A Polka With Circular Iotas!

The week of my sister's wedding she decided she needed a couple new dresses to wear during her new married life. Sometime ago she made a little black dress using Simplicity 3673 - 1950's Retro. It became a staple - suited her perfectly and she got many many compliments on it.

Thus, in regards to that she concluded that would be a good pattern for us to use.

Seeing as we were frequenting Hobby Lobby plenty often for last minute wedding bits...we took the opportunity to pick up a couple fabrics (both which ended up being polka dotted) and trims.

It has simple lines and its quite fast to construct. The most time consuming part is all the darts in the top of the skirt...

 

As you can see we fiddled around abit and she came up with some clever trim placement. I'm no good with such things, however, I like to think my stupidity inspires it.

Van-dykes for the skirt!

After some confusion over what size the previous dress was made. I had to take in the sides a considerable amount. That's always most discouraging - finally completing the finishing touches and excitedly having the recipient try on the garment only to find it doesn't fit properly. Never the less that's all part of being a seamstress. It happens, and we must overcome the issues and contrive a beautiful piece.

Love,

Brooke

The Tale Of A Wedding: The Wedding Day - Reception

The reception was held at the Forman Center which is an old school gym in some dorky town called Manito. lol 

We all wore funky shoes.... :D

Such a lovely cake! Josiah's mom made it. As well as all the cupcakes!

We put together the jars with burlap ribbon and twine for the centerpeices. That was a fun time. Chicken Noodle Soup was playing loud enough the jars were vibrating together. Yay subwoofers. lol Anyhow, add in a couple old books, a few skeleton keys, some flowers, rocks, water, and floating candles! Purty stuff.

Delicious food. My Grandma did lots of prep leading up to the big day. Putting all the food together gathering other ladies to help serve it. We also made two kinds of punch. Could really go for some of the coffee stuff right now. ;) 

There was much dancing to be seen!

Our adorable friends Larry and Shirley - who we had the pleasure of meeting thru reenacting!

The bouquet toss! I didn't catch it. :( lol

All to soon they were on they're way...the tear down began and home we all ventured.

And this my dears is finally the end of all the wedding droll...For a good long time I imagine. I hope you've aleast enjoyed the peek into my modern life a bit. I'll now return to our regularly scheduled program. Thanks for bearing with me. :)

Love,

Brooke

The Tale Of A Wedding: The Wedding Day - Formals

Here-in you'll find some of my favorite formal shots

The bridesmaids.

I CANNOT believe the gorgeous girl is my sister!! ♥ 

Brothers.

Lij and Siah try to look scary.

One of the very best!

But this one I think I love more...we're so lovely! lol

♥ Me and my sis! ♥

Mother and daughter.

Spicing it up!

Cuteness!

Tear jerking. ;)

Fabulous four! We've had alot of good times together.

Sweetness!

Yeah she's just that tiny.. lol

So vintage-y feeling!

Lovely rings, no?

I have gorgeous siblings...that's all that's to it!

His family...

Her family...

Keeping it classy! 

Last up - The reception.

Love,

Brooke

The Tale Of A Wedding: The Wedding Day - Ceremony

The ceremony was held at Lake Park in Delavan. We scoured the area for outdoor venues. Everything was completely booked. Then one day after the Delavan Civil War Days - we realized how gorgeous the park would be for a wedding...

All the sexy ladies making their arrival! Watch out world! :p

My Dad made the "guest book" er bench. He used cherry - its quite solid, but a beauty for sure. My Grandma put her skillful hands to work burning the center design on and we did a bit of experimenting with different writing utensils to see what worked best. Sharpie pens for the win! 

Lij and I mid procession! I love this! We look so happy. :)

She's coming!!!! So much anticipation! 

Prayer with the parents, bride, and groom.

 This is probably about when my mind was wandering and I realized THIS IS PINTEREST MOMENT! OMG! Everything was so beautiful, so perfect! A gentle breeze, lovely temperatures...Everything was just so beautiful there's really no other way to say it!

Unity sand.

The moms first poured it into two of the hearts then Michelle and Josiah together into the center heart.

Vows!

Their very first kiss ever!

Beginning they're new life together!

Probably a couple of the most entertaining people you'll find.

Dismissing the guests...

Boys will be boys! Lil bro and his besties aka cousins.

Next up: Formals.

Love,

Brooke

The Tale Of A Wedding: The Wedding Day - Preparation

I'm finally getting around to going thru the hundreds of pictures from my big sis' wedding. I tried to just choose a few, but there is *so* many I love so I decided I'll just go a head and do multiple posts. :D

 Since it was an outdoor wedding. We choose a historical - 1840's - house in Delavan to get ready in. Its really a darling little place, but wasn't quite big enough for the ladies and the men to get ready in at the same time. So the guys got ready first and then we shipped them off to the ceremony location so we could bring in the lady of honor. lol ;)

All us bridesmaids and my mom started meeting up at our salon at 7:30 to get our hairstyled. We were there till like 11:30...Gave me plenty of time to get my own makeup done so later I could focus on Michelle. :p She wanted a very subdued natural look. We practised it once. I only started doing makeup last year so I am always a bit nervous when it comes to delivering a professional look for special occasions. lol 

The gown!!! We looked at wedding gowns for several week. She tried on at least 60 gowns I'd say. She just wasn't happy with any of them. There was one she liked, but it was over budget and we were too short on time to order it anyhow. When we hit 3-ish months - we had one more dress for her to try on. And if that wasn't the one we finally decided we'd just have to make one. She'd found pictures of a gorgeous one online she loved - so I started locating the materials. Let me just say $200 a yard lace is majorly intimidating to me, but..... 

Alas, she tried on this dress, which an acquaintance of ours had. And she decided to bring it home to give it a closer look. The more she tried it on the more she liked it. And so the story of the dress.

Finishing touches. 

As you've probably noticed from previous pictures. The entire wedding party went barefoot.  And Michelle gave all us females matching anklets and toe rings. SO pretty! ^-^

And lastly the flowers....purple roses for the bride.

White roses for the bridesmaids. And a mixture of purple and white for the boutineers. 

Josiah's mom made all the flowers (yes, you'll find that almost everything for this wedding was homemade... ;) She did such a lovely job!!

Vows. Last minute people we are. ;)

And then we waited...

Ceremony coming soon....

Love,

Brooke