You’re planning an extravagant ‘do, but your favors look anything but extravagant. Favors used to consist of a simple slice of the wedding cake or candy, but with DIY weddings on the rise,. many brides are looking for inexpensive favors for their guests to enjoy. It’s sometimes hard to create extraordinary favors without breaking the bank. Here are some great (and cost effective) alternatives to the traditional favor to send your guests home with:

Some Like It Hot

It’s always nice to create a favor that someone could actually use. For winter weddings, guests might appreciate a warm gift to go home with. Package individual sachets of hot chocolate with marshmallows in clear bags or these personalized glass favor jars. For a summer wedding, you can use ice tea mix or bottle lemonade with monogrammed labels.

Wall You Need is Love

They say plants grow with love, so spread your love with tiny wall terrariums for wedding favors.  They’re easy to assemble and have an incredible impact when displayed at your wedding. All you need is a small plant, like an aloe plant or cactus, pebbles, magnets, and these square tin favor boxes. These favors would be great for beach or destination weddings. Alternatively, you could include seeds, for an herb or flower, and soil so that they can grow for a special surprise. The favors will surely flourish, just like your love.

Make a Mix Tape

Take your guests back to the days when you first fell in love. Recreating the scene with a CD compilation, with a playlist for your guests to enjoy. You can include “your” song, the first song you danced to, and the couple’s favorite tunes. Personalize the mix with these CD Covers and labels.  Your guests will be thanking you when they’re humming their way to work.

Something Sweet

Create a twist on the ordinary wedding sweet treats. Cookies and cupcakes make a great alternative to the traditional favors. These are the perfect frugal favor for weddings that have a large attendance. They’re easily made, at a very small cost. Add labels with your names to personalize your package. Perhaps you can even bake a family recipe and include the ingredients on the back. Not only would the guests have a sweet treat to enjoy, but they’ll have a recipe to keep forever.

Afton Negrea

Hi! I'm Afton - blogger, mother, designer, and world traveller. I’m a seeker of simplicity, a cultivator of love, and I live to create beautiful things. My inspiration comes from my family, my travels through Europe, and my background in Art and Interior Design. I look forward to guiding you through all things party!

It used to be that most brides preferred spring or summer weddings but fall weddings have become increasingly more common in recent years. Fall is a beautiful time of year in many areas, bringing with it milder weather and a beautiful display of color that lends itself perfectly to a number of fantastic fall wedding themes.

Nature Inspired Wedding Themes

Fall is full of natural inspiration. The most obvious inspiration comes from the beautiful display of reds, browns, greens, golds, oranges and yellows. There are many ways you can incorporate this into your fall wedding theme – from the color palette to the decor accents. Fall weddings lend themselves nicely to themes using leaves, acorns, pine cones, birds and other natural accents for your wedding decor, invitations, flowers and more.

Harvest Inspired Wedding Themes

With fall comes harvest and there are many beautiful symbols of harvest that can be incorporated into your fall wedding theme. These may include cornucopias, wheat, apples, grapes, corn on the cob, pumpkins and many other fall harvest foods. The options are endless: a candy apple bar, a thanksgiving dinner style menu, a dessert table featuring pumpkin and apple pies, mini pumpkins in your centerpieces, or even a bouquet with wheat accents.

Vintage or Rustic Wedding Themes

Rustic weddings and vintage themed weddings often have neutral color palettes that fit beautifully into the fall season. A rustic wedding will easily incorporate aspects of the fall season and will play on the natural beauty of the season. A vintage fall wedding may include details like ivory wedding gowns, neutral color bridesmaids gowns, vintage lace accents in the decor and more.

Camouflage Wedding Themes

Camouflage weddings are a popular and yet often controversial theme. A camouflage themed wedding, like any theme, has to be planned with care. A poorly planned camouflage wedding quickly becomes a redneck nightmare but a well planned camouflage wedding theme can be beautiful, tasteful and unique, while blending in beautifully with the fall season. My suggestion – don’t overdue it. Plan a color palette around the key colors in the camouflage pattern and then use the pattern itself as a tasteful accent so that it pulls your color palette together.

