Good Luck, Ami!

Best of luck and virtual hugs to Ami of Elizabeth Anne Designs as she celebrates her vow renewal tonight! I can't wait to hear all about it!

Images: Elizabeth Anne Designs

With This Ring, I Thee Nest

Image: Bride and Broom, H. Armstrong Roberts, 1988

Last week, I begrudgingly, but officially, relinquished my "Bride" title. I sent out the thank you cards - all 91 of them, including almost all of the vendors' cards. I can't find my camera cord to upload the photos of the cute envelope labels so I will post the whole package after the wedding recaps.

In the meantime, here are the Christmas cards that I ordered from Snapfish. They turned out great! We've received a lot of compliments on them.

Ooops!

I was scheduling some posts for next week and accidentally posted them because I forgot to change the year. Those of you who use Google Reader have already seen them in their unedited glory. Oops. For everyone else, the recaps will begin next week!

A Text Just Received From My Sister

"Look! Your wedding colors on shoes at Macy's."

How funny is that? I hope that my invitations looked cuter than these shoes though.

P.S. Working on all of the recaps. If my work schedule cooperates, they'll be posting next week. :)

I Am Embarrassed to Admit This Out Loud...

...but I think that I just did the most idiotic thing that I've done throughout the whole wedding process - perhaps even my life. Yes, even dumber than the time that I forgot to put a screen in my gocco.

I just ran all of the address labels for our thank you cards through my xyron machine upside down. That's right - the adhesive is on the FRONT of the label. What the hell was I thinking?

    $7.16 in paper
+ $9.00 in printing at Kinko's
+ $9.09 in wasted xyron (approx. 1/4 of a $36.37 cartridge)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 = $25.25 + 2 hours of cutting 96 labels down the drain

I am almost more upset about the time than the money. I am on a big initiative at work and have pulling 12 hour days of non-stop work seven days a week. I finally blew off work tonight to get these out the door because I was making myself sick over them. And then I messed them up! So now, I have to be up for work in three hours, I have no supplies left, and I still have these hanging over my head.

I am going to bed to cry my bloodshot eyes out.

P.S. We got to open a guest book card tonight. One of our friends marked an envelope "2 Months" instead of two years. How fun. Their message was cute, but I am too tired to photograph it.

P.S. I'm sorry that I haven't been posting much. Work isn't leaving time for much else these days. I don't even have a Christmas tree up. Or Christmas cards mailed. Or Christmas presents purchased. I'm usally done with all three by the first weekend of December.

Cool Holiday Gifts for the Computer Geeks/Grrrrlllzzz in Your Life

Sorry that I'm so behind on wedding recaps. I'm barely getting enough time away from work to pop home for cat naps. In light of that, I never leave my computer. Here are some cute gift ideas for the dorks like me in your lives - all from where else? ETSY! ETSY! ETSY!

Cute Laptop Sleeves from Dory Designs

(She even has a Damask one out there for all of you Damask Dames)

Image: Dory Designs

Wrist and Arm Support Pillows from HomeGrown Pillows

I actually just ordered myself a set of these and they're wonderful.
They're filled with flaxseed instead of rice or artificial fillers. My cube smells like a spa. LOVE IT.

Image: HomeGrown Pillows

Mouse Pads from Mirror Girl

This shop has the cutest things! I love her coasters.

Images: Mirror Girl

Forgive Me Father, For I Have Sinned.

I've just ordered pre-printed Christmas cards from Snapfish. I am so ashamed! Don't tell the 'Source. I just received the CD of pro pix (Yeah!) and realized that there is isn't enough time to make my own. So I am bit the bullet and placed an order for plain 'ole photo cards. Oh the Shame! It hurts! It hurts!

Am I banned from the blogosphere? Doomed to a death of a million personality-less cards? :) Sadly, it still took me about two hours to lay them out. Happy Holidays, indeed!

Girly, Girly Gifts

I may or may not have been browsing around on my beloved elf, etsy, for Christmas gift ideas when I stumbled upon the shop of Bridget Davies. These passport holders are so whimsical and girly without looking like they should be carried in a bejeweled purse covered in images of martinis and faux fur that you picked up in Chinatown.

