1.       Spring: It is about flowers blooming, birds chirping and planting gardens.

Miniature flower pots- Buy flower pots, fill them with soil and plant your favorite flowers in them.  This would be a representation of you and your fiancé by having your favorite flower for your guests to take home.  Jazz it up a little by adding chalkboard paint with your wedding date or just paint your wedding date on the flower pot.

Edible birds’ nests- If you have a spring/bird theme these favors are great! They are made from chocolate chips, chow mein noodles, butterscotch chips, and peanut butter.  They are then decorated with chocolate filled eggs.  I found this cute idea, along with others on Pinterest.

2.       Summer:  It’s about bonfires, beach days, and getting together with friends and family.

S’more buffet- Make it fun and have different flavor gourmet marshmallows that you can find on Etsy.  Also buy different flavored graham crackers, and have different kinds of chocolate.  If you are having a theme, buy a chocolate mold and have different shaped chocolates.  My fiancé and I are doing this for our wedding and are having airplane shaped chocolates to go with our flying/travel theme.

Personalized bottles of sangria- Go to your local winery and see if they have miniature bottles of sangria that you can personalize.  Have a picture of you and your fiancé and your wedding date.  Do different flavors, such as white sangria and red sangria, and have them on a table and let your guests choose what kind they would like to take home.  Just make sure to check with your reception venue because some places do not let you bring in your own alcohol because it can jeopardize their liquor license.

3.       Fall: What you think of when you think about fall is leaves falling, hot apple cider, pumpkins, and caramel apples.

Gourmet Caramel Apples: Have some fun and make a day out of it.  Go to the apple orchard and pick the apples that you want to use.  Then go home and dip them in caramel, or chocolate and decorate them with different toppings.  It would be a great bonding time with your fiancé and your guests would love to hear how you made them yourselves.

Rice Krispy Pumpkin Treats: Everyone loves the gooeyness and flavor of Rice Krispy treats.  Add a little food coloring to make the treats orange. While they are still a little warm, roll a good amount into a ball.  Then, make a hole on top and place a tootsie roll in for the stem.

4.       Winter: For us in Michigan we think of snow falling, cold days, sitting by the fireplace and drinking hot chocolate.

 Hot chocolate topping bar:  Have clear plastic bags and let your guests fill them with a packet of hot chocolate and different toppings.  You could have mint chocolate chips, candy canes, chocolate covered marshmallows and dip them in crushed peppermint.

Ornaments:  Go out and buy some plain ornaments, some paint, and any other decorations you would like to do.  Spend a day painting the ornaments different colors, put your names and wedding date on them and add different shapes and designs.  This is something that everyone can put on their Christmas tree but can always remember where they got it from.

Favors can cost a good amount of money and can also take a lot of time to make.  So stray away from M&M’s with your faces on them.  Make your favors fun and exciting and something people haven’t seen before. If your guests are traveling for your wedding it might be extra special to use local products. This is a way to thank your guests for coming, so make sure it is something that you would like to receive.

Happy Planning!

~Holly

Images Courtesy of Pinterest and ThatASmore

Blue Tulle Underskirt

A subtle pop of blue in a bridal bouquet.

And a not-so subtle pop of blue. Love this!

How about a little blue for your nails?

Who said you had to walk down the aisle with your something blue? Why not leave in it?

Happy Planning!

Lauren

]]> http://www.elementofelegance.com/something-blue/feed/ 0 http://www.elementofelegance.com/serve-food-youd-want-to-eat/ http://www.elementofelegance.com/serve-food-youd-want-to-eat/#comments Fri, 17 Feb 2012 20:19:10 +0000 dee http://www.elementofelegance.com/?p=2551 Want to wow your wedding day guests and make your reception more memorable than your cousin Fred’s? Ditch the normal wedding day menu of steak, chicken or seafood and serve food you’d want to eat! Think about foods that make you and your partner happy and add them to the menu. This is your day and should represent your style.  Here are some unique reception menu ideas you may want to consider:

1.  Potato Chip Bar
Appetizers that are sure to please! An assortment of potato chips complete with all the dips.  Experiment with chip flavors and dips of all kinds.  Don’t be shy, your guests won’t either.

