Wedding Party Favors, an ongoing idea bank

Even if you do not have the looming deadline of Jan 14th over your head for your sister's wedding and possibly might be planning a party in a hot second, you might find some of these links worth checking out. I'm looking for quick, cheap, and cute ideas. You might even find that some of these DIY projects might even be cute for your home!


1.  http://thecottagehome.blogspot.com/2011/01/tile-coaster-tutorial.html

I found this adorable tutorial recently and I definitely want to use it even if it is not going to be for a wedding or shower favor. I always have a hard time trying to find coasters for apartments I live in and when I do find them they're usually pretty expensive. Getting a tile at home depot, cute paper, and make my own? It doesn't even look hard---heck ya I will do it! :)

2. http://beyondbeyond.co.uk/blog/flagging-pretty/#comments

If you are even THINKING about having a party soon in the future, this would be hands down adorable to do and again EASY. I think it would definitely impress your friends. You'll hear all those whispered comments (OMG, she's so creative, I hate her!). If everything pans out the way I hope I might be doing this for the Spa Day I am tentatively planning for my sister. How cute would everyone's initial be in your lemonade glass? You'll never accidentally take anyone else's drink unless you have the same first letter. :p

3. http://www.segeriusbruceblog.com/bridal-fashion-shoot/twilight-breaking-dawn/

This isn't a DIY tutorial, but seriously if you were a vampire, this would be your dream wedding. Come on, they have cute shot glasses of blood. What else would you need? Someone smells extra tasty? No worries--go to the bar! Besides this wedding photoshoot is done better than the actually movie wedding so you need to see it.

I'm still working on my sis' veil, but it's getting closer! As is her wedding date!

Do you have any good ideas for wedding favors? Had a wedding? Planning a wedding? Been IN a wedding? Tell me! Tell me! :)

Bridal Veil

So my next big project besides hemming a MOH dress (talk about pressure ;p), is to make my sister's wedding veil.

We worked on it today and the results surprised me a little bit. It's actually going to be two pieces. A headband and veil that is basically just that. No glamor, just a little bit of glitz that could potentially make her look like a hippie. Good thing I can do hair :p

Potentially it could be like this pic only not as elaborate...

What it does mean, however, is that I have a lot of extra stuff to play with! I'm pretty excited about making some random wedding veils. :)

We'll see how that goes I suppose.

Tissue Paper Glam Craft Tutorial

So I am going to try out doing a tutorial. I have been wanting to do this for a while now. When I had my first apartment in upstate NY, we saved our empty alcohol bottles. Most of them I threw away, but I did keep some meaningful ones. Such as my senior year champagne bottle for my last play that I opened and a more recent non apartment one when I went to a winery with some friends. I have two bottles that are from professors that I did not do this technique too yet, but I will probably be revisiting this with a friend, because I think it's kind of a fun idea.

So this is the end result on a shoebox:

Interested? Well get on a shirt you don't care about and create a workspace. I cut two boxes open and used my craft table. 

1. the items you would like to glam up.

2. a sufficient workspace area

3. a magazine that has cool pictures that you don't necessarily care about cutting up

You can also probably print out pictures if you would like to. I would suggest photo paper.

Regular paper would probably work as well, though.

4. scissors (kind of goes along with the paper) :) 

5. tissue paper

6. Elmer's glue

7. Water

 8. A cup

9. paint brushes

Have you ever done paper mache? Basically add the glue to a cup or bucket (whatever you would like to use) and add water. I made mine really water down so that in the end there would be a glossy sort of feel. Just to let you know I am going to get some sort of polyurethane or something of the sort at Michael's because I want a glassy finish to my pieces. However, if you just want to use Elmer's glue and water it does the trick too, just know you will be putting lots of layers of it on your pieces! :)

10. Craft paint

11. a paint palette. (or just use any surface even the cardboard!)

My craft area went through several transformations of craziness throughout this process so don't worry if yours looks more chaotic than mine in these pictures. :)

Got all of your materials and glue? You're ready to get creative!

So basically  the hardest part of this is making the glue. I'm going to let you know that if you don't get the right consistency right away do not be upset! When a friend of mine and I tried to make masks one time our paper mache was horrible. The best part about it is you're not trying to make a mask or anything that needs serious paper mache skills so this is a great project to just play with the consistency. 

