Vintage Bridal Shower
Cupcakes, roses, tea cups & giant balloons....just a few of many things that were part of throwing a bridal shower for my little sister. We called it a Vintage Afternoon Tea...
As much as I would've loved to do the invitations myself, I just wanted to focus on other parts of the bridal shower so I decided to go with pre-made printable invites from Etsy. Rosie Day Design (the above is a sample from her website of the design we chose) did an amazing job with a really quick turnaround, and I was able to tweak the design a little bit to what I needed.
Note that the swing tags from the wedding invitations made another appearance as cupcake toppers...one of my favourite things is repeating simple little details like this throughout the process. They were also on the wedding programs :)
As vases for the pink and orange roses, I collected bottles from drinks of iced tea and S.Pellegrino that I'd had in the weeks leading up to the bridal shower. They look cute on their own, but I added a piece of washi tape to each of them just to sweeten them up :)
Last year I picked up a grey vintage typewriter from eBay...so I used this as the centrepiece of the table. I printed a quote in the Traveling Typewriter (I haven't yet investigated ribbons for the typewriter!)...I love this font because it's a bit uneven and looks more realistic than say American Typewriter. I used the same paper we used in the wedding invitations, and a little hand drawn heart (also from the invites) that is part of the Serendipity kit by Paislee Press.
I kept going with the orange and purple colour scheme with the balloons, mixed with a soft metallic pink (from Strath Village Variety Superstore). I switched out the ties that came from the balloon store for kraft coloured twine...and attached random pieces of ribbon from Spotlight to them as well. Some balloons held up better with the extra weight than others. I had them filled with a longer lasting helium/gel combo because I had to keep them overnight then travel with them to the party the next day. The polka dot balloons were meant to be covered in lace like I've seen on Pinterest (to mute the colours and be more vintagey) but the scraps of lace I bought were too heavy for the helium and they just sunk straight to the ground (grrr) so I just let them be and used the lace elsewhere.
The gorgeous tea cups and some of the cake stands were from My Vintage Tea Hire who is local to Bendigo and one of my favourites :) Keren has an amazing collection of not just tea cups but anything you could need for a vintage party...right down to trestle tables with custom covers and vintage furniture and beautiful accent pieces like cases, antique keys, & glass milk bottles...her collection is ever growing. You can see more of it here at the wedding expo.
I picked up some little pastel heart lollies with sweet phrases printed on them to put on the chocolate cupcakes. At $4 for a giant bag they will last me for a fair while!
I taped several rows of fairy lights (the icicle kind) under the trestle table, and then covered it with sheer curtains...and then over the top of that, the lace scraps that didn't work on the balloons. Sadly, I forgot to take a photo of the table that shows this but it was by far one of my favourite things about how it all looked overall, and such a simple idea...I will be using this again for sure! This is an example...I pinched the idea off Pinterest! I covered the top of the table with a kraft paper runner...and then a few random paper doilies...and a table cloth from my Nan. She wasn't able to be there so I wanted to include something of hers...turns out Nan has an great collection of vintage table cloths that I will most likely be returning to again!
I also printed off teensy little instagram-like prints from the engagement photo shoot my sister and her fiancé had with Elise Gow. These were just done on my home printer on regular Canon photo paper and trimmed to size...and I scattered them around the typewriter and attached a few of them to the stronger balloons with tiny little wooden pegs from Kikki K.
I also used the event as an excuse to finally get a giant clear polka dot balloon and fill it with confetti :) Did you know you can get these up to 100cm in width!? I totally would have gone nuts and gotten a huge one except I had to travel to Ballarat and kind've needed to see out of the back of the car as I was driving! I left it a bit late to get giant confetti to go with...so I made my own by just punching circles out of printed out digitally designed paper. Go for the lightest weight paper you can, I think mine was a little bit heavier than it should've been...they couldnt put it all in the balloon for me as it wouldn't float properly. Also if you fill the balloon with just regular helium (instead of the longer lasting gel combo) you can rub the balloon on carpet to create static that means the confetti will creep up the insides of the balloon and stick to the walls making it more visible. This kind've worked for me...but my confetti was heavier than it should've been and the gel prevented a stronger static from forming. Live and learn!
I also discovered that Riley believes helium balloons floating around the house on the central heating currents (especially the giant ones) are some kind've alien life form that are purely out to get him. He was not happy with the balloon bunches and followed them suspiciously around the house growling and barking...I had to tie them down in another room before he would let go and calm down :)
The final table pictured in the house of the host is shown above (click for larger version)...before all the afternoon tea started to arrive. Thanks for the photo Fran! I was really pleased with how it all came together and my sister loved it...all in all we had an awesome day :)
Design Elements: Digital paper by Creashen's Count on Me