With the arrival of summertime comes lots more easy at-home entertaining. And with gorgeous summer blooms everywhere, we’re all wondering how we can bring the prettiness of a fresh arrangement to the table in a fun and unexpected way—and without that steep pro price-tag. Well, just heed the advice of wonderful local florist Natalie Bowen, who teaches us how to assemble a spectacular (and totally easy!) centerpiece for under $20 total. Follow her four simple DIY steps—we did, and they work!—plus get her advice on where to score flowers and vases on the cheap, to add a super sweet touch to your next at-home summer soirée. Now, for those invites…

The beautiful results!

Step 1: Pick Out Your Flowers

“Urban Flowers in the Castro is my secret spot. They’re always open and they have a great $5 bucket, which is similar to the day-old bagel concept. I also like Whole Foods because they have a fairly large selection of fresh flowers and they sell smaller bunches, priced two for $10 or two for $8, so that you can put together your own arrangement. I look for three colors that form a monochromatic palette, and I get flowers that are tight and closed and don’t have any brown on the petals or leaves, so that they’ll last longer.”

Step 2: Find A Vase, Fill With Water

“Different flowers like different amounts of water. And most flowers, like roses and tulips, like a lot of water. I actually notice that most people don’t have enough water in their vases. You should ask the person selling the flowers to give you guidance, or just Google it. But in general, you should fill your glass or vase two-thirds full. And to keep prices down, you can use a mason jar or a nice drinking glass from your kitchen.”

Step 3: Cut And Clean Your Stems

“Making sure that your flowers have a fresh and clean diagonal cut is almost the most important thing to do. Then, when cleaning them up, make sure you don’t have any of the leaves below the top of the vase, so take off any leaves that are near the bottom of the stem. If you have broken stems, just set those flowers aside and you can put them in a separate, smaller arrangement.”

Step 4: Arrange Away!

“Start with the flower that has the bulkiest stem, so in this case it would be the roses, which have multiple stems. Create a symmetrical criss-cross grid with those flowers, so that the vase is filled consistently. I usually do two-thirds of that flower to start and save the remaining stems to fill in later. Then, take the second bulkiest stem next, the godetia, and continue the criss-cross pattern at a little bit of a different height to add texture. For the third flower, the tulip, I like to cluster them so it’s more graphic and not so symmetrical. While you’re arranging, keep cutting them down to the right height. In a smaller water glass, it usually looks best if most of them are sticking up only two to three inches.”

Be sure to clean the stems up...

By Katie Hintz-Zambrano, at Refinery 29
Photos by Shilpi Tomar

 

Sweet Rose champagne

Korbel Champagne Cellars is pleased to announce their new Wedding Favors Program! Individual size bottles of champagne make the perfect wedding or event favor. Customers have the option of choosing our 187ml bottles of either, Korbel Brut, Brut Rosé, and Sweet Rosé Champagne or our 375ml bottles of either Korbel Brut or Extra Dry Champagne.

Included with your purchase of our 187ml bottles or 375ml bottles of champagne by the case, Korbel will provide personalized favor tags and the ribbon to hang the tags from each bottle. Your personalized tags can include the name of Bride and Groom (or event) and the date, and a choice of font. In addition, a 20% case discount will be applied to your order.

These delightful personalized favors are not only for weddings; they are perfect for anniversary parties, baby showers, New Year’s Eve, bachelorette parties, birthday celebrations, and more!

Wedding Favors are available for purchase on the Korbel Webstore (Korbel Wedding Favors!) and Wedding Favor forms are also available in the Korbel Tasting Room. Korbel California Champagne is widely distributed and can also be found in local retailers. Korbel provides the option of purchasing just tags and ribbon online, if provided with proof of purchase of our Korbel products in a local retailer.

For more information click here.

1 Case = 24 bottles (187mL or 375mL)

Brut champagne

Celebrate responsibly.

Korbel Champagne Cellars

13250 River Rd.
Guerneville, CA 95446
http://www.korbel.com
1-707-824-7316
webstore.info@korbel.com

 

Cute, flirty, sexy and fiscally savvy: Affinitas...

Affinitas Intimates Sexy or sweet?  Take your pick with fun, flirty and affordable lingerie, sleep & lounge wear perfect for brides this Spring/Summer.

