Taking it all in…

This goes out to a very special couple, my best friend, Katie, and the love of her life, Scott.  Your wedding is only a few short days away and I want to remind you to take it all in.

At some point in the night, step back, and look around at all the people that love you.  Look at the perfect flowers you picked, and the candles on the tables.  Look at the people dancing, and look at the decorations.  Look at one another and remember that you are each other’s best friend.  You will see that the months and months of planning (and stressing) were all totally worth it! 

The night goes way too quickly, so make sure you take a step back, take it all in, and give each other a kiss you will never forget…

Love you both like crazy!! 

Check out my new logo!

My fabulous new logo for Fabulous Redstars was created by Jenna Malone (a girlfriend of mine from high school)… Jenna and I haven’t seen each other in a while, but I feel so lucky to have people like her in my life who still support me!  As you can see, Jenna is obviously a talented graphic designer and she would love to help with any of your graphic design needs too!  You can contact Jenna here!  

Jenna, thank you again for letting me take advantage of your talent!!!  And after all these years, thank you for your continued support! 

So, now that I have an official logo, I need to order official business cards!!!  This is so exciting!!!!!!!!

Sunshine & Love…Part 3 of 3

We wanted to make the Sunshine & Love bridal shower for Katie more about food, friends, and sangria, so we selected a few simple and entertaining games to play.  First up, The Celebrity Bride Game.  For this game, use PhotoShop or another similar program, and insert the bride’s face on to pictures of celebrities in their wedding gowns.  The object of the game…try to figure out who the celebrity is!  This has become a favorite with all the girls in the group and it can be done at a baby shower too!  Just change it to celebrities with baby bumps! 

Next was The Apron Game.  A very easy game where the bride walks through the room wearing an apron full of kitchen items off her registry.  Then, the guests all write down as many of the items as they can remember seeing.  The winner keeps the apron, and the bride gets to keep all the goodies!  If you decide ahead of time that you want to play this game, you can ask each guest to bring something small, compact, and unwrapped from the bride’s registry (not telling them why), and combine everything after everyone arrives. 

The last game we played was The Purse Game.  For this game, we grabbed everyone’s purse, split them into 3 teams, and gave each team a list of various items all worth different points.  One simple rule…as a group, find as many things as you can in the purses from the list provided!  The team with the highest score, wins!  This would be a great game to play when you have a group of women who don’t know each other too well.  The quiet and reserved girl might be the one who has a condom worth 15 points in her bag! 

And here are some other random shots from the party.

The bridesmaids and I all worked really hard to put on a shower that Katie would never forget.  We hope she had as fabulous of a time as we did!!

Sunshine & Love…Part 2 of 3

We had decided on a Sunshine & Love theme for our bride, Katie.  She looooooves bright colors, so we thought this was perfect for her! 

Since this group of girls love to take a ton of pictures, a photo staging area was essential.  We decided to incorporate a pastime of the bride and groom into it too…beach cruisers!  We also thought it would be entertaining to have silly props for everyone to use for some of the shots.  Naz, a dear friend of the bride, and my personal choice for all of the events in my life, was kind enough to bring a bunch of her props.  She also jumped in to take almost all of the pictures during the party!  When you have a few minutes, you should totally check out her website and Facebook page.  You will love her work!  Needless to say, the photo area turned out fabulously!! 

We used one of the same details I did for my daughter’s 1^st birthday party, which were the large “candy” decorations (check out that post to see how they were made).  These were hung up on each corner the backyard patio and behind our photo staging area. 

I am a huge fan of quotes.  It sometimes helps me sum up a feeling or emotion that I can’t quite get across with my own words.  I thought that Willy Wonka quotes would be a nice addition for this shower.  They are silly and fun, but surprisingly meaningful and deep at the same time.  Totally appropriate for a bridal shower!  And of course, they were printed on the same paper as the Save the Date and Invitation! 

Katie and Scott love taking pictures.  Well, maybe Katie likes it a little more than Scott… Anyways, we wanted some fun pictures of the couple around the party to show their personalities.  There were pictures on the front door (in addition to the Willy Wonka quote, “Little surprises around every corner, but nothing dangerous,” welcoming everyone to the party), on the fireplace, at the sangria station, and taped to the walls around the patio (make sure to use painter’s tape so you don’t ruin any surfaces). 

Since the bride loves wearing bright colors, it should be no surprise that she also likes having bright nails!  To highlight this love, we decided to make a simple take away gift for all of the guests…bright colored nail polish!  Complete, of course, with the Willy Wonka quote, “A thing of beauty, is a joy forever.”  We also made a nail polish bouquet for Katie to take home. 

That’s it for today.  Tomorrow, we will end with the games!  

Sunshine & Love…Part 1 of 3

This bridal shower was SO MUCH FUN to put together!  Planning started months before the party and the bridesmaids and I were so excited to finally have Katie, the bride, see everything we came up with!  There are so many details from this shower that I must talk about, so I’m going to have to split this up into 3 different posts… Today, we discuss food and drinks! 

After the Save the Dates were sent out, we started to concentrate on what other details we needed/wanted at the party.  A cocktail party was decided on, so next to discuss…DRINKS!  We had both white and red sangria, as well as cucumber water for the girls who couldn’t enjoy the sangria.  I recommend having cucumber water for almost any party – it is incredibly easy and a very nice touch.  Whenever I make sangria, I loosely follow a couple of recipes I found online.  Typically, I just change up the fruit and select whatever is in season at that time.  To me, the more citrus, the better.  And I like to try and find something that looks really cool too in the sangria, like blood oranges or kumquats.

For our foodie bride, we wanted to make sure we tried some new and “fancy” dishes.  Since I have no business being anywhere near the kitchen (unless it’s to make a stiff drink), the food all fell on the shoulders of the bridesmaids and my husband.  There were mini turkey sandwiches with cucumber, tomato, and fig spread, homemade stuffed mushrooms, prosciutto wrapped cantaloupe, mac-n-cheese balls, fruit skewers, sundried tomato muffins, caprese salad, and some other wonderful dishes.  Everything was delicious!!! 

Our “go-to” baker, Holly, brought some fabulous homemade desserts.  She prepared these amazing mini chocolate cupcakes with a surprise Junior Mint in the middle, she made caramel corn, and if those weren’t enough, she created these super yummy homemade chocolate lollipops that were pink and in the shape of lips!!  Holly is incredible!! 

In addition to the desserts that Holly made, we also decided to have a candy station.  Because of the warm weather, we decided to mostly have sour candy, which worked out perfectly with our bright color theme! 

Tomorrow, we discuss decorations! 

What’s in a name…..???

Have you ever wondered why I choose the name Fabulous Redstars for my event planning company??  Well, let me tell you….   

My last name in Japanese actually translates to Red Star, which is AMAZING!  And my most favorite thing to say in the whole wide world is FABULOUS!  I strive for my days to be fabulous, my friends are definitely fabulous, and I have a fabulous family!!!

Have a FABULOUS day!!