I’m an overachiever

Happy Turkey Day, everyone! Or, in our case, Happy Ham-Turkey-Cornbread Dressing-Pumpkin Cheesecake day! I’m enjoying some relaxing family time before the big feast, and thought I’d share my Christmas wrappings for this year. Yes, I’ve already purchased and wrapped half of my family’s presents, since we split our holidays every year. Some would say I’m an overchiever, but really, it’s just in this department.

Brown craft paper, divine twine and shiny silver ribbon are where it’s at this year. Apparently for me at least.

We picked up all of our wrapping accoutrements from Target this year – based purely on the fact that we were leaving for Thanksgiving in a day and had to wrap one half of the family’s gifts before we left. Luckily, Target did not disappoint and had a nice variety of silver goodness.

Yeah, I made tassels. Martha’s little tutorial that I found on Whisker Graphic’s blog got me itchy to try these. Martha’s look a thousand times better than mine, but hey, she’s a professional crafter. I can’t compete with that.

Hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving, filled with full tummies and tryptophan induced comas. :)

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Baby Shower Invitations: Lime and Aqua

Dear week from hell,

Me, the beach and a bucket of brews are going to spend some quality time together to forget all about you. No hard feelings.

Sincerely, me.

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We just recently got back from an amazing trip to Alaska, and boy have we had a hard time adjusting. With fire alarms going off, late work nights, and missing alarm clocks, I’m anxious to give a big heave-ho to this week and spend some quality family time at the beach relaxing and recuperating. In the meantime, (since I know you’ve been missing me dearly) I thought I’d share some DIY invitations I whipped up for my sister-in-law’s upcoming baby shower. She and my big bro are having a little boy and she wanted the invites to be fun, a bit modern and tie in with her nursery colors (lime green and aqua). She mentioned wanting some bunting at her shower, so I felt this design (which they ended up using) was quite appropriate.

Cute and simple, no? I like to give people options, but sometimes I get a bit carried away. I designed 3 invitations for this shower. Yes, there is only one baby being born, but I felt my future nephew deserved the best I could do – which entailed three completely different options.

I really liked the look of this one, but maybe it was a bit too feminine for a boy shower? Enter, option numero tres.

The chevrons are kinda funky and a bit retro, which I really liked as another option. Even though my sister-in-law picked the first card, I’d like to see what everyone else thinks. Are you batty over bunting, digging the dots or groovin on chevron? Sound off!

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Daddy’s Day and Letterpress Love

I love a good letterpress card. I have a hard time finding a card that I don’t like. No, love. Have to fork out 4 dollars and 50 cents so I can have it in my possession kind of love. I popped into my most favorite store today (Paper Source, naturally) in search of a father’s day card and I hit letterpress gold. If you’re in need of a fantastic Father’s Day card (it’s just around the corner, you know) check out this lovely at Paper Source, as well as all the other beautiful cards they have in store.

Now Dad, stop reading. Right now. AVERT YOUR EYES! DON’T RUIN THE MAGIC! Obviously my Dad hasn’t received this card in the mail yet because I’m not that ahead of schedule, but I just couldn’t resist sharing in case someone was in search of a fun card and had yet to find one.

The typewriter font is so perfect for a Dad themed card, and the “check your thank yous” format is brilliant. And the letterpress? Yum.

Some of my favorites? So glad you asked. How about “boldly wearing socks with sandals OR indulging in other fashion no-no’s”? What Dad hasn’t donned a Hawaiian shirt or sported a fetching comb-over? Or how about “embarrassing me in public to build my character”? This has my Dad’s name written all over it – and I love him for that. Happy early Father’s Day to all you papas out there and happy hunting for the perfect card!

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Tag, You’re It

In case you haven’t noticed, I’ve been on a bit of a blog break. I’ve been dealing with some things in my personal life, and I needed a break to do just that – deal. Sometimes life can be scary, or frustrating, or down right confusing. And then to top it all off, I now have a cold. Whaa. You didn’t know you were stepping into a whine fest today, did you?

My faithful readers (i.e. two of my friends) started to ask “when are you going to blog again?” so I figured I should hop on the blogging wagon once again. Thanks for being patient and hanging around, despite my unannounced absence. I’ll get back into the swing of things with a quick little project that I worked up for mi madre. After I threw the greeny baby shower a couple of weeks ago, my Mom said that she was throwing a girly baby shower that could use some rockin’ food tags.

The colors for the shower were chocolate-brown and pink, and these tags had to obviously be more girl oriented than my previous shower. I decided to add a cute little scalloped detail to up the cuteness factor and changed up the fonts to something a bit softer.

I left a bit of negative space on the bottom on the tag so the text and scalloped lines would appear more centered on the tag. Oh, and if you’re looking for these simple card holders, I found them on the most random site, thanks to good ol’ Google. A lot of other card holders out there are too “wedding-y” but these are simple (and cheap) enough to fit any venue.

