Project: Sweetheart Chair Decor

Project: Sweetheart Chair Decor

Inspiration: I saw a lot of images online with things like "I'm his Mrs."/"I'm her Mr." or something else cutesy (see examples) and the one that made me smile was the one with The Proclaimers lyrics from "I Will Be" - the "I would walk 500 miles... and I would walk 500 more" super catchy tune (and one that's very familiar to fans of TV show How I Met Your Mother). It grows on you. And it's sweet!

Cost/Materials: Rather than painting/chalking the signs, I wanted to keep with our "natural" looking materials like wood and cork, so I decided I would woodburn this one. This and all the other woodburning projects I did were the result of investing in a woodburning tool. Walnut Hollow has several good starter tools, including this one as well as some that are cheaper. I went for this one (about $35, but I got it half off using a coupon for closer to $17) because it had a heart shaped stamp tip as an accessory. For me, investing in the tool was worth it because I had a couple different projects in mind when I got it. My first time around, I tried just free-writing with what I believe they call a "flow tip," but wood is grainy and uneven and it makes it really hard to write smoothly, at least if you're new to using the tool, so I decided after my first failed attempt that I would invest in the attachable letter stamps. As you can see, they can run you a pretty penny. I got mine using Amazon prime instead, and paid only $14 total. The wooden hearts I used were from AC Moore, though they do carry similar ones at Michaels. They cost about $1.50 a piece, which is good news, because I messed this project up several times and am glad buying new materials didn't cost too much. I also used wood stain (a super old can that hadn't been touched in a decade that I snagged from my parents' basement), a small sanding block, and some pliers (to change out the tips of the heat tool without having to wait for it to cool down). You will want to make sure you have a surface to put the hot letter stamps on while they cool; I used a kitchen oven mitt.

How I Did It: I placed the letters out for what I wanted to write, and moved them around until the spacing looked good. Then I knew how many lines it would take, so I evenly spaced the horizontal lines to make sure things would be aesthetically pleasing and not slant in any wrong directions. Next I spaced out exactly where each letter would rest on the lines; you can probably see the little notches along the lines, and maybe the faint scribble of letters written in pencil. This was so as I changed out the tip of the heat tool, I'd know exactly where to stamp each letter and could get all instances of the same letter on both hearts done in one fell swoop. Once I was done, I erased all the pencil marks. One thing that takes getting used to is determining how long to press the letters down. I found that if you've let them heat up for about a minute before stamping it on the wood, it only takes about six seconds of pressing to get a good mark. If you hold it down longer the letters are more "burnt" and then look more black. I liked the natural variation my inexperience gave to the letters.

There were a few times when I really held the letter down for too long, though, which resulted in a burnt area beyond just the letter. This was relatively easy to fix up with just a little bit of sanding.  Once it was all cleaned up and looking good, I thought it looked a little... boring. I remembered that heart stamp that came with the kit and decided I'd like to do some little flowy designs with it. I entrusted that task to my mom, because #delegation. Then I stained them up!

The Outcome: Pretty sweet! I am not sure yet whether we will actually hang them from the back of our chairs, because, as my smart cookie fiance pointed out, no one is really going to see the backs of our chairs because of how the sweetheart table gets placed in our venue. So maybe they'll be used elsewhere, but they are certainly cute regardless!

Lessons Learned/Tips: (1) Free-handing takes practice. My first attempt sure wasn't pretty; stamped letters were the way to go. (2) Make sure you've run your penciled design by someone before you put the tool to the wood. I wrote out "I would walk 5,000 miles" the first time around, when the lyric is really five hundred miles. On the second time around, I wrote the same lyrics on both the hearts, when the second one should be "And I would walk 500 more" so that was a bummer. Totally could have been avoided if I had just slowed down and had someone check. (3) This is common sense for most, but I also messed up the wood stain the first time that I got around to that step. As I mentioned, I grabbed some wood stain from my parents' basement. I got a couple jars, and it ends up the first one I went with was actually more of a weatherproof sealant without much color to it... silly me, I put it on thinking the color (white) would deepen/bring out the natural tones of the wood as it dried. This is not the case. You want wood stain that looks like it's going to stain wood. Embarrassing! Not only had I not stained it, but I had waterproofed it which kept it from being stained after. Not even standing fixed that. Super frustrating! My fiance will probably not let me live that one down.

Would I Do It Again: I can't imagine doing this exact project over again, because it took three takes and a whole lot of frustration to finish it. As you can see, I took some of my frustration out by testing stamp letters on one of the failed attempts. That being said, I do like using the woodburning tool, and now that I have a good handle on it I can see myself trying other stuff with it going forward. I'd say this project isn't for the total novice crafter, if only because of how much patience you need for it.

