Wolf Lakes Open House

Saturday, March 10th was the open house event at our wedding venue, Wolf Lakes Park. Zac and I were excited to see the venue again, walk around the grounds, and perhaps get some decorating ideas for the ceremony. Zac was mostly excited to eat the food. (We were going to have an opportunity to try a sample of our food options so that we could pick out our menu.)

The weather was pretty perfect and the day turned out to be really fun. My parents were happy that they went with us since my dad had only seen photos of the Wolf Lakes on the venue's website. After walking around and seeing the place in person, he said he thought it was absolutely beautiful.

Here are a few pictures from the day:

Zac and I arriving at the venue. They had all of the couples take a photograph as soon as we walked in.

The linen options were displayed on a table by the entrance. Zac and I have selected the brighter shade of yellow for our table napkins. At the wedding, these napkins will be displayed on the tables in the glasses just as they are seen here.

We chose Barb's Cakery to make out wedding cake. Here is their cake display:

One great thing about the open house was that we were able to see what the ceremony area looks like with the seating set up. The Lakeside venue, which is where our ceremony will be held, has angled seating rather than straight rows. We have decided not to have the seat covers and sashes as you can see in the picture below. (It was an additional expense that we couldn't justify.) So our seating at the ceremony will look a little different. 

The alter had some beautiful decorations set up by our florist, Brown Bunny Flowers. We love the vases on either side filled with baby's breath. The decorations gave us an idea of what we could do for the alter on our wedding day.

This is the aisle that I will be walking down. In May, the plants will be full and the walkway will be covered in greenary. I'm a little nervous about the steep walk down in my wedding shoes, but thankfully I'll have my dad to lean on during that walk.

The buffet line during the reception should go very quickly. The venue has a newly built double sided buffet that should allow for our guests to get their food without a long wait.

Throughout the open house, there were a few presentations by Doves Away. The releasing of the does was pretty amazing. 

One bride and groom couple were asked to help with the demonstration.

Though we won't be releasing doves at our own wedding, Zac and I thought that it was quite the sight from the audience.

This is the fountain on the English Garden side of the venue.

It's a beautiful spot for photos.

We loved the decor that was set up at the English Gardens altar. The yellow flowers hanging from mason jars covered in lace...amazing!

One thing for our guests to look forward to on the wedding day are boat rides around the lake.

After walking the grounds of the whole venue, Zac and I headed back to the Lakeside altar to see if we could incorporate the decor that we had seen on the English Gardens side. Don't we look puzzled? :P

The whole day was wonderful! We successfully picked out our menu and got a bunch of ideas for decor. In addition we were also able to talk to a few of our vendors who were at the event. We will be meeting with our photographer in just a few weeks to take care of some final details. Just 7 more weeks until the big day!

Un - Fork - Gettable Inspiration

Today I was happy to partake in one of my favorite pastimes...browsing through etsy.com. You might remember that etsy.com was where I managed to score my amazing 'Mrs. Chapman' wedding dress hanger:

(Read all about the hanger excitement here.)

I wasn't looking for anything specific during my etsy.com perusing, I was only hoping to get some interesting ideas. Once again, etsy.com did not disappoint. While looking through pages and pages of merchandise under the title 'wedding' I came across these awesome wedding forks:

Seriously, how cute are they?! As you can see more clearly in this close up photo the tops of the forks say 'I do' and 'Me too'. I think it's a really cute and sweet sentiment on such a small detail of the wedding.

The forks also have the wedding date stamped on the handles.

I have to give the seller a little shout out because I love these forks so much! These personalized dessert tasting forks can be purchased from Jessica on etsy.com for $25.00 for the set (plus $3 for shipping and handling of course). These are not the only forks that Jessica offers in her collection of custom designs. She can also make handstamped forks that say 'bride' and 'groom':

And forks that have the specific names of the bride and groom:

In addition to forks, she creates customized cake servers:

The cake server (which can be found on etsy.com here) sells for $30.00 (plus $4.00 for shipping and handling). Those who purchase the cake server are not limited when it comes to customizing them. On the product listing the seller has even included a few ideas for phrases and sayings to put on the server:

Just Married
Love Sweet Love
You make my life sweeter
Mr. & Mrs.
Your wedding date
Forever Yours
Lets Eat Cake
You & Me
Forever Starts Today
You wanna piece of me

I guess the possibilities are endless.

