3 days to go - ratrat-ing DIYs

Daycheck: 8-17-2011 1:59AM - 3 days til the our day!

3 days... parang SM 3 day sale nalang... we know how fast time flies right? the rest is history before we even know it.

I've been in Nova since Saturday AM. I went home Sunday night only to leave again early Monday morning. I miss my mom sooo much, more than words, more than anything, more than I can express. The thought of not seeing her and being with her everyday never fails to bring me to tears. And yes, a tear landed on my cheek just now. I'm still in the process of figuring out how to deal with these emotions. I'm guessing, I won't be able to figure things out but I've got to let destiny take its course.

On a lighter note, I've been busy with last minute DIYs (for those who don't know, DIY stands for Do It Yourself) to keep my mind and heart occupied from my impending loneliness and happiness.

Von and I were able to finish most of the things that needs to be done. Our ceremony and reception program had been finalized, we just need to iron out a few last minute details. Our grand entrance surprise is in the works. And, I'm mostly done packing the things that we would need to bring on the day. No, not my things from home. I need a stronger heart for that and I don't have the will just yet.

Amongst the happy things, DIY stuffs that has been accomplished are the ff:

pamaypay

 Original plan for these fans is to dye them black. However, ayaw kumapet ng jobos so uwe sa ribbon at bulaklak. Hehe! Well at least, the guests will have fans kase the sun will be tirik na tirik on that day. Right Lord? Amen!

gifts for ninangs

 No, these aren't wines. We bought hand purses for the ninangs and placed them in this cute paper bags. We DIY'ed the gift tags.

for our moms

 Syempre mawawalan ba ang aming mga mother dears? Syempre hinde! Mawalan na lahat, wag lang si mama! =)

ties for the boys - groomsmen and secondary sponsors

 Of course, we can't DIY the ties diba?! Hinde ako gnun ka mapangyarihan. Gift tags are still specially made.

love gift for our Pastor

We have yet to wrap our gifts for the ninongs and von's dad since wala pa kme mkitang sing cute na paper bag like that of the ninangs.

fascinator for the MOH and the FG

more fascinators for the girls - bridesmaids and secondary sponsors

I ordered black and red and black and purple fascinators for the girls.

taper candles (or whatever they call it!)

 We bought cheap candles and I just decorated them like this. Though we wont be having a Unity Candle ceremony, our Pastor requested for candles to be lighted in the altar during the ceremony.

refreshments as place cards

Tipid mode. We didnt order bottomless drinks from the caterer so we opted to use drinks as place cards para double purpose.

notecards

Instead of the traditional guestbook, we'll have guests sign these notecards and hang them in a beaded curtain that will be setup in the reception area. Extra entertainment, while they wait for the reception to start.

just married banner

For pictorial purposes, syempre! Then we'll tie it on Stacey's back pg pauwe na. Papansin effect. Lol!

 And... ang aming ultimate stress reliever at stress giver in one. Playtime with Vientong!

We'll be turning over the plans to our coordinator when we meet later. Hopefully, we just have to finish packing everything we need then organize the money that we'll be bringing then I can go HOME!!!

I'll be home until Friday morning... After that, I've got to get used to calling another place home. A place with no mama but with a husband. Emotions... kinda hard to figure them out eh?

Sigh... Yey! Sigh... Yey! Sigh..................

signed, sealed, for delivery!

FINALLY!!!

after so many puyat, ngalay, pagod days and nights we finally got to finish our wedding invites (well almost). there are at most 15pcs left for sealing but they should be finished by tomorrow and along w/ the others will be ready for delivery by Monday.

i took us a long time to complete the invites. I've started with the designs way back April and after several revisions we started to print them early July. we've searched stores offering paper cutting services but found none so we had to go thru the leg work of cutting.

7/9 we purchased a small paper cutter from SM Hypermart and started cutting. we aimed to make 70pcs and  had to cut the front and back page, main page, purple lining (for layering) and 3 inserts (ento card, map, and guest info). to sum it up each invites consists of 7 pages for a total of 490 pages for all the 70 invites and we had to cut all of them one by one!

7/19 we finished cutting and started to assemble.

counter clockwise: back, ento, front, guest info, map, main, envelopes

i folded a part of the front page to create a pocket for the inserts. then taped the back and front page to put them together. once the front and back page are in place we started taping the purple lining and the main page.

7/21 we finally finished taping and assembling everything in place.

main page and purple lining glued to the back and front page

folded pocket flap and the inserts

 we also started putting the assembled invites in our black envelopes and glueing the address labels.

black envelopes and address labels (back)

address label (front) w/ our monogram tat (yes, we have this tattooed)

7/22 we started sealing the invites with wax seal. as of today there are still a few pieces left for sealing because we run out of purple gluestick. we'll be picking the gluesticks up by tomorrow and continue sealing.

sealed!

our custom V seal stamper

i'm not really good w/ numbers so i can't tell how much each piece cost. but if we'd take into consideration the effort von & i have given in to this project, i'd have to say this costs a lot! lol! we didn't really want to spend too much on invitations since guests don't keep them after the wedding anyways. there are a few kinks and several palpaks in our finished product but their passable and easier to accept (since we caused them!) as compared to paying someone to make the invites and see a lot of palpaks. we're having a rock & roll party anyways so they need not be perfect.

the experience was also a good bonding time for both von & me. moments are priceless!

we've already distributed a few pieces and have gotten compliments. well, a simple appreciation is always enough to make all the hard work worth it.

DIY invites - wip

our DIY invites is well on its way to completion *hopefully*.  we're getting there! we've set 7/20, a month before the actual day as our target to complete the invites and to start distributing them. we didn't really want to spend much on invitations knowing that guests doesn't really keep them and after the wedding, they'll just be like any other paper that ends up in trash.

the invitations is by far the biggest project Von & i had done/is doing for the wedding. for someone who knows only to make arte and very little on being artistic, this project is a giant leap of success! the making of the design, took a lot of effort, time, stress and desire of a good outcome. seeing our work in progress brings a certain relief that only completion and success can bring.

the materials that we need:
-design/layout
-printed copy
-black envelopes
-address labels
-colored wax and seal stamper
-tapes & cutter
are all hand and we are now in the process of cutting and assembling. at first we thought of looking for cutting services in the malls but we unfortunately found none so we ended up buying ourselves a paper cutter.

the design has undergone several revisions as i was editing and here's a peek of our finished product.

front

we initially wanted black background for our front & back page. we have even bought several black vellum paper only to find out that printing on black paper requires a special kind of printer which we do not have. so we settled for white thinking that we have black envelope anyways.

the paisley design in the front cover will be folded and made into flaps to hold the smaller cutouts of the invitations.

back

i only used microsoft powerpoint for the layout and am glad it turned out just fine. even our map is made manually from powerpoint (yes, i literally drew the lines in the map!)

map

 so far, i have already noticed a few flaws but all of them are still bearable. i pray that throughout the course of assembling the invites, i won't see any flaws that i can't live with and would cause us to repeat over. i'm keeping my fingers crossed.

i'll be posting!