LIFESTYLE Just some tidbits on the non-house related stuff we got goin' on!
Deal of the Day Shopping for Moms and Kids!
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September 6th, 2011 Bunting: Today, “bunting” is a term for any festive decorations made of fabric, or of plastic, paper or even cardboard in imitation of fabric. Typical forms of bunting are strings of colorful triangular flags and lengths of fabric in the colors of national flags gathered and draped into swags or pleated into fan shapes.
Ok yes, the name is weird. But bunting is fun and SUPER easy. It can be used in so many ways, as you’ll see below, and my favorite thing about using this design pattern is that it can be pulled together really quickly, with things you likely have around your house. It’s perfect for impromptu party decorations!
Let’s have a look, shall we?
Love this? I thought you would. Get the free download from Ruffled, HERE!
Use it to add a pop of color to an otherwise all white space.
Paisley Handmade
If you like it once, you’ll probably like it more 3x over…
Oliver Blue Designs
OMG these are bunting stickers! Doesn’t get much easier than this…
Roll Sticker via Mint Love Social Club
Bunting screams wedding photo op.
Coco Sallore
Bunting in Burlap, I love you!
Funky Shique
Or forget the bunting leg work. You can buy this pattern as art!
Freckled Pink
Or for invitations?
Ampersandity
This is just adorable.
Rainy Day Colors
So we’re hosting a football party in a few weeks (Go Pats!). Maybe I’ll decorate the place with some Patriots themed bunting??? I’m thinking a little Tom Brady bunting decor is a must, don’t you think???
Source: Jenny’s HFoP
September 2nd, 2011 Labor day is one of my favorite holidays because it means a long weekend with great weather. And I’m going to vote September as the BEST month of the year because it’s not too hot and humid, and still warm enough to rock flip flops. Who’s with me???
So take advantage of the (hopefully) gorgeous weekend… pull out the lounge chairs and beach towels one more time…
And I’ll catch you all next week!
Chairs & Umbrellas found HERE.
August 31st, 2011 While I try to keep things HOME and DIY related here on HFoP, every once in a while I feel it’s important to use this blog for one of it’s greatest features… and that is reaching out to the masses with important information. Yes, this is serious people.
The important information that I have for you today is that Tony and I scored the most amazing wedding photographers!!!!!!!!!! Are you writing this down??? 
Hitched Studios, a photographer duo based out of Boston, is pretty much perfection. I can’t help but plug them shamefully here because of how well they documented one of the most special days of our lives. While we will always have the memories of our wedding day, the moments they captured on film will help us relive the special time for years to come, and for that I am forever grateful.
So for anyone who needs some fabulous photos taken… whether it’s for a wedding, engagement, a new baby, or just to capture your adorable family, and you’re looking for photographers who are…
Super cool and laid back
Funny as hell
Incredibly creative
Professional
Good looking
UNBELIEVABLY TALENTED!!!
…pleeeeeease check out Hitched Studios. I promise you will NOT be disappointed!
Their photo blog can be found HERE
August 29th, 2011 So there you have it folks! I let you in on all of my little pre-wedding craft ideas, and I have to say, I thoroughly enjoyed this process! Adding these personal “Do It Yourself” touches to our wedding made seeing everything the day of truly special to me, and I wouldn’t change a thing!
Buuuuut along the way I did learn a few things about wedding DIYs…
1. DIY does NOT always mean cheaper!
If you’re doing some of your own wedding favors or decor because you’re looking to save money, you need to be very mindful of what exactly your incredibly creative, “I must do this”, idea is going to cost! Make sure you add up the price of all of the materials you are going to need ahead of time, and do some comparison shopping. Very often, it’s cheaper to buy things pre-made!
2. DIY takes a LOT of time!
I don’t care how efficient you think you are, when you have to make something more than 100 times over (we had almost 160 guests), it’s gonna take time! Spread out your “to dos” and if you can multi-task like the best of us, put something trashy on Hulu (thank you Bachelorette Season 7 for keeping me company during many glue stick filled evenings!!) to help keep you sane while you do tedious work.
3. Do NOT save things until the last minute?
Do you need to watch the video of my dad and the candle debacle to remind you again? Do you???
Ok, if you want to, it’s HERE.
But the point is… crafts can get MESSY or not turn out the way you envisioned them, so don’t wait until midnight the night before your wedding to realize you need new centerpieces.
