Decorating with Wedding Decorations

So after our wedding, we had a lot of mason jars and random vases and candle holders left over that I had collected from different antique stores. 

Here are a few I had laid out when I first started collecting:

And here are what they looked like as the centerpieces at the wedding:

But anyways, I didn’t want to get rid of all of them yet.  After all, they were sentimental pieces left over from our wedding…  So, I decided to use some of them to decorate our bathrooms.  Both of our bathrooms have the same color scheme, which went along great with the clear, blue, and yellow colors of our vases.

We had a lot to choose from, so I just picked out our favorites. 

We received a bathroom wall shelf as one of our wedding presents, so it needed some love.  And, in the other bathroom, I made a shelf out of crates and it definitely needed some accessories too. 

Here is a picture of the bathroom wall shelf all decorated out:

And here is a picture of the shelf I made out of crates with all of our wedding centerpieces:

*I am so sorry I don't know how to rotate these.  :(  Please help.  My saved pictures are rotated, but I can't figure out how to do it on here.*

But anyways, I think they fit in nicely with the look and colors of both our bathrooms.  What do you think?  Have you kept sentimental pieces left over from your wedding and used them to decorate with?  Or did you not keep anything from the wedding besides pictures?

Our Wedding

So I know one of my New Year Resolutions was to blog more and I haven’t been keeping it, but I have a pretty valid excuse...  I got married on January 14, 2012!!  The wedding was just perfect!!  I have been stressing and working very hard about planning this wedding for about a year now and it was so wonderful to see it all come together exactly how I wanted it!!

Here are some pictures I wanted to share with you all:

This is our first reveal.

This is our wedding party. 

Here are some of the details of our décor.

I went antiquing to collect all of the mason jars and other vases and candle holders on all of the tables.  On Style Me Pretty, I saw another wedding had tied their napkins into bow ties and I had to do that for my own wedding.  And for the table numbers, I wanted to do, “When Chris was 1, he did….”  But it was going to require some research to figure out stuff we liked when we were younger, so I did places that are meaningful to us instead as the table names.  However, none of this would have come together without the help of our lovely wedding coordinator Mary at Bringing It Together!  She is amazing and beyond helpful!!

Here is the head table.

And here is my favorite detail of all, the cake toppers!

As you can see from the head table and the cake toppers, it was really important to us to incorporate the puppies into the wedding since both venues did not allow fur babies.  I am so in love with those cake toppers!!  They turned out to look exactly like us and the puppies!  You can get one here. 

You can see more pictures on our lovely photographer’s blog here.  And in case you were wondering, our photographer was D Coleman Photography!  David and Sarah are just wonderful to work with and take beautiful photographs! 

What do you all think?  Did you or will you make a lot of the décor elements involved in your wedding?  Or did you rent all the décor?

New Year, New Resolutions

So after a long hiatus, I am back.  And I have some major goals for this year!  You always hear that writing your goals down makes you more likely to achieve them, so here we go:

Personal Goals:

Walk the dogs at least once a day… even when it’s cold out.  Like blogging, when life gets busy, I run out of time to take the pups for a walk, especially since it gets dark so early and its cold out.  They don’t seem to mind, but I would feel better if they got to go for more walks. 

Make my bed every day.  I had this goal a few years ago and I did it for about a year, but then got out of the habit of it.  Something about walking into a room with a made bed and going to sleep in a bed that is made just makes your life so much more peaceful.  I want this peacefulness back. 

Be a better blogger.  I am going to post 2-3 times a week.  I enjoy reading other people’s blogs; in fact, some people, I look forward to their posts:  Young House Love , Bower Power , and Serendipity’s Guide to Savings .  Hopefully, once I become a better blogger, other people will like reading my blog as well. 

Workout at least 3-4 hours a week.  I used to work out for an hour a day and I used to train for a marathon.  I do not expect to get back to running 50 miles a week, I am way too busy for that, but I would like to feel better about myself and feel healthier, so I think 3-4 hours a week is a good starting point for that.

Read at least 6 books.  I love reading, but due to wedding planning, graduate school, and two puppies, my leisure reading has vanished.  I want to start reading again.  I have a to read list that is miles long and would love to tackle this.  Six books won’t even make a dent in my to read list, but it is realistic and will hopefully get the ball rolling for more leisure reading. 

Financial Goals:

Keep saving for my car.  Last year, I found out that my parents will not let me trade in the car they bought for me in high school; they are going to be keeping it.  Needless to say, that really hurt my plans of purchasing a new car.  I was banking on that $6,000 trade in value to put towards my new car.  So now I am putting away $200 a month to be able to put down a significant down payment.

