Precap: Menu DIY

Okay so before I get into the recaps, I want to finish my last DIY posts. My personal favorite DIY was the menus I created for our wedding:

Pic by Spark Photography

I used Microsoft Publisher to create this. I started with your standard 8.5 x 11 page, and split it into two columns. I copied and pasted our monograms off our invite proofs and placed that at the top. The text was all written in separate text boxes so that I could center it appropriately, and then I just copied and pasted from one column over to another. Very simple. I liked this because it allowed me to print two per page, which saved me about $80.


I had them printed on Opal Stardream cardstock from Cards and Pockets, like all my other DIYs.

Then, we had to cut down the middle of each page to separate them.

I used a corner rounder to round the corners, and then swiped the edges through a gold stamp pad.

Below, you can see how much that little edging added to the menus. (It also matched the gold edges on our invitation, though I cannot imagine a single person besides me would have realized that).

To make it easier, I ran stacks of about 20 menus at a time through the stamp pad. I had to do it twice to ensure everything got a bold enough gold color.


At the reception, we had these slipped into the fold in an ivory napkin. They looked beautiful and I felt this was a DIY well worth the effort.


Are you designing menus?

Program DIY, Part 2

So last week I showed you guys the inside of the programs, and recently my mom, FMIL, and MOH came over to help me complete them, an easy but time consuming task, made a lot more fun by their company.


I had designed and printed the covers a few months prior at, where else, my beloved Cards and Pockets. I had 6 x 12 inch booklets made and scored so I could fold them into 6 x 6 inch booklets. I printed them on the Opal Stardream cardstock I've used for all my wedding tasks so far, and designed a fairly simple cover:

Just our names, wedding date, and wedding location.

A heads up if you go this route, it's not exactly budget friendly. 225 covers cost me $186, and that is before the cost of resume paper, embellishments, and tools used.

To keep up with our lace and pearls theme, I purchased a beautiful lace from MJ Trim here in New York City. Unfortunately, there was no name or style  number printed on it, but here's what it looked like:

Yes that's right, I set out a Christmas tablecloth in July...didn't want to wreck my mom's table with glue!

I cut 225 strips that were about 6 and 1/4 inches- I wanted the lace to be longer than the program.

We formed an assembly line. My mom attached the covers and the insides using a long reach stapler, which I think is a great way to make booklets. The long reach stapler allows you to set the size so that you can staple papers up to 12 inches long, rather than using a conventional stapler, which wouldn't have reached the binding.

After stapling, she handed the programs off to the rest of us, who used Mod Podge and paintbrushes to apply the lace. We applied it to the front cover and folded it over the spine to hide the staples and leave a border near the spine on the back cover.

Since the lace strips were longer than the program, once the glue dried we just cut the extra edges off, which gave us a nice straight cut. That way, you don't have to worry about cutting the lace straight at the beginning.

The finished product (also displayed on a heinous tablecloth, sorry!)

I'm very pleased with how they came out. They're definitely of a more formal and less trend-forward rustic look, and they were a heck of a lot of work, but I'm glad we did them.

If you're going to attempt a similar project my only advice would be to literally start four months in advance. By the time I got all our text together (and verified by our officiants), designed everything in Word, and ordered sample programs, it was already mid April, and I'd started the project in January.

What are you doing for programs?

DIY Programs: The Inside

It's been a while since a DIY post, so today I'm going to share how I made our programs, in case anyone out there wants to copy a somewhat complicated, but very pretty, project.


I immersed myself in loads of inspiration photos, and ultimately decided I wanted a 6 x 6 square booklet, with lace details.

I started with the insides of the program, brainstorming content and page size. Based on our program cover size of 6x6, I wanted the inside pages to be 5.5 x 5.5 when folded, to leave a margin. That meant the two page spread would be 5.5 tall x 11 inches wide on the computer screen. I planned to print these at home on 8.5 x 11 paper, so I knew I would need to leave a large bottom margin that I would later cut off.

