Some throw rice, others blow bubbles or light sparklers but if you have thoughts of your guests showering you with streamers you should check out ExtravagantExits.  You can order streamers with or with out finger loops and they can be ordered to match your colors or theme.    If you’ve left planning your exit to the last minute there is a ready to ship option to ensure you get your streamers on time.

 The See Canyon Fruit Ranch, a 100 year old working apple farm, served as the backdrop for Courtney and Scott’s rustic wedding and inspired their vintage barn style theme.   The couple wanted to focus on the joy of the day, and according to Courtney, what color demonstrates joy better than the color yellow!    Birds were incorporated where they could be and the talents of friends and family were called upon to help lend a personal touch to the day.

The Details

Our personalized bird cake toppers were made by cottonbirddesigns 
The adorable tutu our flower girls wore was made by DearLillie 
Our milk glass vases were from a combination of sellers: violetsandgrace, MyraMelinda, OpenYourWindow and tjvintage
The milk glasses were from barnwhiteco who is no longer an active seller on Etsy.
Our LOVE garland was made by RavensBloom
The paper bird “Reserved” signs and the paper bird napkin rings were made by paperacorn
The calendar ring pillow was made by GiggleRoom
The yellow and grey paper “Reserved” signs on the back of the chairs were made by katherinekiyoko
Our guestbook thumbprint tree was made by bluedetoi

Photography by Lori Carter of  Tribute Photography

What creative (DIY) or personal aspects did you include in your wedding?

We did almost everything ourselves which is what made the day so unique to us.  I ordered the flowers from fiftyflowers.com and prepared them two days before.  The night before my cousin, best friend, grandmother, mother, aunt and I made the boutonnieres and bouquets.  The morning of at the venue they created the centerpieces with the bottles I purchased from etsy.  My mother used mason jars from my grandmother to make hanging jars that we put water and flowers into which we hung in the trees above the dance floor.  My mother-in-law created our “photobooth” and our wedding sign made from old fence wood.  We had a gentleman in Oakhurst, California cut 14 tree stumps for us to use as aisle decoration.  We decorated our cake with Billy Button flowers (craspedia)

What’s the best advice you have for planning your wedding now that you’re on the other side?

Don’t focus too much on the trends that you’ve always seen, do what represents you.  Be true to yourself and put personal touches where you can but don’t get too obsessed over the details.  It is the marriage that is most important, not the wedding.

What was your favorite Etsy find?

It’s a tie between our cake topper and our thumbprint tree.  Our cake topper was amazing! Angela handmade them with vintage fabrics and even used vintage lace from an old skirt that matched the lace on my dress to make the veil on my bird.  She made sure every detail was perfect for us and they could not have turned out better.  We had people asking about them all day.  Our thumbprint tree was beautiful, our guests had so much fun putting their thumbprints on the branches and signing their name.  We have it hanging in our living room as a reminder of everyone that helped make our day so special.

What is the most memorable moment of your day? 

Leaving the wedding feeling a sense of accomplishment and excited to start our new life together. 

I’m ending the week with Christy and Kyle’s super cute wedding.  Christy is the artist behind Etsy Shop Happy Yogini Designs  and was actually introduced to Etsy by Kyle.  They married last August in front of 100 guests.  The ceremony was held  in the south park blocks and the reception was at The Cleaners in Portland, Oregon.  Enjoy!

 The Details

Vintage inspired wedding themed flashcards for table decorations by CariKraft  

Custom neckties for the groom and groomsmen by MeandMatilda  

Paper mustaches, lips, and beards on a stick for photo props by LittleRetreats  

Chalkboard thought bubble for photo prop by PlayingGrownUp 

Vintage milk glass vases by TheVintageCabin 

Thank you tags that hung on the coffee satchel gift bags by YourAngil 

Vintage, yellow cocktail napkins by KickStandProductions   

Vintage, gray cocktail napkins by recycledcharm

Photography by Brenton Salo

What was your theme/colours and what inspired it?

Our colors were yellow and gray, and our theme was Modern with Vintage Flair.  I felt that both modern and vintage aspects were representative of my husband and I as individuals.  He, being a wonderful technology nerd, is more drawn to a newer, modern aesthetic, while I am a lover of antiques and all things vintage or vintage inspired.  It was a culmination of both aspects that I believe made our wedding charming.

What creative (DIY) or personal aspects did you include in your wedding?

The DIY aspect of the wedding was my favorite part.  My bouquet was made of vintage enamel flower brooches that I collected for months.  Through the use of craft store items, including the ever useful hot glue gun, I managed to turn them into a lovely, handheld bouquet.  Being a jewelry seller on Etsy, it was only fitting that I made all of the earrings that my bridesmaids wore on the wedding day.  I also cut yellow and gray fabrics into pieces with pinking shears, turning them into satchels that held a half cup of local coffee beans for each guest to take home as a gift.  We also had an entire wall of the reception space (25’ wide x 12’ tall!) that was covered in strips of ribbon.  This was definitely the biggest project I took on, and for two months before the wedding I spent evenings cutting ribbon to the exact length of the wall so that hanging on the day of would be quick.

