1.30.2011

The Seussery

When we found out we were expecting last year, we immediately starting talking about what we wanted to do for the nursery. We're both paint-happy and wanted to do something different than just a boring old pink or blue room. I have always been a big fan of Dr. Seuss and thought wouldn't it be awesome to have a Dr. Seuss room?! I started googling and found some pretty cool ideas but figured my husband would never go for it...it was going to be a lot of work. But he surprised and me was all for it! This was really his DIY project, all I contributed was planning the design, picking the paint colors, and assisting by sharpening pencils and washing out brushes.

Supplies:


Background paint color(s)
Trace Projector
Pencils with erasers
Paint for characters - we used sample cans for all of these colors
Black paint for outlining characters
Loads and Loads of patience


First we painted the background, we decided to go with a sky and grass look like in The Lorax.
 








  After your walls are dry, the tedious task of tracing out the characters comes next. Since we used a trace projector (that my father-in-law already owned), we could project straight from the books and didn't have to make copies or transparencies. The downside of the trace projector is that you have to do some interesting maneuvering to get your images exactly where you want them.


The next step is to paint the outline in black, we used many different sizes of brushes in order to do this. This part takes a lot of time, a steady hand, and a boat-load of patience.


Thing 1 was the first on the wall, we were both very excited when he was completely outlined!


After your character is all outlined and dry, you can start filling in - just like a coloring book.


We (and by we, I mean my husband) worked for a few hours each night after work and on the weekends. It took about a month start to finish and this includes about a week that my poor husband thought he was going blind from staring at all those black lines in The Cat in the Hat. But all that time was so worth it!





We both love her room!
 

Wedding Invitations

My invitations were probably my favorite DIY project for our wedding. I worked for weeks and weeks designing and re-designing, printing, and then starting over again. The knowledge that most people were just going to chuck them in the trash later caused me great pain!

The pocket folders are from cardsandpockets.com in tuxedo (black).


For the invite and inserts, I created the invite & inserts in photoshop and printed onto plain white cardstock. The invite is mounted onto Tropical Pink Astro Metallics 105lb cardstock that I purchased from If It's Paper (this is the same color as the fuchsia metallic cardstock from cardsandpockets.com FYI) The Tropical Pink was $19.99 for 50 sheets. I will only need 20 sheets to create the invite mat since I can get 2 per sheet.  I mounted the inserts on alternating pink and orange cardstock. The orange is clementine from cardsandpockets, I finally found it locally at If It's Paper and it's Stardreams Fuse in Flame and it was on sale for only $14 for 50 sheets!

Completed invite outside:

 I originally planned to make the rsvp a postcard but after deciding to mount it onto the cardstock, I was worried they would get ripped to shreds by the PO machines. So I had to go on a hunt for envelopes they would fit in, I had a bit of a hard time because of the length I would need the envelope to be. I found these at envelopemall.com and ordered before I realized they wouldn't fit in the pocket. Instead of starting the search again I decided to simply tuck them in the belly band on the back of the invite. My favorite part is that they're orange (I may have some sort of orange problem!) I can't wait to start getting orange envelopes back in the mail!





How I made the belly bands: 
I used 1.5" grosgrain ribbon that I cut the exact size as needed to go around the invite without overlapping (10" for my 5x7 invites). I printed our monogram on white cardstock by copying/pasting into word & resized so that they were 1.5"x1.5", after printing I cut them with my paper cutter, for the mats I used metallic cardstock that I cut into 1.75" squares. I ran the monogram squares through my xyron making them stickers, I used a small peice of double sided tape to attach the ends of the ribbon to the metallic mat then stuck the monogram square over top. I started out not using the double sided tape under the ribbon but it's kinda hard to hold the ribbon still on both sides while trying to attach the monogram sticker!

