Cassie & Mario's candy-themed wedding

Remember that wedding I was planning...and designing...and crafting...and coordinating...and baking cupcakes for...and making floral bouquets for...and decorating...and standing up as a bridesmaid for...and (you get the idea)

Well it happened.  And it was awesome :)

Here are the photos from the Wedding that was held at the Byron Colby Barn in Grayslake, IL

My beautiful family <3

We collected jars from friends and family for 4 months prior to the wedding.  Some jars were decorated with lace, or burlap and twine.  All 250 jars were filled with candles or flowers and they were clustered on the tables as the center pieces.

Once the sun set, the entire barn glowed so beautifully, from all of the candles

Every Guest received an empty Ball jar to fill with candy from the candy table.  The tags read "Love is Sweet, fill your jar and Enjoy a Treat"

Here are some other detail shots of the other projects I worked on for the wedding

And here's the best photo from the entire event:

It was a lot of work, and there were nights that I stressed so much about it that I lost sleep -- but it was extremely rewarding and I gained a ton of experience from it.

And after all was said and done, I connected with the lady that runs the Barn, and she is recommending me to her Bride's as a wedding consultant / coordinator!  Super exciting opportunity :)

Dining Room Mood Boards

The dining room is going to be the very first thing people see when they walk into our new house.  There's a lot of (self inflicted) pressure to make an impression with this room and I'm struggling to find the direction I want to go with decorating it.

The Furniture

- There's one piece that's going to play a huge role in the design of the dining room -- we salvaged it from Brian's grandfather's home, shortly after he passed.  It's a big, solid wood, ornate dresser that belonged to Brian's grandmother.  We'll be sanding it down, repainting it and repurposing it as our buffet.

- Another piece that we've already settled on, is a tufted banquette from World Market.  I really want to mix up the seating in the room, and am choosing to do so with this awesome sofa-looking piece.  

- Lastly, I am dead set on having a good old solid wood dining table.  Preferably big enough to seat 8-10 people.

Idea #1: Safe and Neutral

I like the idea of keeping everything neutral and just using accent pieces like artwork, vases and pillows, to pull color into the room (less commitment).
The table pictured above is from West Elm and is as solid as 'solid wood dining tables' can get (but it unfortunately comes along with the SOLID price tag). This look would be all about mixing up some old, some modern and some rustic... then hitting the space with a little hint of glam and sparkle.

Idea #2: Mature Navy
Recently, I've become extremely attracted to Navy blue. I feel like it would bring a nice addition of color into the dining room without being overly trendy:

I've been searching for a navy blue rug to anchor the room with.  I found one at Crate & Barrel but when I went to see it in person, it didn't quite have the 'richness' in the blue that I was hoping for (I do love the oversized Ikat pattern -- it's almost too big to make it out).
An alternative to the $1200 West Elm dining table, would be a cheaper ($449) table from Ikea -- definitely lesser in quality, but lighter on the pockets (I'm not exactly Mrs. Moneybags, you know)  I would settle for this table, as it has the capacity to seat up to 10 people and it still has the wood 'charm' that I'm longing for.
Opposite the banquette, would be 3 wooden chairs (also salvaged from Brian's grandparent's home).  They're originally from the late 50's and will need some TLC, but I love the idea of incorporating pieces with history. To know that my mother-in-law sat in these chairs as a little girl, is super sweet to me.
The more I look at this mood board, the more I'm liking it.  I just hope I can pull it off.

Other Considerations
A few other elements that I'm struggling with are:
- a chandelier - do I go modern? do I go classic?
- curtains - bold pattern or solid? 
- head table seating - I don't even know where to begin...
- artwork - want something with vintage flair, but has to be significant

Hopefully I'll find some solid inspiration soon.  I'm gonna have to get Pinterest'ing and Houzz'ing to get more ideas because this uncertainty is making me crazy!

