2012 Wedding Colors ~~ Winter Weddings 101

Maybe you weren’t quick enough to lock in a June wedding date, or maybe you just want to do something a little different from the rest of the pack. The colors of winter are deeper and richer, allowing you greater latitude than spring and summer brides, who traditionally stick with tried and true pastels. Here are a passel of winter themes and ideas to help you plan a spectacular winter wedding, starting with holiday themes and spanning through the most romantic of holidays—St. Valentine’s Day.
Winter weddings lend themselves to sparkle and glitz against rich, jewel-toned colors. Wedding invitations imprinted inside holiday or winter greeting cards present an alternative to the usual ivory engraved wedding invitations. You can serve non-traditional beverages such as hot mulled cider, hot buttered rum, etc., and you can probably get a discount on your favorite venue for any date except a Christmas week wedding if you reserve six to eight months in advance.

Christmas wedding
Add your Christmas wedding to next year’s Christmas calendar now to ensure that the busiest holiday schedule replete with festivities can accommodate your holiday wedding. Plan your wedding around silver, gold, ruby, emerald, amethyst, and sapphire—the jewel tones. Use rich fabrics such as velvet, satin and silk. Add brocade bows for a festive touch.

Set the mood for a Christmas wedding reception
Select a wedding hall with large gold mirrors, a fireplace and a wide curved staircase. The entire venue will glisten with holiday decorations, and the decorations will complement your own decorations.

Christmas wedding bouquet and floral displays
Give poinsettias and amaryllis the spotlight during your Christmas wedding and reception. Add white roses, gardenias, and lilies as accents, and fill in with eucalyptus, pine cones, holly, evergreen and nandina. Surround your guests with the scent of eucalyptus and pine. Small poinsettias surrounded by pine branches sprayed with snow as table centerpieces encourage your guests to talk to one another without having to lean around the centerpiece.

Christmas wedding favor ideas
• Gold or silver bell with an emerald satin ribbon
• Miniature silver salt and pepper shakers
• Gold heart-shaped basket with Christmas potpourri
• Miniature gold or silvers bells – guests can hang these on their Christmas trees at home
• One gold and one silver candy cane tied together with one green and one red intertwined ribbon.

Winter Wonderland wedding
If you prefer a non-religious wedding theme, the winter wonderland theme offers some of the options of the Christmas theme and introduces new options into the mix. Silver, sky blue and white simulate a cold, snowy winter day and offer many options for accent colors. If your wedding is an evening ceremony, consider a color scheme of midnight blue with gold accents to simulate the clear night sky and twinkling stars.

 

Winter Wonderland wedding bouquet and floral displays
Replace the traditional floral display for the reception buffet table with an ice sculpture surrounded by pine branches with pinecones and evergreen branches with berries. Spray the pinecones gold or silver and add a huge gold or silver metallic bow. Use winter foliage and branches in place of delicate baby’s breath for greenery, and use masses of large, white flowers such as amaryllis tinged with yellow, pure white lilies with a hint of yellow center and white hydrangeas. Oversized white flowers with a touch of accent color work particularly well against a backdrop of winter branches and foliage. As an alternative to floral centerpieces, small sleigh ice sculptures amid winter branches, foliage and snow add seasonal authenticity to your reception tables. Huge white magnolia blossoms floating in water in crystal bowls offer yet another dramatic alternative. Magnolia leaves painted with gold paint add to the drama.

Winter Wonderland wedding favor ideas
• Crystal bell
• Star-shaped white tealight candles
• Miniature silver champagne bucket filled with candies
• Antique miniature boxes filled with pine-scented potpourri

Valentine’s Day wedding
If you’re getting married on the most romantic day of the year, your wedding calls for a red and white color scheme: roses, roses, and more roses everywhere! You can play up the hearts theme in a number of ways from a stacked heart-shaped cake to heart-shaped tealight candles adding a twinkle to the centerpieces. Anything heart-shaped or red and white add to the overall ambience of a wedding on this special day. Wear a Swarovski Austrian heart crystal around your neck, and top your bridal gown with a white shawl fringed in simulated white fur to complete your bridal ensemble.