There is no rule that says your wedding has to be inspired by the season but if you’re looking for ideas for your fall wedding, there is a wealth of inspiration sitting just outside your window.

About The Author: Crystal is a self-proclaimed wedding addict who enjoys helping brides plan gorgeous, budget savvy weddings.

Hope you’ve enjoyed today’s guest post. Planning a fall wedding can be tons of fun — with all the warm colors and feelings that the season brings. Crystal gave us some great ideas for fall weddings, but whatever theme you choose, don’t forget to offer your guests some great fall wedding favors! –Sarah M.

sarah

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Butterflies are popular accents for wedding for many obvious reasons. They are both beautiful and symbolic. Much like the caterpillar transforms into a graceful butterfly, a bride and groom transform from two individuals to one united couple. There are so many ways to incorporate butterflies into your wedding reception, but one of the sweetest way is to add edible butterflies.

Edible butterflies are available in all sorts of shapes and sizes, so it’ll be easy to match your events decor. Today we are featuring a few of our favorite edible butterflies, from sugar accents to sugar cookies. These sweet treats can be anything you want them to be: butterfly wedding favors, cake accents, or even pretty little sugars for your coffee.

These butterfly cookies by Lori’s Place would be great as wedding favors or just pretty additions to your dessert table.

These pretty-in-pink sugar monarchs are from Andie’s Specialty Sweets.

And here is another sweet butterfly accent from Andies.

P.S. – check out their shop for some awesome fall themed confections!

These delicate butterflies from Sweet Deja Vu don’t look edible, but I think that’s part of their charm. Made from wafer-thin rice paper, these little monarchs can be used alone to accent any food or in groups on a wedding cake.

sarah

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Now that Labor Day is behind us, and we are bidding a reluctant farewell to summer, I thought it would be a good time to take a look at some of the most popular fall wedding favors. Fall weddings have a charm all their own. The air is crisp, the leaves are changing, and the first frost is right around the corner.

Fall weddings make for amazing photographs – and amazing memories. One way to keep the memory fresh in the minds of your guests is to give fall wedding favors. This way, whenever they use their favors in the future, they’ll be brought back to that special fall day when they shared an important moment with you and your spouse.

As we prepare for the upcoming season, I thought it would be fun to take a look at a few of our bestselling fall favors. Here is a look at our top 3:

These mint tins are all dressed up for autumn. They arrive empty, so you can fill them with your favorite treat of choice. And, the best part is that they can be personalized with your name and wedding date.

Wine stoppers are always popular as favors. They are practical and come in so many shapes and colors that you can easily match one to your theme. It is easy to see why this fall leaf wine stopper is so popular for fall weddings.

Coasters are another popular choice for favors. Again, they come in so many designs and colors that you can easily coordinate them to match your wedding’s theme. These fall leaf coasters are a practical choice for any autumn wedding.

sarah

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This past weekend, I had the good fortune of being able to attend the wedding of two of my dearest friends. It is always great to see two people, who are obviously so perfect for each other, exchange vows that will bond them for life.

What I especially loved about this wedding in particular was all of the unique Asian influences that could be seen throughout. The groom is Chinese, and the bride is not Asian at all; so I thought it was interesting to see how they incorporated his heritage into their special day.

The couple was dressed in traditional Western wedding attire, with a white dress and traditional black tux. The only Asian wedding tradition that I noticed was the tea ceremony, where the bride serves tea to her parents in a symbolic gesture of thanks. This was a nice touch, especially since the bride is not Asian herself. Then after the wedding ceremony, both the bride and groom serve tea to their parents.

