This is an invitation I did last spring for a senior tea, but never had a chance to share. This is about as festive as my “Fat Tuesday” is going to get this year. I figured I would share it for those of you who find yourself in the same boat. Hope that you are having a wonderful start to your week!
This is a photo of the chalkboard in our house right now. (Please forgive its imperfections… I am new to this whole chalk thing.) Towards the end of last year I had planned on my first post of 2013 being an announcement about how excited I was to re-open my etsy shop. Here we are almost a full month into the year and I am just now posting!
The truth is, there remains a whole other part of my life that requires some attention at this moment. In an effort to break away from my usual tendency to say yes to everything and assume it will work itself out, I’m doing things differently this year. I’m saying no. I’m focusing on what I can control, and doing what is best for my little family.
I hope that all of these things fall into place sooner rather than later, and I can get back to running my little online shop. Until then, I’m working on the fun part of the business that made me want to start this in the first place… the creating. For those of you who have been asking, I am most definitely still here. Still working. Just not through Etsy at the moment.
In the mean time, If there is something that you are interested in, please feel free to contact me via email or facebook. I would LOVE to help you with your event!
One of my dear friends is having her baby in just a few days, and I recently had the honor of being one of the hostesses at her darling baby shower. We {admittedly} got a little carried away with this one, but it’s kind of hard not to when you’re dealing with babies! Thankfully, we were surrounded with wonderfully understanding friends and family who not only reminded us of how crazy we were being, but jumped into the trenches with us to make sure we made it across the finish line by 1:00 on the day of the party. If you were one of those individuals… We cannot thank you enough!
We selected the “little man” theme initially because we weren’t sure if we were going to be hosting an all girl shower or a couples shower, and wanted something that would work well either way. I designed several invitations for the event and oddly enough, four women seemed to come to an easy consensus on the invitation.
One of our hostesses took on an extremely ambitious bunting banner project. How fantastic is this?!? She did an amazing job. It turned out SO cute, and turned our ordinary food table into the cutest spot in the house.
We used this tutorial to make diaper bikes instead of the traditional diaper cake. My husband was a bit skeptical of these, but I knew that they were a hit when he commented on how cute they were. Everyone loved them, and I loved how easy they were to make.
We also created an adorable set of tie and bow-tie onesies for the entry and dessert table.
One of my favorite shower details were the “bro code” tips that we used to decorate our bundtinis. Some personal favorites - “Bros do not share dessert,” “A Bro never wears pink, not even in Europe,” and “A Bro never cries. Exceptions- Watching Field of Dreams, ET or a sports legend retire (only first time he retires).”
When my husband first heard about our theme he was fairly skeptical. I believe his first comment was “what, you’re going to play pin the mustache on the baby?” My response? That’s a great idea!
Last but not least, we also set up a photo booth for everyone to have a few fun photos from the shower.
So many fun things you can do with this theme. If you’re considering it I’d highly recommend! Such a fun theme!
Halloween is just around the corner! My son is starting to get to the age that he really enjoys stuff like this, so I’m really excited about taking him trick-or-treating.
As much as I hate to admit it, the last 4-5 years my husband and I were one of the “lights off” houses. We lived on a street that didn’t get much halloween traffic though, so it was much easier to justify being “that” house. THIS year, however, we’re on a new street in a new home and are guaranteed to be seeing more than a few little ghosts and gobblins out there.
Unfortunately, my husband leaves on a business trip the morning of Halloween, so there won’t be anyone to stay and pass out candy while my son is collecting his own. Not only that, we’re also going to be missing a special trick or treat session organized for our local fifth graders.
SO, in an effort to redeem ourselves from the past several years, I created a “please take one” sign for our candy bucket that we plan to leave out on the porch!
I made two versions of the sign. One orange and black, and another with purple as well. Please feel free to download your own copy here!
special thanks to mjranum for the Halloween shape!
One of the designs that I feature on my etsy shop is this Pennant Baby Shower invitation. Designed to celebrate one of my dear friends, she really wanted something that wasn’t too girly. She originally told me NO pink whatsoever, but being the mom of a boy I was dying to have at least some pink! Luckily we ended up being able to slip a little bit of it in there without going too over the top, and mom was still happy.
At the shower, we stayed fairly simple with the decorations, and created some name banners that matched the invitation design. (Please forgive the quality of the photos. Our camera died on us quite some time ago, but we haven’t had the time to take it to get fixed.)
We also used tissue poms, and some sweet little outfits to decorate the living room. The tissue paper pom poms turned out to be SUPER easy to make yourself. I’d definitely give it a shot if you’re thinking about it! There’s a pretty good tutorial for it on Martha Stewart.
My friend’s mom and sister made these amazing cookies. I love to bake, but am severely lacking when it comes to decorating skills. I was so impressed by these!
And finally, instead of a game we created a “wishes to baby” card that coordinated with the invitation. I just love these so much. It’s such a great keepsake for them to look back on!
It’s been about a month since we moved our family into our new home. Our second move for the year, this one was a bit easier seeing as most of our things were already packed. Settling into the new home, however, has been a bit more difficult for us. We’re getting there though… slowly but surely!
Unfortunately, with everything we have going on I think my original plan of opening my etsy shop up by the end of the month is going to have to be postponed. In the mean time, I’m going to be sharing more of my new (and some not so new) projects. This particular post would fall in the “not so new” category.
A little over a year ago I had the pleasure of co-hosting a couples shower for some very dear friends of mine. Bridal showers involving the guys are always a little tricky (they can be such complainers!), so we tried our hardest to find a theme that didn’t just scream bridal shower. The result? A Game of LIFE shower!
None of us had played the game in ages, so we had a bit of recon work to do. Luckily one of my co-hostesses knew several families who were gracious enough to let us borrow their games. After a few days of research and planning here is what we came up with!
The invitation. Mostly, anyway. The actual design of their invitation was slightly different, but very similar to this one.
We created larger versions of the game pieces to decorate with. It took a bit of planning (and a lot of scotch tape), but I was so excited with how they turned out! The game pieces were made of white cardboard that I bought at the grocery store. The bride and groom were made out of dowel rods and floral foam from the craft store. I think the veil could have been a little bit larger, but this was a small pre-made veil that came with a pack of bridal stickers from the scrapbooking aisle. Couldn’t beat the convenience!
We set them up near the buffet, and created a “road” using some extra construction paper that we had on hand. We also set out some of the “money” that we created using some photos of the happy couple.
We also used the game itself as decoration. I think we had about 5 of them out in various locations, as seen here next to the drink station!
Instead of a traditional shower game, we created “certificates” inspired by the game that people could use to write notes and leave advice for the couple.
Here’s a close up of the certificates.
It was really fun to do something a little different! Everyone seemed to have a really great time… even the guys!
We finally got internet again! I’m so stinking happy about it I can’t even begin to tell you! I’m obviously a few days behind on this post, but my poor little 3G connection just wasn’t going to be able to handle a new blog post.
Anyway… Independence Day. An awesome holiday, and one that I appreciate more and more each year as I realize just how many people have payed for the freedoms that I am able to enjoy each day.
This year was especially exciting for me professionally because I was able to design my very FIRST set of wedding invitations! The happy couple tied the knot in Mexico over the holiday, and celebrated with friends and family following their return. They wanted something red-white-and blue without being too over the top. Here are the designs that they finally decided on!
THANK YOU to the happy couple for allowing me to be a part of this memory, and of course to her sweet daughter for the referral! I appreciate you guys so much!
