Bridal shower scrapbook

Last Friday, I went on a scrapbook weekend in the White Mountains (New Hampshire). The idea is that you set up all your things on Friday when you arrive and can leave everything out (day and night) until you leave Sunday afternoon. You can scrap all day - all night. Anytime you want to. Pretty much the only time you stop is to go eat - which are meals that are included in your payment so no money is needed AT ALL. Your space, your hotel room and your meals are included in one bill and you don't have to think it. It's amazing.

If you're into scrapbooking... you should look into going away on one of these weekends. I love them ;)

I'm a relatively quick scrapper. I completed a number of things that I wanted to (thanks to power layouts) and one of my projects was to make my bridal shower scrapbook!

So... here it is. I love it and I spent about 13 hours putting it together.





















In order to make this book... I was at Michaels a lot. I don't like to buy things if they're not on sale... but luckily thanks to my DIY table numbers I had been going often and getting coupons every time. ;) I love coupons.

Bridal Shower Invitations

Here's the invitation for my bridal shower!

I blocked out some info (soo.. it didn't exactly look like this):


Don't you LOVE those stamps!?

The top of the invitation says:

"A sprinkle of confetti and a couple of kisses
Soon Jasmine and Sean will be Mr. and Mrs."

This card went along with the invitation asking everyone to bring a recipe along with them to the shower! =) I got such great ideas!

I love them!

Bridal shower recap: part 6

I knew I wanted Sean to make an appearance at the shower for a few reasons.

1. His family (and mine!) would love to see him
2. He NEEDED to see these decorations
3. He WANTED to try the desserts
4. I knew he wouldn't understand the amount of gifts (ha!)

So I told him to stop by around 5:00... which gave the ladies plenty of time to mingle, eat, do the gift thing, cut the cake... etc. Oh! Here's me cutting the cake... except I didn't know how to do it so Sean's mom helped! I swear there's an art to cake-cutting...


When he arrived we took some pics!



Funny thing, I purposely saved a few gifts so that he could have the pleasure of opening some... but looking through the pictures I'm realizing -- I opened them, anyways... oops!


And my last post will be what the invitation looked like!! Maybe tonight... possibly tomorrow. it depends how fast these thank you's get written! (they will go in the mail today, they will go in the mail today!)

=)

Bridal shower recap: part 5

Between waiting for my guests to arrive and sneaking a bite to eat here & there, walking around mingling and stopping to pose for pictures -- I realized it's a lot of work to be the center of attention. Flattering? Yes. Exciting? Beyond belief. But, work? For sure.

After I started taking desserts to eat, I noticed other people began taking them, too. Before I knew it lots of the tables seemed bare! But my mom and her helpers were quickly replenishing the displays. =)

At some point, my mom suggested to me that I start opening my gifts. There were about 40 people [who all brought me a gift] and with my general slowness in the gift opening department they thought I should get started. =)


It was one of the most stressful things to do! I didn't expect to be under so much pressure. In the beginning, I was forgetting to say who the gift was from, what is was, forgetting to show off each gift. It was awful! I finally got into some type of rhythm:

Bridal party jobs:

MOH Chelsey: wrote down who gave which gift
BM Lindsey: made my bouquet out of all my ribbon
Junior BM Lizzie: handed gifts to me to open
BM Tessa: took gifts from me that I had already opened
Aunt Regina: took all my cards, checks, gift cards so they wouldn't get lost in all the tissue paper!

Let me tell you, I had all this help, and still... difficult!


I'm really the type of person that enjoys opening gifts -- each and every one! And I don't like to feel rushed. I like to give each gift [and the person who gave said gift] equal time of me reading the card, unwrapping the gift, looking at the gift, appreciating the gift & thanking the gift giver. But when you have 40+ gifts... IT'S SO OVERWHELMING TO DO ALL THIS!

Because at the same time, I felt bad! Because all these people were standing around... waiting... & waiting... & waiting FOR ME!

