anoisette

After I got my sewing machine it was only natural that I would need a pin cushion. Except of course I couldn’t find anything I liked in the store, the red tomato? No thanks. So, like pretty much every other time I can’t find anything I like (wedding dress, anyone?) I figured I would just make one. At some point. In the future. I still haven’t, but along the line my mom gave me an extra magnetic one she had so that serves my purpose well for now.

However.

Today I came across these beautiful linen and lace pin cushions at namolio.etsy.com

Would make a lovely mother’s day present for a crafty mom, no?

I just got an email about this Nifty for fifty sale happening this week-end, featuring designer and vintage goods all for under $50. It’s this Saturday and Sunday, April 18 and 19 from 12 to 7 at the Pacific Palisades Hotel (1277 Robson Street @ Jervis). Read more about it in this blurb at the Straight.

I’ve made a muslin of my dress, but despite the fact that I know it’s a muslin and will look different when it’s made out of the read fabric and has a proper lining and all I can’t help think there’s something missing. I sure wish I had found out about this book Bridal Couture: Fine Sewing Techniques for Wedding Gowns and Evening Wear sooner. I put a copy on hold from the library but it will likely be a few weeks before I get it, since it’s currently signed out. I found it while considering going back to a lace dress idea, but realizing that I don’t actually know a whole lot about working with lace since I never have before. Regardless, if I do stick with the idea I’ve been working on, I’m sure the book will have some very good suggestions and techniques for inner construction. In the mean time, as I am planning on making the dress out of Dupioni Silk, I found some very helpful information about sewing with it here and here.

I stopped by Michael’s the other day and picked up some ribbon to have a try at what it would look like on the invitations. I really like the ribbon with the organza middle and it’s just the right shade of navy (the green of that type of ribbon was sadly too yellow), however in the end I think adding ribbon is a bit much. I feel like it makes it look too cluttered. Better to keep things simple. So I’ll just do the punched corners and the green mat. I ordered the paper, hopefully it gets here soon. A friend of mine is coming to visit next week and is staying at our place. She’s probably one of the most fastidious people I know so maybe we can put that to good use However, I’m not exactly sure what the best kind of glue would be to use to mount the invites. Any experienced invitation makers or scrapbookers have any suggestions?

My friend Tracey sent me a whole pile of inspiration boards from snippet & ink. She’s all about the fantastic ideas and resources! Anyway, I just wanted to share a couple of my favourites:

Love this navy and lavender combination. I also really like the idea of the navy suit with the lily of the valley boutoniere! Navy isn’t a color I had considered for a suit…

Apple green and black, a nice crisp and modern combination. What can I say, I like green… A lot!

So the invitation road, like the dress road, has been a long and twisty one. When I was in Calgary I went to a very lovely shop called Box Paper Scissors. The person there was really nice and helpful and they had absolutely gorgeous designs and ideas for wedding invites of the pocket fold variety. The only problem was if one wanted to DIY, the materials were standard sized card that one would have to cut to size themselves. I balked a bit at the work involved in that, having gotten a taste of it from doing our Save The Dates. However I still wanted to DIY as much as possible because after getting a quote from Zing Paperie here in Coal Harbour for a lovely but very simple invitation that was a lot over my tiny little budget, I figured DIY is all I could afford.

I got tired of trying to talk myself into going to Bridal Row all the way in New Westminster again to go to Paper Poet again, because the first time I was there they didn’t have any information I could take home (or on their site) and mull over, figure out what I wanted based on what sizes and colors they offer, how much it would cost, etc. And the second time I tried to go there, they were closed. Enter Cards & Pockets, which I found out about through Style Me Pretty, where another Canadian bride used them for her super gorgeous invites that she designed herself. After reading a little bit more about them on the Weddingbee boards, and also seriously loving that their papers and mats come cut to the right size, I decided to order a sample kit and some extra color swatches. Well it only took about a week for it all to arrive and so today was work on the invitations day.

I bought the corner punch a while back, and wasn’t sure how I felt about it anymore but the boy decided he wants punched corners, so that’s that. I just happened to have the ribbon from a different project so I played around with it a bit, but I’ll probably go with a blue or a green for the ribbon color. I still have to come up with something for the RSVP cards, but I’m pretty happy with my progress so far!

I just found out about these awesome wall decals by a local Vancouver outfit called Surface Collective. I just love wall decals; they’re really quite easy to apply and they can make such a dramatic difference to a space. And the best part for us renters is that they also come off fairly easily. You can check these guys out at their studio in Gastown, or retailer near you. Anyway, I am now off to Granville Island to enjoy the sun and hopefully find some cherry blossoms.

I’m thinking about painting our apartment so I’ve been looking at paint chips. Then it occurred to me that those nice little cards they put together with paint colors that look good together are perfect inspiration for a wedding palette. So is the Color Studio at Brides.com.  Now I’m not sure though if I really ought to be thinking about painting our apartment with our wedding colors? Could be a bit much! Sometimes I think I want to wallpaper it with something that would look totally rad in photos, like this Lucinda Photography portrait. I love how everything works so well in this photo, from the green couch to the lily of the valley boutonnière and of course the awesome wallpaper.

I really enjoyed the DIY Wedding Favors series over at Style Me Pretty. A lot of those ideas could also be used for other occasions or even little Christmas presents. Some of my favourites are the Custom Seed Packs, Spice Jar Favors, and Tea Tins. Currently I’m thinking our favors will be based on the Spice Jar Favors, just because I love how they pull double duty as place ard holders.