Bridesmaid Hangers - Pinterest Inspired

Some of you know I got married last November. Which is part of the reason why I slacked on the blog. Sorry about that! Anyway, I've finally got the time to update the blog on everything I've wanted to share over the past year. :)


Bridesmaid hangers!

 


I absolutely love the bridesmaid hanger shot. You know, with all the bridesmaid dresses and all on matching hangers. So I started to research how to make those really cute hangers. I didn't want to spend $20 on a hanger for 1 picture (which is the cost to buy it via etsy) especially since I had other ideas for gifts for my bridesmaids. So, DIY it was. :)


I also made them for my mother and my fiance's mother. I got the hangers at Bed Bath and Beyond. Then I went to Michaels and got the blinged stickers. I really wanted to do glitter, but my MOH hates glitter and calls it "The H*rpes of Craft." Haha. She says glitter always gets EVERYWHERE! And since my Bridesmaids and my dress have zero glitter on them, I didn't want them to have any glitter specks on their dress.




One of my bridesmaids is married, so I put her last name on the hanger, And I put my new last name on the hanger as well. :) I don't know what the bridesmaids thought of them, but I think they liked them. I can't wait to see the photos from the professional photographer!

All in all, I love the way they turned out.

DIY Wedding Invitations

Man o Man.  The wedding invitations were probably one of the biggest decisions of the wedding.  I started looking for invites early, and either I didn't like them, or they were obnoxiously over budget.  So I mixed and matched.

I was a bit picky with the invitation itself.  Seriously, I think I had 100 + samples sent to me over a few months because I couldn't figure out what I wanted. I wanted the raised lettering for the invite so that it was a bit fancier, so I didn't want to print the invitations myself.  I found some beautiful Vellum invitations at Michaels. My theme was vines/shamrocks and these were leaves and trees.  But they were close enough and I love the way they turned out.

I'm also a huge fan of the pocket invites.  So I ordered the pockets through cards and pockets and created the inserts myself.

























Honestly, the inserts were difficult. Not the RSVP.  That was pretty straight forward, although I was not 100% sure what to put on the RSVP.  In hindsight, it would have been better to ask who wanted the Chicken, and who wanted the pork.  Instead of a circle for them to fill in, a line probably would have been better.  Oh well, just a lesson learned.




But trying to figure out what to put on the inserts.  Very challenging.

Misc on the Left, Directions on the Right.


Although the most challenging thing was creating the map.  I took a screenshot on google maps, and then placed it in paint.  Then I just drew the lines and then deleted the background.  It took a LOT longer than I expected.



I also ordered the damask monogram band through cards and pockets.  These I could have printed at home, but by this time I was tired of printing everything, the RSVP, misc and directions were difficult

Another big decision was the envelope color.  I knew I wanted calligraphy on the invitation envelopes and I knew I wanted the RSVP envelopes to be the same color as the invitation envelope.  My colors were Dark Purple and Dark Green. If I had envelopes in dark green, how would I address them?  I would have to use white labels, and I thought that would look tacky.  So the two choices were lighter green and white.  And I didn't want white.  So light green it was.

I ended up getting some inspiration for the labels. I put a little shamrock on the labels for the RSVP's and for the return addresses on the invitations.  I thought it looked very cute. :) The addresses for the invitations were done in calligraphy by my husband. He is a man of many talents.


I couldn't believe how long everything took to make.  I would recommend budgeting about 3 weeks for 100 invitations.  Especially if you are DIYing everything.


I don't think I would change anything, except the trees... I would have loved to find a vellum invite that had shamrocks or something on it.  Just small details only I would notice. I still love the way they turned out. :)

Do Not Disturb - Pinterest Inspired

I saw these on Pinterest, and I absolutely loved them.

 

So off I went to Vistaprint. I designed the layout myself and sent it to Vistaprint to print it there.  I had a groupon so I printed everything on high quality paper cheaper than if I was going to print it myself.  I used the "note card" on Linen Finish.  I had a minor heart attack when the door hangers arrived from Vistaprint because they didn't print correctly.  One side was printed upside-down.  But a quick call to Vistaprint remedied the problem and they sent new ones right away.

 Then I went to Michaels and bought a 3 inch circular punch by Fiskars.  It was a long process, because the paper was thicker than the punch was meant to be used with, but I love the way they turned out. :)

We put them in the hotel welcome bags.  I can't remember if everyone used it, but I know I saw a few on the doors when my new husband and I were walking back to the rooms.

I still call him my boyfriend

A few weeks ago, I came home from Pitt.  C surprised me with a date.  Actually, C will say it wasn't a surprise, I should have known because I asked him to plan it.  However, I thought the date would be us going out to dinner, not going to a dinner theater detective show.  (Which was AMAZING btw)

Anyway, the show required me to dress up.  Since I had only brought jeans home, and the only nice clothes I had in Chicago were summery, I had to go shopping.  So, C and I went shopping.

I narrowed down the choice to 2 outfits so I asked the fitting room attendant "to go get my boyfriend, C."  As soon as she left I realized my mistake.  Sorry C!


C and I got engaged September 30th.  It is now the end of January, we have set a date, picked a venue, hired a DJ and photographer, chosen our colors and are getting ready to send out the Save the Dates, and I still catch myself calling C my boyfriend.

When my friends/family or whoever would call their fiances their boyfriends, I always thought they were just doing it for the attention.  They wanted to show off the fact that they are engaged.  