2.  Donut Display
Brides have been opting for different dessert options for awhile now, so why not have donuts instead of a cake!  And if you’re into traditions, you can still cut the “cake” through a stack of donuts! Serve up classics like cream and jelly filled varieties or something new like white chocolate and almond or coconut, lemon and mango.

3.  Pizza Buffet
Who doesn’t like pizza! Create a beautiful buffet with different pizza varieties, complete with salad and bread sticks.  I personally know of and recommend a great pizza caterer in the Grand Rapids area who does a superb and delicious pizza buffet.

4.  Pasta Spread
Let’s face it, carbs are really our friend.  Ditch the Adkins diet and serve a pasta menu sure to please a variety of people. Let your guests decide their pasta and sauce of choice to make a meal they will love.  Linguine, Penne, Spaghetti, Rotini or Tortellini with Marinara Meatballs, Chicken Alfredo or Pesto Sauce… the possibilities are endless for your guests.

5. Taco Bar
Yum! Mexican food is sure to please.  Flour and corn tortillas, chicken, beef and all the toppings will take your guests to a warmer climate – at least in their minds and belly’s! Include fresh Guacamole, Salsa and Chips for appetizers.  Bring on the Margaritas for drinks!

6. Great American Comfort Foods
French Fries, Hamburgers/Cheeseburgers, Hot dogs, Coke (in the glass bottle), Soda Fountains, Shakes and Malts, Lemonade, Peanuts, Pretzels, and Cracker jacks.  These are the great comforts foods that Americans have been mowing down for years (at least since the 1950’s)! Love these foods, but want to make things a little fancier?  Don’t be afraid to dress up these comfort foods!  Try french fries wrapped in monogrammed paper or mini burgers served with fresh flower garnish.  It’s all about the presentation.

7.  Soup Shooters
Interesting, huh! These nonalcoholic drinkable shooters are served during the cocktail hour as hors d’oeuvres.  We’re thinking tomato soup, basil puree, cold gazpacho soup paired with fresh veggies and dip or mini grilled cheese bites.

Want more unique menu ideas?  Check out these fun ideas that are sure to make your mouth water.

Let Elements of Elegance Event Planning help you find the perfect caterer that will help you put together a truly personalized (and delicious) menu.  Then watch your guests chow down!

Happy Planning!

~ Sara

Are you sick of looking at multiple websites to find fun and interesting ideas?  Well Pinterest is one website that can help you find it all. If you have heard of Pinterest, you are probably obsessed.   If you haven’t heard of Pinterest, it is an online website where you can find inspiration for just about anything. You can search wedding flowers, theme ideas, cakes, food and anything else you can think of for a wedding or party.

Why should brides have a Pinterest account?

To keep everything organized: You can find things you love and put them in one location.  This way you don’t have some items saved on your computer and some saved on your phone; it can all be in one central location.

Follow other bridal boards:  There are multiple wedding planners and other pinners that have bridal boards that you can follow.  When you follow these people, the stuff they pin shows up on your Pinterest home page so you can see what they like.  They definitely give you different ideas for themes.  It really helps to follow people with the same style as you, because you might not be able to find stuff that they did.

Mobility: You can take Pinterest anywhere with you.  You can access Pinterest from your cell phone or any computer.  Instead of printing a ton of pictures to bring to bridal meetings you can show your vendors what you like on your boards.

Helps to find a theme and look: There are so many different items on Pinterest that you can really develop a certain them or look.  You can search for certain items and it will pull ideas that have that name.

At Elements of Elegance, we LOVE to use Pinterest for our client’s inspiration boards.  It is a great way to have all of your ideas in one place and you can have separate categories.  EOE and our brides can constantly update images and comment on whether or not they like something.   We can allow the bridal party to be able to add things they like to the board and make it so they can let the bride know their thoughts on ideas.

