{ranai}

I recently had the pleasure of throwing a shower for my friend and colleague, Alex Caspero of Delicious Knowledge. I always start early on my planning to get the best deals, and I found amazing items for this event on clearance at Christmas. The chevron plates were my initial inspiration and I scored them at Home Goods buried in the middle of Santa and reindeers. Alex loves chevron patterns (like me!). They were coral, pink, silver, white and gold. To make the color scheme pop I decided to use sapphire blue as an anchor, and I think it was really stunning!

The table scape was my favorite part! I went to my local flower wholesaler, Fresh Ideas, and bought veronica, million star (baby’s breath), carnations, tulips, sweet pea, spray roses, stock, and lisianthus. I arranged the flowers myself, which I was super proud of because floral arranging is generally not my thing. Think fresh flowers are too expensive? Find a local dealer like I did and watch for Groupon, dealsavers, or other similar coupons. I got all of these for around $40!

A few other DIY details pulled everything together. I made small medallions and sprinkled them around the tables. A roll of white, shimmery deco mesh made a perfect table runner for these slimmer tables. Since I used the plates as a charger, I placed the game card for “He said, She said” underneath and added a favor box (handmade of course!) filled with candy on top with the tag that reads, “A sweet ending to a new beginning”.

Since I’m a frugal chick, I also didn’t rent my linens. There is a GREAT fabric resource in San Jose, Fabrics ‘R Us, on Berryessa where you can score some major deals. This blue fabric was $3 per yard. I used 8 yards total on these tables for a cost of $24 compared to renting linens which would have been closer to $36, and now I have the fabric to use over and over again.

To further personalize the space, I printed Alex and Bryan’s engagement photos and put them on our white board. Steffanie, my design assistant for the day, added the baby’s breath which really softened the conference room  look.

And who doesn’t love the look of a giant cluster of poms and lanterns? The larger silver and gold lanterns I once again got on Christmas clearance. The others were made by my coworkers and Steffanie spent quite a bit of time making them look just right. She has an awesome eye for detail!

The strawberry shortcake bar was as visually appealing as it was delicious. I made my first foray into the world of tissue tassel garlands! I bought a custom kit from The Flair Exchange and put it together. Now that I see how they’re made, I think I can tackle it on my own. I spray painted some large letters from Hobby Lobby that Alex got to keep as part of her gift. The little chevron spoon containers were from Target dollar spot.

A strawberry shortcake bar is a perfect shower dessert! Susan, another colleague, made the little cakes. I added fresh strawberries, strawberry compote (fresh strawberries and sugar mixed with a potato masher), crushed graham crackers, pecans, vanilla ice cream, hot fudge, and whipped cream. Everyone raved about how fresh and delicious it was.

Susan had the great idea to have juices with sparkling water for the beverage bar. I bought four juices: peach mango, mango limeade, blueberry pomegranate, and pomegranate lemonade. Since we were at work and it is a medical clinic, any champagne was out of the question so this gave us a fun fizzy drink that felt a bit more festive than soda or punch. I created custom tags for each mason jar and tied them on with colorful baker’s twine. I also had a large container of water with lemons and cucumbers as an alternative.

The game we played was “He said, She said”. I asked the bride and groom a series of questions that they answered separately. The guests circled  lips or a moustache to indicate if they believed Bryan or Alex made the statement. Then as I read the answers they held up cut out lips or moustaches! Normally I’m not a huge fan of shower games, but this one was really fun and a great way to get to know the groom a bit too.

Alex seemed to have a lot of fun, which made me so happy. She’s going to make one gorgeous bride on her wedding day!

For more photos, check out the Photo Album on Google+!