So I opened a Microsoft Word document, set my page to landscape, and set my margins to .3 on the left and right, .4 on top, and 2.5 on the bottom. I formatted the page to have two columns.


I wanted four pages in the program:
1. Order of ceremony
2. Wedding participants
3. Explanation of traditions (we are interfaith, so the explanation helps if anyone's unfamiliar with something)
4. Thanks/In remembrance


I scribbled a little mini booklet on a piece of paper and folded it to see where everything needed to lay when printed in order to fold correctly, and came up with this order.

Printing these was a breeze. I wanted to print double sided, so Mr. B loaded his printer up, printed 225 copies of the first page, turned everything upside down and backwards (you may want to do a few test prints to see how your printer works), and reprinted the with page 2 on the back. We used resume paper, as it is not see through, and gives the programs a nice heft.

Then, we had to cut off the extra big margin on the bottom. That took a cutting board, razor, and a little bit of time. (And a Sam Adams to keep from boredom).

When it was done, I used a bone folder to fold the programs in half, and we wound up with the finished insides: 

Open inside spread

Back page- thanking our parents and remembering deceased grandparents

When they were done, I stacked them up and placed one of my heaviest shower gifts on top of them to keep them nice and flat.

I plan to be assemble these this weekend, and will post the finished product then!

Invite Reveal

Our invites are out and responses are coming back!!! Which means I can finally share them with you guys!

Our beautiful calligraphy is the first thing guests will see in their mailbox:

Carmela did an amazing job, right? I am 120% IN LOVE with this calligraphy. Let's see a close up, of another invite:

Sigh.

So then they open it up to see a more familiar, friendly version of their names, in the same awesome calligraphy:

Then the inner envelope with its pretty gold liner:

The invitation suite includes a beautiful customized card with all the accommodations and website details. I'm glad we spent the extra money to create this, I think it really makes the invitation look classy. Our elegant reply cards are here as well:

And finally, the invitation!

 I love them!!

An Awesome Calligraphy Discovery

I am picky about how things look, and my wedding invitations are no exception. So the idea of computer printing the envelopes, or, God forbid, hand writing them myself, is horrifying. (Well it wouldn't be horrifying if I could do calligraphy. But I can barely even print legibly).

However, I am not a bride on an unlimited budget, which means paying $4.00 an envelope for calligraphy wasn't going to happen.

And that's why I'm grateful to have discovered Carmela Mazzarulli, a South Jersey based calligrapher with a huge amount of talent and an affordable price tag. She charges $1 total for BOTH inner and outer envelopes! Combined! Carmela was also really sweet. I'm sooo happy for this discovery. Silly as it may be, calligraphy matters to me, and I love hers.

Check out some of her font styles (All pics are from Carmela, via email):

Spoiler alert, Mr. B and I chose Formal Script (second image) for our invites.

Carmela is also doing our table numbers and placecards, and can create signs and other custom work. She doesn't have a website, but you can email her at melsinkwell@comcast.net . And you can check out some reviews and additional pictures at Project Wedding.

Carmela is based in southern New Jersey, but I believe accepts work from all over, you'd just have to ship your invites (which may or may not offset the low price).

We'll be picking our envelopes up at the end of March, and I can't wait to share them (and the invites) with you guys!

Program Planning

Mr. B and I are in the process of planning our ceremony, and it's got me thinking a lot about programs. I really want to create something useful and elegant, even though I know 90% of the guests will leave them on their chairs after the ceremony. 

To avoid the black hole of craziness that I hear occurs in the month before the wedding, I'm compiling my program inspiration and brainstorming the project now. I'll share the progress with you guys in the hopes that maybe it helps with your own program design.

I know there's lots of cool programs out there, from fans, to trifolds, to those little origami fortune tellers we all used to make in fourth grade, but I'm into square booklets, like below:

 

 Source

There's so many ways to make these look elegant and beautiful, from messing around with cool font layouts:

Source

To fancy ribbons to bind the booklet together:

Source

I ordered some sample folded cards from Cards and Pockets, and loved the quality and color, so that's the cover stock game plan. Turns out C&P also prints, and provided it's not prohibitively expensive, I'll have them print the cover too. I'm all about convenience. 

