Those that know me well, know I’ve pretty much dreamt of being a Maid of Honour my whole life. I have Pinterest boards for my sister and best friends that I have been adding to literally for years.
One of my childhood best friends surprised us earlier this year, when she announced she’d be getting married in 6 weeks. She also asked me to be her Maid of Honour, and needless to say I was honoured and absolutely up for the challenge! I had been preparing in my mind (and on my Pinterest account) for this for years. LOL.
This meant the shower was going to be in less than 4 weeks and I was instantly thrown into planning mode. Something I truly love to do!
Her mother and I agreed on a Tea Party theme and then it was time to get to work. Her mom said she would be happy to take care of the tea, coffee, dessert and rentals – and I said that myself and the bridesmaids would take care of the rest!
Claire (the bride) and I were talking on the phone today about how much our best friends are a well-oiled bridal and baby shower throwing machine. Everyone is happy to chip in and help. It makes the whole process so lovely. (If you girls are reading this, we are so lucky to have each other. I love you.)
Here is exactly what we did to plan this shower, so you can do the same:
EVITE
Within a few days I had emailed every woman invited to the wedding. I used this free email template from evite and included the import information such as address, registry info, etc.
I also asked guests to dress in colour, and said bonus points for fascinators and floppy hats for the tea party theme!
ATTIRE
As I mentioned, the theme was ‘Tea Party’ and since the shower was in February when everyone’s go-to colour is typically black – I asked guests to wear colour. To be honest, I just wanted the pictures to be cute! ha.
I find if you don’t put too much pressure on a theme people surprise you. If people feel forced, it’s usually a flop and there are a lot of negative attitudes around it.
Let me tell you – everyone was ON POINT with their outfits. Everyone was in some kind of colour and I would say more than 50% of guests went all-out with fascinators and hats.
Since Claire didn’t know the theme, I had an extra white fascinator ready for her – and she wanted to wear it which made me really happy. I’m a sucker for a great theme party, what can I say!
FOOD
So as I mentioned earlier about our friends being A-1 in the department of showing up for each other, this is where we have got it going on. Typically everyone will bring a dish as we will have an amazing pot luck!
This time we had a few ladies unable to attend, as well as a few of the ladies who just had babies and food was not top of the agenda.
So we had a mix of girls contributing money, and girls bringing side dishes.
I used the money to order tea sandwich platters from Longo’s (highly recommend!) and the wine.
The girls that didn’t contribute money brought a mix salads, desserts, veggies, fruit, and more.
We did stations all throughout the house. One for food, tea sandwiches, etc. A bar that also had the wine, fruit infused water and a virgin cocktail. A dessert table, that had both regular and gluten-free options. And then of course a coffee and tea bar, to make the tea party theme complete.
The spread was incredible and with almost 50 guests, we surprisingly had a ton left over – which is always better than running out!
GAMES
We did 3 games:
- Guessing game of how many candy hearts were in a jar. I put 83 in the jar, since that was the year the bride was born.
- A custom ‘How Well Do You Know the Bride’ game. I made a more generic printable version that you can download for free, here.
- A ‘Guess How Old the Bride is in Each Photo’ game. I love this one. It allows you to display memories, pictures of the bride as a baby, etc. This is about my 5th time doing this game for a bridal shower. It’s always a hit. You can see what it looks like and copy me by making your own DIY version like I did. See below.
Also one of the bridesmaids works for the parent company to MAC cosmetics, Estee Lauder, etc. The prizes were BOMB. I’m so jealous I couldn’t play!
La Mer, Mac Cosmetics, Glam Glow and Jo Malone Baskets as gifts. HELLO!
DECOR
We went with mostly white decor, with pink accents.
We got 6 bunches of helium balloons that added to much to the space. I also woke up really early and made this ballon garland. I am SO OBSESSED and pretty much want to make one for every party I ever throw for the rest of time. I wish I had a better picture but this is it:
I used this tutorial on pinterest to make it.
We also had old school china tea cups and white linens on every table.
Honestly it was so classy and beautiful. I loved the set up the most!
TAKE HOME GIFT
Since I’m in the mug-making biz – I had to go with a custom design for the shower.
I used ‘LOVE IS BREWING’ as the saying on the mugs and made two different versions.
We also filled the cups with little bags of chocolates which were amazing!
You can order custom mugs for your next event by emailing info@angelamcnally.com for a quote.
That’s it! Such a simple and adorable theme. I hope you got some great ideas for the next shower you host.
You can keep scrolling down to see some photos of the day and how guests really got into the theme!
The Bride and MOH
The bride and 11 of her 16 bridesmaids… Yup 16 – she even beat me! hahaha.
