Elizabeth Taylor in pictures

RIP 1923 - 2011

weddings, harmonicas and soaking it up

This weekend I have probably my biggest wedding to date, not as far as in numbers of guests, but more so in the amount of handcrafted and designed elements.

I’m so happy about it, the house is a sea of paint, paper and packaging ready to cart everything to the venue where it will shine. I love the week in the lead up to weddings, its where I work my best and its also where I am my happiest being creative and truly loving what I do. I love watching it all come together… but as I think I have said before, I love the celebration the memories that are being created and my little styling elements are there for the ride.. it humbles me.

My Bride and Groom this weekend are a breath of fresh air, there wedding style is unique and fun and they are so relaxed and easy going. This is a bride who left her wedding cake in my hands, Im so looking forward to her seeing it on the day of her wedding.

Image via {love and lavender}

It’s also the first ‘real’ wedding I am shooting with my dear friend and photographer Jen of Jennifer Sando Photographer, we have worked commercially together a lot, Jen is one of the coolest people I know she is currently working on this I want to take a portrait of Eddie Vedder … Mmmmm Eddie Vedder…the first time I heard of this project was on a long drive to a shoot and she was telling me about her idea and I loved it, I knew immediately that she would rock it out, and she certainly has.


I grew up in a family that at Christmas spent weeks in preparation, all of my cousins and I have ALOT of them would practice for weeks and every year we would have a talent show, and sing songs and do skits for our parents, then the parents would all put on a show for us… it was all very Sound Of Music.
My Opa loved it so much and I can remember seeing his face when I was dancing to the ‘Peppermint Twist’ and he was claping along and happy, young and old  would put so much effort into all the details, our costumes, the décor and the food, I’m sure this is why I do what I do, and I’m even more certain that it is why it warms my soul.

{Here I am right at my Opas knee.. with only a pinch of my cousins and my sister.

We would all sit and get gifts and then the talent quest was on followed by dinner and lots of dancing, Harmonicas and Boney M were usually involved }

Every event I do I always think of my Opa, like he is there with me it is a bit freaky but even if I’m in the middle of a set up,  I see his face and know he would enjoy the events I create so much.

My Opa Johannes and Oma Lily loved Dancing

I can also remember being very young, maybe 8 and sitting on a bench overlooking the meadow where my Opa lived and in his beautiful strong Dutch accent we were having a discussion about what he liked most about celebrating, which with the size of our family we did almost fortnightly,
he said his favorite thing was to sit back from afar and ‘people watch’ and how much he loved watching all of his children and grandchildren just being together, I sure enough I can remember him sitting on the bench in the middle of parties often and I knew precisely what he was doing.. Exactly what I will be doing late on Saturday afternoon …..

Soaking it up!!

Bessie

Our beautiful bicycle Bessie has a very important job to do in a few weeks time.

The next 6 weeks are our biggest yet.

I really cant wait to share with you what I have been working on for so long.

Most importantly I cant wait for the lovely couples who, over long conversations about decor, linen, food and every aspect that is a well styled wedding, I have come to call my friends.

I'm so happy for them.

I find it hard to get the right words out on what a privilege it is that they chose me to help them with the most important day of there lives.

In other news, I'm off to Melbourne for the weekend. My husband and I are going (child free) to see The Stone Temple Pilots ... we are driving back home though beautiful towns like Daylesford.
Last time I drove through Daylesford there were so many wonderful finds in the thrift stores but the backseat of the car was filled with much more precious cargo, my 3 boys. So I had to buy sparingly.. even though my 9 year old carried a stool on his lap all the way back to Adelaide ;)
This time.. the boot and back seat are free... will show you my finds on return.

Have a lovely weekend whatever you do.

Please check out The Handmade Hullabaloo where I have a new and wonderful gig as a contributor. with some amazing company a project by the talented Ann from Little Red Bus

Lets Make Lemonade

The concept was one I had wanted to shoot for some time, I was actually planning to shoot it as part of an advertising campaign in May 2011 .. When I received an email from Alanna the sweetest girl ever, she asked me if I would style their shoot, we are deep in the throws of organizing her amazing wedding, now when I say amazing, it’s the stuff dreams are made, anyway I digress, she asked me if I had any time to help with their e-shoot..

I told her ‘of course I did’ and did she have a concept.. sure enough her concept was almost the same as the one I have been storing in my head and dreaming of, so similar our story boards even had some of the same pictures on them… we both could not belive it, it was Crazy! But we have come to know while working on her wedding that we have the same style and adore the same things.