Project: Card Box

Project: Card Box

Inspiration: I knew I wanted to have a card box because I think it really helps guests feel confident about what to do with cards (which often contain valuable, envelope-sized gifts). When attending weddings I know I've felt better when there was somewhere that seemed a little safer than just laying the card on a table. So, I saw some cute ones online, and cute ones in stores. No surprise at this point that they were expensive, so DIY it was!

Cost/Materials: At the very least, you need some boxes and materials to decorate with. Since you can design it however you want, the budget is really in your hands. The boxes can be covered up entirely, so there is plenty of opportunity for upcycling old shoeboxes, etc. I bought a set of nested paper mache ("papier-mâché" if you want to get fancy) boxes at Michaels when they were on sale for about $10, because to me it was worth it to have them perfectly sized and in a natural color. For decor I had some rolls of burlap I got at the fabric/craft section Walmart that had coral chevron painted on them. I didn't want to go very burlap crazy with my decorations, but they were inexpensive and the color was just what I was going for. The rolls are about 10 yards and cost about $3 a piece. They seem to have a large collection of them in different widths with different colors and patterns (including polka dots, lace, etc.) that are priced much lower than at crafts stores or anywhere the word "wedding" allows it to be marked up. You should also have a glue gun or another plan for creating a pretty permanent adhesive to keep everything together, an exacto knife for cutting the card "entrance" spot, plus anything else you want to decorate it with. I used a handful of wood chip hearts that I found in the basement that were mixed in with craft supplies from when we were kids and painted them in the wedding colors. The perfect touch that I just happened across in Hobby Lobby was a little paper mache mailbox ($1 at regular price for the size I got). They have them in all kinds of sizes, but I liked this tiny one to put atop my boxes to make sure it was clear what the box was for. And just to be super sure, I also labeled it "CARDS" with cork letters I had leftover from another project that I'll post about soon. The cork letters are from Michaels in the Natural Threads collection and I love them! The last thing I used was scrap pieces of paper in our colors to make the fake "love letters" and to emphasize where we had cut the hole for cards.

How I Did It: The first thing to do is make a plan for the structure: decide where the card hole will go and whether you want the boxes stacked evenly versus on angles, etc. Next, cut the appropriate holes. For me, having three boxes, I decided the middle one would have the card entrance and the cards would fall from there into the bottom box, so I cut three holes: one for the cards to enter on the side of the middle box, one large hole in the bottom of the middle box to let the cards fall down, and the third was in the top piece for the largest box (again, to let the cards make their way to the bottom). Measure these out and mark them off with a pencil before cutting so you can ensure that you like the size/location. You'll also want to make sure you don't cut the holes between the boxes too large, or you could risk ruining the structural integrity of the middle box, or making the large box's hole so big that the middle box falls in! Measure twice, cut once! That's a thing, right? Next I added the burlap. As you can see in the first picture in this section, I overlayed the burlap on the part with the card entrance so that I would know how much of the burlap to cut out before gluing it on. I didn't worry about the pencil lines I made or cutting it perfectly, because I knew I was going to cover up any messiness later on. By keeping the burlap pulled taught, I was able to put the glue on only two places on each box: first, I put it all along the top of the inside of the boxes, and folded the fabric in, and then I put it along the outside corner edge where the cut ends of the fabric met. Other than that, I did not glue anywhere along the outside of the box, because I didn't want to risk creating any lumpy areas. When this was done and dry, I cut a piece of yellow scrap paper into a hollow rectangle and added it over the card entrance, to make it easy to see. (mom's idea - she's a genius). I then painted up the mailbox in our colors, let it dry, and stuffed in some fake "love letters" (pieces of patterned scrap book paper that I just folded up and stuck inside). For the hearts, I wanted it to look like they were naturally spilling out of the mailbox. To try it out, the first thing I did was just drop the hearts all over, letting them spill out of my hand and seeing where they naturally fell. Next I made some little tweaks here and there, and I started gluing them down to recreate the look. The reason I glued them is because I want to be sure no one needs to worry about setting up the hearts or anything like that on the day of the wedding, or worry about knocking them off or losing some in transport. They're pretty secure. The "CARDS" was made by stringing some clear jewelry thread through the letters and hot gluing to ensure it would stay; more on the cork letters in a future post.

The Outcome: Pretty cute, right? I didn't glue all the boxes to each other yet because I wanted to be able to nest them a bit for storage since the big day is over a year away, but I will hot glue them to each other when we are closer.

