Invitation Dilemma... Round 2

So you may remember me going on about how I am at a loss for what to do about these invitations.  Well, I stopped being crazy and upset about it and decided to sketch out a possible design - IF - I were to make them myself.  Here is the sketch images...  (please don't judge my poor artwork abilities)

This is the entire sketch sheet... There are more close ups below...

 Here is a picture of what I want the main invitation portion to look like.  I am thinking a yellow envelope with a liner that is blue paper with white polka dots.  The actual invitation would be on white paper that would have a punched out design on the left and right side of the paper.  This punch out would allow you to see the color of the paper behind it.  The paper behind it would be yellow and would fold up and close around the invitation and could be tied with a pretty blue ribbon.

 The response cards could be similar to the main invitations, with colors inverted and no closure around the response cards.  (Hope this is all making sense...)

 Information cards would look identical, in design, to the response cards.

I drug Jeff to Michael's with me to help me not spend a ton of money on supplies that we may not end up using and to help pick things out and help me think of possibilities.  I am sure that by July 16, he is probably going to hate craft stores more than he does now.  (I must tell you though, when we left the store after this adventure, he said he didn't mind it too much because we went in, got what we needed and got out and didn't spend time looking for more craft projects that we don't have time for...)

On our craft store adventure I found:

- an adorable paper puncher that does edging that is made by Martha Stewart... around $14.99

- blank white invitation card stock and envelopes (pack of 100)... around $10.99

- blue cardstock and white cardstock... $0.59/sheet (if this project flourishes, I must find these colors of cardstock in BULK!)

- a paper cutter to cut straight lines easily... around $9.99

While looking around in the wedding aisle, Jeff found an invitation DIY kit that was on sale.  There were plenty there for us to be able to purchase them and make our own invites from this kit that included EVERYTHING.... around $15.99

Luckily I had a coupon for 20% off my entire order... shopping trip total... around $50  (forgive my math skills... I think I may have forgotten a few items in our list...)

After the adventure, I decided it was time to try a portion of the idea.  I had invited people to come to my apartment to watch the playoff game so I could only try part of the idea before it was time for me to get ready.  Here was what I tried...

The white paper with the cut out part on the sides (just like I drew up)... making the sides close in proved to be pretty tough... I think if we do make these on our own, we will be scratching that part of the idea...

 Here is a close up of the invite... what do you think??

 Here is a close up of an invite from the kit that we got.  If we used this, I would probably want to put some embellishments on the right side to dress it up a little... but we will see...

Here is the inside of the kit invite.  There is a pocket on the left hand side for the response card and information card, which I like... But, I wasn't too crazy about the overall look and feel of the invite.

So after a few days of thinking about what I wanted it to look like and comparing the options, I decided to try a mock up of the actual layout of the invite print.  My printer ink was pretty much dead and it printed off center slightly, but other than that, I think I like my mock up.  What do you think?  Think we should use our design?

 Here is a close up of the monogram I designed for the invites.  There is a problem near the top of the outer circle with the dots because there are two that are almost touching - which shouldn't be there.  I gotta fix that little issue and then I will be happy with this monogram.  What do you all think?  Should we go for it?  Do you like the monogram?

Oh How I LOVE Save the Dates!!!!!!!!!!!

Our save the dates arrived yesterday - just like the UPS website told me they would!  They arrived in an un-mangled plain, brown box... See below...

Inside of the plain, brown box was a very pretty teal box that had a magnetic closure to hold all of my lovely goodies inside!  I was so excited jumping up and down like a small child!  It was like Christmas morning!

Inside the pretty, teal box, I found envelopes galore and our save the dates!!!! :-)  I was sooooo excited!!!  They turned out beautifully!  Everything is spelled right, the photo looks amazing... OOO!!! I can't wait to send them out!

I was so excited about them that I decided to put them all in their envelopes so I can print the labels, stick the labels to the envelops along with a stamp and get them out ASAP!  I don't know if you can tell how excited I am but believe me, I could hardly sit still!

And here they all are.  Nice and pretty white envelopes stuffed with out save the dates.  Ready for mailing labels and stamps... YAY!! :)

A weekend of registries!

This past weekend, future husband and I decided to start the registry process.  Our plan: register at 4 places - one that is only in NY (Erie)... one that is only in Motown... and two that they share in common.  We started out at Belk (which is the Motown exclusive) and I had already started one there during a bridal event where I won a "men's prize pack" that included a duffel bag, bar utensils and a skillet.  We tried to update the registry with things we actually wanted and didn't have much luck.  We left discouraged (and with no pictures), but headed to Bed Bath & Beyond, in hopes of having better luck.

