Has the thought of a spring or summer wedding never really appealed to you? Are you planning a fall or autumn wedding instead? Fall is a beautiful time of the year for weddings with all the colors and options you have available – you’re sure to find some great ideas for fall wedding centerpieces.  Many brides have a lot of trouble trying to decide what kinds of wedding centerpieces to put on their tables,  I know that I sure did anyway. Your wedding centerpieces are so important, because they really are the focal point of your wedding tables, as each of your wedding guests will be looking at them throughout your wedding reception. The right wedding centerpieces can transform an ordinary room into whatever look you’re trying to go for. One of the best ways to choose wedding centerpieces is to choose a theme for your wedding. So if you’re planning a fall wedding, you might want to choose some centerpieces related to the season of your wedding. Here are some great ideas for fall wedding centerpieces.

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Are you looking for a new kind of wedding cake that isn’t your traditional round tiered wedding cake? Square wedding cakes are a pretty new modern trend that many brides are going with to help make their wedding cake stand out from the rest. Square wedding cakes can be anything from traditional to trendy for a great eye catching decoration at your wedding reception. Let’s face it, even though some people aren’t big fans of cake, they still look forward to seeing what kind of wedding cake you chose to have at your reception, and they’ll probably try it as well, so you need to pick a wedding cake design and shape that suits you best. For me, square wedding cakes are more of my style, but that isn’t the shape that I went with in the end, but I kind of wish I could.  So here are a few of my favorite things about square wedding cakes.

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Tags: Angles, Brides, Cakes Wedding, Colors, Different Designs, Different Kinds, Few Of My Favorite Things, Fondant, Great Eye, Picture Frames, Shape, Shapes, Square Wedding Cake, square wedding cakes, Tiered Wedding Cake, Tiers, Wedding Baskets, Wedding Cake Decorations, wedding cake design, wedding cake designs, wedding cakes, Wedding Reception

Are you finding yourself completely overwhelmed with just how many details are involved in planning a wedding? It seems every time you turn around you find yourself having to choose over the length of  your tablecloths, the cutlery for your dinner, and yes, even wedding cake stands. Just when you think that picking out  a wedding cake is going to be easy, they have to throw in the option and make you agonize over wedding cake stands.  While not nearly as crucial as picking out a wedding dress or flower arrangements, wedding cake stands have their importance in your reception because they add height, elegance and sense of professionalism to your wedding cake. Not only that, but they help your wedding cake rise up (sorry for the pun there – couldn’t help it!) to be the focal point of your wedding reception on the cake table. So if you just don’t feel like dealing with the choices of wedding cake stands and are tempted to forget about them completely, or are just researching ideas for wedding cake stands for your wedding cake, here is a quick rundown of some of the stands available for your wedding.

Wedding Cake Stands with Pillars

Just as there are lots of different kinds of wedding cakes, there are lots of different choices when it comes to wedding cake stands. Wedding cake stands with pillars are one of the most popular kinds of wedding cake stands. A wedding cake stand with pillars means there are pillars and bases between each tier of your wedding cake. Wedding cake stands with pillars can really give your wedding cake some height, and has a really elegant look than a stacked wedding cake. The pillars you use between the layers of your wedding cake could be glass balls, wine glasses, decorated wire and any number of other possibilities.

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Tags: Cake Stand, Cake Table, Central Column, Cutlery, Different Kinds, Flower Arrangements, Focal Point, Glass Balls, Pillars, planning a wedding, Pun, Rundown, Tablecloths, Wedding Cake Stand, Wedding Cake Stands, Wedding Cake Wedding, wedding cakes, wedding dress, Wedding Reception, Wedding Wedding, Wine Glasses

Engagement parties are not supposed to be as big and elaborate as your wedding is going to be, not by a long shot. Yet many people feel like the celebration of their engagement is cause enough to invite everyone on their wedding guest list, rent out a reception hall, and spend a ton of money that they don’t have to do. (Unless of course you are royalty or filthy rich) Traditionally, engagement parties are attended by immediate family and close friends, and are much more laid back than a typical wedding reception. That could be because not many families are not used to throwing engagement parties, they really really want to celebrate this engagement, or they just don’t know about any other options when it comes to engagement party ideas. There are lots of different engagement party ideas to use that can help you tailor the engagement party to the newly engaged couple’s tastes and preferences. But, if you’re having trouble coming up with something, here are some great engagement party ideas to get you started.