Valentine’s Day wedding bouquet and floral displays
Bi-colored red and white roses with either color as the predominant color add variety to the bridal bouquet and floral arrangements. Complement the variegated look of the bi-colored roses with variegated greenery. If you use other flowers, you’ll want to make sure that they are a true red, not the orange-red that’s more common in flowers. Consider small arrangements of clear and red crystal roses in crystal vases with crystal marbles as your table centerpieces.

Valentine’s Day wedding favor ideas
• Antique silver heart keepsake box
• Chocolate kisses in a red or white mesh bag, tied with a red ribbon.
• White chocolate truffles
• Heart-shaped ornament – your guests can use it on the Christmas tree next year
• Single long-stemmed red rose.
Winter offers many opportunities for unusual wedding ideas. There are few opportunities to attend formal occasions between the New Year and Valentine’s Day. If you’re having trouble setting a winter date, consider setting your date during the winter lull. Your guests will remember the highlight of the winter season for many years to come—and so will you.

 

It’s Theme Time Again!! – The Halloween Wedding

What could possibly be more fun than planning a Halloween themed wedding? Keep in mind that a Halloween themed wedding does not have to be held on Halloween. You can have the ceremony the weekend before or the weekend after. The best thing about planning a spooktacular wedding is all the fun choices available for planning your wedding. Here are just a few fun tips for getting you Halloween wedding planning started.

• First decide how far you want to go with the Halloween theme. You can either go all out with all the Halloween trimmings, such as jack-o’-lanterns, bubbling cauldrons and costumes or you can have an elegant Harvest wedding with beautiful fall colors, pumpkin, gourds and leafy décor.

• Selecting your color scheme allows for many choices. Of course black and orange is one choice but you can also use red, yellow, copper or green, the options are endless. Have your groom and his attendants wear black tuxedos with tails to add mystery to their attire. Your bridesmaids can wear black and carry blood red roses for their bouquets. Brides should look for gothic style wedding dress with long flowing sleeves and tight bodices.

• For a dramatic Halloween centerpiece you could use wrought iron candelabras or Black Mini Lantern Tea Light Candle Holders with small gourds and pumpkins around the base. If you want to keep the mood truly Halloween add spider weds with plastic spiders to your centerpieces. Pumpkins are my favorite and they are very versatile. Buy some small pumpkins and stencils and carve your table numbers into the pumpkins.

• Everyone associates Halloween with candy, so a candy buffet is a must. Use all the fun candies of the season such as candy corn and taffy. You could also include caramel apples and sugar cookie cut-outs shaped as ghost and pumpkins. Don’t forget to add dry ice to the punch bowl to add the bubbling cauldron effect.

• Now it’s time to get into your scary groove. Have your DJ play plenty of fun Halloween songs through-out the evening like Monster Mash and Thriller. The sound track from the movie The Nightmare before Christmas also has some great music for a Halloween themed wedding.

Halloween is the holiday that allows us to be anything we want to be, so make you Halloween themed wedding the wedding of a lifetime. A Halloween wedding is a wedding that won’t soon be forgotten.

It’s Theme Time Again!! – The Rustic Country Wedding

Rustic wedding themes are about using earthy colors, natural elements and the natural environment. Rustic receptions can be casual and warm or elegant and classy. When planning a rustic reception, the setting is the most important, followed by small touches like hanging lanterns for romantic lighting and twigs or branches included in centerpieces. Rustic ideas can come from primitive or Americana crafts as well, such as ivy and distressed wood decor.

Rustic Colors and Favors

• Rustic or country colors are deep reds, burnt orange, yellow, browns, beige and greens. Include wedding theme colors in the reception decorations and even wedding favors. Wrap gingham ribbon in orange and yellow or red and beige around clear cube favor boxes filled with candy, or around cardboard boxes filled with flavored popcorn.