4. Have fun!!!
If you get frustrated, tired, overwhelmed…. CHILL OUT and remember this is a wonderful day regardless of how many paper cuts you have endured… At the end of the day, you will be married to the love of your life, escort cards or not.
5. Don’t overdo it!!
Ok… let’s admit it. Using too many “cute” touches can come across as cheesy. You want your wedding to feel like you, but you also don’t want the day to look like kindergarten craft time. Be mindful of how much you’re working the glue gun… and when all else fails, remember that simple is usually better!
And for a quick look back at Jenny and Tony’s wedding DIYs… Here’s a little link recap for you!
#1: Monograms
#3: Hotel Bags
#4: Centerpieces
#5: Escort Cards
#6: Programs and Menus
{What DIY wedding crafts have YOU done?}
August 26th, 2011 Wedding DIY #6: Menus and Programs
One of the easiest wedding DIYs for me was creating our menus and programs. While I loved perusing through Wedding Paper Divas, where we got our invitations, I felt that their complementary items like thank you notes, menus and programs were outrageously priced!
So using only Microsoft Publisher’s fonts, colors and drawing tool, along with the monogram I downloaded HERE, I put together this!
 I
I got about 3 of these onto one page, saved the file as a .pdf, and brought it to Staples. Using my previously purchased card stock, I was able to print 180 menus for $50.
Not too shabby
August 25th, 2011 Oh no, it ain’t over yet…
Wedding DIY #5: Escort Cards
Creating our escort cards (the cards that tell people what table they’re at – yes there is a real name for these!) was hands down my favorite wedding project. Although I will say that there are so many creative things you can do with escort cards, I found my usual go-to-for-inspiration spot Pinterest to be quite overwhelming! But in the end, I was extremely satisfied with my decision.
Here goes!
To start, I downloaded these funky lables from a fabulous blog called Just Something I Made. Here you can find a ton of great labels, borders, and other cool designs to download… FOR FREE! I went with these circular labels:
Next I used an image capture and cropping tool (I use Jing) so that I could work on each circle separately. This came in handy when it was time to digitally add the names of our guests.
Using Microsoft publisher, I imported each circle, and added guest names in all different fonts. I decided to just use first names because I thought fewer letters was more aesthetically pleasing
I also added a “Table: ______” to the bottom of each card so that we could manually write in the table numbers after printing. This is KEY!! Table assignments are likely to switch up until the very last minute, so I strongly recommend doing this part by hand just days before the wedding. It takes NO time, especially when you already have a list of who sits where.
After printing the circles and cutting them out (this took a LONG time!) I went to work on my cardstock, which I posted about earlier here.
I cut the already printed cardstock into 3″ x 3″ squares, and then glued the circles onto them using a glue stick.
Note: If you do something similar and want to make sure the cards are displayed in a nice random pattern, first alphabetize your guests so that when you glue, you do it right!
And the final product??
VIOLA!
 I will try and post a better photo once our professional pictures are ready!
{What creative escort card ideas have you seen?}
August 23rd, 2011 Anyone else need a break from Wedding stuff???
Well it’s been a while since we’ve tried to act smart here on HFoP, so let’s bring it back to a little Teach me Tuesday, shall we?
This week we’re learning about Greek Key!
Source
Greek Key (also known as the Meander Pattern): A decorative border constructed from a continuous line, shaped into a repeated motif. Such a design is also called the Greek fret or Greek key design, although these are modern designations.
It’s like a little maze in your home decor.
Source
Love this duvet!!
West Elm
And these pillows aint so bad…
Jayson Home
I just love the look of the clean lines on this buffet.
VandM
Hot pink greek key rug? Yes please!
Kristy Lee Interiors
Hmmm… this reminds me of my previous Lucite debate…
1st Dibs
Paired with a simple white porcelain base, this lamp shade could ROCK!
Constance Crenshaw
Well aren’t you pretty?
Bloomingdales
So what do you think about Greek Key?
{All Greek to me???}
August 19th, 2011 I’ve heard from some email subscribers that you can’t view the video in today’s post through your email view… and I don’t want anyone to miss out on my adorable dad’s centerpiece MacGuiver work! SORRY GUYS!
So here is the direct link to the YouTube video:
http://youtu.be/-YYNY0spJfw
P.S. I’ve noticed that the blog formatting can get a little screwy when viewed through an email subscription, so if you get fed up looking at images that aren’t perfectly aligned (and if you’re a little OCD like me, I know how annoying this can be!) then just click on the title of the blog and view the post direclty through the www.housefullofpretty.com website.
