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A Wedding Shower in Red
The Halvorson House was all spiffied up this weekend to celebrate the upcoming wedding of my wonderful sister in law, Marie. Her and fiance Chris are tying the knot this labor day and we got the festivities rolling with a luncheon shower at my house.
I haven’t done much party hosting in my years, so I was excited to plan a fun afternoon for Marie. I started by designing an invitation based on a design I saw on Pinterest. I downloaded all the fonts off dafont, a free font site and laid it out in photoshop.
My husband was a huge help and kept the kids out of the house for the afternoon before the shower so I had a chance to get our house and mess of toys in order. The shower decor was a mix of burlap, reds and pinks when I was inspired by this fun chevron ribbon at Hobby Lobby. I used it to make this door banner so guests could easily identify our house.
The cardboard letters were also purchased at Hobby Lobby and I attached them to the ribbon using Gorilla Glue. I kept the mantel simple with a sign that Marie actually made for their engagement pictures that has their wedding date on it. I purchased all my flowers at Trader Joes which is always a steal, with bouquets costing only $3.99 each!
I designed some fun “He Said, She Said” games for a little ice breaker using the same fonts as the shower invite.
I got a little busy getting everything ready before the shower and forgot to get a picture of the table all staged with food and drinks, but here it with most of the items.
I ordered the poofs for the chandelier from Factory Party Direct on Amazon and attached them using twist ties.
I wrote the menu (in my very best handwriting I might add) using a chalkboard pen. The pen gives a much cleaner and brighter line than a traditional piece of chalk and really stands out.
Cupcakes were purchased from the always amazing Dolce Baking Company just down the road from my house in Prairie Village.
I purchased the XO garland from Paper Source back around Valentine’s Day.
Party City sells candy by the color, so I was able to pick up some sweet treats to match the decor. And luckily stain-free as Noah ate a bunch of pink M&Ms and smeared them all over the sofa hours before the shower :)
And most importantly, the beautiful bride. Can’t wait to see her become Mrs. Nelson in just a few shorts weeks!
Yard Update and DIY Cedar Planter Boxes
My husband and I have a dirty little design secret. While the inside of our home is polished and put together, our yard has been a disaster since we moved in. Supported by exhibit A, the view from our family room as it looked last Spring. Beautiful huh?
But last year we finally got our act together and started on a plan to revive the back and front yard. We started by installing a paver patio. Our enthusiasm to create an outdoor retreat quickly dwindled when one of the hottest summers we have experienced set in.
But with Spring this year came another push to get things looking nice. We lost the big tree between our house and our neighbors in a blizzard and then we cleared out the other scraggly weeds and trees. Which left us looking at this.
Because our family room looks right out into a fence we wanted to add some greenery and with the help of my dad, built some cedar flower boxes. We purchased eight foot cedar planks from Home Depot that we simply cut and put together with wood glue and nails. We left the front of the box off so we could screw the boxes into the fence and then put the front on with finishing nails.
We then lined the boxes with coffee filters, a tip from the garden center at Home Depot and planted an array of annuals that can stand up to the intense sun and heat that hits the area.
It added a great punch of color to the very brown and boring fence.
And improved the view from the side of the fence, which neighbors see when they walk by the front.
We are putting some finishing touches on our patio this week and then will have pictures of our entire outdoor space!
The Suburban Urbanist 