Navy, Orange, and Camo Wedding Shower

Navy and orange for the bride......some camo for the groom (although the bride likes it, too!)  What a fun and unique shower to decorate for a sweet bride and groom!  

A friend and I decorated together for this shower, so it made it a lot more fun!  The bride-to-be provided the antlers and pheasant feathers and we gathered up the other supplies.

Tree stumps added an extra-special natural feel and a navy chevron printed burlap ribbon and orange deco-mesh provided a modern touch to the other decorations.

My friend and I enjoy using lamps when we decorate.  She had some beautiful ones to bring for just the right touch for this shower!

My youngest son asked why we called a wedding shower a "shower".  Good question!  Because we "shower" the couple with gifts!  These are just a part of the gifts that were opened during the wonderful shower!

\

Beautiful corsages for the bride-to-be, the mother of the bride and the groom-to-be's mom.  So pretty!

Centerpieces were squares of camouflage burlap which had been fringed at the edges, topped with orange buckets of marigolds.

Best wishes, Jeremy and Harli!  May God bless you in your marriage and may you have many years together and in service to Him!

(Note: We have so many wonderful examples of Christian couples in our church family.  On Sunday....the day of this shower.....one couple was celebrating their 76th wedding anniversary!  Isn't that wonderful?!)

Vintage and Music-Themed Baby Shower

Typically in our small town congregation, we have a baby shower every once in a while, but over the last year, we've had MANY baby showers!  What a blessing!  This may be the last baby shower for a while, but we're sure enjoying having all of the little ones in our midst!  So very THANKFUL for babies!  They are a gift from GOD!

Instead of doing a generic themed baby shower, I began trying to base the decor on the nursery theme - just to make it more special for the parents and the baby (even though he/she won't know and probably won't ever care!). It's just a little more sentimental, even though it takes a little more time.  This shower was a whole new theme and nothing I'd ever done.  I was excited - but a little concerned because I had no idea where to start.  The theme was a vintage/sepia/music theme.  Lots of possibilities!  THANKFUL for this challenge!

Here's a burlap banner spelling out BABY.  The chipboard letters are covered in music themed scrapbook paper.  The shabby material strips are made by tearing muslin and cotton materials in strips and tied onto the jute cord.  I had been wanting to make on of those!  The banner went home with the parents-to-be for the baby's room.

The "Rock a Bye Baby" banners tied in the music theme.  The mini pennant chipboard pieces and mini clothespins came from Hobby Lobby.  I covered the chipboard with burlap and wrote the letters with a thick Sharpie marker.

Above the table an old wooden ladder held "tissue" balls, glittered music notes, and sepia tinted photos of the parents-to-be.  

The whole view doesn't show the different dimensions, so it kind of looks cluttered, but it really wasn't.  

What's a shower without food?!  We had yummy cupcakes, nuts and mints.  The cute cream and brown bears came from Walmart - in the Valentine's stuffed animal aisle!  I had seen them a few weeks ago, but they sold quickly!  There were only three left when I got these two.  I took their Valentine's sweaters off and added mocha colored bows around their necks.

Here's a close up of the balls.  They are made from coffee filters.  The white ones are just plain, unaltered filters that were attached to a styrofoam ball with straight pins.  The larger, tannish colored one was made by dyeing the filters in tea.  They were attached to a larger styrofoam ball with floral pins.  Click HERE to go to my recipe/craft blog to get directions on how to make these pom poms.

My mother-in-law loaned me this child-sized piano.  A friend let me borrow the CUTE, vintage-style burlap pillow.  My mom had given me the candle stick and crystal dangling thing (don't know what it is called....), so it fit perfect with the theme.  (That friend also let me have an old window she had for the mantle in the first picture. SOOOO pretty!)

I made this easy wall hanging by covering a painter's canvas board with burlap, adding burlap/muslin trim, and cutting out letters on the Cricut.  The glittered music notes were added for fun, and the wall hanging was given to the parents for the baby's room.

Beverages for the shower were Mocha Punch and Tea Punch.  You can find the Mocha Punch recipe HERE - on my recipe/crafts blog.  I'll post the Tea Punch when I get that recipe.  The tea punch was served in a soup tureen that was my grandmothers.  The mocha punch beverage server was borrowed from the same friend that had the burlap pillow.

She also let me borrow this CUTE metal heart wall hanging.  The burlap flower is a magnet and held sepia tinted photos of the grandparents-to-be.

There were lots and lots of presents....even more than is shown here!  The parents-to-be were blessed by so many people who love them and who are anticipating the arrival of their little one!  And, oh.....one more thing:  The gender of the baby wasn't known!  It was different, but so much fun being a surprise!  (We didn't find out with our first three, either.  We did on the last one because our daughter said she would cry if she wasn't having a sister.  We wanted her to get all of the crying done before the brother came instead of when he came :).  THANKFUL for the outpouring of love for this family!

