Life is a garden and love is in bloom

This past weekend was the wedding celebration of one of my dearest friends, Beth. Since both the bride and groom are from out of town, many of the guests were traveling to be here for the wedding and accompanying festivities. One of the highlights of the week/weekend for me was the beautiful shower that the bride's sister gave for the bride. She chose the theme "A garden party in pink and green," and used that for every element of the party. She also incorporated a lot of Lilly Pulitzer design and products into the party. It was a fabulous afternoon. The bride's sister put much thought and effort into the planning and hosting of this party and I would say that the princess of prep, Lilly herself, would have approved of this fete.

The lunch was at Poogan's Porch, an adorable little restaurant on Queen Street. It's one of those old places that has a cool story and it is even on the list of Charleston's haunted buildings. We had the upstairs room to ourselves (where the ghost is supposed to be!), so we could ooh and ahh and laugh and visit and carry on as much as we want without disturbing anyone. The bride's sister was particularly excited about the decorated umbrella, which is a tradition in the Bahamas. She got a battenburg lace umbrella and decorated it with ribbons and I attached flowers in the colors to the handle. It turned out great!

a close-up



the gift table

The favors were little tins of sweet pea seeds (one of my favorites!) with a little sweet pea on it and a quote: "Love held is the seed, love shared is the flower," which the hostess also put on the place cards. She put one at each place, along with the menu. For the menu, she made up sweet names for the dishes that had to do with happiness, love, etc., and used the same Lilly Pulitzer stationery she did for the invitations--adorable!


I did the flowers for the shower. For the tables, I wanted to keep the arrangements low so that we could see each other over them. I started out with short vase arrangements to keep a garden feeling and not too fussy, but they ended up being taller than I expected, so I went with julep cups (love them!) and little bitty revere bowls for the main table and we used the vase arrangements in other parts of the room.

We had some great food and beverages, some fun shower games and opening of gifts, and it was a fabulous way to spend a Thursday afternoon.