The décor was very simple yet infused with Asian elements. The cocktail hour was held outside in a garden, with colorful paper lanterns hanging from the trees in varying lengths. The theme of the evening seemed to be “double happiness.” In Chinese custom, the symbol for the word happiness is duplicated (or doubled), signifying the happiness of two people coming together in marriage.

The double happiness symbol was pressed on their invitations, programs, and place cards. And of course they gave us all Asian wedding favors that carried the symbol for double happiness.

It was a beautiful day, and I wish the happy couple the best of luck in their new marriage. Double and triple happiness to you, Kate and Li.

sarah

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This is just a quick post to let you know about an opportunity to win one of our favorite products — the Let’s Do Lunch Personalized, Insulated Lunch Tote. It really is a great item for anyone who takes their lunch on the go. A perfect gift for a favorite teacher or anyone who would enjoy a stylish bag to tote around their lunch.

All you have to do is visit Review Retreat and follow their instructions to enter the contest. There are multiple ways to enter, so you can easily increase your chances of winning.

We know you’ll just love the tote, so go on over to Review Retreat and get started on your entries! the contest ends on August 20th.

Best of luck!!

sarah

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Happy Monday everyone! Today I just wanted to let you all know about a contest that is being held where you can win a the Swish Cup and Saucer Coffee Set (pictured below). Check out the details at Everything Up Close. Your entries must be in by Monday May 10th, 2010. Good luck!

sarah

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With Valentine’s Day approaching fast, we’re starting to give more thought to the emotion that brings us together to celebrate any wedding: LOVE. If you’re planning a wedding for this part of the year, a Valentine’s Day theme would be perfect – after all, it is love that we are celebrating!

There are so many ways to bring a touch of love into your wedding celebration. You can decorate with hearts, or set a romantic scene with candles. You can celebrate the moment you met that special someone with mementos from the place or time you got together. And as a token of the love you have for your guests, you will probably want to choose wedding favors that represent romance, love and/or commitment.

Here are a few of our top picks for love themed wedding favors:

1. Send your message loud and clear with this LOVE Themed Espresso Set:

2. Let them know you’re sweet on them with cute these Towel Cakes:

3. Leave them with fond memories of when they watched you ‘tie the knot’ with these elegant wine stoppers:

Those are just a few of our faves, of course there are so many more options. Feel free to share your ideas with us, we love to hear them!

sarah

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To kick of this new year, we’re going to share with you the top wedding favors for this winter season. There is something about a wedding in these snowy months that can warm even the coldest hearts. So what are the options for offering a gesture of thanks to those who have braved the elements to share in your special day? Here are a few popular ideas:

1. Warm their hearts with some yummy hot cocoa. Shown below are personalized packets of hot cocoa presented in adorable ‘chocolate’ mugs.

2. Help make their holidays sparkle with these snowflake ornaments (shown below). Tip: these would also make for fun accents to your wedding decor.

3. Sitting by the fireside with a bottle of wine, your guests will reminisce about the great time they’ve had at your wedding as they uncork this snowflake bottle stopper (shown below).

Have more ideas for winter wedding favors? Share them with us, we love to hear what’s on your mind.

sarah

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Today I wanted to take some time to share a product that I think is pretty cool. The product is called a Topless Undershirt… intrigued? So was I. The best way I can think to describe it is that it’s very much like a long tube top (that doesn’t quite cover your whole top), meant to be worn under your shirt for extra coverage. Perfect for those low-waisted jeans! It’s a comfortable but snug fit, which helps keep it from riding up. Check out the video below to see the product in action.

To win your own topless undershirt, just let us know what you think about the product in the comments section below.

Contest Details:
This giveaway is open to residents of the U.S. only. There is a maximum of 1 entry per contestant. It will run from October 14, 2009 through October 21, 2009. One winner will be selected by a random number generator from all valid entries. Winner must claim his/her prize within 48 hours of e-mail notification or a new winner will be chosen.

Disclosure: We received a sample of this product in order to write an honest evaluation.

sarah

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