I love October, partly because it is my birthday month and I have a good excuse to eat cakes and also because I take great delight in glitter and October is the month I have a good excuse to start decorating my house for the winter.
I have just had my house repainted this week, my walls and house are all super white, clean and ready for the festive season so I am looking for some inspirations for winter decorations.
With Halloween just around the corner, I am not a huge fan of the ghoulish, macabre look with green hair, blood and gore, but do love a bit of sparkle.
My spooky efforts are pumpkin fairy lights hung over my mirrors along with some cute Halloween snow/gitter shakers and some rather lovely ceramic candle holders in the form of pumpkins and ghosts, from Whittards, which I have had now for years :)
On my quest for pretty yet spooky things, I had to share these gold gilded pumpkins with you, aren´t they just gorgeous, I love them and they would be fabulous for an October wedding.
I would love to take this home to use as a decoration in my own home if I was presented with this at a wedding or party.
To see the DIY tutorial as to how to make these do pop over to Cupcakes and Cashmere. A new Facebook page I found today and well worth having a look over for some wonderful crafty, creative ideas :)
Just ignore the awkward layout! I will have it all fixed up and pretty by Monday! I started working on it last night, lost track of time and before I knew it... it was past my bed time!
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It has been a while since I was nominated for my first Liebster Award and I have been lucky enough to be nominated by a couple of other fabulous ladies since! *Thank you!*
This is what I am going to do. I am going to answer their questions for you guys because I think it is a fun way for you to be able to get to know me a little better. But I am not going to make up any of my own questions or nominate anyone else. Sorry I am just not very good at making up questions and everyone that I would nominate has been a couple of times by now!
Please go check her out! She is completely real in all of her posts, her wedding pictures are beee-a-u-ti-full, and her puppy, Finnley, smiles for the camera!
1. Who is your blog inspiration?
My blog inspiration comes from many different places, before I started my blog I fell in love with Casey and her blog. Her sweet family. And the open sincerity that she writes with.
2. What is your go to outfit?
ohh well that totally depends on what I am doing and what season it is. Summertime hanging out around the house or running errands is always going to be Norts and a Tee. Chances are pretty good that I have a bathing suit on underneath too.
3. If you could travel anywhere, where would you go? Italy. Hands down. The entire country is just breathtaking.
4. Who would you want to play you in a movie? Jennifer Lawerence, she is so candid and awkward. She would be perfect.
5. What is something you always have stocked in your fridge? Cheese and beer. I'm not really sure why, but we always have like five different kinds of cheese.
6. Do you have any superstitions? I broke a giant wall mirror when I was three years old so... if I were to be superstitious I would have been screwed from the beginning.
7. What is your favorite tradition? My mom still gives my sister and I stockings at Christmas and Easter baskets.
8. What is your favorite piece of jewelry?
My favorite piece of jewelry would have to be my engagement ring! But I wear a ring on the middle finger of my right hand everyday too that I love! My aunt bought it for me as a early graduation gift when we were stopped in New Mexico, while traveling across the country. It is turquoise, my birthstone. Before my engagement ring it was definitely my favorite!
9. Do you prefer shows about cooking or shows about home improvement?
Cooking shows all day. Rachael Ray is my home girl!
10. If you could only wear one color for a month, what would it be?
This is sad, but I would wear black. It goes with pretty much everything.
11. If I gave you $100.00 what is the first thing you would do with it?
Figure out how to spend it...I have a problem.
*Second set of questions are from Megan at Barefoot Bluejean Princess. A sweet and sassy Southern girl. Just the way we like them! If you are in college you need to read her post from yesterday! I wish someone had clued me in on those stupid text books when I was a Freshman!
1. If you won a million dollars, who would you call first?
My friend Olivia, she and I always joke about winning the lottery
2. If you were to walk into an airport, money nor time is an object, where would you jet off to?
Once again... ITALY. I need to take SamIam!
3. Coke or Pepsi
Psssh...Diet Coke. And if I ask for Coke, Pepsi is never ok instead.
4. Tell us about your favorite toy has a child.
My Barbies. And of course they were always naked.
5. What is your favorite thing about blogging?
All of the fun ladies from different parts of the country that I have been introduced to!
6. If you could go on any reality tv show, which would you audition for?
I still think that Morgan and I deserve our own reality tv show.
We were going to call it The Over the Mountain Housewives...I think? I can't remember.
It was a drunken conversation. Obviously.
7. If you could only visit 5 websites everyday, which ones would you choose?
Well, I stalk my wedding dress and the skeletor model wearing it on the daily.
