Principessa Wedding Series: My Sister’s Bridal Shower & How to Plan a Bridal Shower!

Ciao dears,

Happy Valentine’s Day to all of you! I hope you have a lovely day! Whether you’re single or in a relationship, celebrate the people you love. I’m always worrying about what is too much to share or if anyone cares. I write this blog partly for myself, so maybe that makes it okay, but then I also don’t want anyone to get mad at me for posting anything about them. Never anything bad of course, just pictures I mean. None of my family really read my blog much, I try not to mention it…ha. I enjoy reading other blogs that include personal stories or pictures, so I guess other people do as well. Anyway, this past June, my mom, my sister’s best friend, Tammie, and I planned a bridal shower for my sister, Jenelle. I think it turned out lovely and was tons of fun. I though it might be fun to share how to plan a bridal shower if you ever find yourself with friends or family members getting married sometime. Also, I’ve included pictures of my sister’s bridal shower.

If you’ve been following my blog lately, you might have noticed my wedding series, in which I’ve been showing you how to make various crafts or food for either a bridal shower or a wedding. In case you missed the previous posts in this series, I’ve showed you how to make a handmade pretty wedding album, how to make treasure chest bridal shower favors, how to make a gorgeous brooch flower bouquet, how to make a bridal shower umbrella, how to make pretty kissing ball flower bouquets, and how to make cupcake bouquets and a pretty dessert table!

Step 1: Choose a place at which to have your shower and a theme or colors. Do this about 2 or more months in advance. The bridal party usually plans the shower, sometimes along with the bride’s mother or other family members. We decided to have my sister’s shower at my and my mom’s house because there’s a lot of room and a deck where people can go outside.

Step 2: Make the guest list and send out invitations about a month or so before the shower. Make sure to note if it is a surprise or not, so no one spoils it.

Step 3: Get together with the bridal party to discuss and plan the food, favors, decorations, etc. at about the same time you send out the invitations. Agree on who will make/do/pay for what. Try to do things together as much as possible, like favors for example.

Step 4: Make the bridal shower favors a couple weeks or at least a few days before the shower. This is fun to do with the bridal party. Make a girls night out of it.

Myself, my mom, and my 2 nieces made these cute treasure chest favors for my sister’s shower. Also remember to get the bride a gift either individually or a nice gift from the whole bridal party, depending on what you want to do. It might be nice to make her something handmade, like the pretty wedding album I made my sister. (See tutorial here.) I also made my sister a brooch bouquet along with her best friend. We gave her that at her shower as well. (Click here for the tutorial.)

Step 5: Get the decorations the week before the shower. My family has a tradition of having a bridal shower umbrella. See the tutorial on how to make that here. You can find a lot of cute bridal shower decorations at dollar stores as well as craft stores like A.C. Moore or Michael’s.

Step 6: The day before the shower, make any desserts or foods that can be made a day ahead. I made all the desserts for the shower. I made gum paste roses to put on pretty floral cupcake bouquets as well as lemon bars and strawberry lemonade bars. I arranged them all on a pretty dessert table. Check out the tutorial for all of that here.

Step 7: Early, on the day of the shower, the bridal party should decorate for the party and get all the food out and ready. Any drinks should also be made at this time, right before the party starts. We made Sangria (with wine and a bunch of fruit) and a Sherbet punch (not sure of the recipe, it was my grandmother’s and my mom made it for the shower).