Consider A Theme

While some people feel that choosing a theme for an engagement party, or any party for that matter is unnecessary, I beg to differ. Having a theme that you can decorate to will help you to search out your options more efficiently than just a tad of this and that here and there. Some popular themes for engagement parties are : a tropical beach party, a romantic evening in Paris, a night under the stars, or even funny themes such as ball and chain. So if you choose to have a theme with your engagement party, and I really advise that you do, you’ll find decorating the party will be much easier.

Find a Location

While tradition states that engagement parties should be small, making them formal or informal is merely a personal choice. You could host your engagement party in a friend or family member’s home, at a nearby restaurant or even a park. Some other popular engagement party ideas for locations can include amusement parks, sports bars and other fun centers.

Engagement Party Activities

There are certain rituals and activities that are expected to take place at any engagement party. Of course, the activities differ from couple to couple, but overall they ring pretty true. First of all, there is the announcement of the engagement (especially if the engagement is a surprise). Sometimes the family plays some games together, and of course talk about the wedding! This is also a great place and time to ask your friends to be in your bridal shower, announce your wedding day, colors, ideas, etc. Also, be sure to expect many toasts and well wishes from family and friends on your upcoming nuptials.

Engagement parties are typically a great time for everyone involved. It allows the family to celebrate together as well as to get to know the people who will be joining their family very soon. Whatever engagement party ideas you go with for your planning, just be sure that it is centered around the tastes and preferences of the couple. What a truly memorable time you’ll have.

Tags: Amusement Parks, Close Friends, engagement parties, Engagement Party, engagement party ideas, Evening In Paris, Family Member, Immediate Family, Laid Back, Nearby Restaurant, Personal Choice, Reception Hall, Romantic Evening, Royalty, Sports Bars, Tad, Tradition States, Tropical Beach, Typical Wedding, wedding guest list, Wedding Reception

For many brides out there, most of their time and effort goes into creating the perfect wedding reception. That includes an excellent menu with elegant wedding reception decorations, wedding favors that are made to impress, and of course, the right wedding reception music to help set the mood and create the feel you’ve been looking for when planning your wedding reception. The right wedding reception music can help to put people at ease, get them excited, and make them fall in love again. Music just seems to have that effect on people. There are several ways that you can use to pump that wedding reception music into your reception venue. Granted, with those different methods of getting your music out, there are also numerous price differences between each one of these options. So be sure to check and see what your wedding budget will allow before choosing which venue to go with to get your wedding reception music done.

Wedding Reception Music – Hiring a DJ

Hiring a DJ is probably the most popular way to get your wedding reception music taken care of. They can typically be hired for a (high) hourly fee, but they have a huge selection of songs that you can use to help make your wedding reception music something you’ve always dreamed of. If you’re having a dance floor, this is probably the best route to take, as you’ll probably need a live person to choose the songs that you can dance to. Be sure to talk to the DJ before the wedding and give him a list of songs that you absolutely positively do NOT want as part of your wedding reception music, such as any offensive songs, the YMCA song, anything like that. Hiring a DJ can be an expensive proposition to have a way to play your wedding reception music, but you will know that the songs will be taken care of.

Wedding Reception Music – Hiring a Wedding Singer/Band/String Quartet

Personally, I’ve never seen one of these at a wedding, though I do know that bands and wedding singers can be hired to provide some great wedding reception music. A live band may give off some great sounds, but again, you could be looking at a huge hourly bill to pay the singer and everyone in the band. Also, another bad thing about having a live band is the noise. It could be hard for your guests to have a private, intimate conversation if they have to yell over your loud live music wedding reception music. If you are hiring a string quartet, you won’t have to worry about the loud noise that your guests can’t talk over, but be sure to check their prices.

