Dear readers, I don’t even know where to begin with this post, except to say that Jordan and I are SO excited to share our DIY wedding invitations with you today! This post is rather lengthy, but for you budget-brides out there, I wanted to give you an extensive look into what it takes to DIY your own wedding invitation suite.

A note on our inspiration

It was quite a challenge to try and explain to Jordan (or anyone, really) what “vintage” means to me, and how exactly I envision us capturing that feel in our wedding invitations. So, I frequented many a web site, from Etsy to super awesome stationery sites to simple Google searches of random objects (mason jars, for instance).

Jordan and I began the design process with the idea that we would utilize Adobe Photo Shop brushes. Since little touches of birds, nature and aviary motifs will appear throughout our wedding, we felt it was important to include a bird in our wedding invitations. We found a Photo Shop brush of a tree, and we started working with that.

However, with each draft of the invitation, we began to hate the look and the feel of it more and more. It didn’t look elegant, it didn’t look lovely, and it didn’t look vintage. So, much to my chagrin (seriously, I was stressed!), we scrapped that idea and started over, a mere month-and-a-half before we wanted to start the printing process.

However, in re-conceptualizing our DIY wedding invitations, I remembered an art class that I took in middle school, where we carved images into a wood block, and then used that wood block to stamp with ink. (I’m sure this was a Mother’s or Father’s Day project from way back when.)

So, I started to try and tell Jordan about what I envisioned based on this look. Then I saw a few invitations around the web utilizing different fonts and a woodblock/boxed layout, and after brainstorming with Jordan, we downloaded a variety of fonts (which is over-simplifying the process – I was very picky about what fonts I wanted to use, and Jordan just would not let me go with Feel Script, no matter how badly I wanted to shell out the money for it – and he was right in the end…) and we  got to work bringing together all of our inspiration into one invitation suite.

A note on the design process

Jordan and I used Adobe Fireworks to design our invitations. Jordan is very familiar with this program, and I found it to be a rather intuitive program myself after playing with it for 20 minutes or so.

Since Jordan and I are living 45 miles apart right now, we designed our entire invitation suite on the weekends we were able to be together. For us, the process worked like this:

1. Sara tells Jordan in advance, “We need to work on this part of our invitation suite this weekend.”
2. Sara sends Jordan links of what she’s found that she likes (“I like this overall look, but with this wording and this graphic and this font.”)
3. Jordan comes home, sits on the couch and designs away, making sure Sara doesn’t look over his shoulder until the project is near completion (it drove him nuts!).
4. Sara edits, says what she’d like changed, and Jordan makes the changes.
5. When Sara and Jordan are both satisfied with the design, they PDF the file and send it to their right-hand person to print a proof.
6. After final proof approval, the document goes to the printer, and a few days later, the final product arrives at Sara’s house.

Multiply this by 5 pieces (there are 5 items in our invitation suite), and you have approximately 24 weekends (6 months!) of design work that we spent working to complete this invitation suite. It was definitely a labor of love; there’s no other way to describe it.

A note on invitation wording

It was important to Jordan and I that we acknowledge the contributions that our parents have made to our lives and to making our wedding happen, so we included them in our invitation wording. In determining the other parts of the wording for our invitation, we spent quite a bit of time (probably two weeks) changing words and tweaking the look of the invitation.

Here’s what we ended up with:

Sara’s parents and
Jordan’s parents
Invite you to celebrate the wedding of their children
Sara Jo and
Jordan Wayne
(Ceremony Details)
(When/Where)
Dinner, Dancing & Merriment to immediately follow
at the Washington Pavilion

A note on the details

First, I spent about 8 – 10 hours of time gluing little doilies (see above picture) inside both the mailing envelopes and the RSVP envelopes (a la Holly) – what a project (!!), but I’m SO happy with how well they turned out. (Everyone thought I was nuts, but I was having a great time!)

I then stamped our return address on each of these envelopes, proceeded to freak out when the ink I used wouldn’t dry, and then our envelopes were miraculously saved by a can of hairspray. Moving on…(I just can’t talk about those darn envelopes anymore!)

Next, once everything was printed, we glued the invitation matte directly to the pocketfold, and then glued the wedding invitation on top of the matte, to create a layered look (again, see above picture).

I knew that I wanted our invitation suite to have a few components to it. While the majority of our guests are from South Dakota (and are rather localized to Sioux Falls, where the wedding will be held), I still wanted to provide guests with a map to help them navigate their way to each location. Thanks to a wonderful classmate of mine, we had a lovely hand-drawn map to showcase to our guests. We placed the map on its end in the right-side pocket of the pocketfold.

