Tag Archives: cheap

[FASHION + DIY Gifts] Mother’s Day Weekend Adventures

You guys. I am tired. My weekend was SO fun, but I am tired. Now, I’m not complaining, I’m merely making a statement of my tiredness.

I had the day off of work on Friday and I felt like such a rebel. I consciously didn’t make my bed. WHAT?! I am a bit OCD about making our bed every day. And Friday, I was heading to Burlington to meet my sister and nephew for lunch and I took one look at the bed and said, “Nope. I’m not making you.”

As my husband so appropriately said, “You’re so metal.”

He’s so sweet.

Anywho. Saturday was JAM PACKED. I helped to throw my friend’s baby shower and it was A-W-E-S-O-M-E. Seriously. It was so awesome. I had a blast. And the girls who helped me put it all together were amaaaazing. I’m gonna blog the whole thing this week. You can bet your boots das right.

Saturday afternoon, hubs and I headed to Newton to spend time with his parents. Dinner, visiting, and whatnot. Sunday (Mother’s Day) we got up – went to church, bible study, and then came back to the house for some grilled chicken and corn-on-the-cob. Nom. Nom. Nom.

My mother-in-law (or mother-in-love, as the card I gave her stated) wanted some impromptu family photos – so these are my only “Sunday / Mother’s Day / Church FASHION” photos from the weekend:

[this is me, my MIL, and hubs. my FIL was the photographer - hence why he wasn't in the photo]

[me and hubs]

[in case you were curious - my dress was $13 from Old Navy last fall, cardigan is from JCrew, belt is from Target, and necklace is from JCrew via eBay via Hong Kong.

husband is sporting: a shirt from Old Navy, Jeans from Old Navy, and Old Gringo Cowboy Boots - those were his "wedding boots" as he likes to call them.]

[below is husband and his mama. aren't they adorbs?]

[this is random, i'm aware, but this lonely magnolia was blooming on the magnolia tree at his parents house and i just thought it was so gorgeous]

now, what did we do for mother’s day gifts? well, we did a couple little things – but we knew we wanted to make her something nice – and what’s more nice and sentimental than wedding photos? oh yeah. so, i did a little remix of my DIY wooden photo boards.

If you wanna see how I did the other photo boards, you can check them out here.

Now, here’s my DIY photo gift board remix.

I wanted to do stacked frames. So, I got plain wood cuts from Hobby Lobby.

I got SIX total – THREE 7×9 cuts, ONE 11×9 cut, TWO 5×7 cuts.

I printed ONE horizontal 5×7 photo and TWO vertical 4×6 photos at Walgreens. That way they’d match up. Now, I did print them in color cause I liked these shots better in color than in black and white.

[I got spray paint. Now, I have now used both Krylon and Rust-oleum spray paint. I will NEVER get Krylon again. It is horrible. I've had bad experiences with Krylon dripping and getting watery and pooling before but I thought it was a fluke. Nope. No fluke. Rustoleum just goes on so much smoother and takes a lot less coats to get the job done. Krylon takes SO many coats and it doesn't even fully cover. Blech. Anyway. This is was I used, and I just dealt.]

[Spray paints your boards. And if you're using Krylon, like I did, it will take you all day to let it dry and repaint. Let it dry. And repaint.]

[Once your boards are dry 17190281098 hours later after using Krylon (haha!) get your Mod Podge and photos ready]

[Put a coat of Mod Podge on the wood itself, on the back of the photo, lay the photo down and get it centered, then coat the whole photo on top and get it nice and covered. Now, remember, the Mod Podge goes on cloudy but dries clear.

Also, I learned this, BE CAREFUL when doing this to color photos (especially glossy color photos) - I started to notice the Mod Podge turning a hint of pink and was taking some of the color off the photo. Thankfully I caught it in time, but just be careful.]

[After your Mod Podge is totally dry (the length of a movie - i.e. a movie hubs and I watched) you can either use Polyurethane or Gloss Sealant to seal your photo boards. For my previous project, I'd used Polyurethane. For this I tried the sealant. I'm not sure which one I like better yet. They both work just fine. Anyway, seal that photo board!]

[Now, let it dry completely (preferably overnight). Now is the time to get ready to get your stackable frames, well, stacked. I had hubs help me with this part getting the frames centered and marked.]

[Because I am a BEAST with a hot glue gun, I took over this part. Now, you could probably use Gorilla Wood Glue for this, but I love hot glue. So I used hot glue. And I hot glued that mess RIGHT ON.]

[Now you gotta get it so you can hang your photos up. This time I didn't wanna risk them being flimsy, so I opted NOT to get the hammer-in ones, so husband helped me get these on and centered.]

[And voila! Now, obviously they're not hanging on a wall cause the in-laws weren't sure where to hang them yet. But I thought they came out great! What do you think?]