Wedding Reception Music – Rigging Your Own

Perhaps the most economical way to arrange your wedding reception music is to take care of it yourself. Hook up your Ipod or computer play list to some speakers placed strategically around the room, and set the volume that you want. This option works best with a wedding reception without a dance floor, as you can’t control which songs will be played at a particular time. But this option will provide you with exactly the kind of wedding reception music that you want to help create your perfect day, and the only cost you may have is buying and downloading songs, and renting speakers if you don’t have your own.

Wedding reception music can be tricky. In most cases it needs to be economical, functional to your wedding reception music needs, and to set off the mood that you want your wedding reception to have. So be prudent in choosing what kind of wedding reception to have, as well as how you want to get your wedding reception music out.

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I understand that when you are doing your wedding planning, one of the hardest decisions you will have to make (and you’ll have to make a lot of hard decisions) is what kind of wedding reception decorations you are going to use to create the wedding reception of your dreams. If you’ve been to any number of weddings, then I’m sure you’ve seen a lot of the same small flower arrangement on each table, or candles. Those are two of the most popular wedding reception decorations that you can use without really breaking the bank. But what if you aren’t having a themed wedding per se, and you still want your wedding reception decorations to pop? I’ve been looking around on the Internet, and seeing what other people have done, and have been thinking about it myself to try and come up with some more totally unique wedding reception decorations, and I’ve got a few that I really think are great.

Wedding Reception Decorations Celebrating Couples

One thing a friend of mine is working on for her wedding reception decorations is to celebrate love through the use of pictures. She is requesting that her married guests send in a wedding picture of themselves that they are going to blow up and hang around their reception hall. Pictures of the bride and groom will of course be hanging up as well. This is a great set of wedding reception decorations that are fun to look at, remember, guess who each couple is, or laugh at the styles during that time period. Print off the pictures in black in white so that they will all “match” somewhat, and pair it off with some flowers to help set the room off. Trust me though, not many people will be looking away from the pictures.

Wedding Reception Decorations with Fabric

One great wedding reception decoration that you can use that won’t really break the bank is colored fabric. I’ve seen some beautiful creations of different colored fabric draped from the ceiling, or draped and looped around the room that really adds a lot of color and depth to the room. Any colors will work, perhaps the colors of your wedding, or just a plain white can really look elegant as well. Depending on the height of your reception hall, you may need ladders and lots of people to help to make it really give off the look you want. So play around with it until you find the look you are going for.

Your wedding reception decorations should help you to create the look you have always dreamed of for your wedding. If you are going for simple and classic, or elaborate and elegant, there are plenty of ideas for every kind of look you want to go for. For more wedding reception ideas and advice, check out my previous article on the subject, called Wedding Reception Decorations. And, if always, if you have any other questions or need any other help, then be sure to write in and ask. Also, if you have some ideas of something that you have seen and loved and want to share, please write in and let us know. Until then, happy wedding planning. Don’t get too stressed out.

Tags: wedding decorations, Wedding Reception, wedding reception decorations

Wedding reception decorations can help to set the mood for your special day, whether you’re planning a large elaborate wedding or a smaller, more intimate gathering. No matter what kind of wedding reception you are planning, at some point you are going to need to decide what kind of wedding reception decorations you’re going to use at your reception. This can be difficult to decide, as there are many different ways to decorate a reception hall to complete the dream wedding that you have in your head. Granted, there are lots of different ideas for wedding reception decorations that you can use that will work wonderfully and create the look you’ve always dreamed of. However, that doesn’t necessarily mean that any kind of wedding reception decorations will work best for your situation. There are several things you need to consider when determining what kind of wedding reception decorations you are going to use.

Have a Budget for Your Wedding Reception Decorations

If you’re not careful, your wedding reception decorations can take up a huge chunk of your budget, but this doesn’t have to be the case. At a minimum, wedding reception decorations should include table linens and a centerpiece. Your wedding reception decorations are important because your guests typically will be spending more time in at reception than they will be at your wedding ceremony. One great way to save costs is to enlist friends and family to transport some of your wedding ceremony decorations to the wedding reception site. This way your flower arrangements and other decorations can do double duty and you’ll get more use out of them. I had two large white flower arrangements on the altar of our church, and once they were brought over to our reception, they made excellent arrangements for our cake table and signing table. Look for great ways to stay within your budget for your wedding reception decorations.

