Let's Talk Wedding: Church Decorations

Lobby: There weren't a lot of decorations for the lobby, but everything I did was a project (for someone). One of my absolute favorite things was the "Gift Card Box" and the "Card Box". I saw this idea in a magazine and thought it was genius! I not only used it at the wedding and reception, but it was very helpful at the wedding showers so I didn't lose any gift cards. Michelle had all my dark purple fabric b/c she was making shoes for the flower girls and the ring bearer pillows, so I asked if she would mind covering some boxes. Her husband ended up doing it and they were awesome!!!! They worked perfectly too! You can see them below where we had them set up for people to set their gifts.
My major project that I worked on was having a tri-fold stand (like below) to put pictures of Ken and I so people had something to look at while they were waiting to be seated.

I didn't get as many pictures on there as I wanted, but it worked and I think it turned out AMAZING! A friend of the family, Rocky, built the wooded frame. My mom, dad, Ken and I covered the panels with the black fabric and then the criss-crossed purple ribbon. It was a nice touch and we now have it in our guest room with pictures in it too. :) I was also EXCITED about the fall decorations the church had up. I wanted to use pumpkins SOOOO badly b/c I just love them. I was out-numbered by my mom and the florists on this idea....but the church had them up already! YAY!!!!! And, they were cute! :)
This was my final idea. I don't remember where I saw this....probably the Pottery Barn catalog, but I needed something to fill space. This was the perfect thing. The hurricanes were used in my best friend's, Michelle, wedding. We used them again here. Added a little of the dark purple fabric and then a framed engagement picture. They looked pretty cute. We put them on the guest sign in table and the gift table.
Auditorium: Decorating is not my "thing". I love it and can mimic any picture, but I cannot just come up with something in my head and picture what it will look like. I'm so thankful my mom can look at a room and envision exactly what it will look like. I had an idea, but my mom finished it. :) It didn't really go all that smoothly. We had some disagreements, but all in all, she saw my vision and we went with it. I loved how it turned out....even though she secretly told my florist to bring extra things. ha! I really wanted the church to be simple and basic. We would only be there for an hour and then spend the majority of the time at the reception. I wanted to spend most of the budget at the hotel, making it beautiful! Anyway....All I wanted on stage was candles and urns. I found these two pictures to show them what I was thinking. My mom and I (along with Michelle) found my urns in Dallas at Market! We had also ordered the "sticks" to go in them, but they never made it to the US. Up until the wedding, they were stuck on the ocean, somewhere between China and the US. Seriously. It was a little stressful...but God provided. A few weeks before the wedding, my mom found some that were almost identical at Pier 1. We went on a made rush buying all that we could from every Pier 1 in the State of Oklahoma. We got exactly what we needed and they turned out beautifully! We had two urns at the back of the pews, at the middle of the pews and then two on the stage. Along with a candleabra on a table that was draped with black cloth. I didn't want ANY white in the wedding except for my dress and bouquet. However, my mom talked me into putting some white on stage b/c it would really make everything "pop". She said, "just trust me." And, that, I did. I was so happy that I did! I knew she could see something that I couldn't, so I knew it would be beautiful. She added some white hydrangeas to the candleabra we found in Dallas. She also had the florists bring in vases with submerged white flowers. It looked GREAT! We used a bunch of votives that the church let us use to add more light to the stage. I was really happy with how everything looked. The last thing I had to figure out for the auditorium was what was going on the pews. I didn't want typical pew-bows and what I wanted, I didn't want to spend the money on it. I really would have loved to have the lanters on every other pew or big tall vases with water and petals. The church aisle is actually slanted. There is a flat landing half way down and then flattens at the front of the church. Not only were my first two ideas too expensive, they wouldn't have worked either. So, I hunted...and found these. I decided to use black chair sashes and put flowers we were using in the wedding on every other pew. It turned out really well! I was very pleased!