cash flow rutt

This week i have been left to my own devices as my parents have gone on holiday and i have 2 weeks off work, and would know what i have had such a hankering for DIY and would love to have been able to make some of the patterned balls for the trees but i just didnt have the cash to buy the right coloured card to start, i was so bored its unbelieveable i hate it when i have these urges but cannot do anything about it, i just cant wait for the rest of this year to be over then i will be debt free and will have the funds to buy all the right colours of card and ribbon then i can get all these things done

my invites again

i previously posted about some DIY in the magazine i bought and showed some pictures of some ofthe projects i wanted to try and today it was about my invitations, for a long time i have wanted the gate fold cards i designed but it was going to cost so much for all the stock so i thought i would try out a similar one to the one below but using purple obviously. i will be printing out the invitations, order of service, menus and place cards on the computer with the monogram at the top of each. the invitation and menus will be the same size and just a flat card with matting and layering, the place card is obviously going to be a little folded card but the order of service is going to be a folded card with copy paper inside with the order writen in it there will only be order of service, amy and dave and the dat on the outside.

purple balls

in a recent post i showed my DIY balls which i did in plane white ard and it looked quite good so i decided i wanted to make one in purple with some embossing on them and i realised just how long it is going to take me to make these if i want to make them into the trees that i want i better get cracking. this is how i made them. this one is using 8cm diameter circles

• first take plenty of thin card stock in purple.
• set a compass to 4cm (this is the radius of the 8cm circle) and load the pencil.
• draw as many circles that will fit onto a piece of card stock
• repeat until you have 20 circles.
• cut out all the circles and draw in an equilateral triangle where each point touches the edge
• (the angles of the triangle should be 60 degrees each)
• on the side that dosnt have the triangle on it stamp a design using a versa mark ink pad and sprinkle with embossing powder
• using a heat gun heat until the powder is set and place to the side to cool.
• when all circles are finished (or as many are required for the design) fold along the lines of the triangle
• glue together 5 of the circles into a circle for the top and repeat for the bottom
• glue the remainder of the circles to make a straight strip and link the first to the last to make a band
• when the glue is dried stick the top and bottom to the middle band and leave to dry.
• there you have your ball.

i plan on making these as in the previous post about the DIY magazine with the dowling rod in the centre and then fix it in a pot and then make some flowers to pop on them. i am going to have to make these in stages. i want 2 for the sides of our top table so that is 40 large circles, then i want 2 or 3 of the 8 cm ones for the cake table so that will be either 40 or 60 circles, then i want to make some smaller ones for the bar so if i wanted to make 5 that would be a whopping 100 circles, i only have 2 years 2 months and 4 days to go i think i may have to start them soon lol i will have to make the circles and emboss them and store them in a box as i dont think i have that much room to keep them.

the dress again

as i have blogged before i got my dress and tried it on but it was sent in a suit bag and so i had to buy a dress bag, as the dress had already been worn and as it does have a train it was a bit dirty so me and my mom decided to wait till the dress bag came to clean off the bottom so as the dress bag came we though i would just pop it on again so i could see if i could get away with wearing heels (which i cant) and when i lift the dress and put the strap on my wrist where the dirt is that you can see then clean it off we didnt get it all of so will try again, my mom says she still might take it to the dry cleaners nearer the time but i didnt really want to pay £80 or more to clean the underneath of a dress that we can clean ourselves with a bit of time and effort. i got my mom to pull it in to the point it is going to be for the wedding which i am going to have to not lose weight if i dont want to have it altered as the waist comes right in, i do think the bust area needs to be pulled in a bit more about an inch as there was still some 'jiggle' there...lol. but i thought i would post some pictures of it as this isnt a shop sample but THE actual dress. i am not going to lose weight just tone my arms as i have never had tones arms but they look a little bit too big for my liking. (note, i am not wearing an underskirt with the dress in the picture but i will be wearing a small one but i think i may hire one thats what the previous lady did)

as if that just happened!!!!!

i cant believe i just spent the last hour taking pictures and then writing a huge blog post for it just to dissapear. i dont really have the time to do it all again now so i will have to wait till i get back from work. GGGRRRRR that was so annoying

my magazine ideas.......it appeared as soon as i blogged....typical...

on monday i was looking in w h smiths and concidering getting a wedding mag but they all seem to be over run with venues and not much else so i decided not to get one but as i was leaving i saw this discount shelf and right infront of me was this wedding annual and it was filled with DIY ideas for stationary and decorations and centre pieces so as i was looking through i got all excited at the thought of testing out most of the things. so far i have only tested one of them and i love it, i just used plain white card stock and i think they are awesome, i will be making some of them bigger so that i can make little tree like the picture below of the centre pieces but bigger for the sides of out top table, then i want to make some for the cake table and then some tiny ones to place along the bar, i also think if i can make enough i would like to make some attatched to ribbon for pew ends and to maybe decorate other parts of the room.

