a COZY COWBOY CHIC themed rehearsal dinner in vail colorado

Before the formal rehearsal dinner, the bride & groom set up a Field Day. You know, like the ones back in elementary school. I can’t imagine a better way to bond family and friends. Great idea!

Notes from the Bride & Groom {Jessica & TJ}: I would say the field day was probably the most anticipated event of the week (besides of course saying I do) for TJ and I, and most of our friends. We are super competitive and thought an old school field day would be the perfect way for our friends and family to bond via assigned teams :) Three of my best friends worked with us to plan the event- and I would say there was no better gift then having them put together that afternoon for us.

TJ and I put together the teams, and ordered some colorful American Apparel shirts with a sweet graphic from a local designer printed on them- and Zach, Marty and Rachel did the rest. In essence the entire event was DIY- our friends created the games based on some they seen on real world/road rules, and of course a few you might have played back in grade school.

One of the featured and most favored events was “Coconut Brawl”- they ordered a giant bag of those fun house balls and wrote answers to questions about TJ and I on them, then dumped them in a baby pool, and 1 on 1 all out brawls ensued to find the right answer (of course TJ and I had to go all out- and he took me down and ended up twisting my ankle- which I was strong and played through- but I ended up not being able to wear my gorgeous sparkly shoes on my wedding day- instead opting for the only thing that would fit on my swollen foot- cowboy boots! I think Gia has a sweet shot of me day of when I had to make that decision). They also blew up giant photos of us and cut them up to create puzzles, there were of course three legged races, straw/water races, a round robin of the rhythm clapping game “big booty”, and of course a grand finale swim across the lake for the first team to finish.

I’m sure you can tell as I gush that I absolutely loved the field day- it was a serious highlight to the week, all of our friends and family still talk about how much fun they had, and it’s always a friendly reminder when I’m in town visiting someone and I see them wearing their shirt!

All of the signs you see in any of the photos- including the table numbers at the rehearsal dinner were crafted by TJ and I. These mini table numbers and stumps were pretty easy and cute- We found a down tree in a neighbors yard so we didn’t have to cut anything down, and then TJ taught me how to use the chain saw and we sliced each round out (no two were exactly the same width or size- but we ended up using the wider ones for the double digits) then we sanded them down a bit to get rid of any splinter action. Initially the idea was to burn everything into the wood (which I had read on some other blogs) but we found that to be way too time consuming when we started out- so we went the easier route- TJ used a Dremmel with a rotary bit to carve in the numbers, and as a finishing touch I used brown paint to paint in the numbers (I bet you wouldn’t even realize they weren’t burned!) We then used all the leftover stumps for raisers under the vases + candles.

The next super easy/super cheap DIY was for the place cards. We went to the local rock quarry and picked up a container of roughly ~300 stones that looked to be the right size for $9 even. We brought them home, washed them off and when they were dry we sprayed them with a clear shellac. Then my aunt with the gorgeous handwriting wrote on all the names and table numbers and there you had it- a simple, cheap, nature chic place card! People enjoyed searching for their name in the giant heart we had set up outside the tent, and most people took them home too!