just because it's friday...

i thought i'd post some lovelies to celebrate the end of the longest week in the history of the world. good grief, i'm glad it's friday!

enjoy...

okay... so, normally i'm opposed to cutting up perfectly good books.

but some of mine are beginning to show mold spots.

this would be a lovely way to repurpose them

rather than just throwing them away.

plus, come on... seriously?

books + plants = gorgeous

the most adorable garden stationery suite i've ever seen.

+ wouldn't that butterfly bouquet be PERFECT for a flower girl?

* sigh *

so lovely + whimsical.

i love the shapeliness + simplicity of the vases + the white

so airy.

original cake ideas rock.

this is tim's IDEAL wedding cake.

such a fun idea!

trees are old friends.

wouldn't it be fantastic to be able to pull something like this off

at an indoor venue?

long, swirly veils = love

this is going to be us in less than a month + a half!

happy weekend!!!

invitations

i realized that i still hadn't posted any pictures of the invitations. i thought it was about time to do so.

we purchased all the paper, the stamp, the "belly bands" (ugh! gross), the envelopes, the adhesive + the printing for 250 invitations for under $140. the total cost to assemble one invitation was $0.54.

we were able to keep the weight of the invitation down by not including rsvp cards (i mean... who really uses those things, anyhow? just a bunch of wasted paper + postage), so it was only $0.44 to mail each envelope. tim's mom (who is a genius), bought about 750 "forever" stamps just before the postage went up. she was kind enough to sell them to us at the $0.42 rate.

so... each invitation only cost $0.96 to assemble + mail. pretty danged awesome, if you ask me.
a whole bunch of my girlfriends volunteered their cutting, folding, glue-ing, stuffing expertise + we were able to complete the entire process in four evenings.

i hand-stamped every single invitation three times + every envelope once. between the save-the-date cards + the invitations, i used that stamp over 1,250 times. i got our money's worth out of it, to say the least. but i tell ya what, if i never see that stamp again, it will be too soon for me.

alright... here are the pics.

the front of the invitation.

belly band. (such a terrible name!)
little swatch of paper, dictionary page background

with our initials + the date of our wedding.

inside.

close up of the inside

i used century gothic + edwardian script

information sheet.

this included info on hotels, how to rsvp, our wedding blog, etc.

there is a map to the church on the back.

the labels were a take on an idea i got from martha.
you can get the template here:

http://www.marthastewartweddings.com/goodthings/ready-and-labeled?autonomy_kw=labels

the labels wrap around the envelope so that the return address is on the back. pretty great, huh? especially if you're lazy like me + don't want to hand-address 250 envelopes.

i printed the labels on the same paper as we used for the center of the invitations. we used a rotary cutter to dice them up + that double-sided permanent adhesive tape that comes in the handy-dandy cartridge to attach them to the envelopes. we didn't have any trouble with the post office or with people receiving their invitations. i was a little worried, so... phew!

it's almost real now...

i'm currently printing the invitations to our wedding. that makes me happy in ways i cannot even name. i think that the elation comes from the sense that, once the invitations are out, i will have jumped one of the final hurdles.

not sure if that sense is in any way based in reality... but for now, any relief is a good thing.

yep. we'll take it.

up next: find an apartment.

i'll post pictures of the invitation making process sometime this week. for now, though... keep your fingers crossed that the printer doesn't give up on me!