Invitations Are Out!

We finally got the invitations in the mail!! But after some delays because of a few days of constant rain (yes, it does rain in the desert) and not wanting to risk get the invitations soaked. For those of you we see on a regular basis - don't worry - we will hand deliver as soon as we see you.

Here is a shoot of the different labels we made using Martha Stewart's craft punches and the amazing Avery labels I talked about in an earlier post.

My favorite is the Doily Lace punch bought from Walmart (pictured on the bottom). Michael's Craft Stores also has the punches from Martha Stewart and the store seems to get new ones everyday. I wish we would have gotten this Valentine Lace punch before we did the labels.

The best thing about being available at Michael's is their 40% off coupons. I have one in my purse and maybe this weekend I will have to get this punch. Or this Mini-heart punch.

Tough decision.

Best Wedding Product Ever

Okay, so it really isn't intending for weddings and I am sure there are tons of other "best wedding products" out there. But for a DIY bride like me you can't live with out these:

They are 8 1/2 x 11" stickers that you can feed through your laser printer. I think that Avery also makes some for Ink Jet printers as well. It is only about $13 for a pack of 25 sheets and are avaiable at Office Max and Staples. They are intended for shipping labels but can work for som many other things. Maybe they are not as cool as having a Xyron Sticker Maker but I feel they work just a good, if not better, and more economical. The sticker is very thick and easy to work with.

I have been printing labels galore and cutting them down to whatever size and shape I need. I have used several craft punches like pictured below to keep consistent with our papel picado banner theme. These are way easier to use than printing something out on paper and then gluing/taping to another piece of paper. It is also much more secure. For some earlier projects I did without the stickers, I had problems with the corners sticking down, etc.

From Martha Stewart Crafts at Walmart.

I originally got the labels to make our invitation address labels to go on our black envelopes. They worked like a charm. Matt did all of the printing, punching, and adhereing to the envelopes.

I have found many more uses for them and they will pop up in a couple of more DIY projects I will feature over the next few weeks.

I have found that searching the aisles of office supply stores has provided me with several shortcuts for my wedding decor. Craft stores are great of course, but the office supply stores also have products you can make work for your DIY projects. Sometimes you just have to think outside the box.

Anyone found their own "best wedding product ever' and want to share?

Custom Map How To

So for those who know me it is no secret that I love maps. I collect antique maps, dream of someday wallpapering my craft room in maps, and my dissertation research is centered around maps. Therefore I wanted to have an awesome map for out wedding invitations.

Well as discussed in an earlier post about our invitations how I really wanted a custom hand drawn and colored map. This wasn't in the cards so I improvised and put my map making skills to work. I cannot freehand draw at all and won't embarrass myself by showing you a scan of my initial freehand draft. But I can for some reason trace using a computer mouse. It is sort of an extension of my own arm. Matt and I worked on this project together and was definitely a successful joint effort.

click to enlarge

To do this map I used Adobe Illustrator- an easy to use vector based graphic design program but unfortunately expensive. I started with a Google Map of Phoenix and then traced all of the essential roads. I then used symbols to mark the landmarks. I got the symbols from the Illustrator symbols library, downloaded some new ones, and designed and drew some of my own by tracing over scanned images. For several landmarks such as Camelback Mountain I imported a photo and traced over the outline. I then colored in the symbols. For a handmade feel, I downloaded a handwriting font from Free Handwriting Fonts to label all of the roads, etc.

I took my file to Office Max and printed color copies onto white cardstock, 4 maps to a page. I then cut them down to size and printed driving directions to our Fiesta Reception site on the back. The total cost was about 4 hours of work to make the map and only $0.11 each to print which included the paper. Yeah student discount! Normally they would be about $1.20 per page and depending upon the size of the map you could fit 3-4 per page. I am no "expert" using Illustrator but if you were just starting out with this program it would take a lot longer. Most of my time wasn't really drawing but design decisions. I drew inspiration from other wedding maps I have seen on the internet.

If anyone out there wants some additional advice or some help with their own custom map - send me an email and lets talk. I wanted to incorporate tons of other ideas into our map but this was just a 4 by 5.5 card! I would love to design maps for other couples.

We wanted a map that was useful, accurately showing how to get around town, as well as gave some insight to our personality and relationship. I think we did a great job and this is my favorite wedding DIY project to date. I can't wait until we graduate and move to do a similar "We've Moved" postcard to inform our friends and fam of our new address.

Wanna an Invite to a Party?

Before we left town for the holidays we finished our DIY invitations to the Fiesta. This was a big goal of mine because I knew the next few months would be full of small projects and I didn't want this big one to be drawn out and up all hours of the night addressing them. The goal with the invites was to translate the vibe of our reception - fun and festive with lots of color.
I have been supper jealous of all of the great Gocco stationary projects I have seen out there in the blogoshpere. But this wasn't feasable. Both becasue of the cost and that they are no longer making some of the supplies :(. But I think I made good use of our home laser printer and colored card stock. I used several different edge punches (via Martha of course) to make little papel picado banners and the address labels. These patterns appear all throughout the reception decor.
I wanted to have a pocketfold design of some sort but wanted to keep the amount of paper per invitation down. It seems that some pocketfolds out there are the size of a book. Lots of paper and postage expenses with those. So instead of a pocketfold ours is more of just an invite with a small pocket on the back for the inserts. Also in an attempt to Go Green without Spending Green we asked that people RSVP via our website rather than including a reply card.

