Crafts & Tutorials•
on January 27th, 2012•
I originally jumped on the yarn wreath bandwagon back in the fall, but with the holiday craziness and my lack of photography skills I just never got a chance to post a picture. I’m still not thrilled with the pic, but it’ll do for now – maybe one of my awesome photog friends will feel bad about how pitiful it looks and come take a decent shot for me ;)
More than likely you’ve already seen these fun projects floating around the web the past year or so and with them being so simple and easy, it’s not hard to see why everyone is joining the yarn wreath craze. Wrapping ribbon around a foam wreath and then getting creative with some embellishments…quick, easy, cheap, and fun! I ended up using 2 different color yarns for mine, a darker shade on the bottom and then a lighter shade over the top. I LOVE IT! I then just made some various styles and sizes of fabric flowers from scraps laying around, so my only cost for this project was the wreath ($1 store) and at some point I bought the yarn (probably with my 40% off coupon).
My Fall wreath will likely double as a Summer wreath since I decided on more colorful fabric choices :)
Here’s some great inspiration if you’re ready to get started on your own yarn wreath:
Homemade Ginger
The Creative Imperative
Take Heart
And probably my all time favorite:
Come and Knock on Etsy
Crafts & Tutorials•
on January 11th, 2012•
We {heart} Valentine’s Day! Although not necessarily for all the lovey-dovey, mushy-gushy stuff, but for all the super cute crafts! Don’t get me wrong, Valentine’s Day is a great day to spoil the ones you love, but we love an excuse to whip up some sweet projects! My only complaint is that it comes so soon after the holidays! I thought I was on top of things when I started planning ideas last fall, but then I got so caught up in all the fun Christmas and Winter crafts and then suddenly it’s almost February! Ahh, need. more. time!
So I had a day and a half to finally get this little project done. Woohoo! One down, 89 million to go! (89 is my 4 year old’s new favorite number) 
Hello again, red burlap! How do I love thee, let me count the ways…..{sigh}
This was a great couch project. You know the kind you can work on while you watch a fun movie with the kids, say for example Lilo and Stitch for the 89 millionth time ;) Grab some red burlap a nice big needle and white embroidery thread and get to stitching! XOXOXO
Happy Early Valentine’s Day! And hopefully I’ll have more time to post some of my other projects before it’s too late. We’ll also have these up for sale at our etsy shop if you’re not up for DIY. Here’s the store link for now and I’ll post a direct link once it’s added – http://www.etsy.com/shop/InvitationsInkGirls
Jess
Crafts & Tutorials•
on November 29th, 2011•
Oh my gosh, I can’t believe I forgot to post this update on the Krylon’s Halloween Challenge on The CSI Project’s website! How awesome is it that our Cupcake Liner Bat made the Top 10!? Our first tutorial and we made Top 10! Hopefully it will be the first of many, so I guess I better get to putting more projects together to share :)
Our Designs•
on November 22nd, 2011•
Just a quick little post about the new products we recently began offering. These custom or semi-custom gift cards and gift card holders are great for business owners looking for something a little more unique than the traditional plastic gift cards. Not to mention the perfect way to dress up a birthday card/gift certificate! Stay tuned for the Bridesmaid Thank You versions :) Feel free to contact us for pricing and details on how to order. 
Our Designs•
on November 8th, 2011•
This photoshoot and blog post have been a long time coming and we are so thrilled to finally be sharing it! Prepare to fall in love with this entire concept…we certainly did when Carmen of Carmen Salazar Photography first mentioned it to us last year.
Carmen and her husband were married at the courthouse and had hoped to plan a large reception closer to their anniversary, inviting friends and family to come out and spend several days celebrating. With her husband being a musician, creating a music festival themed reception seemed perfectly fitting and something everyone would enjoy and remember. The idea had our minds running wild the instant she asked if we’d take on the challenge of designing the music festival poster style invitations. However, as with the majority of us, life tends to get busy and when Carmen realized that she wouldn’t have time to put together her own WedFest, she instead opted for a fun and intimate photoshoot capturing the look and feel of what she still hopes to plan for herself and husband when time permits.
