{real wedding} kelley + ira

Mondays are so much better when I feature amazing weddings like this one.  Kelley + Ira planned this ridiculously fun DIY wedding with the help from their family and friends. Every single detail is well thought out and executed beautifully.  Here's what the lovely bride had to say about her day...

Many of my ideas for the wedding came from different DIY wedding blogs. I’d see something I liked and make it work for us. It was very important to me to not spend a ton of money on things that lasted for only that day and also that reflected our personalities. Most of the decorations we used were things

that Ira, I, or my parents had at home already, that we could make, or that we’d use later. Ira and I are both pretty easy-going, casual, and do-it-yourself type people so we wanted our wedding to be like that too. I grew up going antique/thrift shopping with my mom, and Ira had inherited a bunch of cool older things, so we were a leg up and didn’t have to shop around forever to find some of the stuff to make it all work.

  As many people, I feel in love with the idea of the fabric flower! I found a tutorial online

(http://bit.ly/aF0GJ3) and made a couple which I stuck around the house in old bottles. When we

became engaged, I pondered how I might could work them into the wedding somehow. I’d seen and

liked the idea of lining the aisle with pinwheels and then thought that I could do that with the fabric

flowers instead. I played around with the pattern to make it larger, put it on a larger, painted dowel rod and it worked out just right!

The idea behind the quilt originated with my desire to have an instant photo guestbook. I wanted

to be able to look back and actually SEE the people that attended the wedding instead of just their

names scribbled. We used a quilt as a backdrop of the photos to add a little extra pop of color (In my

quest for which instant camera I should purchase, I ran across a couple that used an amazing yellow

fabric draped as a backdrop and fell in love). The quilt we used is one that I’ve loved for years – my

great-grandmother, Meme, made the quilt-top and years later it was the first piece that my mom hand

quilted. The blue suitcases, used to hold yarn, extra film, and bird seed for departure, were also my

great-grandmothers.

Ira and I are extremely blessed by coming from families with strong marriages. Our

grandparents have been huge parts of our lives and we have had to say goodbye to most of them in this life. We wanted to incorporate our love for them and their example to us somehow. I saw somewhere that someone had pressed flowers/leaves in quilting hoops, and just adapted the idea to frame our parents and grandparents pictures. To go along with the more vintage theme I asked for photos of when they were in their younger years and added old buttons and ribbon for a little something extra.

As many of our friends and family have young kiddos and we thought it’d be fun to have

something to possibly keep their attention occupied for at least a few minutes. I had originally thought

of coloring books or butcher paper on a table, but saw these “Owl Be Yours” wooden masks at the store so I snatched them up! I love birds and thought they were so cute, plus maybe they could double as a fan if it was too hot outside! Ira and I had fun coloring a few “examples” at home about a month before the wedding.

My mom found this awesome fabric that really fit the “fun, vintage-looking”

theme and added different borders to them. We quickly decided that we’d prefer potted plants for the

centerpieces as opposed to cut flowers, due to the fact that they could be enjoyed for a longer period of time after the wedding and would also be cheaper. We potted them in all different types of containers: tins, old desert dishes, old coffee mugs, and typical pots. I have collected vintage cameras for years and have also inherited some of my Grandpa’s cameras that were used when my mom and her siblings were growing up. Ira and I are both interested in photography, so they were an obvious choice as an addition to the tables. Ira, I, and our amazing wedding coordinater Kippi Halfin (of K-Eventus Wedding & Events and also whose beautiful backyard gardens hosted our wedding) saved wine bottles for months and reused them to hold water and raspberry lemonade at the tables so people could refill their cups without having to go back to the food tables. I made labels for the bottles using the same design of a a bird that we used for our invitations.

Pretty cupcakes and pecan tarts were made by the couple's friend, Tonya Organ...

{Photography} EE Photography

{Event Design} Kelley, her mom and coordinated by Kippi Halfin of K-Eventus Weddings & Events

{Venue} Mark & Kippi Halfin's home

{DJ/Music} a playlist created by the bride & groom

{Bride’s Dress} Classy Concepts Design

{Bride’s shoes} Seychelles

{Hair accessory} Misunbridal

{Make up/Hair} Carli Scroggins

{Groom Attire} JC Pennys

{Caterer} trays from Chick-fil-a and Jasons Deli

{Stationary} template from Tattered Vintage

{Officiant} Bret Wells, brother-in-law

{Flowers} Bouquet, corsages and boutonnieres: we bought from WholeBlossoms.com (ranunculus) and BloomsByTheBox.com (all others); they were arranged by a wonderful friend, Elizabeth Jackson.  Potted plants were used as centerpieces.

{Jewelry} earrings were borrowed from bride's mother.  necklace was groom's grandmothers and worn by groom's mom, and all three of his sisters in their weddings.