We’re MARRIED!!!

The wedding has come and gone and I’m still in a wedding bubble. We got our pictures back from our photographer and I wanted to share some here so everyone can see just how lovely it all turned out. Our photographer Shannon, was amazing and I believe can work miracles behind a camera. It rained the entire day!!!!!! but you wouldn’t know it by how gorgeous the photos are right?! 

If anyone is in my area and need/want photos or ANYTHING I’d absolutely hire Shannon at Always and Forever Photo

Distressed Jars.

My dad gave me some jars that he wasn’t going to use because he couldn’t find any lids to fit them.  I washed them in hot soapy water, let them air dry completely and then rubbed the outside of them down with rubbing alcohol to make sure they were 100% clean.

Then I wrote words on them in Sharpie. and traced over those words with school glue.

  If you look closely at the picture below you can see the black Sharpie marker showing through the glue that’s starting to dry clear. If your glue words are a little messy take a tooth pick and use the tip to push the glue around where you want it.

Let these dry overnight. If you move on to the next step before these are completely dry you can mess up the glue and ruin your words.

Now pick a color or two of acrylic paint. I chose white and vanilla ice cream because it’s a little darker than ivory. Make sure that your paint is new and NOT OLD. If you use old paint for this project the 2nd layer you need to put on will pull and gunk up the 1st layer of paint and it’ll be a compete mess!! Learn from my mistake and save yourself some time.

Use a smaller bristled brush and give each jar one coat of paint. Let this coat dry a few hours before moving on to the next coat.  The picture below was taken after the 2nd coat. Make sure you don’t get any drips or pools of paint around your letters.

After everything has been coated twice and dried completely grab some 100 grain sandpaper and rough up each jar however you like and as much or as little as you like.

I then sprayed 2 coats of acrylic sealer on each jar to seal in all my hard work and keep the jars from getting roughed up more. I choose matte because I didn’t want them to have a shine but you could use Satin if you prefer. I found this below at Wal-Mart for $4 and change.

Here are all the white ones I made. I thought  they needed a little something more so I tied some jute around the tops of them.

And here are all my vanilla ice cream ones.

My absolute favorite one I made has to be this one.

~Jess

Burlap Napkin Rings

I found yard upon yard upon yard of ivory braiding at a flea market for $3. That’s right all this goodness for $3.

After a quick wash in warm soapy water, a quick rinse off and an overnight air dry (all with the help of Evan Grace) the braiding was ready.  

I needed to cut more burlap first.  I cut 70 strips 5” x 1 1/2”

Not sure how to cut burlap, click on the link below

http://www.ellaclaireinspired.com/2012/05/washing-and-cutting-burlap.html

I didn’t cut any strips of braiding, instead I left it all in one long piece and slid my burlap strips under the foot as I sewed, leaving a small gap in between each piece. Sew the braiding down the middle of the burlap, slowly, it tends to slide a little.  I used ivory thread on top and filled my bobbin with a brown colored thread to match the burlap. 

All done.

Cut your pieces apart and stack them for the next step.

With right sides together sew the ends of your napkin rings together. I made another continuous chain for quicker work. 

Clip them apart and carefully turn them right sides out.

I used a tiny bit of super glue on the ends where the seam brings the ends together to keep the rings from fraying.

I got an unbelievable deal on some Ivory satin napkins at Tradesy.com. If you’ve never checked out that website you should!!! It’s like an online garage sale for everything and especially wedding items (even wedding dresses!!!) and clothes.

Anyway, after hours of folding these pretty napkins here’s how it all looks together.

Put these napkins with our wooden utensils and I think our reception just got instantly cuter!

 

~Jess

Guest Table Found!

Finally, finally, finally we found a guest table. Nathan’s grandmother’s old Singer sewing table is more than perfect for our overall look. Here’s a before picture. I hope to have an after picture posted this coming week. As soon as Nathan finds the missing foot peddle we’ll reassemble and beautify.

 

This week is going to be a big push for me to try and get all things wedding done so keep your eyes peeled for more and more posts.

 

~Jess

Guest Table Banner.

Let’s do a quick run down of what we have so far for the guest table. There’s the Tears of Joy box, and the Guest Box with hearts. Now we can able a Guest Table Banner to the list. Would you be surprised to read that we don’t have the actually guest table yet? I’m on the lookout to find something rustic, vintage, aged, weathered, whatever really just something that’s not new and doesn’t cost a fortune. I haven’t found it yet. But on to the banner.

 

I picked up these canvas Gypsies at Hobby Lobby for a few bucks and had no idea what to do with them. After kicking around some idea I thought, “I’ll just make a banner and figure out where to put it later.”  It was going to be a super short banner with only 7 gypsies. I used one of the Gypsies as a pattern and cut 8 more Gypsies out of burlap.

