Diy Decor | Socialize, Event Planning and Management

Sep

Decor DIY: Painted Tube Cocktail Art

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When I first spotted Kim & Mike’s wedding on the Treasured Petal blog, my eyes stopped here:

Well, on the amazingly inventive decor part anyway. Don’t get me wrong; they’re a lovely couple but check out the prettiness! I had to see more!

Thank you projectwedding.com!

Get out of the way you two!! source

Much better! source

This stunning piece hung over the entrance to their cocktail hour. It was handcrafted and filled with flowers corks and rolled up magazines. Think about the endless ways you could use something like this – a chuppah, home decor, or modify it slightly and use as a great table centerpiece!
Thankfully, Victoria from City Cradle Design tracked down the creator and rounded up a tutorial! (P.S. Victoria’s site also has a gallery full of templates and DIY projects to explore. She’s pretty fab.) I included the instructions below but check out the City Cradle post and photos here. So the only question now is… what should I make this for first?

Materials:
You will need… Cans with different circumferences and heights, a can opener, nuts (short, slotted) and bolts, drill and drill bit that matches the size of the nuts (also something to puncture the can. I used a screw), flat-head screwdriver and a wrench that matches the size of the bolts.

You will also need… Spray paint (outside color), craft acrylic paint (inside color plus white) & varying things to fill the cans with.

How to:

Cut the bottom of the cans out with a can opener.
Arrange the cans in the arrangement you like.
Starting with the corner can, drill a hole in the middle of the can (we estimated). Match the hole to the middle of an adjacent can and mark the second can, drill a hole where you marked the second can.
Screw the 2 cans together with a nut and bolt (so that the cans are touching, but do not tighten the bolt because you may need to take the cans apart later.
Add the cans together one by one. Depending on the height of the cans, you may need to join some of the cans together with two bolts to make the attachment secure. This step takes a lot of time because each can will be connected with multiple other cans.
Tighten all the screws with the screwdriver and wrench.
Spray paint the outside of the structure. Pay attention to the crevices, and don’t worry about getting paint on the inside of the cans (If I were to make this again, I think I would paint the cans before bolting them into together). Let the spray paint dry according to instruction on can.
Paint the inside of the cans white (so that the inside color will be more vibrant).
Paint the inside of the cans the desired colors to match your event.
Fill the cans with event related items- we used flowers corks and even rolled up magazines.

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Categories: Decor Ideas · Tags: diy decor, kim and mike's wedding

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Jun

Wedding Weekend – Preparations

Note: I promise that I did actually write this post on Sunday. But Blogger was having some issues during the last 20 hours.

After gathering inspiration from all kinds of sources (yes, I practically lived on TheKnot.com) I started to make decisions on how to make my (budget) Modern Glam vision come to life. But the first step was one that I could not DIY – I had to find the dress. I wanted it to complement the Orpheum and be something that people hadn’t seen before. I tried on a LOT of dresses:

before I found The One:

Maggie Sottero Evita (love, love, still love it)

Then it was time to get down to the DIY; well, almost. I wanted to use a chandelier motif to go with all of the gorgeous chandeliers at the Orpheum. However, my design attempt didn’t get very far:

Fortunately for those who want to use this lovely theme now, it’s widely being used in invitation designs. It was just getting popular when I was looking for it so I couldn’t find quite what I needed. Instead I went to Etsy (also fairly new two years ago) and bought these lovelies:

Invitation by fubabee. Photo by Mark Kegans.

So I missed my chandy on the invites but did find a few other places to use it:

Stamped on coasters for cocktail hour;

Stamped and embossed on place cards; (photo by Mark Kegans.)

and on the labels for the CD we gave as favors. (Photo by Mark Kegans.)

We were holding dinner on the stage which, while lovely, may as well have been outdoors! The ceiling was so tall that I knew it would be hard to make the space feel like it was filled. I decided to do both low and high centerpieces to create some more atmosphere. Half of the tables would have Eiffel vases with some gold sprays I found that couldn’t have been more perfect.

Everyone in my family went on the hunt for these!

The other tables would use pillar candles, a gold charger and pearls. But during my test runs I couldn’t get it quite right…

Don’t worry, no fake flowers were planned for the actual centerpieces.

Eventually, the 6 inch candle was replaced by pink candles that my mom, my sisters and I spent one night customizing.