below are some of the invitations that i liked the look of as they look like they would be quite cheap to make and they all link together with the order of service and place cards.

this cake looks so good they have used shot glasses between the tiers i thought this was cute and something i will try when we make a mock cake

they also showed how a simple white rose will compliment any colour and still look great.

then there was this heart shape decoration made with craft willow covered in die-cut hearts

then finally there was an article on cheap but fun hen and stag ideas and they picked go ape which is where we wanted to have a joint hen and stag / team building day

when i have attempted some others i will take more pictures and show them.

too much blogging and wedding 'research' maybe?????

well i think i may have done a tad bit too much blogging and constantly on google that my hard drive has given up. i was looking for some more cake ideas and the computer just gave up and wouldnt turn on again, after trying so many times i did the diagnostics test on it and it failed and told me i had to replace the hard drive, its a good thing it is still under warrenty so they picked it up this morning but i dont know when i will get it back to i am left to use my dad laptop and i hate it as its so big and heavy where as my laptop is a tiny little pink hp that i can just pop in my handbag when im on the go or seeing my MOH so now i just have to deal with what i have, and the worse part is my laptop didnt have a cd drive and so i didnt back up my things so now i have none of my wedding idea pictures, the pictures of my dress, the cake ideas, the flowers, all the saved sites in my favourites all i have now is what ever is saved on my blog or my facebook or my phone i think i am going to see how much i can get an external hard drive for and then i can store eveything on there so that it wont be used as often as the laptop and i wont lose eveything again......i think it deserved the bang i gave it when i had spent 2 hours trying to fix it lol..

i was in my creative mood earlier so i decided i wanted to try another invitation as i still like the gate fold card with the ribbon, but i had the problem of what to have on the front as the card with the silver patterns on cost alot of money so i went on the search of some type of embossing plates or something in my moms craft stuff and i came across once with these flowers and vines which was quite cool, i just used white pearly car but i will probably mat and layer i up on the front with some purple and / or black card, then i will print off my inserts and layer those on the inside.



i went to do some shopping at asda today (on the bus so i couldnt get alot due to the fact my mom has to get a new car) and i thought as i was there i should pick up some more candles before they sell out and i have to deal with just white ones, so i got another bag of 50 purple ones and a bag of 100 white ones, yes i know i just said i didnt want the white ones but i thought i would have the purple ones in the bowls and the white ones on the table or maybe mix it up a bit with some purple and some white in the bowls then the same on the table, as you can see below i have quite a few thing already. in the top picture it shows the 6 purple vases (that i first bought but then they sold out by the next time i went so i may just use them on the top table) thenthere are the cuff links we got at a steal of a price from primark at just £1 each so we got 7 sets. and there is about 170 candles in there too i do store the main bowls in there which you can just see at the top wrapped in paper.



this picture is of some of the purple candles i got in the little glass holders (as the hotel wont allow them to go on the table) i still need to go to ikea to get a few more of the holders.

i said to dave earlier that the main things we need to pay for is the church the hotel and the stationary, after that everything is like extras but i worked it out and i can save more than £200 per month from the beggining of next year so that will be plenty to pay for everything we need and extras.

is here!!!!!!!

well i said i was going to take pictures of my dress when it came, well here is the story first of yesterday......

well i walked to work monday and tuesday and drove on wednesday even though the car was spluttering and sounded like a tank and we had to pick up a new alternator, i was ready to drive again on thursday (well my mom was as i dont drive lol) but my brother decided he was going to fix my moms alternator, before we go, then he comes in and say we wont be driving nowhere as he had wrecked the belt of some sort so i had to head out to work early, i was rather annoyed, that would be i spend an hour walking to work then do my 5 and a half hour shift then the hour walk home, and to make it a little bit worse it started to rain on the way home, it wasnt the rain i was really bothered about but my trousers were baggy in the first place but when they get soggy they drag and i spent most of the walk hoisting them up, i was glad to get home and have a was, so went in, through to the kitchen to get a towel and drop off my bag then head to the bathroom, i had been in there about 10 minutes when my mom came to the dor and asked if i had noticed what as in the kitchen right next to where i got my towel, i thought she was going to say a spider or something but no it was my dres!!!!! i had stood there for and not even noticed the great big suit bag on the chair lol, just like me. well i sort of forgot to take pictures as i up packed it and tried it on as i was a little bit on the excited side lol but i took a few pictures today but not taking it out the bag as its so hard to put back in the bag a its a suit bag they sent it in and not a dress bag, i am going to gey one as soon as i can as it is getting a little bit crushed in there. the first pic is of the suit bag the other 2 are of the top of the dress and the detail on it, below those i have put the pictures of me in the dress that i had taken at the bridal shop as it is the same dress.