Producing high quality lingerie at refreshingly accessible prices, the Affinitas Intimates label is comprised of bras, panties, camisoles, babydolls, chemises, and bustiers, each item designed by the Affinitas team to be stylish, comfortable, well-made and most importantly well-fitting.  Currently retailing at specialty, boutique and online stores in the U.S. and Canada, bras retail for $23-$35, panties from $8 – $18, camisoles $25-$58, and babydolls, chemises and bustiers for $25-$45.  The collection utilizes high-quality, soft materials sourced from all over the world to provide maximum comfort, such as cotton, microfiber, satin, French embroidered laces and even technologically advanced seamless materials that are stitch free, seam free and label free. Affinitas offers consumers a wide range of basic, everyday styles as well as special occasion pieces, targeting young, fashionable women aged 20 – 35 years old with an annual income level of $25,000 and up who want stylish, comfortable, high-quality lingerie at prices that won’t break the bank. Affinitas Intimates’ bras and bustiers span a size range of 30-38 A-DD, with all other items sized XS-XL.

Pieces retail from $8 – $58 in numerous boutiques throughout the United States as well as online at HerRoom.com and LaurenSilva.com.  Please visit www.affinitasintimates.com for the full store locator.

 

6 Budget-Friendly Dates

• Make a Romantic Meal Together: Choose food items that have aphrodisiac qualities such as oysters, truffles, figs or champagne to savor. Chocolate fondue or chocolate covered strawberries are my favorites but be creative and try something new. Or pick a theme, like Indian or Jamaican. Jerk Chicken and Red Stripe Beer? (One last tip – two words: Naked Chef).
• Create-Your-Own Treasure Hunt: Men love games! Ahead of time, plan out a flirtatious treasure hunt for him (or her). The hunt can be executed inside your house, around your neighborhood or all over town. Start with small prizes like chocolates, sexy underwear and build up to an amazing gift as the grand prize, whatever that may be. Make sure to include hints and have at least four to six smaller treasure-hunting points until they find the real treasure.
• Play Board Games: Have you ever played Cranium? Funniest game ever for a group of couples. Plan a game night, have everyone bring a romantic-themed dish or cocktail and have a blast. If you are alone then play an erotic board game. Click here for the latest reviews.
• Play a Sport: Nothing is sexier than seeing your man work up a sweat. If you are an active couple this is a great way to bond. Take a tennis lesson, play a round of golf or go to the batting cages and let him show you how to hit a baseball. Letting him teach you something he is passionate about is the best way to score points with any man.
• Go Dancing: Learn how to salsa dance together. It is sexy and easy to learn. Most dance studios offer lesson or check out any local Latin restaurants or nightclubs for their events. Usually they have free lessons on Friday and Saturday evenings a live Latin music afterwards so you can dance the night way. Mojitos and Salsa dancing, need I say more? Muy caliente!
  
• Give Each Other a Massage: Spa massages are expensive so why not recreate your own spa at home? Purchase some exotic massage oils, lower the lights, light the candles and spend an hour rubbing each other down. Men (and woman) love to be pampered so it will be a memorable and priceless gift.

For more on Autumn Millhouse and her book Romantic Napa Valley, An Insider’s Guide for Couples, click here.

About Autumn

Autumn Millhouse is an award-winning travel writer who specializes in wine, food and romantic getaways. She is also an international trekker who has wined and dined across the globe from Barcelona to Beijing . A self-proclaimed “hopeless-romantic” and author of Romantic Napa Valley: An Insider’s Guide for Couples, Autumn also has a bi-monthly column called Love Vines published in Napa Valley Life Magazine. She resides in Napa Valley where she cultivates her wine and food relationships with top chefs, winemakers and a slew of other foodies. Besides, sniffing, swirling and sipping wine daily, Autumn is currently working on her next travel book Romantic Sonoma Valley: An Insider’s Guide for Couples.

 

Maybe you’re getting married while skiing in Chile, or perhaps you’re surfing in Australia. The reality is that a non-traditional wedding can often be much tougher to get to than the usual church ceremony with your family in Kansas. When it’s tough to get to your wedding, that means it’s expensive as well.

I suppose Australia isn’t the best example right now since you can get some incredibly cheap deals ($700 or $800 roundtrip from the US), but you get the point. Anything you can do to save some cash for you and your guests will be welcome. Let me introduce you to the world of CAMS.

