Crocheted Wedding Flowers

Yesterday, the lovely ladies at This Charming Candy mentioned that you could find their lollipops on a site called Shop Then Wed, so I popped over there to see what it was about. It's a lovely site, some handmade and some commercial, where brides (and grooms) can find things that they might want to buy for their wedding. I liked this idea, so I contacted the site owner to find out about getting listed there as well!

And now Scary White Girl Designs can be found at Shop Then Wed. You'll find crocheted roses in the bridal hair accessories, flower girl, and decorations sections. But the crocheted roses can also be made into boutineers for the guys or corsages for the mothers. They could be in bouquets or as centerpieces. Really, they can pretty much be used for anything you can think of! (At my wedding they were only on the bouquet fans and in the tossing bouquet, but I thought about adding a couple to my dress or hat! I just ran out of time with all of the other wedding prep!)

If you're interested in crocheted flowers for your wedding, check out some of what I've done in the past at Shop Then Wed or Scary White Girl Designs, and let me know what you're looking for!

The sekrit revealed!

Okay, so now that my friends are married and their big reveal has happened, I can share with you the sekrit project that I talked about a bit. They asked me to make a blue shell from Mario Kart for them to toss in lieu of a garter at their wedding reception. And, as you can see, I did.

Of course, when they first asked me to make this, I had no idea what a blue shell from Mario Kart was. Console video games are not part of my geek universe. But they were able to find pictures, and I just guessed on the parts I couldn't see in said pictures. :)

The finished plushie is pretty sizable. The body is probably around the same size as a football. (When I asked the bride how big to make it, her point of reference was a standard size Quaffle. Geek girls rule. :) ) I don't have any pictures of me holding it for scale, but the wings alone are far bigger than my hands.

The wings also took the longest to design and put together. Each wing had eleven individual tubes of varying sizes, which I then stitched together in clusters to make up the wing shape. I only ended up stuffing the body portion, in an attempt to keep it from being too top heavy. The wings are heavy enough just with yarn content, so they didn't need any more weight!

I wrote down most of the pattern for this as I went, but I haven't typed it up to make it pretty yet. I've got some folks who have offered to beta test it for me, but I'm anxious about figuring out how to describe exactly how I did those wings. It makes sense to me, and I could reproduce them. I just don't know if my explanation will be clear or not.

Anyway, voila! Marvel in the awesome. (And as a shameless plug, when I say I can crochet pretty much anything, I mean it. Please feel free to contact me about weird crochet projects. I like the challenge!)

The Wedding Shop Recap (cross-posted from Shop Etsy)

I got married on Saturday. During the wedding, several of our guests asked me about various items I was wearing or that were a part of the wedding. There was at least one person who I promised to E-mail with the Etsy seller information, but I promptly forgot both the question and the questioner. (I have an excuse. All of the crazy adrenaline had drained by that point, and I was a bit out of it.) So here's the list of everything that we bought from Etsy for the wedding, along with sellers. :)

After Jeremy bought me my engagement ring, I told him that I thought boys should get engagement presents as well. He happened to be in need of a new wallet, so I found a local seller, Moxie and Oliver, who makes handmade leather wallets and brands a message onto them. So I wrote a little lovey note to Jeremy for her to brand into his new wallet. Now he has a little reminder of my love that is always with him.

My necklace pendant (the "Something Old, Something New" bit in the shape of the TARDIS) came from Imagination Emporium (which I mentioned in late June). She had done a different, much longer, Doctor Who quote in that shape, which I thought was brilliant, and so I contacted her to see if she could work a shorter quote into the same shape. The reasoning behind this, by the way, is that the TARDIS itself is arguably old, new, borrowed, and blue. :)

My earrings (which were not bought for the wedding, but I got a lot of compliments on them) came from Frozen Fire. They're solid glass, with dichroic coloring. The smallest size he makes are 3mm (I think that's 6 gauge), so those of you with standard piercing sizes are out of luck.

My dress came from Kimmi. She is a local dressmaker who I had bought another dress from previously (which I wore to a wedding where I was a guest a couple of years ago). When I started thinking about dresses, I was looking at rockabilly style dresses, but I couldn't find anything I loved. So I went to Kimmi's site instead, and found the dress I wore straight away. I didn't think it would fit me, but she had me try it on anyway. Once I had it on, I was sold. I tried on two others, but then went back to the lovely crocheted dress. She made an alteration to the lining for me to help with the fit, and I crocheted the shoulder straps.

