MRS. Ticket Reporting for Duty

The name's Ticket. MRS. Ticket.

I'm back!!! The wedding was amazing and wonderful and well I would be lying if I said it was perfect, because nothing in life is every completely perfect. But it was certainly one of the best days of my life (the day Mr. Ticket proposed is still high on my list, as is just about every day of our honeymoon). Luckily I was pretty much the only one to notice the hiccups we did encounter and for the most part I managed to just go with the flow and let everything roll off my back.

The family drama llama managed to keep its cool (hallelujah!) and everything turned out even better than I had imagined. After dreaming everything up in my head for so long, I started to freak out the week before the wedding as to how it would all actually pan out. Well there was no need for worry, between the team of expert vendors, AMAZING family members and a truly spectacular bee (looking at you Mrs. Parasol) the wedding went off without a hitch and looked incredible.

Our photographers won't have pictures back to us for a while and sadly we haven't even gotten a teaser from them. But I do have plenty of family pictures and some photo booth shots floating around, so here's a couple to tide you over till then.

A newly minted Mr. and MRS. Ticket walking down the aisle.

Photo Courtesy Auntie Ticket

 Photo Courtesy our DIY Photo Booth

Can't wait to share all the wonderful details and moments from the wedding with you all! 

A Touch of Geek Goes a Long Way

In one of my early posts I mentioned that Mr. Ticket and I met playing World of Warcraft. For those of you that need a refresher... I alluded to the fact that there would be at least one treasure commemorating this little detail of how our love story began and it's finally here! Seriously I'm just beyond stoked. I'm sure that this will seem cheesy to some of you, heck Mr. Ticket kind of laughed at me a little when I showed it to him but I love it!

I showed you a while back that our kids buckets will include VIP tags with a semi-disneyfied drawing of Mr. Ticket and I, in keeping with the theme of drawn Tickets I sought out the assistance of friends. Well... brother-in-law of a friend... whatever he's awesome. So without further ado...

WOW Versions of Mr. and Miss Ticket by Michael Rodriguez

Yeah those are totally our WOW characters drawn in WOW wedding attire sitting on a WOW beach (I believe it's supposed to be just outside of Rachet). I'm sorry but that's just freaking epic. Seriously Mr. Ticket's toon is spot on, from the awful beard to the crazy muscles. My toon's face looks a touch perturbed (which I actually find hilarious), but her hair and body are perfect. So this little beauty will be sitting on our guest book table in all it's gamer glory.

Did you decide to add an element of how you met in your wedding? Did your SO laugh at your epic ideas like mine?!

Procrastination Lesson Learned

I would like to give a fair warning out to brides nearing their wedding day. It's easy to put things off and plan to do them later. To assume that if it comes down to it and you run out of time you can always throw money at the problem and let someone else do things for you. I am here to tell you that I learned a difficult lesson recently.

Attempting to throw money at a problem does not always work!

I had originally planned to design guest book pages myself, then print them out and leave them on a table with place cards for people to fill out. However I have been unable to replicate the awesomness that other people seem so talented for creating. After enough fail attempts I started avoiding guest books in general.

Image via Weddingbee / Posted by michellybelly124

Honestly I think I avoided working on a guest book so well and for so long I actually just forgot about it... So when I finally remembered and we were so close to the wedding I decided that throwing money at the issue would be my best solution. I was so sad when I received a reply back from a very talented Etsy seller that she would be unable to complete an order for me in time for the wedding (this was approximately 2.5 weeks prior to the date). Epic fail procrastination on my part!

Amazeballs am I right?! (Image via Etsy/ Sold by CottageCreekArts)

This is one of those trees that you have guests finger print and sign, honestly I think this one is too pretty to even let guests near... I actually asked the seller about a different one (I still secretly hope I can convince Mr. Ticket that we need to buy this one just to frame and put on a wall in our home) since this one was significantly larger than what we needed. Well fail me for not getting on that band wagon soon enough!