The place settings from this post, and the centerpieces too, would have been a perfect finish to the table. But…I would probably still be paying those off today. So the final touch on the tables were framed numbers:

Little sister lovingly cut and assembled everything.

A few more DIY projects were also completed for the ceremony. Quite a few nights were spent pinning flowers to styrofoam balls that would line the aisle:

Photo by Mark Kegans.

I used our engagement photos on my DIY programs which I probably had way to much fun designing and writing!

Photo by Mark Kegans.

Actually, I had far too much fun with all of it. Which is one of the reasons why I love to see the weddings and parties that others have planned. It’s great to know that other people enjoy putting together all of the details that make a celebration special. But no matter how much I liked putting everything together, nothing compared to seeing it all come together to celebrate our wedding day!

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Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: centerpiece, diy decor, wedding

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Apr

Spring Table Inspiration

Spring is here! Finally! Trees are budding, shoots of green are sprouting up and the sun is shining again.
After enduring some recording breaking snowfall and cold temps, it’s understandable that we Iowans are itching to celebrate the arrival of some warmer, sunnier weather.
This table from A Beautiful Mess (I found via A Perfect Palette) is the perfect setting for a fabulous springtime brunch – even if it still has to be indoors:

Using rentals and a little DIY magic, this table would be fairly inexpensive to pull together. Gold rimmed plates are rental company staples.

Beaded glass chargers are becoming more standard as rental staples. You may not be able to find rentals with the gold accent, but clear will work just as well.

But what about that extra large charger underneath it all? Well, I don’t think it’s a charger at all. Take a closer look:

I think it is material wrapped around a cardboard circle (or some variation of that). Easy enough, right? Round up a few gold vases or spray paint some tealight holders throw in a few roses and your spring brunch is ready to be served!

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Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: diy decor, spring, tabletop

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Feb

My (brief) Awards Season

Not all of us have a party budget like HBO or InStyle. I work as the Events Manager for a regional convenience store chain in the Midwest. It’s a mid-size company with over 400 stores, 4,500 employees, over $2 billion in sales, and some pretty conservative leadership. They want internal events and dinners want things done well; but on a (tight) budget. I can’t complain too much – they know enough to have an events manager to handle these things, right?
While our recent awards ceremony (for our 30 district supervisors) doesn’t compare to these elaborate displays of exemplary event production I’m happy with what lil’ ole me could produce with my muscle on a lil’ ole budget.

Our corporate headquarters has an atrium that is a great space to work with. It’s large, open and dramatic. Because this was for company recognition, I decided to use our brand colors – red, black and white – as the decor theme. And what would an awards ceremony be without a red carpet?
With a bigger budget I could have used tall ladder, some nice quality fabric, some dowels and a few of these nifty magnets to add some red draping along the sides of the space. Turning down the lights and adding uplighting to the material would have created even more drama.

Because the focus of the event was the awards I went with simple centerpieces. Plus, once the salad bowls and pre-set desserts were added – the tables were pretty full. I wrapped glass cylinder vases with shiny white scrapbook paper and set those on top of a piece of die cut scrapbook paper. I used this tutorial from Domestifluff to make two pom-pom flowers for each table. It was a great excuse to craft at work!

Another great thing about this space is the natural stage at the base of the stairs. It’s ideal for a one-person presentation and it suits the needs for this event. But for a few more (ok, more than a few) dollars I could create a cleaner and more professional look with a taller and wider set of pipe and drape with a few more uplights and a larger screen.
So it may not be Hollywood but you gotta start somewhere, right?!

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Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: centerpiece, diy decor, tabletop, work

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Jan

Bird Alert! Bird Alert!

The latest and greatest DIY project that is making the rounds in the event/wedding/craft blog world is an adorable twist on the as-seen-everywhere bird-themed decor. The fabulous Laurie Cinotto of La La Laurie (who, I just discovered, is originally from Iowa!) created these adorable scrapbook paper birdcages for The Bride’s Cafe.

So many opportunities to use these! I am considering using them for some Valentine’s decor. I wonder if the cardstock “bars” would hold up if you made a slightly larger cage? I’m thinking room for lovebirds inside…

In case these cuties haven’t popped up on your Google reader yet, instructions are here.

Added bonus! Ice cream pint lids are recommended for the bottom of the bird cages. Bring on the cookies ‘n cream!!