Reception

Venue

Josephine S. Leiser Center

I fell in love with the site right away. I don't get the banquet hall feel. The site is only for me that day and I won't have to share. I have more pics somewhere. I'll add those shortly.

Our Style

Dario and I have very similar taste. We both believe less is more. We wanted something simple, traditional, elegant and chic. So we came up with the following...

Colors

Black and white are our primary colors. It started because I wanted the girls to be able to choose their own dresses anywhere. You can't go with a color because not all reds, blues, etc are the same everywhere. Black is black and white is close enough =) The more we thought about it the more classier we thought it would look. The colors are timeless. I fell in love with the green cymbidium orchid, hence the green accent color.

Underlying Theme

We both love to travel. I came up with the travel theme after deciding our table names will be places we've been together. It will not be an in your face kind of theme, but it will be there! The card box will be an old suitcase. The favors are luggage tags. Our save the dates were boarding passes. =)

Centerpieces

We purchased these candle holders from Costco. We flipped the stands over to allow for more height. The rocks are river rocks from Lowes. After meeting with Gil he came up with this idea in like 5 min. It's funny because about a year ago I saw a display of flowers that looked just like this and I loved them.

Around the centerpieces we will add black river rocks, opened flowers and votives.

Thanks to my wonderful DOC we're getting these frames for our table numbers. Each table will be named after a place we've visited together. The frame is 5x7, so there's room to put the picture and the name on one frame.

Table Names

Thanks to Knottie Goldie3474 I have these beautiful table names. They came out better than expected. I'm so happy to have them and I know the guests will enjoy!!!

Creating the Seating Chart

Seating arrangements were not an easy task. I saw this trick in a magazine and thought it was a great way to do the job. It was easy to move people around and get a good visual of how the tables will be.

I also colore coded it. Green - Adults, Blue - Kids, Pink - Adults that I still don't know for sure are coming (3). The numbers at the center are the number of people at each table.

Table Accents

At the last minute I decided to go with chivari chairs! So excited and think it's going to look great in the room.

I so wanted silver chargers on the table. At my last minute with the caterer he added them for free!!!

The Toasting Flutes

Thanks to my sister, Debbie, we will now have these beautiful toasting flutes. They were a gift and they're perfect!

The Cake

I saw this cake at a bridal show and it was love at first sight. I was never one to care about the cake until that moment. Mine will be 3 tiers. Everything green will be white and everything white will be black. We decided on a vanilla cake with guava filling. Yum =)

Maria from Mayu's Cakes was extremely helpful in finding a cake topper. The website was easy to go through and order. It came in really fast.
Debbie, purchased the cake cutters for me too. So nice. =)

Linens

Linen for our seating cards and gifts.

Linen for our guestbook table.

Linen will be used for the "Grooms cake." It's not really a cake but 3 tiers of McDonald's chicken nuggets. In the center of the top tier I'll have some sparklers coming out. This is a total surprise for Dario and will come out after our real cake cutting. I can't wait to see his face.

Guestbook Idea

It was not easy to think of a guestbook. I used pictures that I have of the guests to create a photo book. It took a long time to complete, but I think it's totally worth it!

Music Choices

Bridal Party Entrance - Black Eyed Peas "I Got a Feeling"
Newlywed Entrance - Smashmouth "I'm a Believer"
First Dance - Michael Buble "Everything"
Father/Daughter- Josh Groban "You Raise Me Up"
Cake Cutting - Adam Sandler "Growing Old with You"
Bouquet Toss - Beyonce "Single Ladies (Put A Ring On It)"
Garter Removal - MC Hammer "Can't Touch This"
Garter Toss - Inner Circle "Bad Boys"

Misc. Ideas

I purchased the sign at Target. I might have it at the Sign in station. Not sure yet.

To go with our travel theme. We are using these suitcases from paper-source for our bathroom baskets
Girls - deodorant, hairspray, emory board, and lotion.
Both - comb, tissue, tylenol, band aids, and mints.

I'll use these suitcases as my card box.

The luggage tags will serve as a seating chart and favor. We are still trying to figure out how to display them. Perhaps we'll use the suitcases for that too.

Sparkler pictures are courtesy of behapybride.

I had always wanted lighting at my wedding. I truly believe it transforms the atmosphere in the room. Because of costs I thought I'd have to let it go, but fortunately my wonderful DOC is including it in our package!!!