Last month, Mr. Eggplant was the best man for our friends' wedding in San Diego. Coincidentally, one of my bridesmaids was the maid of honor! The wedding was gorgeous. Our friends hosted a lunch reception at the Marine Room, a restaurant with an AMAZING ocean front view. The beach was literally right outside the window. Unbelievable. And the food… Oh. Mah. Gah. It wedding food I’ve ever tasted.

Hubs gave a hilarious Best Man speech where he made fun of the Cal/Stanford rivalry between the couple (Mark, the groom, graduated from Cal and Catherine, the bride, from Stanford). Hubs got some good chuckles from the crowd–he’s such a ham. He also prepared a slideshow for the couple, which was better than the slideshow he prepared for us! Why? Well, Hubs did something super sweet for the bride and groom: he emailed all of their close friends who couldn’t attend the wedding and asked them to record a short video sending well wishes to the newlyweds. Then Hubs added the footage at the end of the slideshow as a surprise! The couple was definitely surprised. How stinkin’ sweet is that? I’m so proud of Hubs. He thought the idea up all by himself.

I had an opportunity to work on the couple's wedding invitations with the talented Emily of Emma and Bear. I'm totally addicted to Emily's blog where she shares her lovely crafts and posts the most adorable photos of her puppy! Emily did a fantastic job designing the ocean themed cards while I came up with the color scheme, monogram, and invitation suite presentation. Catherine picked out cranberry colored BM dresses for the ladies and wanted to keep an ocean feel to her wedding, so I suggested a color scheme of cranberry and sky blue .

Once the design was finalized, I goccoed and assembled the entire project by hand. Yes, 150 invitations with four cards and one envelope per set. I'm going to pat myself on the back here, because--I won't lie--it was a LOT of work. The project took two full weekends, plus several weeknight evenings. In the end, it was all worth it. I think they turned out rather well! Most importantly, the bride and groom were happy with the finished product.

 
Catherine wanted a cover that would act as a pocket fold, but wouldn't cost as much. I came up with the idea of folding a sheet of thick card stock in half and using a ribbon to secure the cards inside. The metallic paper was only $0.30 per sheet from www.paperandmore.com and I was able to cut two folders per sheet. This option was much cheaper than a pocket fold. The entire invitation suite was less than $2.50 per set, including all the paper, envelopes, Gocco screens, ink, and embellishments. Not bad!

On the cover, I used two different sized square punches to cut out the monogram. The unsightly ribbon ends were hidden beneath the square.

Here's the lovely reception card in all of it's Goccoed glory. Emily carried the whimsical wave motif and starfish on all the cards.

 
And above is the RSVP card.

  
Once the project was finished, I packaged the lovely paper goods in ribbon and sent them off to be shipped!

Next up, I'll share some of the dazzling, gorgeous images from Catherine & Mark's beach themed wedding.

Hiya, bees. How are ya? Long time, no blog!

I'm back today because I wanted to share my wedding experiences from the other side. Not the married side, but the bridesmaid side! I'm a  bridesmaid in my future sister in law's (FSIL Eggplant) and brother's wedding next year. They recently got engaged and set their wedding date for October 2009 and I couldn't be happier for them! I couldn't have picked a better match for little Brother Eggplant if I had chosen her myself.

Last week, I got my very first bridesmaid newsletter from FSIL Eggplant. It was so stinkin' adorable, I just had to share it with the hive.

 
The newsletter was called, Bridesmaid Aisle Style. FSIL Eggplant and Brother Eggplant picked pink and brown as their wedding colors and each page was coordinated in shades of pink and brown. FSIL Eggplant wrote a sweet welcome message on the first page.

Second page, she wrote introductions for the bridal party members. We don't all know each other, so the blurbs were a great touch.

The third page showcased photos of our BM dresses. FSIL Eggplant already purchased our gowns for us! Now that's stress free wedding planning at its best.

On the fourth page, FSIL Eggplant included some suggestions for affordable, cute footwear.

Next, FSIL's showed us the results of her makeup trial with Wow Pretty. Wow, she definitely looks purdy!

FSIL also introduced the designer who will be doing the reception florals. FSIL suggested making our own bouquets the night before the wedding to save a bit of money and spend some quality time together.

 
On the last page was everyone's contact info, useful for bridal shower planning.

As a former bride myself, I loved receiving this newsletter in the mail and I appreciated the organized presentation of information. With busy schedules and limited time, it's hard to stay current with everyone's happenings. Newsletters are a wonderful and impressive method to keep in touch. They can be sent via snail mail or email in PDF format, although I personally prefer getting something in the mailbox myself.

Thanks for letting me post this, FSIL Eggplant! I'm looking forward to your wedding day!