What is the most memorable moment of your day?

The most memorable moment of my day was the pedicab ride my husband and I took from the ceremony to the reception.  It was only seven blocks, but we got to have that time alone to just enjoy what was happening.  The nerves from the ceremony were gone, and we knew that the rest of the evening was going to be an amazingly fun party.

What was your favorite Etsy find?

My favorite Etsy find was the milk glass vases.  I knew for a while I wanted vintage milk glass, but didn’t realize how expensive it was.  The seller gave me an incredible deal on eleven vases, and even threw in three extras!  It was a great find.

What’s the best advice you have for planning your wedding now that you’re on the other side?

My best advice for brides to be is just to enjoy the process.  This includes all of the planning, whether you have a year or one month, as well as the day of the wedding.  I gave myself ten months to work on the wedding, which turned out to be a luxurious amount of time.  I also got a massage the week of the wedding, and I did extra yoga that week as well. On the wedding day I didn’t try to control anything, I just enjoyed whatever happened, and honestly everything was just how I dreamed it would be.

Rachel and Dion had an amazing destination wedding in Las Vegas, Nevada back in March.  25 of their closest friends and family turned out for the Ohio couples big day.  The wedding ceremony was held at The Chapel at the Mandalay Bay Hotel and the reception was held at Maggiano’s Little Italy in the Fashion Show Mall, just down the Vegas strip from Mandalay Bay.  Rachel first came across Etsy while searching for Christmas gifts.  She’s been hooked ever since.

Scroll down to the bottom of the post for some fabulous shots of Rachel’s “Trash the dress” photoshoot taken a week after the wedding.

The Details

Invitations, table numbers, and wedding photo frame by onereverie. 

Bride’s wedding jewelry by Sahara Amaya.

Personalized hanger by Lila Frances. 

Bouquet by Croska. 

Favor Tag by Fubabee. 

Escort cards by RepChi.  

Cake Topper by Dandelionland.   

Poographer byTodd Wilson of Bently & Wilson.   

Trash the Dress Photo Shoot  by Jennifer Mott. 

What was your theme/colors and what inspired it?

We didn’t have a theme for our wedding–Vegas is enough of a theme on it’s own without going out of our way! But, our color scheme was an espresso brown, and a fern green color–and, to be honest, was only decided upon when we found our amazing invitations on Etsy. My dress was a coffee colored silk, so, we knew not much would “go” with it, but we found the perfect invitations, and subsequently the perfect color scheme almost by accident!

What creative (DIY) or personal aspects did you include in your wedding?

We tried our best to make our wedding as “us” as possible, which was hard because, at the time, we lived in Ohio–getting things to Vegas for the wedding would be difficult. So, it was the little things that we did in an attempt to tie it all together–and, surprisingly enough, Etsy helped make that possible. We were able to, through multiple vendors, stick with the same color scheme, and make it all look cohesive, despite being thousands of miles from home. We DIY’ed our favors (mini glass jars of personalized M&M’s and chocolate covered espresso beans, with labels from Etsy), and I dyed my crinoline blue (as my something blue) for under my dress

What is the most memorable moment of your day?

For me, the most memorable part of our wedding day was the few hours my husband and I spent taking pictures alone prior to our ceremony. We had a “first look,” followed by two and a half hours of picture taking at various locations throughout Mandalay Bay. It was an amazing feeling to spend time with my husband alone prior to the big moment; it was extremely calming, and not to mention fun! We definitely felt like celebrities walking around a hugely populated casino in our wedding attire!

What was your favorite Etsy find?

It’s definitely a toss up between my bouquet, the personalized hanger, cake toppers, and invitation print that now serves as our guest book, if only because we have constant reminders of them placed throughout our home! 

What’s the best advice you have for planning your wedding now that you’re on the other side?

The best advice I have is two-fold:

1.) No one cares about your wedding as much as you do. It’s sad, at the time, but it’s true. For as excited and involved as I was–well, no one else matched my level. It was disappointing at the time, but looking back now, it makes sense. It was our wedding, so it was obvious that it would be more important to us that others. 

2.) insofar as no one else will care about your wedding as much as you do, no one will notice when things don’t go as planned–so, don’t stress the small things. Weddings are like life, they aren’t perfect, and things will undoubtedly go wrong, but in the grand scheme of things, it doesn’t matter, and isn’t worth fretting over on the day of the wedding. If, at the end of the day, you’re married to the one you love, then the wedding was a success!

