Special touches..

I love when a bride adds her own special touches to the wedding. Whenever I can, I try to grab photos of these items to share on the blog. I realize I've been collecting them for awhile now and figured I'd better get to posting!

This wedding was from way back in April (seems like ages ago!). The groom is in a band and the bride made a special boutonniere for him.

She also did these very pretty chair reservations.

Another trend I'm seeing is TOMS wedding shoes - so love these! The bride bought this beautiful garter from Etsy.com.

Another bride had a special touch just for her guests - flip flops for the beach ceremony! You can purchase these fairly inexpensively at places like Old Navy and of course, get them to match your wedding colors!

I really enjoy seeing cultural influences as well. This bride & groom brought their cake topper with them, a shout out to their heritage.

This bride also had a fun way for guests to find their seat.

I was a big fan of this too - a large wooden tray with moss & beautifully labeled envelopes.

Be sure to check back often for more fun ideas!

It's CARNIVAL TIME!

Carnival Time in the VI! Such a great time to be married - just look at the photo ops! Want to get married during Carnival? If you're on-island now, it's not too late - but if you aren't lucky enough to be here, come down in July! St. John Carnival is the first week of July and offers such great photo opportunities as well!

A cruise ship PARTY!

It's not very common, but every once in awhile, we get a group off the cruise ships for like 100 people. It's wonderful! We often do large weddings, but most cruise ship affairs are a bit smaller, normally less than 30 people. It's always fun to work with a large group though. This bride & I have been working together since September of 2010 to get all the details together. It was a really simple affair, just a nice wooden arch and a decorated aisle. Something unique about her wedding was the fact that she brought along her own photographer. Know what's really cool about that? All day photos, on the ship, on land, in different locations...so pretty. Check out their photographers blog for a timeline of their wedding day:

http://www.michaelwachniak.com/realloveis/2011/11/stephanie-colin-st-thomas-cruise-wedding/

My favorite photos? The ones in front of the Fort. Amazing.

PS I was TICKED that there was another wedding on the beach that day (you can see the other arch in the background). There is a calendar for wedding planners to use so that we can schedule weddings on this beach, as the beach is not very big for multiple weddings (like Magan's Bay can handle). The other wedding was NOT on the schedule. The wedding planner left it off on purpose so that we wouldn't be aware of their set up. Shady!! Then they had the nerve to ask me to move my set up! Fortunately, the bride & I had discussed the set up and she liked the idea of the arch being parallel to the water, not facing it, so my spot was perfect for her. I wasn't going to budge, especially since my wedding WAS on the calendar. Please note though, if you are not using Island Bliss Weddings and found the blog by some other means, PLEASE make sure you check with your wedding planner to make sure they have your wedding on the calendar or if they know of other weddings that are taking place at the same time. I really felt bad for the other bride, as I'm sure they did not tell her that there would be a wedding for 80 people at the same time.