I can’t even begin to tell you how much fun Rashell and I had with this shoot. We started off with the color scheme, which was determined by looking at colors from the 70′s and giving them a modern twist – instead of mustard yellow, avocado green, and burnt orange, we went with slightly brighter tones. We tossed in a nice dark henna, bright red, and charcoal grey, giving it just the right amount of retro with a balance of current trends.
So what better way to start off this wedding than with the Save The Date designed on a 45 – fun right!? For the wedding invitation itself, we definitely loved the idea of the festival style poster and were totally inspired by this guitar pick flower we found on Pinterest. We just can’t get over how the textured paper we used helps give it all a washed, rustic look. 
The Welcome Table greets the guests as they arrive with helpful items like water bottles, lip balm, and sunscreen, as well as their commemorative t-shirt favors, festival-inspired wrist bands, custom mix tape, and VIP passes. The burlap WedFest banner with its colorful scarves (love us some Steven Tyler) helps frame the view and the wooden directional signs help point the way.
Love Notes has a whole new meaning when used as a fun alternative to a guestbook, plus a guitar case and stand make the perfect display. On a personal side-note, the songbook on the stand shows Tom Petty’s Here Comes My Girl, which is the song I walked down the aisle to on my wedding day :) 
Ok, and then there’s the Escort Card Table. This makes us smile – 8 track tapes designed to include music trivia on the back for a fun way for guests to get acquainted. Huge thanks to Audrey for the cute wooden display that worked out so perfectly! 
The table details of this shoot are pretty amazing. The table itself is simply a truckload of tree stumps arranged in a row and then surrounded by several colorful quilts. We just love how rustic and warm everything feels. The incredibly gorgeous flowers from Audrey of Botanica Floral Designs never disappoint and it amazes me how much flowers can really pull everything together. Serving light snacks on cut logs alongside all the beautiful floral elements also creates such a natural, cozy feel. We designed coordinating labels for the home brewed beer from our good friend at Robert’s Homebrew Academy. We also brought along some of his homemade cheese (he teaches classes for that as well). We figured the table numbers would need a little bit of height so we decided to use a full size lp with names of their favorite bands.
The fabulous dessert table set up was designed by Rebecca and Hector of Sweet Cakes by Rebecca. The cake was absolutely beautiful! A great combination of rustic and elegant with a sugar flower on top that used the same paisley pattern as our paper elements – so cute! They not only invented s’mores kabobs just for this shoot, but the candy apples, popcorn balls, brownies, cotton candy, and churros tasted just as heavenly as they looked! And talk about creative – a nacho style dessert bar with cinnamon bunuelos and whipped cream, including tasty toppings like chocolate chips, cherries, chocolate and caramel sauces, and sprinkles.
We ended the day with a cute little tent scene for our happy couple and the lighting by this time couldn’t have been better! Using an A-frame my husband built and more quilts, we created this fun get-away spot for some gorgeous photos!
Huge shout-out to more great people involved in this project:
Marty from Dig Music for all the vinyl we could possibly want
Audrey from Fringe for the dress and so many extra little details for this shoot
Matt from Fibers.com for the awesome T-shirt favors that Rashell and I love to wear – you have to get one of their organic shirts, LOVE the look and feel!
Dominique Obrien for her hair and makeup magic
And of course, our wonderful models – Scott Freshour aka “Fresh” who emcees for the Sacramento Kings and the beautiful Mara Croesy
Crafts & Tutorials•
on October 22nd, 2011•
Hey there! Just a quick little post to share one of the new projects I’ve been tinkering with. I’ve been so anxious to find a fun, unique way to incorporate embroidery hoops into decor projects. Cross-stitching and embroidery were some of the first crafting hobbies that I did as a child and have been doing ever since, so I’m excited to see how these little banners evolve. Anyways, this first one is for Carissa’s adorable little bakery – Sugar and Spice Specialty Desserts – but I’m already getting started on Christmas themed ideas :)
And just a little close up of the letters – it’s a little hard to tell in this lighting, but each one is glittered with Krylon’s Glitter Blast Spray Paint (my new obsession)
Crafts & Tutorials•
on October 12th, 2011•
OK! Here it goes – something I’ve been anxiously anticipating for quite awhile now – our first crafting tutorial! Yiipee! :)
Shockingly, it involves glitter! I know, so out of character, but couldn’t be helped. Now please bear with me, I’m sure the pictures are less than spectacular and any advice, tips, corrections, and constructive criticism on this process are certainly welcome – just be gentle ;)
This project is a spin off of the cupcake paper pom poms I made for our awesome friend Carissa of Sugar & Spice Specialty Desserts. Carissa gives me all the excuses I need to get creative since she let’s me decorate her adorable little bakery downtown. So when I saw the original version over at Kara’s Party Ideas, I made her 3 pink ones right away, and when brainstorming Halloween decor ideas, I thought a pumpkin version of the pom poms would be super cute and a spooky bat would be over-the-top adorable!
