Have you been to an event with an ice sculpture? No matter the occasion, ice sculptures are always a crowd pleaser – always. And there’s a lot you can do with ice, you just have to find the right artist.

As I was planning my wedding back in 2007, I had the good fortune to tour an ice sculptor’s studio. Let me tell you, you can be as creative as you want to be when it comes to ice. I was shown option upon option. From hollowed out ice spheres that glowed with an LED candle for a fire and ice affect to three-foot blocks of ice that could be carved into whatever you desired ice can be transformed into almost anything.

At the end of the day, I decided to go with miniature ice swans for every guest and a personalized ice luge. We used the swans for serving salads and the personalized ice luge for a self-service punch station. Later on some of our guests decided to set the swans free by releasing them into the nearby lake. Ah, memories…

Posted by Sara, a Dot-arilla Blogger

Going for a home-spun look for your wedding day? Consider using pears as decor and guest favors. Yes, that fabulously green fruit! It’ll add a pop of color and can pull double-duty by holding table numbers or escort cards. Just paper punch your table numbers or escort cards, or cut down on your work and use a personalized tag from SimplyWeddingStuff.com. Then tie a piece of twine or pretty ribbon through and lasso your creation over the top of each pear.

And if you’re not doing the whole seated-dinner extravaganza, opt to place a theme-y personalized sticker label from SimplyWeddingStuff.com on each pear. Then you could place the pears in a fruit bowl and you have an instant centerpiece for your tables! The stickers will tie the whole event together and make your look consistent.

Here are some great personalized sticker label options from SimplyWeddingStuff.com that would work fabulously on green fruit: Sage Green and Brown, Modern Beach Blue and Delicate Expressions. And, the best part is, SimplyWeddingStuff.com offers complete themes ready for you to pick and personalize.

Posted by Sara, a Dot-arilla Blogger

I decided to brave the craziness on Black Friday and go shopping not for Christmas gifts, but for wedding centerpiece ideas. My mom had been shopping and said their was a lot of great Christmas decorations out right now that would be perfect for wedding centerpieces. So, I took my swatch of my bridesmaid dress color and went on a mission to find some good deals for the wedding. I’m glad I braved the crowds and long lines, I found a ton of centerpieces and decorations in my wedding color, eggplant aka a really dark purple, at Target and Michaels. Now that I found a couple of awesome decorations, I have the “itch” to keep on looking for more centerpiece ideas. Another great time to look for wedding centerpiece ideas is right after News Years because all the Christmas decorations will be on sale!!

If you don’t want to buy centerpieces sometimes your venue will have centerpieces you can use or you can rent centerpieces also. I plan on doing a mixture of both, the items I have been looking for are accent color centerpieces to add some special touches. For example eggplant color tea-lights, floating candles, crystals etc. I know my venue provides very basic centerpieces that I can use and I also can rent some vases for my centerpieces through wedding companies in my area. So, I don’t need to buy everything, especially vases and mirrors because these are the most popular items that venues have for brides to use. SimplyWeddingStuff.com also has great centerpieces to select from and do it yourself ideas for decorating.

Ahh…I finally feel like my wedding vision is coming together. My plans are really starting to come a long and I am starting to check off items on my to do list…yeah!! I only have a couple vendors left to book and then the really fun stuff beings…designing invites, centerpieces, decoration ideas. Fun, Fun!