Wedding Favours On A Budget

[Barmaid]

You'll be bored of me by next June because I'm going to need LOTS of inspiration............ I'm helping to organise the wedding of two good friends. Unfortunately, we now have significant budgetary restrictions. Having dealt with some of the bigger costs quite efficiently, we are now looking at some of the smaller areas.

Bride wants wedding favours that are a bit different. The couple are a country couple (they run a small farm) and are very eco friendly and enviromentally "conscious". Bride also wants these DIY (rather than bought in). So my task for you for today is to come up with some inexpensive wedding favours that will look pretty, wont cost the earth and are in keeping with the couple. If they could possibly not be too complicated, that would be a bonus since I imagine yours truly will have the task of making/assembling them.

Over to you and TIA.

[friedgreentomato]

I have a dear friend who is marrying next year and she is donating her wedding favour fund to an animal sanctuary, at each table setting there will be a card thanking the guest for their understanding and informing them that they have rescued a chicken or horse etc etc

[gness]

Best wedding favour I received recently, Barmaid was a small jar of jam made by the brides Mum.....Label read...Wedding Jam...with the name of bride and groom and a cover from the left over material we had used to make bunting....x

[Mamyalynne]

Pressed flowers or leaves made into bookmarks.

[Eve]

I think that is a lovely idea fgt!

If they are determined to have something to give then how about some homemade sweets or lollipops?

[rowanwitch]

Wild flower seeds

Buy in bulk (or colour themed annuals) Make packets from small envelopes with a wedding image on the front Seeds of love or love grows

Or small jam jars with ribbon round and a tea light in could be painted with glass paint intowedding theme colour or little jars filled with home made jam or chutney with pretty 'mop cap' covers

[mazie]

I think that's a brilliant idea fgt.

[mazie]

Some great ideas BM.

[Barmaid]

Some good ideas here. Rowan - I thought the seeds might be a good idea - the bridegroom has just set a wild flower meadow in honour of the big day and I thought some of those seeds might be nice.

Really liking the jam idea and the bookmarks idea. I'm probably not creative enough to make the bookmarks though. It would look like something a primary school child had done. We could probably make jam from some of their home produce. I'm doing a recce next month so I'm sure once I've raided the orchard I could come up with something.

I don't think they would go with donations to an animal sanctuary - probably because they've already rescued several chickens, a couple of sheep and a few ducks this year.

[Barmaid]

you see, I knew if I asked on CB some good ideas would flow forth!!!

[Sqad]

\\\\You'll be bored of me by next June\\\

By Xmas, I would guess ;-)

[wolf63]

You can buy paper made out of Elephant poo. Does she keep any animals that may be able to assist you in the production of some paper?



:-)

[Barmaid]

I'm sorry, I just have to share this.

Google "small jam jars" and go to the Amazon hit. 13th suggestion down is "Grow your own Cannabis". pmsl

[yinyang]

What about tiny tree saplings wrapped in hessian tied with a ribbon and label. http://www.nurserymen.com/trees/weddings/kellie-02.jpg

[Barmaid]

You're doing well then, Sqad. Mr BM was bored of me by last Christmas ;)

Wolf, I'm not sure what can be made out of sheep, chicken, duck or dog ****, of which they have plenty.

[Barmaid]

That's a nice idea Yinyang. And given that I have a close friend who is a forester that might be doable.

[Ellipsis]

So in a nutshell you want something ...

A bit different
Eco-friendly
DIY
Inexpensive
Looks pretty
Quick and easy to "make"

Quite a challenge!

Seeds would be good but I don't think you will have a chance to collect enough of them DIY given your time constraints now - a year ago, you could have planned properly.

The Californian poppy is a really good plant to share among friends. See this article, for example:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/gardening/howtogrow/3311595/How-to-grow-California-poppy.html

You could buy a load of seeds quite cheaply, then put them in your own envelopes with some very simple printed instructions and a message of thanks.

[gness]

We begged, borrowed and stole jars, Barmaid.....looked nice all being slightly different.
Another idea...print off all Squad's replies and make them into little comic books.... ;-)

[rowanwitch]

I am suffering from Wedding planning withdrawal.... keep asking....

[coccinelle]

What about corn dolllies? I used to make them years ago and if I can make them anybody can!! Plenty of corn left round the fields at the moment...

[rowanwitch]

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Chatsworth-Simply-Scatter-Flower-Butterfly/dp/B007R3Z8BY

cheap seeds here