"It Is Not Only Fine Feathers That Make Fine Birds."

Fine Paper Works Too

As I mentioned before, we had some birds at our wedding. It all started with a cake topper. My inner Disney freak would have liked to have had Ariel and Eric on top of our cake, but reason and a skeptical Groom won out. I am however the proud owner of a pair of Fischer's love birds. They look a lot like these guys:



My husband is more of a barely tolerating cohabitant of the love birds, but he was a good sport and agreed to let me deck out our nuptials with birds. It all started when my mom suggested this cake topper, which I can only imagine that my husband thought was a marked improvement over Ariel and Eric.



While we're at it, check out the Cupcake Tower on Etsy. It was totally perfect for our cupcake cake. Most of the commercially available stands have something sticking out of the top that would prevent having a cake to cut. What would we have cut if there was no cake on top? Utter nonsense!

So back to the topic at hand. This has just been a roundabout way of getting to our love bird table numbers. I wanted an elegant silhouette that would give our tables some pizzazz. Now, I believe in giving credit where credit is due, so I must admit that I took the idea and part of my template from a seller on Etsy. My version is not die cut however, so I needed to simplify the design. I cut about forty of these guys (for twenty table numbers total) out by hand in order to prepare for the unlikely event that every single guest would RSVP in the affirmative. We didn't need nearly that many, but always be prepared! I made these by cutting two frames and then gluing a piece of white card stock in between. I then enlarged numbers in Garamond font in Microsoft Word and cut the numbers out individually. The numbers were then glued to the back and front of the white card stock. Here's a close up of the end result:



Here's what our tables looked like:



All in all, this was a little time consuming, but I liked the touch it added to our tables.

The Wrap Skirt

Why Darts Can Be A Girl's Best Friend

Right after I received my new sewing machine, we trekked off to Ohio to visit my husband's family. It just so happens that my grandmother-in-law lives in Hudson, OH, home of Joann Fabrics headquarters.



Naturally, I had to make a pilgrimage to pick up lots of fabric for all of the new projects that were dancing in my head.

One of the fabrics that I picked up was a green and brown (I love green) shirting material. I bought 2 yards, not quite knowing what I wanted to do with it. I decided that I wanted to make a wrap skirt. After reviewing the instructions here and here, I foolishly disregarded their careful measurements. I had dreams of a skirt that would be the sleek love child of a wrap and a pencil skirt. The skirts in the instructions were too much of an A-line. I decided to lessen the difference in width between the bottom and the top of my skirt. This might have worked if the human body were shaped like a pencil. As this is not the case, this did not work. What I had was a skirt that fit fine through the hips, but was huge through the waist.

It took me a few days to figure out that this project could be salvaged with darts. Darts are the easiest thing in the world. You basically draw a triangle flush with the edge of your garment and then sew the remaining edges together. You just press the excess fabric to the side. Darts saved my skirt.



Ultimately the skirt turned out to be a pretty decent fit. I used a brown poplin bottom weight to back my shirting material. I also created a waist band by turning the top of the skirt down.



I love how the skirt goes perfectly with the green and brown pearls that my in-laws got me for Christmas. Check out Dresie Designs on Etsy, although the store appears empty at present.

To finish off the dress I used buttons to fasten it in the back. Buttons are really handy when you haven't yet mastered a zipper. Expect fewer button closures in the future.