Bridal Shower – Yankee Edition

I was so honored when Mandy asked me to participate in the wedding. Besides the fact that Sean is like a second brother to me, I adore Mandy and really looked forward to spending more time with her and helping her prepare for her special day. 

As we started discussing plans, Mandy went into great detail about how she wanted an ‘eco-chic’ wedding. I’ll admit that my first reaction was like that of a deer in headlights. Eco-what? Green wedding? How on earth do you do that? Then Mandy explained how she planned to attain her goals and my second reaction was one of admiration. It takes a lot of effort and dedication to be green – to use local vendors, in-season meat and produce, and find eco-friendly items like bridesmaid dresses, flowers, and favors. 

I’m excited to be hosting the “Bridal Shower – Yankee edition”. I wanted to adhere, as much as I could, to Sean and Mandy’s vision. I had a bit of a learning curve, though. Besides recycling, eating some organic foods and using canvas shopping bags, I’m somewhat ignorant about being green. So I took to the internet and did some research. 

I deduced that Mandy has a fondness for historical locations, especially if it involves preservation of historical buildings and artifacts. So I searched high and low for a location that would suit. Not an easy undertaking. But eventually I found what I was looking for – an 18th century brick manor house in Maryland. They serve a traditional English tea and I thought that would be perfect for a bridal shower. 

My thoughts then went to invitations. I looked around for eco-friendly options – there are many out there – but didn’t see anything that I really liked. Then I thought about the most eco-friendly option – sending an evite. I was concerned because I didn’t want it to seem tacky or cheap, though I believe that evites are becoming a much more popular and acceptable form of correspondence. I questioned Sean about this and he agreed that evites were a good idea. So off they went… 

I then thought about favors. I didn’t want something that would look pretty on the table but be completely useless once taken home. If the favors were to be eco-friendly I thought it should be something that was usable (and possibly reusable), produce little waste and made with organic or recycled material. I typed ‘eco friendly favors’ into google and the first website that popped up was beau-coup.com. I fell in love with their tea sachets and thought it went well with the tea party theme. The sachets are made of silken fabric and processed in an organic certified production facility. Yes, I totally got that straight from the website. I did, however, make an eco-faux-pas because of my lack of ‘green’ knowledge. I found small organza bags for the tea sachets. I was going to go with no packaging at all, but I thought, “Hey, it’s a ‘green’ bag, plus it’s reusable. I’ll just skip the tissue paper”. When I got them in the mail I saw “100% Nylon” and had a mental moment. I went back to the website and this was the product description: 

“The corded silk handle makes it easy for your guests to carry. The bags are made of organza, a sheer silky fabric that gives the bag its see-through quality.” 

I saw “silk handle” and “silky fabric” and mistakenly thought that they were made with silk. Since many consider silk eco-friendly since it is a renewable material, I thought I was golden. WRONG. My bad, lesson learned. 

So I was able to include a few ‘green’ aspects in the shower, though not as many as I would have liked. For instance, I’m pretty sure the food and tea won’t be organic or completely local. But for my first foray into green party planning I’m pretty pleased with the shower so far. Hopefully the party will go off without a hitch and we’ll all have a good time!