Of course I rounded the corners to these cards to make them that much more girly. Am I obsessed with rounding corners on everything I print? Quite possibly… but look how cute these cards look! I couldn’t resist. If only I had access to a letterpress, these cards would literally make me DIE with cuteness. Anyone else have a weird obsession like me? Leave some love!

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Greeny Baby Shower: The Delivery

You’ve seen the idea collage and now it’s time for the unveiling of the greeny baby shower that my blogging cohort, Evelyn, and I whipped up for our very pregnant friend and her hubby. We decided to throw a simple and fun shower, filled with candy (the mom’s favorite), drinks and no games whatsoever. This was a couple’s shower, so we provided the booze and the good times found themselves – and it was a hit! The decorations and the food went off without a hitch, and definitely kept with our modern green, black and white color scheme. Get ready for an eyegasm of pictures headed your way!

We jazzed up the parents’ entry way with some simple bunting in a fun arrangement. This let our guests know that grabbing a beer and kicking back was totally acceptable at this baby shower.

We then had a simple candy bar that was at the entry (next to the gift table) so people could pick up a goody bag of candy on their way out… or as they entered. We used simple glass vases of varying sizes to keep things consistent, and even raised some of the smaller vases up to add some height with a glass cake stand. The varying heights kept the visual going up and around, and helped to keep the arrangement from looking flat. We kept the candy in the green/white/black family and added some simple flower arrangements on each side to add another fun pop of green.

I didn’t focus on keeping all of the greens the same color – I just kept things bright and fun and everything seemed to coordinate just fine.

These simple gift bag were the perfect parting gift for our guests. Everyone could grab what they wanted and had the freedom to take a whole bag of tootsie rolls, or a combo of everything on the bar.

I printed these simple food tags on white card stock (still working on my industrial pack of cardstock, I tell you) to tie the whole party together. These also tied back into the invitations I sent out earlier, as well as brought in another little pop of green to liven things up.

We kept the food table simple with white and glass platters and a little strip of bunting across the front. I whipped up some simple flower arrangements with green button mums and a bit of divine twine tied around the vase.

I didn’t think a thicker ribbon worked with our simple, modern shower, so a bit of divine twine was just the ticket to give the flower arrangements a little something extra. I ordered the green mums in bulk from a local florist and saved a ton of money making my own arrangements. There’s something to be said for simplicity – it’s easy on the wallet!

We kept our menu pretty simple for the 2 o’clock shower. Evelyn whipped up some yummy cheese and cracker platters, as well as some delicious spicy cheese straws that were a definite hit. Add in some seven layer dip, veggies and dips, and we had plenty of food to feed 30 party goers.

More bunting made its way around the bar to tie the drink area and desert bar into the rest of the space.

Cute green polka dot cupcake liners and green sprinklers on the cupcakes were the perfect desert for this boy baby shower (as well as rice krispie treats – another favorite of the mom-to-be). These orange vanilla cupcakes were actually made from scratch! Check out the full story on Evelyn’s blog here.

Guests could get their drink on in another part of the kitchen (it helped with traffic flow to keep this area away from the food and dessert areas). We had lemonade for our preggo guests, as well as margaritas (green, of course!) and simple buckets filled with sodas and beer. This shower was definitely no-nonsense which was perfect for this modern, laid back couple. Let me know your thoughts on the final product!

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Greeny Baby Shower: Bunting Bonanza

I may have found a new obsession – bunting. I started to make a couple for the greeny baby shower that’s coming up this weekend, and I got a little carried away – and made five. This may be a bit overboard for the shower, but I just couldn’t help myself! Once I whipped up one set of these cute little triangles-on-a-string, I wanted to make more – and wanted them all over my house. Take a stab at this simple little project and you’ll be hooked as well!

I started out with this simple flag template (courtesy of fellow blogger, OhBrooke). The tapered flap helps to attach your triangles to your twine (or string, yarn, whatever) and giving your final banner a clean, finished look.

I then cut a tooooon of triangles out of some fun green, black and white papers, hailing from Paper Source and Michaels. I really didn’t think about how many triangles one banner would make, hence the 5 total banners I ended up with. Whoops. I pre-folded my triangles ahead of time so the assembly would be quick and easy. I made sure the patterns of my papers were of varying scales, so the bunting had some interest and didn’t look like the same flag over and over.

I, again, went a little overboard and used a combo of rubber cement and scotch tape to attach the flags to my divine twine (love that stuff). Side note: we went looking for rubber cement at Home Depot and Target and neither store had any. The Target employee actually said that she had never even heard of rubber cement – what kind of world are we living in where people don’t know what rubber cement is!? Luckily for me, I work for a company that has an overstock of rubber cement at my fingertips for such dire situations. Phew. I used the rubber cement to hold the twine in place, and added a strip of scotch tape on the back to make sure the thicker papers didn’t come unglued (the shame!)