Our rings came from Marlo at I Make Cute Stuff. Marlo is one of my good friends from EtsyRain, and she was happy to work with the unusual shape of my engagement ring to make a ring that can be worn with it or without it. These rings are based on her Secret Promise Rings, which means they do, in fact, have messages inside of them.

The flower fans were a collaboration between me, my friend Kayce (Nue to Me and several other shops), and Patty at Full Blooms. I crocheted several blue roses, Kayce made hers out of scraps of T-shirts and buttons, and Patty made hers from silk. Patty also assembled them and attached them to the fans that Cindy and I carried. I took a few extras and bundled them together for the tossing bouquet.

The garter that Jeremy tossed came from Kizette. She makes pairs of lace and satin garters with d20s attached to them--one to keep and one to toss. Of course, the dice don't really roll any more, but that's okay!

The wedding favors, which I talked about last month, were made by Recycled Ideas. She makes handmade paper with flower seeds in the mix, so that the paper is plantable. I had a stamp made by TerBear Collectables, and stamped all of the flowers with a water soluble ink. The stamp (which was a little off on some of the favors) is of a pair of hands in the shape of a heart, with our names above and our wedding date below.

We also got gifts for some of the people who helped out with the wedding on Etsy. My best woman, Cindy got a necklace made by my friend Tricia, Pequest Designs. Andrew (the best man) and Kindred (the officiant and also a good friend of Jeremy's) got engraved flasks from Precision Engraving. And I had 4 My Angels make a custom apron for my Uncle Joe, who was our barbeque chef, that reflects the several names he's known by in our family.

And we're to 17 days!

In a week, I can start obsessively checking the weather! :)

Recap of the to do list:

• Finish all of the flowers
  
• Finish the tossing bouquet - almost there, just need some glue to finish the ribbon part.
  
• Stamp all the favors
  
• Get the last wedding party gift
  
• Get Costco membership
  
• Send UJ the headcount
  
• Buy all the picnic stuff
  
• Get the marriage license
  
• Make appointment for nails
  
• Make appointment for pictures (after the wedding)
  

Added to the list are:

• Write vows
  
• Finish figuring out transportation arrangements for the guests who are flying in
  
• Print up cards related to the favors and our planned photo site
  
• Clean the guest room
  

I sent an E-mail to Etsy today to see if they're interested in doing a feature on the mostly-handmade, mostly-EtsyRain, super low budget wedding. Fingers crossed. Of course, if they don't want it, I'll find somewhere for it to go. I'm very proud of what I've pulled together (though I'll be more proud when it's all said and done!), and I want to show it off! :)

37 days and counting

Yup, I've reached the point where I start counting down to the wedding. :) And no, I haven't done a whole lot since my last post. Well, I made some leaves for the roses. That's a good start. :)

But I did pick up the rings last night, and they are spectacular! :) Mine matches up with the odd shape of the bottom half of my engagement ring perfectly, and it also looks neat even if I decide not to wear my engagement ring with it. So win on both counts! :) Thank you, Marlo!

Okay, to do list time:

• Finish all of the flowers
  
• Finish the tossing bouquet
  
• Stamp all the favors
  
• Get the last wedding party gift
  
• Get Costco membership
  
• Send UJ the headcount
  
• Buy all the picnic stuff
  
• Get the marriage license
  
• Make appointment for nails
  
• Make appointment for pictures (after the wedding)
  

I think that's all. :)

Two months and counting!

So I've finally gotten back in the swing of posting to Shop Etsy. There are new posts on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, which is a good start. Now, to see if I can get back into the swing of updating here...

Monday marked two months remaining until the wedding. Things are coming together quite nicely. We're going to see Marlo tonight to see the progress on our rings, and I'm picking up the flowers from Patty on Sunday. I still need to figure out what on earth I am going to do with my hair (I'm still not sure if I'm going to get it cut before then, or just grow it out for two more months), and I need to sit Jeremy down and get him to commit to what gifts he wants for his best man and our officiant.

I've also got some crafty work to do, like putting together the tossing bouquet. I have the pieces, I just haven't done anything with them. And I need to work on the favors. I got plantable paper flowers from Recycled Ideas, and a name/date stamp from Terbear Collectibles, but I still need to actually stamp all of the flowers. :) I keep telling myself "I still have two months," and then I go "TWO MONTHS?! That's crazy talk!" Yes, I really do often have conversations like this with myself. :)

The only other thing I'm still working on is someone who can make a small-ish gluten-free, vegan cake. My best woman is gluten-free, so I want to have cake for her to eat, because she won't be able to have the normal wedding cake. And I figure vegan because that way any vegans in attendance will also have something to eat. (I'm slightly willing to bend on the second point, because I don't know that anyone coming to the wedding is full vegan.) If you've got any thoughts on local gluten-free cake makers, drop me a line or leave me a comment!

