Oh my! I have so much great wedding inspiration to share with you today! There are so many experimental, visionary, offbeat brides and grooms (and brides and brides, and grooms and grooms!) out there, and I am just in awe of some of the incredible weddings I’ve been seeing lately. But don’t let me tell you about them— look at the photos yourself! Enjoy!!!

• Let’s start out with this Shepherdess bride who wore a gown made from the wool of her own sheep in England. Are you amazed? Me too!!!
• What about this treehouse wedding? Did you check out her tights? Sweeeeeet!
• I just loveloveloved these valentine-influenced inspiration boards. I’ve always thought Valentine’s Day weddings were super cheesy, but done right, I think they could be super spectacular. Hmmm…
• This lesbian wedding had some of the prettiest details: I particularly like the “stones” instead of a guestbook. Seriously creative. Right???
• One of the best photo booths I’ve ever seen. So much detail! Love it!
• Fun spotlight on budget-friendly details from the ILoveLolliblog!
• And lastly, also from ILoveLolliblog, some astonishingly beautiful wedding gowns: some with traditional silhouettes and non-traditional construction elements, others are the other way around. I am so impressed by designers who push the envelope like this.

Until next time!

I read wedding blogs. Lots of them. Possibly too many. It might be a problem. Honestly, I can easily spend two or three hours a day just browsing through my Google reader and checking out all the latest posts on all of my favorite wedding blogs. Sometimes it’s just what I need- a cornucopia of inspiration lovliness. Other times, every blog seems to have picked up the same photos and I get the doldrums when I find the same wedding featured 8 million times. I know, I need to get a grip. Seeing a wedding featured more than once shouldn’t affect my mood like that. And it’s not like I wouldn’t be thrilled to pieces if several major blogs all featured one of my weddings at the same time! ;-)

However, not a day goes by that I don’t see something new on someone’s blog to get my creative juices going or just remind me how lucky I am to be in such a fun and exciting industry.

Succulent Wall photo by danasmith via Flickr. **

In case you don’t spend hours every day trolling the internet for visual wedding porn, hints and tips for the DIY bride, wedding etiquette, etc., here are a few of my favorite links of late:

• A Post from Red Velvet Occassions on wedding dress codes. You’ll never have to ask yourself again, “what exactly constitutes semi-formal attire?”
• A brief history on the tradition of eating cake, along with some absolutely stunning cake pictorals from the I Love Lolliblog.
• The Fat Bride Survival Guide. I was no skinny-minny at my own wedding (who am I kidding? I was no skinny-minny, ever!), and I truly believe that every bride is/can be/will be beautiful on her wedding day, regardless of her shape or size. This article just reinforces my belief. No apologies.
• I am a self-professed Star Wars geek, so I found these Ewok invitations (via Offbeat Bride) exceptionally charming. I just love that there is a couple out there, offbeat enough to send out Star Wars invites. The only thing that would have made their wedding more perfect would have been to have the ceremony and reception in the Ewok village. Yes, the tree village. I can only imagine the pictures from THAT event!
• My current obsession is a venue called The Smog Shop in Culver City, CA. Here are two amazing weddings that took place there. Isn’t the succulent wall absolutely to die for?
• Finally, because it’s becomming apparent that manners and etiquette haven’t quite caught on with my own generation, a simple explanation of “RSVP.” It means respond. So if you receive an invitation to a wedding, and it has a little card with a return envelope that is already stamped for your convenience, just indicate whether you’ll make it to the wedding or not, and pop the little card into the mail. Do so BEFORE the “reply by” date. My brides and grooms- and other brides and grooms across the world- will thank you. And you might actually get to eat. It really is important to have a proper head count for any wedding or event. Caterers demand it, venues insist upon it… let’s face it, you could end up at a table without one of my fantastic centerpieces, all alone, because you forgot to send your reply card. Bad form, my friend. Very bad form.

Well, that’s all for now. Tell me what you think about these links, and feel free to send me anything wonderful I might not have already come across on these interwebs of ours. Email me llane (at) floraorganicadesign (dot) com!

I’ve finally done it. I’ve caved, I’ve done what I said I would never do: I’ve joined Twitter. I can hardly believe it. I’ve resisted the Twitter phenomena for a long time now, convinced that it was “just a fad,” and that if I ignored it long enough, it would simply go away.

But it’s not going away- at least not anytime soon, and I finally decided it was time to join the rest of my wedding industry peers and start “twittering.” I haven’t quite gotten the hang of it yet, but I will get there eventually. You can follow me as I jabber about flowers and weddings and inspiration: floraorganica on twitter. It might be fun. Maybe.

One thing I have found that I absolutely DO like about Twitter is that I’m suddenly surrounded by people who love the wedding industry just as much as I do, and these people are quite generous about sharing inspiration and resources. Today I came across a tweet (is that lingo correct, “tweet”?) that linked to a stunning 1920’s themed wedding. I am gaga for themed weddings/events/parties these days, so I just about flipped with joy over these images. Check them out- aren’t they grand?

Thanks to Twitter, I’ll surely have more to share with you soon!