Previous Wedding Recaps: My Thoughts on the Day//Our Wedding Video//Hair and Makeup//The Dress//The Ceremony//Our Wedding Photos
Squeeeeeeeeeeee! I am so excited to finally show you guys our wedding reception! I had major fears, I'll be honest. I'm an incredibly visual person - I knew exactly what I wanted the reception room to look like and I tried to convey that vision as best as I could - but I had no control over what it looked like as I wasn't going to be there for the set up... 
What we had was so much better than what I imagined it would be.
Our wedding reception was in a studio - a blank canvas - and I loved that we had the opportunity to do whatever we wanted.... but it took alot of work.
Luckily, Jesse and I are blessed with the world's greatest family and friends who all pitched in and the lovely Nicolle from Ra Ra Kitty pulled everything together. Check out Ra Ra Kitty's Facebook here as her website is currently under construction.
We had no help from the reception venue so it was all on us - so a SIL army took over and transformed what was a boring empty space into absolute heaven.
We had 2 cars and our van filled with things - we created quite a few pieces ourselves and transported everything ourselves. We had our awesome friends Tom and Mel driving our van, my Aunty Judy and cousin Ange driving Mum's car full of stuff, Aunty Lyn and Uncle Kevin's car filled with stuff and extra helpers, hired a truck to cart the furniture from Nicolle's studio and Nicolle was driving her van full of things.
Our family and friends are absolutely, ridiculously, incredible and I will be forever grateful for everything they did. A bit of a three ring circus, but it all worked out.
Nicolle from Ra Ra Kitty is the queen of vintage and has so many incredible things. I knew she would create something fabulous as her studio is pretty much Kristy heaven.
I wanted a really casual reception with no formal seating and Nicolle was right on board. SIL Mama and I headed out to the markets on the Friday before the wedding to buy flowers - we ended up buying baby's breath, chrysanthemum leucanthemum (which are the daisy looking flowers) and stock flowers. Mum was worried because I'd picked all white flowers and no colour - but I knew that the colour of everything else meant that we'd be better off with simpler flowers. I love the country feel of the leucanthemum and baby's breath and I knew that Nicolle had all of her jars and vases that would fit them perfectly.
One of the main features of the reception was this gorgeous dresser (be sure to click the picture to see it in full) which was decorated with flowers (the pink flowers are Nicolle's incredibly silk flowers), photos frames, vases and little bits and pieces. Nicolle and I had a secret pinterest board and I had shared something very similar with her so I was so excited when I saw it in the room!
We had clustered seating arrangements with mistmatched chairs and couches which all came together perfectly.
The painting you see on the top right was created by yours truly - I recovered an old ugly painting (don't worry, it was cheap and not anything art-worthy :P) in torn up pages of a book called "Perfect Bride, Perfect Groom" which I bought from the thrift store for $1. Later I found that said love story was more.... inappropriate than a love story so we did spend a lot of time covering those bits up.
I then drew on the letters and hand painted them and the canvas became one of the focal points of our reception! It now hangs in our room and we love it!
The clustered seating was perfect - everyone could move around and mingle with eachother and everyone loved it - so many of our guests said it was the best wedding they've ever been to as it was so laid back and relaxed and they actually enjoyed themselves.
For us, the most important thing about our reception was that our family and friends enjoyed themselves. We know they love coming over to our house for dinner parties and barbecues and we wanted that same fun, happy atmosphere - and we achieved it.
When I first came up with the idea, everyone thought I was a bit cuckoo - but once they saw my vision in action they were totally on-board. It was a totally untraditional reception - but everything we ever dreamed of and more and I wouldn't have changed a thing!
A SIL reader who's also a Bride to Be asked me for my reception tips and I've been thinking about it for some time and have come up with a bit of a list.
Our Wedding Reception Tips:
Choose what you want - when planning our wedding, we got some preeeeeetty weird looks from people when we told them what we wanted to do. A relaxed reception the way we did it was totally out of the norm, but it's what we wanted so it's what we did - and I am so glad we didn't give in to what everyone else wanted or thought was the proper thing to do.
It's your wedding, but focus on your guests - Your wedding will be the best day of your life - but it can be really boring for your guests if you don't think about them. The worst thing about traditional weddings is being stuck at a table of people who you perhaps don't even know or get along with - so maybe think about having an area where everyone can mix together and pay attention to who sits by who. Also, make sure there are fun things for people to do - and make sure they have enough food and drinks - no one likes hangry guests!
Find wedding vendors who you adore
Our wedding "team" was absolutely incredible and they made our day so much better. Nicolle from Ra Ra Kitty our stylist, Lucie and Alban our photographers, Adrian and Amath or videographers, the Photo Social guys all helped to make our day so special as we had so much fun with them. They weren't just "staff" they're friends and were a big part of our day. Remember that the vendors you hire deserve your respect - and make sure you feed them too! (Because would you want to be working at a wedding for hours whilst starving?)
But tell me, laid back reception or formal traditional wedding reception - which would you prefer to have and attend?
If you're married, what tips do you have for brides to be?
Next post: Our Photo Booth!
Wedding Vendors in this post:
Hair/Makeup Nieves Calvo, Get Threaded Met Centre - 1300 277 122
Dress &: Allure Bridals M476 (dress) and C33 (sash) purchased from House of Brides
Photography Lucie Zeka Wedding Photography - mail@luciezeka.com
Flowers: Brides in Bloom and Sydney Flower Markets
Reception Styling & Furniture Hire: Ra Ra Kitty - 0414 319 922
Reception Venue: Contact for details if interestedJesse's Suit: Spurling Beige 2 Button Suit hired from Spurling Hurstville
Videography Adrian Tan - second shooter Amath Magnan (wedding video is here)
Church: St Paul's Anglican Church, Burwood NSW
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