Tying the Knot

On September 15th I had the pleasure of being in one of my very dear friend's wedding, Danielle Mesich, or should I say Boisvert! Since she is the one who got me into paper crafting it is only fair I give her a shout out and share with you how I made her custom wedding card and coordinating bow/wrapping for her gift.

Danielle's theme was nautical, the wedding was at DiMillo's Restaurant in Portland which is a floating restaurant in the port. The invites included anchors and light houses, seashells adorned the tables as well as chocolate lobster favors. With that I thought it was only fitting that the wedding card I created for Danielle followed that theme as well. 

If you want to create a similar card here is what you will need. ( I used the Cricut Explore for my project but if you want to use any nautical themed paper punches for embellishing your card you can do so as well)

1. Ribbon (I chose a burlap green ribbon and a blue grosgrain ribbon)

2. Green and Navy Cardstock

3. Gold gilded cardstock with Anchors (or any patterned paper you like)

4. Corrugated paper

5. Adhesive

6. Cricut Explore

7. Envelope Punch Board (I linked to it on Joann's website, I love my envelop punch board)

Here's a close up of the paper I used (I swapped the orange out for the green after I took this picture)

~ Step One ~

There are three shape cutouts that we need to make, the card, a large oval, and a slightly smaller over (the smaller oval is where I made my tying the knot cut and rope cut)

Using Cricut Design Space I chose the card format I wanted to use ( I chose the card layout from the Sweet Treats image set). Using the rulers on the top and left hand side of the screen I measured out how big I wanted my card to be. for this card I chose kind of an odd measurement, 5 1/2 in  x  9in.

The image I chose had the main part of the card but also an insert for writing a greeting on. Because I wanted to do a layering affect on the inside the insert that came with the original card image I just duplicated and made slightly smaller than the original.

For the main piece of the card I chose the gold gilded paper and for the two rectangles on the inside I chose green for the large one and navy for the smaller one.

On the navy blue portion of the card I added some text which I used my Cricut silver metallic pen to to have the machine write out for me (my handwriting is terrible when under pressure, same goes for my  spelling :-) )

~ Step 2 ~

Next step is to cut out our ovals for the from of the card along with choosing what the front should say. I found this really great rope writing and rope heart image online I wanted to use. Following the steps from my last blog post on how to upload your own images and cut them, do the same with the image you choose to use for the front of the card. You can also use images you might already own or are subscribed to, the world is your oyster, 

Cute right!

For the large oval I chose the corrugated paper and for the smaller oval I chose a chevron cardstock. 

~ Step 3 ~

Now it is time to put it all together! 

I started with the inside of the card using my Scotch Advanced Tape Glider placed adhesive to the back of each of the rectangles, lined them up and attached them one by one to the card.

For an added touch to the front of the card I added some ribbon to the first Oval so that the colors would peak through the cutouts of my small oval. Again using my tape glider I secured the ovals and ribbon to the front of my card.

And here is the finished product!

I wasn't completely happy with it so I added the cutout piece from the heart and did a shadow effect (Cricut's cuts are so precise!)

~ Step 4 ~

Envelope and Gift Wrap.

I chose the same green cardstock I used on the inside of my card for the envelope. Following the easy instructions on my envelope punch board it was simple to make!

For Danielle's wedding present I got her a personalized Christmas ornament made by a really cool artist I found at the Yarmouth Clam Festival this year. They are called Chart Metalworks, out of Portland, ME. It's a husband and wife team that create handcrafted custom map and nautical chart jewelry. For Danielle's I chose the coordinates where DiMillo's is for the map that appears on one side of the ornament. 

This is how it turned out...

I linked to their website above if you would like to check out some more of their pieces. You won't be disappointed!

The last item of business I needed to take care of was tying it all together. Using my Cricut Explore again I chose a bow cut out that turns into a 3D bow. How cool is that!! I chose a bow from the Something to Celebrate image set.

I kind of just eyeballed the size I would need to make it. I didn't want it too big so that it completely took over the box.

Here is how it turned out....

I chose a neutral chevron cardstock for the bow.

To wrap it all together I took some of the leftover navy blue ribbon I used on the card tied the box and the card together like a present, and stuck the paper bow to the top of the box with some adhesive. I left tails with the navy blue ribbon for that little extra something. 

The finished product turned out beautiful I couldn't be more pleased.

I would love to hear your ideas on what you would do for a nautical themed wedding card. 

Happy Crafting!! ~ T