A negative, turned positive

A few months ago, I dragged my boys to Home Sense.  We were strictly there to find a birthday gift for a friend, but anyone who has ever been there will know that it’s practically impossible to walk out of that store without something that isn’t on your ‘list’.  The place is filled with such fantastic stuff..*sigh*

I spotted an upholstered arm chair in the furniture section.  It was off white, had a tufted backing, dark espresso legs and chrome studding all along the back edges.  Beautiful.  And what was even more beautiful was that it was clearance for 100 bucks (I know, I know - it’s still not cheap).  Since it was such a timeless piece, I was willing to pay a little more for something brand new, and something that I knew we could work with in any room of the house, so $100 was reasonable, in my opinion.

With baby in tow and a stroller in the trunk, I knew that it would be impossible to transport the chair home that day.  So we didn’t get it, and left the store with a couple of great gifts and a little something for Xierra.

I know you know where I”m going with this, so I’ll just go ahead and say it -- I went back for the chair and it (‘they’ actually, since there were two available) was gone.  Surprising?  Of course not.  I knew I should have jumped on it, but meh.  I’m not completely heart broken about it, even though it WAS a really great deal.  

So that was the negative...

But on to the positive...

So since I was already in the store, I figured I’d “look around”... the night before, Brian and I had a conversation about picking up some larger pillows for the coffee couch.  The couch originally came with 2 OVERSIZED cushions, and 2 small side cushions which you can kind of see in this photo, past the adorable trio:

The cushions were super comfy but hideous - which is why I don’t have a proper photo of them, as I removed them almost immediately after the couch was delivered.

I really love the shape and structure of that couch, so simplifying it with just the small cushions and small accent pillows was the way I decided to go: (oh how I miss this old lay out - 2006)

Fast forward to 2011 -- I went to the pillow aisles at Home Sense and looked for neutral coloured LARGE cushions.  Off white, perhaps?  With the weird khaki colour of the couch, it was going to be hard to find a neutral colour that would ‘match’ or at least have the same kind of undertones in the fabric.  I browsed, but nothing really popped out at me... I turned the corner and saw this pretty lady:

*love*  Okay, THIS was going to be my source of inspiration.  I loved the boldness of it, and the mixture of colours.  What a gem.

So to make things easier on myself, I opted against neutral large cushions and decided to go for a muted colour with a simple texture, so as not to take away from the awesome accent pillow (did I mention that I love that accent pillow?), but I still wanted another set of heavy patterned pillows, for volume.

This is the combination that I ended up with:

I chose to go with the light green large cushions primarily because they were on clearance (woot!) but also because I knew it would bring freshness to the couch.  I enjoy the fact that there is a tiny hint of green in the accent pillow, just enough to pull from.

I found the two smaller brown cushions (which are intended for patio furniture).  Brown, yes.  And no, the accent pillow doesn’t have any brown in it whatsoever.  But what I loved about the geometric pattern, was that it had squares in it, which match the stitching on the large green cushions AND the pattern is actually an off white colour, which pulls from the off white flowers in the accent pillow.

So, that was my thought process when picking out the cushions (which by the way, still have their tags on, in the event that I get some sense knocked into my head and realize that the combination really doesn’t work).  My husband isn’t much of a fan of the brown pillows.  He can’t get past the fact that they don’t match the accent pillow - such a guy.

Oh, and I forgot to mention that the print that hangs above the couch has oranges and browns in it too, which help to pull it all together even more:

But that’s not all folks -- one more slooooow browse around the store and I just couldn’t resist putting this in my cart:

SERIOUSLY! If I had my way, my entire house would be FILLED with lanterns.. I mean, COME ON!  Look at this thing!! It’s stunning, and was only 15 bucks!  And hmmm...orange huh?  The colour seems awfully familiar doesn’t it?  Ooh, riiiight.  It’s in the AWESOME ACCENT PILLOW.

So I didn’t get the accent chair that I wanted, but I scored in the pillow department.  I’m happy with that.  Anyway, there’s an ad in Kijiji for similar (but still not as nice) upholstered chairs -- I just emailed the poster and she still has a couple available.

For now, I’m going to make myself a pot of coffee and enjoy my new cushions.  I might even decide to cut the tags off..