You may have heard that airlines offer group rates. The problem with group rates is that they require the entire group to fly together. Now, if you and your guests all live in the same place, then that’s great news. You can fly together and maybe save some money if your group is large enough (usually 10 or more) at a minimum. But more often than not, people are scattered and coming from various places.

That’s why airlines created CAMS fares. That stands for Conventions and Meetings. Granted, you may not think of your wedding as a convention or a meeting, but the premise is the same. People are coming from a variety of places to get to a single destination. You can get some good deals if you have enough people. Here are some resources for different airlines.

AirTran EventSavers – Requires 10 or more people

American Group & Meeting Travel – Requires 10 or more people

Continental MeetingWorks – Requires 20 or more people

Delta Meeting Network – Requires 10 or more people

JetBlue Meetings Travel

United Meetings Plus – Requires 25 or more people

 

Retro regency meets mod in the ultimate urban retreat

Whether your goal is business or romance travel, take a step off the beaten track and sink into the Chamberlain West Hollywood. A self-described metropolitan boutique hotel and residential pied-a-terre, designed by the hipster hotel interiors maven Kelly Wearstler (of Santa Monica’s Viceroy fame), the Chamberlain is about discreet luxuries and hidden pleasures. What’s its got: privacy and peace in the center of the bustling West Hollywood Sunset Strip district, (located a mere two blocks away), spectacular interiors rendered in icy blues, greens and teal, and eclectic mash up where regency meets mod. You can’t put your finger on why it all works, but it’s the hipster crib you wish you had with the coolest most covetable light fixtures. What its not: see and be seen, loud house music and a big agent/model/celeb scene replete with the 5’ heels and bikinis, poolside. By the way, there are probably celebrities here, but they are just hiding!

My favorite part: the quiet and blessedly scene-free rooftop pool, with enclosed cabanas for a tete-a- tete, a glass of wine under the stars, a view of the cityscape of Hollywood, or a chaise-bound afternoon with a stack of movie magazines and iced tea.

The rooms are the definition of comfort, again, I will stress the quietness of the place, with 400-thread count sheets, an entertaining lounge area, and muted tones that are easy on the eye. The price is right too, with a Chamberlain Fall Special designed especially for you: there is no reason not to enjoy luxe for less than at the Chamberlain!

35% off standard room rates – along with a complimentary bottle of Prosecco on arrival to toast the Fall with your sweetie by one of Chamberlain’s in-room fireplaces. Guests must enter the promo code “DESTIN” to receive this special deal.

Right off the lobby in a green house type setting that reminds me of an enclosed garden in New Orleans or Paris, where the noise of the City of Angels fades to a distant memory, and banana fronds wave gently in the early evening breeze, we begin our culinary adventure with Chef Mark Pierce and his charming Chamberlain’s American bar and bistro. His point of view is French-influenced and farm to fork, with a dash of Americana, taking classics and reinterpreting them with zesty new point of view. “It’s all about quality and flavor,” says Pierce on his use of sustainable cooking. “I love color and vibrant fresh herbs, fruits and vegetables make a dish modern and flavorful.”

To travel is to unearth rare gems, hidden treasures and true luxury (for less). For a honeymoon, an intimate “pop the question” or rehearsal dinner, or a hot date, if sublime is what you seek, all roads lead to the Chamberlain.

Chamberlain Fall Special

Book by 10/31

Valid 11/01 – 1/31

Black out date 12/31

Promo Code: DESTIN

 

My wife and I live in sunny Southern California, a beautiful place for an October wedding. But of course, we decided to go elsewhere. Our decision to get married in the Napa Valley meant there were countless planning trips to find the venue and nail down the details. It was fantastic, but it ended up being a fair bit of work.

Then we had to find hotels for our guests (not a cheap thing in wine country during the crush, I might add) and help them fly in from places as far away as London. It took a look of work, but of course, it was worth it. Coordinating travel must be brutal for those of you who don’t live it and love it. (I’ll just guess most of you don’t consider yourselves to be an airline dork like I do.)

Planning becomes even more difficult if you’re putting together a wedding off the beaten path. Maybe a surfing wedding in Chile? How about a volunteering wedding in the jungles of Africa? They all have one thing in common. You have to get there.