Anyway. Sorry, I know that was a long Mother’s Day recap post. I hope you had a great weekend. What did you do? Did you do anything fun? Post your links in the Comment Luv section of the comments with a recap of your weekend. Or you can just tell me about it. Anyways.

xoxo, all for now.

My Attempt(s) At Fashion: A Week of Attempts

4 Replies

Did you have a good weekend? I had a great weekend. Productive weekend. Fun weekend. Relaxing weekend. I love weekends.

For realsies. Okay, enough small talk. Let’s get to it.

There’s a part of me that is somewhat embarrassed that I’m continuing to share these fashion attempts with you guys. But then there’s a part of me that doesn’t give a rip. It seems like you guys like sharing in my learning experiences and risk taking, so for now, I’m gonna continue to post these. K? K.

I’d really love to hear your thoughts, ideas, suggestions. I have a feeling that you guys (the collective of you guys) are much better at this than I am.

++++

How sweet is this truck? There was an old car show going on outside the BBQ place where Hubs and I had dinner last week.

Shirt – Goodwill
Blazer – Belk
Necklace & Bracelet – JCrew Warehouse Sale
Jeans – Seven for All Mankind (got ‘em on eBay!)
Shoes – TOMS

I’m kind of obsessed with this $5 shirt I got from Old Navy. It’s neon. It’s comfy. And it was $5. WOOT.

Shirt – Old Navy – $5 (Similar)
Jeans – Seven For All Mankind (really old)
Shoes – Converse All Star (really old)
Necklace – I made it, yo

Shirt – Target – $3 (clearance! …a long time ago)
Skirt – JCrew (old)
Shoes – Rack Room Shoes (old)
Belt – Target ($5)
Necklace and Earrings - Kazuri Beads

I just thought it was hilarious that my dog was judging my clothes picture taking.

Sequin Shirt – Express (but purchased at Plato’s Closet for $7!)
Black Sweater – Express (purchased at Plato’s Closet)
Necklace – Kohl’s Jewelry (clearance section)
Jeans – Citizens For Humanity (old)
Shoes – Target (old)
Dog – Her name is Audrey Hepburn

Shirt – Ralph Lauren Polo (got it at the outlet – it’s really old though)
Cardigan – JCrew Factory
Necklaces – Wal-Mart clearance
Jeans – Seven for All Mankind
Shoes – TOMS

What do you guys think? Yay? Nay? What’s your favorite? What do you do when you’re trying to reinvent your wardrobe without buying new stuff? Cause that’s what I’m trying to do…

Happy Monday!

xoxo, All for now.

My Super DIY Wedding Invitations.

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Okay, so since I like to write about anything that’s going on in my life, and since I’ve gotten a lot of questions about the wedding lately, I figured I’d blog the latest awesomeness that we finally finished last week.

I preface this with a few things:

I am not a professional designer
I’m no wedding expert
I am not the craftiest person in the world
I am no invitation expert
We saved money on invitations fo’sho’
These took FOR.EV.ER.

But, I did learn a lot along the way. AND, I am really happy with the way they turned out.

Here’s the skinny on how they went and what I used and how much they cost.

Materials Used:

1 ream of 120lb white OfficeMax brand card stock – $15
1 package of white Avery print and tear envelopes – $18
1 package of white Avery print and tear postcards – $18
White size A-9 envelopes – $20
10″ square paper doilies – $24 (eBay)
100 yards of navy blue twine – $5 (Save-On-Crafts.com)
100 yards of sangria purple twine – $5 (Save-On-Crafts.com)
Custom photo stamps – Stamps.com ($115 with a coupon code)
Custom return address stamp – $40 (Sweet Papery)
Quatrefoil stamp – $5 – etsy
Last minute George Washington $.20 cent stamps (more on this later) – $30

Total cost (INCLUDING POSTAGE): $290

Now, for 150 invitations, I’d say that’s not bad.

Obviously the photo stamps and custom return address stamps were splurge items, but I justified the custom stamp because we can keep that for a long time… and, well, I really wanted the photo stamps. Creative googling gave me the coupon code so I saved money on them. WOOT!

For the invitations themselves:

1. I designed all three printed elements in Adobe Photoshop.

I took inspiration from The Wedding Chicks Mason Jar printables but I didn’t want them to be exactly like the other wedding invitations out there.
- We really wanted the invitations to feel like us – both of us. The mason jars really go with our country theme (cowboy boots, FTW) and everyone that knows me knows I love quatrefoils. So we wanted all of those things to be incorporated.
I searched and found free fonts on DaFont.comthat I loved and used those
- The script font is LaPointe’s Road
- The regular font is Promised Freedom

2. I cut the edge of all the business cards, RSVP info cards (we went green and are doing web / email RSVPs), and invitations with Fiskars Paper Edgers – since I printed all of these invitations on a home printer on the 8.5×11″ card stock (which was a HUGE pain in itself and is not something to be taken lightly) this was really the best way to cut away unwanted white space away from the edges after cutting the 8.5×11″ card stock sheet in half.