I don't have to tell you that I'm obsessively debating between these two near-identical colors, right?

(Personal Pic)

For the inside, I'm using Mrs. Corn's incredibly helpful template, adjusting her margins to match my 6 x 6 folded cards. I plan to print on resume paper, to give the inside of the booklet a nice heft and a classier appearance over normal printer paper. 

And I'm also brainstorming the content, right now planning to include:

• Order of ceremony
• List of ceremony participants (bridesmaids, groomsmen, etc)
• Explanation of traditions, since it's an interfaith crowd
• Secular love quote (unless I can break down Mr. B, in which case I'm totally using this awesome quote from CS Lewis, a recent favorite author).
• Thank you to guests and parents
• A line remembering our deceased grandparents

So that's the start of the program project! What did you guys do for yours, and what kind of content did you include?

Crazy Lady Alert

Obsessively creating online samples of your wedding invites to test font variations is normal, right?

Please say yes. I'm starting to worry about myself.

(In case you're wondering, we chose the William Arthur Ecru Gilt Edge Invitations).

Addressing Etiquette

Sending our save the dates meant that Mr. B and I had to learn all those rules about how you properly address an envelope. You know, does the wife go first? Doctor first? What if the wife’s the doctor?

So I figured I’d put the rules down here, to save someone out there the trouble of looking them up. I compiled with the assistance of my girl Martha, the ladies of the Knot, and our calligrapher on the “right” way to address things. Do it your way, of course, but if you want the official “rules,” here they are:

Spell Out:

• House numbers smaller than 20
• State abbreviations (New Jersey)
• Street abbreviations (10 Main Street)
• The word “apartment”
• Post Office Box

Addressing Rules:

• If husband is a doctor, it would be “Doctor and Mrs. Daniel Brummel.”
• If wife is a doctor, it is “Doctor Sally Brummel and Mr. Daniel Brummel”
• Both doctors, “The Doctors Brummel.”
• If they have different professional titles, it is “The Honorable Rachel Hayden and Lieutenant Ryen Slegr.
• If the wife kept her maiden name, it should go first: “Mrs. Rachel Hayden and Mr. Ryen Slegr.
• Unmarrieds living together are separated by a line, as in:
                 Miss Britney Spears
                 Mr. Joseph Hawley
• If children are invited, the outer envelope is only addressed to the parents, as in “Mr. and Mrs. Andrew Horowitz.” Then, on the inner envelope, include the kids, as in:
                 Mr. and Mrs. Ross Federman
                 Jack and Jill
• For single people, address the outer envelope with their name, and include “and guest” on the inner envelope.
• For a same-sex couple, it is like any other couple: Mr. Jose Galvez and Mr. Robert Cantor.
• Children over 18, even if living with parents, should receive their own invitation

Doing the save the dates also brought up some of those fighty, awkward questions, like who really needs to bring a date, and must we honestly invite those people’s kids?  Things will still change slightly by the time we do invitations, I’m sure, but it’s a good time to hammer out all those details.

Hope this helps!

Further Resources: The Knot, Martha Stewart Weddings

Save the Date? Meh

I'm not sure what I thought the reaction to our save the dates would be. Maybe something like this:

 

Source

Okay, maybe not that psyched. But I did anticipate a bunch of excited phone calls, "the date is SO saved" texts from friends, that type of thing.

But we got nothing! Save the dates were mailed to around 120 people; three days later, not one person had commented.  I started to worry that something went wrong, since our recipients were mostly local and usually receive things the next day. We did use a flourishy, decorative font on the envelopes, after all.  Maybe the post office couldn't read them. I made a few phone calls to check on the situation. Things were fine.