Save an extra $1,000 in 6 months.  I think I will try to accomplish this by being more frugal and selling a bunch of stuff I no longer need.  In 2011, I spent a lot of towards our wedding and on unnecessary things because I had my first job that actually paid a decent amount.  This year, I would like to focus more on savings for our new house and our future. 

Wedding Countdown

So our wedding is in 6 months...  That terrifies me!  We still have so much to do and to do lists galore.  It actually makes my stomach sick.  It would actually be quicker to tell you what we do have than what we do not.  :S

We have:  a ceremony location, a reception location, a wedding coordinator, a photographer, a few half completed DIY decorations, half the centerpieces, half the bridal party gifts, and a honeymoon.  Additionally, I have an idea of how I want basically everything; I just have not had the time to sit down and actually do all the DIY projects and/or hire the vendors.

That's it...  Right now, I am taking a class, so I do not have a lot of extra time to work on wedding planning.  However, once this class is over on August 6, I am going to start kicking wedding planning butt.  That's my plan!  But I need some goals to motivate me, so by this time next month, I want to have all of this done:

Find an officiant.
Complete guest list.
Order invitations.
Add embellishments to invitations.
Complete all DIY decorations for ceremony.
Find cater.
Register for gifts.

That sounds reasonable on paper...  Now to just get down to business. 

Can you believe all the little decisions involved with plannig a wedding?  What tips do you have for me on planning a wedding?  Have you been to a wedding lately and they had some neat idea you have never saw before? 

Homework

So I am currently taking an online course this summer.  As much as I hate online classes, this one is about a topic I am interested in, entrepreneurship communication.  As a part of the final project, we are interviewing social entrepreneurs about their entrepreneurship.  I am very excited about getting to interview them because one day I would love to have my own entrepreneurship.  The two social entrepreneurships I am interviewing are Blessings in a Backpack and Connecticut Food Bank.  They both are doing wonderful things in their communities and both have a backpack program.  If you have not heard about a backpack program it is a program created to help feed children whose families cannot afford to feed them on the weekends or during summer.  I really like this type of philanthropy because I hate to see anyone go without food, but it is very important for many reasons for children to get the food they need.  I can't imagine going to school because it is the only place I know I will get a meal or being able to focus with a growling stomach because I missed dinner and breakfast at home.  It is extremely important right now for these organizations to receive help because it is summer and the children are not in school, but they still need to eat. 

Do you guys have a philanthropy that is close to your heart?  Do you have dreams of starting your own entrepreneurship? 

Stella and Dot Fall Collection is Here!!

So besides working full time, going to graduate school part time, and planning a wedding, I am a stylist for Stella and Dot.  What is that, you have never heard of Stella and Dot!?  Well, S&D is an affordable, couture jewelry line that is sold at in home trunk shows.  Several celebrities have been spotted wearing it and it has really taken off in the last few years.  I LOVE the jewelry!  It is always right on trend with the fashions on the runway.  And yesterday, they released their fall line!  I have to say this launch is probably my favorite launch yet!  Everything is so stylish and on trend with the tribal jewelry feel!  I am having a hard time selecting what pieces to purchase for my samples for trunk shows.  Here are my favorites though: 

 Love the turquoise color of the necklace!  What a great statement piece!

What a fun layering bracelet!

I have a weakness for earrings!

This is a great cocktail ring that will match everything!

What do you all think of my favorites?  You can see the full collection and shop for yourself here.  What is your favorite pieces from the new fall line?

Great Find!

We just moved in May, so our apartment still has rooms that need finishing touches or rooms that need to be started.   I have decided I am going to start room by room and finish decorating the place, so when we are married it feels like a home.  I wanted to start with the guest bathroom first; basically, it has a shower curtain and the rest needs to be decorated, but it is one of the smallest rooms so it is not that intimidating. 

However, this past Fourth of July weekend, I found the perfect lamps for our bedroom that were too good of a deal to pass up.  First of all, our bedroom is another one of those rooms that pretty much needs to be started.  It has furniture and a bed set, but that’s it.  These lamps for our night stands match the bed great!

Kirklands is one of my favorite home décor stores because everything is priced well and they have lots of sales.  Nothing makes me happier than a good deal!  These lamps were priced $29.99 each.  However, that weekend they had a sale for 25% off the lamps.  On top of that, I had a coupon for $5 off your purchase of $20 or more.  To break it down

2 Lamps Originally @          $29.99   $59.98

Marked down to                  $19.99   $39.98

25% discount                        -$5.00  -$10.00

Coupon                                  -$5.00   -$5.00   

Grand Total                             $24.98 + tax

I love my new lamps, but I love them even more since I got them for such a steal!  What do you guys think?  Do they look great with the bedset?  Have you got any great deals lately that you are proud of?  Does finding a great deal make you as excited as me?