Pinterest. duh. Planning a wedding here!
Does Instagram count as a website?
My bank webpage. Let's be practical. I've got to stay on top of that shiz.
and I guess Facebook. We all have a love/hate relationship with that nonsense.
8. Which iphone game is your guilty pleasure--don't lie!
I really don't play games. No lie!
I will sit on my phone and edit the same picture five different ways and never post any of them though.
9. What was your favorite part about your 4th of July celebrations this year?
Probably our boat ride that we took as a family during sunset,
even though we had engine trouble it was still really fun.
10. Are you a morning person or a night person?
Definitely night. It seriously takes me around two hours in the morning to be fully functioning.
Longest post. Sorry about it! If anyone has any awesome layout/design tutorials PLEASE leave the links in the comments! I am really good at messing this mess up apparently.
And yes I know my media icons are not working right now.
Patience is a virtue and I have lots of it thank goodness.
My family might disagree with me when I cannot find things as this is my pet hate and my patience usually goes flying out the window at a very fast rate if I cannot find something, I hold my hands up, it is a red flag to a bull!
However I love nothing better and more therapeutic than designing and planning our weddings and events, quietly watching fashion trends and bringing new and fresh styles to my business. I love a challenge and could not bear to be turning out the same well versed styles time and time again.
I approach each wedding as a new challenging, creative project and love playing around with ideas and thinking out of the box styling for our weddings with suggestions our clients have not thought about. I prefer to be a leader rather than led and always have which is why I have worked in the design industry now for nearly 30 years, quite an achievement :)
I was thrilled last week, having finally managed to hit the shops, how the Ikat tribal prints were everywhere.
Having foreseen this way back and blogged that this was a new fashion and we would see this in the 2013 and 2014 wedding trends, it was lovely to see that my predictions were spot on and tribal fabrics, bright colours and the ethnic style is now everywhere in the fashion industry which will of course filter into the interior and wedding trends.
Now back to patience, I am patiently waiting for our summer to heat up, we have had a strange year with an unusually chilly May and June and strong winds, not my favourite weather.
I am also now waiting patiently to see images of our fabulous weddings we have created over the past month to share with you.
Patience required again as we are re-branding the business to move it forward, we have reshuffled and I have some fabulous designers now working with me along with enthusiastic fresh talent in the events industry, if I could wave my famous magic wand faster I would but all good things come to those that wait!
So in the meantime as I design and create and inspire myself I thought it would be lovely to share these warm Mediterranean colours with you of a shoot featured on Elizabeth Anne Designs.
We love the warm sunshine colours, the gorgeous tropical florals and the Spanish influences from the use of the crockery to the cute door knobs, which I seem to buy in abundance here from Zara home. I have a drawer full of pretty door knobs and handles, perhaps my other obsession as well as cushions and candles :)!
To see more of this fabulous Mediterranean photo shoot and the talented vendors involved do pop over to Elizabeth Anne Designs.
Many moons ago when I started Reviva Weddings I spent hours scouring the websites for inspiration and fabulous ideas, I fell upon many beautifully created websites sharing love for all things weddings and styling.
Snippet and Ink had some beautiful inspiration boards and as I worked on my own business I often browsed the internet looking for the latest wedding trends and fashion.
I soon recognised some of the Wedding World Web leaders as being Junebug Weddings and Style Me Pretty and never in a million years did I think I would ever achieve being accepted and featured on both these amazing websites as one of their recommended Destination Wedding Planners and Designers.
My love of all things Spain, combined with my professional design and styling skills, I am fortunate to have created an amazing business whilst bringing up my smallest daughter and juggling two teenage daughters, which I am hugely proud of, delivering beautiful weddings to our wonderful clients time and time again.
So after many years of hard work, I am known for burning the midnight oil, I am thrilled to have achieved so much and absolutely love what I do.
Plus I am also known for scoffing wedding cake samples, trying to steal cupcakes, standing on my soapbox about commissions in wedding world, earned the honorary title of the Fairy Godmother of the Costa Del Sol who waves her magic wand hence my magic sparkles on our Blog that follow the cursor, surviving on less sleep than Maggie Thatcher and drinking coffee until it comes out my ears :)
I am now delighted to have Reviva recognised as one of the most creative and innovative Wedding Designers and Planners in Spain.
I would also like to thank our team who have supported me and helped me to get where we are today, including Carla, Isabel, Loraine and Anoulka, an amazing array of hugely talented girls who are all passionate as I am about weddings, along with the fabulous suppliers, venues and photographers we have the pleasure of working with, without whom we could not create our weddings and showcase our hard work.
