:: Happy New Year! ::

I hope you all had a fantastic Christmas and a fabulous New Year! Christmas was a huge day for Mr LG and I. We started the day by opening our presents from each other (he gave me a box filled with crafty things - stamps, ribbons, pens, stickers ... I was in Heaven!) and then headed to his brother's place to spend time with him before going to my parents place for the rest of the day (and night!). We were truly spoilt by our family and friends and our day was filled with love and laughter - what more could we have asked for?

We spent New Years playing Nintendo monopoly with my sister and her boyfriend. I lost ... big time! But, I still had a tonne of fun! I have officially started my holidays and yet, I still feel so busy! My days are filled with wedding crafts and errands while trying to move out of my room. Have any of you tried to move after 17 years of accumulating stuff? Wow, it's a huge task! I'm not generally a hoarder, I'm actually quite good at throwing away/donating things I don't need or use anymore. And yet, I still have SO much stuff! My room currently looks like a bomb has hit it!

It is my 28th birthday in a few days (the 6th) and I can't even begin to think about a way to celebrate it while my wedding 'to do' list still has so many items on it. None of them are huge tasks, but some do take time. My latest project has been stamping cute little brown paper bags for guests to put lollies from our lolly table in.

Can you believe I get married next weekend?! Everything is starting to feel more and more real as we do things like final dress fittings and finalising menus. I can't wait to share the actual day with you all via what will probably be multitudes of photos!

I hope you are all having a fanastic break over the new year!

:: And the winner is ... ::

A big thank you to everyone who entered my Christmas giveaway! Ladies (and gentlemen?) we have our winners!

The winner of this adorable spotty make up bag/pencil case and goodies is Gracie from GracieBellaButterfly!

The winner of the cute tartan make up bag/pencil case is Chloe from Chloe in Reality!

Congratulations ladies! I'll be sending you an email shortly to get your postal addresses.

Thank you all for your generous comments on my wedding invitations. I'm glad you all like them as much as we do! We are currently working on our Orders of Service and a survey for our guests to fill out about us!

:: Wedding Inspiration - Vintage Books ::

I love books. The love the smell of them. I love the feel of them. One day I hope to have a library in our house with floor to ceiling books. Luckily, I am marrying someone who also loves book - old books in particular.

So, what do old books and our wedding have in common? I've been so excited to share this with you, but I had to wait! Now I can finally show you our vintage book invitations!

Time was running out on our invitations and we still hadn't settled on a style we liked. We both love simple, clean looking things and we both love old books. It was actually my younger sister who came up with the idea to join the two together and create a fantastic book themed wedding invitation!

They have been a hit with our guests and we couldn't be happier with them!

Who doesn't love a brown paper package tied up with string?

The countdown is officially on now - 24 days 'til we get married!

PS. Don't forget to enter my Christmas giveaway!

:: And so this is Christmas ... ::

So, I don't know if anyone else has noticed, but Christmas has crept up on us quite quickly once again! Mr LG and I put up our Christmas tree a few weekends ago and I think it's quite cute. We chose red as our accent colour this year, but we plan to change the accent colour every few years. This weekend we will start wrapping our presents! I can't believe that in two weeks time Christmas will be here!

To celebrate Christmas I have decided to have another giveaway. This time there are two prizes up for grabs!

Giveaway number one is a cute spotty make up bag/pencil case, some gel pens, an assortment of sticker seals, a pearl and glass bead bracelet and a shimmery lip shine!

Giveaway number two is a cute tartan make up bag/pencil case, a little notebook, an oversized paper clip, an eraser, some lip shine and some hand repair creme.

Here are the rules as to how you could win one of these prizes:

♥ The give away will end Friday 17th of December

♥ The give away is open internationally

♥ I will be selecting the winner using a random number generator

Mandatory Entry:

♥ Follow my blog and leave me a comment containing your email address and tell me what your favourite part about Christmas is.

Optional Entry:
♥ Blog about this give away and leave me a separate comment with the link.

To top it off, each prize will also contain a little surprise from Gracie's adorable etsy shop!

Good luck!

PS. Isn't my Mum's Christmas tree to die for?

:: Wedding Inspiration - Engagement Photos ::

Just in case you're not totally over me talking about wedding information, I can finally share with you some of our engagement photos! Mr LG and I woke up early and headed to the Storey Bridge, which is across from Brisbane City. We bought Mr LG's vintage bike with us, as well as my vintage inspired bike. Our photographer was the incredibly talented Troy Hansen.

This shot was taken while we were on our way under the bridge, so some action shots could be taken of us riding along it.

While I don't like having my photo taken, I do like this photo. My dress is dark blue with tiny white love heart polka 'dots' on it. Seriously cute dress.

In the end, this is the photo we decided on. I love Mr LG's old bike in the corner. The only touch ups I insisted on were to remove my underwear lines! I love the slightly vintage feel of this photo.

If you could have a photo shoot, what kind of feel/look would you go for?

It is my Hens weekend this weekend. We are planning on enjoying pedicures/massages, dessert for dinner, Harry Potter and a photo-based scavenger hunt! I can't wait to share it with you.

I hope your weekend is fabulous!

:: Wedding Inspiration - Kitchen Tea ::

Thank you for all your lovely comments about my Kitchen Tea invitations. That chandelier stamp was the best $16 I've spent in a while! I think a lot of things will be stamped with it in the next few months - pen pals, you have been warned.

I have finally uploaded my Kitchen Tea photos, so you can see a few snippets of the day. I had so much fun and I'm so glad I decided to do something different and went with a Parisian theme.

I am in love with the pink and white 'poufs' my sister created out of tissue paper. Thank you Martha Stewart for providing such adorable (and simple) decoration ideas!

The pink coconut macaroons were to die for. I gave myself a sugar headache because I ate so many! They were such a vibrant pink colour inside, I wish I'd taken a picture to show you!

Note the Earl Grey Lavender tea my Mum put in the box as a little joke.

Our toilet paper brides and flowergirl!

The gorgeous toilet paper flower girl. This is my next-door-neighbour's second daughter. She is adorable.

One of the very few photos taken of me on the day. I don't like having my photo taken.

I'm still working on my thank you notes. I'm not working any more than I usually do, and yet somehow I don't have enough hours in the day to do what I need to do! Christmas, New Years, my birthday and the wedding are only a few weeks away!

Speaking of Christmas, check back soon for a Christmas giveaway!

:: Wedding Inspiration - Kitchen Tea Invitations ::

Well, my Kitchen Tea was a success! We ate far too much delicious food, played some fun and slightly ridiculous games, and had an overall good time.

A few months ago I was perusing wedding blogs when I came across a Parisian themed Kitchen Tea. I sent the link to my sisters/bridesmaids and said, "Wouldn't this be fun?" And within about 5 minutes from sending out the link we had decided that I should have a Parisian themed Kitchen Tea! Ideas came thick and fast - generally in the form of pictures sneakily Googled while we were meant to be working - have I mentioned that at the time I worked on the same floor as my sister and sister-in-law? I also work in the same team as my brother. We work for a large company, so it's kind of funny we all ended up working there!

I digress ...

Anyway! We decided on a black, white and pale pink theme complete with chandelier-themed invitations. I decided to have my Kitchen Tea at my Dad's art gallery (tres chic!) and purchased the most adorable pale pink dress with black velvet polka dots and a black ribbon belt.

It was fun to do something slightly different for my Kitchen Tea. I am normally surrounded by green (by my own choosing, of course) so it was fun to buy pink items for a change. I am about to start the Thank You cards because you can bet that if I leave it too long I'll find every reason under the sun to procrastinate!

Stay tuned for more photos to come!