A Very Etsy Wedding

So one of my goals for the wedding is to have as much as is possible be handmade. This means I've been scouting and picking things out already, to give everyone enough lead time to make their parts. Since after the beginning of the year is a slower time for a lot of crafters, it also means that I'm getting a lot of stuff well in advance of the wedding, and only have to remember where I put it to keep it safe until then. :)

There are a few things that I'm making myself, too. The first of those was the straps for my wedding dress. See, I picked out a dress that is made from crocheted fabric. It needed only a minor alteration, but in the process of working out the details for that, I took a close look at the edging on the dress and decided to replicate it to cover up the plain fabric of the straps. I've heard back from the dressmaker that the straps I made match the dress perfectly. :)

The other thing that I'm contributing to is the flowers. Patty from Full Blooms is going to do the bulk of the assembly work (and the centerpieces for the bouquets), but Kayce and I are making flowers for her to use in the finished pieces. So there will be silk roses, T-shirt flowers, and crocheted roses. Nice and eclectic, just like me. :)

There's lots more wedding stuff still to come from Etsy, which I'll talk about as the months progress and the wedding gets closer. As it is, we're less than 5 months away. But all of the planning has gone well so far, so I think we'll get it all done in plenty of time! :)

I have returned

Yeah, gone for a long time and all that. :) Lots has happened, including several emergency room trips for Jeremy (fractured elbow, followed by a gall bladder attack and removal, followed by almost pneumonia (we think)), moving into a bigger apartment, and getting engaged. Probably some other things, too, but those are the big ones.

So yeah, engaged means wedding. And as of today, we have an official date for the wedding. 7/9/11. It's a good sequence of odd numbers, perfect for odd people. :)

We're trying not to have this be a huge to-do. Really. We want to have a picnic where there happens to be a quick wedding as well. We're hoping for as many of our friends and family members as can make it to Seattle to be there. At least the good news is that July in Seattle is almost always gorgeous, so it's the best time to come and visit. :)

So far, we've been working on the invitation list, I've been in contact with the person who's making my dress, and have an E-mail out to the person who's doing our rings. Gotta work on the website tonight and get that launched. :)

I'm back!

Got back to Seattle on Friday, and then had a very busy weekend.

Kansas was hot, humid, and generally disgusting, though the trip was improved by good food, lotsa love from my niece and nephew, and inexpensive clothing shopping. :) The work was about par for the course, and it appears that I'll be returning in July for a single week. No more of this two week nonsense!

This weekend, we attended two weddings, which were about as opposite as they could get. The first was uber formalized, very dressy, etc. Lovely, but a bit stiff at times. The second was in the backyard of the couple's new home, and the amount of laughter that accompanied the wedding was really delightful. There was also Sculpey to play with, and I apparently have mad bartering skills, as I went home with 7 different colors. (Jeremy giving me his did help with the amount of Sculpey I had. :) )

My schedule for the foreseeable future is truly madness. Between July 1 and July 20, I only have one day where there is nothing on my calendar... and that happens to be our 6 month anniversary. We're actually avoiding planning anything for it just so we can have a quiet evening together. :) We honestly don't have a free weekend until August. Luckily, we do have a couple of free nights this week, and a couple next week, so that helps a lot. But we are WAY too busy!

It is so lovely to be back, though. I was chilly at the wedding yesterday afternoon, despite wearing a hoodie, and I'm still wearing my hoodie at the office today. It's gray outside, and I love it! Seattle is totally where I belong! :)

Ow.

So in preparation for my trip to D.C., I decided to explore some summer-y shoe options. Really, this meant one option, which was my Doc Marten Mary Janes. I bought these a while back, and wear them occasionally. But today, I decided to wear them without socks, to see how that would work out.

Suffice it to say, badly. I got off work at noon, and we headed down the street to get some lunch. Then we took a bus up to Volunteer Park, where the wedding was going to be. By the time the wedding was over, my feet were already giving me trouble. Then we decided to walk over to Lake View Cemetery, to see Bruce and Brandon Lee's graves. Since Lake View is right there, it seemed like a good plan. Well, my feet were killing me by the time we found their graves, so of course they were not happy for the rest of the time. We took a couple of buses and headed over to Capitol Hill for the reception, and I found a pair of socks at the drugstore. At that point, I didn't care how lame it looked.

