diy invitations

DIY invitations…love it.  This is the first impression that a wedding guest will have of your occassion.  Why not handcraft it? 

I will be doing several runs of handmade wedding invitations this year. The first batch went off without a hitch…so we thought.

I met with the bride and groom (my brother and future sis-in-law) to consult as early as last Labor Day to select colors, designs and layouts. Several weeks and several modifications later, the bride and I began cutting all of the cardstock to size. Stacks of luscious navy, saffron & ivory cardstock were building high by October. Our plan was being followed out on point. We had closely mapped out a schedule to complete assembly of the invitations by December so they could be mailed the second week of January with no stress over the holidays.

The plan included an assembly day in November with a half dozen of us to complete specified tasks in order to construct the invitations. The invitations are a modern gatefold with a pocket at the bottom for the response card & envelope plus hotel accommodation information. We had enough pieces pre-cut to make 100 invitations although the final count to mail would be 88. We calculated a 10% error rate. We quickly learned that a 20% error rate would have been more realistic. Note to self. Luckily we ended up with 88 acceptable invitations but not one to spare.

Fast forward six weeks ahead to this weekend. Here’s where the hitch comes in. There are exactly 88 completed invitations, as needed. Bride and groom go to stuff the envelopes in preparation for the big mailing. Oh no, 75% of the pockets were no longer adhered! The response card had popped it open. The disaster was quickly solved by the bride and groom who used double side tape which proved to hold better.

Lessons learned: 20% error rate on DIY invitations AND heavy duty adhesive for adhering pockets.

What we did right: Starting 3-4 months in advance of when invitations need to be mailed. This means starting the DIY invitations 6 months prior to the wedding! I will be starting invitations in the next week or so for the vintage June wedding…

-The perennial bridesmaid