If you are going to go this route, I HIGHLY recommend having something mindless to watch on TV whilst printing and cutting. Seriously. I’m not kidding.

3. After all the pieces were done being printed and cut I got the paper doilies out and laid the pieces in order on the doilie

4. To make the paper doilie envelope, I just centered the invitations on the diagonal doilie and folded the sides tightly over and then folded the bottom tightly up towards the center. After those parts were tight, I folded the top down over the middle to cover the side and bottom corners. (I hope all that made sense)

John was a really good doilie folder. He will hate that I am posting this picture. Teehee

5. To finish securing the envelope, we cut the two-color twine into 2/3 yard and tied it around in a bow.

Look at my dad and Bonnie go with the twine cutting!

Ta da!

6. Then after stamping, addressing (my sister is AWESOME for helping hand write addresses), and stamping again the regular envelopes, we put the finished product in and VOILA! DONE!

Here are the envelopes:

I love our stamp!

Yeah, I sealed the envelope with a quatrefoil. Sue me.

Also, you will notice the nice George Washington stamp. No, we did not plan that. We stopped at the post office before mailing them to make sure we had enough postage only to learn that the twine, yes the twine, adds $.20 cents an envelope because that means they can’t put them through the machine. GAH. Any ribbons, anything that makes the envelope bumpy jacks the price up. SO, it’s a good thing I checked or else we would have been in deep bull-poo. Yeah, I said bull-poo.

Anywho.

These things were DEFINITELY a labor or love but in the end we are really happy with how they turned out. Considering invitations, especially 150+ invitations can cost hundreds even THOUSANDS of dollars, we saved money and they had a personal touch. If you decide to do your own, just be prepared that saving money doesn’t always save headache.

What do you think? Yay? Nay?

Did you do your own invitations? Would YOU do your own invitations?

YAY! Now, to collect RSVPs.

Need an Opportunity to Help Someone this Christmas? #NCCIW

2 Replies

Okay, so this is my quick Sunday afternoon plea.

Some of you, if not all of you, know that I volunteer and serve a few times a month at the North Carolina Correctional Institute for Women in Raleigh, North Carolina with my church newhope Church. It’s a humbling experience every time that I serve. Every time.

Well, this Tuesday, we will be heading there to hold a Christmas service for the women, and we want to serve them by bringing a little something nice.

Now, our definition of something nice is completely different from what is actually allowed. So, we are bringing toiletry bags for the women – however, there’s a catch… we cannot bring ANY of the bags if we don’t have enough for every one. (Sad but true common sense). We are short right now about 20-30 bags.

That’s where you come in.

Would you like a quick opportunity to serve and bless a woman in need this Christmas? Gather these toiletries, place them in a clear ziploc / hefty bag, and bring them to ME (I will meet you and get it from you) or you can bring the bag DIRECTLY to newhope Church in Durham, NC by 6PM TOMORROW (that is MONDAY, December 19th, 2011). Mark the bag to the attention of Amy Lynn.

Here’s what the bags need – and I cannot stress enough that it has to be THESE EXACT ITEMS – I know we all feel generous and want to put in other things, but this is a prison and they will not allow it.

1 TOOTHBRUSH

Colgate classic medium or soft FULL HEAD toothbrush

1 TOOTHPASTE

Colgate gel toothpaste (4.2 oz)
OR
Colgate mint toothpaste (6.4 oz)

1 BAR OF SOAP

Dial Gold Soap (3.5 oz)
OR
Ivory Soap (4.5 oz)

1 DEODORANT

Lady Speed Stick Shower Fresh (1.5 oz)
OR
Secret Solid Powder Fresh (1.7 oz)
OR
Suave 24 Hour Protection Fresh Invisible Solid

1 SHAMPOO

Suave Humectant Shampoo (14.5 oz)
OR
Suave Naturals Shampoo Strawberry (15 oz)
OR
Pantene Pro V Shampoo (12.6 oz)

Okay, so I did this myself and was able to find most of these at Wal-Mart. I put two bags together for two women and it came in at around $15-$20. I have also heard that Roses is a great place to find these items.

This is an incredibly quick, cheap, and easy way to make a HUGE impact on a woman’s life this Christmas.

I will even be there on Tuesday when we hand out the gifts so I will be able to report back with exactly the kind of impact you were able to make.

If you have ANY questions, AT ALL, about the #NCCIW prison ministry, what I do there, what newhope does there, or what it’s like to serve these women and daughters of Christ, let me know. Email me at mollyebuckley [at] gmail dot com.

Thank you!

xoxo

Molly