The concept is simple really, a love story with a lemonade chaser.

‘Girl meets boy on a hot summer’s day, driving up a windy road in his beloved Kombi Van,

He stumbles across an oasis of refreshing lemonade and a cute girl to boot,

She gives a smile, he stops the car and the rest, as they say is history.

On her stand she sells, home bakes goods, cookies and of course lemonade, individual serves as well as take home bottles, she also sells lemon butter in jars covered with liberty printed fabric,  flowers and posies made from daisies and herbs.

Why wouldn’t they fall in love forever, nothing else could happen on such a sun kissed hillside

They live happily ever after, of course’

Alanna and Tim (Bride/Groom) had booked in a date with her wonderful wedding photographer Christine Pobke from www.pobkephotograhy.com and was looking for a location. We didn't want to do the usual 'lemon orchard thing' we wanted to have a different setting, with a lemonade stand.. wanting to choose somewhere that showed off South Australia at it best! Not long before this I had visited the Barossa Valley one of the worlds finest wine regions and come across the most magical boutique vineyard Bethany Winery perched up on the hillside www.bethany.com.au  it all came together. Christine Pobke's style is fresh and it speaks to me, its whimsical and playful, she is an artist and each shot she shoots is a piece of art! I think some photographers just shot, they dont see what they do as art, which is to me what makes a stand out photographer.. like Ms Pobke!
The sun loves Christine and she loves the sun, the rainbow in the ring shot made me get goose bumps, perfect! the result is dreamy, like a dream sequence, and that's what Alanna and Tim had wanted from the start.

We had a few things going on, a very subtle nod to hot air balloons, this will make sense to those who attend their wedding in April,  Alanna is a lover of all things whimsical, the colour scheme was yellow and white with soft grays and some blues and peaches thrown in for good measure.

With our huge collection of props and vintage wares we made it homely and authentic,  with a retro twist, the Kombi vans from www.kombis4u.com.au were an absolute highlight for everyone on set, they are the colour of butter and were just so cool.. I haven’t stopped dreaming about owning one since. If you are thinking of hiring these for your wedding please do, not to mention these are the hottest cars around the owners of these vans are truly some of the nicest people you will meet, I imagine on a wedding day they would make you feel comfortable and happy.

And of course no e-shoot seems complete without beautiful round sunny balloons!

We had the most beautiful couture cookies made up from www.spoonandfork.com

And small posies from www.lotusflowershop.com.au

Aside from the lemonade stand, we hung a custom made sign in the tree stating the name of our shoot

‘lets make lemonade’

The lemons hanging with twine are possibly my favorite part of the shoot, but the little detail of lemon cookies also hanging was just adorable.

Up on the hill under a beautiful gum tree we set up a shag pile rug and loosely covered it with lemons and vintage hanky bunting and tied the tree, the ties to me are symbolic of the years they have been together.

Alanna and Tim looks so cute in there outfits I think I told them that about 4000 times during the afternoon.

We also set up a bedhead draped with ribbon garland then paper leaf garland and paper chain all handmade loveliness.

The sun started to set and I just remember thinking..  how the people around on the shoot were really so fantastic, you could feel the warmth, my friend and assistant Lisa (thanks for your help my sweet friend) and I packed everything up and sat on a rock looking over the vineyard eating pecan pies.... satisfied doesn't even cut it.

Really can't wait to share this wedding with you.

Also, had to share their Save The Dates.... Save the Dates people!!! don't you just LOVE the attention to detail!!! really amazing!

Em xo

We Have Moved

To this new blog :)

Everything from the old bloggy is up here now and this willl be the new place to find us :)
Thanks so much
Em xo

Woodland Folk Party

I know most of you have seen these pictures, but I really want to put them into a blog post... bear with me
Taken by my freind and brilliant photographer Jen Sando http://www.jennifersando.com.au/ we adore the pictures so much, I cant stop looking at them.

plants for guests to take home and make a little bit of 'woodland'

printables - Love The Day

Popcorn

I wanted to make the fabrics very folky, loved the woodland cupcake wrappers from

The Cupcake Wrapper Co.

Belinda from Sweet Treats, cakes and cupcakes, made the AMAZING cake and cupcakes!!