 

Then I took a piece of cardstock and started drawing hearts of all sizes until I found one I liked. I cut 7 hearts out of burlap and glued them to the canvas gypsies ONLY by using Fabric Mender. You can play with the pattern/layout of the banner however you like best.  I decided the canvas gypsies ‘in front’ of the burlap ones was my favorite look. 

 

 

I stitched the edges of the gypsies together for added strength. This will make gluing the string to the back of the banner much much easier too. 

 

I needed a long area to work with the banner so I took all my stuff to the hallway.

After laying the gypsies down, right side against the floor I set out gluing the string to the top edge of the banner about 1/4’’ from the top.

Don’t worry too much about seeing the glue, it eventually dries clear. I left quite a long tail on the end of each side of the banner. I’m not sure what size table we’ll end up with or how we’re going to attach it so I didn’t want to cut the string too short and not be able to use the banner at all.

I might hang this in our bedroom over our bed after the wedding; I like it that much!

 

~Jess

Aisle Runner

I admit it. I saw this idea on Pinterest and knew I had to somehow make it a part of our wedding too.  Have you seen the picture of the cute hearts going down the aisle instead of flower petals?  It’s a super cute picture, go search for it!

 

We cut hearts out of Kraft colored card stock and using Super Glue, glued them to a Bamboo skewer. Here’s a picture of the back so you can how little of the skewer we glued to the hearts.

I was able to find an online retailer to purchase the lace heart doilies from and we glued them to Bamboo skewers the same way.

I have these skewers in that crunchy floral stuff you can find at Wal-Mart. I have no idea what it’s called!

I can’t wait to stick this fun, alternative to flowers, in the ground down both sides of the aisle.

~Jess

One More Sign.

We had one more sign to make. A Thank You sign for when we take pictures.

I grabbed another craft board from Lowes. Cut it into 9 pieces about 5’’ wide and stain them. Drill a hole all the way through the top of the blocks so you can string it up later on.

While the stain was drying I set about painting the wooden craft letters I had picked up at Hobby Lobby a Vanilla Ice Cream color. Since my dress is Ivory we’re trying that color in as much as possible.

Pay no attention to the small blocks. We used those for the back of our direction signs.

 

Once the blocks and letters were dry we used just a tiny bit of Gorilla glue on the backs of the letters to adhere them to the blocks right in the center.

 

Gorilla glue needs a little bit of pressure as it dries so we stacked the lettered blocks on top of each other and let them dry before moving on.

Nathan was great enough to run the jute string through the blocks, tying a knot at the beginning and end of the drilled holes so the letters wouldn’t slip together. I forgot to take a picture of the finished project.

 

Even though Murphy is showing the words on top  of each other we strung them all on one line so we can hold it between us as we posed for a sweet Thank You picture.

 

I think this would be a great idea for a birthday party or child’s room with their name on the blocks hanging on the wall.

 

~Jess

Echo Hollow Farm (Our Venue)

We’re getting married nearby at a gorgeous outdoor location called Echo Hollow Farm. Minus 6 years, I’ve lived here my entire life and never once had I heard of Echo Hollow anything! We happened upon the place while we were out scouting for a wedding venue. It was kismet.  We knew once we booked the place we’d have to make signs for all the out of town guest and even for those that are from the town to make getting to Echo a little easier. Here’s the entry to Echo Hollow Farm.

Sweet right? But easily missed! We’re going to hang this from a Shepard’s hook right below the Echo Hollow Farm sign.

Once you turn into Echo you drive until you come upon this split.

Honestly, I could get married right here in the driveway and it would be gorgeous. I love this place.  Our ceremony is on one side of the property and the parking and reception is on the opposite side. So we needed more signs. 

I took a 1/2’’ x 2 x 5 (if I remember correctly) measured and drew out the arrow and cut the boards. I stained them Walnut. Then I opened up a word document, found the font I liked (which is oddly the font I’m using for this blog, it’s Pristina, I typed the word I wanted to paint, blew it up to 300%, printed it out on cardstock  and cut it out to use as a stencil. I used a paint pen to trace the letters/words onto the wood and then took a small paint brush, some white craft paint and spent a few hours filling in the words.

My favorite one is the I Do’s.  Do a quick google image search for clipart wedding rings, pick the one you like, save the picture, blow it up, cut it out like a stencil and trace and paint just like the letters.

We’ll hang these off of a Shepard hook at the split.  We drilled holes into the back and strung some jute string so we can hang them.

We also made 2 more directional signs for the restrooms the same way I made the ones above.


Before I leave I just have to share with you the Bridal Room where my maids and I will finish getting ready. I want a picture of my dress hanging from the eves above the steps. Eeekkkk I’m so excited!!!

I want to pick it up and bring it to my house and live in it forever!!!!!!

~Jess~Jess