Lace hanging mason jars: DIY tutorial

I’m very excited, as this is going to be my first DIY tutorial!

First and foremost just a little update for you. If you can’t get hold of me on Facebook or Twitter, that’s because I have given it up for lent.
I have also found out this week that I am suffering from shingles! 😦 the doctor has told me it can be brought on by stress and I just have to rest, take things easy and get lots of fluids into me. Due to this, the fact that our wedding is now only 10 weeks away and wedding season is about to kick off at Glemham Hall, Cute as a Button is closed until June when we return from our honeymoon. I really need to start looking after myself a bit more as the last thing I want is to be covered in horrible spots on my wedding day! I also don’t want to commit to making things that I just don’t have time to make. I hope everyone understands and as I said, Cute as a Button will be open for business again in June 2012.

Back to the tutorial! As we are having our ceremony at Glemham Hall we don’t really have the need for pew ends. I wanted to jazz the ceremony area up a little though and came across some hanging mason jars that had wild flowers in them that hung on the chairs at the end of the rows.

I’ve made ours in our wedding colours but you could use whatever colours you like!

Your need a glass jar.
2 pieces of thick florist wire.
Lace (I brought a square metre and cut it into strips, but you can get the lace in strips).
Ribbon.
Glue & glue gun.
Scissors.
Wire cutters.

First, cut your lace to fit around your glass jar. Leave enough lace so it overlaps slightly at the back.

Then run some hot glue down the edge of the lace and stick it to your glass jar.

Run some hot glue down the other end of your lace and overlap it slightly at the back of your jar and glue down.

Cut your ribbon to fit around your jar leaving enough excess to tie in a bow if you wish.

Add a tiny bit of hot glue at the back of your jar, where the lace overlaps. Put it about midway. This is to secure your ribbon and stops it slipping down the jar. Stick your ribbon to it.

I’ve added a dab of hot glue both sides of the ribbon at the front of the jar just for extra security to stop the ribbon sliding down.

Tie your ribbon in a knot or bow, whichever you prefer.

Take a piece of your florist wire and wrap around the rim of your jar. Hook it over its self. Don’t twist it. You want to be able to take it off again. Make sure you leave a little room for the other piece of florist wire so don’t pull it too tight.

Bend your other piece of florist wire into a U shape.

With your wire cutters, round off the ends of the U shaped florist wire. Make sure they are rounded off enough to form a circle.

Then thread the first piece of florist wire through the two hooks you have just made on the second piece.

Place it back round the the rim of your jar, hook over its self and twist the excess wire tight using you wire cutters. Trim off any excess wire and make sure to tidy it up so no one catches themselves on it.

Tidy up the hooks you made on the second piece of florist wire, rounding them off with your wire cutters.

And there your have your finished hanging lace mason jar! You can fill them with candles or wild flowers or whatever you so wish. I’m making mini button bouquets to go in ours.

EmX

Introducing our wedding photographer – N.Cadman Photography

I would like to introduce you to our wedding photographer. The beautiful Natalie Cadman. I’m sure some of you will know her from L.O.V.E Bouquets. What some of you might not know is, not only is Nat a very talented crystal bouquet maker, but she is also very talented when is comes to photography and run’s N.Cadman Photography.

I became friendly with Nat through Twitter and Facebook what with us both being wedding suppliers and Elle of Elle is for Love Stationery made the stationery for her wedding.

Now I must admit, we had asked a friend who sometimes takes photos for Brigade to do our photos, but he had to pull out as he got the chance to go travelling. I had however, at this point, already been following Nat’s photography updates on her Facebook page, and her photos are stunning.

I discussed it with H2B, and showed him the photo’s on Nat’s page, and we both agreed that we would like her to take the pictures at our wedding. So I sent her a message, and luckily for us, Nat agreed!

Now Nat is doing us a huge favour as she lives a good couple of hours from us, so it’s a bit of a drive for her, but I’m over the moon because we both love her style and Nat gets our style too and what we’re after. I cant wait to see our photo’s!

