Wedding planning is such a big journey, and I am so excited that I get to plan my wedding alongside my brides and share in this special season! In that spirit, I want to share a little wedding update with you guys and hopefully a little inspiration for any other brides who are looking for bridal party proposal gift ideas!

If you know me, you know that gift-giving is my LOVE language. I get super excited about putting together the perfect gift and it lights me up to love on other people that way. When it came time to officially ask our bridal party to be a part of our big day, naturally, coming up with perfect proposal gifts was super important to us! Before I dive into all the fun gifts we put together, let me tell you a little more about our wedding party…

Our Wedding Party

Our wedding party is slightly non-traditional (by New Jersey standards). In addition to Ryan having five groomsmen, and me having five bridesmaids, I also have three of my sisters as my house party! If you’re not from the south you may not be so familiar with the term ‘house party’ – but it’s a tradition that I thought was super fun and unique. A house party is an extension of the bridal party, and are often assigned specific wedding day tasks that vary from a standard bridesmaid. You can read a little more about House Parties here!

Because I have four sisters, and some very close friends that I wanted to have all be a part of the wedding, I was struggling with not necessarily wanting to have a huge line up of bridesmaids, especially when Ryan would only have five guys. My little sister, Megan, is my Maid of Honor, (along with my best friend, Alex). I wanted to have each of my older sisters involved in a different way. And having them as my house party was a way for me honor my other sisters and also give them a stand out role that fits with them/their personality.

Each sister will have their own role, but just to give you an idea of one example – our dog Lily is going to be our flower girl, (I’M SO EXCITED!!!). One of my sisters, Lauren, is going to be Lily’s “person” for the day. She’ll make sure to have her ready for portraits before the ceremony when we need her, keep an eye on her throughout the day, and of course walk her down the aisle during the ceremony. Lauren is Lily’s go-to babysitter any time Ryan and I are out of town, and I know that Lily loves her to death, so choosing this role for her was special to me (and to Lily).

I’m excited to share all our wedding party proposal gifts! There was a lot of thought, intention, and effort put into all of them, so they all feel really special. Let’s start with the house party!

In case this post inspires you for your own gift giving and bridal party proposals, I’m throughout this post and listed at the bottom, I’m sharing links to all of the items that you’ll see in these gifts. Some of these links are affiliate links!

The House Party

I love the quote, “Sisters are different flowers from the same garden.” And I feel like that couldn’t be more true. Growing up with four sisters was so much fun. We’re all super different, and I love each of them so much and cherish our unique relationships.

Starting off with that quote in mind, I wanted to give them a tangible reminder that they could wear on the daily and be reminded of our sister bond. To make sure they knew the quote, I started off with some handmade paper with floral fragments in it. (This handmade rice paper and this Lokta paper card set are both really beautiful similar options!) I wrote that sister quote on each of the flowery pieces of handmade paper. To go along with that, I ordered custom engraved, matching bar bracelets. I ordered them with double sided engraving. One side of the bracelet says “different flowers” and the inside reads “same garden”.

In addition to the wearable element, I wanted to make something for my sisters that they could display in their home, so when they see it each day, they’re reminded of our sisterly bond. 🙂 I made these sister “definitions” including a photo of the five of us as little kids, and printed them out on a small 5×7″ sheet of plain white handmade paper. I wanted to show off the deckled edge of the paper, so I bought these cool float frames to put them in!

My sisters all mean the world to me so it was important to me to put together a gift for them that speaks to that special sister relationship, and shows them how much I love them. Whenever it comes to gift-giving I always like to try and think of the end result first: what do I want them to feel when they open this gift? And then go from there!

The Bridesmaids

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These are my bridesmaids right here. I love these ladies so much. Ryan and I threw an “engagement party” in August to officially ask our bridesmaids & groomsmen. We called it an engagement party because it was still a surprise to a couple groomsmen & one of my bridesmaids that they were going to be in our wedding party. (We shocked the pants off of Tori Kelner, my photog bestie, and it was amazing.) In order to get them to the party without ruining the surprise we called it an “engagement party” – hehe.

I know there are tons of gifts out there that have “bridesmaid” written all over it, and they are super festive and fun to give as a gift! But I wanted to try and put together a gift that felt a little more unique with items that would still be relevant after the wedding day!

I got Polaroids printed of me with each bridesmaid from this fun little Etsy shop! You can print any photo (iPhone, camera, etc.) onto a Polaroid!! I’m obsessed with Polaroids so wanted to include this in the gift! I also found a shop on Etsy to get these custom clip board frames made! I could put any text I wanted on them, so I chose “Soul Sisters” for the top, and on the bottom, a quote I love, “Stay close to people who feel like sunlight.” These ladies feel like sunlight to me, and have all impacted me and my life in such amazing ways.

