TaraFae Bridal Shower

When my niece asked me to be her Matron of Honor I couldn't wait to get started on her shower! I decided first on the theme Love Is... as they are so cute together and so much in love! Her wedding colors are hues of purple so that was easy. I made most of the decorations myself, with help from friends. It was a lot of fun and we all enjoyed the day!

• Desserts

  In addition to the cupcake cake, we had chocolate covered Oreo's,rice krispy hearts, fudge, chocolate covered pretzel rods. brownies, puppy chow, chex mix and seasoned oyster crackers.

• Party Favors

  We made three favors since I loved all of them and couldn't decide on just one! First we made the spoons with 2 Hershey kisses that read "A spoon full of love and two little kisses, soon Tara and Ben will be Mr. and Mrs."! Then I got the adorable little favor boxes on ebay and filled them with homemade hard tack candy. The tag read " Love is wacky, Heres some tacky!". The third was a happy accident! I ordered organza bags that were too large for the hard tack boxes so we put two chocolate covered pretzel rods in them at each place setting. It worked out great since everyone was pretty full by the end of the shower and could take them home neatly.

• Activities / Games

  I really loath shower games so I kept them minimal. We had Bingo which worked well to keep everyone paying attention to the gift opening and the noise level low. I will say I never realized how serious women can be about Bingo! Then I had a timer go off and whoever gave the gift she was opening at the time won. This didn't work as well since some people left early or had just dropped off a gift but still better than other games! I had the envelopes for the thank you cards at each place setting and had everyone fill in their address so that Tara could pull one for the last prize, however two people got Bingo on the same gift so that was that!

• Budget

  I made most of the decorations and found the rest on sale. The food was the largest part of the budget. I would say I spent more than I thought I would and not as much as I would have liked to!

• Best Moment

  The best moment for me was when Tara walked in and saw the room! All the hours of work were worth it!

• Funniest Moment

  When she opened the gift from her very proper great Aunt and it was a naughty nighty!!!

• Most Touching Moment

  Ben, her fiance, sent a surprise gift!

• Best Dressed

  The Bride to Be of course!! On top of her beautiful purple lace dress, she had her Bride To Be sash and a pearl and rhinestone tiara with purple veil!!

• What People Ate

  I love to cook and over feed people so there was an abundance of food! We enjoyed eating sausage pinwheels, sweet & tangy meatballs, crab ragoons, veg. spring rolls, mini quiche, deli pinwheels, antipasta salad, mac. salad, fruit salad,waldorf salad, deviled eggs and a raw veggie tray with dip!

• What People Drank

  We had wonderful purple punch and a Mimosa bar. Everyone loved making thier mimosa's! I'm not much of a drinker but there is so little alcohol in these and they are so much fun! We had fresh strawberries, kiwi and pineapple to go with the OJ, Passion fruit and strawberry breeze juices.

• Added Touches

  I got 28 5x7 frames painted and decorated them and then took pictures of Tara and Ben for in them. They sat on all the tables and I offered them to the guest to take home. People really loved them and many took one home! In the pictures of the cake table you may notice the "pokemon balls" that I made from white paper lanterns! When Ben proposed he had the ring in a pokemon ball! Tara loved the very personal touch and it started a lot of conversations! Mostly,"What is Pokemon?" But it was fun.

• McCain Beatty

  Photographer

  Most of the pictures on here are not his! I had him take mostly people pictures so you really can't see his work here. He was great and the pictures are wonderful and I would highly recommend him!
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