Fall Inspiration: Favors

Picking favors can be a really challenging task, especially while on a budget.  It's important to find something that fits with your wedding theme, your personal style, and pleases your guests.  Given that I'm planning a December wedding, I have plenty of winter favors to share with you, but I decided to save those for later as winter is (thankfully) still a few months away.  Thus, I decided to continue with my fall posts and share some great Etsy autumn favors with you guys. 

If you're going for a green wedding, the first favor is just for you.  These eco-friendly leaf coasters, made of recycled water bottles, are perfect for guests to use during the wedding and to take home!  Or, use these painted pumpkin clothespins as place card holders or table number holders and have them double as favors.  Another great idea is to package up anything your heart desires in one of these fantastic fall foliage sparkle boxes.  For romantic lighting, decorate your tables with these gorgeous natural leaf luminaries, one for each guest to keep.  For a bookish couple, share your passion with your guests by giving them adorable handcrafted fall bookmarks.  Finally, if food favors are more your style, feed your guests some yummy fall spice cupcakes or gourmet pumpkin pie marshmallows!

More Fall Inspiration

I adore fall.  Growing up in New England, fall was always such a magical time for me.  There was apple picking, pumpkin carving, and horseback rides through the crisp autumn air.  I always feel inspired when I'm able to return to New England in the fall and see the changing of the leaves.  I really love the vibrant rich colors of the leaves, and strongly believe the color palette of reds, oranges, and yellows would be a beautiful accent to any wedding.  Unfortunately, I think most brides tend to play it safe when they have a fall wedding and stick to brown as their main color.  While I love brown, I just think it would look so much better with a pop of bright color to accompany it.  Hopefully some of these inspiration boards will motivate all you fall brides out there to take a risk when choosing your wedding colors!

All photos courtesy of Style Me Pretty. 

Fall Inspiration

I live in the middle of the city, which offers many wonderful advantages, but one downside is that I don't normally get away often to appreciate the beauty of nature.  This weekend, however, I took a drive through the country to visit my fiance, who was out of town for work.  Along the way, I passed a pumpkin patch.  Other than reminding me of fond childhood memories of fall and Halloween, I was really struck by the beauty and richness of the orange pumpkins.  Orange has always been one of my least favorite colors, so I never considered using it for my own wedding colors (plus I'm getting married in the winter, so it would not really be appropriate).  But after feeling inspired by the beauty of this wonderful fall color, I decided to make an inspiration board with pumpkins as my theme.  Now that it's complete, I'm starting to feel jealous of fall brides!

Winter Decorations

Although I love flowers, I also like the idea of nontraditional wedding decorations and centerpieces, especially for winter or fall weddings. There's something about flowers that just feel too summery to me. If you're worried about wanting centerpieces that smell good without having traditional flowers, consider other options, such as cinnamon, lavender, and eucalyptus.

The other bonus is that everything featured here is DIY, and considerably cheaper than purchasing flowers, and, in my opinion, still look fantastic. I have found two great websites for DIY decorations: Nettleton Hollow, based in Brooklyn, and an online store called Save On Crafts. I'm obsessed with all of these great natural, winter wedding ideas, and know that branches will be the focal point of my centerpieces!

Clockwise from top: lavender, Texas tallow berry, mitsumata branches, silver leaves, sierra red manzanita wreathe, cinnamon.