Calligraphy

There are so many little extras in a wedding that one can quickly get lost-both in time and money. Calligraphy is one of those fancy bows to top an already extraordinary gift. You know a la Martha Stewart. Jingles bells and felt snowflakes. Every once in awhile I look deep in my pockets and spend a few more penny's than I should but Calligraphy would have cleaned out the entire piggy bank. My solution was to create my own lightbox with a piece of plexi-glass and a flex lamp. Here are the results from my trial and I have to say I'm pleased with the results. Nothing about me is perfect and neither is my expectation of my calligraphy skills advancing.

Where are you splurging and where are you DIYing?

This is going to be sweet and romantic

This early out I don't know what our wedding will look like or the words we will promise to each other, but I wanted to get as much done as possible before weddings completely suck the life out of me; and with all honesty I love the craft projects and screen printing. So here is the cover of our programs. Yeah they make me want to take a seat and watch this wedding too :)!

They are actually more ivory and less starch white.

How early did you start your projects?

We would like to invite you

The invites are done! Well, I still need to compile them and address them but I still have 16 months to do that :-D *groan*. As I booked the venue I decided I could finish printing the invites. Here they are. I wish I didn't have to cross out so much information! Oh well, I don't need to invite the whole world wide web to my wedding! I heart them, with all their flaws and personality!

Printing these invites really made it official! I'm getting married!

At what point did it hit you that you are getting married?

Cute as a Button

I found this idea on flickr searching for wedding programs. I am not by any means a graphic designer or too familiar with adobe photoshop. Like most things though I am willing to try anything, and I think I am a quick learner. Maybe? So I found a photoshop tutorial on pop-art and I started messing around with some pictures. Some of my product wasn't the greatest, but by doing the tutorials I learned a lot about some new capabilities of photoshop. Oh how I love the internet! So I took some pictures of us and started making them into cartoons by recoloring them in photoshop. The next thing I did was start looking for some prices on 1-inch buttons. In the most unlikely of places I found a button maker--MySpace.com! There were actually several guys on there that make these buttons for bands. I was almost embarrassed to send them pictures for wedding favors to these bad-asses making buttons for bands. Think Father of the bride meets Heavy Metal. I Sucking up my pride and I contacted one of the guys and he told me how I needed to resize them and it was a pretty cut and dry process from there. I was totally THRILLED when I received these little buttons!

How did I package them you ask?
I bought 100 4x6 polybags off ebay
Next 1) I recolored the background of the picture of use together 2) created a new file the size of a postcard 3) Resized my picture to be on one half and then added a thank you note to the other half 4) Created a postcard at Vistaprint.com, and 5) simply folded the card in half and stapled the set together.

I now have a super awesome OOT favor.

Cost of Project: $00.46 per set

Did you find any ideas that you thought were just too cool not to incorporate into your wedding?

My little pumpkins

My proposal was something special to me, and even that night I thought about how I would add something about it to the wedding day. Mr. Engagement wanted to actually use the pumpkins that he had created but I didn't think it was practical. My idea was to sculpt miniature versions of them and sit them on the guestbook table. I was also thinking about afterwards. I could have them on display on the bookshelf to remind me of that night! So that is exactly what I did. I waited till the material went on sale and then grab a cart full of the clay. They are not by means perfect but I love them for that fact. I modeled them out of FIMO (a modeling Clay) and then baked them in the oven to make them hard (Instructions on the package). When they cooled I painted them with watered down paint which gave them that rustic look. I think they will be a small and lovely addition to the guestbook table and then to our home!

Have you incorporated your proposal into your wedding?

Centerpiece

There are so many time I think about the cost of wedding and I just cringe! So I spend a lot of time seeing how I could do a project cheaper. So when I began thinking about my centerpieces, my idea was just to buy some white roses (a flower that isn't overly expensive) with some tapers. It would be fairly inexpensive but also was going to require some work to prepare the days before my wedding. Then my mom called and told me that there were some gold branch centerpieces on sale from after Christmas at pier 1. I hadn't been to pier 1 because I was just recovering from Christmas shock and I had already tackled so many store for their after Christmas sales. Anyways, the FI and I stopped by Pier 1 to check out the centerpieces and we both agreed that they would be a great option--inexpensive and wouldn't require too much effort--My kind of centerpiece! Together my mother and I collected 25(?) of these centerpieces. I am not sure how I will arrange them though: A) long tables with two centerpieces or b) round/square tables with one centerpiece. I also need to consider whether to add candles or flowers or table runners, OH MY!

Please ignore the fake tea lights in the juice glasses. We were just trying a few looks out.

Have you found any good deals? How would you arrange the table?

Year and a half

We are basically at the year and a half mark ! It is somewhat exciting and somewhat like this is an irrelevant marker in a very long engagement. I think of everything that has already been done and all the time that has already been invested. Please, I don't want to spend the next year and a half with the same about of time dedicated to this wedding. How do you stop obsessing? Any advice? Please? Anyways what have we completed:

* Venue has been booked!! (this is exciting)
* therefore, the date has been set!
* Invites are 80% complete
*STDs 90% complete
*centerpieces done

I'm pretty excited about completing the rest of the items. Hopefully the more I complete the less I will think about these items. Or will I continue to worry until these items are mailed and the wedding is complete?