save the date

We decided to do our invites and save the dates ourselves, both for financial and control freak reasons. We’re not making the invites until July, but I couldn’t resist sharing these, I’m pleased how they turned out!! Contrary to what one might think, I’m pretty simple and traditional when it comes to stuff like this, and we wanted an old-fashioned feel.

The calligraphy is by Linea Carta, who is here in Berkeley. We had her do one copy of the date and words, then we used Illustrator to combine the URL text & calligraphy together, and created a gocco screen. We used gold ink (which only looks shiny in one of these photos, but it’s all the same ink!) on cream Fabriano deckle edged enclosure cards, glassine envelopes from the closing sale of Nice Package, jade green sealing wax from Castle in the Air, dusty-gold ribbon from the closing sale of Nice Package, & a seal from Castle in the Air. The glassine envelopes were trimmed with one of those wacky crafty scalloped edge scissor deals. They were mailed in G. Lalo cream scalloped edge envelopes, because they are too small to mail!

S. had a vision of a tiny tiny card with a simple, mysterious message on it – and I loved the idea. (No, it isn’t a Blair Witch wedding.) They were super, super easy to make, though I did burn my fingers a few times on the hot-glue-gun sealing wax. (Who knew such a thing even existed!?)

The invites will also have gocco-ed calligraphy, and a similar design, but with a twist! I’m excited to start putting them together! (Though, I wouldn’t turn down any graphic design eyes or fancytown font ideas.)

In other “let’s put on a show!” vendor-free (aka “thanks friends, for all being so awesome with the talent and offers of help”) wedding updates, for my sanity & in case anyone cares to know our plans so far, though hopefully it is not jinxing to talk about!

Wedding cake: Holly Bobisuthi (who works at Miette)
Dress: Me!
Catering: My mom & ex-chef aunt
Venue: My land in Vermont
Building for wedding, outhouse digging: Me, my brother, my dad
Chairs, picnic tables, etc: begged, borrowed, stolen, have
Dishes & flatware, wine glasses: Borrowed from SoRo House catering kitchen, vintage, found
Linens: Found, borrowed, have
Photographer: Jennifer Loeber (and uh, basically EVERYONE there, my sister-in-law Emily does wedding photography, Annie is a genius, etc etc)
Officiant: Angel Polacheck
Ring design and metalsmithing: Angel Polacheck
Crown/tiara/veil design and metalsmithing: Holly Bobisuthi (who ALSO works at Dark Garden & will be making veils if anyone needs one, she is AMAZING)
Suit: No idea. Anyone know a good source for a cinnamon tweed English country vintage looking suit? For a lanky tall fellow? Maybe James & Todd?
Music for procession: Hmmm. Maybe my sister-in-law’s father or sister on violin?
Flowers: Found? Local florists?
Decor: Emily? Everyone? Found vintage? Kate?
Day-of coordinator/ sanemaker: I don’t know. Vivi? You’re the only other project manager besides me.
Games & activities: TBD

What else does one need for these shindigs? Makeup? Shoes? Shotguns? We’re not doing the music/dancing thing at all, it’ll start at noon and be an afternoon picnic, play croquet, socialize & eat deal. Things feel much, much more under control with the invite list finalized and the save the dates out. Like, hey! This is happening & it’s got it’s own momentum, people are excited, it’s good.

By the way, any Bay Area brides-to-be, or general lovers of pretty things ~ I was just walking around my neighborhood and stopped by a new shop here that I’ve been liking a lot – they do sustainable event design & flowers, and the arrangements they have in the shop are stunning, plus everything she stocks is so sweet and pretty (and shockingly affordable, I always walk out with something!) The owner is Pilar and she is super cute and nice and helpful! So go look! http://www.gorgeousandgreenevents.com

Please excuse the iPhone photo!