After you have that you can start creating. I started by putting tissue paper on the wine bottles and then added pictures over it. Sometimes I put tissue paper on top, sometimes I didn't like it so I tore the paper. You can really do whatever feels right. 

On the shoe boxes I added the images first and then added the tissue paper in spots I felt appropriate. I felt like my pieces were missing something so I mixed up some craft paint and added that as well. 

The key is after you have your first coat on wait for it to dry and then add more coats of just glue. That's what's going to really finished it up nice. Unfortunately, my glue was thrown away actually into a drain because someone thought it was paint so I wasn't able to put as many coats of glue on as I would like. However, I think they turned out pretty well. 

The shoe boxes are going to be awesome for storing sewing supplies and the wine bottles are going to be awesome for vases. I might have to go out and buy some fake flowers just to get the right effect. :)

The end result: 

Happy crafting :).

Pictures of Adventure Time Costumes and Shoes

So I got pictures of how my costumes turned out on! :) This is really motivating me to buy a smaller mannikin.

I've never met my friend's fiance but you can tell in these pictures that they're amazing for each other. I'm excited they're getting married. :)

And on a completely random note... I have restored faith in Payless for being a good place to buy shoes. Especially shoes that you wear every day chasing around small children. They're doing another buy one pair get the other half off so I got these (below) and tennis shoes.

 

Satisfactorily cute for in a pinch... not NYC cute, but still cute. :) And no joke: my bill was $44 for tennis shoes, cute flats, gloves, and tights... who can beat that price?

It's been a long trip...to say the least.

I should have suspected that the East Coast might get some snow around Halloween. I mean, I only grew up in Upstate NY... But I guess I just needed to be reminded that random snowstorms stink. It literally snowed on the way to Boston as soon as we hit Mass and on the way back we got caught in that snowstorm on Saturday. We had a huge debate. Should we leave? Should we stay for an extra night and not go to NYC and drive home the next day? Oh we'll just take 95 right by the water. Awesome.

Honestly if we had stayed though, we prob would still be in Boston. Oh well.

So anyway my excessive luggage was in my last update so I'll skip over that.

DAY 1:

So we decided to drive somewhat back roads to avoid tolls on the way to Boston. We thought it would be cool to go to Sleepy Hollow, NY just to say we had been there. We went to an AMAZING restaurant Horsefeathers. It was delicious. I loved by Turkey Pot Pie Soup. So good. And Sleepy Hollow is a pretty cute little town. I wish we could spend more time there.

On the way into Mass it started snowing. The grand total of our 9 hour car ride turned into a 13 hour car ride. It was very sad.

However, we arrived safe and alive and surprised our friend with a visit. He literally slammed the door in our face because he was in shock. It was great.

Day 2:

So after an epic car ride, where we stopped in Sleepy Hollow, we went to Salem the next morning. Salem is such a cute little town that completely tourist, but still fun to go to.

After a morning in Salem, we went back to our friends house and met up with him in-between his shifts at work. We went walking in a park and drank a beer. Apparently it's pretty rough drinking beer on tap in Boston because they don't clean the filters. Who knows if that's really true though. :) Our stomachs have been pretty messed up since then sadly. So maybe it is.

We got lost driving back to our friend's house and got to drive in the streets of Boston. Pretty epic.

The one thing I'm really glad we did was go to the top of the Prudential Building.

Then, of course, it's time for us to start putting on our Halloween costumes.

Zombie newly bitten hipsters here we go off into the night. Definitely not the most attractive Halloween costumes ever, but it sure is fun. I even teased my hair though that lasted about five seconds.

Day 3

So then of course on Day 3 we were supposed to wake up bright eyed and ready to go to a museum in Boston. Yeah...that happened. There was also this crazy snowstorm coming our way. So of course we slept in and then ate some yummy lunch food... and then got to drive in this lovely weather.

We ended up having to stop in Milford, CT. I spent two summers in New Milford, CT and there isn't much going on there, but there is definitely more in New Milford than Milford I will say that much. Of course, we were in the middle of a snowstorm but ya kno.

