Posts from — May 2009

Easy, affordable, lovely and reusable DIY’s?  Well sign me up!  Inspired by this tutorial from Design Sponge, Tangarang’s version of this cake stand pretties provides an eclectic touch for displaying cakes and other sweet treats for any occasion.  Now bring  out all the vintage plates and decorative glasses and head over to Tangarang’s blog for the deets (via The Long Thread).

Stripes, salt water taffy, preppy hues… ahhh, summer is so close I can almost taste it!   The Martha shares the instructions and FREE wrap label templates for making these favor boxes.  Check ‘em out.  Are those fabric knot buttons cute or what?!

I knooow. My eyes popped too when I first saw their planters’ wheel invites. Charming, clever, one-of-a-kind, letterpress and yes, D-I-Y.  Can you believe it?   So much real wedding inspiration from our awesome couple today so sit back, relax and read on.

Invitations. This is the pride and joy of our DIY wedding efforts. We created these chipboard invitation wheels to give guests a creative way to get all their information in an heirloom keepsake format. They are made from two circles of untreated, recycled chipboard diecut and letterpressed to look like an old planting wheel with redwood rings on it.

We decided to do almost everything ourselves (minus the cooking and the flowers, which was all local and in season). With a little help from our friends and family we managed to have a really personal and meaningful wedding that everyone enjoyed and that didn’t cost a fortune.

Decor. We didn’t have to do much decorating since the entire setting, both inside and out was gorgeous to begin with. We just strung some paper lanterns around the room and put Xmas lights and LED votives around the porch.

Our friends were awesome in helping us pull off this wedding. They DJ’ed, tended bar, brought and ran the sound equipment, provided cookies, guarded the rings, ushered, led the tour bus to the wedding and, of course, decorated the room. We have the best friends EVER.

Ceremony. Didn’t I tell you it was a gorgeous setting? You save a lot of time and money on decorations when nature does the job for you. I always wanted to get married in a redwood cathedral and I got my wish!  It was amazing.

There was also a beautiful koi pond next to the ceremony site. Our wedding party walked through here along the paths rather than entering through the aisle as is traditional.

Wool Chuppah. This freaking gorgeous wool chuppah was designed and hand-sewn by my mother. Isn’t she amazing?! And my Dad offered to carve me some small wooden birds for my hair but they would have been too heavy so he made us menorah instead. I guess I know where I got my crafty genes!

Ketubah. I really wanted a painted papercut ketubah but we couldn’t afford to have any of the artists I admire make one for us, so we ordered this blank lasercut one from Israel and had a calligrapher fill it in with our chosen text afterward. I just printed it out on nice paper from the Internet and sandwiched it into the frame on the actual day. I drew in the places for signatures myself with an archival pen so it could get signed before the wedding.

Wedding Dress. I worked with a dressmaker to make a 40s-style goddess dress I designed for my wedding. She did a great job with the fit and construction and came up with the awesome knot in the back. It cost less than half of the typical off-the-rack dress and I got a one-of-kind gown that was literally made for me!

Place Cards. I rented a mitre saw and cut these disks from a eucalyptus branch one of the park landscapers gave me. I printed the names onto clear label sheets and then cut them into circles before sticking them to the wood. Our florist gave us a moss-lined tray to display them.

Guestbook. We had pages with several prompts to help guests with what to write (or draw), which we put out with lots of colored markers. We asked things like. “what advice would you give to new couple?” and “what was your favorite memory from today?”

“California Disaster” Table Sculptures. My husband is an artist, and one of the things he makes are tiny HO Scale disaster sculptures. We thought it would be funny if each table was represented by a typical California disaster rather than a boring old number. This is the sinkhole table but we also had things like “Wildfire,” “Tidal Wave” and “Mountain Lion.”

Recipe Book Favors. We put together a family recipe binder (presented by my gorgeous sister). I ordered the binders wholesale then had 4×6 cards printed and punched with recipes the guests had submitted with their reply cards. We also sent these to guests who couldn’t make it out to Cali. I tried to silkscreen the covers, but it was impossible without breaking them so I printed labels instead.

Thanks so much Lauren for sharing all the DIY awesomeness with us!

Got DIY’s to share? Email us!

I’m really liking the above Bari Zaki boxed sets I saw at Oh Happy Day recently.  If you’re going for a travel/postal themed affair or perhaps, just like moi, you’re a bit of an ephemera junkie, I thought you might also enjoy some of my freebie finds for your wrapping repertoire. Yup, (mostly for personal use) freebies. Look-it! Pretty red labels, check! Vintage stamps and postal collages, check!

From Poppytalk

From Just Something I Made

A few via the Collage Images Flickr Pool*…

From Alphenstamp

From Wackystuff’s Flickr

And another set from Alphenstamp

* requires joining the Flickr Pool to get free access.

Now go forth and wrap beauteous boxes, seal envelopes, decorate place cards.  And oh, Happy Memorial weekend, peeps!

I say three cheers for being more creative and less wasteful!  Here’s a few more  neat-o’s for upcycling those junk mail envelopes.

Take a sneak peek at Ugly Kitty’s already spiffy-looking DIY centerpieces (above) and  flowers for bouquets (below) that she’s testing out for her wedding next year. (via Weddings and Cookies)

Need some hanging decor? Try these mobiles (from the Painted Fish Studio).

Buntings/Garlands (via Swirly Arts)

Origami cranes to hang or use as seating cards (via Folding Trees)

Hang tags for your gifts or even a Wish Tree (via Swirly Arts)

Charming rosettes (from Papier Valise)

Spotted and definitely hearted: security patterns combined with colorful Japanese masking tapes!! (via Eco monster)

Magnets, paper beads, pendants, and the list goes on… but I must. stop. now.  Gotta run and collect some junk mail stat!