Decide if You Need Wedding Reception Decorations

I know, this seems to contradict some of the other points I’ve already said about how they are important, but let me explain. Depending on the location of your wedding reception, you may not need as many wedding reception decorations as you would normally. For example, our wedding reception venue was located on the edge of a lake, with big beautiful bay windows and lots of beautiful landscaping. With the windows open, our guests got a beautiful view of the landscaping, and then of a beautiful sunset on the lake. Because most of our guests were focused on the beauty out the windows, we didn’t need as many wedding reception decorations than if we had rented a windowless room somewhere else. If your reception will be in a hotel lobby or another location that’s already nicely decorated, you might not need many wedding reception decorations after all, which will also help with your budget I was talking about before.

Another fun aspect of wedding reception decorations to consider is that decorations that can be used after the reception will more than pay for themselves. For our reception, I used artificial flower arrangements, and today these flower arrangements add beauty and memories to our home. Regardless of what kind of wedding reception decorations you use, you will want to make your wedding reception your very own. The right combination of wedding reception decorations will help to create the atmosphere you have been looking for, whether they be romantic, elegant or playful. Wedding decorations may not make up a huge part of the budget, but they play an important role in setting the stage for the mood of the ceremony and reception. For more great wedding reception decoration ideas, check out my other article, More Wedding Reception Decorations.

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My sister called me this morning with a great idea for an article for today’s post. You see, a few days before Christmas a friend of hers got married, and my sister was the maid of honor in the ceremony. As she was telling me the story about what happened, I realized that this could be a mistake that many brides make while they are planning their wedding reception, and thought it would be a great piece of advice for brides. With so many things to remember while doing your wedding planning, it is easy to make a mistake, leave something out, or make some kind of assumption that you really shouldn’t be making. Such is the case with my sister’s friend. Let me explain the situation before I go on any further.

My sister’s friend got engaged about a year ago, and planned her wedding to be just a few days before Christmas. They planned a large wedding, with over 400 people on the guest list. They wanted to have a large wedding, and yet still have a wedding on a budget. Now, in the small Texas town where we live, there are only one or two places around that will hold that many people,  and neither one of them is a church. But that isn’t the main problem that my friend faced, which was the wedding reception.

The mistake that my sister’s friend made was in her wedding reception. With a guest list of over 400 people, she rented a reception hall that would hold the number of people she needed, and had the trays of food for a Snack Wedding Reception, and then she made her major mistake. She only provided three tables and a total of eighteen chairs for people to sit down, assuming that everyone would want to stand or walk around and mingle. Big mistake. From my observation, you will have people who want to stand up and mingle, but a majority will want to sit down to talk and watch the festivities. Not only that, but add plates of food, and people will really want to sit down instead of having to balance a plate of food and glass of punch. In the end, her guests really only stayed about thirty minutes at the wedding reception, with many leaving before the bride and groom made their departure.

When planning your wedding reception that you want to last awhile, then be sure that you have enough chairs for everyone, and if not, then at least some taller tables placed around the room for your guests to stand around and be able to rest their plates of food. Don’t let this wedding reception mistake happen to you.

Tags: Wedding Reception, wedding reception mistake

When in the quest for new and interesting table decorations for your wedding, you are sure to come across the idea of using goldfish bowls as part of your table centerpiece. In fact, I even bring it up as an option in one of my earlier posts, Wedding Table Decorations. I’ve been to many events where the host or hostess has used goldfish bowls with decorative rocks and mirrors, and it can really be a pretty centerpiece, and quite unique as not many people go this route. However, there are some benefits and downsides to using goldfish bowls that you may want to consider before going out and buying everything you need for this centerpiece.