The map printed on the back of the Directions insert is my special pride and joy of this project. I really wanted a custom map by Laura Hooper Calligraphy or Couture Maps by Stephanie Barba. I wanted one so bad I was even considering cutting my dress budget down to dollars to make it happen. Then I realized that "Hey, I draw maps and figures all day long. I can do this." I don't make hand drawn maps and couldn't free hand anything like these ladies but I do have some mad skills using Adobe Illustrator. I will have a detailed DIY post later on how I designed the map but for now check out this post from Elizabeth Anne Designs.

Now that they are all done we can begin the tedious task of addressing them. In the beginning I had high hopes of learning calligraphy. Well as with several other projects - that had to go. So instead we are using our trusty laser printer and a package of full sheet labels cut down to size. We designed them so they wrap around the back of the envelope with our return address on the back and we are using the same font as the rest of the stationary (Merceed). Matt is getting in on the action and printing and punching them out. The plan is to print a sheet of labels a day and they should be all good to go for mailing in no time.

Going Green without Spending Green

After seeing this post on Earth Friendly Weddings about a giveaway for a new book called "The Green Bride Guide", I got to thinking about how we are trying to green our wedding. My graduate research focuses on issues of sustainability and human impacts on the environment in the prehistoric past so naturally treading lightly on the earth today is how I like to live. Having a Green Wedding or Eco-Wedding is definitely a big trend in weddings and there are numerous resources and blogs out there for tips and tricks. As I started looking into how to green our wedding I came across all sorts of ideas from hemp paper and soy ink for invitations, biodegradable confetti, and organic champagne.

To be honest, most of the ideas I have seen on how to green your wedding just seem to be encouraging couples to consume more and spend more money. As if the wedding industry doesn't try to suck you dry enough as it is, they have to capitalize on popular social movements. Whatever happened to the good ol' fashioned REDUCE, REUSE, and RECYCLE?

We are going to try to green our wedding by just trying to consume less, forgoing many of the unnecessary (although some would argue essential) things found in many weddings. Today I will focus on ways we are trying to REDUCE and the next few posts will be about how we are REUSING and RECYCLING. I am not claiming that we we have a zero-ecological footprint wedding by any means. The mroe you investigate any choice the more environmental impact do you uncover. But we are trying to do our part by making smarter environmental choices where we can.

1. Less Paper. Why is there always an inner envelope in wedding invitations? This always seemed to be unnecessary, wasteful, and now that I am addressing our own invitations - time consuming. We are forgoing the inner envelope, large pocketfolf invite, place cards, and return RSVP notices to reduce our paper usage. We are asking guests to RSVP via our wedding website rather than send us back an RSVP. Not only is this less money for us but saves an envelope and the ecological cost of delivering mail. Our webiste service Nerlyweds has a built in RSVP feature. I thought about forgoing the invitations altogether and exclusively doing email invites, but I have too much Martha in me.

2. No Wedding Party. This may seem like we are missing out but it also means we are saving $$ as well as resources by not having to dress, primp, and gift a wedding party. We just want to have a good time with all of our friends at our wedding. By treating all of our guests as special, we are not playing special treatment as well as consuming way less.

3. Less Fresh Flowers. The flower industry has numerous environmental as well as social implications. (see this article) The pesticides and herbicides get into water supplies and are also extreamly bad news for the health of the workers. Many of are banned in North America but not in South America and Asia where most flowers are grown. Then there is also the environmental impact of shipping the flowers to the US. We are not cutting flowers out all together but are reducing. We will just have a bouquet for me and a boutonniere for Matt.

Photo from Flowers by Jodi. This is my inspiration bouquet. Mine will be made with different flowers, unfortunately still not local. But I am in continued talks with the florist if there can be more earth friendly options.

Our reception will be decorated with a few tissue paper flower bouquets which goes great with our Mexican theme. Okay so we are using paper which is cutting down the rainforests. Not ever choice is without consequences. The point is that there are small better choices that can be made that still give us the wedding we want while also trying to reduce our environmental impact.

4. Two Receptions. I see what your thinking. Having 2 receptions isn't exactly REDUCING the number of resources we are using. But in a way it is. We have a few friends from out of town flying in to Arizona for our party. (insert cringe here - HUGE carbon footprint). But having a recpetion in my hometown means that by ginormous extended family wiill not be making the flights to Arizona and staying local. Our immediate families and us will be making the treck to all the receptions but all of these trips is still far less than all the traveling that would occur if we were just having one event. If we just had one event in AZ or in NE there would be alot of travel and therefore increases in carbon emissions, jet fuel, etc. Hosting two events locally means travel impacts are cut way down. Although there are increases in other resources. Argh! Tradoffs.