So now I'm back to the drawing board on the guest book issue. I seriously HATE the plain jane books where people sign their names and that's it (no offense Jane). No time to order a beautiful photo book of our engagement shots for people to sign either. So I need your help hive. I'm too tired to attempt to make this decision and Mr. Ticket doesn't really care. So what do you think I should do?

A. Suck it up and design guest book pages like I originally planned.

B. Just blow up one of our engagement pictures, have it matted and let people sign that.

C. Forgo the guest book altogether since we are have an Anniversary Box anyways.

D. None of the above. Because you have an epic suggestion you are about to share with me below.

Oh and please learn from my mistakes! Do not put things off unless you are willing to do the work yourself RIGHT before your wedding. I also had to institute a new rule for myself... no more Etsy until after the wedding. It feels harsh sometimes, but I know it's the right thing to do.

Family Drama Llama

Let's be real for a moment here. Family drama exists and more often than not it rears it's ugly head around family functions... like a wedding. A wedding you may just have happened to spend the last 11+ months planning. A wedding you may or may not have just spent thousands of dollars on. A wedding you possibly want to be one of the happiest days of your life and the last thing on EARTH you want to deal with is FAMILY DRAMA!

My own personal little ball of family drama decided to drop yesterday afternoon. A certain someone was recently...indisposed, but found themselves released from prior constraints yesterday and has announced they will be attending my wedding...yay? Now in the interest of full disclosure I did in fact send this person an invitation (ONLY at the vehement request of my dearly beloved aunt), however when I sent this invitation there was NO question in my mind as to this person actually attending. As far as I was concerned Unicorns would be making a flight to Pluto the once epic planet and CNN would be airing the live coverage prior to this person actually coming to the wedding.

Well Unicorns... your big day is here! 

Horrible Paint Art by Miss Ticket

After an evening of contemplation... and maybe a little bit of wine. I've decided to just not worry about it. Honestly I've got enough stuff on my hands to deal with that constantly worrying over one individual's potential actions on our special day is not worth the effort. Believe me... in that one evening I managed to come up with dozens of potential awful scenarios, but fact of the matter is it's out of my hands. Whereas the matter of final payments, tip envelopes, transportation and a must take shots list for our photographers are very real, very immediate concerns that I do in fact NEED to be worrying about.

Now I may have given up worrying in the sense that I'm not allowing myself to replay horrible scenarios in my head of what MIGHT happen, but lets not pretend here. I'm crossing every bodily appendage and praying like there's no tomorrow that everything goes smoothly with this situation. Has family drama popped up in close proximity to your wedding plans? How did you handle it?

Productivity is the Current Spice of My Life

I would like to take a moment to share the awesomness that was a productive Tuesday with you all. Lately with a still over flowing to do list, it isn't often I feel very accomplished. But yesterday gave me a little glimmer of hope.

Mr. Ticket and I finished our final pre-marriage counseling session (the week before our wedding, talk about cutting it close lol)  and with our marriage license in hand we are so ready for next week! Mr. Ticket tried on his suit and officially learned how to tie a tie (side note: my man looks GOOD in a suit), everything fit pretty well so back to the hanger with no worries hooray! Then a few little last minute projects;

Programs

I've known for a while that I wanted to have programs, but I just kept putting it off because I didn't know exactly what I wanted to put in them. Well spring forward to now with the wedding next week and no one else offering to design the darn things for me, I sat my butt down and started/finished them.

I was inspired by the fan concept, our wedding day is looking to be in the low-mid 80s (fingers crossed) which is suitable weather in the shade but a fan and a water bottle would certainly improve things for our guests.

Image via Weddingbee/ Posted by Sievequeen

How adorable and simple is this concept? Get all the information you need and cool yourself down a touch. But then there was still the issue of exactly what to put on said fan...

