Tip - Go Green

When choosing the flowers for your wedding consider adding a splash of lime green. Lime green will make any color combination appear 30% brighter and more intense. Bright green will give your color combinations a modern and interesting look too. Tip provided by Flourish
Photo courtesy of True Love Photo

Trend - Red and Yellow Make...Fun!

This summer, red and yellow are bright inspirational colors that can stand out as primary wedding colors or add a powerful complement to a black and/or white wedding. a great place to do it is with your drinks. Hostess with the Mostess put together a lovely drink tray with a few great options.

(Clockwise from left: Pomegranate Martini & Yellow Passion Fruit Caipirinha {via Brides}; Tequila Sunrise; Bloody Mary “Light” featuring organic tomato water as the “juice”; Screwdriver & Ruby Red Grapefruit cocktails on the rocks)

Tip - Holiday Colors Discounted

If you're planning your wedding, using specific colors that happen to be popular during certain holidays (Easter, for example), check for outrageous deals right around that holiday time. After the day, you could find some items up to 75% off!! This could apply to paper goods, ribbon, linens, baskets, containers, shoes, dresses, candy etc.

All photos provided Allison Stahl Photography, Profinish Design, Sharpe Photographers, The Memory Journalists

Other Dynamite Experts featured in this storyboard:
Flourish (floral ring and floral ring pillow)
Celebrations Elegant Party Rentals (table decor w/ tulips)

Trend - Jaime Brings Darkness To Light

After watching Twilight last night, this Old Hollywood themed wedding I found over at It's A Jamie Thing has a bit of sensual darkness! Love it! Check out her original post.Storyboard courtesy of It's A Jaime Thing (for original photo credits, click here.)

Trend - Your Cake Unveiled

We love this trend of doing away with external icing and exposing the detailed layers of your cake. Work with your baker to create the custom colors that blend with your day.

Photo courtesy of Martha Stewart Weddings

Trend - Lovely Lavendar

Lavender is projected to be a popular color for 2009 (along with other shades of purple). With the varying intensities and shades, you'll be sure to find one that matches the feel you're aiming to set for your wedding day.Photo provided by The Memory Journalists
Floral design by Blooms by Martha Andrews

Tip - Peaches For Any Season

If you have a love of peaches, consider incorporating this soft color into your wedding day palette. There are many different peachy shades you can mix and match. It surely makes this cake look soft and inviting. How yummy to bite into some fresh peach puree with white cake. Mmmm....

Photo courtesy of Martha Stewart Weddings

Trend - Simplicity

Rocks, stones and petals strewn across guest tables can enhance your color theme but tend to detract from centerpieces and create obstacles. Minimizing table clutter and maintaining a simple design conveys elegance. Also, those cute glass stones you got can become cause for disaster when someone sets their wine glass on top of one, knocking it over. If you want to add these elements to your table, be sure to keep them close to the center to avoid mishaps.

Photo courtesy of The Memory Journalists

Trend - Gray Steels Brown's Thunder

According to The Knot, "Gray is the new brown. Steel gray is an ultracool color that can be used in a modern way teamed with robin's egg blue or raspberry pink. The look is softer than chocolate brown, but it's still stylish enough to carry through a contemporary wedding style. Dress your maids in steel gray with a robin's egg blue sash. Add gray to the flowers with dusty miller or silver brunia."

Photo provided by The Knot

Trend - Gold Is the New Black

According to The Knot, "Gold is the new black. Wear gold heels, use gold utensils, and dip cocktail glasses in gold-dusted sugar."

Photo courtesy of Martha Stewart

Hot! Hot! Hot!

The wedding season has started! Are you as excited as I am? What I'm really excited about is seeing all the new trends. And they've started to pop up. So let's explore one of the new trends, shall we? The hot new color combos. I love that so many weddings now are bright and cheerful. That's how it should be!

Yellow & Green

This combo just reminds me of sunshine and summertime (there's a song like that!). I really love the various shades of green.

Chocolate & Aqua

First, I LOVE this blue. And I love Chocolate brown! So how could you go wrong with this combo?

Red, Red, Red

Ah, the color of love! When I see this it just seems so passionate and so like "love".

Magenta & Orange

When I first saw this combo I wasn't so sure about it. But the more that I look at it the more it grows on me.

What do you think girls? Like the new color combos?

Trend - Flex Your Floral Colors, Save Your Floral Budget

Colors for weddings are moving away from the mono-chromatic look of repeated use of all one color. Instead shades of color in either warm or cool tones are making a new statement. To give your wedding a fun, tropical and romantic feel use a warm color palette of red, orange, hot pink and golden yellow. To give your wedding an elegant and soothing feel use a cool color palette of blue, lavender, purple and mauve.