Reception Setting Ideas

• A rustic reception should be at places that have the old, country atmosphere. Some of these places can be old boat houses, fishing or hunting lodges, ski resort lodges, rustic barns, horse ranches or vineyards. TheLittleNell.com in Aspen, Colorado, features breathtaking views of the Rocky Mountains, at an elevation of 11,212 feet. After the ceremony, you can host a rustic wedding reception at the Aspen Mountain Club, where pine wood paneling, warm stone fireplaces, antique Austrian tables and hand-woven needlepoint rugs provide a country and cozy setting.

Wedding Cake Ideas

• A rustic wedding cake can feature country details such as maple leaves instead of flowers. The wedding cake can be the traditional butter cream filling and fondant icing, but the leaves can be in red, green, and orange in fall colors to mimic falling maple leaves. Add tan and red berry details on the bottom and throughout the cake, inspired by primitive country home decor. For a cake topper, use a dark red, primitive star instead of a monogram. The cake topper can be edible or a distressed metal piece.

Sunflowers

• Sunflowers are common in rustic weddings, because they are rich in color and reflect the landscape. They can be used to decorate both the ceremony and reception. For reception tables, place them in clear glass vases or large Mason jars with a deep red ribbon around the top of the jars. You can add other flowers in with them, such as black-eyed Susans.

Fall Leaves

• Like sunflowers, fall leaves are a versatile decoration that can be used for both the ceremony and reception. Consider mixing small autumn leaves with flower petals in the flower girl’s basket. For a reception centerpiece, fill a shallow crystal platter with autumn leaves, and add gold and red candles as a finishing touch. If you’re concerned about the leaves catching on fire, consider using silk leaves instead of real ones. If the venue will not allow the use of lit candles, consider investing in flame-less candles, available at most retailers.

Twinkle Lights

• Tents and barns are logical venues for rustic weddings. Dress the location up with white twinkle lights around the edges of the rafters, or drape them from the ceiling of the tent.

Harvest Garlands

• Use harvest garlands to decorate a rustic wedding. These can be made from artificial vegetables and gourds, or you can make them yourself using real ones. If specific areas will be roped off during the ceremony, such as the ends of the aisles, consider using a harvest garland instead of rope or ribbon.

Bales of Hay

• If you want an extremely rustic country wedding, incorporate bales of hay into both the ceremony and reception. You might place two bales at the end of the aisle where the wedding ceremony will take place, or set them next to the buffet tables during the reception.

Colored Aisle Runner

• Although aisle runners are traditionally white, you can use an earth-toned color for a rustic wedding. Consider a deep red or yellow runner for the ceremony to reflect both the theme and the landscape.

8 Great Fall Wedding Ideas

Fall is a very popular time for weddings. primarily because of the weather and that nature masterfully weaves its color palette into stunning displays of oranges, yellows, reds and browns. It’s natures best color coordinated season of the year. Brides simply love this season and here are some great ideas to accentuate your fall wedding planning.

1) Location
Make sure that wherever you host your wedding, that it’s somewhere that is accented by the natural beauty of the season. A quiet Victorian style church surrounded by trees in their fall colors makes for some incredibly brilliant wedding photo opportunities. Mountain settings are simply stunning if you can get your location reserved before that other bride does!

2) Set the Tone
It’s good to plan ahead and make your guests aware of your fall themed wedding in advance. This may help to steer them in their choice of fashion accessories such as maple leaf broaches or autumn color handkerchiefs. Set the pace by sending our leaf save the date cards or wedding invitations with a fall or autumn feel to them. There are tons of wedding invitations places online including Get Married’s shop which carries some nice unique wedding invitations that you won’t find anywhere else.

3) Fall decorations
It’s also important to make sure that your guests can enjoy the seasonal colors whether they are inside or out by decorating the tables with centerpieces that use colorful leaves, straw, dried flowers, and pumpkin colors. Keeping within the brown and yellow spectrum of colors will be eye catching. Small details like using a Leaf Guestbook or maple leaf place card holders make very dramatic statements. Handmade tablecloths and doilies also give a small town feel that adds a nice touch.