In the end, my MOH and her mother reacted excitedly, calling them classy and beautiful, and Mr. B's mom heard from two guests. On my side, my dad's sister called to acknowledge receipt, and I'm not sure what was said but I know that the exchange somehow wound up in an argument. Definitely not the outcome we were going for! 

So 5 total acknowledgements out of 120. This surprised me because I spoke to plenty of recipients- friends, bridesmaids, cousins- in the five days since we mailed them. I don't expect the world to turn upside down because Mr. B and I formally announced our wedding date, it's old news now anyway, but since I was talking with people regardless, I thought they'd mention it. 

It's not keeping me up at night or anything, but after spending money and time on them, I have to admit I was hoping for a few compliments! At least notice the effort we put into beautifully addressing them, at midnight on a Saturday night no less!

Oh well. Hopefully the invites get our guests a little more pumped.

What reactions did your save the dates get?

STD Reveal

Okay so a while back, I made a list of September goals, and then promptly accomplished 1 of 4. 

But that changes today! We might be a month behind our goal, but no matter: we've finally finished our save the dates, and will be mailing them out early this week! 

After a unanimous vote for a photo save the date, we ordered the Beautiful Band design from Wedding Paper Divas, and used one of our favorite engagement pictures. It came out, in my opinion, awesome:

Here's the JPEG proof close up, edited, obviously:

We addressed them on the computer, feeding the envelopes through the printer. It was gloriously easy- the Paper Divas envelope stock didn't jam a single time, and we got 70 save the dates addressed in under two hours! The envelopes are my favorite part actually. I LOVE the font (Exmouth, a free download on dafont.com) 

The whole thing:

Overall, these didn't break the bank. We clocked in at around $125 for 75 save the dates, and 90 envelopes with our return address printed on them.  The paper stock is nice and thick, and we received them in just a week after ordering. I'm really happy with them, and I'm looking forward to hearing some feedback from our guests!

Save the Date Poll

Alright, we're really trying to choose a save the date by the end of the week. But I need your opinions! 

Would you get something you absolutely love that's a bit more expensive, that matches your invite suite, as below:

 (Gilt Edge Card, customized at William Arthur)

Or something that uses your nice engagement photos, your fiance likes better, and is much cheaper? Like below:

(Wedding Paper Divas "Beautiful Band")

If it helps, we're talking like a $150ish difference. I do love the first option, and the difference isn't exactly bank breaking, so I'm questioning if it's dumb to obsess over the budget. But then again, $150 here and there it adds up- it could be tips for vendors, my hair, makeup for two bridesmaids, etc. Cause it's not like the save the dates are the only place where we can scrape a bit off the budget.

So which would you go with? Pricey but you love, or pretty good and less expensive?

STDs: I'm So Lazy

I'm surprised at myself, but I can't get interested in save the dates. I never thought I could lose enthusiasm for something like this, but here I am, doing another 180 on my previous convictions, shamefully admitting that I'm just not on the ball with STDs. 

We have a few invite suite ideas in mind, so we've decided our STDs will be a simple, classic card that would coordinate with any of them. (I'm completely obsessed with everything coordinating. It's so classy!). We’re thinking something like this, except in all black font:

 Source

But taking the lazy way out means that I had to give up my favorite idea: save-the-date stickers, for guests' calendars! Functional and cute. 

Source

 (Mine would definitely have a much plainer, elegant look, but you get the idea).

I gave this up since you can't just put a sticker in an envelope and expect people to get it.  We'd have to design a little card with our date and an explanation ("Put me on your calendar!"), complete with slits cut in the card to attach the sticker. That's just too much graphic design and formatting for me, I had enough of that with the e-party invites! But should you be more of a champion bride than me, feel free to take over the idea, if you like it.

Here's some sticker sites options to get you started:

Vistaprint 

With pre-made designs or the option to upload custom work, this site offers sheets of 24 stickers starting at $3.99 per sheet. Not bad, considering you'd barely hit $50 if you ordered 100. Costs increase, of course, based on number of colors, paper quality, etc.   