Finally got home just a little while ago, and I have at least one blister on the bottom of my foot. My heels are fine, because I put moleskin in the heels of the shoes last night. But there's some weird seams on the inside soles, and that's what gave me a blister. *sigh* So I may just be wearing my normal Docs with skirts, regardless of how silly that looks. I just can't do sandals most of the time, and I'd rather have slightly substantial shoes, since I'm not sure how much walking we'll be doing out there.

Between my feet and being in a fancy dress all day, I am so done with dressing up. :) But the wedding was wonderful, and I couldn't be happier for my friends! :)

Time for the Monday Mission!

1. This seems to be the year for movie sequels (Terminator 3, Matrix Reloaded, 2 Fast 2 Furious, LOTR: The Return of the King, etc.). Is there a movie you would like to see Hollywood make a sequel to? Hmmm... well, I would have liked to have seen a GOOD sequel to "The Crow," but that didn't happen... I'm still hoping for one of those, I guess... :)

2. What movie sequel do you think should never have been made? Where should I start? Any sequel to any Stephen King movie (i.e. Pet Semetary, Carrie, Sometimes They Come Back, Children of the Corn)... and, I'll continue to wish that "The Crow: City of Angels" had never been made... :)

3. Are there any books (comic, novel, etc.) that you would like to see made into a movie? Who should star in it? Sandman, in one form or another, needs to become a movie... Fairuza Balk would be perfect as Death, and I wanna play Delirium... :)

4. When was the last time the you got a shot at the Doctor's office? Do you prefer them in the arm or your backside? Or would you rather just take a
prescription? Lately, most of the "shots" I've gotten have been finger pricks... I really hate those, especially when they insist on putting them in my right hand... it makes it hard to write for a few days after that... let alone type...

5. Do you make friends easier in "Real Life" or online or is it about the same? Do you have closer friendships in "Real Life" or online? Why do you think that is? Are you ok with that or would you like to make a change? Real life, definitely... I'm rarely online to chat, it's usually just to check E-mail, take care of game stuff and update my blog and such...

6. When you first got your drivers license how did you feel? Did you get it on the first try, second, third, more than that? Do you have a license? If
no, do you plan to get one? Why or why not?(by Rebecca) I got my license about 2 months after I turned 16. I passed on my first try, but only by a point... then again, none of my siblings passed on their first try, so I'm pretty proud of that... :) Don't really remember how I felt, but I guess I was pretty happy about it... was nice to be able to drive myself places... :)

7. Have you ever had your tonsils removed? Did you ever come close? Tell me about that. Nope... don't think I've come close, either...

::..::

In other news, games on Friday and Saturday were both good. I took a nap at game on Friday, though... and we didn't arrive till late on Saturday... but, nonetheless, both games were good. I got to run a small-ish combat on Saturday night, and I did okay... it helped that I had another ST (from another game) out there, and a former ST from our game helping out. I just stood there in my Trinity outfit and fuzzy slippers (cuz my boots were killing me), and yelled stuff... :) I think I only ran two rounds, anyway... so it wasn't difficult at all... :)

Gabe's brother's wedding went well. I didn't see much of it, as I was helping out with the ringbearers and such, but it was still really nice. Got to meet a bunch of his family, of whom I have probably forgotten half of their names... :)

And we finally got to see "The Matrix Reloaded" last night... I loved it... :) And the new theatre we got in C-dale is pretty nice too... stadium seating is kewl... :) Then, after the movie, I sat through the entire end credits on the edge of my seat, waiting for the preview for "The Matrix Revolutions"... *sigh*... it was rather disappointing, honestly. They could have done better, I think... then again, there's six more months to show previews, so I guess they're waiting to show the good ones later. :)

As for previews I saw that look good, I think "Finding Nemo" will be cute... probably we'll wait for it on video, though... "Terminator 3," I can wait for video, if at all... "Freddy vs. Jason," no thanks, I'll pass... "Kill Bill," definitely gonna see that... "The Last Samurai," we'll have to see when it comes out, and what other movies come out around the same time... it'll probably wait for video tho...

I think that was all the previews... the nice thing, at least, was no commercials before the movie... just previews! :)