Lessons Learned/Tips: One thing I wish I'd done was to maybe pull the burlap around the bottoms of each of the boxes instead of it being flush. Part of the reason I did it the way I did was because it would be easier and stay more flush to the corners, etc., but I think it looks a little messy. Just something for thought. Also, I originally tried to do this on a spare wood box (see photo). It just wasn't coming out how I wanted. Might be nice for something more rustic, but I tried to make it without much planning and I didn't like the way the paint came out. There's a lesson for you - no impulsive late night crafting... it never turns out as good as you think it might. Do projects when you have the energy to go through each step nice and slowly so that you don't end up wasting materials because you messed up while you were rushing!

Would I Do It Again: Yeah! And I think I'd maybe get a slightly bigger version of the paper mache mailbox... it's just so cute, I think I'd showcase it a little more if I made this a second time around.

Project: Boutonnieres

Project: Boutonnieres

Inspiration: I wanted to craft the boutonnieres myself if I could for a few reasons: (1) I don't care that much about having fresh flowers for everything, (2) flowers are expensive, (3) I think boutonnieres are silly and heavy roses drooping because the little pin can't hold them up just looks sad, (4) since our wedding is in July, it's going to be hot out and the guys will only have their jackets on for a very short time. I didn't get inspiration from any particular image online, more just kept visiting the mini florals section in craft stores until something showed up that I liked (the mini calla lilies).

Cost/Materials: Over all, making the boutonnieres saved me a lot of money. Figuring a real rose one costs about $8-10 from the florist, and that's what I spent in TOTAL on making a dozen of these, it was a slam dunk in terms of saving. I also like that it is one fewer thing to worry about picking up from a vendor/not accidentally leaving in the fridge (per every prom I've been to) on the day of the wedding, because these are now safely packaged away until the big day. The faux calla lilies were 99 cents per bundle of six, leaves were 99 centers per bundle of ten, the coral/yellow sprays were $1.49 per bundle of six, and the floral tape I got a bunch of rolls of for 19 cents each (yes, 19 cents) during a warehouse closing sale from the sunshinecrafts.com site. Also pictured: washi tape purchased on clearance and ribbon that cost about 50 cents a spool. I thought I might tape the bottoms with these but ended up not going with it and just kept the floral tape exposed.

How I Did It: I pulled apart the mini callas into sets of three and then arranged them until I thought they looked aesthetically pleasing (usually close to each other, but on different levels in height), then popped two of the leaves and a tulle spray behind them. Take your time on this part to make sure you like where everything is placed; you can do some adjusting after you tape, but not a whole lot. After I was happy with how it looked, I gently twisted all the wired bottoms together, and then folded them in half, doubled-up on itself, which resulted in a shorter and sturdier "stem" (see picture). After that I wrapped the floral tape, typically staring at the very top where everything came together and then working my way down the stem to the bottom (making sure to cover the very end) and then back up. I usually wrapped it around the top area again a few times to be sure everything was very secure before tearing the tape off.

The Outcome: Cute, right? I'm pretty pleased.

Lessons Learned/Tips: Like I mentioned above, I tried wrapping colored ribbon around the bottom to tie it in more with the colors. I ended up just liking the exposed floral tape more. Also to note, if you haven't worked with floral tape before, it will take a little getting used to. It doesn't seem very tacky when you touch it, but it sticks to itself incredibly well. Don't be afraid to pull it tight, especially working on faux flowers.

Would I Do It Again: Yes, yes, yes! I suppose we'll have to see how they perform on the day of to really know, but my fiance likes them a lot and I like them, so that's really all that matters... they're just a very small detail of the day.

Update: They looked just fine at the wedding! And boy was I glad I didn't need to make boutonnieres when I was done with all the other flower stuff we did! [Photos below by Danyel Stapleton]

Pin Fail: Rose Swirl Cupcakes

Pin Fail: Rose Swirl Cupcakes

Inspiration: Images like this on Pinterest. And a love for sweets.

Cost/Materials: Buttercream frosting is pretty simple, so we had the ingredients around the house to try it. Wilton sells little jars of frosting dye in a gel form for about $2-3 a piece which will color plenty of frosting. A "rose tip" (metal tip used at the opening of the bag for frosting purposes) runs anywhere from about $2-5.

How I My Mom Did It: My mom was the one to give this a shot. She made a batch of buttercream, then put two bags (one of each color) into a third bag that she would pipe it out of. You can buy frosting piping bags online or in store, or if you're a real MacGyver you can just cut a small opening in the corner of a ziplog bag and affix your frosting tip to that.