This is how sad we were. Until we had a make-up party.

Day 4:

After the epic snowstorm, we still went to NYC the next day. We drove to queens and had some amazing crepes. They were epic. Then, we briefly went into Manhattan to see a friend from college. I dragged him to tourist-y things, which he hated of course. :)

And the rest of the drive home was no nearly as epic as the rest of the trip.

All in all, pretty successful vacation. However, I already want to go back to Boston because I keep learning about all of the things I missed out on doing!

Road Trip Day #1

Waiting for Kerie to get here so we can start our road trip! And I need coffee badly. It's so sad that I can't start my day without coffee now.

The plan of attack is non-95 and tolls the way there. Well stop in Sleepy Hollow Ny and possibly New Haven Ct. I'm excited to drive thro seven states today!

Maryland, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York, Connecticut, Rhode Island, and Massachusetts.

Our destination? Boston or, more specifically, Danvers and then Salem.

PS I think I packed too much. :)

Finished Adventure Time Costumes!!! :)

So I finished the Adventure Time Costume and shipped it today! Now it's just time to cross my fingers all my measurements are correct. It always makes me nervous when I'm making clothes for someone tinier than me. I think I just need to buy a small dress form... SOON. Haha I need money first.

So I think these costumes are going to be adorable. I can't wait for pictures of my friend Laura and her fiance in them! The hat turned out cute (if I do say so myself hah) for the main character. The princess hat is foam. I glued two pieces together for added strength and it's going to be held in by bobbi pins, which should be more than enough. I was over-complicating the headpiece in my mind for days. When I sat down to do it, it just seemed best to do the simplest option.

The pattern I ended up using was the same pattern I used for a Dorothy costume for a Wizard of Oz play I costume designed for. I modified the pattern using mulin as practice so that the neckline would be a lot higher. It worked out pretty well. I definitely am going to use muslin in the future over the paper I bought.

Unfortunately, it's hard to see how this will look on, but I did a gather in the middle of the dress rather than darts. I think its going to look really nice, though it will create a little bit more lines than the Princess actually has on her dress.

This is the dress without sleeves laid out. Again, I do not have a mannikin that is the correct size. I only have a plus sized mannikin.

This is kind of a better view of how the gather works.

The completed dress. :)

I tried to explain to my dog that everyone left to go paint at my sister's brand new house and I stayed to sew. He didn't really understand. This is his confused face. Or maybe it's his hurt face, because I did tell him that the yard has a fence at my sis' house, but no one wants to have him in their car, because he sheds.


My project that I did tonight:

A tinkerbell pillow with my fabric remnants! A great way to go green if you have enough extra fabric. Make a cute little pillow. :)

 I did an M for Maddie and little black sparkle hearts. It's a pretty quick project and a great idea for extra fabric. It's a little heavier than an actual pillow, but it's super comfy!

I'm so excited for a zombie road trip!!!!

I'm so excited about Thursday now... I'm going on a four day vacation! That's what I will have to focus on tomorrow when I babysit for ten hours (yikes!).

So Kerie and I spent the night getting our halloween costumes together.. We're going to be Zombie Hipsters. Completely random... I know... I didn't take pictures of our shirts yet, but it's going to be epic. I can't wait!

I will put up the reference pictures for this make-up design later... I simply need to sleep in a minute, so this is an unfortunately quick post. Also, I am adding veins on her eyebrows and forehead. We are considering putting on a whiter foundation. And playing around with the idea that we're "infected."

Here's is my zombie bite mark. Again, I will put up the reference tutorial when I have a minute! It's really simple. We used latex from Party city, toilet paper, paint from party city, and fake blood.

Basically you put a small rectangular piece of toilet paper on your skin, put the latex around the edges, and then make sure the latex is covering all of the toilet paper. Repeat for as big of a surface as you would like. When you're done you dab brown on and a little green. Afterwards, you cut a piece of latex and pull it up to expose skin. The skin is where you apply the blood. Pretty simple, yet the tutorial is two parts and 20 minutes long. The plus side? The girl is hysterical in it.

~*::EDIT::*~

Make-up Reference links: 1 | 2 | 3

Zombie Make-Up Tutorial.