I can tell you for a fact I am not doing it on purpose.  

Save the Dates - Abbreviations

I don't know if its just me, or if its all engineers or what, but when I'm chatting with people (via gchat, sametime, or office communicator) I tend to abbreviate things all the time.  Pittsburgh gets abbreviated to Pitt.  Marquette University gets abbreviated to MU.  Engineering terms get truncated.  The Kentucky Derby is just The Derby (because honestly, what other Derby matters?)  Basically, I've developed my own language.

So, when I'm talking to someone about Save The Dates, of course that gets abbreviated.  Hence my hilarious conversation -

I'll let you know, but i'm pretty sure we are sending STD's to everyone who she put on the list. If I remember it was ~ 70 people

C and I should probably get on those STDs...

  HAHA

  STDs!

  Save The Dates

  LOL

Since this convo I have started to abbreviate Save the Dates as StDs.  Its helped a little.  But has still been some hilarious conversations.

I Bought the Dress I'm going to be Married In!!

I've been to two bridal salons.  Both were amazing experiences.  (Message me if you need recommendations in the Chicago Area.)

My fiance reads this blog so I can't get detailed except to say it is white. ;)  And its beautiful.  And I look beautiful in it. (What can I say, I'm modest.  Haha)

But, they say as soon as you try on the dress you know, and that's the case.  I tried on the dress at the 2nd salon and I didn't want to try on anything else.  The only reason I tried on the rest of the dresses was this was the first dress I tried on at that salon and I booked a 2 hour appointment.  Once I put it on, it was perfect.  It fit like a glove and I felt happy in it.



Every once in a while I get really giddy and excited about the fact that I am marrying C.  I can't wait to start our life together.

Engaged

Well, if official.  I'm engaged to C.  :) But I'm not going to blog about how he did it or any of that stuff, when the wedding website gets up anyone can read our story on there.  I'm going to blog about what its been like since I've gotten engaged.  

I may sound a bit conceited, but my ring is gorgeous!  And when I first called and texted all my friends, everyone asked for pictures of the ring.  I think I ended up taking ~ 30 pictures of my ring before I found ones that were acceptable.  At first I thought my fingers looked ugly.  Then when I made a fist I thought my fingers looked like toes (See picture)

And then when I tried to just take pictures of the ring people asked for pictures of the ring ON my finger.

I mean, no one ever talks about the challenges of taking a ring picture.  I just felt that every picture I took did not live up to the beauty of my ring.  (God, I sound so stuck up!! sorry!)


So, ladies, if you think your going to get engaged soon get a manicure every few weeks leading up to when you think its the big day.  Seriously... I'm not kidding.

The other gigantic surprise was how many people asked me the night or the day after we got engaged if we set a date yet.  Seriously, If I had $10 for every person who asked me if we set a date I think I would have enough for a gorgeous wedding dress.  I was shocked!  I honestly didn't expect anyone to ask if I set a date and when the first person asked I was speechless.  All I wanted to say was we got engaged like 10 minutes ago!  I ended up saying I think we want to get married in Fall, but I don't know if we will get married in 2013 or 2014.

I guess the one good thing about everyone asking me questions is it got me into wedding mode.  I've already started planning.  I've talked to my parents and C's parents to get a rough guest list together.  So far, I think the guest list is going to be gigantic and extremely difficult to narrow down.  Oh well, let the wedding planning begin!

Haaarvard and the wedding - Boston

On Saturday we went to Harvard.  To be 100% honest, I was NOT impressed with the campus.  I imagined an oasis campus in the middle of the city, similar to Marquette University (where I went to college.  Instead I saw a quad, and a campus that was intertwined with the town. 

To the left is Mr Harvard. 

Below are gates at Harvard that say "Enter To Grow in Wisdom"  Dad needed some Wisdom, so he went through the gates. 





















Possibly the coolest thing I saw was at the Harvard was the Book on Demand Printer.  We got lucky and they were printing a book as we speak.  It was really cool!  Basically if you have a book, recipe book, or whatever that you want bound, you can send it to Harvard and they will bind it.  Its not even that expensive!  You can go here for prices.
 

After Harvard, we went back to the hotel and got ready for the main event.  My cousin getting married. :) Here you can see the new Mr and Mrs. 

Non Black Tuxs

Alright, I got my inspiration.  See I've been having writers block and so I was searching facebook for something to write about. And... I found non-black tuxes.  A friend of mine's boyfriend was in a wedding and he wore a beige-ish tux.

I know this is not the best picture, but I purposefully chose one that does not show faces that closely.  So, anyway, I can't decide if I like these tuxes or not. Personally, I have never seen non-black or white tux. I know you can get them at a store, but I've never seen pictures of them, or seen them in real life unless its pictures from a wedding in the 70's.  And let me tell you, I am NOT a fan of the 70's wedding with powder blue tuxes.... HIDEOUS!

So anyway, I think these tuxes make the wedding very unique, but I also think they make the wedding less formal.  I am NOT a fan of white tuxes.  In my opinion the bride should be the only person in white at the wedding.  I generally feel bad if any part of my dress has white on it; even if its a summer wedding and its OK.  So, I believe white tuxes are a no-no.

I also believe that white and beige (generally) do not go good together.  So I have to say I'm not really a fan that they chose white tux shirts.  But aside from that, I have to say, I kinda like these Beige tuxes.  I know its something completely different, but I think it looks very summery and fun.  So, I guess I vote Yes....

Opinions?