Saturday, March 12, 2011

Weddings Galore!

This is a big summer for weddings! We have THREE, amongst our special friends, all in the course of one month... then, of course, there's that one on the other side of the "pond." When the team for the Designer Craft Connection decided weddings would be our theme for this month's blog-hop, I was delighted! As we "speak" I'm in the process of creating proto-types for two sets of wedding invitations I'll be making over the next few weeks. I also have the honor of creating three hand-bound and stitched wedding guest books for the events I mentioned before. (Not the royal wedding, mind you, the other three!)

A couple years ago our son, Chris, married our beautiful daughter-in-LOVE, Sarah. It was truly one of the most joyous days of my life! We are crafty people (the good kind of crafty), so much of the wedding was DIY. Sarah made her own table decorations, her bridesmaids did her floral arrangements and bouquets, Sarah's Mom decorated their cake and they allowed my hubby and I the great honor of creating many other items for the wedding. We made their Save-the-Date cards, their invitations, ceremony programs, aisle decorations, guest book, and garter. I think the day was extra sweet, especially with all of the personal touches that went into it!

Here are a few pix of this blessed event...

The happy couple near the end of their wedding reception.


The assembly line for the 200 invitations!


You don't quite understand how many 200 is until you start addressing and stamping those puppies!


The programs for their ceremony were embellished with an arrow though a heart, which was symbolic because Chris is an archer.


I had the honor of making Sarah's garter, which is a very special tradition in our family. It was her something blue and included a button from my wedding dress. Stitched inside were two pennies, each from the birth year of the bride and groom, just as my grandmother did in mine. The pink garter is a purchased one for tossing.


The handsome groom and his very proud Mom!


One of MANY kisses!


The hand-bound guest book I made for them, included a photo printed on canvas for the cover. We had a photographer take a black and white photo of each guest/couple/family who attended and they wrote a note on a separate piece of paper that had been pre-printed with a journalling block. The photos were later printed and added to the book with the note for the attendees. There are extra pages in the back of the book to be used at future milestone anniversary parties.


(Pardon my teeny pictures... long story short... computer issues)

Thursday, March 3, 2011

Designer's Craft Connection



So inspired by the blog-hop we participated in a few months back, several designers decided to keep it going! With our blogs linked together by the widget in our sidebars you can easily move back and forth through the series of participating blogs.

Every month, beginning on March 13th, we'll be posting something handmade or inspired by a specific theme. With wedding season fast approaching and a certain royal wedding in all the news, we decided we'd start with weddings as our very first theme. You can check back on the 13th and move through the series of blogs to peruse many "love"ly designs!

As a kick-off for the exciting Designer's Craft Connection there will be an amazing giveaway... a Cricut Expression! Just hop around the Designer Crafts Connection ring and locate the 9 blogs that are displaying the Cricut bug logo. List them in the comment section of Julie McGuffee’s blog to be entered in the drawing to win!



As part of this exciting kick-off we decided to share a bit about what we saw and/or were inspired by at the recent Craft and Hobby Association Trade Show. Here are a few snapshots of what inspired me and I would I'd like to share with you.