ericabstudios: wedding tutorials for DIYers

{ "make your own boutonniere" pdf tutorial }

i discovered ericabstudios through her lovely gardenia hair flower, see below, but came away intrigued by her boutonniere and birdcage veil tutorials, all sent as pdf instructions on how to make the lovely items you see here, and thought i'd share with you all.

i love the idea of making my own... i can follow simple instructions... maybe? these tutorials don't break the bank, and there's no shipping cost. tempting...

 
 

for more info, see ericabstudios.etsy.com

#683: doesn't take much.

photo by raya carlisle via oncewed.

#680: the paper crafties.

i love crafting.

but i'm not the type who can REALLY craft. i mean. i love the people who can REALLY craft. like, the serious crafters out there who can REALLY create REALLY amazing stuff.

but i'm not one of those.

i'm more of a... wannabe crafter. you know. the kind of crafter that gets an a for effort.

that kind of thing.

but i guess i didn't care. because we still ended up with sort of a paper craft extravaganza...thing.

our card box and our programs:


uh huh. that's right. paper baggies for the pompoms:


our centerpieces:


part of our placecard table:


here are our placecards, appropriately blurrily photographed by a friend:

(remember way back when when they were just frosh? sigh.)

most of them ended up finding cozy homes as such (photographed by a friend):


the paper experience worked for us because...well, i love paper. and i love to craft. craft-extraordinaire-WANNABE i may be, but those jitters came second to just doing something i really enjoyed doing...so that the end result would be a personal, connected, and meaningful one.

which it was.

and that's the a's and z's of it, yo. simple, huh.

all photos by max wanger unless i said it wasn't.

#676: the flowers. and kismet.

we used real flowers for only a few things: my bouquet, the bms' bouquets, 3 orchid bouts for our moms and my grandmother, and two flower bundles to present to the parents.

total cost: $50.

so very nice.

my plan all along had been to stop by the whole foods behind my house the night before the wedding and just buy the flowers they had available there.

but a couple of weeks before the wedding, i found out that the flower mart was literally two blocks from where i worked. i always knew it was close, but having never been, i had no idea it was THAT close. so i walked myself over during lunch one day to check it out and promptly scrapped the whole foods idea. it'd be so silly to go retail when the wholesale route was staring at me in the face.

the day before the wedding, the hubs and i went to the mart to select and purchase our wedding flowers. and we had 1.5 hours to do it.

i didn't have any colors in mind or the names of the types of flowers i wanted to use for our bouquets. and no pictures of inspiration with me. instead, i was hoping really really hard to be inspired by whatever was there that day. (flexibility is cool like that.)

we weren't walking around for more than a few minutes when i came to a place that had an assortment of peonies. light pink peonies, bright pink peonies, and lavender-pink peonies. they were all blooming differently and i thought they were amazing looking. so i began to look through the bunches to pick the best ones. of course.

when all of a sudden, the owner was like "hey!"

turns out, the shop owner was my dad's friend. someone i hadn't seen in over ten years. i was like WHAT?! and he wouldn't take more than $50 from us for the 10 bunches or so that we bought. and then he threw in 3 orchid bouts for the moms and grandma for free. i was like WHAT?! but there was no saying no. and so we graciously said thank you and left the flower mart feeling uberly lucky and happy.

sometimes, when it's meant to be, it's just meant to be i guess.



the bouquets look pretty homemade, huh. my bms and i wrapped them up the night before the wedding with flower tape and some ribbon i had laying around at home. i will never know how florists make the bottom of bouquets so perfectly round and lavishly thick. mine was far from round. and way far from thick.



see what i mean? the bottom was all jaggedy and triangular.

but i don't know. i still loved the way our bouquets looked. the light pink color matched my bms' dresses quite well (my sister, the MOH, in the jeweled green/blue above. one of my bridesmaids in coral below.) and, well, i wore white, so anything would've worked. but the slightly darker lavender pink color was nice.




oh, and then here's one of the two bundles i made with the bright pink peonies for our parents. wrapped with a cut up ralph's paper shopping bag.



all pinks. all peonies. all DIY.

who knew.

all photos by max wanger. some given an extra crop by me.

#664: light it up.

any excuse to have a party. or to buy a house with a backyard.


so gorgeous. instructions via once wed.

#661: tshirt stuff.

forget tissue. use real fabric. you know. if you've got some layin' around.


instructions via something old, something new.

#647: did you know.

that even when the wedding's over, the to-do list is still alive and kickin.

we have registry gifts we have to return (dupes and the like) and we have yet to even begin writing our thank you cards. but at least we have the thank you cards.

i love gocco.




oh, and should i be worried about our marriage license? we mailed our stuff in at the end of may...and the check hasn't cleared and we haven't seen anything yet. does it usually take this long? don't know about these things, see.

#639: open letter. ish.

hi stephanie.

can we be twins? pretty please?

because i'm diggin' the do you posted. like way.

many thanks.
tto

#635: ellie's back.

congrats ellie!


via mint.