The Outcome: So... it didn't go all that well. It seemed nearly impossible to get the two colors to not just mush into one. And it seems like the frosting wasn't quite thick enough. This is after chilling it in the refrigerator for a while hoping it would harden up. 

Lessons Learned/Tips: This project is probably for very skilled frosters. My mom actually decorates cakes like a boss, but these cupcakes weren't just happening. If you give it a shot, I'd say to make sure you're making pretty thick frosting. And you don't have to do through making a batch of cupcakes to try doing the frosting - we did it on the backside of tiny custard cups - although you may want to eat any disappointments after, so that's up do you. Also be sure if you make them that they aren't going to melt on your wedding day - heat apparently turns buttercream to mush pretty quickly, which is why most summertime wedding cakes have fondant.

Would I Do It Again: My mom loves to figure things out, so maybe she'll try it again, but I won't. Regardless, we won't be able to use them for the wedding because the desserts need to be from a Safe-Serve certified food vendor. But maybe for a bridal shower!

Project: Initials and Ampersand

Project: Initials and Ampersand

Inspiration: Images like these ones, from Pinterest. Again, the cost of buying these just seemed silly to me, plus I wanted to do something in our fun colors!

Cost/Materials: You can get the letters and ampersand at Hobby Lobby for $2.99 a piece. They're about 8" tall. I waited until there was an "all paper mache 50% off" sale and got them for closer to $1.50 each (so $4.50 total). You could also go back each week with a new 40% off coupon to purchase each one individually (hey - I'm not above it. #extremecouponing). For paint, I'd purchased some in our colors for about $3 a tube (Hobby Lobby - "The Fine Touch" 120 ml tubes, in Neutral Gray, Permanent Rose, and Naples Yellow). I figured $9 for three decent sized tubes would be a worthwhile investment since I'd paint several things. The pink I picked out wasn't quite coral-y enough, so I got a small $0.69 bottle of a better match later on and gave it a new coat. I used regular, nothing-special brushes to paint the letters.

How I Did It: I figured the pink-ish coral for my initial, yellow for my fiance's, and gray as our ampersand. I gave each letter a couple coats, making sure they dried in between. Took about an hour and a half total - getting in all of those creases was a little tougher than I thought. Make sure you're in good lighting so you can ensure proper coverage. I did mine while watching Netflix. You know you've got a show to binge watch, so why not be productive while you do it? Plus watching paint dry is just sad.

The Outcome: Here they are! So simple yet so cute. Not sure yet whether they will be on the sweetheart table, or elsewhere as decor.

Lessons Learned/Tips: I worked back and forth, alternating between the letters, so that I could touch the dry sections of each as I added new coats. If you paint one letter in its entirety you end up touching the wet paint. Also, I had seen seen somewhere online that a person decorated the letters with Washi tape (see picture, left), so I tried this. It might just be because the tape wasn't opaque enough, but it looked pretty gross/chintzy, so paint was definitely the way to go. The paint may have some lines/imperfection close up, but at any reasonable distance it looks great, and boldly colored!

Would I Do It Again: Sure! Super easy, not expensive, and they make cute decor to keep around after. That is something that's important to me - making sure a good number of the items aren't just for the "big day" and will have future purpose.

Project: Cake Toppers

Project: Cake Toppers

Inspiration: Images like this, from Pinterest and Etsy shops had me thinking this would be a super cute, yet subtle cake topper. The price tag ($45-$75) had me shocked, though. Once I looked into the formula for what people charge in their etsy shops it made a little more sense, but paying that much just wasn't for me. Off to Michaels!

Cost/Materials: The actual set of peg dolls is regularly priced at $1.49 at Michaels. There are different versions at different price points at AC Moore, Hobby Lobby, etc., but I liked the shape of the ones at Michaels. I didn't have much confidence in my painting skills, so I bought two sets. I ended up spending $2.54 for 2 sets of people. I used my 15% of educator discount, which is why it cost less than regular price. Never buy anything at craft stores without some kind of coupon or discount! They are always running different sales. I'll write a whole tip post about this later.For the paint and paintbrushes, this is where having a crafty mom comes in handy. She had a bunch of old bottles of acrylic paint in the basement, which I sorted through to see which ones still had life in them and which didn't. If you needed to buy the paint, the small bottles are less than a dollar a piece. For brushes I had some of my own junky ones, and then found a couple nicer fine point ones. Use whatever is accessible to you - small details can be done with toothpicks if you don't have nice brushes! And if you borrow brushes from an artsy friend (or mom), make sure you take good care of them by washing them properly immediately after.

