Bridal Shower

A couple at our church got married this past weekend.  The woman has been at our church for a very long time and has been very involved in the ministries of the church, so, my sister and I decided to throw her a bridal shower.  It was such a beautiful celebration of her and her coming marriage (she has been waiting a long time for this).  So, of course, no store bought products for me!  The is the invitation I made:

I went with soft and elegant, pulling out an old, old, old SU! stamp set to stamp the bride.  I die cut all the stitched rectangles and then my middle daughter helped by stamping almost all of the bride images.  I set it up in my mini MISTI to make it (mostly) error proof.  I backed the image panel with some white mulberry paper for some extra softness and stamped the background with a pale gray ink.

As favors at the shower, I made these adorable little treat boxes (inspired by these I found on Pinterest).  We filled them with two Lindt truffles--one dark chocolate and one white/milk chocolate mix--to represent the bride and groom.

I embossed the sheets of card stock and then die cut the boxes, as I didn't think I could emboss after I die cut due to the dimensions of the boxes.  Unfortunately, die cutting after embossing really flattened out the embossing, so they weren't as textured as I wanted.  I hot glued on the pearl "necklace", threaded some sparkly white tulle through a hole I punched in the handles (to represent the veil), and tied it on with some twine along with a kraft tag.

The shower had a bit of a elegant, rustic theme, using a lot of kraft/natural and gold.  These are the cute little cupcake toppers I created.  I used some really, really old patterned paper that I had.  It really isn't pretty, but it had the perfect colors to go with the theme.  I used my scoreboard to score the strips and my youngest daughter helped me fold them all and turn them into rosettes.  She was actually quite a bit faster at it than I was!  I added a die cut glittery gold heart and the word love.  My middle daughter helped me quite a it with die cutting these out.  They were both a lot of help!

Luckily, I found out the week before that the bride-to-be doesn't actually like cake!  So, I scrapped the whole cupcake idea and made some cinnamon rolls (which it a whole other adventure!).  We placed them in cupcake liners and stuck in the cupcake toppers, and they looked so awesome!

Thanks for sticking with me to the end of the post!  I know it was a long one.  I didn't take any pictures of the actual shower set up, maybe my sister did and I can post them here later.

CARD:

Supplies:

Stamps: SU! "She's All That" (I have probably had this for at least 10 years, probably more like 15); JustRite Stampers background

Dies:

STAMPlorations stitched rectangle die

Challenges:

Crafter's Cafe #252--anything goes

Cards Galore #80--anything goes

Creative Inspirations--anything goes

We Love Chocolate Baroque--anything goes

Paper Girls #209--wedding/anniversary

Creative Moments #200--anything goes

Creative Knockouts #371--CAS

Sweet Stampin'--use your old stash (OLD stamp, and OLD mulberry paper)

BOXES:

Supplies:

Stamps: PaperTrey Ink "Happily Ever After"

Dies: Elizabeth Craft Designs "Bonbon Box"

Darice Damask embossing folder

Challenges:

Craft Dee Bow-Z--anything goes with handmade bow

Love To Craft Challenge Blog #51--anything goes

Crafty Creations #414--anything goes

Lil' Patch of Crafty Friends #143--anything goes

Crafting Happiness--anything goes

As You Like It--favorite non-card project (I love making little treat/gift boxes!  You can customize them for the recipient/occasion and, come on, everything is cuter in small sizes!  It's also a great way to make a little gift seem even more special)

CUPCAKE TOPPERS:

Dies: Sweet n' Sassy small heart; "love" from a Stephanie Barnard/Sizzix die set I borrowed from my mother-in-law

Challenges:

Scor-pal #75--anything goes or harvest/Halloween (I went with the anything goes)

Creative Fingers #194--anything goes

Craft Rockets #75--add sparkle

Crafty Friends #146--more than one die

Simon Says Stamp Wednesday--make it sparkle