spring

YOU’RE INVITED…. STORK THEMED TEA PARTY BABY SHOWER

We recently threw our dear friend Lori a baby shower for her FIRST baby!!! There is just nothing more exciting, huh? We have been “planning” her shower since the day she even spoke about a baby. We couldn’t have asked for a better day!! It was the first day of sunshine and warmth we had had in a while, and it was such a mood lifter. Lori loves her “tea time”, especially ever since our trip to JA together with our husbands’ work family. See here for those photos! So, we opted for a tea party/stork theme. What more could you need for a beautiful afternoon?…. feathers and tea! Ha!
Ok, so all of our little details…
The invite…. beautifully designed and assembled by Lauren @ Rock Paper Scissors. She completely saved us and tied everything together with all of the printed goods you will see throughout the post.
Leah and I scored with a major tulip sale from Whole Foods. Tulips are our fav!!! We used mini tin pails from the Target dollar section as vases. It was so fun to send Lori home with these beauties for her to place around her home! Just a little reminder of her special day and all of those that came to love on her and baby Mahon.
Leah and I gathered as many teacup sets as we could get our hands on! Thank God for thrift stores 🙂 I walked into a Goodwill near my home one day, and literally bought an entire table of teacup sets. They were just waiting to be used for this shower.
Nothing goes better with tea than sweets….duh! Poundcake, scones, macrons, and tea sandwiches were our food groups of choice :). These are food groups, right?
Can we talk about that diaper cake? Leah did such a great job! We always love a good diaper cake that coordinates with the shower theme. They make beautiful center pieces, and are totally practical for the mommy-to-be. We really want to get a tutorial up on the blog for you to see how we make our diaper cakes!
I ended up tying white feathers to aqua thread, and taping each feather to the ceiling and adding other feathers to the bottom of my light fixture to resemble a “nest”. Again, a time consuming project, but it really made for a beautiful centerpiece above the table. 
These moss letters were the perfect “springy” touch for our little tea party. I actually left them up for a week after the shower because I have an serious infatuation with moss. Why is it so beautiful??
I simply cut the tops of the letters off with an xacto knife, and just stuffed fresh live moss in there. It stayed beautifully, and took a total of 5 minutes!
Our favorite tea cup find! Isn’t it lovely? Leah totally beat me to the punch when it came to who would get to sip from this beauty while socializing with guests. 
These DIY tea tags were by far my favorite touch of the shower! We love showing baby pics of the mom and dad to be, and this was such a unique way to do it. VERY tim3e consuming, but totally worth it. Guests absolutely loved picking their tea and admiring the pictures. You can find the tutorial I followed here. For the tea selections that came without a string, I simply threaded a piece of green and white twine through the tea bag and tied a knot on the end so that I could add a tag 🙂 
The absolute cutest “pickles and ice cream” wrapping job by our friend, Lauren! 
The stunning mama to be sipping her tea of choice… Tazo Passion tea with a baby pic of her sweet hubby on there of course!
As guests said their goodbyes, we made sure they left with an “egg from the Stork’s nest”. We purchased little EOS organic lip balms for each of them!

RYAN AND CHRISTY’S RUSTIC WEDDING

I am so excited to feature this wedding on the blog this week you guys!! I was asked to style the wedding of our dear friends back in April, and it was so much fun. Even if Ryan and Christy weren’t dear dear friends of mine and my husband’s, I STILL would have jumped at the chance because they are incredible people who also have great style already. They are just cool without trying, ya know? 
In talking to the newly engaged couple, they had very clear visions of what they wanted. My job was to just make it come to life. The ladies on Christy’s side of the family had lots of their own creative juices flowing, so I felt like I got to come in and just “touch up” and add to what was already beautiful. The term “rustic chic” is very overused, but that is what we were going for, haha! Lots of brass, peaches and creams, navy and other natural looking textiles. The most important thing to the couple was that they married in the middle of a “forrest”. They wanted nothing but trees and guests attending the ceremony. It was a genius idea, and made the entire ceremony so captivating.
 There are so many beautiful pictures to share, that I decided to break this feature up into two posts! So, I guess you will just have to check back tomorrow to see how this beautiful day unfolded. 
The couple decided to use Nashville postcards for people to write on as their guestbook. 
Christy (along with friends and fam) were on the hunt for months leading up to the wedding looking for brass containers and candlesticks ( which you will see more of tomorrow….eeeeek)!
We decided to use old cigar boxes that the groom had on hand to present the groomsmen with their ties and a pre-wedding cigar.
Isn’t that backdrop stunning? We think so!
Beautiful photos by: Kristin Sweeting Photography
See part TWO of Ryan and Christy’s wedding HERE

