Love Birds

A friend asked me to help her with her May wedding.

This is a second marriage for both her and her fiancé.

There's a specialness to it 

that comes from two people living busy and established lives, nurturing careers, having raised kids, 

and then finding each other

and falling in love — a love infused with the joy and passion of

youth coupled with the wisdom, patience

and forgiveness of wise older souls.

It's an honor.

Julie came on Sunday to see the staging of ideas

I'd brainstormed, created and curated.

And, folks, we have us a wedding.

Here are a few snippets of what 

we looked at and discussed on Sunday while sipping champagne

and listening to Michael Buble. 

[Forgive the poor-quality images.]

Julie has gravitated toward a bird theme.

Her Pinterest wedding board is all about the birds.

The wedding invitation is so beautiful . . . 

birds on twigs.

I can do something quite lovely with birds.

A fifteen-pane window that gal pal Ali

salvaged from the roadside and handed off to me as an 

"I just knew you would put this to good use" piece, 

got a coat of Annie Sloan chalkpaint in the loveliest

of warm whites.

It's been put to use in a grand way for

Julie and Alan's big day.

I attempted a DIY mercury glass vase, which turned out beautifully.

And so easy to do!

For staging flowers, find a picture of the arrangement 

you want online and then print it out in color and cut it out.

This was a flower arrangement that Julie pinned. 

It's what I plan on doing for the table arrangements.

And for staging purposes,

a print out is way easier than purchasing the exact flowers.

I just glued a piece of foam core to the back, stuck a wooden skewer into the foam core,

then the other end of the skewer into floral foam in the vase.

Here's the tutorial that I used, but I think for the rest of the vases,

I'm going to try this one.