Wedding Shower Fun

Come on in!

This past weekend my sisters and I threw a shower for our oldest sister, Kirsten. See the blushing bride, above? Well, in reality it took a whole army to pull this thing off, from my sister out east and the other who flew in from Alaska, to my mom and aunt who stayed for the weekend. But we had fun planning, crafting and cooking away in preparation for the day (oh hey, that rhymed). 

Trader Joe's has the best bouquets for just a few dollars, and Kirsten made the tissue paper pompom herself -- tutorial to come!

Orange Juice Mimosas hit the spot. And notice the coasters? Christmas gift from my crafty little sister, Sarah!

 

We hit up the Whole Foods bakery for these mini treats (the cannoli and fruit tarts were my personal favorites). And we whipped up some banana sour cream cupcakes because what's a bridal shower without cupcakes? (Super simple recipe found here - we substituted plain greek yogurt for the sour cream)

My mom and her sister accidently dressed alike! Of course it helped that their mom had just sent us all matching scarves. Here they are with their "uniforms" making magic in the kitchen.

I found this tacky, glittery heart in the Valentine's Day section of Joanne's for a few buckaroos and simply sprayed the back of it with a can of blackboad spray paint. It doesn't work as well as a regular chalkboard, but it gets the job done. I might replace the wire with a cute ribbon at some point.

And there were games, naturally. By the end of the party Kirsten and Scott had a mason jar full of cute date-night ideas. 

We also played a 20-Questions game where guests had to guess the famous couple taped to their back, ie: Hermione and Ron, Kate and William, Mary and Joseph. 

Over Christmas my sisters and I interviewed Scott (the groom-to-be) via iChat to capture his response to questions like "what is Kirsten's favorite color, who initiated the first kiss," etc along with his answer to the same questions. We then played the video at the shower and Kirsten provided her answers and guesses. We kept tally and I believe they ended up tied, a good omen for their marriage.

It was so cozy with the snow falling outside. We may have pretended we were at Downton Abbey with our little tea party ; )

We painted some cheap wood letters (from Joanne's) and strung them up to a ribbon to display the upcoming wedding date! (Mom on the left, aunt Sarah on the right). Ignore the painter's tape around the window ... as always, we are finishing up a house project.

The Pearson girls, minus Karrin

I thought it would be fun since so many of Kirsten's friends and family live far away and were unable to attend the shower, to gather recipes from everyone and create a cute recipe binder. I don't know how "cute" it ended up since Sarah and I were throwing it together last minute, but Kirst now has over 50 awesome recipes. Thanks everyone! 

In other new:

I finally got around to making the paper-straw wreath that I've been seeing all over Pinterest (see the first photo in this post for a close-up of my rendition). Really easy craft (tutorial to come) but I'm not sure I love the results. From the curb it looks like our house has been marked, by the plague or aliens or something supernatural. "Don't go in there" it screams to me. Haha. I wonder what the neighbors think? Not sure how long it'll stay up ...