For our RSVP card, we wanted to make sure that our guests knew to expect an offbeat, relaxed wedding from the moment they received their invitation. So, we utilized the following check box system, as seen on A $2000 Wedding:

- Gladly Attend
- Regretfully Decline
- Regretfully Attend
- Enthusiastically Decline
- I’m in the wedding, so I have to come
- Other ____________________________

Since Jordan and I are coordinating the music for the wedding dance ourselves, we also wanted feedback from our guests to see what would get them out on the dance floor. Our “Request a Song” card was so much fun to design, and Jordan even made the record player graphic himself!

These two cards were tied together with the RSVP envelope using baker’s twine, which is a special type of yarn that blends two colors (our’s was yellow and white) together. This little package was then placed in the pocketfold in front of the wedding map.

A note on the construction and presentation of the invite

I owe a lot to the lovely Holly at Nothing But Bonfires for introducing us to a company without which our invitations would have lacked cohesion: Cards & Pockets. We ordered nearly everything for our DIY invites from Cards & Pockets … from the pocketfolds in which each piece of our invitation suite was placed to the envelopes that carried our invitations to their destination, we found Cards & Pockets to be the best value for our money. And the quality of the materials? Couldn’t have asked for a better product or better customer service along the way. [No, this is not a sponsored/paid post; I just love the company!]

A note on printing

Jordan and I feel extremely blessed to have had the help and support of one of my father’s business colleagues throughout the DIY invitation design and printing process. From our first initial idea to our final proof, having a person to walk us through the process, telling us what worked and what didn’t, was absolutely invaluable.

While I understand that what’s right for us might not be right for everyone, I would encourage readers who are looking to DIY their own invitations to get them printed by a professional (but local!) printing company. All we supplied was the paper (we chose a partially recycled natural ivory linen cardstock), and the printers and our right-hand person handled the printing and the cutting gratis (yes, we were extremely lucky).

A note on the materials used

Materials:

From Cards & Pockets:

- Perfetto pocketfolds in “Smoke” (We ordered a sample of one, loved it, and then ordered 90 for our invitations)
- 5.75 inch square invitation mattes in “Lemonade” (Again, we ordered a color swatch, then ordered 90 mattes for our invitations)
- 90 6.5 inch square envelopes in “Lemonade” (to hold the invitation; we scrapped the inner envelope, because I think it’s wasteful and frivolous (no offense))
- 90 RSVP envelopes in “Lemonade” (while we initally thought about designing postcards, I loved these little envelopes, so we went with them)

From Etsy:

- Customized stickers from Maxim Creative Invites on Etsy (we ordered two different designs of stickers, one which we used to close the pocketfold and the other which we used to close the envelope)
- Yellow baker’s twine from Whisker Graphics on Etsy (we used this adorable twine to tie a bow around our RSVP package)
- Return address stamp from Love to Create Stamps on Etsy (we used this stamp as a return address and as the “deliver to” address on our RSVP envelopes)

From around town:

- Partially recycled natural ivory linen cardstock (we printed everything on this stock; we probably utilized 250-300 sheets for invitations for our entire guest list)
- Doilies + glue sticks + glue lines + ink pads from Michael’s craft store
- $0.61 cent wedding cake stamp, plus 2 $0.10 cent clock/nautical stamps, per invite, purchased at our local post office (I really wanted stamps with one of our engagement photos on it, but I couldn’t justify the cost)
- $0.44 cent “Love” stamp for our RSVP cards; we chose the stamp with the King and Queen on it!

A note on final cost

After calculating cost for everything ordered, including postage, it seems that the cost for each invitation suite was $3.74.

Here’s the breakdown:

Pocketfolds: $0.98 per invitation
Invitation Mattes: $0.18 per invitation
Natural Ivory Linen Cardstock: $8.00 per ream, $0.09 per invitation
Mailing Envelopes: $0.17 per invitation
RSVP Envelopes: $0.12 per invitation
Stickers: $0.47 per invitation
Address stamp: $0.08 per invitation (includes RSVP envelope)
Doilies: $0.14 per invitation (includes RSVP envelope)
Glue/Glue Lines/Double-stick Tape: $0.22 per invitation (includes all construction)
Baker’s Twine: $0.04 per invitation
Postage: $0.81 per invitation
Postage: $0.44 per RSVP card

TOTAL: $3.74 per invitation

What do you think of our DIY wedding invitations?

[All photos taken by my soon-to-be father-in-law, Steve!]

Good morning, all! I hope you’re coming back from a relaxing, wintery weekend – we had SO MUCH FUN at our engagement shoot yesterday; thank you to all of you who left suggestions for me on how to “winterize” my dress! I can’t wait to see (and then show you all!) our pictures.

Today’s post is a hybrid of sorts, combining the usual “Green Post” theme with an “Our Wedding” feature.

