This Christmas I finally decorated the house (somewhat).  Garlands, front door wreath, candles etc.  Had Nick put these 3m anchors on the front door to put up the Xmas wreaths.  It looked lovely.  Then came January…then February….and finally took down the wreath (yes 2 months later).   And that’s when I started looking at 3 plastic hooks on my front door.  x 2.  I have a double door.  the 3m held up so well that pulling it off likely will peel the paint and be more of a pain.  Plus I’ll need it back come Christmas time as I really like the look of having the wreath.  That’s when I started going on Pinterest (most dangerous app ever – full of inspirations and late night scrollings).  Via Pinterest, I came across How To Mom blog, who made a wreath for $15 vs the $50+ ones I see in stores that I don’t even like.  what a great idea and thrifty too!  It’s arts & craft time! I forget sometimes how much I love it.

Cost of 2 wreaths all from Michael’s (I love that store!):

Grapevine Wreath $4.99 @40% off x 2 + tax = $6.76

4 bunches of plastic flowers (on average $2.5 after using 40% discount + tax) = $11.3

2 burlap ribbon 2 1/2″ x 3 yd on sale at $3.99 on sale + tax = $9

So my total was $27.06. or $13.53 Cdn each. Score!

To be fair though, I had many of the other necessary supplies, so no extra cost there (floral wire, wire cutters, hot glue)

I didn’t time myself – but it definitely didn’t take long.  And it was enjoyable time as well.

I started with the ribbon first.  I ended up making a double layer ribbon out of the fact that Michael’s ran out of the original white burlap design and 1 spindle of ribbon wasn’t enough, and instead of driving to another Michael’s, I just chose another colour.  Laziness turned out in my favour as I really liked the effect of the double layer colouring.

getting ready for wreath making

one of the first stationary related thought I had was about our wedding monogram.  I like the idea of having it as the “symbol” at the event – to be used on our invitations, gift tags, backdrop, photobooth pictures, etc.  So I set to design something.  Googled a lot (i mean a LOT) of different ideas on monogram, and as usual, took inspiration from all the lovely designs out there.  I incorporated elements of a few that I liked and came up with this:

As I had the thought to incorporate it as a seal on the invite, I set out to get this made into a stamp.  Over to Etsy, and found a vendor that does it relatively cheap – and had great reviews:  JLMould.etsy.com – Jessica replied to my questions and after sending it to her to create, it took no time at all to get the lovely clear stamp back.  I ordered the 2″ x 2″ square clear stamp so that I hopefully can see what I’m doing.  (truth be told, I have never stamped anything in my life before this!)

Note the picture here is from the wishing tree tag that I also used the stamp for – but this shows what the clear stamp looks like:

After slaving over the computer to create the perfect design, I was ready to tackle the DIY wedding invitation project.  I estimate it taking approx 2-3 months to complete as it involved many steps and continuous labour.  I figured out all the little steps that I will need to do, and decided to do it in a self-assembly style.  ie. I would create all the little components individually and then piece it all together at the end.  I chose not to ask for help in this entire process simply because it really wasn’t needed.  Most of the prep work was all about cutting and stamping, in which I only have 1 tool for.  The actual assembly of the card require precision and I was too much of a control freak to let someone else put that together.  quality assurance, you know?  Other than the embossing part, most of the jobs were quite simple, something I do in front of the TV watching movies and catching up on shows.