Sorry if I'm coming across as a total infomercial for Jessica and her handstamped creations. In no way am I getting a kickback from the etsy.com merchant. I just happen to love her designs. I haven't placed an order for these forks just yet, however. While I definitely think that they would be a sweet addition to our dessert table and make for a fun reminder of our special day (we could definitely use these forks every year on our anniversary) I'm holding off on ordering them until after I sort out my list of needs for the wedding. Supplies for things like centerpieces, decorations, the guestbook, invitations, etc. will all need to come before any additional small details, even ones as awesome as these dessert forks. I'm sure in the end they'll make their way onto the list of soon to be purchased items, but for now I'm happy leaving them on my list of wedding inpirations. (We all know how much I love a list!)

Speaking of inspiration here are a few other items I found during my window computer screen shopping on etsy.com:

1. Yellow and Gray Clutch

I thought this clutch was super cute and perhaps would make for a nice accessory for my girls' bridesmaid dresses. I even thought that it would be a nice touch to have the girls walk down the aisle holding these clutches rather than flowers but I can already hear my mother's disagreeing "Hmmmm". (My poor mom. From the description of my mother in my wedding nightmare and this last comment, I doubt people are getting the right picture of her. Yes, my mom has an opinion and she isn't afraid to let it be heard, but she's also very sweet. She's very excited for the wedding of her only daughter and has been active in the planning process, she has even begun to make some favors and fun details for the big day.....which you can check out in this post.) I must say that the vision of my best girls carrying clutches instead of flowers was a short one. I think that I would prefer they carry flowers but this clutch is still very cute. If you think that it's an adorable bag too you might want to check out the listing, here.

2. Yellow Flower Garter

I am in love with this garter belt from rosebudlips. It has such a vintage look and the color scheme is perfect. The combination of the pearls and the elastic lace.....yeah, it's love. :) I think that this summer will involve some crafty handywork for other wedding projects and I might have to add "attempt to diy a garter belt" to my to-do list.

3. Feather and Rhinestone Hair Clip

During my dress shopping trip at David's Bridal, I tried on a few feather hairclips. I have a thing for owls and Zac and I have decided to include some fun owl elements in the wedding decor. While trying on head pieces, the bridal consultant asked if we had a theme for the wedding and owls was the only thing that I could think of. (Our wedding doesn't really have a theme. Yes, a few owls will be spotted in different places at our wedding but there certainly won't be owls peering at our guests from the centerpieces of every table.) Sarah brought over a few different feather headpieces and (although one was kind of crazy big in size) I thought the idea of wearing feathers in my hair was really cute. Perhaps my craft to-do list might also include attempting to make my own feather hair clip as well. I plan to use this hair clip as inspiration. If all else fails, and my diy project doesn't turn out so well, I can always order this specific feather clip.

4. Owl Cake Topper

Speaking of owls, I also found this adorable owl cake topper complete with top hat and veil. Look at that little bowtie on the groom. So adorable! Unfortunately, this adorbale little number comes at the price of $130.00. Cute, but not for us. Zac and I have already gotten our cake topper. The cake topper was another little diy project that I will happily spill the details about later. Although we already have a cake topper that we're proud of I still thought these little owls with their wedding wear were too cute not to share with all of you.

5. White and Yellow Striped Straws

Although our venue does not offer/allow hard alcohol (the majority of the glasses will be for beer, wine, and champagne) I think that these cute striped straws would be a fun touch in the water, iced tea, and lemonade glasses. They could add a little extra pop of color to the tables and they just have a fun, carefree vibe to them.

This is just a small peak at some of the inspirational items I found on etsy.com. There were tons of other photos that caught my eye and got the creative wheels in my head spinning and perhaps I'll post a little more about my finds, but I think that's enough sharing for now.

P.S. If you've never taken the time to check out etsy.com, you should!

P.P.S. For those of you who love etsy.com as much as I do, have you found anything that inspired you as much as I was inspired this time around?