Handmade Wedding

Being a crafty person when it came to the run up to my wedding I knew that I wanted as many handmade aspects as I could manage - and not just for the reason of saving money!

Some things were a given like buntings and place names but the further into planning I got the more I realised I could make to save money and to give it the homey and festival feel that I was after.

I thought I'd share them all below as when I sat down to think of them I've remembered I made more than I thought!

As the reception was taking place in my parents garden I knew I wanted bunting throughout. In the marquee, across the garden and the summer house/dance floor. I also have a big shot machine with letter templates so I was able to customise the bunting even more with sayings like 'Alice and Malcolm' over the marquee, Pie and Mash for the catering tent, Bar - guess what that was for =)

It's still possible of course to customise your own bunting with letters and sayings without a big shot machine but it made it was easier, quicker and neater.

For labelled bunting I made the triangles slightly smaller (13cm x 16cm) just big enough to hold the letters and so then the letters were closer together and easier to read.

I like bunting made from lots of different fabrics however when using it for signs I think it was more legible if the triangles are form the same fabric but the spaces and end can easily be different!

Groomsmen Ties

My Husband (back then fiance!) very early on went out with his father and best men to pick out suits and 2 hours of shopping later they were ordered from a high street and boom, nice and quick! They only thing missing was ties. We went round shops together having a look and everything either seemed like nothing special or way over priced so I thought ahh I'll just make them! I managed to make 8 ties (including a mini one for my nephew <3) from just 2 metres of fabric costing a grand total of £24, bargain! The hours of hand sewing I've no idea but I never really counting hand sewing as much work as it can be done in front of the telly!

Table Cloth

A simple one but effective. We were borrowing tables from the local village hall so I knew they wouldn't be that pretty but they were free so I can't exactly complain! As I was going for a festival theme I really wanted blue and white gingham so I ordered a 50m roll of just that through my work (working at a haberdashery does have it's benefits!) and just rolled the fabric along the three long tables and pinking sheared them at the ends, didn't even hem them!

Pie and Mash tickets

Sticking with tables we had Pie and Mash for our mains for the wedding, people still talk about now which I LOVE! It was lovely to decide we love pie and mash lets have it at the wedding. I took quite a while to find a company that would be able to out to my parents house in the middle of nowhere (South Devon) and not cost a fortune and the best deal we found by booking The Humble Pie Company who I only found out on the day cam all the way from Brighton! How they were the best option for us I can't quite remember but they had loads of different favours and said that people could just pick on the day. However marrying a veggie I know that sometimes people can sometimes not decide when there's so many offerings and what if all the veggie pies went before the vegetarians got their pie! So I narrowed it down to 4 options and got everyone's choices ahead of time with their rsvp. Then to remind them on the day (you know what it's like when you pick your meal 3 months before!) I designed and wrote out pie tickets for everyone's place and a little memento of that time they had pie and mash at a wedding!

Table Name Embroidery Hoops

I struggled with table names for quite a while. Countries or places seem quite popular but then randomly Alice in Wonderland characters just came to me!

I decided to do a simple embroidery of 8 difference characters. My cheating way for embroidery is to find a line drawing online and then lay my fabric over my laptop screen with the brightness on full. Trace onto the fabric with a water erasable pen and then get stitching!

I decided to leave faces blank as they seemed tricky!

 

Hand written black boards

A simple one but I thought effective! It's good to have the simple staples of the day nice and obvious as guests arrive to the reception so they know what not to miss!

I first draw on the letters with a white pencil and then went over with chalk pens!

 

Table Plan Notice Board

Another simple idea is a fabric notice board to hold the table plan - can be used in your home after the wedding!

I bought a large canvas from an arts shop, staple on the fabric. Lay over the ribbons and pin in place. Then stitch buttons over the criss crosses!

Handmade Gingerbread Favours

But by now means least are my gingerbread favours! Very often favours get over looked or even forgotten so I didn't want to spend much on them so I baked them instead! Then there's a little something on the table if you're on the last table who gets dinner, a snack for later or even the next day! Some still got left behind but my family didn't mind having a tin of biscuits for the rest of the week!

I hope you've enjoyed seeing some snippets from my wedding, I also tried to use local and independent business' for things I wasn't able to make myself like the rings, flowers and cake etc but think that could make another blog post in itself!