Hello, friends! I hope that you had a wonderful weekend! I am smack-dab in the middle of back-to-back wedding weekends, so I apologize if I'm a little off the grid these days. This past weekend I stood next to one of my closest friends, Sara, as she married a wonderful man, and on Friday I have the priveledge of standing beside my long-time best friend Elizabeth as she does the same. For some they might see these bridesmaid duties as obligations, but I have truly loved trying to make this time special for them both and hope that their wedding days were and are just perfect. I'm hopefully going to post about Sara's big day this week, so stay tuned!
Of course, along with wedding-day duties and showers, however, there is also the fun of planning a bachelorette party! For Elizabeth (whose shower you can see here), the bridesmaids are kind of scattered and we knew that this would mean a weekend getaway was in order. She initially wanted to go to the beach, but seeing that it would cost a lot of money during spring break season and it's very far for some of us to travel, we decided to meet in the middle and got a cabin in the Smoky Mountains. Besides, all she really wanted was a low-key girls' weekend where we really wouldn't do much other than relax and spend time together, so we figured we could do that anywhere!
If you have never rented a cabin in the mountains, I highly recommend it! Most are equipped with game rooms, plenty of bedrooms, back porches with gorgeous mountain views that you can look over from a rocking chair or porch swing, and outdoor hot tubs for relaxation... it's my kind of place. We all arrived on Friday night, had a delicious spaghetti dinner, stayed up until one o'clock in the morning sharing stories and catching up, and then "slept in" on Saturday and enjoyed a big breakfast. I put that in quotation marks because for those of us with kids, this meant that we just stayed in bed until about eight... my how things have changed! We spent the entire day in our lounge clothes, spent some time in the hot tub, took naps, and just enjoyed a nice change of pace. The one thing we wanted to make sure of, however, was that we did some sort of "party" for our bride-to-be, no matter how laid back it was. We just wanted it to be special.
A few weeks before the trip a couple of the other bridesmaids and I started thinking of themes and somehow got stuck on those red-hot candies... perhaps because this was right around Valentine's Day. We decided to take that idea and run with it and called it her "Red Hot Mountain Getaway," since we were celebrating one red hot bride! I called up my uber-talented sister, told her the theme, and she designed what just might be my most favorite invitation she has done to date (and she's done a lot of great ones!). Just see for yourself:
We asked everyone to wear red for our night out and our bride wore white. Actually, I wish I had a picture of the group because we could not have coordinated our outfits better... all the girls ended up in an equal mixture of red, white, and black as if it had been planned! Unfortunatley, all of the group photos are on someone else's phone. I did make sure to get this one, however, since we were the three moms on the trip, just to show that even post kiddos, we've still got it! Haha!
And since I don't have any of the photos from our night out, which was... er... interesting to say the least considering that Gatlinburg doesn't really have a night life, I just wanted to post the decor since it was fun! So here's a glimpse inside our Red Hot Party:
It was a fun and really easy theme for a "last fling before the ring" and one that I hadn't really seen before. We decorated with red roses, red hots (as well as other red candies), candles, pom poms, crepe paper, boas, and pearls and served red wine and red velvet cupcakes- heaven! And the awesome table cloth? That's actually a curtain that hangs in our study... you can find it here. It makes me strongly consider using curtains as tablecloths more often as there are so many more cool options!
And what's a trip to Gatlinburg without this classic shot? If you've been there you know what I mean:
Sunday morning came quite early and I had to jet early to get to my speaking engagement, but it was wonderful to have a weekend away with these ladies, and one without kids! I love my children dearly, but a couple of days away every now and again can make a huge difference... sometimes we just need some me-time. I'm thankful for a husband who understands that, too.
Just four more days 'til my best friend is married off. I CANNOT wait!
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