And last but of course the most important, all the beautiful brides and their handsome grooms and lovely families who have trusted us to create their magical days.
I sound like I am standing on the stage for an Oscar, but we are proud of our achievements however will not cry or waffle on about our families!
The images on this post are a sneak peek from a beautiful wedding we planned and styled at the iconic Marbella Club two weeks ago, more to come on this wedding and our thanks to Agata Jensen Photography for a sneak peek of this beautiful wedding :)
Well isn't this exciting! Thank you Steph for tagging me!
Here's how the Liebster Award works:Acknowledge the blog that nominated you
Tell 11 facts about yourself
Answer the 11 questions the nominating blogger created
List 11 bloggers with less than 200 followers that deserve some recognition
Post 11 questions for them to answer
Notify them that they've been nominated
You can't nominate the blog that nominated you
11 things about me!
I am always cold. My feet are popsicles.
I had three herniated disc in my neck my sophomore year of college and if it had been one higher I would have been paralyzed.
I drink milk out of the jug. Cups? Who needs those?!
My first CD was the B-52's Cosmic Thing. I used to dance on our coffee table to "Love Shack". It is still my favorite!
I am a Criminal Minds junkie. I will be devastated when they quit filming.
I have a scar across my right cheek from where I cut and broke my cheek bone on an upholstery nail when I was four years old.
I have one tiny tattoo. It says hope. The "o" in hope is a peace sign because my GranAnn always tells me to hope for inner peace.
My mother and grandfather both call me Punkin and now SamIam calls me Punkin Butt.
I HATE olives. Like really hate them. Picking them out of my food isn't even an option.
I love cooking and trying new recipes! I'm pretty good at throwing something together!
Eleven really is a weird number. I don't even remember being eleven years old.
11 Questions from Steph to Answer! 1. What is your drink of choice? My drink of choice lately has been Pinot Grigio, but after Magic City Brewfest this coming weekend I will probably be back on a beer kick.
2. What is your guilty pleasure? Shopping. I wish I was kidding. I have a problem.
3. What is your favorite time of day? Any time after 12 pm, because it becomes socially acceptable to start drinking. It's always 5 o'clock somewhere! Right?!
4. What blogger makes you laugh every single day? Whitney and her yoga pants crack me up! She is part of the reason why I wanted to start blogging.
5. We are at a karaoke bar and I'm forcing you to sing a song, what would it be? Haha I asked Sam what song he thought I would sing...that boy is not right. This is what he chose.
6. What is your favorite thing about blogging? I love all of the people that I have come across so far! I am really looking forward to building relationships and making new friends!
7. Name your go-to comfort food (or other comfort item.) Macaroni and Cheese all day!
8. You're stranded on Gilligan's Island, what 3 people would you want with you? Haha this is so funny because we were just joking about Gilligan's Island last weekend while we were at the lake! I would take SamIam of course and then...Riley and Dakota. They are people in my mind!
9. Star Wars, Star Trek or Star Magazine? Star Trek. We went to see the new one last weekend with my sister-in-law to be. It was AMAZING! I was emotionally invested in that movie. If you have not seen it yet...GO!!
10. What is your favorite thing about your hometown? My favorite thing about my hometown is that the older I get, the cooler the city gets! Growing up my friends and I would all call Birmingham "Boringham." We really didn't realize how much was really going on! But right now Thirsty Thursdays at the Barons games are on the top of my list! Just look at that beautiful new field! The Barons are our local Minor League team under the Braves. Baseball and $1 beer!
11. What is your favorite color? I swear my favorite color changes with the seasons, but shades of blue seem to always be a constant. My closet is proof of that.
As a young girl my magical world was provided by reading books and I was transported by my imagination into different worlds. I loved books and the wonderful places they would take me to that filled my dreams as I slept.
Sometimes I wonder if it is this that made me want to create magical spaces as I became an adult.
Enid Blyton´s Faraway Tree,The Wishing Chair, My Family and Other Animals by Gerald Durrell and the Famous Five are all some of many books I was fortunate enough to read as a small child and absolutely loved and I am so lucky my mother encouraged our reading of these enchanting stories.
One of my favourite novels was The Secret Garden by Frances Hogdson Burnett, I so loved the mysterious wonder of this book and what the Secret Garden held within it´s walls as it was unlocked and discovered.
A Secret Garden wedding for me having read this book would be difficult to achieve with everything my imagination conjures up but I adore this photo shoot created by Hannah Gooch and Sarah Gawler featured on Love My Dress, it has that lovely mysterious quality about it that is so evocative of how I imagine a Secret Garden wedding.
