Sewing Project: Pretty business card case

 Thanks to the lovely Pamela over at Dayton Time, I was suddenly in possession of 500 wonderful business cards. It makes it so much easier to share my fancy new google voice phone number and my work e-mail when its all on a handy dandy little card!  One teensy weensy little problem. For those of you who have been following the game here, my name is set to change in t-minus 205 days, so I had to get those babies out the door! My solution, make the cutest ever business card holder so I can convince people to take my card. So far, its gone something like this...

Me: Oh! Let me show you my latest sewing project that I completed in all the time that I have free.

Unsuspecting parent/teacher/specialist:Wow! That's super cute! But what could be inside? I must know!

Me: Why, I'm glad you asked. I have right here some handy dandy business cards so you have no excuse not to call me back my information easily accessible.

Unsuspecting parent/teacher/specialist: Oh! Wonderful! I'll take 5!

Or something along those lines....

Anyway, I found a great pattern which, as with the best projects, took about 30 minutes, including the time I spent rummaging though my crazy stash of random fabrics and clothes that will someday be awesome projects. The finial product was a combination of pretty print fabric left over from my days of making sorority shirts, some terry cloth remnants from baby bibs I made this past spring, a ribbon that was decoration on the package of some gift given to me, and a metal spare button that came with a piece of clothing I'm pretty sure I no longer own.  After gathering those things up, and a few cuts, pins and stitches, I ended up with this!

Even better, when I showed it to my cousin, she requested one for a Christmas gift. Wonderful! I love an excuse to make things for people, but its tough sometimes to know how they'll react to a homemade gift.

Engagement pics.... Finally!

Sorry for the big time slacking, but I have an excuse, I promise! My three jobs (yeah, I know, everyone else thinks I'm crazy too) are really starting to pick up, and on top of that Mike and I are moved! Its just a hop, skip and a jump away from where we w before, but its saving me about 20 minutes on my daily commute. It's been pretty crazy around here!

On with the good stuff!

Dylan and his assistant Robin from Onion Studios did a great job with the pictures, and the best part was it was free with our wedding photo package! Yay! We got a CD of all the digital negatives to do with what we please. So, without further ado here's a sampling of our favorites. One of these lovelies made its way onto the 250 Thank you notes that we won, thanks to Pamela! Thanks!

Do you know what these are called?

Mike and I have been working on the design for our wedding decor. Lanterns are up there on the list of design elements. I haven't been able to find quite what I'm looking for yet, but I'm still searching. One of the types of lanterns I stumbled on today is pictured below. Its different than many others that I have seen and may have a place in our design... if I only knew what they are called so I can search out some more! Any ideas?

Exactly 11 months to go...

So far we have the location, photographer and... as of last week, the dress!! I purchased a store sample off E-bay of the exact Maggie Sottero dress I wanted, in my size, for less than half the price I would have paid if I had bought it new! Fabulous!

It arrived in the mail last Wednesday and I was thrilled. I ran right upstairs after camp to check it out. Mike was confused by the deceptively small box, but there it was in perfect shape! It will need a few alterations, but then it will be perfect!

Our wedding has a home

I'm happy to say that Mike and I have finally made a decision on where we will have our special day, Sweet Briar in Geneseo, NY! Both of us are really happy with the place and know it will be a beautiful backdrop for an intimate celebration with our closest family and friends! And it all happened because I missed a train....

Long story short, I miss read the time on my ticket by 20 minutes, missed the train and came up with the great idea of having Mike meet my mom, sister and I in Geneseo (about half way between where my two homes are) to check it out! I showed them around the place, because Will, the owner, was busy with a rehersal dinner, and they loved it as much as Bridesmaid Jamie and I did in May. So we grabbed Will and signed a contract, for exactly one year from the day! :)

Its so nice to have that decision done with, and with the place I kept coming back to every time I sat down to think about our wedding.

My last few post were only a small percentage of the locations that we looked for. Since I've graduated and summer camp hasn't started yet, I had time to do some serious searching. Bridesmaids Jenny, Jamie and Holly all got in on the act. It got pretty stressful there for a while. There may have even been a few tears. I wanted to make sure that we could find the best place for our money, which isn't a whole lot. So I searched and searched Buffalo, the finger lakes, Rochester and Syracuse. I wrote tons of e-mails. I made spreadsheets. But every place, I compared to Sweet Briar. As the days ticked away, I got more and more nervous we'd not find a better place and miss out on one that I knew I liked. As my mom says, everything happens for a reason. If I hadn't missed the train, Mike would have never seen the place, fallen in love with it too and agreed to make it our place. I'm happy its done and we have a beautiful location!

So, if there are any ladies out there that need some ideas in the Western/Central NY area. Let me know, because I know what its like to be stressing over that....

I'm a winner! (again!)

Wow. I really must be lucky... or maybe its just the enormous amount of blogs that I read that have contests I enter. I'm a little obsessed, but came you blame me? I keep winning! Now, I just need to win something for the wedding.

So, Thank Yous to:
VintageGlam Weddings and {sweeter than me} designs (a great Etsy seller!) for these two pairs of great earrings! I wore the ones on the left for my graduation. They both have the romantic vintage feel that I love! Thanks so much ladies!

My second round of thanks goes to Focus Organic and Niagra Conservation for this lovely little house...
filled with eco-goodies!It includes a whole bunch of things to help make our house more energy and water efficient. We definitely could have used these in our crazy old house this past winter! I think we're going to hold on to the stuff and install it in our next place, once we find out where that will be!

Thanks again for all the great giveaways fellow bloggers! Keep it up! :)

Oh so pretty!

Remember that post about anthropologie being a store I drool over, but can't really afford? Well... I found this great lady who can MAKE anthropology-like pretty things and, even better, recycles other clothes to make them!



Just look at this great shirt here! Even better, she's GIVING IT AWAY!

Oh, fingers crossed!