A taste of the islands

Last year my family and Mr. E took a trip to my dad's home country of Trinidad and Tobago. This was the first trip ever for Brother Elephant, me and of course Mr. E.

The Whole Family

Arriving in T&T

We had some quality relaxation time on the beach. 

We were able to try regional drinks (Sol) and food (like Roti and Conch & Dumplings).  It may look weird, but that Roti tasted so good!!! You may be able to see the awesomeness of Roti from that pic of Brother Elephant and Mr. E chowing down.

We toured both islands learning so much about Daddy Elephant's childhood and culture while enjoying family time together.

While there we heard a lot of steel drum music which originated in Trinidad and Tobago.

Little kids practicing the steel drums

I thought that it would be awesome to somehow incorporate the steel drums into our wedding as a nod to Daddy Elephant's heritage. Early in the game I requested a quote to have a local group play at the cocktail hour, which ended up being a little out of our price range. So I tabled that idea for a later discussion.

As the months rolled by, I thought more and more about it, and thought that having the steel drums for the ceremony would be something that all of our guests would remember and could be a surprise to my dad (a small token of thanks for all of his monetary help for this wedding). So I reached back out to Island Boogie and found out that their price was very reasonable! Here is a you tube video of some common wedding songs played on the steel pan.


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I am so excited to work this into the budget and surprise my dad on the big day... let's hope I can keep this secret better than I do with most of Mr. E's Christmas gifts!

Are you planning any music forms for your wedding that incorporate your heritage?

Vases for Decor

It's an ongoing joke between my mom, Mr. E & me that when ever we want to add something to the budget that we'll just take it from the flower budget. I'm not the biggest fan of flowers, at least not spending thousands on something that will most likely die within a couple of days.

Our planner Kathie is going to save us some money by buying the flowers wholesale and doing all the arrangements herself (score for one less vendor to book!). We won't be doing anything elaborate (which means expensive to me) and Kathie has a ton of vases so we don't have to pay for those either. Of course I forgot all about Kathie's supply of vases when I saw a local Knottie selling some of hers for a great price (24 vases for $32).

I haven't really thought out how we'll be using these since the centerpieces are still in the planning process. If they aren't utilized for centerpieces I know they will look great to spruce up the escort card and gift tables. To save on the floral budget we're thinking of using ribbons, colored stones, water and floating candles or underwater floralytes. I tested the ribbon look on the vases, and I really like it!

I need to pick up some some floating candles and floralytes to test out which look I like better.

What ideas did you use to reduce the costs of your decor?

Embossing up a storm

Our travel themed programs are by far the wedding detail I am most excited about! I knew that embossing these bad boys would take some time, so I decided to do them ahead of schedule since I had some free weekend time.

Let's take a quick photo tour of my embossing good time, shall we? (all personal pictures)

First off the set up, I figured out that I had enough embossing powder to do 3 passport covers at a time.

A little commentary on my set up


After much trial and error, I determined that I had to use 2 different powders. One more sparkly for the top half, and a different one for the text on the bottom so that it is readable.



Here's a shot halfway through the heating process where you can see it turning from powder to awesomeness.



The green cardstock and gold powder was a lot darker prior to heating.



Here's my little helper Gypsy, doing what she does best!



120 covers later, and I'm all done!



A close up of the blue/silver cover...



And here's the green/gold cover.



I love love love these! Once we nail down the order of the ceremony with our pastor (closer to the wedding), I'll print out the inside text and complete these.

What was your favorite DIY project to work on?

A spin on the guestbook

Oh, the wedding guestbook. When I think of wedding guestbooks, I think of white books with tons of lines that guest sign their name and possibly address (sometimes not even legible) and the bride and groom store away in some drawer or box after the wedding. Sounds like a waste to me.

I knew I wanted to do something a little different, in hopes that I would actually look at the guestbook more than once after the wedding. I made the mistake of looking online for inspiration and found so many different ideas.

Some of my favorite ideas were the wedding bench idea, seen in this post from Mrs. Apple Cider:

Or the tree thumb print idea suggested by Mrs. Poodle here,

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And then I found this photo vie Style Me Pretty, and knew it would be perfect!

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Postcards! Works with our theme, and allows for more then one guest to be writing at once. This great idea has been used by other bees like Mrs. Pencils and Miss Starfish. The guest will leave us a little message on the postcard and we will put them into an album after the wedding, hopefully with their strips from the photobooth.

While in Michael's armed with a 50% off coupon I came across an unfinished wooden chest that would work so well to display the postcards. I got right to work painting the chest in our blue and green colors (thanks to left over paint from our wooden signs), and of course took a couple of pictures of my handiwork.

Next up will be to look for a photo album that I like, oh and of course hundreds of postcards.

What did you do for your guestbook?

Hair accessories

When it comes to wedding day hair, I know that I don’t want to wear a tiara. They are pretty, but just not really my style. Like I mentioned before, I’m planning on wearing a flower or similar piece in my hair.

I don’t want a huge flower that will take up half my hair, just something that will add a touch to my dark hair. I was looking on Etsy this morning and found these:

Etsy Seller Nomsa (link)

These would go great with the colors in our wedding, but I’m not sure the blue will really stand out with my dark hair. So I checked out a similar version in white:

Etsy Seller Nomsa (link)

I think this would pop more in my hair, and if I decide to go with it, I might see if an Etsy seller (or a past Bee) can customize it so I can still work blue and green into the center of the flower.