I love the combination of nature and the glamour of the dress. The styling details are beautifully done so I had to share this gorgeous and magical secret garden inspiration with you :) If you have any beautiful childhood memories you would like to incorporate into your wedding day, we would love to hear about them.
Design is creating a space, a product or a function with harmony, balance and style.
Whether you are designing your home, a wedding, a work space or a product there are basic principles applied to make it work plus of course an eye for balance and style.
One thing I find always works is to gather various collected elements together to create an inspiration board and tonight I created this with some photos I have pinned on my interiors file on Pinterest.
Working on a design project is always exciting whether it be a re-decoration of a room or the design of your wedding, party or event.
It is always a good idea to gather the colours, images and swatches together and you will quickly see a cohesive look and colours leaping out at you.
This time of year I am updating my own living spaces and as an interior designer and stylist I apply my own principles to my own home and thought it would be interesting to gather the images I have collected over the past few months, of interior spaces, together on one board.
It appears now I have to go out and buy lots of mint green and soft turquoise paints!
With storms predicted here in southern Spain tomorrow this actually sounds like a good plan.
January is not one of my favourite months, it is coldish, all the sparkly things have been put away, we are all supposed to stop eating chocolate, embark on diets and everyone seems to be wearing tracksuits and trainers :)! All of us super women should by now have completely reorganised our storage in every cupboard, have a spotlessly clean house, be attending the gym twice a day, creating super, culinary, lean, healthy meals, given up the coveted glass of well earned wine and still of course be working and looking after our children. We are also embarking on our newly prepared household spreadsheets, managing to budget and balance the books, finding cheaper utility suppliers (which in Spain do not exist!) and generally tidying everything up and preparing for another year which will descend into the usual chaos around Easter when we can eat chocolate again :)! Better still Valentines Day which is now only 21 sleeps away!!
I also find if something can go wrong it will in January, so can you imagine my horror the other night when my dearly not so beloved emptied a glass of wine over my computer, he has not given up the wine or embarked on a diet and is very accident prone. My heart and computer died and not so beloved partner escaped a near death. But along came a Fairy Godmother in the tiny shape of Fay atMy Destination Marbella.
Fay recently, and very romantically, became engaged to a wonderful man called Mark and I was supposed to be meeting Fay for a pre wedding chat but I knew I had to get my computer and work sorted out asap. I was in a state when I sent Fay an email in the morning. My state is usually a very calm quiet moment with lots of swear words ringing around my head of which there were quite a few followed by some louder swear words on this occasion :) I have to hand over my Fairy Godmother of the Costa Del Sol title now to Fay, I think we could start something here! As soon as Fay heard about my predicament she efficiently starting waving her magic wand for me and her fabulous team of techies, including her H2B, at My Destination Marbella had rescued my computer and all it´s contents within 12 hours. Never have I been so impressed and grateful.
My Destination is a global travel resource that is powered by a diverse community of hundreds of local experts. Passionate about providing the best value for money, they work closely with the global partners whilst supporting local businesses. As a result, they make travel experiences inspired, more enriched, and quite simply, better. Their local experts are on the ground and personally experience what each of their destinations has to offer. Armed with this unrivalled local knowledge their local experts produce comprehensive information in the form of travel articles, local tips, guides, reviews, videos and panoramic virtual tours. They began in 2006, picked up numerous awards along the way, and today count over one hundred destination offices worldwide. If you want any up to date information about Marbella and the surrounding areas, My Destination Marbella has it covered. Reviva Weddings are featured on there as well in their services section, it is well worth popping over to have a look as there is so much information about Marbella.
So now added to my already long January list is to make sure I am even more super efficient and back up my computer every night! I have been told :) I am also hugely excited about Fay and Mark´s wedding which will be held on one of our fabulous beaches here in Marbella, so watch this space! It will be my turn to wave my magic wand again!
As the Christmas weekend approaches, we are sharing some last minute glittery images with you. This approach to design is so up my street and I am horrified I did not find these gorgeous images beforehand!
I am in love with the wonderful eclectic array of colours and styles, and this is so my house, style and colours, olive greens combined with hot pinks, reds and turquoise and cooled down with whites, greys, silvers and golds, I am in heaven and needless to say if there are glittery cushions, completely sold :)
We would like to take this opportunity to wish all our past clients and friends and our future clients, who we are looking forward to working with in 2013 and 2014, a peaceful and wonderfully sparkly Christmas :)
