Monday

Chris and Narineh Ferderer

My first big gig on my own was the wedding of two of my closest friends, Narineh and Chris. Because I love them so much, I offered to do the coordination AND the flowers for the wedding.  This was no little task especially with the bride’s varying tastes and styles.  We finally agreed on a whimsical garden theme with birds.  Lots of birds.
Her main color was a sage green with an accent color of “all”.  I turned that into bright pinks, purples and green and used roses, hydrangeas, snap dragons and freesias, stock, and jasmine.
The ceremony site had three pomander balls, two urns, a giant swag and aisle markers.  The pomanders were designed by my friend and co-student, Kim.  We used purple carnations and green button mums.



The aisle markers were a lot of fun to make.  I took styrofoam balls and cut a hole in each of them.  I then place a water tube in the hole and covered the ball with moss and bouillon wire.  In the water tubes, I placed hydrangeas, spray roses and jasmine and placed a butterfly on each of them.  Add ribbon and a very cute wreath stand (with birds of course) and voila!  A unique, whimsical aisle runner!





The reception featured three different styles of center pieces.  The first, was a tall cylinder wrapped in jasmine placed inside a twig birds nest I created with a vine ribbon.  Inside the cylinder was a floating candle and the whole thing was placed on a square mirror.



The second style was a white pitcher with hydrangeas and roses and other stuff.  This was also set in a birds nest and placed on a square mirror.



The third style was a small vase with a hydrangea head placed inside.  I then added roses, jasmine, and hydrangeas and placed that in a nest on a square mirror.



For the sweetheart table, I created a love nest with the vine ribbon, jasmine and small floral arrangements placed around the table.  

For the bride’s bouquet, I put together a loose hand tied and wrapped it in the vine ribbon to create a nest.  Placed inside the nest was a tiny bird.  This was such a big hit with the bride that when she got up to the alter, the first thing she said to her husband was, “There’s a bird in my bouquet!”.



The boutonniere’s were white calla’s with green china berries and green button mums.  For the groom’s boutonniere, I used green bouillon wire to frame the calla lilly.




Now, for the coordination side of things.  
The wedding was held at Wedgewood Banquet Center in San Mateo.  I really enjoyed working with the staff of Wedgewood.  They were very friendly and cooperative and the center itself was very reasonably priced.  
The ceremony was in the morning and we couldn’t have asked for a more beautiful day.  It was warm, with a light breeze and I heard many of the guests comment on the beauty of the view.
It was a very simple ceremony and went well other than the officiant forgetting the exchanging of the rings.  Not to worry, during the pictures we did a retake and got the ring ceremony out of the way.



The reception was a lot of fun. The food was delicious and the cupcakes by Cynically Delicious were absolutely sinful.



It was a fabulous celebration of the love between my two friends and I am so grateful that I got to be apart of it.




Congratulations Mr. and Mrs. Ferderer!



Sunday

A New Business Venture

Starting a new business is a daunting task.  Figuring out the right name and business model is a real challenge not to mention filing all the paper work in time!

Now a bit about me.  I am currently studying Floral Design at College of San Mateo.  In the past, I've worked with a popular Bay Area wedding planner, helped at several local floral shops, and have planned a few corporate events and weddings on my own.

What is a Sassy Diva, you may ask?  Well lets break it down a bit; SASSY- adj.  to  be lively, bold, full of spirit; cheeky.  DIVA-an admired, glamorous, or distinguished woman. Thats me.  The Sassy Diva.  But don't let the name fool you.  I can do classy, sassy, whimsical and affordable.

So here is my journey, for all of you to enjoy and to help spread the word.  The Sassy Diva is in town and ready for business.  On this journey, you, the readers, will get to see my class projects, my personal designs for my wonderful customers, and any events that I coordinate or design.  I will also be posting pictures of the latest trends in weddings, corporate events and anything else I think looks cool.  I'm new at this blog thing, so bear with me as I get used to updating *hopefully* once a week.  Also, feel free to contact me if you would like to be a guest blogger.

Thanks for sharing this journey with me.  I am looking forward to seeing where it goes.