She also sells tea cosies, change purses, and pillows:

All images: Bridget Davies

The Final Product: Out-of-Town Bags

Image: Sarah Alair

After six months of talking about the OOT bags, I ended up printing out the welcome packets on the morning of the rehearsal dinner. Not even kidding. I spent a total of maybe 20 minutes laying out the pages for printing. There was no map of the surrounding area, no Chicago fun facts, no list of things to do - just the bare essentials. And I thank God that I didn't waste time on that stuff because I don't think that anyone actually looked at them. Not to mention that the hotel didn't hand a couple of them out. (No comment on that.)

The welcome packets were printed on circle cards from Paper Source and attached to the bag with binder rings.

 Image: Sarah Alair

Each room in our block received one of my beloved Chicago tote bags:

 Image: Sarah Alair

filled with a travel candle, bottled water, snacks, and a "Taste of Chicago" goodie bag containing:

• Fannie May Candy
• Ferrara Pan Candy: Boston Baked Beans, Lemonheads, and Fireballs
• Frango Mints
• Tootsie Rolls and Tootsie Pops
• Wrigley Gum

There would have been Jays potato chips too, but they're impossible to find since Frito Lay monopolized the market. Trust me. I've looked. They sell out fast. If any 60613 brides want to know what day the Jays delivery man hits the local convenience stores, drop me a line. I know the schedule. Ha. Ha.

 Image: Sarah Alair

The candles were fancy Akeewakee travel candles that I picked up at a sample sale. They retail for $11, but I paid $1!

Image: Sarah Alair

I was so disappointed in my matchboxes. I had ordered plain white matches in September, but they were lost at the post office and didn't arrive until LAST WEEK (as in 11/25)! I was on a mad hunt for matches the week of the wedding and found some at Osco on Wednesday. By then, I was TOTALLY out of time, but just couldn't let myself give out ugly matches. I made these match covers using scrap paper that I found around the house. I was cutting pieces and running them through the xyron in between hitting print on the welcome packet pieces. I think my DIY Fury frightened Andy at this point; however, given that it was about an hour before I had to leave for the Ladies that Lunch Luncheon, he knew to stay out of the way and not ask questions.

Pretty Pottery

It seems that I've fallen prey to the post-wedding cliche of fantasizing about a newer, larger home in which to unpack all of our shiny new wares. Since that's probably not in the cards for us for a while, I'm stuck with longingly reading Domino and Apartment Therapy.

If I did have a "home," I think that this vase, these votive holders, and maybe some nesting bowls from etsy seller Sara Paloma Pottery would definitely be on my Christmas list.

Images: Sarah Paloma Pottery

Guest Book

Our guest book table was a hit at the wedding!

Image: Sarah Alair

As you may recall, I combined a Blurb book full of engagement photos:

 Images: Sarah Alair

with Martha Stewart's idea of collecting anniversary messages*:

Images: Sarah Alair 

I swapped out plain note cards for ones gocco printed with our various wedding logos:

After the wedding, I ran the envelopes through my xyron machine and pasted them into the appropriate pages of the book**:

Our friends and family actually had a lot of fun with it. (Except for my mom who asked me two days later, "What guest book? You had a guest book?") We've even gotten a few in the mail from people who took cards home with them. We had a couple of guests that came up to us to announce that they'd be dead or in their 80s when we opened their cards. Which, how do you respond to that? "Well, then, I guess that you better hurry up and drink your miniature martini right now!"

Image: Sarah Alair

(*I had some printer problems on my very last signage project - the guest book instructions. When I went to buy new stickers, Paper Source had changed the product. I never found time to figure out the new format, so I never reprinted anything. My DOC wonderfully printed out these instructions for me the morning of the wedding. When I was cleaning the Sunday after the honeymoon, I found a perfectly functional copy that I had kicked underneath the couch by accident. Oops.)


**I have heed caution to anyone else who is planning on doing this. The book is really thick with the envelopes - about 16". I'm worried about the binding breaking. I'd so some sort of spiral bound book withh large prints if I were you.

Wedding Programs

Image: Sarah Alair

Our wedding programs turned out to be a Labor of Love. The original design had the inserts printed on 11"X14" paper, which would have involved making two folds and required MAYBE an hour of time to assemble. Well, due to (a major printing company)'s lack of supplies and employee competence, I ended up having to reprint these on 8.5" X 11" paper the four days before the wedding and spend two days measuring, cutting, and folding.


You may recall that the cover art was created by etsy seller arippke based on my design that I was too lazy to finalize myself.

Wordle

Does anyone else feel stressed out after running their blog through Wordle? Seriously, no wonder I'm so tired! I wish that Work would be bigger!

