Bridesmaids Gifts

We gave the bridesmaids, best man, ushers and parents their gifts at the rehearsal dinner night before the wedding so I didn't want to share what we got them before then. I'm going to start with the bridesmaids gifts.

All of the gifts could be used on the wedding day; we got them jewellery, a hair comb; a clutch bag and a pashmina. We also got them a letter tag of the first initial but that was just for the gift boxes {and hopefully they will hang them on their Christmas trees}, rather than for the wedding.

The girls dresses had rhinestones on the back so I wanted to find jewellery that had some crystals incorporated. I didn't just want crystals though so started looking for pearl & crystal earrings & necklaces. After a lot of searching {almost every set I found just had metal backs and I was looking specifically for sterling silver, since that's all I can wear myself}, I found a lovely delicate set, including earrings and a necklace, on Etsy, from seller K Garner Designs. I contacted her to find out how long it would take to make 5 sets of the jewellery and as it was only going to take around 5 days, I placed the order. They came fairly quickly, although as they were from the US, I did have to pay a customs VAT charge on them, which delayed the delivery slightly. They were packaged in a silver gift box and she had also included gift tags and organza bags for me to put them in.

Images from here

I loved the jewellery when they arrived, so I ordered myself a different pair of silver filigree & pearl earrings to use the day after the wedding, since I was wearing diamonds on the day.

I found hair combs for the girls to wear in Accessorize. They also had pearls & crystals on them to tie in with the rhinestone buttons on the back of the dresses and their jewellery.

As well as the items above, I wanted to get the girls something they could also keep and use again. I decided on clutch bags a while ago and started looking for examples and ideas. I eventually ordered them from Etsy seller Emma Gordon London. I'm not entirely sure where I first came across Emma but I loved that she could customise the bags to whatever material & colour you wanted. There were so many designs to choose from but I eventually decided on the Olivia clutch design for all of the girls and I also got one for myself too {in ivory}. While I wanted the girls to use them on the wedding day, I wasn't sure that complete purple bags would be that practical, so I chose the gunmetal grey satin instead and added purple satin lining, purple satin piping & purple chiffon frills, to match their dresses. Emma sent me swatches of each grey and purple she had for me to choose from first.

I loved working with Emma and she made exactly what I wanted and even stitched each girls initials inside to personalise the bags. I was really impressed when the bags arrived so I ordered another 2 in a different colour as presents for our mums {separate post will follow}.

I would definitely buy another bag from Emma and she also was able to make all 9 bags that I ordered really quickly. Since I ordered so many, she was able to offer me each bag much cheaper than they are sold individually in her shop. Considering they were custom made bags, they were no more expensive than buying a bag in Accessorize or somewhere similar. As you can see below, I think they looked great against the purple dresses.

Since you never know what the weather is going to be like in Edinburgh, I also got pashmina's for the girls. I did order one of Ebay but it was rubbish quality so I ended up finding them in the shop in the Grassmarket which sells loads of scarves & pashmina's. They were only £1.99 each which was a bargain! I went with grey pashmina's, like the bags, rather than trying to match the purple.

The last thing I got for them all were letter tags from POSH Graffiti. I got each of their first initials and used them as tags on their gift boxes to tell them apart. As Helen's & Hazel's were the same, I had to stick an extra tag with the names so we could tell them apart. Since each bag had their initials, we couldn't just give everyone a random box.

I painted the mini letters while I was painting our large G & G letters in the same purple colour then used thin grey ribbon to tie them to the boxes. We found the gable boxes in John Lewis and since they had some purple on them they looked great with the purple letters. {Of course I also had to get one for me so I now have a mini G that I'm going to hang on our Christmas tree this year; it helps that Graham has the same initial!}

For our flowergirl / bridesmaid Georgia, we got a couple of different things. It was her birthday the day before the wedding so we got her a white gold & diamond necklace to wear at the wedding, since her birthstone is diamond. She had only got her ears pierced a couple of weeks before so we couldn't get her earrings to wear.

As well as the hair band to wear in her hair, the brooch for the back of her dress and an ivory pashmina, we also got her a bag.

I got Emma to make an ivory bag to match her dress but with purple lining & purple chiffon frills to tie in with the other girls. It was a little bit smaller than the other girls bags and also had a strap so she could wear it across her body. Again Emma was brilliant and made exactly what I wanted.

Hopefully all of the girls liked their gifts; the jewellery, hair combs & bags certainly all looked great on the day and hopefully they will be able to use their bags again. The only thing I had told them before was that I had everything they needed for the day and all they had to get was their underwear and shoes. Ashleigh did see the jewellery beforehand as we wanted to see what it looked like with their dresses.

{I also put in a pack of Penny Heels into each box. They are supposed to stop you sinking into grass and it had been so wet the week before the wedding, but we didnt need them in the end.}