Invitation Making!

Here's the thing about invitations: they all look alike. Well, not exactly alike. To be fair, they fall into three categories: those that look like Martha Stewart mass-produced them (these tend to have a lot of pink, brown, and mint green flowers and leaves); those that would make a man cringe (channel images of pink hearts and kissing couples); and those that are just plain expensive (imagine thick ivory paper and embossing).

Up until several weeks ago, Eric and I were stuck in the land of all these these bland possibilities, having leafed through at least 2,000 such invites. None of them stood out to us in any way, except for one that my mom criticized because the paper was too flimsy.

Which brings me to my mom: My mother loves scrapbooking, and since her retirement, she has become a virtual scrapbooking aficionado. She goes on scrapbooking days, saves coupons to Michael's, and an entire room in my parents' home is dedicated to her craft. So one day she showing us a card she had made for a friend, and Eric and I took one look at it and thought, "That is what we want our invitations to look like!"

So began the invitation adventure, a project my mom undertook with gusto! She found a printer who could use thermography on the invitations; she spent several days cutting out and embossing small pieces of paper with Aunt Marie; an entire afternoon and evening were wiled away with her college crony Michele trying to choose ribbon, figuring out how to tie it (credit goes to Michele for that), and cutting out hearts. Then she spent a number of evenings painting the embossed paper.

And all that was before the big invitation assembly day! Eric and I drove down from Boston in preparation and then we all got in one car and drove the rest of the way to Long Island, where Aunt Marie was hosting the event in her home. Aunt Christine was also there, along with her new daughter-in-law Melissa, who handmade her own beautiful invitations and is a whiz at scrapbooking generally and glue guns specifically. She came prepared with two of them so that we could assemble all the pieces of paper together onto the invitation. Add in Bonnie--a scrapbooking teacher who came to cut out butterflies with her press--and Amanda--my friend who works at the church where we are getting married--and Gino's Pizza and Front Street black and white cookies and chocolate fudge cake, and the day could be nothing but perfect.

Except for the fact that half of the assembly kit got left at my parents' home. In Connecticut. 2 hours away.

Sigh.

Thankfully, after initial panic, it turned out that we had plenty to amuse ourselves. Bonnie and Aunt Christine cut out butterflies, Amanda and I painted them, Melissa and Eric glue-gunned and attached pieces of the invitation together, and my mom and Aunt Marie assembled them, making sure that they were perfectly--and I mean exceedingly perfectly--straight.



Amanda, Aunt Marie, Bonnie, Aunt Christine, and Melissa working on the assembly line!



Eric, Amanda, and Aunt Marie. Check out their intensity!

When we had done all we could do, we ordered takeout from my childhood favorite Gino's Pizza and then, since it was Melissa's birthday, we made sure to celebrate with Front Street cake and cookies.

At the end of the afternoon, we were able to make one complete invitation. Here's Melissa showing it off!



Eric, my mom, and I returned to assembling that evening in Connecticut. Here are a batch of finished invites!



These on the table were finished the next morning. Each had a bit of painting that needed to be fixed before they were mailed out, so you see them all drying, neatly in a row!