Post Dated Thrifting

I have been out wedding dress shopping with my sister this weekend so I haven’t had the to partake in my normal thrift shop/ market trawl. So instead of showing a new thifty find I’m going to share an old (and topical) thirfty find with you...actually its not even so much of a 'find' as a gift...so I guess I'm cheating slightly (eeek!) but I still count it as thirfty, so I'm going to share...

When I got married last year, I wanted thrift and make by hand as many things as I could. I had the most lovely surprise when my mum gifted the off cuts of her old wedding veil to me. It’s an old ribbon lace from the 60's.

Beautiful isn’t it! I was going to use on a garter or something, but in the end I just didn’t have time to make one. Instead I put a piece of it into her botton-hole, and pinned a piece of it to my jacket too.

It worked as my something old. When my sister gets married next year I hope to make her something out of it too.

For more Flea Market/Vintage or Thrifty finds pop on over to Her Library Adventures 
and Apron Thift Girl

Getting into the spirit of things

 

Whilst the rest of the country (if you believe what the media says) has been going Royal Wedding crazy, I have managed to stay relatively uninterested (apart from wanting a peak at the dress) in the whole thing. Until yesterday...

We were going to go head up into central London to have a look at the preparations, but by mid afternoon had been distracted by Thor (the new film out – its a bit silly, but the lead is very easy on the eye!). So when I got home (minus pictures of festive bunting), I decided to make some of my own...

So I took a few scraps from this...

To this...

I love it! Admittedly I've taken a bit of artistic licence with the Union Jack colours, but I love the crafty look of it.

Whether you are enjoying the wedding on Friday or not, have a good bank holiday!

Paper Garlands and Gifting Bags

As I’ve mentioned before, my sister is getting married next year. Woo Hoo!

I’m still looking around for ideas I can send her way. As I love, love, love all things bunting related, I was really inspired by Frog Goose and Bears post on paper garlands, so I did a bit more digging around and found these garlands.

(I cant remember where the top image came from - eek! If you know let me know.
Bottom image from paper doll romance blog)

Aren’t they pretty! My sister loves music, so I was thinking that instead of using books we could use sheet music instead.

In other news, I decided to use the sewing paper idea to create some gifting bags. I don’t know about you but I love wrapping presents using brown paper and then adding a variety of bits and pieces to jazz it up a bit like this and this.

The thing is, I spend ages wrapping presents and needed a quick alternative. So… I created a few pouches.

(apologies for the colour balance on these pictures - its completely off - awful!)

They are perfect for small items and I can seal them up using my new fabric tape!

Ta da! Wrapping made easy!

Eye Candy to Brighten Your Monday

Sooner than I thought - a second wedding post!

As I seemed to be on a roll at the weekend, I carried on looking at wedding bits and pieces, this time with my sister in law in mind - who is also getting married next year! I dont know what the happy couple's current thinking is venue wise, but when we last spoke she had been dreaming of doing the whole spring or summer/converted barn thing. So I had a scout around for ideas that might compliment that.

Heres what I came up with:

(Again courtesy of Style Me Pretty with a bit of Oh Happy Day thrown in for good measure)

I have to confess that I love the use of unusual materials for button holes - especially this use of corn and wheat. I made the ones at our wedding from material, thistles and pheasant feathers which looked awesome! I seem to have a bit of thing for bunting too! The pictures in here remind me of village fairs at the height of summer and I had to include the little flag stirrers again - they are super cute! And dont you just love those pinwheel type things? Or is that just me? I'll have to try making some when I get the chance - they'd be great for a kids party and would give a wedding a lovely fun whimsical feel...

...Thinking about it, I'm not quite sure 'whimsical' is what my sister in law is going to be looking for, but posting just now has cheered up my monday morning no end so its all good.

As a little aside - congrats to me for finally finding a picture tool that let me collage photos together. I had been wondering how the hell everyone else did it!

In case you are still in the dark too - my way of making collages is to use Picassa. Its a great little photo viewing/ editing tool, its free and if you go to 'create' you will find the 'collage' tool - which will help you create your own multi-pictured extravaganzas. Awesome!

Have a good week!

Spring Weddings

I mentioned a while ago that my sister and her partner are getting married in the spring next year so as you can imagine – I’m mega excited! Having only gotten married myself about 4 months ago, I have been getting withdrawal symptoms after cutting down on my wedding blog viewing (i couldnt resist the occasional peek at style me pretty - its like eye candy) but now I have the perfect excuse to keep looking. Hurrah!

After proffering many offers of help, I have been set the fabulous task of coming up with a few decorations for the church. So searlier today I set out on the internet super highway in search of inspiration . Three hours later I had managed to sidetrack myself completely by finding all kinds of loveliness that would go with the colour scheme (yellows, greens and whites) and season (spring) that the bride and groom are they are going for.

(All photos courtesy of Style Me Pretty. )

Soooo lovely! I have a feeling that this may be the start of quite a few posts on the subject!

Note to the bride to be - I know you liked the moustaches/photobooth and sweets things that we had at our wedding, so if you were looking for a variation on the theme maybe something like your favourite chocolates and the photobooth with lips might work!?! Also I loved the little flag stirrers, Mr & Mrs signs and then the bunting - it screams springy/summer! Plus if it is nice, a few nicely designed cushions would be lovely scattered in some kind of cosy corner. I will keep thinking of church type decorations but in the meantime I hope the planning is going well! xx

My Creative Space

This Thursday I'm reminiscing about button hearts and making more. So simple but so lovely. We used them for decorations at our wedding. 

 

For the original creative space - pay Kootoyoo a visit.