Monday, November 7, 2016

Great Gatsby Theme Wedding

I became a little obsessed with the Great Gatsby / Art Deco / Roaring 20s / whatever you wanna call it ;) look after I attended a charity event with a 1920s theme.  I ordered this fabulous dress (off Amazon - can you believe it?!?!?) and since then I've been looking for reasons to wear the dress again and it has inspired a collection of items in my etsy shop.  The pic is a little blurry, but you get the picture.  Black and gold sequins!!!!  It was a masquerade ball, so I had my black and gold kitty mask to go with it!

At the Chelsea Hicks Foundation Masquerade Ball (2015) - Sentinel Hotel - Portland, OR
Luckily I DID find some other things to wear the dress to and I just love this style!  I wasn't really aware of people having this theme a lot until I became a fan and now I can't imagine how life was before LOL  

I wanted to create black and gold items for weddings and events and have that lined art deco type of design.

Here are some of the items I've created for my etsy customers - some of these are custom items that have not yet been added to the shop and are available by request.  It takes me time to get everything together for new items and with the wedding season at a close, I'll have more time to do that now!

Custom Art Deco Style Place Cards or Escort Cards
Art Deco Style Instagram Table Tent
Art Deco Style Table Number Tents
Custom Sign on Framed Magnetic Memo Board (I sold out of these boards for now)

Custom Art Deco Hashtag Sign with Old Style Camera Icon
Have a fabulous week!
♥ Allison

Tuesday, November 1, 2016

Latest obsession...pineapples!

Now that Halloween is over, I'm getting into holiday mode and preparing to struggle with giving unique gifts to my friends and family that seem to already have everything...or really expensive taste that doesn't jive with my gift budget!

Throughout the year I have a "gift bin" - basically a storage bin where I collect little things I find on a good deal.  Recently I've noticed my gift bin has been taken over by little pineapple things and this is mostly due to my latest little obsession!


It started when I decided to do a quote gallery on one of my big walls.  I bought a bunch of different size frames and then went on pinterest to search for quotes that were worthy of the wall.  I came across a pineapple one and I just loved the message and feel like it's something I should see each day.  I made my own version of the quote for my wall and I made a couple of them in different colors and gave them to some of my girlfriends to keep in their offices.





Ever since then, I've been going pineapple crazy because every time I see a pineapple, I'm reminded of that quote and I stand a little taller and am reminded to be confident and kind to people.  Because I think we all need to be reminded to "stand tall, wear a crown, and be sweet on the inside" I'm offering a free printable of my design for the quote wall.  I made a few different versions, so hopefully there's one you like!  Click on the images above to get to the download page, or click here.  Do something with it for yourself or a friend who might appreciate the message :)

Visit my Pineapple Obsession Pinterest Board to see more pineapple cuteness!

♥ Allison

Monday, October 17, 2016

Well here I am again!  I kick myself all the time for not blogging or paying attention to my social media accounts.  So several weeks ago I started working on some projects so I'd have something to blog about.  I can't promise I'll keep up with it, but here goes!

Pinterest is one of my obsessions!  I literally look up and pin just about every kind of thing you can think of and it's a big source of creative inspiration for me.  One thing that sucks about Pinterest is that it can sometimes be very unrealistic - especially when it comes to weddings!  Many photos are from styled shoots where only one table is fabulously decorated and there's no way the person on an average budget could afford it.  Sometimes my customers will send me photos from Pinterest and I think "how in the hell am I going to make it look like that?!?!?"  Then I proceed to go crazy until I figure it out or just decide to say no.

Scrolling through Facebook one day I saw that my friend Taylor had posted about wanting to have a large easel chalkboard at her wedding.  I decided to take on the challenge!  She sent me the photo below, which she found on Pinterest.

I thought this was so beautiful and I love the flowers on top!  So I had shown this photo to a friend of mine and he built one for me out of materials from Home Depot - total was around $50.  We picked a smooth 2x4 piece of wood for the main chalkboard piece.


Next step - make that wood look beautiful!  I stained the frame with a dark stain, then coated it with a semi-gloss spray after the stain dried for 24 hours.  Luckily my Dad has a fabulous shop he let me use to do this!

As you can see, I got a little stain on the chalkboard area, which I sanded off with a fine sand paper...although that probably wasn't really necessary.

Next I put my first coat of chalkboard paint on!  I got this in a medium sized can at Home Depot near the spray paint section.

I'm get this super intense excitability over my projects and I couldn't stand waiting to put the second coat on...but the can said to wait 4 hours I think.  I just left it overnight.

The second coat made it perfect!  Excuse my poor quality photo :)


Next is the fun part...getting the words on there and having them look flawless!  Here's what I did and you can do this on any chalkboard (not necessary to go building one from scratch!).  

1. I created my text design in photoshop at the dimensions of the board.
2. I printed each section, then taped them together.


3. I taped the printed/taped text centered on my chalkboard with some painters tape.
4. I put a sheet of graphite paper under the printed text, then traced around it with a pen - you trace on your printed text or design with the graphite paper in between that and your chalkboard.
5. Take off the tape and remove everything and you have a pencil-like outline of your design right on your chalkboard.
6. I took a thick chalk marker and carefully filled in the design.  Voila!  A perfectionist's dream!





To conclude this post, you don't have to have the perfect handwriting or artistic skill to create something fabulous.  If you're determined enough, you'll find a way!

♥ Allison