Wedding Blog

Well, it’s been a long road (4 days’ worth, in actuality!). To begin this post, let’s recap.

When I start a project, I don’t mess around:
It began with a Post-It note on a Friday.
I had a change of heart on Saturday.
On Monday, new plan emerged, and a crisis was averted.
Monday night revealed a new design (and a lot of paper-cutting).
On Tuesday, we took a break.
On Wednesday and Thursday, we assembled, stuffed, and stamped them.

And now that that’s out of the way, let’s see ’em!!

In some of the pics, you can kind of see that the RSVP card was a different shade of ivory than the other cards. This is because the paper was a different brand. Was it planned that way? No. Do I care that it doesn’t match? Obviously not enough to change it. Perhaps people will think it was meant to be that way so it would stand out.

This card featured above is MINE. I’m going to scrapbook it later. It’s my favorite shade of brown cardstock: “Mud Pie”, and it was really well-put together. No crappy/messed up invitations went out, but we did sift through and pick out the best for our moms and grandmas. I’m not ashamed. (Come on, don’t pretend that your DIY paper products are all 100% the same perfect quality.)

I mentioned before that due to Michaels’ limited supply, there were three browns, and this next photo shows a “French Silk”-colored invitation without the “Directions” card. These were sent to family and friends who know where Mr. MJ’s family home is. We thought they’d think it was a little weird if they received directions cards, as proud as I was of my design! (The RSVP card is missing from this card too, but it was included in the ones we sent!)

So there you have it. These did not come out perfectly, by any means. I mentioned in my previous post that the cards ended up with screwed up margins. The paper cutter was getting dull too, so there was some fray on some of them. And that light orange line I made as a cutting guide? Well, it printed in neon orange and was noticeable on several of the cards even after cutting and assembling. (It was uh… meant to be that way. Yeah, that’s my story and I’m sticking to it.) My point is: these were DIY. No machine made these invitations. They weren’t perfect, but they were the best we could do, and we’ve gotten tons of compliments on them. I’m really happy with the way they turned out. (Seriously, I’m looking at my own post and thinking it’s surely got to be some other, much more crafty bee’s invitation suite!!!)

Now, what about the money, honey? I’ll break it down for you. We made a total of 66 invitations, so that’s how I’ll measure the following costs. (I’m not going to count stuff I bought, but didn’t use, unless it came in a multi-pack.)

Stuff I had to buy (and use):

• Seventy 4×6 prints from Walmart (1-Hour service): $13.30
• Eleven sheets of Floral cardstock @ 99 cents each: $11.00
• Thirty-three sheets of various solid brown cardstock @ 69 cents each: $22.80
• Two 25-packs of ivory “Recollections”-brand cardstock @ $5.99 each: $12.00
• Two 20-packs of ivory “Value-Pack”-cards and envelopes @ $5.99 each: $12.00*
• Two 100-packs of gold “Recollections”-brand brads @ $2.99 each: $6.00
• Two 50-packs of pink “Martha Stewart”-brand seals @ $3.99 each: $8.00
• Two 50-packs of gold paper clips from Office Max @ $2.19 each: $4.40
• One 100-pack of “Ascend”-brand greeting card-sized envelopes: $17
• Double-sided tape squares (bought at Michaels): $0 (I’ve had ’em for years)

Tools I used (already owned, thus not included in cost):

• Single-page paper cutter
• 1/16″ hole puncher
• Corner-rounder
• Ruler & Pencil
• Mr. Mary Jane (Kidding! He’s definitely not a tool, and I don’t own him [at least, not for another month or so!!]) He just helped out a TON with this project.

Total cost of supplies: $106.02
Total cost of postage: 66 postcard stamps for $18.48 + $29.04 44-cent stamps = $47.52

Total cost per-invitation (for 66 invitations): $2.32 each (including postage for the outer envelope and RSVP postcard)

*I counted the cost of the Value Packs of cards here, but I did not use the envelopes that were included in the packages. I plan to use them for our announcements, so I won’t count them in those costs when I tackle that project.

So there you have it! Now that that’s out of the way, I can relax! (Ummm, NOT! There’s a sash to be sewn, announcements to be designed, flowers to be tackled… the list goes on!)