Fond Farewell

After a lot of thought and prayer, I've come to the difficult decision that I need to focus my time and energies elsewhere. I will no longer be adding new posts to this blog.

However, I hope the posts I've already made will continue to be useful to brides in general and Christian brides in particular.

If you haven't already, please take a peek at the trailer for my book Carry Me Over the Threshold; you might learn something you didn't know from it, and maybe it will encourage you to snatch up a copy or two before the book is officially out of print.

Thank you for visiting, and may you have a beautiful wedding and an even more beautiful marriage!

Kristina

Great Ideas in Country Living

I've blogged before about snatching great ideas for weddings from non-wedding related magazines. The July 2007 issue of Country Living has some great examples of decorating ideas that can be incorporated into your wedding.

Page 10 points toward stylish dinner party ideas in a web exclusive that will appear in July.

Page 34 offers complete instructions for making a live flower wreath. Beginning on page 21, there are tons of great ideas for using bandanas to decorate: make easy table runners, candle holders, favor bags, napkin rings and more for a country-themed reception. (The bandanas shown here are from Alibaba.)

And my favorite idea: Page 32 features instructions for "carnation balls." This is so simple, you'll wonder why you never thought of it. The editors of Country Living have taken humble carnations, trimmed the stems, and inserted the flowers into a round florist foam, covering it completely. Then they stick the ball onto a plate or in a vase, and viola! They have stunning and simple centerpieces. What an inexpensive, easy DIY flower project.

Something Gorgeously Blue

If you're looking for a little color to add to your wedding outfit, check out Etsy. There's lots of "something blue" here, as well as jewelry in other gorgeous colors. My favorites include: Czech "Aquamarine" Earrings for $39 (and similar earrings in a cobalt blue, shown here), "Swoop" Bird Necklace for $50, "Stained Glass" blue earrings for $70, and blue moonstone earrings for $39. Lovely, lovely!

The Best Site for DIY Brides

There are lots of sites that have projects for weddings, but my favorite is Instructables. Here, anybody can post how-tos for pretty much anything. Cruise through the craft or art sections, or do searches for specific items. Some of my favorite projects include a 5 cent wedding band, "Monica's wedding cards", and LED balloons.

Brides Recommend

Each and every purchase you make at Amazon - if you first click through one of the links included either in one of my posts or by the photos of book covers on the left hand side - helps support this blog. Every once in a while, I like to check out what ya'll are buying. I can't tell who bought what, but I can see what products are popular just now.

This month, it's Preston Bailey's Fantasy Weddings. This is really a gorgeous book, and while most of us will never have a wedding so "large" as the ones pictured here, the book offers lots of terrific inspiration. Expect to find lighting designs that make you go "wow," extravagant floral arrangements, vintage Hollywood designs, and more. There are even some practical tips for DIY brides.

Recycled Wedding Gown

Recycling is nothing new. In fact, it's very, very old. It's just that instead of using recycling centers, our ancestors used a more hands-on approach. As I talk about in Carry Me Over the Threshold, for example, during WWII it was often difficult for brides - especially in Europe - to get their hands on wedding gowns or fabric appropriate for making them. Americans helped out some by sending yards of white bridal satin to their sisters overseas, but often brides had to make do. They even used military parachutes to create the gown of their dreams.

There are lots of stories about this, but check out this one, at The Smithsonian National Museum of American History.

" This wedding dress was made from a nylon parachute that saved the groom's life during World War II. Maj. Claude Hensinger...kept the parachute and used it as a way to propose to Ruth in 1947. He presented it to her and suggested she make a gown out of it for their wedding. She wondered how she was going to make 'this voluminous item' into a dress. Seeing a dress in a store window that was based on one that appeared in the movie Gone with the Wind, she patterned her dress after that. She hired a local seamstress, Hilda Buck, to make the bodice and veil. She made the skirt herself; she pulled up the strings on the parachute so that the dress would be shorter in the front and have a train in the back. The couple were married in the Neffs Lutheran Church in Neffs, Pennslyvania, July 19, 1947. Their daughter and their son's bride also wore the dress for their weddings."

When You Need to Be Silly...

If you need a break from planning your wedding and just want to do something silly, check out the 2007 Annual Toilet Paper Wedding Dress Contest. Yeah, it's for real!

Our $150 Wedding

"Our own wedding in the woods was intimate, dreamy and definitely one-of-a-kind. We snow shoed a short distance into the trees and found a pine alcove for our chapel. Our Unitarian-Universalist minister read some inspirational passages we had chosen, we exchanged our own vows and we kissed. Two friends photographed the ceremony with a digital camera and surprised us by popping open a bottle of champagne they'd carried into the woods in a backpack...Afterward we enjoyed a simple dinner at a cozy café, complete with wood stove, in Centennial, a town of 100 at the base of the Snowy Range. A few weeks later, we ordered a special cake from a bakery and e-mailed an open invitation to our friends for a potluck dinner, minus gifts. We have a marriage certificate and an online photo album to share with family and friends. The final rundown: Marriage license: $25. Dinner for five: $60. Minister's snowshoe rental: $15. Flowers: $25. Champagne: $10. Cake: $15. Online photo album: free. Total: $150."

This sort of thing isn't for everyone, but I do like the author-bride's question: How has a nearly $30,000 price tag - the average cost of an American wedding - become acceptable for a one-day event? She suggests this kind of money could be better spent on a home, "a few years' tuition at a state university," or given to charity. This is a good thing for every engaged couple to consider, and is especially thought-provoking for the Christian bride.

What Flowers Are In Season When?

As you plan the floral arrangements for your wedding, it's important to know what flowers will be in season on your Big Day. If you request out of season flowers from your florist, the price tag (if the flowers can be had at all) will be astronomical. Here's an easy to use guide to flower availability, provided by the California Cut Flower Commission. Select a month or type in a flower name, and you will instantly learn what will be in season and what will not be in season on your wedding day.