4) Fall wedding favors
Give your guests fall wedding favors that will help them to remember the occasion. They may not remember details, but when they get to take home fall themed wedding favors like copper leaf bottle stoppers, place card holders, or simply any of the many ideas that are available out there, you give them a point of reference to remember the occasion. If leaves or pumpkin type gifts aren’t your style, at least try and manage to stick to your color palette.

 

5) Dress Color
In some people’s eyes, the only potential downside to a fall wedding is the dress color. An off white wedding dress is normally a safer bet with fall weddings. primarily because a bright white dress can clash with your fall motif. Be sure to stick to the color coordination since you are the focal point of the day. If you’ve inherited a white dress or refuse to walk down the aisle in anything but white, it won’t ruin the day, but it’s that attention to detail that will set the bar. Also ensure that the wedding party and especially bridesmaid dresses will help to support your color choices.

6) Food
Your fall wedding menu should highlight food of the autumn season with selections like pumpkin pie, pecan pie, squash, zucchini, and apple cider with cinnamon sticks. Don’t forget your vegetarian guests as well. Likewise your wedding cake should also have fall colors and decorations incorporated into layers or decorations. Placing the cake on a light brown or dust yellow tablecloth surrounded by leafs would be a great eye catcher.

7) Everyone knows
Out of all of the great fall wedding tips that are available out there, be sure that you keep the color coordination on the top of everyone’s mind. Let your wedding planner know your plans so that they can inform all of the right people and monitor the situation for you. The caterer needs to know that you want your menu seasonal so that they can plan accordingly. It’s just very important that everyone is aware of your autumn motif to make sure that they don’t add something to the mix to clash with your flow and feel of fall.

8) Lighting
Make sure that whoever is in charge of decorating, that they keep the lighting subdued and not bright white. All of your colors can get washed away in bright white light. Keep lighting off-white or yellow to keep the ambiance flowing even in the air. If the DJ will be supplying lighting as well, be sure that they know of your color plans so that their “disco lights” don’t ruin everything you worked so hard to create. But more importantly, be sure to let your wedding photographer know about the yellow lighting since yellow plays havoc on white balance. It’s best they know as far in advance as possible.

It’s theme time again – The Gothic Themed Wedding

A Gothic wedding tends to embrace the darker side of human nature, lingering on the forbidden and mysterious. Though often associated with ancient symbols or the colors black and red, a Gothic wedding can choose from a wide variety of hues and styles. You can go with a romantic, punk, historical or sweet Gothic wedding theme. Though not the most popular of the many theme wedding ideas, Gothic weddings are nevertheless catching on.

Color – Gothic wedding ceremonies are characterized by a darker color scheme. Plan for black red, or purple wedding attire and accessories, including flowers. For a toned down look, opt for rich jewel tones of ruby red, navy and emerald green with black accents.

Clothes
Gothic themes tend to use dark or jewel-toned colors, but don’t feel limited by this. If you want a white wedding dress, you can wear it and still have a Gothic wedding. Think about decorating your dress with black or red accents. You could also dress your bridesmaids in royal purple or midnight blue, not to mention jet black and blood red. If you want something a little sweet, mix pink and black for your bridal gown.

Candles – You can never have too many candles. Think of a dark castle on a heath during a storm in a horror movie. That’s the ambiance you want to create.

Decorations
Decorating with flowers works as well with a Gothic wedding as it does a traditional wedding. Live or dead, real or fake, your wedding decorations can be as beautiful or dark as desired. Use vivid poppies, with their red petals and black center, as the perfect fit for a black and red Gothic wedding. Fake dead flowers on thorny branches work if you want thing dark, or try richly colored roses for a more traditional Gothic feel.

Skulls, bones, castles, swords and gargoyles can be found at any store with Halloween supplies. Just because they’re meant for Halloween doesn’t mean they can’t also work for your Gothic wedding theme. Don’t forget the symbols, such as crosses, stars and ankhs.

