Busy Little Bee

There's obviously been some dead air on my blog lately, but that definitely doesn't mean that my hands have been idle.  We're about 2 months out from the wedding now, so I've been busy chugging away at all of the projects that I had planned for myself.  The following are some highlights of what has been keeping me away from the blog:

Garter
Using a little lace that I ordered from Etsy, some $1 bargain bin blue ribbon, a pair of cheap rhinestone earrings from Charlotte Russe that I deconstructed, elastic, and a little sewing, I threw together a garter for about $10.

Accent Pillows
In what was obviously a non-wedding-related project, I used some remnant blue silk taffeta to throw together a couple of accent pillows.

Pete was a fan.

Wedding Cake Topper
Little wooden peg dolls seems to be in the in thing in wedding cake toppers these days. There are a handful of Etsy sellers that make personalized ones, chief among them Naked Peggies . They cost somewhere in the neighborhood of $60-$75. Because I love a good trend and it seemed within my realm of artistic abilities, I made one myself. Naked Peggies sells unpainted couples for $3 (or at least she did, as she doesn't seem to anymore), and I picked up a little round wooden box from Michael's for $1 that I used as a pedestal. Otherwise, I just used some acrylic paints that I had around, glitter, wood glue, a tidge of mod podge, and some scrap fabric and ribbon. In all, it cost me maybe $7, and I honestly get a little giddy every time I look at it. In case you're wondering, it's based on dress #2, when I will actually be wearing dress #3 down the aisle. Oh, well.

Invitations
The invitations have really been what has taken up the majority of my time. To anyone thinking of doing their own invitations, I would warn that it takes a lot of time, and while you may convince yourself that you could save 80 or 90% of the cost of ordering them, you're wrong. You will save some money, but it won't be an overwhelming amount, so you should really be in love with your DIY version to make it worth it.

I began by designing them in the same way that I designed the save-the-dates. Then I printed them out on card stock.

I opted to forgo an inner envelope, and instead used some baker's twine (from Etsy seller Whisker Graphics) with a little paper disk to serve the same function of personalizing the invitation.

Using a handy paper cutter, I cut out each invitation, RSVP postcard, accommodations insert, and envelope label.

Then I rounded every corner (because I just had to have rounded corners...)...all like 2,000 of them!

Then, I assembled them.

Finally, I stuffed and addressed them--utilizing a tip that I read somewhere to number the RSVP postcards in case folks mail them back without having written the name in. And yes, addressing wedding invitations is just about as much fun as it sounds like it is.

Now, they're all ready to be shipped out this week. So exciting!