My Little Ebay Finds ♥

Being a DIY bride, I must spend hours upon hours sifting through Ebay. Pages and pages of items from sugar flowers to dresses. This blog should probably be called confessions of the Ebay bride, but hey ho! I thought I would just share with you a few items I have found that I am considering for the wedding, how much they are, and what I plan to do with them. I'll also pop the links below each image, so if you are planning your own celebration, you could get them yourself =) These are in no particular order, just whatever I pick out.

These organza bags are a total bargain, it's 50 for £1.79 or 100 for £3.19. I am torn between the nude colour and the pink. As well as favours which may possibly be teeny pots of home-made jam, I am going to have these organza bags dotted randomly on tables filled with mini eggs! It is Easter Good Friday on our wedding day, so I thought we have to involve it somewhere. This just means there's a subtle hint of Easter, mini eggs are nice pastel colours, so I could put five bags on each table, and then fill a bowl of mini eggs on the buffet table. The total cost would probably be less than a tenner for a pretty little Easter hint.

Update - I bought 50 nude bags for £1.79, wehey!

Organza Bags

This is some floral vintage style fabric I have found. It comes in a fat quarter bundle for £7.50 with £1.75 postage. These would be ideal for the top covers for the jam favours, and also to make some bunting. The fabric on the far right has the exact colours of my little sister's bridesmaid dress too! So I shall get two lots of these because I think they will look so pretty all around the tables on the jam lids, tied with some brown twine! I have already got the twine too, 4 rolls from the 99p store!

Vintage Fabric Bundle

These are the teeny Jam jars I keep waffling on about. They are so cute! You know the type when you go down for breakfast at a hotel, and they have these with Jam and marmalade? I think with them being small they add a bit of quirkyness to the favours, and with a nice sticker saying 'Spread the Love' on the front, perhaps with the date of our wedding, they will be super duper. The only slight issue is...I've never made Jam before! Where there's a Till, there's a way!

These are 100 Jam jars for £53.00, which I don't think is too bad really. I excited to see them filled with Jam, with their little floral hats on!

Mini Jam Jars

Cake. Cake, cake cake. I have a mini panic attack when I think about the cake. Scouting around online, cakes are round about £300.00 for a 3 tier cake. It's daylight robbery, I know a lot of intricate work goes into them, but it only gets eaten! I have been thinking about buying a cake base, just sponge already iced in 3 or 4 tiers, and decorate it myself. Risky I know, considering you can only really get it 14 days before, and I could mess it up, but we will see! I think it's worth a go, plus it will be personalised, even if it's crap.

These pretty sugar flowers are £3.99 for 100, and I could either dot them all over randomly, or do a pretty trail up the tiers. Ill have to design before I stick!

Sugar Flowers

That's enough jibberish for now, but at least you can see what I have been looking at. What do you think? Have you got any Ebay items to recommend? 

Tilly xXx

Save the Date! ♥

Before we got engaged, I hadn't really thought of Save the Date cards, and when buying wedding magazines and surfing the net, it became more apparent they were pretty popular. The concept of them, is to send out a card with the date and perhaps the location of your wedding before the invitation, so guests can get it booked off work in plenty of time. I've seen some nice idea's for Save the Date cards.

Some people like to take a photo with themselves in, and send that out by itself, or a formal card like the invitation. Here are some examples.

The idea is to be short, sweet and one sided. I like the photograph concept, however for ours I wanted something that would give an idea of the theme of the wedding. The card below is more like what I seem to come across more regularly, as it's straight to the point.

So, after a little while messing around on Photoshop, I came up with a design that I quite like for ours. Also, I am going to send ours out as magnets, so our guests can stick them on the fridge, and not forget! They will be about Credit Card size and come with little envelopes. They are priced at 20 for £6.99, or £8.99 with envelopes if you require them. If you don't fancy your chances with Photoshop, there are also some pre-designed magnets, that you can personalise with your names and date. 

I've got to do a final count of the guest list before I know how many to order. Obviously it is one card per house hold, so I think it's going to be around 50, which is a little annoying with it being 20 per pack. Nevermind! The link to the Ebay seller for the magnets is HERE.

This is the first design I have done, I wanted something a little bit vintage and floral. I'm a little unsure about the font looking at it now though, I'm not sure if it's right for the theme. But, that's what it's all about, trial and error and I shall get there in the end.

I'm not actually sure on when to send these, I'm thinking around Christmas or just after in January, with just over a year to go so they don't get mixed up with the Christmas post. 

Thanks for reading, tomorrow is my first Weight Watchers weigh in, so a post on #OperationWeddingDress will be coming either tomorrow evening or Wednesday morning! I'm a little nervous, but I think I've lost at least a pound (out of my pocket), so I'm not sweating it too much. 

Tilly xXx

P.S. I've just done a quick Save the Date card with the use of my background, and I think I much prefer it. I'm thinking when I receive them, to stick a little pearl heart in one of the top corners to make it a little bit more pleasing to the eye. Reckon it's better than the first one?

X

Wedding Dresses ♥

Now the venue has been chosen, and the theme is on the right track, my head has been full of what to do next. With just over 20 months to go, it gives me plenty of time to decide on a wedding dress. It is probably one of the most exciting parts of it and I think I plan to buy it around 6 to 8 months before. I really want to shift some weight first, as I'm no spring chicken and I'm a real foodie, which unfortunately shows the minute I put an M&M near my lips. It is a big issue for me, but I can't seem to combat it at the minute for some reason. I think it's all getting in the right frame of mind, trouble is a meal out is something my Fiancé and I really enjoy doing, when really it's lethal. More on that another day.

So after scouring through a million wedding magazines, and pages among the net, I have finally came up with a wedding dress style I like. I want to keep it along with the vintage theme, have something different with plenty of lace. I'm not a fan of these generic satin dresses, when I'm watching 'Don't Tell the Bride', they all look the same. Other people look really nice in them when they are on, but they are just not for me. 

I plan to buy my wedding dress off Ebay. They have some amazing designs, and at phenomenal prices for a custom made fit. Of course, I shall still go and try some on to get an idea of what suits me, but once a bargain hunter, always a bargain hunter. Here are some I have found and loved.

I would prefer something with shoulder straps or some way of holding up the dress rather than the 'boob tube' style. I don't fancy hoiking it up all day. Also I'm pretty broad shouldered, so I'd prefer to take the edge off that too. These are two however, that I loved anyway without shoulder straps.

My favourite at the moment is this dress here. It's different, has side shoulder straps, and abundance of lace with a vintage feel to it still. I absolutely love it, and all for a hundred pounds. I understand it's risky, but I'd rather pay fifty quid to get it altered than another two grand to have a designer label put in the back. That still looks amazing to me, and although it might not be to everyone's taste, it's just what I'm after. The only trouble is with Ebay, dresses like this come and go so I have to scour it everyday to see what is still there. We shall see nearer to the time, but this is certainly a contender if it would still be there. 

Have you bought wedding or bridesmaid dresses off Ebay? I'd love to know!

Thanks for reading,

Tilly xXx