Food
Almost any dish can go with a Gothic themed wedding, it just all depends on how the food is presented. You can go with food that match your wedding colors, or food shaped into Gothic themes. Good, old chicken is still acceptable, but think about serving each plate next to a little chicken gravestone. Maybe decorate the plate with extra black roses to match your bouquet or have tiny, plastic gargoyles perched on each dish.

Your gothic wedding cake could be red velvet and shaped like a realistic heart. It could be a layer cake covered with red, teardrop jewels that look like drops of blood. Try a tiered-cake with marzipan spires to make it look like a castle.

Goth/Gothic Themed Wedding Resources:

GothicWeddings.org – All the supplies you need.

Offbeat Bride – Great blog on all kinds of alternative wedding themes.

Gothic Wedding Dresses – Choose from morbid black, death white, and bloody red.

Vegas Goth – For your quickie Gothic wedding, get a package deal in Vegas!

It’s Theme Time – Coffee and Books

I have found some great eclectic themes that I’ve been dying to blog about.  I’ve always loved the themes that are a bit on the unusual side because it reflects more the personality of the couple, and it’s not so traditional.  So I think we will look at a different great theme every week!!

Caffeinated Wedding – Books and Coffee Theme

You’re a bookworm. You’ve got a bookcase jammed with novels aand one of your favourite places in the universe is the library.  And what goes better with a good book than a cup of coffee? Which means that you love cafes just as much as libraries. In fact, the café is one of your favorite places to go with your fiancé.

From coffee berries in your bouquet to a color scheme of beautiful rich browns and a gorgeous accent color, a coffee wedding theme would be an absolute delight. This theme idea is so fabulous for a Sunday afternoon wedding or any late morning wedding. Give your reception venue that coffee house treatment… perhaps an acoustic guitar player and a barrista serving up your fave caffeinated beverage. Just head over to your favorite cafe’ for inspiration!

Why not have a coffee and books theme reception?  You could have the wedding at a quaint inn or bed and breakfast, and decorate the reception room to look like a café. Use vintage café posters on the walls and have a swanky jazz band to provide just the right café ambiance.

Here are some more ideas to help you pull it off:

Stationery – Use coffee colored stationery or use paper with coffee cup motifs, cocoa bean motifs, or book motifs.

Flowers/Centerpieces/Décor – Using clear vases filled with coffee beans. Stack old books in centre of table. Place vase on top of books.

Colors – Use dark shades of brown. Brown looks great with pink, pale blue, crimson, purples.

Cakes – Use a whimsical cake for either the wedding or even the grooms cake.  Carry the theme in everything you can.

Food – Have a lunch reception and serve gourmet Panini or go all out with a seated meal. Carry the theme over by having a coffee bar that serves espresso, late, and other gourmet coffees, along with plenty of decadent chocolate and mocha desserts. Hire a barista to serve the beverages. If you are serving alcohol, offer Irish Cream coffee and Kahlua.  GFavors – Buy used books that look brand new, wrap them in paper that compliments your wedding colors, and give them as favours. Or buy gourmet coffee beans for guests, or chocolate covered coffee beans. What about Coffee Mugs filled with delicious chocolate goodies or coffee candles?

If you and your fiance love your morning coffee or 2 p.m. pick up, why not share your love with your guests!

Value Invitations are Coming!!!

I have gotten some amazing deals on different types of paper and will be offering them as different types of invitations, menu cards, programs and save the date cards.  Create one-of-a-kind wedding invitations with your choice of papers, ribbons and design, PLUS personalize and Make It Yours!  You will save time and hassle — have your invitations assembled, or save money and Do-It-Yourself.

Keep an eye out in mid Summer!!

Wedding Style: Color-Coordinated Weddings

Wondering how to pick your wedding day colors and make them work? Here’s a guide to creating a winning palette

The hottest thing happening at wedding receptions isn’t just on the dance floor — it’s on the wedding cake, the invitations, the centerpieces, and even the bride’s gown. It’s big, bold color. Years ago brides used color to accent their white wedding day decor, but now they’re using color to cover every inch of the wedding. We’ve developed a step-by-step guide on color coordination (from choosing it to decorating with it) to help you dream up a bright wedding day.

