Our Alice in Wonderland Virtual Wedding Ceremony

     Brian and I got married on Friday, May 22nd, 2020.  While the ceremony was certainly different from what I had envisioned six months ago when I started planning, it was one of the best days of my life.  The joy of seeing so many friends and loved ones, either virtually or in person, and standing up with the love of my life celebrating our union, kept the perfectionist in me from noticing the little things that fell by the wayside.  Sure, we were late to the venue, and didn't have the time to put up some of the decorations I had painstakingly created for this event, and we had plenty of Zoom and internet issues, but these were nothing more than blips on my radar.  If you are currently planning a wedding, especially if things are now up in the air or you've had to change your plans substantially, I want to say that while stressful now, in my experience, none of those issues will matter in the end.  I was so happy to be marrying Brian that it did not matter on the day of if not every detail was Pinterest perfect.
     For the rest of this post, I'll walk you through the day with photos, but I also made a brief video of our day, which I have included below:

Our Wedding

     Brian and I got married at the ornamental gardens at the University of Maine.  The funny thing was, when we started talking about getting married, the gardens had been our first idea, since it is a lovely venue and UMaine is where we met.  We ended up selecting Penobscot Valley Country Club instead because it was more wheelchair accessible and I wanted to have a venue that my grandmother could navigate easily.  Unfortunately, once COVID hit, we realized we would no longer be able to have my grandmother there in person, and so when we got to the stage of downsizing and changing venues, we knew the gardens would be the right choice.  I love the flowering trees, and they were in full bloom that day, making for the perfect backdrop for our ceremony.  We still hope to do a vow renewal ceremony at PVCC next May.

     I figured I would include this zoomed out shot to give you a sense of where our guests were situated for the ceremony.  My brother was also there, although he did not make it into this picture.

     Here Brian is, reciting his vows.

     And here I am, reading mine.  Some say you should make sure your vows and your partners' vows are roughly the same length, but we didn't bother with coordinating vows.  Brian's were short and to the point, which suited him well, and mine were long and sentimental, which is very me.

     The downside to an outdoor venue - sometimes nature gets mean.  Brian is running away from a hornet in this picture.  But not a murder hornet; those haven't made their way up to Maine yet, as far as I'm aware.

     The ring exchange.

     Brian getting chased by the hornet again.

     Taking some pictures with the family.  Even though I didn't have time to put up some of the decorations I'd made, the gardens were so lovely that it didn't really matter.  It didn't feel like we were missing something.

     I don't know if the Hathaway family knows how to take a normal picture.

     The Toner family isn't necessarily good at normalcy either.

     We had our reception in our backyard.  Here's our wedding cake.  My dad picked up these Little Debbie Fancy Cakes for us to use, and I made some cake toppers to give them a little extra flair.
     Even though our wedding was small and not at all professional, it was a great day.  I truly am lucky to have such wonderful family, friends, and partner - now husband - in my life.
     If you like wedding crafts or Alice in Wonderland crafts, stay tuned.  In the coming weeks I'll show you how I made the bouquets, the card soldiers, and how I turned a romper into a wedding dress, among other crafts.

Alice in Wonderland Inspired Teacup Thank You Cards

     I've been meaning to send out thank you cards for my bridal shower for a few weeks now.  I wanted cards that were in some way reminiscent of Alice in Wonderland, but also that were not a ridiculous amount of effort to make.  These teacup cards are what I came up with.  While I'm using them as thank you cards, these could be great for many other occasions as well.

Materials:

*Floral scrapbooking paper
*Scissors
*Pencil

Directions:

*Print out a copy of the teacup template given below, or draw a teacup template of your own.  Make sure to size the template such that it will fit inside your envelopes.  I apologize for the blurriness of the teacup handle.  I had made a handle that was more vertical and had to rotate it using Paint Shop Pro to get it to fit on the cup correctly, so that's why the handle ended up so blurry.

*Fold your sheet of scrapbooking paper in half lengthwise, right sides facing inward.

*Place your template such that the top of the teacup rests against the fold and trace around the teacup.

*Cut out the teacup shape, making sure to cut through both layers of paper at once.  I was able to cut out the inside of the handle using scissors, but if you have an X-acto knife, you may find it easier to use that.

*Fold your paper back along the crease you created, so that the right sides face outward.

DIY Wedding Invites with the Foil Quill

     As some of you know, Brian and I are getting married this May.  When it came to the invites, we decided to make them ourselves.  To aid us with the invites, we picked up a machine called the Foil Quill, which adds shiny foil to your cards.  In this video tutorial, we'll show you the method we developed for using the Foil Quill to add some shine to our invites.

Here's what the front and back of the invites look like, as well as the RSVP card.

     Check out the video tutorial below to see how we used the Foil Quill to make our invites shine.

     Although I don't go through the design process in this video, if you want to find the clip art I used for the back of the card and the RSVP card, I ordered it from Etsy.  The three packs I used are Alice in Wonderland Clipart, Tea & Macaroons, and Autumn in Wonderland.