So here’s what you’ll need:
3″ foam ball
80-100 black cupcake liners (standard size)
glue gun
hot glue
pen
small plastic cup (optional to hold the ball in place easier)
download & print this pdf – wing and eyes template
8.5×11 or larger black cardstock
White cardstock/paper
scissors
Krylon Glitter Blast Spray Paint – Starry Night
4 flat toothpicks
First thing to do is draw a line all the way around the ball dividing it in half. This will help with the placement of the wings.
Next is the time consuming part – gluing the cupcake liners to the ball. Take the flat bottom end of the pen and place it in the center of each cupcake liner. Now I’ve experimented with both ways and it seems to give slightly better color when you place the pen in the inside of the liner. You’ll then pull the sides of the liner down around the pen. Holding the liner on the pen, you’ll dab some hot glue on the end and stick it to the foam ball, holding for a few seconds until secure. 
Continue this process until you have one half of the ball covered and are ready to attach the wings. For the wings, you can download the pdf and print out the template. Either print directly on your black cardstock if possible, or print out on paper and trace on to the cardstock and cut out two copies. Hot glue 2 of the flat toothpicks to each wing and insert into the foam along the line that you drew in the first step. 
Once you have both wings in place you can continue gluing the cupcake liners on the rest of the ball.
Now comes the really fun part – the glitter! So by now you’ve read past the materials list and maybe you just skimmed past it and didn’t realize the sheer awesomeness of the item listed as Krylon Glitter Blast Spray Paint – Starry Night. Maybe you were distracted by the heavens opening up and the angels singing like I was when I first read those words. Sparkling glitter spray paint available in 12 colors, as in every color of the rainbow and then some! Not just silver or gold, but COLORS, real colors! Ummm, so where was I? Oh yeah, the tutorial – so follow the directions on the can and get all spray-glitter-crazy and cover your bat from head to wing (that’s kinda all there is after all, but you get my point).
Let the sparkly little guy dry for awhile and while it’s might be super tempting to watch him dry, you can probably tear yourself away long enough to cut out the eyes from the printed template and maybe even use some Stickles Glitter Glue if you’re insanely addicted to glitter like some of those oddball crafty types I’ve heard of. Anyhow, once your glittered eyes are dry (we all know you glittered them so don’t even pretend), figure out the positioning you like the best, then slap some hot glue on them and press them down for a few seconds and Ta Da! You now have yourself a glitterific Halloween cupcake liner bat that will slightly smell like bug spray for a few hours :)
And here’s a pic of the pumpkin version although I realized after I took these photos that my pumpkin still needs some cute little corkscrew, whispy vines up near the stem. Eh, I’m over 30 now so my teenagers will quickly point out that I’m getting old and senial, so it’s just to be expected, sorry ;)
Ok, so whaddya think? Can I get at least a C+ for effort? It wasn’t all that bad was it? I mean besides the occasional ramblings and all the damn smiley/winky faces, right?
Our Designs•
on June 4th, 2011•
To be honest, neither Rashell or I are the super mushy, overly sentimental type, but when I started thinking about what my husband and I could do this year for our 5 year wedding anniversary, Rashell and I realized that it was around this time 5 years ago that we had met! We’ve reminisced about all the things that have led us to this point and knew we had to do some kind of blog post about it all. It’s been quite an adventure, to say the least, for both of us individually as well as these last few years in business together.
Our very first post on this blog starts with “had Jessica had not wandered into Rashell’s store…” And we’ve somewhat come full circle, since I was shopping at the scrapbook store for paper products to use for my own wedding. And now here we are, combining both of our talents and love of paper and design for other brides looking for that same unique, creative touch.
