I got married a few months ago, and in true Tracey fashion, was compelled to make a lot of the decorations, favors and items to be used in the ceremony. For our casual backyard wedding, it was entirely appropriate and the items turned out to be the perfect touches, making the ceremony and the reception uniquely ours.
Our theme colors were yellow, orange and red with gerbera daisies as our flowers. I tried to pull those elements into all of the decorations and plans, right down to the red-, yellow- and orange-frosted cupcakes! We bought silk gerbera daisies and wired them to the fence in the front yard. I used Avery Ink Jet Window Cling Sheets to print out high-resolution clip art of gerbera daisies and stuck them to all of the windows in our house. As an altered book artist, a number of the other projects I worked on were books, of course, and we’ll look at those in this article.
The first project wasn’t entirely out of the ordinary, but it’s still an altered book. I started with a blank book my mother gave me a few years ago, and pulled off the pink flowers that were glued along the spine, leaving the leaves intact.
I collaged a vintage image onto the front cover over a ribbon that was in our themed colors. We later used this same ribbon for the Unity Candle lighting and as a pretty collar for our “flower dog” (we hot-glued some silk gerbera daisies to it to match the theme). I also stamped our initials and the wedding date on the inside cover, over the ribbon, for an extra personal touch.
Tim and I wrote our own vows, but I decided that I needed a cheat sheet of sorts, since I’d be so nervous saying them aloud in front of all of the guests. So, I came up with this little vow book. The book is a small photo album I found in the dollar bin at Michaels. Each page of the book as well as the cover has small openings where a photo can be placed. All of the pages were gessoed and covered with white mulberry paper to make a place for my vows to be written. I typed out my vows and spent some time breaking up the sentences so they would fit evenly on the backs and fronts of all of the pages. When I was happy with the layout of the words, I hand wrote them into the book.
Of course, then I needed another “keeper” to hold both my vows and my husband’s together. A hollowed-out book would be perfect! All of the pages were glued around the sides and clamped together until they were dry. I then used a rotary tool to cut out the niche, which now holds my vow book and the little scraps of yellow paper my husband wrote his vows on.
The Vow Keeper and the Vow Book both seem like big, complicated projects with a lot of steps, but they are actually very simple and use skills that you’ve learned in previous articles. Take your time and be patient so you can enjoy the process.
A friend was getting married a month after us and a number of us all chipped in to give her and her husband a gift. I was commissioned to make the card, which I fashioned out of a thin hardcover wine journal I found for a dollar at Target. With some careful gluing, I turned it into a thick card, collaged with the names of all of the contributors.
During the time that I was creating these projects, it seemed like I as doing unnecessary work (compared to dealing with the wedding vendors, plans, not to mention my day job!), but each of these tiny touches really added to the overall ambience of the event. We’ve had a lot of compliments on all aspects of the ceremony and the party, and I think these projects rounded out all of the other arrangements we made. And, as we all know, making art is a great stress reliever! If you have an event coming up where you might be able to use some of the projects in this article, I’d love to see what you come up with.