Boxes filled with honeycomb

and really the most beautiful cookies in the world from

Spoon and Fork

handmade chocolate owls and squirels made by Archie and I

AMAZING! hey, truly breathtaking

Spoon and Fork

I love to put unexpected things on tables, so we sourced logs og wood and I found this sweet sqirrel neckalce to hang from it, so cute! and I have it in memory of the day to keep forever.

green toffee apples and almond bread.. mmmmmm

little treats, printables Love The Day

Darling Archie - has his photo smile down! :)

little chocolate crackle nests and a jar of half macarons

Mini terriums lined the long table with deer and toadstools inside, a grass runner and lots of tasty treats 

Some of the kids at the photobooth - Peace!

the outdoor lounge area, and cake table number 2

Horsey's

handmade photobooth props

This cake was truly and work of art!!!

sweet treats, cakes and cupcakes

Feeding a possum, we had a wildlife person come with her collection of animals, the kids loved it

Xavier, Darcy, Sophie, Banjo and Billy in

Deep in Woodland chatter

My little boy turned 4 on late November, we worked together on his party, not long after he turned 3 he told me that he wanted his next party to have owls and squirrels, I suggested some gnome folk to keep the animals happy and a 'Woodland Folk' party was born.

He very carefully selected the guests, he is a shy little guy and only wanted people on 'his' list, so we went about sending inviatiosn to 40 family and friends.

I was originally goign to do it at home, but we were looking at a property for sale and happened upon this old hall on the edge of a forest and I was hooked.

It was so much fun making everything, including sewing the sweet table background by hand.. wont do that again in a hurry! and it was a really hot day so it ended in true Aussie style with all the kids down to there underwear having a water fight....

So much fun!

Happy Birthday Archie ... You have my heart!

Preppy Christmas

Each year, I like to create a different look for my Christmas table, and while I love snow and the nostalgia of a 'white christmas' this year I wanted to make something that was more casual and fun. Vintage is beautiful but its been done to death right ?
I new I wanted to do red and white, and some where along the line navy came into the picture, and wha'la a "Preppy Christmas" was born.

I contacted the lovely Lindi from http://www.love-the-day.com/ to ask her if she would like to collaborate with me and design a printable party pack, I purchased her 'Harvest' pack for Archie Woodland Folk party and it was wonderful, I was so impressed not only with the amount of things in the pack, but the endless possibilities for using the goodies inside, and you can reprint them until your heart is content.
The packs include Welcome sign, banner, cupcake wrappers, water bottle labels, chocolate wrappers, cupcake toppers, food flags, gift tags, and so much more I forget, a whopping 24+ pages.. WOW!
You can purchase this from here http://www.etsy.com/shop/lovetheday
so easy and you have plenty of time to make your table all 'preppy' for the 25th of December.
Even used as a boxing day BBQ for styling would be so cool. I adore Lindi's work, please like her on facebook as well, cuteness and creativeness overload.

No Christmas is complete with out macarons, they are little bite of heaven, soft, sweet and very special.
Silvana from "The Mac Factory" is the Mac Queen ... for real! the Mac Factory is opening soon in Hutt Street in Adelaide's CBD and is sure to be a massive success, with over 50 flavours.. FIVE ZERO people!!
I have used these mac's in every buffet I have done so far and the flavours of all the ones I have been lucky enough to try are to good to explain, you cant pic a favorite because they all leave you weak at the knees.
So we did the Macaron 'Ivory Tower' these come in small, med and large and are so perfect for any event, wow people at a wedding or birthday with one, I love this one so much!!

Then we also had, blue, red and white and then very super special ones with red glitter dusting.. OH MY GOSH! so good! like 'The Mac Factory' on facebook also, for updates of the store opening.
http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/The-Mac-Factory/147897728587207

All Photographed by the lovely http://www.jennifersando.com.au/ we had fun, as always, then we ate macarons for a few days after .. and blissed out. Jen and I have known each other for probably 6 years, she is inspiring and a great support to me, Im looking forward to 2011, Jen and I have some amazing projects in the works, I cant even tell you how blessed I feel to have a friend who is also an amazing photographer, so talented and lovely all in one!

Okay, now to the food, I wanted to include 2 recipes that are easy and fun so they are
an starter of Prawns on Cucumber and Dill salad.. very yummy!!! and Eton Mess for dessert..
then as no Christmas should ever go with out a cocktail, a Mint Julep .. so good, best. drink. ever.
I have attached recipes, and they are also on my facebook page www.facebook.com/whiteroomevents
in the Preppy Christmas album :)

 

I didn't set a table for you to see as such, I'm saving that for Christmas day, but I love how it turned out.