Bridal Shower 101
Imagine this, you get asked to be a maid of honour for your sister / best friend’s wedding. You’re riding a high and you feel so loved! And then you realize that you now have to make sure that your sister is practically Martha Stewart, the most crafty and creative woman you know, and that she has thrown many a party and shower’s before you. So now, of course, you are tasked with the daunting job of not just throwing a nice shower, but throwing the shower to end all showers. Because I am me, and I am competitive and proud, and I am nothing if not determined ….
So, for all those that may or may not be struggling with a similar scary thought — this one’s for you.
Canva is a great tool for all things digital marketing, and I used some templates to create this invitation below. There are a ton of pretty templates that you can customize and even print directly through the website. I however had a glitch and had to get my invites printed at staples and order some envelopes through amazon — all in all it worked out and they turned out super cute and right on theme.
Now, for me it’s all in the details. I need to get every little thing right for the big picture to be pristine in my mind. So I started making tons of lists, thankfully my google notes app was amazing and allowed me to organize everything in one place. A big tip is that I also used a running google doc to keep track of RSVPs that were coming through via text so no one was forgotten while I was on the go (per usual).
First of all, one does not simply walk into party packager’s and find the perfect rose gold, gold, pink, white, and blush colour palette to decorate your parents large and lovely home with. NO. Of course not, it could never be that simple — could it? So you start pinteresting your little heart out, and you start drinking a lot of wine, and you begin to realize that you cannot in fact make everything by hand solo. So you enlist the bridesmaids and create an assembly line with your templates and vision in hand.
My first decoration task aka the cutest thing ever, is a streamer garland. But unfortunately for me, I had to make everything out of streamers instead of tissue paper (which is easier), so it took much longer, but it turned out breathtaking and so worth it (it was my baby aha). I’ve linked the tutorial that I used as a guideline here for you all:
Then, circa my sorority days, we enter into the land of poms — again, here is the tutorial for your convenience.
Finally, my favourite craft, and a time consuming one was the hand painted mason Jars. There is no tutorial that I followed, so I’ve outlined the steps here for you all:
What you’ll need:
Mason Jars of varying sizes
acrylic paint in 3 colours (I used rose gold, white, and blush)
sponge brushes
twine, ribbon, lace, burlap
Steps:
Rinse out and let mason jars of varying sizes dry.
Once dry, lay out glasses on craft paper
Using sponge brush, apply a medium layer of paint to jar, completed coat.
Let dry.
Repeat steps 3 & 4 until opaque (3-4 times)
let dry completely. Using hot glue gun, tie twine, ribbon, burlap, or lace to jar and secure with glue.
Fill jars with fake flowers, straws or utensils, pens, etc whatever you like!
I bought these awesome BRIDE TO BE balloons on etsy as well, and using scrapbook paper, traced and handcut out circles to be taped onto string and hung up beneath the balloons. This made a perfect Bridal chair for Nikki to open up her presents.
Now that the decorations are out of the way I had to start really nailing down a menu. I knew that I was juggling a lot already and I wanted to keep things a little more simple and eliminate as much extra running around as possible. I decided for the big food items to order the meat through West Side Beef so that I didn’t have to worry about lugging, storing, etc for weeks in advance. They delivered the meat the week of the shower vacuum sealed and in insulated bags that I simply popped in the fridge over night until I was ready to start prepping the food the next day.
When you’re dealing with large amounts of people eating, you’re also dealing with lots of different food intolerances, dietary restrictions, and lifestyles. I wanted to make sure that anything that I was cooking that was labelled as GF, DF, Nut Free, Soy free, and vegetarian/Vegan — was in fact that. That’s when I instantly thought of Mother Raw foods. They are certified free of the aforementioned ingredients and are absolutely incredible! The Gluten Free Pasta Salad, Grilled Chicken, and Thai Meatballs were big hits because of the greek dressing, sweet heat bbq sauce, and japanese dressing. The salads were served with the greek and maple & fig dressings, and we served the french onion, ranch, and vegan queso on the charcuterie boards (which was 10 feet of food on my mother’s kitchen island).
One just (AND I CANNOT STRESS THIS ENOUGH) neglect the alcohol at a bridal shower. Enter Pelee Island who does custom wine labels that can be added to any bottle for a low cost. Again, one less thing on my list to get at the store — they delivered all the cases (and I do mean cases) of wine two days before the shower. That meant my mimosa bar was also ready to go thanks to the incredible Secco from Pelee.
For the mimosa bar, we just grabbed great pouring / spouted decanters from walmart for the juices (grapefruit, cran-raspberry, and orange), sliced up some fresh fruit, and started popping bottles. My classic sangria recipe was broken out for the event, and a quick lemonade (shhh, it’s from concentrate) was spruced up with some lemon slices as well.
That coupled with the wine, some ciders, beers and coolers made for a very boozy afternoon (cheers!).
Everyone kept asking about the adorable handwritten toothpick food tags, the chalkboard signs, and the little paper straws — everything under that category was from party city and the dollarama. Cost effectiveness is necessary when dealing with mass amounts of people and Michael’s was just way too expensive! But my boyfriend was a lifesaver and after helping all the ladies with decos and food, also handwrote the tags out for me.
Our little party gifts to everyone was their mason jar mug (we wrote their names in gold marker) and their little succulents — HUGE HITS!
The most coveted part of the party though, was the cake — semi naked, red velvet on top with vanilla on the bottom, buttercream icing and hand painted rose gold. I supplied the cake topper that I found on etsy and the flowers that I found at Michael’s on clearance. Little Miss Cup & Cakes knocked it out of the park with this one ladies and gentlemen! It was gorgeous and delicious, and the best cake I’ve ever had. No lie.
Now, just know that I did in fact have to get very drunk to take away my foot, hip, and knee pain from being on my feet for days prepping for the event, but also know that it was all worth it to see my sister happy <3 .
If you do take any of these suggestions, don’t forget to tag me or comment below!
-XO Angie