Voila! Bunting brilliance right there, folks. I don’t know why something so simple gets me so hyped, but I really love this stuff. Would it be wrong to incorporate this into my daily home decor?

Yeah, maybe. But perfect for a boy baby shower, no? Let’s hope the Mom-to-be doesn’t judge me for showing up with a bag full of bunting to decorate her house. My house is living vicariously through hers.

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Box O’ Birdies

I’ve learned something about myself – when I do something, I tend to go all out. Meaning, when I’m working on a project, it starts to consume my (personal) life. Ever since my sister’s baby shower came about, all I can think about is bird related things and how to put those cute little birdies I found on anything and everything. Hence, my blog has turned into a super boring, bird focused journal of my latest and greatest obsession. Now, just because I’ve come to this realization doesn’t mean that you’re safe from ANOTHER bird related post. Enter, origami birdies!

One of my sister’s college buddies, who is heading up the shower committee, mentioned that she had a fun mobile for the shower decorations and asked if anyone was willing to make origami birds (to keep with our cute birdie theme). I obviously volunteered, despite the fact that I’ve never attempted origami, but couldn’t resist the chance to do something crafty. Plus, it gave me the chance to check out the new Paper Source store here in Charlotte, which is now my new favorite store. Ever. I walked in and burst into song and dance because every nook and cranny contained hordes of beautiful papers and stationary. HEAVEN. I thought I would have to make my own origami paper out of wrapping paper or some other type of thin paper, but of course Paper Source has these awesome origami sets. The patterns are fantastically modern and just the perfect size for an origami project. Did I mention this store is my happy place?

After I stopped snuggling with my beautiful paper, I decided to find out how to make some paper birdies. I did a quick google search and found this super helpful video that walks you through the process of making the origami crane. There is also a downloadable PDF showing you some simple diagrams, but the video is definitely the way to go. The hubs even got in on the arts and crafts action, thanks to this helpful video. He said it reminded him of his note passing days in middle school, where he wooed the ladies with his brilliantly folded notes. How did I get to be so lucky?

24 lovely pieces of paper and 24 kickin birds later, I now have the knowledge to take the origami world by storm. Well, at least the origami crane world. They’re super easy to make and are a great little project if you’re looking for a simple touch to add to a wrapped gift or a bottle of wine for a friend. Try it yourself and let me know if you’re obsessed like I am!

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Tweet Invites : Hot Off the Presses!

After some great feedback on my sister’s shower invitations, I decided to take the plunge and print these suckers out. I made a few minor tweets tweaks on the text sizes/colors, but overall it seems that the birdie invitation design was a winner from the get go. These were printed on simple white card stock – turns out you can only buy card stock in massive economy packs, so I have enough to get me through the next 50 years.

I decided to use a corner rounder to soften up the edges a bit, making it more appropriate for a baby shower. Sharp edges + baby = bad idea. I can relate, since I cracked my head open as a kid on the corner of a coffee table. Ow! Did you catch that bird reference – cracked? Yeah, there’s more where that came from.

Since the invitations were brightly colored, I decided to have a little fun and forgo the standard white envelopes and pick up some punchy colored ones from my favorite Charlotte stationary store, Papitre. (unfortunately, no website – boo!) I had my mind set on some cool blue envelopes to mimic the blue in baby Greenlee’s nursery, but couldn’t help myself when I saw the rockin orange envelopes. Why not do half and half? Now all I have to do is address these birdies and send them on their merry way. :)

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Tweet Invites

As you very well know, my big sis has a bun in the oven. When an event like this comes around, I can’t help but get creative and get involved, whether is be designing a nursery or helping to throw a baby shower. I’m basically a wannabe Martha Stewart, but without the criminal record (zing!). So, for my sister’s upcoming baby shower, I thought I’d take a stab at designing some invitations. I’m by no means a graphic designer – I’m limited to my minimal knowledge of photoshop and the free brushes I can find on the internet (anyone want to give me Illustrator? teach me the program? Anyone?). But, I digress. The whole bird theme seems to be popping up everywhere in baby land. Even ol’ Martha featured some bird themed shower ideas on her website. With the fun words like “hatching” and “nesting”, the bird theme really is a win win.

While thinking about a bird themed shower, I just so happened to come upon the most perfect invitation during a little light blog stalking. I had to borrow OhBrooke’s text design for my invitations (because it was downright perfect), but decided to try my hand at creating a different design to fit my sister’s taste. Behold, Option numero uno.

option one

Does this invite make you wanna pop on over for some yummy treats on a saturday morning, or would you prefer something a bit different, like option numero dos?

option two

I would love love love some feedback on these (like “ew that’s gross, change the colors” or “oh my goodness, you’re brilliant!”) so drop me a comment and let me know your thoughts!

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