*************************************

you know she's going to share lots of visual goodness. first up, her invitations. are you as inspired? can't wait to see what's next.

#631: stuff.

hi again.

i've been wanting to share these pictures with you. because i think they're nice.

but before i do, let me just say that after a small meltdown earlier this week, i feel like i'm in a good place. in other words, i've got my sh*t together. for now.

big sigh of relief.

i'd also like to add -- that i wouldn't be even close to this sane without my little sister. she's been cc'd on every email i've been blasting out for the past few weeks re: for crafts, for the rehearsal lunch, for the guestbook table, for meetings, for ideas, for a song she's going to sing during the ceremony, for the slideshow she's putting together for our entrance, for drams. everything. she only just turned 25 (our little baby!) but she's been my friggin' anchor. go figure. she's done things unprompted like clearing her schedule for this entire month so that she could be available to help me with any and all things.

i mean. srsly? i'm not even close to being as thoughtful.

and to put things into perspective, let's just say she's the kind of person who has 1000+ friends on facebook. uh, not in a weird way but in a she's-a-major-social-butterfly way. do you know what i'm saying here.

anyways.

point being. there isn't quite anything like a sister and i'm so stankin' happy to have mine. she's not my friend...she's my sister.

it's different.

here's a shot of our placecards and a closeup of the centerpieces. my bridesmaids and i spent a saturday and sunday (read: 8+ hours) cutting, folding, gluing, horsing, hurting (glue gun = scary).

#624: the makeup.

so these are the products that made the cut:
1) diorshow waterproof mascara.
2) urban decay eyeshadows.
3) make up forever eyelashes.
4) smashbox primer in light.






what i've learned.
1) makeup is damn expensive.
2) makeup is way fun to play with. but it takes time to apply. me = lazy.
3) but still. i should wear makeup more often. because it's fun.
4) there's a lot of stuff out there. it's like, crazy.
5) i toads need to practice before the wedding.

#621: done.

centerpieces: check.
placecards: check.
boutennieres: check.
flowergirls' headpieces: check.

#620: twenty dollars.

that's how much alllll the materials cost. i'm making 5 real bouts plus several other bouts-y type things.

twenty dollars.

holler.

#617: too kitschschty.

you know what i mean.

so this was the original concept of our placecards. you know. because we're having our wedding at a restaurant known for their..*ahem*..prime rib.



but as i kept going with it, i came to my senses. so. no more cow cut-outs. (i hear sighs of relief everywhere i think.)

and now we have a new concept. concept 2.0. i'll post about it on monday since i don't have a prototype yet. heh.

p.s. i really like cereal box stock. re-using is cool.

#612: will it keep.

diy instructions at once wed.

would this baby's breath garland keep if i made it ahead of time and kept it out of water for like 12 hours?

just askin.

#610: whole foods.

i was over at whole foods on friday, picking up a fruit tart and a wheat-free/flourless chocolate cake and briefly stopped to admire the flowers by the entrance.

i'm DIY'ing my bouquet, see, so i notice these things.

now. ideally. i know i should head over to the flower mart where they have a million flowers on the cheap. but 1) i don't have time and 2) i don't want to stress over it days before the wedding and 3) i don't want to stress.

i think i would try harder to save bucks on the florals if i was building my own centerpieces and needed a LOT of flowers. i'd probably also care what would be available to me and i'd probably even go so far as to order in advance the flowers i really want to use.

but the truth of the matter is, i don't because i'm not. my centerpieces are paper, remember. and the bouts are not going to have anything live in 'em.

so. i need real flowers for my bouquet. and the bms' bouquets.

that's it.

and my bouquet will not be one of those lush, thick, 10 pounders, i can tell you that much. and the bms' bouquets will probably be itty bitty. heh.

anyways. the point of the story is that i'm going to go to the local whole foods on the friday before my wedding because 1) it's right behind my house, literally, 2) they have a great selection and 3) it'll keep me sane yo.

happy monday.

#608: pretty.

instructions via once wed.

since i'm making my own bouquet, i'm hoping wherever i go the night before our wedding to buy the flowers has these exact colors and species available.

and if not, that's ok too.

#606: in the hair.

via a desert fete.

i plan to make two. one for each of my flower girls.

#602: shoot.

i'm already in the middle of constructing my centerpieces. and i've repeatedly said i don't want to use candles.

but dang.

i need to host a party of some kind so i have an excuse to create these lovelies.


complete instructions over at once wed.

p.s. i said dang. what.

#597: oh for "love & lace".

i was inspired in a major way today by stephanie of love & lace. who i'm starting to feel is kind of most definitely my crafty kindred spirit.

so. i will be constructing a teeny poof of fun color for the guys' bouts. can't wait to get my hands on the goods. that's what she said.

and yes. etsy is addicting. like way.


from etsy seller seven arrows shoppe.



both from etsy seller little vintage violet.


from etsy seller book nook creations.