On this GRATITUESDAY, I am thankful for the church and the baby showers we host for our Christian brothers and sisters.  What a special thing to have that special bond between God's children!

To see what others are grateful for, visit Heavenly Homemakers!

Safari Baby Shower

I just realized that I never blogged about a baby shower I recently decorated for a sweet young couple who are expecting their first child - a little girl.  How did I forget to do that???  Oh, well.....it doesn't really matter....

I counted up and I believe that this made the forth time I have used these tall, slender candles in the center of the vase.  I got them at Dollar Tree in February, so at a dollar a piece, you can't beat it!  

We have the glass vases at our church fellowship building, so they are ready and available for any occassion.  I simply put tulle in the bottom of the vase, inserted the Dollar Tree candles that had been wrapped in burlap and animal print material, then dropped in a cute wooden safari animal to be peeking out from behind the glass.

 The ceiling decorations were made using a purchased kit at the party store, but cutting the banner apart and using the hangings in a different way.

The ribbons from the garland were cut in long length and hung through a safari hat to the ceiling.

Another view of the centerpieces.

A hula hoop from Dollar Tree was covered in leopard print duct tape, then a raffia skirt was tied to the hula hoop as a kind of "chandelier".

The table skirt was several raffia skirts pinned around the table, with a burlap/scrapbook paper BABY banner.  The table was set for a brunch - a fun twist on shower food.

Close up of banner.

 Another close up of banner.

Safari animals welcome guests.

Raffia bows on paper lanterns hung over the table.

The entry table.

Pineapple trees were placed on the serving table.  I had never made one, though I had watched someone do it once.  It was fun! The palm leaves were found at Hobby Lobby.  

A smaller pineapple palm.

Table is set and waiting for the food!

More cut garland decorations from the party store.

The shower is done, the parents are ready:  All we just do is now wait for baby girl to be born!

Baby Shower Decor - Black, White, and Lime Green

Decorating for baby showers is always lots of fun, but this time, using a different color palate than I had done ever before:  lime green, black and white.  I found all of these baby clothes at Hobby Lobby.  The hanging rods were made by hot-gluing smaller rods onto larger ones, cutting them when needed and putting balls on the ends.  If needed, clothes were attached with mini clothes pins.  The lime green crocheted flowers were attached with stick pins (because my duck tape didn't work on material :).  The clothes were all given to the mom-to-be.

Every little baby is special, so planning for his/her up-coming arrival is special as well.  And since this little girl, Tynlee will be my great-niece, it was especially. This name banner was made using a lime green piece of tulle from a roll, zebra print black and white rectangle pieces (alternate the direction of the animal print), burlap rectangle pieces cut from a roll, and lime green ruffled ribbon which made the letters. Hot glue all pieces together and attach letters with mini clothespins.

We have some pictures hanging in our church fellowship building that needed some sprucing up for the shower decor.  I covered the whole picture with a paisley/floral black and white paper, then finished the project in the same manner as I did the banner, except for this one, I hot glued the clothes pin to the background paper and tied a ruffled ribbon bow.  The whole picture was hung by lime green tulle....making an easy cover-up for existing decor.

This burlap wreath is the one I've shown before that hangs on my own front door.  It was dressed-up with some black mesh ribbon and more lime green tulle.  More could have been added to make it even more personalized for this shower.  If my printer had been working, I thought "It's a Girl!" would have been a cute sign hanging in the middle.

Isn't this an interesting addition to the shower decor???  My husband and son hung all of the paper lanterns from the ceiling for me Saturday morning.  When I got ready to finish late that night, I found this little thing sitting like they had made it just for the shower.  Of course, I wanted to give them credit (so no one would think that I did it :).  Later I found out that it was only my husband's doing.  Funny!

Here is another existing picture re-do using the same supplies:  black and white paper, burlap, zebra print ribbon and lime green ruffled ribbon.  I taped the bottom piece of paper to the picture glass, making it easy to just tear off and throw away.

If you remember the Valentine's banquet pictures, I used a candle jar inside of a vase.  This time I used those same candle jars (from Dollar Tree and now in their second use).  I removed the sheet music from the jars, hot glued burlap around them and added zebra and/or lime green ruffled ribbon.  The jars sat on a base off lime green tulle inside of the larger vase.  It made a perfect centerpiece with very little cost.  I'll be able to use the jars at least one or two more times, so they've been a great addition to all of my other "stuff".

Now.....it's on to get ready for the next baby shower in a few weeks!  It's a girl, too!  Babies are a gift from God :).