Why Goldfish Bowls are a Great Idea

There are lots of reasons to choose goldfish bowls while doing your wedding planning for your table centerpieces. The bowls, rocks and fish are relatively inexpensive, and in the end you’ll have a unique living centerpiece. Not only will a goldfish bowl centerpiece be unique to many of the other table centerpieces that your guests have been used to, but having a living goldfish in the bowl will provide your guests with some entertainment watching the fish swim around especially if you have kids at your wedding. But perhaps the best part about using goldfish bowls as table centerpieces it that you can give away the goldfish bowls at the end of the night to your guests. You can put a tag on each goldfish bowl at the table with who the bowl is to go to, or just leave it up to the table about who goes home with the fishbowl. Whatever you choose to do with it, in the end you won’t have a dozen or more goldfish bowls to take care of when you get back.

Why You May Want to Think Twice

When I have been to an event that used goldfish bowls, at times they have been rather disappointing. Goldfish are not typically known to have long lives, and sometimes the goldfish died before the event was over. Call me crazy, but having goldfish floating belly up on your wedding tables could be a bit of a downer. Plus, who wants to take home a dead goldfish? Again, it could just be the goldfish that were bought for the event that I attended, but it is still something to take into consideration when deciding if goldfish bowls are right for your wedding ceremony.

Goldfish bowls can be a charming and unique living centerpiece that your guests will love.  Having a table centerpiece that is living can really provide a lot of entertainment for your guests, and is something to consider. If you have any goldfish bowl centerpiece stories, please write and let me know.

Tags: goldfish bowl centerpieces, table centerpieces, Wedding Reception, wedding table decorations

If you are planning an early afternoon wedding or a wedding on a smaller budget then you may want to consider planning a snack reception instead of a large ornate dinner wedding reception. Snack wedding receptions can still be done elegantly at a fraction of the cost of a catered dinner reception. There are many different snack foods from which you can choose, and if you are wondering what kinds of snacks to choose, here is a great list to start with, and then go from there.

Fruit Platters

Fruit platters at a wedding are a popular choice. You can buy them yourself at the grocery store and place them decoratively on a large platter. Popular fruits to use for wedding fruit trays are grapes, both red and green, strawberries, cantelope and honeydew melons, and even watermelon if in season. Chocolate covered strawberries are popular, but if you are buying them somewhere, they can get expensive. They are, however very easy to make yourself if you choose to go that route. They are a favorite though, so if you are making them be sure that you have plenty.

Pasta Salads

This is a popular one, and one that can definitely be done the night before. There are many different recipes for pasta salad, so look around for your favorite recipe, and then alter it for 100 people or so. You can work and make the pasta yourself, or ask a friend or family member to make it for you, and give them money for the groceries it will take. Place in large zipper lock bags until you can place it in a prettier bowl for the actual wedding reception.

Cheese and Crackers

Boxes of crackers from the grocery store aren’t very expensive, especially if you choose non-brand crackers. They do taste just as good. Buy an assortment of crackers, typically 2 or 3 kinds, and three or four boxes of each kind. When you’re looking at cheeses, consider purchasing an assortment of flavors, such as sharp cheddar, pepper jack, swiss, and any other favorites that you have.

Vegetable Platters

Large vegetable platters are another healthy addition to a snack wedding reception. Carrots, celery, broccoli, cauliflower, and radishes are the most popular vegetables to include in a vegetable tray. Use ranch or other flavors of vegetable dip, and you have another simple snack for your wedding reception.

Other Ideas

There are lots of ideas for snacks at a wedding reception. Another idea is tuna or chicken salad sandwiches cut into fourths. Nachos are another idea you can look at. Several large crock pots with cheese and bowls of corn chips are delicious, but potentially messy. Also, consider several dessert platters besides the wedding cake, as they are also popular.

No matter what you choose, remember that it is your wedding reception. If your favorite snack food is popcorn and soda, then have a popcorn machine humming with freshly popped popcorn and ice chests of cokes for your guests to choose from. Your wedding ceremony and wedding reception should reflect both of your tastes and favorites to help make it totally unique.

Tags: planning a snack reception, planning a snack wedding reception, Wedding Reception