Wedding craft #1

I'm working on getting all my wedding decorations set for my wedding next June - yay!!! My fiancé and I have decided on a literary theme wedding because we both love to read, and actually spend many weekend mornings happily curled up in bed or on the couch with good books! I've realized I also love theme weddings because then it gives you a focus for all decorations and other ideas. I see hundreds of cute wedding ideas on Pinterestbut if they aren't literary theme I can just scroll by them! 

Anyway, back to crafting. 

I wanted candles on my tables to add mood lighting/romance to each table (plus candles just seem like something you include for wedding decorations) but how to make candles literary? Apart from buying candles that smell like books, yes, those exist, I decided to make the candle votives themselves literary. 

My mom scoured a variety of thrift shops for small glasses (I didn't care that they didn't all match) and when I visited MN in October to go dress shopping, I also spent a day decorating all of the glass votives. I took my Modge podge and my falling apart copy of Pride & Prejudice and coated each class with the book pages to make literary votive holders! 

Step 1: get glasses (if you have some time and don't care if they match then I recommend hunting thrift stores, but if you want them to match IKEA or a wedding consignment store might have some) 

Step 2: get your Modge Podge and a brush - I used a stain brush because it's what my parents had

Step 3: apply Modge Podge 

Step 4: apply paper 

Step 5: coat entire thing with Modge Podge 

Step 6: let dry! 

Optional step 7: go back to do an additional coating of Modge Podge 

You could easily adopt this to use tissue paper in your event colors or some other lightly colored paper! Just make sure the paper isn't too heavy or you won't get much "glow"

Have you made anything crafty lately?

The Lucky One

I'm here, sitting on a train that will take me to see my amazingly wonderful boyfriend. While on the train I'm listening to two albums: one encompassing the wonderful talents of a high school friend, another is a funk album by a group of guys, including two guys from college that were my friends. As I do the typical scrolling through Facebook I see other friends/acquaintances who are in the peace corps, grad school, learning to be doctors, trying to make the world a better place, involved in cocoa service, making it in the theater world, and countless other things. I'm amazed, awed and I feel super blessed to know all these amazing people who are each brave enough to try and put their own mark on this world. 

All I feel in this moment is incredibly lucky. I have had the chance to interact with and become friends with such an amazing and talented group of individuals. Thanks everyone. 

Happy Valentine's Day to all the wonderful people that I see on a daily, weekly, monthly, yearly or only on Facebook status - you are all loved!