Sunday my mom, Ashley and I made the wedding favors. It was a little time consuming but the three of us made 200 in probably 2 hours? Maybe less. We had pre-cut tulle circles. You can find them at Michaels, or any craft store. We actually got ours and the ribbon we used at Norfolk Wholesale Florist. They are well worth their $6 to $10 price tag ( for 80- 100 circles). I can't imagine the nightmare it would be to cut circles out of tulle yourself. We had ordered two 5 pound bags of customized M & M's. They are not the cheapest. Upon receiving them we realized we definately needed more M &M's so we looked at Michaels first since we knew they carried a variety of solid colored M &M's. However their selection was picked over and the M&M's were a little beat up. So we headed over to fresh market where we found the perfect ones.
Ashley is having fun puring the M & M's!
A plethera of M& M's!
Here's some close ups. Note: when ordering customized M & M's you can pick up to three colors. I chose pearlized white, light blue and lavender. So when we went to the store we picked out some brighter, more fun colors. That sea foamy light green, a bright limey green, and that periwinkle color. I really like the mixture of colors and they will go well with the rest of my wedding colors!
The first set was to set up the handy folding table. Which has served us well for our somewhat DIY wedding. We have used it for making the bridesmaid dresses, as well as putting invites together, and getting them ready to mail.
My mom also pulled out her xacto cutting board as well as a rotary cutter. Notice on the one side there is a ruler so we or Ashley(she ended up with ribbon cutting duty) could measure and cut ribbon super fast. She was cutting 12" lengths of both a bright blue and a sage green ribbon. This method worked extremely well.
I was given the job of scooping and gathering. We were using a tablespoon as our scoop and started off using about 1 1/2 scoops and by the end more like 2 scoops. I would say 25- 30 M & M's per favor. after scooping the needed amount onto a tulle circle I would gather it up evenly and hold it out for my mom to get that first starter tie around it ( It was real difficult to do yourself) then I would move to the next one while she made the bow.
Here are some finished favors.
There were 2 layers in this basket.
And we ended up with a good amount leftover!
So we did need more than ordered but number wise didn't need to add so many. However, I am alot happier with having those extra colors added in. We will probably set a nice bowl of these remaining M & M's out for our guests to enjoy at the wedding. We will also set the favors with each place setting.
All in all it was not too bad of a process and if we had more people helping it could have been done alot faster. We plan on using the same method for the birdseed which will be thrown at Zach and I while we make our grand exit. Fingers crossed I don't get a mouthful!
