A Westervin Wedding: Invited

We did it! We finally finished and mailed our invitations! Hopefully, all invited parties have received theirs by now, except for some overseas friends. But I just couldn’t wait any longer to share. We are so pleased with ourselves.

Let me give you a play by play. We started with the same French Paper Co. envelopes in four different colors: slate blue, grout grey, packing paper brown, and a darker brown (pictured above). We also used the custom return address stamp, which featured a typewriter font.

Now comes the good part. Open the envelope and what do you find? A delicate vintage handkerchief invite, designed by Brian West and screenprinted by Barrel Maker Printing.

Arrows!

Inside, the hankie was wrapped around a wood card, made of Sycamore wood and printed with our logo (above) and instructions to visit our website for more information (below).

Our vintage typewriter came in handy once again when it came time to address the envelopes.

I had to keep a few of my favorites. They’ve come in handy in other ways. More on that to come!

The real fun part was collecting all the vintage hankies. We searched every antique mall and flea market from here to Timbuktu and found a few winners in Etsy and Ebay lots. It sounds tedious, but you know I enjoyed every minute of it! The real challenge was finding ones that fit our color scheme and general aesthetic but weren’t more than $1 each, give or take.

You like?

Envelopes:  { French Paper Co. }

Return Address Stamp:  { Note Trunk }

Screenprinting:  { Barrel Maker Printing }

Wood Cards:  { Cards of Wood }

Handkerchiefs:  vintage, various sources

Graphic Design:  Brian West!

The Shopping Sherpa: Be My Offbeat Valentine

Clockwise from top left: { A Perfect Match Necklace from Early Bright }  { Husband & Wife Finger Puppets from Yaelfran }  { Together Forever Sculpture from Snew }  { Mail Order Husband Card from Faucethead Cards }  { One Hot Couple Embroidery from Campfire Chic }  { Blunt Valentine from Letterhappy }

WE Thank You

{ insert dreamy, romantic or heartbroken text here. by Victor Huckabee }

Well, my darlings, the contest is over, and although I never stopped wishing on fallen eyelashes and shooting stars or quit nagging people for votes, I knew we wouldn’t make it to the top 50.  While we definitely won’t be winning a fatty wedding, I don’t regret all the effort we put into trying.  The long and frenzied road to 87th place has been nothing but fun and fulfilling.  From the bottom of our happy hearts, Brian and I want to thank every one of the 550+ people who voted for us.  Big hugs and kisses and cupcake sprinkles especially for everyone who wished us well, left a heartfelt comment of congratulations and cheer or entered our giveaways and helped us spread the word.  I wish we all could have won!  And I can’t give enough cupcake sprinkles and hugs to Lorena and Lisa who donated their crazy-beautiful necklaces for those giveaways.  You muh gurls!!!  Now, cue the exit music.  I think my 2 minutes is up.

Daily Pretties: Love & Bedbugs

I would like to point out that, as I began scouring my collection of favorite images for my next Daily Pretties post, this Daily Pretties post, I did not intend to include cliche representations of Valentine’s Day, which, unless you’re living under a rock or, let’s say, a tent (because I’m sure there’s more room under one of those) away from our consumerism soaked culture, I’m sure you’re aware is just around the corner.  Now don’t get me wrong, I’m a generally optimistic person who values social relationships and the deep fulfillment they bring above most things.  (In this case, I am also considering my love affair with chocolate milk a “social relationship”.  You can judge me if you wish.)  I love “love” and celebrating it.  But people, if I see another jewelry commercial saying that buying me a diamond something-or-other is the most sincere and romantic way my significant other (who must be a man, obv) can show he loves me, I WILL puke.  Yet, despite my newly developed aversion to stereotyped images of love and romance, the beautiful collection of rich reds, soft pinks and dainty florals you see before you just… happened.  Perhaps it was non-conscious (as in subconscious, but less Freudian) — I’ve seen too many Valentine’s Day ads — but I just found these photographs too compelling to say no.

{ Fade Away Show by Mick Alister }  { Untitled (another lovely) by *Nishe }

Our dream wedding: You can help!

If you haven’t already heard, we’re engaged!  And guess what else.  You could help us have our dream wedding!  Just vote for us in the Crate & Barrel Ultimate Wedding Contest, and we could win a big ol’ wedding worth $100,000!  We NEED your vote.  In the name of love and happiness and handmade, eco-friendly weddings, perdy-please vote for us here!  It will only take a few seconds.

EDIT: If you’ve voted for us, you can now enter our giveaway to win a stunning embroidered necklace from Marañón, a featured seller on Etsy.  Enter here.

Our love story: I’m Australian.  On a family vacation in the states, we met and fell in love on a California beach.  In a happy twist of fate, my family decided to move there, and Brian and I ended up going to the same high-school together!  But Brian turned out to be a bad-boy, and my good-girl ways made it hard for us to be together.  But love conquers all!  Eventually, a song-and-dance number at a school carnival brought us back together, and we each realized that “You’re the one that I want”.

Ok, so that’s actually the plot of Grease… but our story is romantic, too!  Brian and I met on the first day of school (college), and we spent the first days of our friendship on a class trip to Memphis.  He put my number in his phone, listed as “Elvis”.  He fell in love almost instantly and spent the next three-and-a-half years patiently and tirelessly bearing the burden of unrequited love, making me mac ‘n’ cheese, taking me on dinosaur hunting adventures and holding my hand when I cried.  Eventually, I received a metaphorical slap in the face, and realized I would never meet another person more talented, fun, handsome or caring.  [insert more gooey-lovey-dovey stuff], and now we’re living happily ever after.

Three important details about our Ultimate Wedding: Our dream wedding?  Picture this.  An underwater reception, a chorus of glittering mermaids, floating off into the sunset in a hot-air balloon piloted by Dolly Parton.

But if that doesn’t fit the budget, here’s Plan B:

1) Environmental and social responsibility:  We don’t want our special day just to be about us (for more reasons than Brian’s shyness).  With every detail, we want to support our community, environment, and small businesses.  We’ll have food from local farms, local wildflowers, a handmade dress from an independent designer, recycled-paper decorations and invitations printed on vintage silk scarves.

2) Nature meets Urban:  We’ll exchange vows atop a landscaped roof in downtown Chicago.

3) Bye-bye traditional:  Champagne pyramids, identical bridesmaids, 6-tierd cake?  NO THANKS!  Yes to cup-pies, quilt-covered hay bails, a bluegrass band.

Our everyday dream day: Our everyday dream day includes shopping at Crate & Barrel *wink wink*  Then, blogging together, baking together, balloon dancing together, playing thought-jinks — all on a warm, summer Sunday, with the windows open and Sam Cooke vinyl crackling on the turntable.  After all that we would be tired little puppies, so we would take a nap until dinner, which would include grilled salmon and scrumptious inside-out BLTs, a Pink Slip (one of Brian’s original cocktail creations that includes basil and raspberries) and cinnamon rolls for dessert.  The rest of the night would be spent dancing with our wonderful friends.

Thank you so much for reading and viewing all these vain pictures of us!  Please remember to vote for us here.  If you really want to help us (and I will love you forever if you do) please post this on your blog or website, asking your readers/viewers to vote for us, too!  Don’t hesitate to email me at sarah@westervin.com if you have any questions.