Vintage Wedding Blush and Gold

Summer means wedding season! And since we started the summer off with a wedding, it means I haven’t had a many lazy days of summer, yet. But it was so fun to help my niece Mellissa on her special day!  I was sort of the florist, day-of wedding coordinator, and day-of photographer all in one! And that means I took a million pictures. I tried to narrow down just a few of my favorites to give you a feeling for the feel of the wedding and share a few fun ideas with you!

Mellissa and Jake were married in a beautiful ceremony in the Salt Lake LDS Temple. I enjoyed taking pictures of them in front of the beautiful doors there. I know it is small, but the group kissing picture was so much fun! Most people are cheering as they kiss, but there are some other really cute facial expressions. I think it is important to have some fun pictures along with the serious standard wedding day photos in order to capture the personality of those present and the emotions of the day.

My biggest job was arranging all of the wedding flowers. The bridal bouquet was comprised of pastel shades of cream and pink peonies, ranunculus, garden roses, spray roses, Queen Anne’s lace, with dusty miller. We also used seeded eucalyptus in the centerpieces at the reception. Mellissa used water and shimmery gold spray paint to create faux gold mercury glass vases for her collected style centerpieces, really adding to the vintage feel she was going for. The mothers’ wrist corsages were attached to pearl bracelet holders. The stems of the bridal boquet were wrapped in lace and attached with pearl-headed pins. I tied a long satin ribbon around the middle to echo the satin ribbon around the waist of her lace wedding gown.

The reception was held at Smoot Hall at the This is the Place Monument on the east side of Salt Lake City. A nice historical spot for her vintage wedding, providing a beautiful view of the Salt Lake area.

A big round white balloon marked the entrance to the hall. The photo of my daughter looking out the window was a total accident, and then she came out and modeled for me.

Some of the details from the reception:

• The initials of the bride and groom and the toss bouquet decorating the sign-in table.
• In lieu of a traditional sign-in book, Mellissa created a photo book of their engagement pictures and had guests sign their well-wishes around the photos.
• On the sign-in table and on each of the banquet tables, we used vintage crocheted doilies from my mother’s collection (most originally from my grandma) for a homey nostalgic feel.
• Mellissa dyed and glued thousands of coffee filters to create the pretty pink poofs that hung from the lanterns in the hall.
• Each table had a combination of collected items: vintage books, low faux mercury vase floral arrangements, a tall faux mercury glass bud vase with single bloom, and a few faux mercury candle holders. At the reception in Michigan a couple of weeks later, they added small vintage frames with photos from the wedding.
• The bride loves her straws so made sure cute striped straws were available for all of the guests.

The wedding cake was a fail that turned out ok in the end. The father of the bride had offered to make the cake under the supervision of one of my sisters, who has made many wedding cakes in the past. It was a funny experiment, but his experience with dry wall made him an expert at smoothing icing onto the cake. More difficult was assembling the three-tiered creation, but all looked to be good, until the cake tried to make the hour-long drive to the reception site. On the first big hill it slid apart, destroying the bottom layer and seriously cosmetically damaging the top two layers. Fortunately the cake transporter was the sister who actually knew how to fix it. I wish we had a before picture, because you would be impressed at how pretty the cake ended up if you could see what a mess it was. We found a smaller table to feature the cake. My sister smoothed and smoothed out the remains of the cake, and re-piped the border. Then I used the remainder of the peonies and ranunculus (-es, -i) to cover the cake and we added the antique topper of a bride and groom that Mellissa had and it ended up looking quite sweet. The caterers served all of the salvageable parts of the bottom layer along with the sheet cake we had provided. The groom prefers pie, and we had one of those for him, so I think the couple was fine with how the cake fiasco turned out. And my Brother-in-law had a fun time taking credit for his masterpiece.

There were fun and sweet moments, like the slideshow of the bride and groom from childhood to the present. But my favorite part of the evening, was probably the Father/daughter dance–Round 2. They first danced a slow and sweet song, and then turned on something more up-beat so that they could show off their robot dancing and other moves. It looked like they had spent a lot of time choreographing the dance. Really, they were just deciding what to do as they went, but they have obviously danced together before and were so cute busting a move together!

They weren’t the only ones busting a move! The kids were so excited when it was finally their turn to dance. I love this picture of my daughter dancing with my mother–partly because it shows my mother looking about 30 years younger than she really is. I’m quite sure she still has a lot more energy than I do.

Before guests went home they grabbed a miniature honey bear favor that read, “Meant to BEE!” It was really cute since Mellissa has always had a thing for bees. The favors were a big hit with my kids.

And then it was time for the couple to make their escape. In what felt like a vintage nod to tradition, Mellissa changed into this adorable short lace dress to make their exit. She still looks excited after a full day of excitement. They started off slowly saying their goodbyes and then broke into a run as they were showered by loved ones with flower petals.

Despite a glitch or two (which always happens, right?), it turned out to be a beautiful day for a beautiful couple. Thanks for letting me be involved (and boss all of your friends around. :-)) Best wishes, you two!