Remember when Mrs. Giraffe first posted her Wedding Crush? Well I do. Let me tell you Mrs. Giraffe was not the only one crushing on that wedding! The colors! The Disney! The details! Love, love, LOVE! You might even notice another detail later in our wedding photos that was inspired by this wedding crush. But for now I'll share with you the details pertinent to our programs.

 Image via Weddingbee/ Posted by Mrs. Giraffe/ Photographed by Colin Lyons

I loved the bridal party page so much! I am simply not talented enough to pull this off. I tried to replicate it and it just was not happening at all. But the more I thought about this the more I wanted to do something with pictures. For the most part Mr. Ticket's family has never met mine (with the exception of our parents) and vice verse obviously. I have some family coming to the wedding that hasn't even met Mr. Ticket yet, let alone his family. I thought it would be nice to include pictures of the bridal party along with names to help people out. And thus our programs were born...

I'll admit they aren't the beautious, amazing, fantastical programs I imagined when we first started planning the wedding. But I've got to admit, the closer we get to the wedding, the more relaxed and less perfectionista I become in regards to wedding projects. If it gets done at all, I'm a happy camper.

So we used 2 different pictures in the final version, but since I have yet to find my good camera a screenshot is the best way to show you how the programs turned out. I would like to add I was incredibly proud of myself for figuring out how to use watermark in Microsoft Word and using our silhouettes in the backdrop.

That's both sides of the fan, our entire beautiful bridal party and all the pertinent information we want to share with our guests (sorry for the LAME cell phone camera picture). I thought about adding more information about our ceremony, but honestly our goal was to keep it relatively short. We aren't doing any readings or special songs. The only thing we really added to our officiant's suggested ceremony was a sand ceremony.

Card Box

One other little gem to share with you from our productive Tuesday, like a couple of bee's before me I fell for the mailbox card box inspired by the movie Up. Honestly after seeing how AMAZING Mrs. Lioness' and Mrs. Snowcone's turned out how could I not want one?! This project took us maybe 20 minutes (mostly because I wiped off and rewrote our names on there like 5 times, because I hate my hand writing. It was fun and I LOVE how it turned out!

*All personal photos unless otherwise noted.

Have you had any particularly productive days recently? Were you really excited at how a simple project turned out?

Bowl + Plate + Miss Ticket's Sad Handwriting = Semi-DIY Cake Stand Results!

Remember back when I mentioned painting our cake stand? Well I did get it back eventually and here's the proof!

Side view

Except instead of blurriness it says 'The Mr. Ticket's Last Name'

Sorry for the lame blurring

I still don't love my hand writing, but I'm really happy with how it turned out, considering it's just a plate glued to a bowl. This isn't the only stand we will be having for the wedding. I decided I didn't want just a boring table of platters for the cookie table, I want dimension. So with that in mind I scoured the local thrift shops and bought up their cheap candle holders and some plastic plates from Target like Ms. Ferris Wheel and went to work!

We started with a pile of black plastic plates and these,

Not gonna lie, I was a little sad to paint the silver ones they were pretty. Then they morphed into...

Then we glued the plates onto the painted candle sticks and they came out looking like this,

We have 6 total, I'm quite pleased with how they came out considering they were about $2.50 each. We have lots of matching plates and some matching platters to go with them. Our cookie table numbers are exploding too (which is awesome) so I'm glad we bought so many plates!

All personal photos.

Did you take on any painting projects? Were you pleased with how they turned out?

Flower Baby's Fly Ride

So there is one project that I alluded to and I've been stupidly excited about. It involves our Flower Baby, in case you forgot how cute she is here's a brief reminder.

Seeing as how she will only be 14 months old for our wedding and she's still a touch wobbly when she walks long distances we wanted to give her some help getting down the aisle. So we bought this...