 Trash the Dress Photo Shoot

More from the bride on her Etsy purchases:

Our invitations, table numbers, and wedding photo frame all came from the amazing onereverie.  They were fantastic to work with, and incredibly helpful when we continued to go back with more ideas for additional needs. We started with just with invitations, then returned back to the store months later for the table numbers, and again for a print that resembled our invitations to use as a photo mat to sign for our guest book, and they were amazing every single time! 

My wedding jewelry was from Sahara Amaya. I couldn’t have asked for more beautiful jewelry. Although I didn’t end up wearing every piece, I can’t say enough about this shop. I had trouble with the back of my earring staying on, and she was quick to send me back ups–talk about professionalism! 

One of my favorite purchases was a personalized hanger from Lila Frances.  I knew in advance that my wedding dress would be too heavy to hang on the hanger (to be fair, my dress was gigantic!), but I still managed to find a way to get it into some pictures. And now, it’s proudly on display with my amazing bouquet. 

Speaking of my amazing bouquet, it was purchased through Croska.  I knew I wanted something unique when it came to a bouquet, but, in Vegas–unique would have cost a small fortune. When I realized I could have something unique that would last forever, I was sold on this bouquet. I was fairly late in the game in order this (and two smaller versions for our sisters who were our attendants), Croska did everything in her power to make sure they arrived before we left for Vegas. Now, if only I could stop my cat from attacking the feathers on the bouquet…. 

The tags for our favors came from Fubabee.  This purchase was one of the easiest ones we made!! There was no thought involved; the tags we went with matched our color scheme perfectly! 

For our escort cards, we decided to spice them up a bit with personalized buttons from RepChi.  These buttons were such a hit, and I still hang on to my “Team Bride” button!

Our “cake” topper came from Dandelionland.  We knew we wouldn’t be having a traditional wedding cake because we had such a small guest list, so we went with mini-cupcakes for our guests, and two regular-sized cupcakes for us and our mini-look alike toppers. They not only turned out great, but now serve as cute decorations!

Today’s wedding had a “Dude of Honour”, a “Groomsgirl” and the bride and groom reading their vows off  from their Iphones.  With fun elements like that you know that Thanisha and Ian’s wedding was going to be a blast.  200 guests shared their fun filled day at the  Holland Ranch, San Luis Obispo in California.  Bride Thanisha first learned of Etsy from her Bridesmaid who was raving about what she called a “ridiculously awesome crafty site”.

The Details

Giant initial letters and the table numbers by thebackporchshoppe
Custom stickers for the “Thank-you” goodie bags by MAUpromos
Boy and girl robot wedding toppers for the dessert bar by Littlebrownbyrd
Vintage typewriter we used in lieu of a guestbook. Guest could either type us a message or write us a postcard by amyquerin
Fabric squares for reception tables by fabriccloset, fabricpalooza, mimis, fernridgefabrics
Sign to direct guests by TheWoodenOwl

Photography by Jen Rodriguez Photography 

What was your theme/colors and what inspired it?

Our wedding to convey a romantic but rustic chic feel. In San Luis Obispo, there are a plethora of gorgeous locations and we had a lot of out of town guests coming to the wedding so we wanted to showcase how beautiful it is where we live. From the color palette of soft peaches and corals of the bridesmaids dresses to the khaki color of the groomsmen (and groomsgirl). My bouquet and all the flowers were local and what was in season. We had a lot of wildflowers and herbs infused throughout the wedding.

What is the most memorable moment of your day?

Ohhh I can pinpoint just one so here I go:
1. Having my brother walk me down the isle while the theme song from Amelie was playing
2. Seeing my soon to be husband at the end of the isle waiting for me
3. Reading our vows off our Iphone
4. Calling him my husband for the first time

What creative (DIY) or personal aspects did you include in your wedding?

It was important to me to have unique elements in our wedding that our guests would not see at other weddings.  It started out with our invitations. I wanted our guests to get the invitation and say “wow that’s going to be a fun wedding” My bridesmaid Pam (who is a goddess and will be opening up a shop on Etsy in winter) made the invitations and programs. I love flowers and the floral look so my mother in law made different floral fabric squares for every single table. Instead of having my brother on the grooms side I had him on my side as my “Dude of Honor”. My husbands sister was a groomsgirl. My husband is gluten intolerant so we had a completely gluten free dessert bar. My mom even made her famous peanut butter cookies (gluten free of course).

What was your favorite Etsy find?

The Robot Wedding toppers that matched my tattoo. My husband loved this so much when I showed him.

What’s the best advice you have for planning your wedding now that you’re on the other side?

Remember it is about two people in love. Make your wedding personal and something that really reflects both of your personalities. Your guests will enjoy it more if your try to keep it about you two and not a cookie cutter style wedding.