Now back to your regularly scheduled weekend
xoxo
Jenny
August 19th, 2011 Wedding DIY #4: Centerpieces
Oh the infamous centerpieces. So pretty, so fun, yet soooo expensive…. Especially when you have a lot of tables!! And we had 20
Well I was determined to do something that would not cost thousands of dollars, and go with the industrial look of our wedding venue. And while flowers are absolutely gorgeous, they just didn’t fit into the budget.
So after lot’s of internet searching and store browsing, we were able to do our centerpieces for only….
$25 per table!!!
FYI in wedding world, this is CHEAP!
Ok, enough showing off. Here was the plan of attack:
(P.S. There is a real life video in this post, but you gotta read through to get to it!)
Wood Flowers:
$65 for 150
These flowers are made of “Birch Wood” shavings and are dyed yellow. And they come from the Philippines!
Etsy seller Accents and Petals
Lanterns:
$7/each
 The are the Ikea Borrby Lanterns and are a steal. Seriously… price out lanterns right now. These were a gold mine.
Candles:
$1.99/each
We originally went with the standard pillar candle, but the size turned out to be a possible fire hazard. So at the last minute we went with these Ikea Fenomen Round Block Candles. And in the end, I actually liked these better!
Placemats:
$8/each
 You can get the Chilewich® Dahlia Gold Placemats from a lot of stores, but we bought them from Crate and Barrel. And these are now my “fancy” dinner placemats at home!
Table Numbers:
$60 total
I fell in love with these black and white vintage number signs that I found at Java Jane Designs on Etsy, and thought they would be perfect to use as table numbers. The seller even gave us a major price discount for buying 2 sets so that we could make the signs double sided by gluing them together. I’ll probably use these again, possibly framing our wedding date number 8-6-11.
Final Product
Once people sat down and the table filled up with plates and serving ware, these were the perfect combination of simple yet romantic.
And as the dancing started and the lights were dimmed, the centerpieces really came to life….
[Thank you Facebook friends for posting some early wedding pics to use on my blog!]
And just a tip that I learned the hard way… If you’re doing your own centerpieces, MAKE SURE you assemble them well before the big day. As I mentioned earlier, we ran into a little candle issue (see video below) which resulted in a last minute trip to Ikea. Not what you would want to do the morning of your wedding!
Here’s a little video to support this lesson. Thanks dad for being SUCH a trooper!
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-YYNY0spJfw]
{What have YOU done for centerpieces?}
August 17th, 2011 Wedding DIY #3: Hotel Bags
So this was probably the least creative, yet time consuming project given the 60 hotel bags we needed to make. The upside to having a really good price hotel block is that everyone stays over! Paaaarty!
The downside? You need a full fledged assembly line to put them together!
Enter… Mom and Dad!
To me, a great hotel or “welcome” bag is one that provides some important information about the weekend, has goodies you can actually enjoy, including snacky foods but also some healthy options, and most importantly, does not cost a fortune! While you can go crazy creative with the items inside, I decided that wedding budget-wise, this was not worth going overboard. Especially knowing how many hotel welcome bags I have ripped through just to get to the snacks
So for our welcome bags, we decided to go with:
- Cape Cod potato chips (reduced fat – I swear they taste better) to represent our home state
- Peppermint patties (because I die for anything mint chocolate)
- Bag of assorted nuts (Tony’s go-to lunch snack)
- 100 calorie snack packs (assorted)
- Granola bars (assorted)
- Bottled water
- Mini wine bottles (I mean this is a celebration after all!)
In addition to the edible treats I included a 1 page itinerary for the weekend (with our monogram at the top – see post HERE) to remind people where to be when, and to invite them to additional wedding related activities going on in the area. On the back of the page, I included all important driving directions.
Now let’s not forget the importance of presentation here… On the outside of the bag here’s what we did:
[White paper bags]
+
[Natural/tan colored paper ribbon to tie the bags closed]
+
[Assorted cardstock, cut into squares, and glued to the outside of the bag]
+
[Love stamp, to go on the cardstock]
Here are me and my mom getting to work on the outside labels. Did I mention that big glasses of beer are a must for this project?
Wanna see what 60 hotel bags looks like??? (And a proud dad)???
And so while Tony was away at his Bachelor party, this crafty trio produced an efficient assembly line, and put these babies together in less than 2 hours.
Anyone else have some good welcome bag ideas?
{Hope ya’ll felt welcome!}
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