SPRING FASHION WEEK: DATE NIGHT

It’s “fashion week” here at Love & Lion. We are dedicating all of our posts to Spring looks that we are loving right now.
I love patterned pants…. like LOVE them! I bought this pair of 7 for All Mankind skinnies last season, and they feel like leggings. They are also my hubby’s favorite! Who doesn’t want to wear something that their husband compliments a little more? This is my perfect date night outfit right now. I love it! I am all about nudes right now, so I chose to pair this with a nude lip  (Maybeline’s baby lips is my favorite right now) and a copper eye (from the Naked Pallet 2)

top / jeans (very similar here) / sandals (from Target, but couldn’t find online. Another cute option here / 
thick gold bangle / blue stone bangle / clutch /, watch, earrings, citrine stone ring and other stacking bracelet are old/ boutique purchases.
Photo cred: Gabriel Patillo
XO!
-J

EASTER WARDROBE PICKS

I can’t believe that Easter is this week!! It is one of my favorite holidays. I love dressing up, going to church and celebrating Jesus, and enjoying an amazing meal with family/friends. It is usually rainy here in Tennessee and cold even. However, it is calling for a beautiful day this year, and that alone makes me ALMOST more excited than eating my weight in Reese’s Pieces eggs. ALMOST! This will be Amara’s first year hunting for eggs also, so that is pretty special.
Here are some of my favorite picks for the little ladies and gents. I totally believe in buying an outfit that my child will wear beyond Easter. We don’t splurge too much on Easter clothes, but it is still fun to buy a special outfit for the occasion, don’t you agree?
Look one: dress shoes / Look two: dress shoes / Look three: dress shoes

Look one: shirt tie pants shoes / Look two: shirt shorts boots / Look three: shirt pants sandals
Any special plans for Easter or special traditions you have with your friends/family?

A VERY SPECIAL GIVEAWAY: FRESHLY PICKED MOCCASINS – CLOSED!!

Happy Happy Monday friends!! We are beyond thrilled to be teaming up with one of our favorites, Freshly Picked, to bring you an awesome giveaway this week! We truly can’t rave enough about Susan, her amazing team and the quality product they produce to keep our littles styled comfortably. We discovered these handmade gems when our babies were born, and now consider ourselves “forever fans”. We finally found something that STAYS on their feet, with an ingenious elastic band around the ankle, while helping them get their little bearings in the world. The color choices are so stunning you will have a hard time choosing…. trust us! Be sure to check out the new Spring color releases if you haven’t already! We are crushing on the new coral and camo just to name a couple. I have personally saved each pair that Amara has grown out of to pass on to my other children in the future. They hold up so well, and make great gifts too!
(GIVEAWAY- details at the end of this post)
^^ Amara is wearing Radiant Orchid ^^
To enter to win a pair of Freshly Picked moccs in your choice of color and size, please comment below telling us what color you would love to add to your child’s shoe collection!
** For an additional entry, follow us on Instagram and comment by tagging TWO friends! **
The giveaway runs through Saturday, March 15, and the fabulous winner will be announced on Monday, the 17th! Thank you all for being a part of our first giveaway, and good luck!!!
UPDATE: And the winner is Rachel Arnold!! Contact us via email mama!!