House of cards

I seem to have accidentally hit on a recent theme for the wedding: vintage cards.

I found these beauties on Etsy.


I purchased 15 consecutively numbered vintage playing cards for only $5.60, including shipping! Hooray for inexpensive, unique and vintagey table numbers! The Etsy store where I purchased them (30one) has a bunch of fun things like this.

The seller mentioned that the design on the back of the card left something to be desired, but honestly, I don't mind it. It certainly conjures up the look of old playing cards to me!


Although, I can't imagine what card game was played with a deck of cards that were numbered up to 15. Then again I'm no card playing expert. :)


You know what might have been my favorite part? They were wrapped in an old McCall's sewing pattern!


Love! I think I'll be using that to make a tissue flower for one of my tables. I'm so addicted to paper goods it's ridiculous.

I was completely reaffirmed in my belief that these cards were great when I saw them in a Seattle store called Watson Kennedy (purveyor of fine goods - yes, please!). I want my wedding to look like that store, except without the price tag, of course. And you know what's completely adorable - it's Chris' mom's favorite store in the city! She's got good taste, that Wisconsinite. And did I mention that the store is conveniently located across the street from our wedding venue. Win!

Of course, we had to visit while she was here, so my aunt and Chris' mom and I went to check out the venue and then wandered across the street for a little shot of fine goods. I fell in love with these cards (and 15 other things in the store, but, you know, I exercised some self control).


They're rather large, and extra sturdy. My lovely aunt purchased them for me. How sweet! Yes, they're more orangey than champagney, but you don't always want to be perfectly matchy matchy, now do you?





Check out the back! It's soooo the best part!


Apparently there are more words that begin with C than begin with K.


The detail on these babies is pretty great.


I can't wait to mock up a dessert table using all of these great vintagey monogrammed finds!


Oh, and I also love the tissue paper from Watson Kennedy (shown behind the cards in these photos). I will use that for some flowers as well. I'm like a kid - the packaging is just as much fun as the actual item!

PS - Some day I will learn to take photos in daylight so they look a little less...uh...dark. Some day...

Fluffy Letters Tutorial!

Well, I've survived Christmas, and I'm only slightly traumatized. If I ever start blogging about my family, you all would understand. I suppose I just have to mention "family" and many of you are already nodding your heads...or banging them against the wall. Just me? Ok, then.

So, I'm back to wedding crafting and I still think it's about the best thing I can do with my time. Surprised? Me neither.

I love monograms. I see them all over weddings nowadays. Like these from Martha:


And, of course, I love these fabric poms:


I wanted to combine these two loves into ruffley monograms. I managed to do so, although I'm not sure that I'm madly in love with the results. I wanted to be madly in love with the results, but these things happen.


These ruffled letters are certainly cute enough to make their way onto a dessert table or a guest book table, where they will happily show off their ruffleosity and announce that this is, indeed, Chris and Kerissa's wedding.

For this project you will need:
* Wooden letters (I purchased mine at Michael's. They were painted white, which helped because I knew I would be covering them in a cream colored fabric, so they would blend well. They are approx. six inches tall.)
* Fabric (I used inexpensive cotton)
* Hot glue/gun
* Circle Cutter (Optional)
* Scissors

Here are the letters pre-fluffiness:


I knew that the fabric ruffles had to be short enough that you would still be able to tell that it was a "K" at the end of the project. So, I took my circle cutter and cut out a one-inch circle out of paper to use as my template. You could certainly freehand this as the circles do not have to be perfect.


Then, I cut some inexpensive cotton into a zillion teensy circles.


Next, I put a dot of hot glue in the center of the circle like so (but hopefully with a hand that was more steady than mine when I took this blurry photo):


and stuck it to the letter.

Repeat 50-hundred times. :)

To give it the ruffled look, I stuck each circle up tight to the one before so that it would fold the edges of the other circle up in random spots.




Sometimes the cat helps. But she looks irritated when you explain to her that she cannot nestle in that fabric. See the look?


Here are my tips, also known as "what I would do differently next time":

(1) I ruffled the whole letter. This probably isn't necessary but I thought perhaps I would hang them, so I wanted ruffles all around. However, I think I liked the less cluttered look of the letter when only the front was ruffled, like this:


The fabric was able to hang over the side and look gently ruffled. But, then I ruffled the sides and it looked like this, which I wasn't as thrilled with:


(2) So, if you do want to ruffle the whole thing, I learned that it is best to start with the back and sides first. I ended up flipping the "C" over and using the back as the front (thank goodness it was a symmetrical letter!) and making the ruffles a tad less crowded on that side. As you can see, I had perfected my ability to use a little less fabric and make it a little less ruffly by the time I got to the "K."


(3) I also trimmed the edges of the ruffles in the center of the letter to make sure that the edges were still defined and the "K" was identifiable, instead of a ruffled blob. :)

I do love me some ruffles!

These are the smallest letters I've purchased, so some ginormous monograms are certain to follow.