You can check out Nat’s Facebook page for her photography by clicking here.

Luv EmX

 

Our beautiful reception stationery from Elle Is For Love Stationery

Back when I first started blogging, Elle Is For Love Stationery was one of the first suppliers I blogged about. Her creativity blew me away and I loved that her work had so much detail to it.

I also blogged about our first meeting at a vintage wedding fair in Norwich last year. I’m happy to say that since then, Elle is another wedding supplier that I hugely respect and have become good friends with. The help she has given me when it comes to our wedding is amazing. She has been my rock with the up’s and downs of planning a wedding. She even designed the Cute as a Button logo!

Our friend Tom designed our wedding invites, but Elle is designing and supplying all the stationery items for our reception. She is making various different stationery bits for us, including our table plan, place setting luggage labels, sweetie bar bags and a photo-booth sign. We’re keeping the style inline with the invites, and is another thing that I would like to keep as a bit of a surprise, but I do have some examples to share with you of Elle’s previous work.

Our place settings will be some of Elle’s beautiful luggage labels. As Brigade (H2B’s band), are sponsored by Jagermister, I’m sure you can understand when I say Jagermister is a big part of our lives! 🙂 So, for our wedding favours, we will have miniature bottles of Jagermister and a cupcake for each guest. Elle’s labels will be great for this.

I have managed to rope my dad into making us a photo-booth and Elle will be making the sign for it.

Elle will also be supplying our sweetie table bags. They will be in keeping with our colour theme.

The one thing I must admit to being most excited about that Elle is making for us, is our table plan! All I know is, that it will be in a beautiful black frame and will be in keeping with the style of our invites! I just know that it is going to be amazaballs! Elle said she has never been sent the details for a table plan before that had her own name on it! 🙂

I cant wait to see everything finished! It’s all going to help bring the reception decor together and add a personal touch.

You can get in contact with Elle through her website which you can find by clicking here. You can see all Elle’s work at her Facebook page which you can find by clicking here. And you can follow her on Twitter by clicking here.

It’s not so long ago at Elle was a bride to be herself, so she understand how a bride feels and wants things. Again, another supplier I strongly recommend, not just because we’re friends, but because the quality of her work is outstanding and she goes above and beyond to help create whatever it is you need.

EmX

 

Our super amazing wedding cake by Crumb – Bespoke Suffolk Cakes

I have to admit, and I know it may sound cheesy, but getting engaged changed my life in a way I never thought it would. Through searching the internet for alternative ideas for our wedding, blogging and being on Twitter, its given me the chance to discover and meet some amazing wedding suppliers, who I’m glad to say, have become very good friends.

One of these amazing suppliers, and now good friend, is Anmar of Crumb – Bespoke Suffolk Cakes.

 I first heard of Anmar and her amazing cakes on Twitter. I then had the pleasure of meeting her at a wedding fair we were both exhibiting at. She had some of THE most amazing cakes on display. The detail on some of them blew me away. What caught my attention even more was the fact that she had a button themed cake on display!

At the time, Anmar was also planning her super South Africa wedding for that November and came over to my stall to check out my button bouquets and decided to order some!

 

We’ve since become friends and have a few things in the pipeline that we’re working on together, so watch this space!

I’m so proud and excited to say that our wedding cake is being made by Anmar. The imagination, skill, time and effort that she puts into her cakes is more than any bride could wish for and I don’t doubt for one second that she will make our cake super, super amazing!

Our cake is going to be BIG, BIG, BIG! I don’t want to say too much as this is one of things that I would like to keep as a surprise but Anmar is going to work in my tattoo’s and music elements for James and be in keeping with the style of our invites.

 I can’t recommend Crumb – Bespoke Suffolk Cakes enough. Not just because I know her and she’s a friend, but because, as you can see from the pictures I’ve shared with you, her skills are top of her game. She’s attentive and extremely creative. If your after a cake that’s a little different from all the rest and a bit personal, Anmar is the girl you need to contact.

You can find Crumb’s. website by clicking here.