5. Outdoor Ceremony and Recptions. Okay so this may be a silly way of REDUCING our resource use. But being outdoors for our ceremony and both receptions means we will be using less electricity.

So I don't think our wedding is deserving of any 'Outstanding Green Wedding' nominations. But reducing our impact is something we have tried to incorporate both for the environment and our budget.

Making Progress...

I have decided to take a break from blogging in an effort to actually get some wedding tasks done instead of just talking about them. I am even going to cut down on my regular blog reading. Oh the horror! Believe me this makes me sad. I actually love working on wedding stuff. I just can't seem to get many things finalized and checked off the list. I made progress on several things over the long weekend and want to keep up the momentum. We are just a few days away from the 4 month mark (which is also my b-day!) and I am beginning to panic. So when I return I hope to have the following tasks completed:

1. Order my wedding dress. I hope it looks something like this....

Photos from here.

2. DIY project - a cardbox.

My inspiration is from a great bride blog: With this Ring.

Check out the instructions and more photos here.


3. Finish Fiesta Invitations. Okay let's be honest in 2 weeks I hope that about 3/4 of them are done. I would say I am about 1/5 of the way there. At least I finally decided on the final version and have all the supplies. Still need to finalize the map with directions to the reception site.

4. Address and mail Nebraska Reception STD. This will involve some cooperation from my mom to get me some addresses. I may have to wait until I am at home for Christmas.

5. Purchase the groom's wedding band (or at least a plan for when and where to get it).

6. Test another recipe for Dessert Reception. I am going to try making pates de fruits (a fancy French gummie) for a holiday party.


Photo from Martha Stewart.





7. Finalize Cake decision. Currently we are leaning towards Sprinkles Cupcakes. We had high hopes for a Southwestern Prehistoric Pottery cake to pay tribute to our dissertations but this is looking to be to an expensive option. Since we don't really want a boring white traditional wedding cake we are considering cupcakes to keep with our fun whimsical vibe. Sprinkles even has an option to add a sugar saguaro on top. And I could DIY a cupcake stand I thought about a few weeks ago.


Well I think this list is ambitious to finish over the next week and weekend. But necessary to make some progress. Wish me luck...

Save the Date Sneak Peak

Here is a little sneak peak at our Save the Date cards for the Fiesta in Tempe. I am making all of our invitations not just to go easy on the budget because I love being crafty. Later in the week I will post about we put them all together. We printed them on our laser printer and I used an embossing method using supplies I already owned to save on the budget. We also have plans to hand deliver to everyone we can to save on postage. They have a fun crafty component that I hope our guests will love!

Weekend Projects

I have been crazy busy over the last month and have been really looking forward to this weekend. Even though I still have things to do I promised myself that I would take the weekend to relax and work on some wedding projects.

Guestbook
I found this guestbook a couple of months ago. The cut out design goes great with many of the other decorations and papel picado theme. I added some of our favorite engagement photos using cardstock in our colors. I am calling our colors turquoise, fuchsia, lemon, lime, orange, and plum. I wonder if there are food related terms for turquoise and fuchsia?

Agave Favors
I made a couple of tags for the Agave Favors. I hope this project works out because about half of the agaves look like they are dying. I wanted to work on this project so I could submit an entry for the Martha Stewart Weddings creative favor contest. You can view my entry here. Take a look an rate my entry! I hope Martha will like it. It is sort of my secret dream that she will see it and I will get to go to the show. Fingers crossed!


Papel Picado Banners
I did some work on more Papel Picado banners. I think for the maximum color I will probably do most with just a decorative edge using craft punches. I think the hearts are a little cheesy.


Invitations
I made a first run at the Fiesta Reception invitations. I want to do a mini papel picado banner in our colors. I think they turned out pretty well. The photo is a little blurry to to fully appreciate the details but I love them. I love the font too. It is called Merceed and makes the Ms of our names look really cool. Matt likes it because it looks like a pirate font.


So even through I didn't finish any projects to the point I could cross them of the list, I did make decisions about alot of things. On the list for the rest of the month include:
1) continue dress shopping (spent all afternoon looking and even was about to place an order for one I LOVED - only to find out it was discontinued!!!)
2) print and finish Save the Dates for Fiesta
3) order cake, think about design

Winner!!!

So I am always entering contests on the Wedding Blogs I read. Usually they are for different on-line stores that sell wedding favors, invitations, jewelry, etc. Well I finally won one! I won 25 free Save the Date cards from Minted via the Brooklyn Bride blog. Brooklyn Bride is an awesome blog full of great ideas. Minted is also an amazing on-line shop with hundreds of pretty paper designs. This is the save the date I picked out:


Usually with these blog contests you check out the on-line store and post about your favorite item. We had just gotten our engagement pictures back and thought this invitation (called Exotic Lovebirds) would look really cool with the photo below. I am very excited! Unfortunately we won just 25 and am not sure we can afford any more (these 25 are about the cost of our entire invitation budget). So yet another decision to make - who gets one of these. Oh, decisions...

Invitation Ideas

I love this idea for a save the date card from
http://www.birdandbanner.com I think I will try to recreate myself and include tissue paper and instructions for a Mexican paper flower.