What a breath of fresh air!  The wedding registry staff at BB&B was absolutely amazing!  The woman was so full of energy and so nice!  She printed off images from their website of some of the things we were on the fence about so we could find them easier later.  She spent time explaining to us the differences in the various pots and pans they had available, and did the same with the knifes!  We found pots, pans and knifes that we are absolutely in love with!  Then the fun began!  I let Jeff run the "gun" and I used my "organizational skills" (that some like to refer to as OCD) to check things off as we registered for them.

We spent 2.5 hours in that store and only registered for kitchen items and luggage!  We found it difficult to decide on kitchen linens, bathroom and bedroom linens because we hadn't really thought about what colors we wanted to use for those rooms.  Figuring that out is certainly on our to-do list!

Look how much fun we had!

YAY!!!  (I will let you all take a guess at what this may be...)

 Jeff was so excited when he found a waffle maker that flips around!

We will be having more fun registry adventures this weekend.  All the time we spent at BB&B wore us out so we celebrated with dinner at Carrabba's.  We were also celebrating 6 months away from the wedding! YAY!  Getting more excited as the day gets closer!

DELIVERED!!!!!!!!!!!

I'm so excited that I almost can't sit in class any longer.  Unfortunately, I am stuck here until 5:30 tonight... EEEEEK!!!  I can't wait to get home, bust open this box and just get excited!!!!!  

Here's the proof!

Today is the day!!!!

Save the dates arrive today!  I can't tell you how excited I am!!! Luckily I will be in class all day to keep me from sitting at the door of my apartment waiting for the knock that delivers great things! :-)  Be safe today Mr. UPS man... I need that package! :-)

Take a look for yourself!  YAYY!!!!

They are "completed"!

I have been checking the website we ordered our save the dates from every day hoping that there has been a change in the "status" of the order.  Every day they have said "in production."  While that is excellent because it means they are being made, I am dying to get these in my hand to see how they turned out!

Well, the day has come!  The status is now "completed"! YAY!!!!!!  Now I just have to keep checking back to see when they have shipped.  This means I will have the screen open all day clicking refresh a million times in hope of a change in their date shipped! :-) 

Sooooo excited!  The company even threw in a wedding style book for free.  I'm not even sure what it is, but maybe it will be something cool! :)

Invitation Dilemma

I have been searching for months now for the "perfect" wedding invitations.  To be "perfect" the invitations must be cute, come in our wedding colors, have some sort of special element to them, be reasonably priced and just wow me.

I began my invitation adventure believing that I was SuperBride and could hand craft EVERYTHING including the invitations.  While I am sure this is possible... it is not a feasible plan for me.  Don't get me wrong, I will be doing A LOT of crafts this semester preparing for the big day, but I don't think invites will be on the craft list (which needs to be made...).  You may remember seeing our first attempt at a mock up of our hand crafted invites... the problem with this one was that the paper just seemed too flimsy... Here is the original mock up in case you missed it...

 Mock up with the inspirational one beside it...

The main reason I decided that making my invitations was a bad idea (at least for now) came when I decided that I needed to have raised ink and realized I couldn't do this on my own.  I knew from the beginning that I wanted to carry something throughout the wedding... something that was unique - like a monogram.  Solution?  Buy a monogram seal that was personalized with our initials and press that into the top of each invite after flat printing the rest.  Then I decided I didn't like that idea so much anymore and decided I could letterpress some part of the invite after flat printing the rest.  (Letterpress is where text is pressed down into the paper.)  I decided this was a bad idea because it would be incredibly time consuming.  There were considerations of these invites that you fold up and when guests get them, they tear off the bottom portion and mail back their response which is like a postcard - super cute... but not traditional... I considered these for a hot second (maybe more like a hot few days) then realized I wanted something more formal, more traditional.  I bounced back and forth back and forth between ideas.  I thought I had finally decided when I came to the conclusion that flat printing would be fine... then changed my mind back to raised ink and started looking online for the perfect invite...AGAIN!  At least I finally settled on colors... right? :-)

Well, I have continued the search and haven't been able to come up with anything that I am in love with yet that meets my criteria.  I LOVE the idea of a monogram and have clearly fell in love with polka dots... so should I use a monogram in a circle?  Should I even care about having raised ink on my invitations or would flat printing (like what you would get if you printed this page on a desktop printer) be ok?  Do people truly care about the type of printing on the invite?  Am I concerned too much about this little detail?  Should I still consider making my own or should I continue the search?  Any suggestions or words of advice?