But red isn't exactly one of our wedding colors, and it was a little worn down. We bought it through a craigslist ad for $50, and it goes for roughly $102 new on Amazon. So we got to work (and by we I really mean Daddy and Mama Ticket because honestly they did the bulk of this project while listening to me bark out orders, they are AWESOME). First they stripped the wagon down and Daddy Ticket sanded and varathaned the wood. Then we sent the bucket to the powder coater. Let me just tell you how insanely excited I was to find he had the PERFECT shade of pink. The first time I went down to his shop to find out if he could do it they had a good orange, but no pink. The day I went to drop off the bucket they showed me a new spread of colors and I about did a happy dance on the spot!

When we got the bucket back, Daddy Ticket spray painted the rest of the metal parts that needed a touch up and painted the little red caps on the wheels then he put everything back together. Meanwhile Mama Ticket graciously took the fabric I bought and turned it into a giant pillow for FB to sit on. Now the wagon's better than new!

Then one Saturday when Sister Ticket came over to help bake cookies we decided to let FB take it out for a test drive.

I think she likes it! I can't wait to see this little one in action going down the aisle. Pictures will be EPIC!

*All Personal Pictures

Are you providing your flower girls/ring bearers with transportation down the aisle? Did you find any good deals from Craigslist or yard sales and bring them back to life?

Anniversary Box

The instant I saw this on wedding blogs I fell in love with it. As I believe I may have mentioned before my favorite parts about wedding planning are the things you get to keep after the wedding. So the concept of having all your nearest and dearest write notes for you to open on each anniversary is FANTASTIC in my book. While I find the premade boxes from Happily Ever AfterWords to be quite lovely, I didn't particularly want to spend $50 on this little project. So I set to work on how to do it for less. I scoured Etsy for cute little boxes, but found it would cost me just as much if not more to go that route. So I asked Mr. Ticket if he would mind making our box out of scrap wood from work and he said sure. Score!

Next up was the note cards, this was the fun part. There were SO many amazing options.

Image via WeddingPaperDivas

Image via WeddingPaperDivas

Image via WeddingPaperDivas

Seriously I found dozens of designs I loved, but keeping in mind the price point we were trying to come in under I decided on trying to go a slightly more DIY route. We found pre-designed cards on VistaPrint then added our names and silhouettes to them (very little DIY but still cheaper). Want to see?

That's the front and back view. I LOVE them. Then I decided to emboss the numbers 1-50 on each envelope representing each anniversary we will be opening them.

 

My little embossing station, this was my first experience with clear stamps, they are pretty cool! Took a while because I had to wash off each number as I went then reapply them as necessary 1-50. But in the end I'm quite happy with how they turned out.

 Pre-Embossing Gun

Final outcome. Except instead of blurry lines it says our future last name and wedding date.

I plan to include recipe cards from all the different types of cookies we will have on the cookie table in the extra space of the anniversary box. That way each year on our anniversary we can bake one of them.

Note Cards (Vistaprint): $24.72

Stamps/Stamp Pads (Michaels): $16.30 (which we plan to use for other projects as well)

Ink/Embossing Dust: Free!! (used leftover from previous projects)

Box (Mr. Ticket): FREE! (the boss also known as Daddy Ticket let us use some leftover scrap wood and nails from the office)

Final Total: $41.02

Alright so it still cost more than I wanted it too... Less than $50 and more personalized I'm happy with it. And I now have a nice little collection of stamps for future DIY projects wedding related and otherwise.

*All Personal Photo unless otherwise noted.

Will you have an anniversary box at your wedding? Has your SO helped out by building anything for wedding projects?

Mason Jar Pretties!

Sorry for the light posting as of late. While I still haven't managed to track down my half-way decent camera I figured a few cell phone pictures were better than nothing for a couple of posts so here goes nothing.

