Weddingbee Blog

The RSVPs are rolling in so I can finally share our finished invitations!

Bridesmaid K has designed and made invitations for several people over the last couple of years, so after my engagement, she showed me her designs in case I was interested in any of them. She knew I wanted to make my own and as luck would have it, one of her designs was perfect! She mocked up the main body of the invite in our colors and it helped confirm this was the route we wanted to go.

MOB ordered multiple paper samples from a company in Gary, IN. I wanted a cream color, but nothing too yellow, as well as a midnight navy paper for the background. We found exactly what we were hoping for and the navy even has a nice shimmer to it to give it a wintery feel.

Drum roll please…

We got to use our return address stamp again! (And this particular envelope may just have gotten ran over by a 50 pound dog acting like a mad woman.)

Let’s see what’s inside! We used both an inner and outer envelope.

The body of the invitation is a piece of 6×6 navy card stock. We then printed the wording on a slightly smaller piece of cream paper. The large ’R’ was printed on 6×6 vellum. We stacked the three pieces and punched holes at the top for the ribbon. We used navy organza ribbon and tied it through the holes to simulate a bow-tie. The ends of the ribbon were tucked and glued behind the cream paper and then the cream paper was glued to the navy card stock.

To read the wording, you simply lift up the vellum.

We kept the RSVP cards fairly straightforward, but I did use the black light pen trick on the back to number them in case anyone forgets to sign their name! So far, no one has forgotten.

We decided to include the words ’Adult Reception’ on the reception cards just in case anyone was unclear. We’ve had one person push back on us about the children issue after they received their STD. I haven’t discussed our no children decision with the hive, but after inviting 318 people to the wedding, adding an additional 50+ children was just out of the question (and budget!).

And finally, a map to give those out of town guests a general idea of the venue locations along with a summary of all the important addresses. Oh—and remember this post about printing the wrong zip code for our reception venue? Well, thankfully we discovered before changing a thing that we had the correct zip code all along! For some reason, the venue’s website reflects the incorrect zip code. I was so happy we didn’t have to re-print! I should have thought, as many of you noted, that no zip codes were even necessary but what’s done is done. Live and learn!

I created the map on WeddingMapper.com. It was quick and easy to use and produced the kind of map that worked perfectly for our invitations.

I wish you could see and feel the quality of the paper we used. I never thought I would care about or love that detail so much!

We have been getting rave reviews about them. It’s so nice to hear the positive feedback when you’ve put so much time and effort into them. Many bees before me have produced gorgeous, colorful invitations with lovely details, belly bands, twine, etc. As much as I love those, I really just wanted a simple, classic looking invitation that matched the season and spirit of the occasion. I think we may have pulled it off.

Do your invitations reflect the season of your wedding? How are you incorporating seasonal details?