The added bonus of using several shades in the same color family is your florist has more flexibility when choosing flowers to decorate your event. This can be a budget saver. It allows your floral designer to choose flowers that are plentiful and at the height of their season. This approach will translate to more beautiful flowers at a less expensive price.

Trend provided by Flourish
Photo courtesy of True Love Photo

Trend - Something Blue

Something Blue-According to InStyle Weddings, blue is the hue for this wedding season for your attendants. You can give them a fun, stylish cocktail ring, a cashmere wrap, a clutch treat or heels in a playful blue hue. Monochromatic, solid hues, whatever sparks your interest.

Trend provided by Dynamite Weddings
Photos courtesy of Zappos.com, Etsy.com, The Memory Journalists

Tip - Paint Chips Help Share Your Color Theme

Recently I had a bride come to our consultation with a small stack of paint chips. She made a trip to the hardware store and developed the color scheme for her wedding. I thought this idea was brilliant! When she met with me she brought a sample of her bridesmaids' dresses and the coordinating paint chips to illustrate the color palette for her event. The more visuals you can share with your wedding professionals the better. It will keep everyone on the same page and makes sure the wedding in your dreams is your wedding day reality!

Tip and photo courtesy of Flourish

Pink Still Hot?

While they say hot pink is on it's way out as the big color trend this year, it still makes a statement big or small. It doesn't seem that hot pink will ever lose it's place in the hall of fame for brides favorite wedding colors (but please use with caution). Here are some tasteful samples of how recent brides kept their favorite color incorporated.Photos courtesy of Allison Stahl Photography, Profinish Design, Sharpe Photographers, The Memory Journalists, True Love Photo

Trend - Add Colored Glassware

The new way to get those tablescapes to pop is to add colored glassware. A colored water goblet matched with a clear wine and champagne glass can make a beautiful compliment to your dinner tables. Don't be afraid to use color on your tables -- bold statements are in!
Tip provided by Dynamite Weddings
Photo courtesy of Sharpe Photographers

Trend - Nonmatching Bridesmaid Dresses

Your Bridesmaids dresses don't have to all match! A lot of brides are opting to either pick a style of dress and tell the girls to pick their own colors or give the color theme to the girls (swatches are best) and ask them to get a dress in any of those colors. It's nice to let the girls pick their dresses because they can pick something that looks great for their body type and hopefully something they will wear again!
Trend provided by Dynamite Weddings
Photo courtesy of The Memory Journalists

Trend - Experiment with Color

Experiment with unique color combinations! Tiffany Blue & Chocolate, Hot Pink and Bright Orange, Lime Green & Magenta…Candy Apple Red & Bronze…(my favorite). Don’t be afraid to do something different. Go to a paint store & pick up paint swatches. It’s a great way to explore combinations you’ve never thought of. Color can be the easiest way to add the WOW factor!
Trend Provided by Newcastle Wedding Gardens
Photo courtesy of Sharpe Photographers

Birthday Bash & Charity Event

We would like to acknowledge Catriona Arcularius' amazing generosity on a day that was meant to be celebratory of her own life.

Catriona's 30th b-day bash and charity event was held March 28th, 2008 at Blue Goose, Loomis

Benefit- '4 the Babies' a Sacramento Crisis Nurseries charity
Participating vendors

Amazing services provided by:

Jeremy Underwood, Sharpe Photographers

Martha Andrews, Blooms

Catriona, Arcularius Events

Michaela Rodgers, Plush Weddings
Steve Schon, Function 45 DJ

Sharri Black, CMC

A roast and fabulous celebration was held in honor of Catriona Arcularius's 30th birthday. Family and close friends took the opportunity to poke a little fun at Catriona's unique personality and quirks. Following this comical display and laugh out loud funnies at Catriona's expense, guests danced the night away to the best mix of music. The dance floor was lit by a chandelier and surrounded by ornate jewel trees, fabric hung from the tall rafters above, and all up lit with a teal glow. The Blue Goose turned out to be the perfect venue for this benefit bash that raised over $1,000 for the charity. The theme was anything but an old country barn hoedown. The modern lounge design was the perfect contract to this rustic barn.

Over $1,000 for charity! Kudos to all those that helped make the event so amazingly successful and to those that attended and were willing to give. Way to go!

Inspiration Boards - Dynamite Site!

Today I stumbled on Snippet & Ink, a blog focused on daily inspiration boards. These awesome daily inspiration boards are designed with mood and palette in mind. Inspirations are arranged by themes, seasons, colors, etc. with weekly Real Weddings mingled in to share additional insight. This is definitely a Dynamite Site!

Check out this sample of DIY Waterfront Wedding

Inspiration board courtesy of Snippet & Ink