Wedding Dress Thank You Cards

I realized that never shared this project with you guys. I created these thank you cards for my family shower. I liked them so much that I also used them for my bachelorette party. I wish that I would have made them sooner and used them for the Sur La Table and Work showers too, as I had them in my mind all spring.

They were inspired by these lovelies from Snow & Graham:

Image: The Red Stamp

I traced a photo of my gown to create the line drawing. I decided that it looked better filled in for a silohuette image.


For the family shower, I lined plain envelopes with pages of bridal magazines.

For the bachelorette party, I created envelopes out of pages from bridal magazines and mailed them in plastic envelopes from Paper Source. I also rounded the corners on this set of cards because my sister had given me a corner rounder and I wanted to use it. :)

I have a feeling that I wouldn't have had as many cancelled wedding projects if I wouldn't had wasted so much time on gocco and envelope projects. As you may recall, I really took a shine to my liner and envelope templates from the 'Source. Oh, who am I kidding? I would have been against the clock no matter what I did!

A Cool Getaway for City Girls

I hate to be ungrateful and rip on a product that I get to use for free with no strings attached, but blogger  chaps my frickin' hide. I had just finished this post and it crashed for no reason. You wouldn't believe how many nights I've stayed up too late retyping posts. I believe it's the reason behind 75% of the typos in my posts.

Look at this cute photo that I found on the facebook page of one of my A New Leaf friends. Cristin and her husband were married at ANL the same weekend as Andy and I. Dig it. I love her cute sign!

Image: Cristin W-S

As you may recall, I had debated on where to use a Just Married sign. Our DOC ended up hanging it in a tree. (Photos to come.) A small part of me wishes that we would have had a formal get away, but I didn't want to give up a single minute of the day. Still, I think that my mom would have enjoyed it. And I really could have lived without the chaos of trying to get people on the bus and deciding who would take flowers home and where to find plastic bags for the flowers that were in the vases that we had to leave at ANL. Blah, blah, blah. Our DOC was at dropping stuff off at the hotel, so I ended up dealing with all that crap. I could have been back at the hotel with room service or a gyro from Five Faces!


Posting may be sporadic in the coming weeks. I'm on a huge project at work that's demanding long nights and weekends. Computers are the last thing that I want to look at aftter 15 hours on one.

Sneak Preview

Our photographer sent us some sneak peeks to tie me over until next Wednesday!

(Incidentally, you're looking at my office building on the left. I work right above the satellite dishes.)

Images: Sarah Alair

Under Construction

Those of you who are non-Google Reader Readers may have noticed that I've started doing some housekeeping on 'ole WTRITO Lane. This was my way of procrastinating on the thank you cards  tonight (31 down, 54 to go if you're curious). I wish that I could send everyone these:

Image: Knock-Knock

I'm not sure where my blog's going quite yet, but I do know that I am not quite ready to transition to "with this ring, i thee nest." :) So I will just hang out here while I find my post-wedding legs, if you will. Once the recaps are over, I think that I will begin doing a weekly "With This Ring, I Thee Recess" post that takes a fancy wedding and gives it a ghetto fab price tag - kind of like that "Look for Less" show on the style channel.


I am sad and project-less, so if anyone would like any help with their invitations or DIY-stuff, please drop me a line. My e-mail address should be displaying in my profile now. I am cheap (free) labor and would be happy to even just help you talk through and plan out your ideas. Oh! Speaking of which, I kinda sorta have an invitation gig! My cousin brought our invitations and programs into school and her math teacher has "hired" me to make all of her paper products for her 10.17.2009 wedding (I know!). Isn't that so fun?


BTW, I am playing around with all of the new (to me) features that Blogger's released in the last few months before the wedding. If you're pokin' around, you may notice things don't fit in the sidebars and that my blog roll looks funky and random as I decide what goes where and how. Blogging may be random as I try to get the thank you cards finished. I promised myself that they'd be in the mail before Thanksgiving. I can't send Christmas cards until I send the Thank You notes!

One Month Ago Today...

I can't believe it's been a month. Only 11 months + Eternity to go! Ha, Ha.

(I need my damn pro pix already.)

Since we didn't get any of this:

We're going to celebrate with this:

We ordered a small white cake with coconut buttercream frosting. I told the baker to "just toss our initials on there with some circles or something," thinking that she'd draw buttercream circles or something equally as simple. Nope. Love her!