At one point, I realized I was opening gifts on the ground! All my practice of sitting correctly in my fancy chair went right out the window! But those boxes can be really heavy! And to have them on your lap... while trying to unwrap... while trying to balance them on your knees... well... the floor seemed like a safer option!

See our dishes?! I LOVE THEM!

I really wanted to have a ribbon bouquet. So I made sure to pass every ribbon/bow/string/anything toward Lindsey.

I unwrapped those ribbons really carefully! Supposedly, the number of ribbons you BREAK [by accident!] while opening bridal shower gifts represent the number of CHILDREN you will have. Not that I don't want children because I do -- but I really wanted the bouquet [haha] so I didn't break any!


I don't even know how long it took to open all the gifts but when I was finished I got to pose with my bouquet!! And because I didn't break any ribbons... I have a long & beautiful bouquet!

And, finally me with my bridesmaids!!
3 girls weren't able to come =(

Next up on the blog: Sean's arrival at the shower! =)

Bridal shower recap: part 4

When my mom and aunt started planning my shower, I knew I would love it. But I didn't comprehend what having a bridal shower actually meant. I only thought about the decorations and who would be able to come -- and then my imagination sort of stopped. I had no idea what it would be like.

Saturday morning, I woke up really early. Too early, actually and I laid in bed until my alarm starting going off at 6:30. After getting ready, Sean dropped me off at my cousin [& bridesmaid] Lindsey's house so we could go get our makeup done. The sweetest girl did my makeup and I'm so happy to say that I loved it so much that I booked her right then and there for the day of my wedding! It was a perfect experience and I can't wait to tell you more on this later!

We headed to my mom's house right after and when I walked in -- there were plenty of cameras waiting for me! I was SO excited.


Nothing was necessarily a surprise [as in being kept a secret from me] but I didn't know about that much stuff. So when I walked in I couldn't believe it! I almost cried and if I didn't just get my makeup done I probably would have allowed myself to shed some tears!

After I looked around and saw every little detail, we took some pictures in the spot where I'd be opening gifts. I wanted to know how I should sit...


We decided that something like this would be appropriate =)


Do you remember when my MOH's mailed me a package in this post? Well, I wore the shirt they made me to get my makeup done. It was very cute and sweet of them!


Then I decided that I should get ready and change my outfit in case we had any early bird arrivals.

Once I changed I posed with some of my bridesmaids:


And then I walked around trying to eat! I was starving but didn't want to ruin any of the displays before people saw! If I was to give a word of advice to brides -- I would say, "MAKE SURE TO EAT SOMETHING!" I definitely need to remember this for the wedding day!

And the last thing to do was to wait for my guests to arrive!


More tomorrow!

Bridal shower recap: part 3

I have another shower recap for you today! You can check out recaps one and two here & here.

I seriously had the most amazing time! After each post, I realize there are even more pictures that I want to show!

So here it goes:

I loved these straws the very first time I saw them! One side of the tag says, "Love is sweet" and the other side says, "7.16.11"!

The desserts and drinks all had name tags.

Along with the invitation, my mom sent a request to bring a recipe to the shower. Here is the basket where everyone placed their recipes! Hopefully, now I'll learn to cook... Oh, and the chair covers! Yeah, they were all re-covered to match the shower colors. Amazing...

Sean's mom brought me these flowers and they are so beautiful! They're now in my bedroom!

Feather decorations!

Don't these look fake?! They were so pretty -- people didn't know they were real!

Ah! These strawberries, again. Luckily, we have some left over and I've been eating one [a few] a day.

Cute water bottles!

Glasses all lined up... ready for the taking! Do you remember this post about champagne glass name tags? Well, they're in the picture... can you spot them?! Oh, and all these tissue poms in each picture... my aunt hand-made them... each and every one!

Favors! Inside there were yummy Godiva chocolates!

Now that I've shown you all the details of the shower -- I feel like I can actually tell you about it!

Be sure to check back tomorrow!