My Wedding Report

Remember these?

Yes, the long lost Duckling invitations. I know I have been promising the tips from the DIY process, but due to some computer crashes and general life craziness it’s been a little difficult to get everything together.

The printing of the main invitation was very basic. We basically just designed the invite using a combination of Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Illustrator. We used my very favorite font Feel Script from Veer, which we had also used for the Save the Dates. Graphics for the entire invitation suite were bought from Istockphoto for a few dollars. We found an image that had all 4 patterns to use so we only had to buy 1 item. Probably the hardest part of the main invitation step was figuring out how to do borderless printing so that the design went to the very edge. Once we figured that it it was a matter of printing 50 at a time until we were done.

Most of the work and labor was bundled up in our little Matchbook booklet a.k.a. “Everything you need to know about our wedding.”

Earlier in the summer Mr. Ducky and I were at my favorite store, Paper Source and found a whole bunch of these matchbooks for 50% off. We weren’t planning on using them, but who were we to pass up a good deal? So, we bought everything they had, not knowing what we were going to use them for. Well, eventually we came up with the idea to use it as the holder of all our inserts in the invitation versus doing something like a pocketfold invite.

On the base we put directions on one side and then details for our website on the other. We printed them on 8 1/2 x 11 paper and then cut them out individually. To avoid messy glue sticks and other adhesive messes I used my trusty Xyron. Or should I say Mama Duckling used the trusty Xyron?! She figured out just the right technique to not waste xyron sticky and go through each insert quickly.

Here is what they looked like after they popped out the Xyron. After that it was a matter of simply removing the sticky backing and then placing the insert evenly onto the matchbook.

Many of you loved our accept/decline stickers for the RSVP cards. (Thanks for all your sweet words!) I have to tell you that was one of the easiest parts of the whole process, which means you can incorporate this into your own DIY project without much trouble. We bought 1 1/4″ round labels from Paper Source and then it was a matter of printing and cutting. One column was “Accept” the next was “Decline” and then repeat for the next two columns.

After printing the paper was all a solid khaki color with the stickers. We carefully peeled away the background surrounding the stickers so that we were eventually left with the backing paper full of round stickers. Now you had white background and the stickers popped against that.

We found the best was to cut was first length wise after your 1st accept and decline column and then width wise so you were left with 2 stickers. For the actual RSVP card we designed it in Illustrator and used the circle shape to indicate where guests should place their answer.

I packaged everything together so it was in one unit and would look presentable when guests opened it. At the last minute I decided to stamp the outside of the matchbook because it seemed like it was missing something.

I knew I wanted to do envelope liners but I was pretty mystified on how to do them. Was I supposed to print the whole page in the print and then cut? Or make some sort of shape? Or just give up completely and do plain envelopes?  Remembering Mrs. Gloss’ beautiful invitations and envelopes, I asked her how she did it. She explained how she just printed the shape of the liner on paper and then cut it out. After her feedback, Mr. Ducky and I figured out how to get 2 liners out of one 8 1/2 x 11 piece of paper. We shrunk down the depth of how far the liner would go in the envelope and lined them up on the edge. This probably doesn’t really make sense so just look at the picture below. You can see the 2 liners on the page and then the cut out version. By having the bottom of the liner on the edge of the paper it also saved some cutting time versus putting it in the middle of the page.

Here is Mr. Ducky dutifully cutting out envelope liners.

To adhere the liners to the envelope we used 3/8″ Adhesive Runner by Xyron that we had previously used for the Save the Dates. It works so well! We “drew” a triangle on the back of the liner in the upper area and then tucked it into the envelope.

And that is about it for the Duckling invitations. I hope that helped. Let me know if you have any questions.

What helped you with the DIY process? Anything seem difficult and then end up being simpler than you thought?

I have finally sent out our Save the Dates and now that I’m sure everyone has received them, I can finally share them with the hive. We’ve seriously taken our sweet time getting these guys out due to delays from school, life and just general procrastination. But oh well they are out and I’ve finally uploaded the pictures to share!

Without further ado here are the Duckling Save the Dates!

The first peak

Pull the Save the Date out

One more envelope!

And ta da!

Here is a picture of how my FMIL displayed her Save the Date. Isn’t that sweet?

Please let me know if you have any questions. I will try to put together a post with pictures of how we put them together, as well as what supplies were used if you are interested. Can you already tell where my cricut and cuttlebug came in handy?

