Our wedding cupcakes

While I'm on the topic of cupcake toppers, here are the cake toppers from our wedding cake! I printed these by hand using hand carved rubber stamps bought from Craft Pudding on Etsy. We also printed our Thank You cards with the same faces!

We chose chocolate cupcakes over a white iced traditional cake, because we both love chocolate and I often make brownies for my hubby! We have Karen's Cakes in Paignton to thank for making our delicious wedding cupcakes. Karen came to our rescue and managed to squeeze making these in at short notice and everyone loved them!

Mum and I made the cake stand using silver cake rounds/boards with my wedding ribbon pinned on. The levels are made using polystyrene cake rounds which can be bought from cake suppliers - I bought mine from Crafty Cakes in Exeter. We made this for around £30 which is less than it costs to hire a plastic cupcake tower stand!

Wedding photos credit Lumen Photography

Wedding cupcake toppers {free printables}

Last weekend I made cupcakes for our friends' double 30th birthday party...and entered the world of party printables! This is a very exciting place indeed, especially if you enjoy making things and like the idea of personalising cakes.

These little flags actually came from a 4th July party printable from Creature Comforts blog, which I downloaded and then added my own text using Photoshop. You have to allow plenty of time for cutting and gluing to the toothpicks (this is the fun part for me!). Thank you to John Barwood Photography for taking these great photos at the party.

Here are some lovely FREE printables that would work really well for wedding cakes/cupcakes.

Gorgeous vintage labels - download from Miss Cutie Pie's blog.

Love the little bow on the cute cake toppers - download from Little Flamingo's blog. 

Change the text to your names or your wedding date - download from Thirty Handmade Days blog.

Please share any links to FREE printables in the comments below. There is also a great range of editable cupcake topper designs that you can buy on Etsy!

Five fabulous frame ideas

From table plans to kitschy dessert table trays, vintage frames have a lot of potential for practical and decorative use in your DIY wedding. Here are five fabulous frame ideas...including our own table plan made using an old frame from a charity shop, which we painted gold and placed black card inside. My painting easel came in handy to display the frame and saved us from hiring a stand for £20. And, being a budget bride I then sold the frame on afterwards to another bride and we made our money back!

Our DIY vintage inspired table plan frame

DIY Wedding Chalkboard - Intimateweddings.com

DIY Vintage Frame Table Numbers - Projectwedding.com

Framed floral fabric table plan - Little Miss Wedding's blog

DIY Framed Dessert Table Trays - ruffledblog.com

Thrifty Nifty Flowers on a budget

'Handmade not High Street' is the ethos of The Craft Hub, a Crafty Collective for Devon, based in Exeter.

The Craft Hub runs modern, vibrant and seasonal craft fairs, showcasing products from some of the best of Devon's Handmaking Talent. They run pub nights teaching fun and engaging workshops called Cr'After Dark, inspiring others to join the handmade movement. In the May workshop they made Crafty Corsages (as seen above).

The next workshop on 15th June is set to be a flowery fantasia! Thrifty Nifty Flowers on a budget workshop with Sarah Pepper, a highly experienced florist, will be teaching how to flower arrange on a budget, and how to use old and obscure treasured things in the home as vases for your floral creations.

Their craft fairs are a great place to find unique handmade quality crafts and get inspired too. Whether it's wedding favours, corsages, candles, bunting, flowers or jewellery (to name a few) the Craft Hub can inspire all you DIY brides out there.

After I went to one of their fairs in Topsham I was inspired to pick up my knitting again, and now we have a weekly knitting circle at work!

Don't miss the next fair on Fathers' Day, Sunday 19th June 2011, Matthews Hall in Topsham.

Weddings with heart

While looking for eco-friendly favours I came across the fabulous cherrygorgeous, who not only produce eco-chic wedding stationary, but also help families in Africa make a better life for themselves. 'You order, we plant trees' - order over £200 of wedding stationery and they'll pay for two fruit trees to be planted in projects in sub-Saharan Africa. So far they have helped plant over 120 fruit trees in Africa, which is fantastic.

Choose from a range of designs, or use their bespoke design service, for all your stationary needs. Plus, cherrygorgeous use energy efficient print processes and use the very best recycled card available, so you can be happy knowing you have helped the environment.

Designs from cherrygorgeous

Favour Earth Day

It's Earth Day today so I've been inspired to look for eco-friendly wedding favours, which will please your guests as well as the environment.

 Plant your own herbs in small terracotta pots, it's a gift that keeps on giving!

'Love Tag', £2.50 from Caesars Wedding Favours - can be planted to grow wild flowers.

 Seed packets, £7.50 for 5 from cherrygorgeous.

For more ideas on DIY seed favours visit Cheap Wedding Success.

Bug me cakes

Sticking to the Spring theme...how cute are these bug themed cupcakes?! I love all things ladybug and I love cakes so I am in awe of these. I found these on Flickr by Hello Naomi - check out her photos for more cute cupcake ideas.

Save the Date: Inspiration

I like the idea of Save the Date cards (or emails) for giving potential guests plenty of notice about your wedding. Choosing the design also kick-starts ideas for your wedding stationary as they can be a teaser for the tone and theme of your wedding. Here are some of the designs that have inspired the design for my own DIY Save the Date cards.

I discovered Made By Michelle Brusegaard's pretty flower designs on my favourite online shop Etsy.com.

Letterpress gurus Hello!Lucky now have a UK online shop full of inspiring wedding stationary.

    

    

    

On a more local note...Bristol stationery maker mhcreate offers personalised lithographic and digital printing.

So Sublime, in North Somerset, make pretty bespoke Save the Date cards (and stickers too!)