Zazzle

Same deal as Vista, but more shapes and the ability to get your stamps too, though they have a very slightly higher price tag. 

Sticker Giant

My top choice, since they do stickers in bulk rolls of 500 (for only $125!) I like the bulk idea so the stickers could reappear in other wedding elements, like OOT bags or to seal thank you card envelopes (like I said earlier, I love when stuff coordinates!). (Also I guess then you couldn't actually write "Save the Date," you'd have to just put your names and the date and let the card say "STD").

 

Anyone else give up a good idea because they just didn't feel like working on it?

 

**As an FYI, these prices are all estimates- obviously it depends on many design factors. I also have not actually USED any of these sites, so I can't vouch for quality, just sharing some research I did on an idea I loved but had to discard.

A Jumble of STDs

So I do have some good news, my job transfer went through and Mr. B and I found an apartment!!  Lots of changes for me up ahead. It’s a blur of excitement, furniture, new job paperwork, and some not-so-minor freakouts.

But despite all this craziness, I've been trying to squeeze in some decisions on our STDs, since we want to get them out by the the end of the summer. My inspiration is all over the place: Should I do something crafty and creative? Use a photo? Coordinate them with the invite suite? (Hence my previous post on invite styles).  There’s so many options!

I initially fell in love with two really cool ideas, but nixed them both on the cost. The first were these gorgeous vintage handkerchiefs- different and elegant to me, although I think receiving a glorified snot rag in the mail may confuse people not regularly immersed in wedding blogs (so like, 95% of our guest list):

 

Source 

I also LOVED these vintage looking matchbooks below. The ornate gold and baby blue one fit perfectly in with our wedding style, and a matchbook is unique. Again though, they were just too expensive. Good thing, since I believe the Etsy seller no longer makes them anyway.

 

Source

So now I’ve moved onto stickers. They’re functional, as guests can peel them off and pop them on the calendar, without having to look at our grinning faces on a magnet every time they open their fridge. Plus, stickers are very cost effective. Vistaprint sells a roll of 500 for around $75. Having all those extras would allow me to use them in other wedding elements for a nice cohesive look- and I like carrying a theme through.

The downside of this would be that I couldn’t just pop the sticker on its backing paper in an envelope and mail them. I’d have to come up with some kind of little info card and tie it all up in the envelope, like Mrs. Giraffe from Weddingbee did with hers:

See, the magnet goes onto that little card. Source

I love this, and the opportunity they afford to be creative, but I’m concerned that with everything else going on in life now, I might not be able to devote the time to executing it perfectly.

So the next choice is the photo postcard. It's a good way to use our engagement pics, but I’m just not in love with this, and neither is Mr. B. But it is so quick and easy to execute, all we'd have to do is stop by Minted or whatever and upload a picture.

 

Source 

Finally, I love the look of an STD that coordinates with the whole invite suite though, even if it is the simplest option. Of course, that means we have to choose invites now, which I’m not sure we’re prepared to do.

Source

These Martha Stewart for Crane "Crown" invites are the closest copy I can find to the ones I posted last week. Unfortunately they still aren't cheap, and they're lacking that awesome gold border.

What do you guys think? Something different like a sticker, something that matches, or a good ol’ photo card? Leave some links to your STDs on your blogs if you want!

I Love Fancy Invites

A few weeks ago, I was browsing through a bridal magazine and stumbled upon what I consider the most perfect wedding invitation ever created:

Lehr and Black

I love the rich paper, elegant gold border, understated script, and rounded corners. They remind me of something from a more genteel era. I'm sure they're boring to some, but to me, they're exactly what a wedding invitaiton should be. I'm not into all the letterpress, kooky vintage designs, and wild colors that I keep seeing.
Unfortunately, they come with an extremely big price tag, something in the neighborhood of 3-4 grand, so they are not even remotely an option for Mr. B and I.

