DIY Bride™

5.6 earthquake

Did the earth move for you, baby? It sure did for me last night. A quiet evening of watching DVDs was rudely interrupted by an earthquake of a magnitude I haven’t felt in all my years in the SF Bay Area. 5.6 on the Richter scale is pretty scary.

My husband and I are located about 15 miles or so away from the epicenter. No damage to report at Casa de DIY Bride and all near and dear to us are ok.

Exactly one year ago I was in NYC shooting the completed projects for the 1st half of my book. We shot part of them in Central Park and the rest in the photographer’s studio. A few months later, I was back in NYC to finish up the photography for the remaining projects. Right after that, the manuscript was done. (Then, a little while later, the edits were complete.)

There were times when I was so.utterly.sick of this thing that I could (and did) scream. There were times when I doubted I could really do it. There were times when I completely bugged out over deadlines, stress, and overwhelm.

It was totally worth it.

Here’s why:

Today I received the book. The finished book. The beautiful, glorious, darling, fun, wonderful book. My book.

Flowers, schmowers. Who needs ‘em when you can create a stunning Fall bouquet out of leaves?

I’m always on the lookout for things to make non-traditional bouquets out of. A while ago, I was heavily into crystal bouquets. This season, I’m all about foliage. Beautiful, rustic, cheap, fake foliage.

Taking a cheapy silk leafed garland from Michael’s, I used a few tools, some wire, and my DIY magique to turn it into an inexpensive and easy bouquet.

SUPPLIES NEEDED:

• Silk leaf garland
• Floral wire
• Wire cutters
• Floral tape
• Ribbon (1″ wide)
• Scissors
• Pearl headpin

INSTRUCTIONS:

1. Begin by pulling the leaves off of the garland. I used about 40 leaves for this bouquet.
2. Cut pieces of floral wire, about 12″ – 14″ long.
3. Now, take the wire piece and wrap one end around the stem of one of the leaves, spiraling down from the leaf to the bottom of the stem. I did about 3 – 5 wraps around the stem on each leaf. (Don’t do anything to the remaining wire that’s hanging from the leaf. That’ll become part of the handle.)
4. Continue to cut wire and wrap leaf stems until all of your leaves are finished
5. The next step is to bind the leaves together in groups of 3. I found this helped make handling them easier. To do so, hold 3 wired leaves together and wrap floral tape around the stems a few times, until the binding feels tight and secure. Do this for all of your leaves.
6. Once your bundles have been created, the next step is to bind all of the groups of 3 together to make a bouquet. I gathered the whole bunch in my hand and did some arranging to get a nicely shaped bouquet. Once I was satisfied, I held the bouquet in one hand and used the floral tape to secure them together in one big bunch. [Note: I also threw in some crystal stems as an afterthought. That's why you'll see some crystals and wire sticking out.]
7. After all of the stems are bound together, I then wrapped all of the wires with floral tape from top to bottom. This helps protect your hands from pokey wires.
8. Now that the stems are covered with floral tape, I then covered that with a wrap of satin ribbon (secured with a pearl pin).

NOTES:

• This cost about $15 to make (I already had the tools) and took just over 1.5 hours to complete.
• The big box craft stores often have 50% coupons and sales – use those to your advantage!
• When wrapping the wire around the leaf stems, I recommend using a glove on our wrapping hand. My fingers were pretty sore from being poked with the wire. Not a big deal but if you’re doing lots of leaves or more than 1 bouquet, you’ll thank me.
• You can use any kind of garland with this project. Flowers, pine cones, or whatever’s in season.
• If you’d like to use real leaves, go for it! However, I highly recommend dipping then in wax first to help protect them and make them less fragile (directions from eHow). Also, use a thinner gauge wire (the higher the number, the thinner the wire) like a 22 – 26 gauge, found in the jewelry section of craft stores. Regular floral wire might be too stiff to wrap around a real leaf.

The fun and fabulous folks at 365Halloween have posted this cool tutorial for making pumpkin picture holders out of Fimo clay. While I think they’re great for pictures, they’d be even cooler used as place card holders. And, even if you’re not into the pumpkin thing, the techniques you learn can be translated into other shapes and motifs.

Happy October!

Beginning today, I’ve opened up a new section on the site called DIY Halloween where (big surprise) I’ll be publishing all sorts of creepy crafty goodness all month.

The direct URL is: http://halloween.diybride.com. Those of you who subscribe via an RSS feed will need to subscribe to the new URL to get the Halloween posts (it’s running on a separate blog from this one.)

  Hey there, my eco-friendly readers ~

Ultra fabulous photographer, Beth Beljon, is donating 6 hours of coverage to one lucky couple (in the US  or abroad) who are dedicated to having a green wedding in 2008.

The Details:

Couples considered should be environmentally mindful in all aspects and details of their wedding from invitations, attire, location and food.  “We are looking for the most creative, authentic  green and organic wedding.  It’s simply  beautiful to see more couples not only making a commitment of love to each but to the earth.”  says Beljon.

The deadline for entries is Dec. 15, 2007. The couple chosen will be announced  through her website Jan. 1, 2008.

Beth Beljon is an established and published photographer covering weddings around the globe for nearly a decade. She provides stunning photography  for modern and mindful couples.  Her photojournalistic style is elegant, modern and graceful that captures each event in a visually organic documentary . Her packages start at $4800 and range to $8200.

To apply, please visit Beth’s Website: http://www.bethbeljon.com