Crumb also has a Facebook page which you can find by clicking here, and you can find their Twitter profile by clicking here.

Luv EmX

Hodgkinson’s Art Exhibition

As I’m writing this, H2B, mini me & myself are stuck in traffic on the M25. We’re on our way to pick up Mr Will Simpson and then it’s a road trip to Bristol. We’re going up there to see the amazing art exhibition that Tom Hodgkinson, the brains behind our wedding invites is putting on.

If your about in Bristol this weekend, get yourself down to The Volunteer Tavern and check it out!

EmX

My Birdcage Veil

I had my heart set on having a birdcage veil. I even spent ages looking for tutorials on the Internet on how to make on myself to save money. I found some great ones! But it turns out, after looking into it, the money I would of spent on getting all the bits was the same as the cost of one I had seen on eBay
So I brought the one I had found!

I’m going to add some red details to it to put my own stamp on it.

EmX

Alternative idea to the chair cover!

At our reception venue, we have some very beautiful, vintage looking chairs. It would be a shame to cover them up with chair covers, but I still wanted to give them a bit of sparkle!!!!!!

I came across a few ideas in magazines that caught my eye. One idea was to drape the organza over the chair, rather than tie it in a bow. This looked beautiful, but the wedding had a colour scheme of white and I wasnt so sure that idea would work as well with our colour scheme.

Another idea I saw, that I fell in love with, was really colourful tissue paper fans. I thought this would work great in our colour scheme and would dress the chairs nicely rather than cover them up!

The idea is to make fans like the above, smaller and in our colour scheme of black, white and red and each chair will have one. There is a great tutorial on marthastewart.com.

The only chairs that wont have one, are ours. Instead, for us, I’ve brought two large, white, wicker hearts.

I got them from the The Range just after christmas. They were around £3.00 each. Bargain!

EmX

Wedding decoration ideas: Pom Pom’s

I have been searching the internet for cheap, but pretty, DIY decoration ideas for our wedding for over a year now. I have a folder on my computer full of DIY projects that I have found on various different blogs. It wasn’t till I had a look in this folder about a week ago, I realised it is going to be impossible to do all of them! I now have to pick my favourites which is a hard task as their all so lovely!

One decoration idea that I have been set on that we will be having is, pom poms!!!!!!

I found a great DIY tutorial at marthastewart.com and gave it a go myself!

I also gave making some paper flowers a go with a little direction from Laura at Bluebird Vintage who made them for her wedding.

We’re going to make them in our colour scheme, so black white and red and mix it up a bit. Their quite easy to make, it’s the folding out bit that is tricky! Be patient!

The idea is to hang the pom pom’s from the top of the marquee at different heights (to do this we’re going to hang lines of fishing wire across the marquee and then hang the pom pom’s from those). For the flowers we’re going to scatter them around the marquee.

EmX

Bridal Hairstyle Ideas

So I’ve found a few more hairstyles that I really like that I thought I would share with you.

I’ve been growing my hair as I thought I wanted it, down, wavy, bright red and of course, big! However, I’m sticking with red but my bridesmaid suggested that I go for an up do as its a long day and I still want it to look nice in the evening. I’m still undecided. Any suggestions welcome! 🙂

  

The above is prehaps my favourite.

    

EmX

My own bridal button bouquet!

As you all know, the reason Cute as a Button got started in the first place is because I saw a button bouquet on the internet and fell in love with it. I decided , to save money, that I would attempt to make my own and the rest is history!

Im glad I had a chance to make other bouquets first. Its given me a chance to perfect my technique and find out what style I wanted for my bouquet. I’ve gone with a 100 stem teardrop bouquet. The teardrop is slightly different to teardrops I’ve done on other bouquets, but I really like it. Its not quite finished I’d like to add! I need to finish the collar and handle but at this present moment I’m not quite sure how I want it.

 

Every single button in my bouquet was either given to me by friends, friends relatives, relatives of ours, found in antique shops or car boot sales which makes it so more special to me.

We’re going to use it as our table centre piece at the reception.

EmX