One of my favorite parts of a wedding is all the paper goods. There is a lot of paper involved in a wedding: save the dates, invitations, programs, escort cards, guestbook, signs, photo collecting cards and so much more. I love it all! Mr. Ducky and I are going to be DIYing all our paper for the weddings so we have a lot of work ahead, but I am excited to see what we come up with.

I’m starting to collect the images and styles I like. I don’t have a cohesive look I am going for yet, but hopefully as I continue to find what I like, something will stand out. I thought I would share with you a few of the invitations/save the dates that I have loved so far:

From Style Me Pretty are invitations from Posh Paperie. I love the save the dates in particular and how everything looks put together in the green bow.

I also found these on Style Me Pretty by Lilah Paper. I love the images and color combination.

I love Bella Figura invitations. We aren’t doing letterpress, but even if they were simply printed I think the designs are beautiful.

These are DIY invitations by RedShoeGirl, whose bio I mentioned in the post below. Can you believe she did these herself?? They look professional!

Mrs. Cupcake’s invitations are incredible!! She works with Louella Press and was able to use her resources and creativity to create these invitations.

I love these too from Louella Press which are the Modern Meadow design. I really like Louella Press because I feel like all their designs have a lot of personality and could really be individualized to your tastes.

These are also DIY invitations by BeltranBride from the knot. (Her wedding was absolutely beautiful by the way if you have time to look)

Don’t you think these are all amazing!?! I hope ours turn out as beautiful and unique!

There are so many more that I could share with you, but this post would be a hundred miles long. What do you think though? Is there something similar among all them that I am missing?

Mr. Ducky likes infomercials. Not really sure why, he just is extremely entertained by them and usually wants whatever they are offering. Well one day the roles reversed when I watched an infomercial for the Cricut. It was this amazing papercutting machine that could make anything! See the video link below for a quick demo of the Cricut in action:

Cricut Provo Craft

As I watched the infomercial I could only imagine the amazing things that could be created with the Cricut. I eventually forgot about the Cricut because it was simply out of budget and I already spend way too much money at Michaels. Then…for my birthday Mr. Ducky surprised me with my very own Cricut!! And it is just as awesome as the infomercial! (I sound like such a craft nerd right now) But it is really easy to use and the detail of things that it can cut out is amazing. For example I had it cut out a cityscape and it cut out tiny little windows for all the office buildings.

There are 3 types of Cricut machines. The basic difference is the size paper that it can cut out. I have the original and most basic Cricut. Maybe one day I’ll work up to the bigger one, but for now I am perfectly happy with the one I have. I also am not creating huge projects that would need really big shapes or letters. To use the machine you simply load your paper onto the “sticky pad” and feed it into the machine. Then using the keypad you select what you want it to cut and out and press “start” and your Cricut buzzes into action cutting out your selections.

Now with the Cricut you get cartridges, which contain all the shapes and fonts that it can cut out. For each cartridge you get a keypad and book detailing what you can cut out. You get 2 cartridges with the machine and then buy the rest separately. The types of cartridges are unlimited! There are cartridges for disney, baby, wedding, holidays, gardening, animals and just about everything you can think of. There are also tons of different fonts and shapes. My first cartridge I bought was the newly released Storybook cartridge. Here are the different options (shown from the Cricut website) that I can cut out using the Storybook cartridge:

For each letter/key there are 6 different “versions” I can use that change the look. So there are many more options for what to create than whats above.

Another picture of a few possibilities:

Do you want one yet??

Since getting my cricut I have discovered there is a whole community of “Cricuters” that share projects, ideas and just discuss their latest crafts. If you want to get some more examples of what you can make, go to the community and explore: Cricut Message Board

My first project with the Cricut is my “Will You Be My Bridesmaid” cards. They will be making their debut to the hive soon. In the meantime so that you too can be in awe of the Cricut, here are some examples of the crafts…

From Cricut SN: StampinMeg

From Cricut SN: CamilleRobinson

From Cricut SN: RachelL

From Cricut SN: Craftsmanda

There are even Cricut cartridges to make tags and boxes as you can see above. I don’t have this kind yet so I’d be interested to hear feedback from anyone who has used it. They look super cute though!

We are hoping to use the Cricut in some of the DIY for our wedding. Of course I will be keeping you updated on the specifics of what those projects are. I am thinking it could be good for invitations, programs, favors, guestbook, any sort of signage that we need and for adding a special touch when necessary.

So I just wanted to share with you my newest craft discovery. I am not nearly as advanced as the projects above so go easy on me! If you have more specific questions about the Cricut let me know and I can go more in depth. I didn’t want to bore anyone with too much information.

Have you used a Cricut before? What is your favorite craft tool or discovery?