Mr. Ticket asked for very few things throughout this wedding process, he doesn't tend to get overly excited about the details. He did like the food/cake tastings and I know he's pretty stoked about the cookie table. Then every once in a while he throws me a curveball... We will be stocking our own wedding bar and hiring a bartender to save some $$$. First we asked our caterer what it would cost to rent glasses from them (our catering contract includes all dishes/server ware rentals) and when he informed us it would cost upwards of $0.75 per glass for rentals we decided to just pick up a few packs of plastic cups from Sam's Club. Then one day I stumbled upon...

Image via Ruffled / Photographed by Wildflowers Photography 

Image via Green Wedding Shoes / Photograph by Love Ala

Well I was sold, so I brought the idea to Mr. Ticket and he LOVED it. I hadn't seen him this excited about anything other than the cookie table regarding the wedding. For some reason he really likes the idea of everyone getting their own mason jar to drink out of and keep at the end of the night. Which is awesome because I really like the look of mason jars and I love those straws! So I went on the hunt for mason jars, I didn't have the energy or time to go hunting through garage sales and thrift stores for them so I decided to find a deal online. In the end I'm sure I could have got them cheaper but I'm perfectly content with the deal I found.

We bought them from Kmart online (when I called multiple Kmart locations in the area to ask if they sold mason jars they didn't even know what mason jars were), we bought 7 cases of 12 - 16oz Mason Jars and with shipping and tax we paid $87.99. Yay for online coupon codes! Then it was time to prep them.

Mama Ticket very generously offered to wash all 84 mason jars (which was fantastic because I REALLY didn't want to do it) and I got to work designing and assembling tags for the jars. Here's a little preview for you...

 I have never punched out so many circles in all my life.

This project took a wee bit longer than originally anticipated...

 Ticket Kitty helped too.

Once the little tags were all assembled it was time to attach them to the mason jars, with adorable twine of course.

Image via Etsy/ Sold by BakersBlingShop

 

On one side the tag says, "Your glass for the night for whatever tastes right!"

On the other side it says, "When the evening is through please take the glass with you!"

Image via Artfire/ Sold by Sweet Estelle's Baking Supply

I fail at getting a picture of the mason jars with straws in them, but these are what the straws look like, gorgeous right?!

We now have all the mason jars packed up in sealed trash bags to keep them clean, so they sit in my parents living room for 18 more days... I seriously love how these turned out. So as much as Mr. Ticket teases me for all the crazy projects I pick up from blogging, I'm quite pleased with my blogging finds. I also love that we get to keep the extras and use them in our future home, because seriously mason jars are awesome!

Twine (BakersBlingShop on Etsy) - $16.95 (we have TONS left over for other projects too)

Shimmery Pink Cardstock (Michaels) - $2.90 (purchased while they were having a 6 for $1 sale)

Mason Jars (Kmart) - $87.99 (You can save a boatload on shipping if a Kmart near you has them in stock)

Ivory Card Stock (Staples) - FREE! (leftover from wedding invitations)

Hot Pink Striped Straws - $16.00 (note we only purchased 75 of these, we had a better idea of who was coming when we bought them and adjusted accordingly)

Total Cost for 84 Mason Jars w/ 75 Straws -$123.84

*All images are personal pictures unless otherwise noted.

Will there be mason jars at your wedding? Did your SO surprise you by what ideas they chose to get excited about?

Sneaky Wedding Date

Less than a month. Even as I type it part of me can't believe it. There were periods of time where this engagement felt like an ETERNITY. Where all I want to do is just be married to Mr. Ticket already and not hear one more person ask me, "Are you excited yet?!" or "Well you should be all done planning now right?" (you've got to be kidding me with that last one folks). Yet here we are, the Ticket Wedding is less than one month away. I've basically been running around like a crazy lady for the last month as is. If general life stuff, work and helping Mr. Ticket move into our future home wasn't enough to deal with we are in crunch time wedding planning. I've been baking cookies, designing the menu, working on the OOT bags, buying materials for our photo booth, printing and cutting and generally just trying to stay sane while accomplishing more than I have ever attempted before in my life. Getting a college degree was a cake walk compared to wedding planning.

