Make a cute engagement gift!

Everybody I know is getting engaged and married lately. My future brother in law proposed to a fabulous girl the week after Jeff and I got engaged and my fun loving bestie had a magical Disney proposal just a few days after that!

I wanted to do something fun for them both and I saw this adorable idea on Pinterest that I thought would be really easy to recreate. A ring frame!

 I was constantly misplacing  purposefully leaving my ring in strategic areas around the house. Then a good friend of mine made me (yes, I have crafty friends too!) an adorable ring dish with my future "Mrs" name on the bottom. Now I always leave my ring in the dish and it saves me from having a mini heart attack every time I wake up in the morning!

So along those lines I made my friends custom ring frames!

Things you will need:
A photo frame
Scrapbooking paper of your choice
Computer
A printer
A pin/hook/fixture to hang the ring on

Step 1: Find some super cute frames that suit your needs! Take out the cutesy pictures that come in them.

Step 2: Choose a font that looks right for your frames. Make a square that matches the size of your frame (note these frames were 2 different sizes, hence the difference in size on my publisher document below).

Step 3: The next step you can do one of two ways. You can simply print the square onto your scrapbook paper, or you can transfer the font onto your scrapbook using this technique and then paint or draw the font on for a more handmade look. I did one of each.

Step 4: Cut out the paper and put it in the frame.

Step 5: Get together the stuff you are using to act as the "hook". I used little spools that I painted and hot glued onto the glass of the frame.

You could also use a hook like the one in the picture above and screw it into the frame back directly (obviously you would need to be sans glass) or use a push pin like in the Pinterest inspiration photo. Its up to you! I did it this way because I used paper with writing on it and I didn't want it to bleed if it got water on it, so I wanted glass to go over the paper.

Step 6: Affix your "hook" and you're all done!

 

 My sister had her wedding this past weekend so I'm officially on to working on my own wedding projects! I'm so excited to get started!

Update!

I made one for myself with a push pin and it took me 5 minutes total! I love it!

 

Will you be my bridesmaid? DIY

The day after Jeff proposed I had my bridal party picked out and I wanted to do something special to ask them. There are so many cute ideas on Pinterest so I spent a little while looking and I found something I really liked (pictured below). It was a wine bottle with a personalized label saying "Will you be my bridesmaid?" I liked the idea but I wanted to make the label more "me" so I changed it up a little bit and also made some little wine glasses too because, whats a bottle of bridesmaid wine without an awesome personalized bridesmaid glass to drink it in?

http://www.etsy.com/shop/mdp7

Things you will need:
- Avery labels number 22826, you can get the on Amazon (Prime!) right here.
-Avery label 22826 template, can be downloaded free online from the Avery website, click this link to get there.
-However many bottles of wine you will need
-Alcohol (sadly not of the fun variety....the rubbing kind, though a good glass of Moscato does make crafting more fun)
-A printer
-Microsoft publisher
-Wine glasses to paint
-Enamel paints click here to see the kind I buy (one of these kits will last you quite a while... I've had mine for over a year and I do a LOT of glass painting)
-Ribbon

Step 1: Download the Avery template and copy and paste it onto a Microsoft Publisher document. You want to make sure it takes up the whole page exactly, there is nothing more annoying than printing out your project on a label sheet only to find it doesn't match up because you were a little bit off.

Step 2: Find something you like and design your label within the outline of the template. I searched "Will you be my bridesmaid" on Etsy and found some wording that I liked and used different fonts to make it my own. You're going to want to copy and paste your inspiration onto the document so you can look at it as you go along.

As you can see I played around with colors and fonts until I found something I liked. You should do the same, make it your own style!

Step 3: Once you're finished designing your label print them out! I also decided to do a back label for mine, with a photo of me and each girl and the "Established Since" date (the year I met each one). This was pretty easy I just copied the photo and fit it to the template.

Step 4: Take the wine that you got and carefully pull of the labels. I found that its better to take the time to try and get the whole thing off in one pull, it leaves less sticky residue to get off. Once you've got the labels off use the alcohol (the rubbing kind not the drinking kind) to wipe off excess stickiness.

Step 5: Lay your labels on your wine bottle, I would suggest starting at the left or right and working your way over, rather than going from top to bottom. The curve of the bottle makes it easier to do it that way.

Step 6: Jazz it up however you want! My wedding colors are going to be light gray and yellow with chevron touches so I found this perfect yellow chevron ribbon to tie to the top.

The front

My "Established Since" back with the picture

Step 7: Make your own hand painted wine glasses. I won't include directions on how to do that here... you can check out the link to a past DIY on how to do it. This is how mine turned out:

Step 8: Package them up and give them out to your girls! I included a note with mine for each girl.

The finished product on display at one of my bridesmaids' houses.

Have fun and make it  your own. Speaking from experience being asked to be a bridesmaid/maid of honor is very special, but its also a lot of work, so I think its really nice to ask in a special way.

I have some other posts to do soon about DIY engagement gifts (I feel like everyone I know is getting engaged/married so I've had lots of practice!) coming soon!

I feel like it might be weird that the Hobby Lobby manager totally knows me and greets me with "back already?!?" every time I walk in the store?