Invitations

A tiny number of invitations went out in the mail Monday. By tiny, I mean, fewer than 20. Given that this is a destination wedding and that we already had a (still fairly small) wedding and reception, we didn't want to overdo it. This is because of budget. And because we're too busy to plan anything larger. And because we're not trying to upstage our previous wedding.

Now I wait for RSVPs to both the ceremony in Palm Desert and the family gathering in Lansing. I'm not sure what to expect out of these RSVPs, given that this is not a typical wedding situation and given that my family is not super supportive of me being a lesbian. I hope that they'll surprise me, though.

Curious about the invitation? We went with a kraft paper card accented with an aqua hand-dyed lace doily, and purple calligraphy text in a purple envelope with aqua accents. Very different from our hand-painted amate art on the last set, but lovely nonetheless.

Invitations

So you may remember my post about amate, in which I confessed that we had spent more than we intended and created extra work for ourselves.

That consequence has arrived. Tuesday we went to Staples and found an invitation kit for about $35. This doesn't sound too bad until I remind you that we already spent $50 on the paintings.

Now not only do we need to print up the invitations and RSVP cards, we also have to glue in the paintings and tie an accent ribbon. And then of course all of the other things that normally come along with sending invitations.

Fortunately, Rebecca's sister has volunteered to help with assembly, an offer for which we will ever be grateful. We're hoping to get a good start on that this weekend.

I'm hopeful, though, that the invites will be pretty enough to justify all of this work.

That Thing

We did that thing. The thing that every bride-to-be does, without meaning to. The thing that ends up being a problem in the end when everything is said and done. The thing that most brides promise themselves not to do.

I don't mean being a bride-zilla, although I'm sure that will happen at some point (and when it does, I promise to hang my head in shame and write a post about it).

I mean that we spent more than we intended to and created extra work for ourselves.

See, I had this brilliant idea. We're in México, right? And we love Mexican art. We'd already purchased two amate paintings. Then I thought, why not use amate paintings for our invitations? Surely we could find an artisan willing to sell us 60 or so for a good price. We had already calculated that getting them printed through a standard printing website would be about $50, so certainly we could do it for that.

So we headed down to the artisan market. We did, in fact, find amate in the perfect size. We did, in fact, find exquisitely beautiful amate. The only problem? Amate generally costs about 10 pesos, or a little less than $1. We bargained with a couple different vendors, since nobody had enough paintings to buy from a single artisan, and we ended up paying $550 pesos, or about $50.

This sounds good, right? It sounds like we came out at the same price. However, we've now given the mouse a cookie, because we cannot simply mail people an amate painting. We still must get a card printed and put into an envelope. The plan is to buy blank note cards a little bigger than the paintings and rubber cement the paintings to the front after we print them off at home. Still, this is an added expense and effort.

So we did that thing. Anyone want to come help us assemble invites?

Wow, I Wish I Were Sleeping

It's 12:30 AM, and I am wishing to be asleep. I have insomnia (on a more and more regular basis, lately), and I've discovered that I am rarely productive in the middle of the night.

Tonight was a small exception. I started looking at wedding invitation designs online. I'm thinking something orange, because Rebecca loves it (you should see our dining room if you don't believe me). I might also consider purple, since we both love it, and there are probably some very sassy designs out there in one of those two colors.

I have no idea how much invitations are supposed to cost. My plan is either to order them online through VistaPrint or PrintingforLess, or to purchase a set at an office supply store and print them at home. I don't need anything too fancy.

Then there's also the question of what to put on the invitations. There's the obvious: our names, the date, time, and venue, and where to RSVP. There's also the obvious NEVER included - where the couple is registered. However, I've noticed that many wedding invitations appear to be sent from the parents of the bride or from both sets of parents. In our case, that's not the case, but we still want to make it clear that there are people in our lives supporting us, and we certainly don't want to be disrespectful to the parents who are less than excited about our coming commitment.

We said that this didn't need to be traditional, and it doesn't. I don't mind changing things that I feel are old-fashioned or unnecessary. However, I don't want to be tacky. How important is it to pretend that the invitations didn't come from us? Is there a good way to handle that?