I'm happy to say it's not all stressful though, there are certainly some fun moments in there too. Like dress fittings (I had my first one last week!) and planning out some pampering spa time before the wedding (SO looking forward to that)! I've found that wedding planning has basically consumed all my time whether I realize it in the moment or not. Even days I think I've taken off Mr. Ticket and I end up doing wedding related tasks (we just started Dance Classes last night). Thank God for fall TV, it's so much easier to work on wedding projects while watching shows like Terra Nova, Pan Am, Unforgettable, etc. (I'm loving new shows this season). Then there are the shows that I refuse to work on projects through because I'm to enthralled in their awesomness (Vampire Diaries, Lying Game, Happy Endings, etc.) so fall is a blessing and a curse in that way.

Image via ABC Family / Lame editing by Miss Ticket

I can't wait to share some of the projects I've been working on (once I find my camera...) but until then, what distractions help you with wedding projects? Do you plan out time for wedding planning or do you find its everywhere you look at this point?

P.S. I can't believe I'm getting married this month!!!!

RSVP Number Madness

RSVP #s Are In! Well mostly. Here's a basic breakdown for you.

Total Invited Guests: 102

Formal RSVP Received by Deadline: 62 (61%)
Yes: 50
No: 12

Phone In/ In Person/Tracked Down After Deadline RSVPs: 14 (14%)
Yes: 10
No: 4

Still Missing RSVPs/Haven't Been Able to Track Down: 26 (25%)

Total Yes: 60
Total No: 16

Of those guests we have been unable to track down 90% are family and most are OOT, many are cousins of mine that I don't even have phone numbers for. We are planning on going on the assumption of no for many of them for various reasons (one just had a baby this morning ~ YAY! Congrats Cousin L! ~, some are are unable to fly cross country, etc.) and continuing to attempt to track down the few that are still on the fence. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The OOT/In Town Guest Numbers

Total OOT Guests Invited: 63 (62% of our Guest List)
Total OOT Guest Acceptances: 27
Total OOT Guest Declines:14
Total OOT Guests MIA: 22

Total In Town Guests Invited: 39 (38% of our Guest List)
Total In Town Guests Acceptances: 35
Total In Town Guest Declines: 0
Total In Town Guests MIA: 4

Percentage of Guests Invited that Are Attending: 58%
Percentage of Guests Invited that Declined: 20%
Percentage of Guests MIA: 22%
Percentage of  Attending that are OOT Guests: 44%
Percentage of Attending that are In Town Guests: 56%

We ended up having only 1 uninvited guest RSVP, one of my cousins asked if she could bring her boyfriend and since our numbers were coming in lower than expected I said sure. I'm kind of excited to meet him actually. We originally only offered +1 to OOT guests (friends) coming alone or those that were married/engaged/living together.

Oh and it's been decided that this is entirely too many numbers for Miss Ticket to handle as my brain is now spinning a little and I'm really glad this post is almost over. <3

I would like to leave you with a few of my favorite RSVPs.

This one made me laugh out loud. Only FBIL/GM COD could pull this one off. Poor FSIL Dr. Lady even apologized in the upper right hand corner.

From BM C (henceforth known as BM Pool Shark because the initials thing is starting to confuse me since several BMs have similar initials) and her boyfriend. In this instance I'm pretty confident it's BM Pool Shark pondering her meal options. Good thing I didn't ask Chicken or Fish otherwise it might have taken her an additional month to fill out the comment card (she's a touch indecisive with food). <3 you Darling!

From FBIL/GM Mavy and FSIL Sassy Pants. I have a good idea which is declining to respond... I'm looking at you Sassy Pants!

Then there were a few guests that wanted to add some mystery to the RSVP process. While I had written numbers on the back of these cards with invisible ink for this VERY reason. I lost the sheet that had all the numbers and their associated names... EPIC FAIL me! Luckily these 2 did include their names on the envelopes with return addresses. They still made me smile.

