They're Hooked! Kissy Fish Bridal Shower!

I LOVE a themed party and I {heart} a DIY project; so when a special occasion comes around; you can be sure a Daydream Believers celebration will be BIG! :)  This past weekend, I had the privilege of helping to host a bridal shower for my sister. It is so fun to plan a great party with friends! I had a great time planning and prepping for this event with my mom (she is a true hostess with the mostess and my #1 party-planning-partner!), Chris (the mother of the groom) and Ryan (my sister's fun friend and bridesmaid). The shower was great and everyone had such a fun afternoon! :)

I love finding inspiration online, so I wanted to share some of the crafty highlights from our event with you - If you have any questions about anything we made/did, please ask I'd love to help!

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Our Inspiration:
My sister and her groom are having a destination wedding and have planned a sure-to-be-beautiful sunset ceremony right on the beach. How amazing will it be to be married in the sand with the ocean as your backdrop?! Seriously, I can not wait for her big day! SO exciting! :) We wanted the theme of her bridal shower to compliment the overall tone of the wedding - fun, bright, beach! Since her wedding is going to be so spectacular; we did not want to do the standard "tropical" shower (luau based with coconuts and hula skirts) - we needed something more unique and modern. Her wedding color palette is bright, with a beautiful tangerine as her base. Here's what we came up with:


(click on any picture to enlarge it!)

We made these parasol topiaries following this awesome DIY tutorial. We personalized them for our event by adding a hand tied aqua bow and filling the base with sand. They are spectacular in person! 

The beach candle holders you see, were part of the guest's favors. They featured small painted fish and were filled with sand, mini seashells and an ocean-scented candle. A clear bag with a shiny aqua bow finished them off and made them easy for our guests to carry home.

I made the "They're Hooked" sign for the head table by layering sheets of colored cardstock.  It was easy to make and the bride LOVED it!

It also served as a nice way to highlight the bride and groom when they were seated at the table.

The kissing fish were drawn by hand and cut out of orange glitter cardstock. Inexpensive and adorable! LOVE THAT! :)

Here's a close up of the bride and groom's seats - unfortunately I did not get any good pictures of the guests tables

(doesn't it always happen like that!?) 

Each guest table featured mini fish bowls filled with gold fish crackers, and glass seashell dishes filled with swedish fish candies and gummy sharks.  In addition to their candle favor, each guest place setting also featured a miniature blue suitcase from Martha Stewart's seaside wedding collection. Each suitcase was handstamped to read "thank you" and filled with personalized buttermints (the grooms fav!) and saltwater taffy. The guests loved them- they were really an adorable favor for a destination wedding! We also scattered starfish shaped shells around the tables.

In this picture you can also see a rock candy bouquet. These little sweeties were inspired by an idea the bride saw in a magazine and loved. After a  trip to the local candy store,  we recreated them for the shower. They were an adorable way to reinforce our color palette and we were able to use them for a shower game! :)

The fish you see here are actually placemats that my mom found at The Christmas Tree Shop near her house for only .50cents a piece (score!) - they complimented our theme perfectly, and looked great hanging on the front of the tables and the walls.  Another easy (inexpensive) decoration were the woodblock initials we made for the bride and the groom. We covered them using the same glitter cardstock used for the kissing fish.

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The shower was a great success, and the theme really complimented the bride and groom's upcoming beach wedding trip!