So I’ll be writing here every couple of weeks to try and demystify the entire travel planning experience around weddings. I’ll post tips and tricks, deals, and more. Of course, not all travel planning is painful. There’s always the best part of the wedding to plan as far as I’m concerned . . . the honeymoon.

I’ll cover all these things and more over the next few months. If you have questions or suggested topics for me, you can always email me at cf@crankyflier.com or come visit me on my site, The Cranky Flier.

 

Anyone who has been on an airplane has been frustrated with at least one part (likely all parts) of the air travel process.  Now starting at only $30 http://crankyconcierge.com/pricing.php per trip for all passengers on an itinerary (with a money-back guarantee), our clients can have their own airline dork watching over them to help with all aspects of their trips.  Here’s what we provide:

Flight Planning
- We will search for the best flight options regardless of complexity
- We’ll search the web for the best fares and give you specific instructions on how to book (we are not a travel agent)
- We will answer any questions the clients may have leading up to their flights

Flight Monitoring
- On the day of travel, we’ll send an email with full flight details, known delays, weather issues, and the specific aircraft routings leading up to our clients’ flights
- We will actively follow the aircraft throughout the day and then notify clients of delays
- Delay & Cancellation Assistance
- When things go wrong, we’ll look for all possible alternatives, no matter how unconventional, to get our clients to their destinations
- If all else fails, we will find hotels, restaurants or anything else (within reason) to make the situation less stressful
- Post-Trip Dispute Assistance
- If things still aren’t resolved when the trip is done, we’ll research what compensation our clients are owed
- We will help draft complaint letters and identify appropriate contacts

This can come in handy for weddings since it is so important to get places on time.  A couple years ago, I was at a friend’s wedding on the beach in Florida when we found out that her sister-in-law (who was in the wedding) had her plane turn back to Paris because of engine problems.  It looked like she wouldn’t be able to make it in time for the small ceremony.

I was able to jump in and help.  She ended up getting the first flight to Atlanta, and then I had her running across the airport, squeezing on to a flight to Sarasota (instead of the original plan to go to Tampa) just as the door closed.  She made the ceremony and everyone was happy.

This service is not meant for the self-sufficient savvy traveler who likes to do things alone.  This is meant for those travelers who don’t have the time to spend on researching options.  It’s also meant for those people who don’t have the deep knowledge about the industry and simply want someone to help make the process a little less daunting.

You can find full information including more details on the services and pricing at http://crankyconcierge.com/.

 

Away from the numbers, that's where I want to be....

Many couples are opting to do their destination weddings closer to home. Some do it because it’s not as costly for guests. Others do it because they have a special place in mind that has sentimental meaning for them. Whatever the reason, it’s good for our economy and there are so many amazing places in the US to tie the knot.

The featured couple for this week, Chris and Aisha Advincula, decided to say their destination I do’s in a very remote location, only accessible by private boat or ferry. Cumberland Island, Georgia is not only secluded, it’s the place where the late JFK Jr. and Caroline Bissette Kennedy were married.

Not an umbrella drink in sight, imagine that....

Wild horses roam the island (and have for over 100 years) and there are still ruins from the Carnegie family property (which the family still owns). According to Kristie Love, the couple’s professional photographer, “there are beautiful beaches with unique brightly colored purple flowery vines growing alongside the untouched dunes. The couple are equally as beautiful which made for some awesome photos.”
Chris and his family is originally from the Philippines and Aisha is from England, which made it a little difficult for Aisha’s family to attend. The couple decided to have an intimate ceremony with some traditional Philippine rituals incorporated.
Cumberland Island is well preserved as a National Park, and although you can actually camp within the park, there are also luxury history properties such as Greyfield Inn on the island.

 

About VintageGlam Weddings Blog

Excerpted from the Vintage Glam Blog Site
Vintage Glam Weddings is not about lavish or over the top wedding ideas, but rather talks about handmade and flea market treasures that can help you make your vintage inspired wedding a special day for you and your guests to cherish. I love sharing my vintage finds, DIY projects, wedding templates and everything in between for your vintage inspired wedding! I think we all hold onto something that reminds us of the past. An old trinket, an old photograph, your grandmother’s jewelry. Vintage by definition is anything that is older than 20 years. Vintage style is your passion for vintage inspired things (clothes, jewelry, cars ,…) that remind you of a certain time or decade you love.