My mother collects birdhouses of all shapes and sizes. In the home that I grew up in, my mother showcases her collection of these birdhouses atop various overhangs in our formal living room and kitchen. I’ve always loved how completely diverse her birdhouses are, and would often admire them as a young girl. I love how a weathered birdcage would sit next to a mossy birdhouse on one side and a refined church birdhouse on the other.

Before Jordan and I were even engaged, we knew that our wedding would not be the typical affair, partly because we’re not mainstream people (both of us are fascinated by imaginary worlds of television and fiction), but mostly because of money. We (smartly) did not want to dive head first into the big ‘D’ (debt) to afford letterpress invitations or chocolate fountains.

So, after Jordan and I were engaged, I began diving into wedding blog after wedding blog, trying to find a theme or motif that inspired me. I came across Olive You Deerly relatively early in my search, and I fell in love with the floral/birds’ nest fascinator that she wore in her hair. I love the imagery of lovebirds, and after a little more brainstorming, I thought back to my mother’s birdhouse collection. Why couldn’t we utilize her wonderful collection for our reception centerpieces? From there, I began Google searching everything “rustic” and “bird-themed,” and after a few months, I now have a honed vision on the main theme of our wedding: lovebirds with a touch of rustic elements, heavy on the vintage.

The point of my story is this:  instead of purchasing (or renting!) tall clear vases, mirror squares, candleholders, etc. for our centerpieces, we’re utilizing reusable decor and found items. By showcasing my mother’s birdhouse collection, we’re being budget-friendly AND eco-friendly (no waste!). I feel like learning this lesson early in my wedding planning has not only helped me to accomplish a honed vision, but has also contributed significantly to our desire not to go into debt or contribute to mass waste. As an added bonus, I feel very satisfied that we’re honoring my mother by including her collection of birdhouses. Utilizing her collection also gives our wedding personality – how many weddings have you attended where birdhouses sit center stage?

Do any of your family members have collections
that you could utilize in your own wedding?

Photo: www.bymyhands.com

That’s right, readers – after searching high (as in high prices) and low (as in desperate Google searches for “metallic grey dresses”), my lovely gal pals and I have finally found a bridesmaid dress that not only will look fetch on all of my ladies, but is absolutely cost-effective, too!

The dress is from Dessy‘s After Six line, and after selecting four of my favorites, this is the one that all of my girlfriends loved:

Isn’t it beautiful! While the picture shows the dress in brown, my ladies will be wearing the dress in a metallic silvery grey satin (I still have to get swatches of the colors, but for now I like “mocha”). The dress comes with optional straps that my girls can elect to wear (I care not), which will help my chestier and/or more modest chums!

Here’s my next debate, however:  readers, do you see the waistline of the dress, and how the dress features almost a band around the waist? We have the option to either keep that band of fabric the same color as the dress, or to select an accent color for the band. Although I’ve flirted with the idea of having coral be my accent color, I really feel that my true love is yellow (yes, I changed my mind again…) so I love the idea of using a lighter hue of yellow as the accent color for the band. However, I also like the use of ivory as the accent color, since that’s the color of my wedding gown.

Even still, I love the dress in solid metallic grey, and to me, if I were a bridesmaid, I would prefer a solid-colored dress to a dress with an accent color. (I seriously think if it were me, I would wear this bridesmaid dress again to another wedding or a fancy holiday party.)

My solution: at this point, I think I’ll have the girls order the gowns in solid metallic grey, and that way, we have the option to add a yellow or ivory ribbon/sash to the dress, if we so choose.

Do you all remember this dress pattern? See the beautiful woman on the right in the amazing patterned strapless number? I love how she’s rocking that wrap with the brooch, and I recently fell in love with having my girls walk down the aisle with wraps and brooches of their own. But I’m not so sure of this look anymore, and I’m not sure why.

Readers, what do you think of the bridesmaid dress we’ve chosen? Have a thought about the color conundrum? What about the wrap look – what do you think? Please comment below!

Have a happy Tuesday!

Top Photo: Dessy’s After Six, Style 6553, www.dessy.com
Bottom Photo:  McCalls Dress Patterns, www.McCalls.com

Happy Wednesday, readers!

Great news for Eco-Vintage Weddings – we’ve just been added to Green Maven, a search engine and directory of web sites with social and environmental values!

Green Maven markets itself as “an easier way to find companies and individuals that are working to build a more sustainable, just world.” Instead of doing all of your searching using Google or Bing, head on over to Green Maven and be connected to thousands of companies who are making environmentally conscious choices when producing their products. What a great resource for your holiday gifts!

Eco-Vintage Weddings is proud to be listed on Green Maven; gracious thanks to all you do to promote green commerce and blogging!