Shadowbox Vows

A friend of mine got married in Hawaii last August and she asked if I could put together a shadowbox as a surprise for her husband with a section of their vows.  Of couse I was going to make that happen, I immediatley started thinking of ideas for it.  She gave me her vows and said she'd like the frame to be dark brown, and there to be a starfish so it matched a saying they have in the room this would hang.  I was off.

A little background about this wedding, it's kind of a tear jerker but it's priceless...

So, Beth and her, now husband, Jacob have been together for a little over 4 years and she has never been into frilly girly type things.  She's talked about wanting to get married but nothing traditional, she said her dream wedding would be on the beach in Hawaii with just the two of them.  They had planned a trip as just a vacation.  Beth had talked before they left that she would buy a dress to bring with them as a joke.  They were flying to Hawaii and heard a conversation of a couple behind them talking about how excited they were about getting married when they arrive in Hawaii.  Beth said at that point, she was just getting her hopes up.  She joked to Jacob about getting married while they were there and he shrugged it off.  Well, a few days into their trip, Jacob proposed to her on the rocks, overlooking the beach while they were fishing, she said it was perfect for what she had always imagined.  Well, it gets better... that was on Tuesday and Thursday morning they got married on the beach with just them.  She was in heaven.  It was all she'd ever dreamed of.  Her ring is gorgeous, he picked out a diamond with her favorite color.  And the pictures are pricesless, absolutley wonderful.

Ok, so here's the final product of what I came up with for her shadowbox.  I loved it, it was all I could do to hand it over to her.  She loved it and said that Jacob was surprised and loved it just as much.  I'm glad she was happy with it and that it was exactly what she was looking for. 

This is the flower I made for the shadowbox.  I found the video tutorial on http://valitasfreshfolds.blogspot.com/  This lady does amazing work.  She sells some of her templates, I would highly suggest checking out her blog.  Just amazing. 

I filled the box with 28 oz of sand from Michaels and picked out some sea shells that were unique from a bag of them I had purchased.  I added the starfish and the flower I made as a border for the vows.  I just fell in love with the words she chose.  I can only imagine how magical it was for her dream to come true.  I did have to seal the back with hot glue around where the sand sits so it didn't sift out as it settled. 

Congratulations to Beth and Jacob - may you have many happy years ahead of you!