How I Did It: I checked out my inspiration pictures, morphed my own hybrid idea of what I wanted, and started to pencil it on to the pegs. Starting with this step is a much better idea than starting with paint on your brush! You can change the pencil design as many times as you need before you get started. Make sure you feel really good about the pencil before beginning to paint.

The only thing that made this project time consuming was that parts of it took multiple coats. The bride's dress I was using an bottle of something along the lines of "iridescent pearl" which was just what I wanted, but also took about 4 coats to really show up. Including that, this project only took about 45 minutes. I'd work on the groom in between coats of the dress to save drying time. In the picture you can see where the white is showing up, but notice that there are already two coats down - yikes! Patience!

 Our colors for the wedding are a pink-ish coral, yellow, and gray. I mashed up some pink and yellow paints on a spare piece of cardboard, then dipped in a thin brush to do the flowers. Add a good size drop of paint to make sure it will be thick enough to give some dimension, and just swirl a little circle until you like how it looks. Remember that the more pressure you create by pushing down on the brush, the bigger the circle becomes, so be gentle! After the flowers dried I went back in and did some tiny spots of green as leaves. I then cut out some piece of scrap paper I had left over from another wedding project (table numbers) into diamond shapes, and folded them over a piece of twine and glued them to create a triangle pennant. I wrote "just married" on the center one. My intention is to use small BBQ-like skewers to have them hang between on the cake. You might want to consider a protective/food-safe coating for the peg dolls. I haven't decided on that yet (wedding is over a year away, but I'll update in the comments if I have any later insights about that).

The Outcome: Here it is! The photo came out nice even though it was just taken on my phone - what you don't see is that to hang the ends of the string up I actually have them taped to large water jugs on either side, beyond the crop. Photo magic! ;)

Lessons Learned/Tips: It can be tough to see the pencil lines once you start painting in heavier colors (like the gray suit). I was glad I'd taken a picture of the pegs with the pencil on them before beginning to paint, because I was able to go back and reference them.











Would I Do It Again: Yup, in a heartbeat! And I'd make them for family and friends if they ever wanted them. This was a fun, quick, cheap project.

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Update: I made a veil! Took a scrap of white tulle (small roll purchased for $1 at Dollar Tree), bunched it up along one side, put some Fabri-Tac glue on it, and squished it between two pieces of plastic (packaging from the tulle) until it dried. This allowed the material to stay stuck to itself, but not to stick to the plastic it was getting squished between. The glue was still sufficiently tacky to adhere it to the peg doll, but I did add a bit of hot glue just in case.

My first post!

So I am very new to blogging (read: last time I "blogged" was on livejournal about a decade ago), but thought I'd give it a shot. I am planning my wedding right now and have come to realize a few things that made me want to blog, as I'm crafting my happily ever after:

- Wedding planning and crafting stuff is super fun for me. I am a planner at heart. I know it's not that way for everyone, so I wanted to share how I'm managing to get it done in case it helps anyone else.

- I found it SO helpful to read a few other blogs written by "real" brides (you know what I mean... the real nitty-gritty stuff, not the stylized shoot where professionals made a beautifully staged scene out of things completely impractical and/or fiscally unattainable, albeit aesthetically pleasing).

- I'm super blessed to have been brought up with a Do-It-Yourself mom, and to be surrounded by a craft army (my amazing aunts) who are able to help me get things done and done well. I know not everyone is surrounded by so many creatively inclined people, so I figured it would be nice to share the wealth by letting you know how we tackled the DIYs of my wedding.

- I am super thrifty and, as my other thrifty humans of the world know, us thrifty folk like to brag about our bargains. It's both a pat on the back for myself and a way to pay it forward to future thrifty brides to let them know where I found the best deals.

- I spent a lot of time sorting through the black hole that is Pinterest, and wanted to share with future brides how some of those things turned out in practice. We've all seen a good Pinterest fail or two... or three... or more. I'll be happy to share both the good and the bad and what I would have done differently.

Here's my plan:

I'll post about some of the crafts as I go. After the wedding I'll give some updates on how well different things worked on the day-of, since that's important info. But I know if I wait 'til after to get the ball rolling on posts it will be tough. So know that for the next year or so, these will all be "in progress" projects. :) I'll do my best to cite where my inspiration came from when appropriate.

Guidelines:

Feel free to comment if there is something you like, something you don't, something you know how to do better/more efficiently. This is all for the betterment of wedding DIY knowledge!