What type of hair accessory are you thinking of using for your wedding?

A little love for the guys

As most brides can tell you, when it comes to thinking of wedding attire most of the time is spent on what the bride and bridesmaids will wear. As you know (if you've been following along) I have found and ordered my amazing dress, and the bridesmaids have decided on their dresses. Next up? The guys.

After seeing this inspiration board from Snippet and Ink I was hooked on that blue and green stripped tie for the groomsmen.

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At first I thought it would be a pretty simple thing to find, blue and green are very common colors and lots of ties are stripped... well I was wrong. Really?? Yes, I was wrong. It took me a while to find these darker shades of blue and green in a thicker stripe. I even checked a couple of stores in person with no luck. After hours and hours of searching the web... (OK more like one hour, but it felt like hours and hours) I came across this on Ties.com (yeah, probably a site I should have checked first but didn't come up at the top on a google search of "blue and green stripped tie") and quickly bookmarked it for future reference.

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I also checked out Tiebar since it was referenced by a couple of bees like Miss French Fries and found these

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I can't decide which one I like more so I'll have to leave it up to Mr. E. Once we pick the one, we'll be buying 5, one for each of the groomsmen and one for Mr. E to wear at a later date. I think he should stand out a little on the wedding day so we're still trying to decide what tie he should wear, but I know he'll get use out of it after the wedding.

While shopping I did find these ties for the ushers...

And this tie for the ushers. I'm still waiting on buying these ties until they go on sale (you know it seems like Kohl's is always having a sale)

Did you gift your groomsmen with ties?

What are we going to eat?

Well to be truthful, I don't exactly know what we will be eating at the reception yet since we haven't had our tasting. But I have completed a mock up for a menu so that the guests will know what they will be eating at the wedding.

At first I wasn't planning on doing a menu (thought it wasn't necessary since we were having a buffet) but after meeting with my planner the other day we've decided to do one. It won't be anything fancy, but will add to the design idea my planner has planned out for our table decor.

I checked out the Knot for some inspirational pictures and came out with this...

All photos from the Knot

And here's my simple mock up. It's printed on white cardstock, and backed with the same blue cardstock we've used for all of the other DIY paper products. I added our monogram to the top and embossed the little flourish to the bottom which can also be found on our invites and save the dates.

The plan is to have these placed inside green napkins, wrapped with blue ribbon and a final touch of a green kerrmit mum. I am leaving all of that up to my planner and can't wait to see the finished product at the reception!

Were there any "unnecessary" DIY projects that you ended up doing in the end?

Who doesn't want a little more bling??

Yay for more diamonds, what girl doesn't love a little more bling?

When it came to looking for a wedding band I was actually the easy shopper. I'm a sucker for matching, so my band will be princess cut diamonds to match those in the band of my engagement ring. Here's a little refresher of my E ring

And the matching band to go with it


Easy peasy, and I'm done.

On the other hand, we have Mr. E. He didn't want a simple band. He's wants something unique with a little bling, which I'm all for. Why should I be the only one with some diamonds? :)

Due to his job, I thought it would be best to get a tougher metal to keep up with the dings that are sure to come. We looked into Tungsten and Titanium and decided that we liked the weight of the Tungsten better then the "light weight" feel of Titanium. I was very happy with the ring Mr. E picked out because it was unique, had a little bling and most importantly is something that he will want to wear for the rest of his life.




2 middle pictures are from Kay Jewelers

And here is a little photo shoot I did with all three of our rings!

Our Wedding Colors

Flowers that Mr. E gave me

Side view

On Mr. E's Xbox Controller

On our kitchen floor

Did you get a band that matched your E-ring? Did your man want a little bling as well?

Thank goodness for my bumper

Picture this... we're (Chris, mom and me) on our way to our engagement shoot... traveling down interstate 35 in the left lane when all of a sudden mom yells out "Oh no, watch out". That was followed by a loud sound, that didn't sound too good.

My first thought is, "Are you kidding me?". My second thought is "I refuse to be late to my engagement pictures!!" Thank goodness no one was hurt by this lady being distracted in the middle lane and drifting into the back bumper side of my SUV in the left lane.

Here's what her car looked like after the accident.

And here's what my car looked like. The dent looks bigger then it really is because I zoomed in on it. All I can say is that I'm so thankful that my bumper was able to take most of the impact of the hit.

The good news is that we made it to our engagement pictures (only a couple minutes late, but that was more due to the fact that the museum had the wrong street listed on their website) and had a blast with Lynn and Vivie!

Engagement Props

To go along with our travel theme for the wedding, we'll be shooting our engagement pictures (in 3 days, EEEEEEEEE!) with a travel theme. I don't want to give away too much until I can share the sure to be amazing pictures with you, but I think a little sneak peak is in order.

When emailing back and forth with our photographer, Lynn, about our photo shoot she said "Tell me you are bringing old suitcases, because that would cause me to happy dance!" (Love her, she's so enthusiastic!) To which I responded of course!

The first thought was to check Etsy, but the cost was a little much for something we would only use once, maybe twice. Next thought was to rent them from a local antique shop, but my awesome mom used some connections and got some for us, for FREE (that word is music to my ears when it comes to anything associated with our wedding)!!

These beauties will be making an appearance in our engagement pictures.

Pics from Mom's cell phone.

I am so excited! Mom you did good! ;)

Did you use any props in your engagement shoot?