Inside of invite:


The flourish on the invites is a photoshop brush layered in both pink and orange. You can download the flourish for free here it is the first brush in the file. Fonts are Scriptina and Copperplate Gothic
The inserts:


Envelopes with wrap-around labels:


I never planned on doing custom postage but after saying "I don't care what the stamps look like" I went to the PO to have them weighed and discovered it was going to cost a whopping $1.05 ($1.00 if mailed before the increase on 5/11) and the only options for a $1.00 stamp were these NOT what I wanted to put on the invite I worked so very hard to make pretty! Rob's parents had given us a disc they'd gotten from stamps.com when they purchased a printed that had a code for 20 free stamps, I assumed it would only discount for 20 stamps at the .42 rate but to my amazement it gave me 20 free $1.05 stamps!! Thanks to this I was able to purchase the 40 custom stamps for $42, that's the same I would have paid for 40 ugly regular $1.05 stamps.

If you have any questions about how I made any part of these feel free to ask!

1.29.2011

It's a nice day for white wedding...

My biggest DIY project ever was my wedding. I literally planned & made everything myself (with the occasional helping hand of my MOH or husband). 

This was my to-do list:

  • Save the Dates
  • Invitations
    • belly bands 
    • Inserts
      • directions
      • rsvp
      • hotel info 
    • Invite
    • wrap around labels 
  • Program Fans
  • Card Box
  • Centerpiece/Table Numbers
  • Photo-share Cards
  • Water bottle labels
  • Table Runners (thanks mom!)
  • Runner w/monogram painted on for cake table
  • Seating Chart
  • Pomander Balls for ceremony
  • Bracelet
  • Necklace
  • "We Do" letters for cake table
  • Bridesmaids Jewelry
    • Necklace
    • Earrings 
  • Cake Topper
  • Shoe bling
  • add waistband to hoop skirt
  • getting ready tanks
    • Bride
    • MOH
    • BM
  • Cupcake Stand
 I'll be posting instructions and pictures of how I made most of these items. Today we're going to start with Save The Dates, misfortunately abbreviated StDs.

I got the cards & envelopes from Michael's in the stationary section, they can in packages of 10 A7 flat cards & 10 envelopes. Since I didn't send out many STD's this worked out well for me. I purchased 2 packs for $4.99 each and used a 25% off coupon.

Envelopes lined and with a cute little bouquet embossed on the back. To line envelopes, trace the fold of your envelope onto the paper you want to line with then cut out approximately 1/4 inch smaller than your "pattern" I used double sided tape to adhere around the glue line on the envelope and just under the fold.







This is what the magnet looked like - I removed our last names and our website for privacy reasons. They are business card sized magnets ordered from Vista Print. 
They turned out alright, the Scriptina font on the black background wasn't the best idea since the font is so skinny. And I've yet to figure out how I managed to leave "Save the Date" in such a yucky, boring font but I was happy enough with them, they served their purpose and didn't cost a fortune.

After the magnets were attached, I punched 2 holes horizontally in between the cheesy rhyme and "formal invitation to follow" and then took a orange piece of ribbon and tied it in a knot.

For me, StD's were completely unnecessary I had a lot of out of town guests but they were all my immediate family and were well aware that my wedding was coming up. I really did these simply because I wanted to so keeping the price as low as possible was a must. Overall, I only spent about $1 each for these including postage.

Welcome to Pickles & I Scream!

I first started this blog back in March of 2010 when I was 3 months pregnant and wanted a place to vent my pregnancy woes. In all honesty, I HATED being pregnant! HATED it! I didn't even have a real solid reason for hating it, no morning sickness at all, no health problems, but it was hot as hades and I was pregnant ALL summer! After several drafted & un-posted posts, I decided that I probably sounded like a raving lunatic to anyone who doesn't know me and deleted those posts. I can say that at least typing it out made me feel better at the time! 

Now I have a beautiful 4 month old daughter and I'm desperately seeking my inner-mommy all while trying to squeeze in time for work, crafty-projects, and spending some time with my husband (that involves talking about something other than dirty diapers). I look forward to sharing my misadventures in mommy-hood, DIY projects, and some tips on some super-awesome deals I've scored on baby gear!
Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...