I wanted to try to create the floral arrangements myself, and bought silk flowers at Michael's. It came out quite well. My arm bouquet was red and cream flowers (roses and forget-me-nots); the corsages were red and/or cream roses with baby's breath and sprigs of pine; the boutonnieres were pretty standard cream rosebud things. I was actually surprised at how well my floral attempts came out and how much fun I had with it.

Jason's mom also contributed to the decorations by bringing over tons of poinsettias and red ribbons, as you can see in the above picture. Jason's parents also lent us candlesticks, tablecloths, a punch bowl, and other such items.

The ring bearer and "flower" girl were going to be carrying battery-operated candles. I decorated the base of each candle with long red and silver ribbons, with red and silver jingle bells attached. (You can see Shari holding one of these candles in the picture to the left.) The ring bearer's candle had extra ribbons to which the rings would be attached. The bells would jingle as they walked down the aisle. Also, for the "flower" girl (in quotes because there were no flowers for her :) , I bought a "Lucia crown" -- something that Swedish girls wear on St. Lucia day, a headpiece wreath of candles (battery-operated also, for safety). My little blond niece would look adorable in it. The Lucia crown was $12 and the other battery candles were .99 each. The ribbon and bells cost about $12 total, but I used the ribbon on some other items, too.

Unfortunately, as mentioned elsewhere in this website, the flower girl and ring bearer were unable to attend because of the snowstorm. So no one wore the Lucia crown in the ceremony, but my friend Robert did try it on.

I bought a ton of other candles to use throughout the house, in red, white, and cream colors, votives, tealights and tapers. I tried to buy some candles every week in beween the engagement and the week of the wedding. I also bought silver and red luminarias to put on the front porch.

The "guestbook" was a little unusual, and not exactly a book. We had red tags made of cardstock, shaped like circles and hearts. The tags were about 2 1/2" across. Each tag had a hole punched in it, and we tied silver metallic wire-edged ribbon through the hole. We provided silver ink pens for people to use, and each guest signed the tag with a wedding wish and their names, then hung the tags on a wreath next to the table. (See the photo to the right.) We're going to save the tags in our wedding scrapbook.

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© 1997 by Wendi Dunlap Simpson and Jason Simpson