I tried a search for custom invitation designers, hoping to have these cheaply copied. But of course, instead of finding budget-friendly alternatives, I found even more gorgeous, and just as expensive, invites from designer Ceci New York. I venture to guess most of us don't have invitation budgets that start at $3k, but let's ogle these beauties anyway (all pics below from Ceci New York):

The Erin and Peter design

The Gold Room design from her Breakers collection

In case your taste doesn't venture to vintage gold the way mine does, here's a bolder design, inspired by the royal wedding (oh yeah that! Anyone else forget it even happened?)

The Catherine and William design- Love those blue flowers!

In love does not even begin to describe my obsession with these invites. The company does have some ready made designs, but I'm still not sure they'd be in our budget. But just in case it works out, I'm feeling the Elizabeth:

What did you guys fall in love with that was totally out of your budget?

DIY Engagement Party Invite Design

Mr. B’s parents love to have parties, and they’ve decided to throw one for our engagement. They’re hosting a backyard pool party for us at their house, so it’ll be a pretty relaxed and casual atmosphere (hope FMIL knows relaxed and casual means beer pong!) To reflect this, I decided to design some party invites with a vintage and fun feel. The look was heavily inspired by the menu at Brooklyn Bowl, a great bowling alley/bar in Williamsburg:

Source

My design, after the jump:

Classing Up The Envelopes

My younger brother was recently invited to two weddings, and while the invitations themselves were nice, the envelopes were a mess. One was sloppily handwritten in ballpoint (!!) pen, and the other was done in those semi-transparent computer labels, with mismatching fonts on the return address and guest address labels.  I realize lots of brides just don’t care about this, since the envelope usually gets tossed, but  I believe that for all the thought we put into invites, the envelopes should be a consideration as well- it’s the first thing people see when they get the invites!  My mom didn't care, but I was honestly scandalized when I saw them.

Doing guests’ addresses can be a pain, I get that. But at the very least, your return address can be nicer. Lots of companies and calligraphers offer custom return address stamps, so you can just stamp and emboss your address on envelopes. It’s perfect, as you can have a unifying, cohesive element on all envelopes from your STDs to your thank yous. It looks so good, there’s almost no excuse not to use it! (No, no one is paying me to promote this idea, even though I sound like it!)

I ordered a stamp from Etsy seller “Foryoo.” It shipped quickly, and I’m really happy with the final product. Plus, it was only $20. To me, not a lot to spend to make all my paper goods look a little better! (although when you factor in embossing supplies, if you don’t own them already, you can plan on spending another $25). (Still worth it to me!)

Here’s my stamp:

 

Personal photo with address not so covertly hidden by tissue paper

And here’s what it looked like on the back of an envelope. It would obviously look MUCH better if I didn’t  have to block out my address and last name! Kinda looks now like I don’t know how to emboss properly! Swear it looks awesome in person

And to give you a better idea, a pic from Etsy, in a different style font:

Source

Inexpensive way to add a little something extra to all the paper goods. Now I am just hoping we get a random engagement gift so I can put it to use on my thank yous!

Invitation Making Class

My mom and I love to find random things to do together. Sometimes we check out trendy restaurants in the city, to see if they’re as good as people say. Sometimes we go to wine tastings at local wineries, other times we spend hours in the Lenox outlet, ogling the china. (These activities make us sound a lot fancier than we actually are!) This particular weekend, we took the Wedding Suites class at Paper Source. It's a two hour class that goes through some of the basics of creating your own wedding invitations, and it was really fun. I'm not going to DIY my invites, but I do plan to maybe do some other elements, so I definitely felt like I learned how to add a little professionalism to whatever projects I do. The class was $30, which can add up when combined with all the stuff you’ll undoubtedly buy. It was a fun way to spend the afternoon together, could even be something cute to do with your bridesmaids!

 

Some class highlights:

We learned some basic envelope lining techniques, as well as some cute ideas to decorate the liner.

As you can see, I had a little trouble using that particular punch, but you get the idea.