We all know wedding planning can be stressful and you need to find something to take a little stress away.  So, if you haven’t tried Pinterest, give it a try! I promise you will love it!

~Holly

Photos courtesy of Pinterest

Option 1.   A trolley is a great way to transport you and your entire wedding party. There is space for everyone and most trolleys have open windows to allow for cheering for the happy couple. The Grand Rapids Trolley is a great trolley resource in West Michigan. The classic red color and ability to make as many stops as your heart desires makes for some amazing photo opportunities.

Option 2. A Classic Car. Imagine this, you and your husband leave the ceremony while being showered in rose petals from your family and friends and up drives a beautiful vintage car draped with flowers and adorned with a “just married” banner and ribbons…here’s the best part…the ride is a surprise for your new husband!  See even the royal couple left in a vintage automobile

photo credit: www.msnbc.msn.com

Option 3. Vespa! While this mode of transportation might not be ideal for all brides and their dresses it might be perfect for some.You could rent a single vespa to share or rent multiple vespas for the entire wedding to use and buzz around town. Remember, safety first so helmets, long dresses and traffic are things to keep in mind

photo credit: Wedbits

The key to picking a great mode of transportation or any other wedding vendor is working with your style! If you and your fiance are horse people rent a horse drawn carriage, if you want share a drink with your wedding party a limo or bus might be a great option.  Elements of Elegance has fantastic full planning, partial planning, day-0f coordinating and floral services. We would be happy to offer ideas, inspiration and tips and make sure your day is executed effortlessly. Contact us today to schedule a consultation appointment!

Happy Planning!

~Lauren

You’re engaged and you picked your date, now all you hard work starts…  Choosing the right vendors is a very important and somewhat daunting task.  I always tell my planning clients that we need to make sure you “love” each of your vendor choices because they are the ones that are going to pull all your hard work together.  So here are a few suggestions to make to help with this task.

Suggestion 1: Do the research

Researching for the best vendors for you is a very important task that should be completed once you have determined a budget.  Research can be done through the web, friend’s recommendations or bridal shows.  Once you have determined a few you like start email communication with them and set up some meetings

Suggestion 2: Look past the Website

Anyone that knows us at EOE knows that we love a good website and are constantly changing our own.  But our team also realizes a great website doesn’t mean we are going to “click” with everyone that calls upon us for service.  With that being said, we HIGHLY suggest that you meet with the vendor before just signing the dotted line.  And meeting has many different meaning in our world today.  We work with lots of clients that we have done all our meetings via phone or Skype because they are not local to West Michigan.

Suggestion 3: Cost awareness

Inexpensive doesn’t always mean less service nor does expensive mean you mean you are getting something better.  We realize that couples have budgets and that they need to stay within that budget.  So when looking at vendors you should price point them out for what you can afford.  Example: If you have a budget of $3000 for a photographer then meeting with a $5000 photographer you are not comparing apples to oranges.  With that being said and you can’t find what you want at $3000 we suggest that you take a look at you budget and see if there are other areas that you can move monies around to get the vendor that you want

Suggestion 4: Interview a select number of vendors

We have lots of brides that ask us “How many is too many when it comes to interviewing vendors?”  Our answer is between 3 but no more than 5 companies per vendor category.  What we see happening when couples interview multiple companies is things start to get confusing for them.  Make it easy on yourself and do the research up front and narrow it down.

Suggestion 5: Connect with them and be upfront with expectations

Your vendors are the people that are pulling together your well thought out plans so it’s important that you really trust them.  Don’t be afraid to ask lots of questions and take the time to get to know them before making that decision.  Lay it out what you will be asking of them for service but also ask what they expect from you.  Open communication from the very beginning is excellent!

There is hundreds of tips we can give but these basic five will get you started.  Happy Planning!