I don’t want to babble on and on and make anyone gag, but we owe such a huge thanks to our terrific customers who not only keep us in business, but continue to allow us to challenge ourselves creatively. And to the amazing, wonderful, inspiring friends we’ve made within this industry – we’d be lost without you! We sheepishly admired these Superstars of the industry when we first started out and now we feel so fortunate to call them friends :)
So cheers to many more creative and prosperous years! And now for a nice good laugh, some of the little projects made when Rashell and I first began in our quaint little scrapbook store. Did I mention we’ve come a long way creatively-speaking? ;)
Our Designs•
on May 29th, 2011•
It’s nearly June and when it comes to weddings, we all know this time of year is pure craziness!! About now begins the weekends full of beautiful couples saying their “I Do’s”, other beautiful couples getting last minute details worked out, vendors working their awesome little tooshies off, far away tropical resorts preparing for the cute honeymooners {insert jealous sigh here}, and kids out of school driving most of us crazy.
This is the time of the year that we tend to get too busy to stop and smell the roses. But Rashell and I have a couple quick things that we’re super thankful for right now that we just have to share.
First off — drumroll please……….Invitations Ink was announced as this year’s Winner for Best Invitations on the KCRA 3 A-List. I cannot even tell you how excited we were to see the amount of support we had for this contest! We took 2nd place last year, so coming in 1st this year was a great feeling! Thank you to everyone who took the time to vote, we feel incredibly honored :)
Our next “Feeling the Love” moment really took us by surprise and literally made us giddy with excitement. Recent customers and Rashell’s good friends posted on the Brides Magazine Facebook page about the wedding invitations we’d created for them. The following week, we saw this article on Brides.com
Yep, you guessed it – Brides.com mentioned the super cool wedding invitations we designed for Lyndsey and Michael! Talk about exciting! And, having our name under this gorgeous picture of Kate Hudson is a huge bonus! We adore her!
Wedding season is starting off great here at Invitations Ink, and we hope your summer is going just as well!
Thanks again to everyone for all the love and support!
Oh, and be sure to scroll down a tad to check out that super cool, awesome invitation that “everyone” is talking about, hehehe ;)
Our Designs•
on February 18th, 2011•
This blog post is waaaaay overdue! Hostess with the Mostess recently featured this photoshoot, which made me realize that I had never even posted it on our own site! Geesh! What a slacker, right!? ;)
We had an amazing year last year – filled with so many new friends and opportunities. One of those new friends we met with was Jackie of Jacqueline Photography who is such a sweetheart! It started like most of our relationships – we stalked her :) Between Twitter and Facebook, we felt like we already knew Jackie even without having met her in real life. With so many friends in common, it’s easy to know someone without actually knowing them. You see their conversations with others, you read their blog and see their work, you share in their excitement when they announce the news that they are expecting a little boy!! Even better is when you are asked to do the invitations for their new bundle of joy! One of our mutual Twitter, Facebook, and real life friends, Aimee (2Chic Events & Design) was planning Jackie’s Baby Shower and came to us to handle the stationery. We were slightly excited (LOL – OK, our minds were exploding with ideas, whatever).
We love the creative freedom that Aimee lets us run with when we collaborate with her. She gave us our guidelines and here was the final design we settled on for the invitation:
Once the invitations were sent out, we set to work thinking of other aspects we could add in. We knew Aimee would need signs for the food table, lots of paper stars to hang throughout the house, and her super cute Mad Libs she created just for the party!
We eventually put together an entire Bingo Game set (we’d been dying to see this idea in action), some cute little napkin rings, Thank You bags for the dessert station, and these amazing wooden letters that we cut out on a scroll saw, hand-painted, then hand-glittered to match the font used in the original invitation. Check out all the details:
Joe from SJ’s Disc Jockey also provided additional fun that day with his popular photo booth. If you’re even thinking about having a photo booth at your event – you totally should! And give Joe a call, he’s seriously awesome! For Jackie’s take on her shower, visit her blog to see what she had to say. She had some gorgeous contributions from two of our favorites in the wedding industry, Audrey from Botanica Floral Designs and Rebecca from Sweet Cakes by Rebecca, so check it out!
First pic of Jackie’s invitations up at the top there is courtesy of Nick at Wilson Fotografie.
