideally also adjacent to a pool, which I could then border with candles - either tall plain white novena candles per the below or small tea-lights in cobalt blue glasses.   

There will be no sit down dinner, so no tables and chairs.  Instead scattered Moroccan leather ottomans in bright pink, orange, turquoise, silver and gold as well as maybe the occasional simple rectangular wooden benches with white leather cushions for some sturdier seating options.  Tall "novena" candles everywhere.  I'm talking everywhere, likely hundreds - luckily they're only 99c each! (Not only are they really cheap, they're extremely long lasting, pretty safe as far as candles go and beautiful, what more could you ask for in a candle?!).

Maybe some Indian style flower wreaths draped here and there of yellow, orange and pink carnations.  The same color combination of carnations floating in the pool.  Andy likes the idea of floating candles also, so I'm researching and trying to find ones that aren't plastic-y & tacky (easier said than done).  Maybe strands of simple round white paper lanterns hung from here to there?  

Brass Moroccan tray tables laden with aforementioned candles, big full single flowers in Moroccan tea glasses, scatterings of - yes again - colorful  carnations (in keeping with my theme as well as being cheap!), as well as maybe the occasional lemons and limes (sounds weird but when done well it looks great).  

Oversized Moroccan lanterns filled with glimmering candles.  One or two brightly colored Balinese temple umbrellas, and maybe even some Moroccan rugs scattered about picnic style with cushions for people to lounge on?  Or will people not lounge because it's not that kind of event and they're not dressed for lounging?  I'm thinking of making the dress code "comfortable glam" which should help?

If I had to pick two colors.. (which all the experts 

say you must do) well, I couldn't.  But I could maybe pick three - turquoise, pink and orange - but then I'd have to add in hints of green (the grass), white (because I love how clean and fresh white is),  as well as touches of gold and silver (cos I love me some sparkle), oh yeah and cobalt blue, red... the list goes on!

So basically we're going for festive, bright, fun and casual.  Not very wedding-y really is it?  But it seems "us" and that's the important thing, right?!  Hopefully it will look lush and eclectic and gorgeous, not amateurish, but we'll just have to see!