Make Gold Ombre Pens

I will allow for the possibility that I’m taking any stress/anxiety related to throwing a giant party, spending lots of money, watching all of our family and friends mingle and then, oh, committing to spend the rest of my life with one person, and channeling into making cute shit for the wedding.  That’s possible.

The thing is, I feel quite relaxed (this could have to do with the massage gift certificates I’ve been hoarding since Christmas that I’ve been cashing in the past few weeks) and totally confident that everything’s going to get done (this could have to do with a couple of elaborate spreadsheets we’ve created).  However, I do keep coming up with wedding crafts to do that are seriously SO unnecessary. Though, really, what wedding craft IS necessary?

This weekend, I decided that it was absolutely imperative to decorate the pens with which our guests will write us happy messages.  Because WHAT WILL THEY THINK IF WE JUST HAVE PLAIN PENS?

So I broke out some spray paint and blinged out our wedding pens.  Now we can all relax.

Gold Ombre Pens

Get:

• plain ballpoint pens
• color spray paint (I used gold)
• flat white spray paint
• matte spray sealer

Step One:  Spray pens gold.  Don’t worry if you get paint on the pen tips- they’ll still write.

Step Two:  Once pens are dry, hold a pen tip down with your non-dominant hand.  Spray about an inch of solid white starting from the bottom (non-tip side) of the pen, turning the pen as your spray to coat entire circumference.

Step Three: Without waiting for white strip to dry, hold pen farther away, and spray again, this time allowing paint to coat about half the pen.  Turn the pen a little faster as you spray, so the coat is less even that at the very bottom of the pen.

Step Four: Repeat for all your pens and then spray with matte sealer.  Once they are dry, scribble on a piece of scrap paper until they start writing to remove any paint on the ball point.

Hooray!  It’s harder to explain how to do this than it is to actually do it.  Just grab some spray paint and you’ll figure it out.  Now I’m going to go put these into the wood pen holder Shawn made this weekend and tonight I’ll sleep well knowing we have what we really need for a good wedding (and marriage): two people strange (anal?) enough to spend their weekend decorating pens and making pen holders.

I Love You So

It’s true!  Even though I’m preoccupied with work and banner making at the moment, I love y’all.  Here’s a banner I recently finished for a wedding in Ireland.

Jelly Favors

Last night I stayed up waaaaaaay too late decorating little jars of apple jelly my friend Chrystal made for our wedding favors.  I carved a stamp and stamped squares fabric I had on hand for a simple  and sweet (literally! AMIRITE?) little favor.

Open Road Project: Ironical Smiles in Memphis

When I’m on a vacation, be it a month-long backpacking trip or weekend jaunt, each day I plan to leave a section of Walt Whitman’s Song of the Open Road. I might leave it in a B&B guestbook, tuck a note behind a hotel painting or write it on a dollar bill I spend at a hot dog stand. In any case, I’ll be tracking where I leave the poem here. I call it The Open Road Project.  Track the poem’s progress here.

 

I’ve been slacking on this project lately. I’ve done a lot of traveling, but keep forgetting to leave the poem in my wake! Last weekend we went to Memphis for a lovely wedding and had a big old time. We ate at the fantastic Rendezvous BBQ joint, sipped cocktails at the Peabody Hotel, discovered an awesome little secret garden in the middle of the city, and watched two awesome people get married on the rooftop of the Madison Hotel. Of course, I forgot to leave the poem in any of these fantastic spots. As we were leaving town, I realized this and scribbled the 54th section of the poem on the coffee we’d grabbed on our way out of town. Better than nothing, I suppose!

ducks at the Peabody Hotel

mermaid graffiti is the best kind of graffiti

poem on a coffee cup

You shall be treated to the ironical smiles and mockings

of those who remain behind you, what beckonings

of love you receive you shall only answer with passionate kisses

of parting, you shall now allow the hold of those who

spread their reach’d hands toward you.

Where the poem’s been so far:

Make Big Ol’ Ice Cubes with Lemon and Basil

I’ved used my spherical ice mold quite a bit– for cocktails, punch and iced tea.  Wanting to branch out a little from the spherical mold, I picked up a few silicone ice cube molds to create large cubes of ice.  These are great because they’re flexible, so the ice is easy to extract from the mold, which is not always the case with my hard plastic sphere.  For the first batch of cubes, I added small lemon slices and basil leaves to each cube and added them to grapefruit mimosas for brunch-time sipping.  Lovely!

For more recipes like this one, check out the Domesticity page!

Make Deviled Eggs

Leftover Easter Eggs?  No problem!  Make some of these super tasty deviled eggs with capers and you shouldn’t have a problem getting rid of them.  So tasty.

Ingredients

• 6 hard-boiled eggs
• 2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
• 1 tablespoon mayonnaise
• 1 1/2 teaspoons Dijon mustard
• 1 teaspoon fresh thyme
• 1 tablespoon minced drained capers
• salt and pepper to taste
• smoked paprika (optional)

Shell eggs, then cut in half lengthwise. Transfer yolks to small bowl and mash with fork. Mix in oil, mayonnaise, and mustard. Stir in thyme and capers. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

Spoon yolk mixture into white (or use a piping bag like we did). Sprinkle with smoked paprika. (Can be made 4 hours ahead. Cover loosely and refrigerate.)
For more recipes like this one, check out the Domesticity Page.

Party Bags!

My sweetheart and I are getting married in under two months, so it’s time to start really getting down to business.  Clearly, I have my priorities straight– I’ve been assembling little bags of balloons and mini garlands made from paint samples to put in welcome bags for some of our guests.  These aren’t the most practical things in the world, but I thought it would be fun for our buddies to gussie up their rooms or tents a little.

I collected paint samples from hardware stores and assembled garlands by cutting them into little triangles and attaching them to twine with the magic of many many glue sticks.  I then stuck them in treat bags with a few balloons, stamped some cardstock scraps and sewed the top of the bag closed on a machine.  INSTANT PARTY IN A BAG!