{Paper} Washi Tape Place Cards

This month's brunch club gathering was a baby shower for our friend on Team Green, Tara. It was such a nice celebration as everyone contributed something. Colleen tirelessly hosted and made the most spectacular ham and cheese sandwiches I've had since France, Natalie baked incredible muffins, Ami took photos with her fancy camera, and devon made witty favors inspired by the super cute invitations received from Colleen. I don't want to share any photos in case Tara is planning on blogging about it, but here are some place cards that I designed using washi tape and my Silhouette SD.

{Photo by Ami of Elizabeth Anne Designs and Entouriste)

I downloaded the shapes from the Silhouette store and re-sized to fit my cards.

Next, I applied the tape to some regular text-weight printer paper. (This was a time-consuming task, so be sure to build some time in for it.)

Then, I ran that through the Silhouette machine using the largest blade tip. (Pink on my model.) It worked like a dream! I was short on time, so the back layer of the houses was simply cut out of plain gravel paper from Paper Source.

I ran all of the pieces through my Xyron 900 and assembled them on 4-bar note cards printed with each guest's name.

{February} Hitched ‘n Hatched Tea

Back in February, my friends and I enjoyed an afternoon tea in celebration of our engaged friend and pregnant friend. I know that it seems like I go to tea a lot, but in my defense, this one wasn’t my idea. I just styled the event. (Ha! Ha!) 

The “engagement party” was a surprise, so I made neutral, Valentine-themed invitations inspired by a set of persimmon heart cards and peacock envelopes from Paper Source.

As always, I was on a huge work deadline (and office move) in the middle of this project, so they turned out to be a "lazy man's invite," as my Grandma Ona would say.

 

At the tea, everyone was greeted with a customized menu, cloth napkins (from Paper Source - no longer online), and a box containing a party favor.

 Napkins and Menus

I repeated the pattern from the envelope liners inside the menu.

 Party Favors

 

For party favors, each guest received a monogrammed mug, a tea bag with a crepe paper heart attached with baker's twine, a red or blue “tea bag holder,” and some heart-shaped chocolates from Macy’s.

 The complete package:

 The boxes were wrapped in pool wrapping paper, the peacock hearts and lined hearts (printed on plain text) were free-handed and cut out by hand, the persimmon heart was traced from a left over heart card.

{December Projects} Wry Baby-Inspired Shower

In December, my coworkers and I had a joint Holiday Party and Baby Shower for our friend. Our office parties usually involve me making a lame attempt at decorating our nasty store room with balloons and plastic table clothes and coordinating a potluck. I was so happy when they heeded my suggestion to go to the restaurant in the Holiday Inn upstairs from our office. (The same place where they had my bridal shower.)

I’ve always wanted to host a shower around my favorite go-to baby gift, the Wheel of Responsibility and Safe Baby Handling Tips book by Wry Baby. Since the guest-of-honor was a guy, I thought this was the perfect opportunity.

Wheel of Responsibility Napkin Rings

I pulled the baby head image from the Wheel of Responsibility and recreated a miniature version to sit atop napkin rings.

Menus

Each guest was greeted with a menu that I fashioned after the Wheel of the Responsibility.

Table Decorations

I scanned a few tips from the book and mounted them on tent cards cut from black card stock for centerpieces.

I also made a table runner out of red and black paper from the 'Source, of course.

I brought all of the vases and candle holders from home.

We topped everything off with cupcakes from our office favorite (You're Welcome, co-workers!), Sugar Bliss. I added some not-really-matching red and black flags to the cupcakes. I should have made some wheels of responsibilities or danger symbols for those, but I was DONE with cutting after finishing those napkins.

Catching Up - July, Part 2: A Pucci-Inspired Baby Shower - Details

Our Pucci-inspired afternoon tea was held at the so-frickin'-cute LM in Lincoln Square. God Bless Chef Stephan who agreed to host our party of eight with only a few days notice. The shower turned out great! We had the perfect mix of funny people who all loved the guest of honor. All of our friends agreed that it was one of the most fun days of the summer.

On to the details!

The Decor

 

 It was very, very hot that day...the vase even steamed up.

The Menu

My original plan for the menus were stitched booklets, but my sewing machine kept eating the paper. I pulled these together with scraps of paper from around the house.

The Party Favors

I *loved* the party favors. These reusable tea cups literally hit the local shops that week. I had been out with my sister the week before and hadn't seen them anywhere. It was total kismet.

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My mom and sister wouldn't use the mugs, so I gave them tea-scented lotion.

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I added a tea bag and customized tag to each cup. (Is it considered unoriginal if you repeat your own designs?)

I packaged the gifts, along with some psychedelic cookies,  in the most perfect green and purple boxes from the Container Store.

I made custom confetti by running fuschia, chartreuse, and violet paper through a shredder.

Catching Up - July, Part 1: A Pucci-Inspired Baby Shower - The Invites

My dear friend, VP, had a little girl in July. We barely squeezed her baby shower in the Saturday before the baby was born (two weeks early!). VP didn't want anything too over-the-top and attention getting, so my friend and I hosted a very minimalist afternoon tea for her.

The Inspiration

For the invites and general theme, I wanted something very "high fashion" since VP loves Nordstrom. She didn't want anything too girly and pink and I wanted to include some shades of purple to honor her mother, whose favorite color was purple...thus, the Pucci-inspired invitation was born!

I was originally going to recreate the design from the Gigi line of paper products from Caspari.

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I quickly realized that this image from iStock was nicer than anything that I could freehand with my mouse.

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Front

The invites say "An Afternoon of Pampering," as we originally planned a little spa day that, unfortunately, didn't pan out.

Back

Ribbon Belly Band

 

RSVP Cards

Envelopes

I assembled these while in Atlanta for work. Thank the sweet Lord Jesus that I had a room on the concierge level and was able to print the labels for these. 

Catching Up: May, Part 2 - Rainbow Runner Baby Shower

My sweet friend, devon, from Brunch Club had a beautiful baby girl, Piper Alice, in July. Our friend, the most organized hostess/cook that I know, Tara, hosted an incredible brunch for our other Bruncher, Colleen’s , little nugget in March, so I did the honors for d’s.

I didn't have a chance to photograph anything, so I have a hodgepodge of photos. (Turns out that Tara had her beautiful camera with her too. Grrr!)

Invitations

Devon’s a very enthusiastic runner, so I made a mock-finish line for her invitations.

{Source - Invite Photos: the small d}

Total confession time: I really, really wanted an excuse to justify the purchase of some happy tape. I was sitting in a classroom in Atlanta when these popped into my head. I mocked them up in the back of my work notebook and then made the tape purchase during lunch. devon's follow-up e-mail to me and follow-up post about the invites totally made me blush.

The Tablescape*

I really wanted the colors teal or robin-egg blue, gray, and purple instead of girly pink. I've had this ribbon theme in my head ever since I pulled it out of Martha Weddings in the late '90s.

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I was so excited to make these banner placecards.

 

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Decorations

I didn't get ANY photos of the decorations.

“Bib” Signs

I hung a few "race bibs" around the house with the month and year the baby was due.

 I still have an unassembled “Congratulations” banner that keeps popping up around the house. I was going to send it to her in the mail, but was so wrapped up in work that I never got around to assembling it. Maybe I’ll use it for the next marathon. Ha!

“Onesie” Banner

I designed a bunch of race bibs with names that played on the names of real Chicago 5Ks. I then ironed them onto onesies using iron-on transfer paper. I strung the onesies on purple ribbon and hung them as a banner above the table.

*Tablescape

My friend posted this video to my Facebook Wall after I used the word "tablescape" in a status.