will you be my bridesmaid?

so i'm not the kind of bride-to-be who just calls up her girlfriends and asks them to be their bridesmaid. not that there's anything particularly wrong with that approach, but it's just not me. having been a bridesmaid myself upteen times, i know how special of a moment it is to be asked to be one. i wanted my future bridesmaid's "asking moments" to be just as special...

i had two approaches to asking... in town and out of town. 5 of my girls were luckily in town over the holidays... 3 of them are cousins who live out of town. the brainstorming began and here's what i came up with...

cupcakes for the intown girls...

And "shipping friendly" cookies for the out of town girls...

want to know how i did it? see below!

Step 1: buy some incredible paper. 

i settled on my wedding colors (a whole separate post entirely) and from there bought two solids papers and a lovely print... the solids are both cardstock, so they will hold their shape, but the print is a little more flimsy, as i wouldn't be using as much of it. 

Step 2: cut into flag shapes

the shape and size are all on you... i wanted mine to be simple so as not to take away from the cupcake! 

Step 3: create flags.

i layered my colors together and using rubber cement (i have a secret affinity for the smell of it!), glued the layers together. once down, they were nice and stiff so as not to warp or give at all. 

Step 4: Affix flags to toothpicks

when making the flags, you want to give them a centimeter or two of room on the left edge. this will give you the room necessary to affix the toothpick to the flag. i used a glue gun to do this - any chance to whip out my mini pink glue gun is a must. 

Step 5: decorate!! 

i saw these pearls and just had to have them. my wedding is built around the idea of southern elegance... what better to convey that then a bit of raffia and a shimmering pearl?

the wonderful ladies of gigi's cupcakes helped me put the flags in the cupcakes once i got to their store. and i must say, they looked adorable. gigi's makes a wedding cake cupcake, so it really was meant to be! i presented these cupcakes to my girls at a "breakfast date" that i asked all of them to come to. i think they all knew what question was coming, but i don't think they quite expected the sweet surprise! after much oohing, awing, (and a bit of finger-licking) i had my in-town bridesmaids!  

now, the out-of-town bridesmaids were a bit trickier. i still wanted them to each have a sweet surprise, but didn't know quite how to pull it off. i certainly called gigi's in the hopes that they could somehow figure out a way to mail cupcakes... can't be done i'm sorry to say. 

but a cookie... 

i traipsed over to the puffy muffin and was delighted to discover that they would LOVE to help me. the picture doesn't do it justice, but this cookie was PRECIOUS! they did it in royal jelly (aka HARD) in my wedding colors, and even sprinkled edible glitter on them. but how to decorate them?

i went with the same theme as the cupcakes, pretty paper, raffia and pearls. each cookie was wrapped in a clear, crinkly cellophane and then tied tight in raffia for freshness. the label asking each girl to be my bridesmaid was simply tied at the top. 

with shipping a cookie comes the dilemma of packaging. being a girl who absolutely judges a book by its cover (and won't buy an ugly one if she can't help it), i knew that my cookie boxes had to be adorable. what better place to get ideas than target? 

found these perfectly sized thick brown paper package-colored boxes. stuffed them full of cream tissue and laid the cookie in. 

on top of the boxes, i used my amazing cricut to make a cake (green to reflect my wedding colors) and tied the box shut with some raffia. i couldn't help the fact that these cute little boxes were going to be shoved into an ugly USPS box (believe me, i tried), but i could sure as heck help the fact that when my girls opened said ugly boxes, that my cute one would be there to greet them. 

big hit. 

with each cupcake and cookie i included a hand made card... (made in cooperation with my cricut and the wedding cartridge). upon this i wrote a little note to each girl... nice and sappy, of course! on the back i wrote down pertinent information, including the dress model numbers, church address, hotel names, dates and times, etc. 

i hope this helps someone get inspired with how to ask THEIR bridesmaids... these were as much fun to make as they were to give! now resisting eating them, that's a completely different story...