This one REALLY through me for a loop. The envelope had no return address or name so I just sat and stared at it for a few minutes. This was one of the first RSVPs we received actually and it seemed a bit harsh! I soon realized that if you flip the card over there was a very nice little signed note from Mr. Ticket's Aunt and she is actually very sorry that she can't come (I think she may have misread the options haha). So now I look back at this RSVP and it makes me laugh.

Did you get bride brain number confusion from RSVPs? Did you get any fun RSVPs back in the mail?

To Match or Not to Match...

So it's getting closer and closer to the wedding and I realized I haven't even mentioned what our Bridal party will be donning for the affair. Fairly early on in the wedding planning process I decided I wanted my girls to wear short black dresses. Somewhat similar to Mrs. Avocado's girls.

Source

I have been in several weddings and generally speaking the dresses are frightening (I've got some pictures of flower girl dresses I wore as a child that make Ronald McDonald look fashionable) and most certainly will never be worn again. Let's just say Miss Ticket does not look good in yellow...

I did not want this for my girls. I want them to look hot and be comfortable and maybe JUST maybe wear that dress at least one more time (so overdone and cliche but true!). Just so they feel they got their money's worth. I started out looking at David's Bridal for dresses since this is where I was planning on looking for my own dress, but there was really only one dress there that I liked and it was $150! I'm sorry but asking my girls to pay $150 for a couple yards of fabric was an unacceptable option for me. Two of them will be flying in from out of state specifically for the wedding and I had no intention of asking them to spend hundreds more for an outfit they would likely only wear the one time.

With this in mind I started looking at other stores and checking out postings by other Bee's because lets face it the hive is awesome. =) I found the idea of each girl wearing a different dress rather appealing. In case I haven't mentioned it before my bridesmaids come in rather different shapes, sizes and colors. So each one is going to look good in a different style. I thought about this for a while but ultimately it wasn't a hard decision to make I gave the girls a basic set of requirements:

Black Dress, Mid-thigh to Knee Length, No embellishments of Silver or Gold and Strapless to Cap Sleeve (or anything in between). Something like...

Source

Did you let your girls pick their own dresses or were you totally stoked to have them all matching?

Bridesmaid Goodies!!!

Let's talk about Presents!!! Oh wait... First things first.

Image via Zap2It / From the NBC show Up All Night / Lame editing by Miss Ticket

Okay now that we've gotten that out of the way let's talk Bridesmaids gifts. Since pretty much the moment I asked my wonderful ladies to join me and stand by me on the day Mr. Ticket and I get married (I get giddy just writing that!) I have been thinking about what to get them as a thank you. Being in a wedding takes a significant time commitment as well as a financial burden and I wanted to make sure my girls knew I appreciated them.

I have pretty much wanted to get them everything I have seen and one item in particular stood out to me,

 

Source

unfortunately Mr. Ticket and I agreed that we should spend the same amount on each person in the bridal party (ladies AND gents) and we simply can't afford to spend over $700 on our bridal party gifts (no matter how badly I wish we could). And so I was back on the hunt. It certainly wasn't difficult to find oodles of awesome gifts as many other bee's have done. However narrowing down the choices to ones I felt were just right for my particular group of ladies proved to be a bit challenging. In the end I couldn't decide on just ONE gift, so I decided to get each of them 2 smaller gifts. Overall I'm very happy with what I found.

Each lady will be receiving a VS robe (which just so happens to be one of our wedding colors):

 

Image via Victoria's Secret

As well as a silver necklace:

All purchased from the fabulous Etsy Seller MorganPrather

Each of my girls will also be receiving a personalized mini tote bag courtesy Auntie Ticket who so generously offered to sew and embroider them after I bought her a pattern and a little fabric.

Did you have trouble narrowing down gifts for your awesome Bridal Party? Did you want to buy everything in sight?