Choosing Your Color

First things first: location. When deciding on a scheme, you must consider the reception space or choose a space without decor or color. If you’ve chosen a country club with navy and maroon Oriental carpets, a color scheme of lime green and hot pink won’t work.

Next, become aware of color combinations that you like, whether browsing art galleries or flipping through a stack of fashion magazines. You might be able to narrow down your color choices to a half a dozen. To help you choose the exact hue for your wedding details, visit a local fabric store or paint shop and collect swatches or chips of colors you might want to use. This will help you get specific, so that when you decide on green you’ll know if it’s lime green, kelly green, sage green, or forest green. If you have access to a Pantone book, use this collection of colors to select your shade the same way graphic designers do. Many invitation designers mix ink to match the colors in this book, and many cake bakers use Pantone numbers as a reference when creating dye for frosting. Can’t decide on just one or two colors? Don’t worry. In fact, many extraordinary weddings feature a variety of colors, sometimes up to five, that work together to create a specific sensibility — like an “English garden” with green, yellow, pink, red, and brown, or “Fall in New England” with orange, red, brown, and gold.

 

Where & How to Execute Color

Where and how you use color really depends on the mood you are trying to create. The best way to get started is to figure out what emotions you want your celebration to evoke. A peaceful, Zen-like retreat? A regal, romantic affair? A jumping, high-energy party?

For instance, a vibrant summer yellow mixed with chocolate brown (think sunflowers and bees) is perfect for a country-chic wedding style; add gold to the mix, and the combination becomes more reminiscent of Northern Italy. As another example, leaf green paired with cantaloupe is pretty for a waterside wedding; but pair this green with copper, and you have a color scheme that’s formal enough for a ballroom or an estate setting. If your wedding takes place in multiple spaces, each room can have its own color scheme.

The Elements of Style

Attire Your gown doesn’t have to be solid white, especially since color accents are increasingly more available. A blue or red sash around the waist is striking and still very bridal. The groom and his guys can also sport color in their ties or on their cuff links. But color will be most prominently displayed throughout the day in the bridesmaid dresses. Some fervent folks might want to match the dresses to the invitation ribbons, the favor tags, and the bouquets but this isn’t the only way to define a style. Mixing and matching dresses in varying shades — pink and orange, or pale green and yellow — can sometimes make a statement stronger than uniformity.

Invitations Your invitations set the stage for the event, so remember that mood you want to evoke? This is your time to show it off. Coordinating the invitation colors with those of the wedding can be as easy as choosing a color font, ribbon, or monogram or as elaborate as layering colorful cards.

Flowers & Decor No matter what color you’ve chosen, chances are you’ll be able to find flowers in that shade — but that, of course, does not mean the blooms will be available or affordable. If your dream flowers aren’t an option, use neutral white flowers with centerpiece containers or other decor elements in your color.

Wedding Cake The cake is one of the easiest places to add color — all it takes is the right mixing. The color should reflect the other style elements used throughout the wedding. But when it comes to cake, your color options are the most flexible. White icing makes a marvelous background for colorful sugar flowers, sugar-paste stripes or polka dots, or other effects. Fondant can also be created in any number of shades. For instance, a yellow and brown country-chic wedding might have a wedding cake iced in a light brown basket weave and topped with fresh sunflowers.

Favors Ultimately, it’s more important to give something meaningful rather than something that matches, but it can be a nice touch to your favors package in your color scheme. Use gift tags and ribbons to incorporate your colors into your favors. If favors will be left at each place setting, consider how they will look with your wedding linens and flowers.

New Ways to Use Color

We should point out that overdoing it with a matchy-match look is entirely possible. (You don’t want your guests thinking, Um, yeah, lavender…we get it.) Begin with the five essential wedding elements (attire, invitations, flowers, cake, and favors) and see where you can — or should — add more color. Then consider details, such as napkins, candles, signature drinks, your ring pillow, or your guest book, made from the same fabric and in the same color as the bridesmaid dresses.

–TheKnot.com