The next element was these cute hair bows from Simple & Blush! To make each one a little bit unique I wanted to choose a specific color for each girl that fit with their style/personality.

I’m all about picking out new special perfumes for different occasions, so I was pumped when I found these fun perfumes at Anthropologie. They were fun colored, and also had sweet little messages in the box. One of them said “For the littlest biggest things.” I loved that.

The Painted Press is a favorite shop of mine, and I love their adorable jewelry dishes. Again I thought about ways to customize it with our wedding date or “bridesmaid”, etc. but I wanted the dish to be something they’d use and would feel relevant beyond our wedding. So I chose this pinky promise design for the jewelry dish.

I am all about crafting, so I was excited to get these plain wooden boxes and stain them to the color I wanted, and add a little personalized touch! Using white transfer paper and this tracing stylus set, I was able to copy over the names in a fun calligraphy font and this pineapple line drawing! Then I just went over the transferred white lines with a white paint pen to make it permanent!

Lastly, finding a good proposal card was important to me. I wasn’t seeing any cards out there that felt unique or special enough, so I reach out to my girl Alex, of Summit and Sage to see if she could custom design some bridesmaids/groomsmen proposal cards for us! Our “engagement party” was pineapple themed to symbolize welcoming everyone into our bridal party. As you know, I love pineapples and everything they stand for, so it just felt right to be the theme of the party, and I was hoping to carry that pineapple-y goodness over to the proposal cards too! And boy did Alex deliver! Needless to say I’m OBSESSED with these pineapple scratch off proposal cards she made for us!! Alex is literally amazing and if you ever need any stationery design or graphic design, you’ve gotta reach out to her.

The Groomsmen

Ryan’s groomsmen gifts were simple and fun with a similar vibe. His best man, Will, was unable to make it to the “engagement party”, so Will’s girlfriend came as a stand in to accept Will’s gift for him. <3 Thanks Kbay!! 😉

Ryan’s groomsmen gifts started off with a Polaroid of him with each groomsman, too! We’re all about the Polaroids and have a ton of them hanging in our living room, so it felt appropriate! : )

Ryan also got custom engraved shot glasses for each of his guys, and a tiny nipper bottle of alcohol to go with it. Ryan was super intentional when choosing the types of alcohol to pick something that either had a fun memory associated with it, or was a favorite of that groomsman!

Ryan had a matching set of groomsmen scratch off cards, made by the one and only Summit and Sage! I loved that she used all different colors for the envelopes and made the stripes in the background a green color, to compliment the pink color I had for bridesmaids! Seriously how fun are these cards?! And the cute little monogrammed pineapple on the back! I can’t get over it.

Lastly, Ryan also got smaller wooden boxes and stained them, and I traced the names/pineapples onto the tops! These boxes were just a hair too small to fit some of the alcohol bottles so I would recommend getting a slightly larger box than you may think you need!

OUR “ENGAGEMENT PARTY”

Okay, as a bonus, while I’m reminiscing, I just have to share a few pics from our “engagement party”, or as I like to call it, our bridal party party. 🙂 My BFF/MOH, Alex, put together the most amazing celebration for us and I’m so grateful that she hosted this for us! From the most epic cheese board I’ve ever seen, to all the pineapple-y perfection decorations, she knocked it out of the park in every way possible! So beyond grateful to have a BFF like her. <3

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HOUSE PARTY GIFTS

Float Frame: Amazon
White Handmade Paper: Amazon
Floral Handmade Paper: Amazon – Rice Paper or Paper Card Set
Custom Engraved Bar Bracelet: Amazon

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BRIDESMAIDS GIFTS

Scratch-Off Pineapple Proposal Cards: Summit & Sage
Polaroid Prints: Occasional Motto – Etsy Shop
Polaroid Clipboard Frame: Etchey – Etsy Shop
Pinky Promise Jewelry Dish: The Painted Press
Hair Bow: Simple & Blush
Perfume: Anthropologie (Anthro ran out of the kind I bought, but these would be a great alternative! They always have great scents in rollerball size at Anthro!)
Wooden Boxes: Amazon
Wood Stain: Amazon
White Paint Pen: Amazon
White Transfer Paper: Amazon
Tracing Stylus: Amazon
White Crinkle Paper: Amazon

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GROOMSMEN GIFTS

Scratch-Off Pineapple Proposal Cards: Summit & Sage
Polaroid Prints: Occasional Motto – Etsy Shop
Engraved Shot Glasses: Personalization Mall
Alcohol Bottles: Local liquor store
Wooden Boxes: Amazon (The ones we had gotten were a little too small to fit some of the alcohol bottles, so I would recommend checking something out like these ones!)
Wood Stain: Amazon
White Paint Pen: Amazon
White Transfer Paper: Amazon
Tracing Stylus: Amazon
White Crinkle Paper: Amazon