Again…I’ll try to stay on subject here. When we first got engaged and my brain was thinking we had TONS of time to do all kinds of DIY projects (you can stop laughing at anytime now) I had the brilliant idea of having a really nice funky chic background for wedding pics and for anyone who wanted their pics taken at the wedding ..possibly for the photobooth inside. My MOH, Alexi, who is the downtown Bryan Horse Drawn Carriage lady reminded me of a stash of doors collected by a building owner in Downtown Bryan. Zane Anderson currently renovates old buildings and tries to leave the charm but saves as much of the original hardware as he can. Sadly, many of these doors are in somewhat poor shape and their only hope is that some insane bride comes along to rescue them with a coat of paint and put them in her wedding. “Score!” Zane sold me about 7 of these doors for relatively little money. We stored them in Phil’s (BM) Garage till we found time to deal with them. We hired a guy to sand them down for us and clean them up a little before painting.

After Thanksgiving, we set to work the rest of the weekend painting and re-aging the doors:

Tina painting and then distressing antique doors to be backdrops for wedding pictures.

Door Gallery:

I found a great tutorial on aging furniture at Design Sponge. The colors are bright and gorgeous…no light pastels at this wedding. I think with the photographer we hired there will be some beautiful bright pics with these doors as a background. I managed to find an old bench too off of craigslist that should be a nice contrast. My bridesmaid, Molly, and I spent and entire evening sewing paper garland…I learned oodles about my sewing machine and I’m excited about it. There will be lots of colored paper garland over the doors and photobooth. We’re going for a casual fun atmosphere. I encourage people to wear bright colors and not expect a huge amount of formality after the ceremony. ;) I will add pics of the garland as soon as I get home.

Coming soon….the uber-bouquet making party of ’11. It’s gonna be crazy.

2008: Our first year making ornaments we made ceramic ornaments at the local ceramic store. They made everything very easy. They had a wide selection of un-decorated “bisque” ceramics in all shapes and sizes ready to be painted. Once you paint them with a chalky glaze paint they’ll need to be fired in an oven. The local ceramic store had everything we needed: we picked out the ornament shapes out and painted them right there. A few days later we picked them up after they had been fired in an oven. They turned out great; see the gallery below.

2009: The following year we choose to go with simple wood ornaments. They sell various shapes at the local craft stores and along with a set of paint pens we were ready. These were the easiest to make so far, and I’d expect them to last the longest.

2010: This year we wanted to do stained glass, but we don’t know anything about glass making. Instead of real stained glass we used painted glass that when it dries it has a stain glass look. We picked up some plain clear glass ball ornaments at the store along with a paint kit. The kit had several colors along with a bottle of liquid leading which is a thick black paint that when dries resembles the lead joints seen in stain glass windows.

To make the painted glass ornaments we had to do a two-step process. The first day we used a China Marker to draw an outline on the glass. Next , we used the liquid leading to draw a beaded line along the outline. The liquid leading requires at least 8 hours to dry. So we left them to hang in the closet. The next day we came back and painted color in between the shapes created by the leading. To paint the color you just use a special tool that comes with the paint kit to scoop paint into the area. You fill up the entire area pushing the paint to cover all the areas. It requires more paint that you expect; it thins out as it dries translucent. The color paint requires another 8 hours to dry then they are ready to hang on the tree.

Next year: We haven’t decided what material we’ll use for next years ornaments but Tina’s interested in using Fimo Modeling Clay. We’ll certainly have lots things to celebrate with our ornaments next year after getting married!

Ornament Gallery

Ok so the last couple of months have been packed with finding vendors, writing checks, and cutting fabric. Lots and lots of fabric and making decisions about that fabric and then starting over with different fabric…unfortunately, that’s the creative process. I’m learning to trust it as long as I keep budget in mind. Making fabric flowers was a LOT harder than I thought. As this was my inspiration from Milkpod Studios on Etsy.

Their shop is closed until Aug 30…guessing because they’re so busy after being featured in Bride’s magazine. I found them a bit pricey but people have to make a living, but i need to save some money so I decided …YES I CAN! (famous last words, no?)

My first attempt was “fairly clunky” it’s the only way I can describe it. Scott was supportive, but I wasn’t totally feelin’ it and when that happens and i’m not real confident I tend to be slow at it. I have 5 bouquets and centerpieces people. This is not for the faint of heart. I started to scour youtube on tutorials and other bride blogs etc. I came across Princess Lasertrons pretty flowers but wow that’s a LOT of sewing…a talent I haven’t quite grasped. At least her earlier work anyway. I needed something inbetween. Some of her later stuff is actually what I decided on. I’m thinking all that emroidery may have gotten to her as well as it seems to fading from her recent bouquets.

So anyway, Here’s a look at my salvageable ones after i figured out how these crafty ladies were producing these. I’m quite partial to them:

Fabric Flowers

What’s really cool is that I’m using our old jeans in some of the flowers so it’s very personal :). I’ve found some unique buttons on Etsy that I’m waiting on right now so the flowers aren’t all wood beads and plastic. I’ve discovered that buttons are a unique art in itself and can be quite pricey if you don’t scour places like etsy for a nice deal.

Onto how these are made: A company called Sizzix is a creator of all things scrapbooking. They actually make the heavy duty versions of die cuts for schools…I always thought my teacher cut out that stuff, but no the secret’s out. They’re diecuts that go through a manual press type of machine. They’ve since created a cheaper version for the masses for soccer moms to make overly visual scrapbook pages with one photo in them. I never really got into scrapbooking as that stuff gets very expensive if you let it. There’s a digital online thing anyway now called scrapblog if you’re interested. They can print books too. No more cutting! sorry, I veered off…It turns out Sizzix had a couple of manual machines that with the right die could cut through fabric. About 7 dies later, I’ve managed to get the above. It’s sooooo much easier too. I just spend time cutting out shapes out of various fabric…make little stacks of each kind then assemble each flower as I go. Each one is different but from the same fabric colors. I’m quite excited about it, especially since I got all the pieces and dies about 40% off. My dress maker also said she would send me extra fabric to include in the flowers. *happy dance* I will post more pics once i get more done. I just hope I can make enough. I have about 40 so far.

The dress and the peacock feather post I think will have to come later. I just thought I’d tease everyone a little bit :). I have the fabric and color of the dress picked out but nothing really to discuss just yet. Did you catch that? I said “color”…I decided not to wear white as I never wear white anyway so it would make me feel self-concious and not me. I should feel comfortable and pretty so color will be quite prevalent throughout the wedding methinks. As Martha would say…”it’s a good thing”.