Holly

Happy Valentine’s Day lovebirds! May your day be filled with hugs, hearts, kisses and love. Xoxo

~Lauren

Sources:

1. Cookies and Cups

2. Style Me Pretty

3. Tatertots and Jello

4. Better Homes and Garden

After what I would call a FABULOUS event last Wednesday for our Thanksgiving Floral Workshop, EOE has decided to offer TWO workshops for the Christmas Holiday! Each workshop will teach participates how to make a long lasting Christmas evergreen centerpiece that can be enjoyed for two to three weeks with the proper care. Our EOE team will be offer two different types of workshop this time around.

First Workshop

This workshop is more of a get together, have some fun with food and drink with lots of personal attention when you are ready to start your design. All the supplies, Christmas greens, hurricanes, and candles will be provided. Please bring any holiday picks/ribbon that you would like to incorporate into your centerpieces. We will also be teaching those who would like to learn how to make Garland for their holiday décor during this workshop. The class will be held in my home studio and will be limited to 10 participates.

Date: Tuesday December 13th, 2011

Time: 4pm to 8pm

Place: Dee’s home Studio

2576 Vanhorn Court

Allegan, Michigan 49010

Price: $45.00 per person

Second Workshop

This workshop is more of a large classroom teaching environment where we will learn together with an instructor (Dee) leading the class along with EOE staff assisting. . All the supplies, Christmas greens, hurricanes, and candles will be provided. Please bring any holiday picks/ribbon that you would like to incorporate into your centerpieces. We will also be teaching those who would like to learn how to make Garland for their holiday décor during this workshop. The class will be held in my Grand Rapids studio and will be limited to 20 participates.

Date: Wednesday December 14th, 2011

Time: 5pm to 8pm

Place: Studio 409

401 Hall Street SW Studio 409

Grand Rapids Michigan 49503

Price: $40.00 per person

Please email us at info@elementofelegance.com for further information and to reserve your spot!

Photo1

For example, say you as a couple to go boating together. One idea would be to incorporate a boat in with everything or just the steering wheel for a sail boat to set a nautical theme to you wedding. Then by adding navy blue and white stripes and possibly some pops yellow or red as your colors would tie into the boating/nautical theme very nicely. For my upcoming wedding it was an easy to decide what you really wanted to design as a theme for our wedding. My fiancé has his private pilot’s license and I love to travel with him so we chose to do a travel themed wedding. We are incorporating maps and airplanes in everything. It’s fun and sets your wedding apart from everyone else.

Another idea for theme wedding would be basing it on a favorite season. If you have decided on having a winter wedding then you do white and silver colors and have winter themed items. I love seeing Christmas ornaments for wedding favors! Another season that is very easy to have a theme wedding for is a fall wedding. You can incorporate lovely seasonal fall flowers, pumpkins and leaves. Plus it does have a bold color palette that you can have a lot of fun with!

And finally using a favorite pattern can also be developed into a wedding theme. Two patterns that I like are paisley and damask
Everyone wants their wedding to stand out. Just make sure it is something that both people are happy with and it is something that reflects your personality. Make it fun and memorable!

Holly

Photo via The Knot

Event Planner

We are looking for an event planner that is motivated, meticulous, outgoing, energetic and organized. This person must be a team player and should have exceptional customer service skills (willing to go above and beyond for our clients). They should also be a self-starter, extremely detail-oriented, have the ability to emerge as a leader and be able to make quick decisions.

Our ideal candidate will have the following:

At least 1 year of experience in event planning (preferably weddings)
Ability to work with and manage outside vendors to ensure client satisfaction
Experience with creating and executive event timelines
Experience with creating and adhering to an event budget
Able to stand on their feet for long periods of time / lift items over 20 lbs

Intern

We are looking for an intern who is currently enrolled as a college sophomore, junior or senior, in a hospitality program. Our intern must be a quick learner, be very detail-oriented, a team player, and responsible. We are looking for someone that is willing to go above and beyond in providing the best customer service possible.

Our ideal intern will have the following:

Previous customer service experience
Current enrollment in a college hospitality program
Willingness to work long hours on their feet
Reliable transportation
Excellent communication skills (both verbal and written)

Please email your resume and cover letter in a PDF format to Dee Mitchell at info@elementofelegance.com no later than December 1st, 2011.