Invites

- i made these myself on photoshop then got them printed on 300gsm linen paper at officeworks. it was super cheap to do it this way, compared to buying a pre-made one!

Theme

- no exact theme, just elegant and a little rustic.

Colours

- gold, white & black

People

- 130

Event Run Time

- 7.00pm to 12.00am 

Favours

- for favours we had cookies with stamped fondant to add a personalised touch. these were gifted by my wonderful friend Trang - @Finecakesandpastries

Frames/Signage

- i made the all signs myself on photoshop using the same flower/theme from our invitation. we had a sign for the guestbook with instructions and one for the favours with a thankyou message. i purchased the frames for around $10 each from BigW.

Food & Drink

- we went with subsidised drinks and had platters of cocktail/finger food which was walked around by waiters. drinks were subsidised at $3 for beer and wine, with sprits at $5 and soft drinks free.  we had around 15 platters that were walked around from 7.45pm - 9.15pm.

Decorations

-  i tried to keep the decorations pretty simple with some gold and white garlands around the room.

- i also printed polaroid sized photos of us from over the years and hung them on a wall on some twine with little pegs. this created a great talking/viewing point!

- i had midi sized light up marquee letters for our initials. these went on the gift/guestbook table.

- the venue also lent us a wooden back drop for photos which turned out to tie the whole room together in the end. 

Balloons

- the balloons were done by a local party supplier and i was really happy with how they turned out.

- i had 5 arrangements: 2 big, 3 smaller and then 1 large confetti balloon

- the arrangements had foil, confetti and normal latex balloons (gold foil hearts, clear with gold confetti, white and gold latex).

- the large confetti balloon had different sized gold confetti in it and a black tassel. we also got this one personalized, it read "our engagement 2/3/2019".

- i set the 2 large arrangements up next to the cake table and the 3 smaller arrangements around the room. With the stand alone confetti balloon next to the photo area.

Cake

- i could not have been anymore happier with how the cake and cupcakes turned out!! it was exactly as i had imagined.

- my friends mum made the cake and cupcakes for us and literally drove 3 hours to deliver them! she is amazing!!!!

- we had a naked cake with a dark chocolate drip with a vanilla sponge and chocolate butter cream layers.

- i got a customized black acrylic cake topper from Etsy (by CandyBarSydney).

- i purchased the flowers from Kmart and we just cut and organised them how we wanted to! this was a super cheap way to do it!!

- the cupcakes were all chocolate however i had a mix of chocolate and vanilla frosting and they were to die for!!!

- i purchased gold and black glitter heart cupcake toppers from Ebay. i used the gold on the chocolate frosted cupcakes and the black on the vanilla frosted cupcake. this contrast was really effective.

Guestbook

- we chose to do a polaroid guest book as we thought it would be nice to have photos along with peoples messages. this way worked well and turned out to be really funny, however a lot of people didn't end up signing the guestbook which was annoying but oh well.

- i picked up the guestbook from my local department store (i think it was around $25). i liked this particular one because it had two columns on every page, which meant our guests could stick the photo on the left and write on the right.

- we used a Fujiflim Instax 8 Camera which i already had for years and just purchased bulk film from eBay for around $80 for 100 sheets.

- i got washi tape in our theme colours from the local stationary shop to stick the photos down.

- i printed out some instructions for the guests and stuck them into a photo frame so it looked a little more elegant. i also made sure i printed some instructions on how to change the film to go on the table. (i also had my sister and myself checking the camera paper supply throughout the night)

- this was definitely a more pricey way to do a guestbook but i think it worked out great.

Cardbox

- after seeing the prices of pre-made card boxes i decided to make my own. i bought the box from Kmart for $12 (it was a jewellery box) and then the 'cards' decal from Etsy for $7. i am so happy how it turned out and definitely will be using it again and again!