Talented Dads Are Cool

We have held probably over 250 wedding receptions at our facility in the last five years.  I can say with great certainty that every single one looks different.  Even if they have the same color scheme, there is always a different twist.  A splash of the couple’s personality in the mix.  It might be my favorite part of the job.  Every weekend, we get to see how the next couple will transform our room to fit their personalities.

A few weeks ago, we had a dad who blew our minds with his talent and creativity.  When he was showing me what he had designed for the centerpieces, I must have asked him twenty times, “You seriously made this?”

This amazing dad asked a recycling center if he could have their blue wine bottles.  Then, he painstakingly cut the bottoms off of 72 bottles and filled them with LED lights that were on a string of pearls.  Plus, he built boxes for the battery packs to sit in to keep the whole thing hidden.  Each centerpiece features one bottle sitting atop the handmade box, a single bottle filled with the LED lights, and a vase.

As part of the centerpiece, he cut some of the bottles in half and then glued them back together to create a vase.  Because it was cut glass, he also sanded down all 30 of the vases that he had created.  Not leaving his daughter’s table out, he made her a special taller vase to hold her bouquet.

As a part of the ceremony, he made each individual frame for all of the pictures.  On the ends of the aisles, he had pictures of the bride and groom in timeline format, so the guests could watch them grow up as they walked to the front of the church building.  Once the ceremony was complete, he brought all of those frames to our place for the reception and used them as part of the centerpiece.

He also made “redneck” wineglasses for the head table by gluing mason jars to the tops of candle holders.

For the bride and her bridesmaids, he included labels on their glasses for personalization.

To tie the whole “wine glass” theme together, they had a wine barrel wedding cake that was completely edible.

The groom (and bride) are big husker fans, so the groom’s cake featured a husker’s football jersey on it.

I found his craftiness too cool not to share!  The best part is that this dad is actually a taxidermist!  He must have lots of spare time now that his beautiful daughter is married!  What do you think?  Have you ever tried the method of cutting bottles that involve pouring fuel on string, then lighting the string and hitting the bottle on a hard surface?  Supposedly it creates a good cut, however, this dad just went and purchased a wet saw.   I think he told me he cut and sanded over 100 bottles!