Black, White, and Robin's Egg Blue Wedding Shower

I've been super-excited to write this post and share these pictures with you!  Have I mentioned that one of my favorite things to do is decorate for weddings and showers????  (Probably every time I do a post like this, huh?? :)  This one was especially fun because I did it with a friend what has very elegant taste and also happened to have a lot of the decorative items in her home that worked with the color theme we were doing.

The bride and groom, Krystin and Cesar, are actually only using black and white for their wedding colors, but Linda decided to add a third color to the mix.  It definitely made this shower "pop" by adding in the third color for accent. (I'm a huge black and white fan, though.  My school's colors were black and white!)

The "C" and "K" initial wall hangings were clear, but not showing up too well on the table.  Linda had picked up some scrapbook paper in the robin's egg/black design and I cut it and backed the initials.  I also used a scrapbook frame I had at home to make the black/white photo of the couple match the decor, using the paper as a background and some scrunched up tulle in the bottom.

As a guest register, I took the scrapbook paper, attached it to a piece of cardboard, then topped it with an accent black sheet of paper and a printed piece of lined paper designed on the computer.  To hold it all together, I punched holes and tied a tulle bow.

We didn't have a square white tablecloth for this table, so each corner was tied with tulle.  It made it seem fancier than it was!

I enjoyed working with Linda because she thinks of things I wouldn't have.  For example, I wouldn't have added a new, different color with the fresh flowers.  I would have wanted everything to "match".  She suggested that I buy a different color - something that would stand out.  My children and I went to Wichita Falls and Sam's Club there had a beautiful selection of flowers.  I took her advice and went out on a limb with these orange flowers (though I did buy some white ones....just in case we needed them :).  The orange was BEAUTIFUL and she taught me a lesson in decor!

The white flowers did get used.  A few went for corsages, but the majority went in this black iron tiered basket (I got this on sale at Hobby Lobby the afternoon I went to Wichita Falls...$14.00!)  Cute!

After I got back from Wichita Falls, I walked in and Linda had arranged the gifts and made up a mock bed - just like they do in department stores!  It was sooooo neat!!

The bedding was a gift from the hostesses.  I wondered if the bedding would fit back in the bag after the shower.  It did!!

The shower was in the morning so brunch-type food was served.  Isn't cheesecake a brunch food??? :)  Yum!

I'm not pointing out the cheesecake again, but the pretty serving dishes Linda has in her collection.  Every serving dish was beautiful! 

Some of the serving pieces are in our fellowship building.  They are used for various church events.

As we were working on the shower Friday night, I thought of something that would be really neat for the coffee.  I have an antique silver and glass carafe with a candle warmer that was my grandma Sibyl's.  The only problem was that it was "mine" technically, but it was stored at my parents - in Altus - 30 minutes away.

I called my husband and told him I wanted to go get the carafe.  Guess what?? He volunteered to go get it for me!  Wasn't that sweet??!  It hadn't been used in over 20 years, so it needed some polishing.

One of the other hostesses cleaned it before the shower.  Isn't it beautiful?!  I was so excited to use it.  I remember being at my grandma's house and her having her extension club parties - using the carafe.  I thought it was the neatest thing and it was the one thing I told her I wanted some day.  She passed away in 1990 and wrote that the carafe was to be mine.  I'll be storing it here at home from now on.  I've made room for it and want to use it more in the future.

I made these little filo shell sausage and egg appetizers.  Here is the recipe (on my family recipe blog).

Linda ordered the black and white checked tablecloths.  Aren't they cute?  For showers she and I both like to put two long tables together.  It gives more decorating room.  One just isn't enough to do a whole lot!  Linda had the two lamps from her bedroom.  We both like to use a lot of boxes to make different levels for the decorations.

This wasn't a planned thing, but when I went home late Friday night after decorating, I decided to make this "Blessing Ring".  I had the ring in my craft closet and just happened to have a lot of black and white ribbon.  Each ribbon is looped onto the ring.  If the ribbon is a fraying-type, just knot the ends.  I "stole" these pictures off of the bride-to-be's Facebook page and copied them off...tying them to the ribbons.

This little note was attached to the ring.  I bought the ring at Walmart in the sewing section.  I'm not sure what it's actually for, but I bought it a long time ago with the intention of having my daughter make one of these for the county fair.  Oh, well, this worked out even better! Cards, pictures, and other items can be attached to the ring itself or to the ribbons.  The bride and groom (to be) mentioned taking it to their wedding reception.  I suggested that little blank notes be left on the tables and guests could write blessings for the couple, which could be added to the ring.

My photo of the tables where the guests were seated turned out blurry, but we used these glass vases and placed white candles in each one.  Black tulle bows were tied around the middle sections of the vases.  Each table had a white cloth, two pieces of paper (black and the same robin's egg blue/black print we used throughout the decorations) in the center, topped with the vases holding the candles.

Best wishes, Krystin and Cesar!  May God bless your upcoming marriage!