9 Months of Laundry Soap? Yes, Please!

So I've been noticing all the pins on Pinterest for homemade laundry soap and after my friend and bridesmaid, Megan said it was amazing, I went out and bought the ingredients to make it. She said she added the Downy Unstopables to make it smell even better and have the fabric softener. Here is what I used tonight to make it... it took me a little over an hour to make it because I kept running in the living room to watch the CMA's.


Supplies:

• A mop bucket or large container
  
• Plastic bag to line the bucket
  
• Grader
  
• 4lb box of Borax (12 oz)
  
• 4 lbs of Arm & Hammer Baking Soda
  
• Oxi Clean 4lbs (I bought the 5lb tub and have 1 lb left over)
  
• 3lb 7 oz box of Arm & Hammer Super Washing Soda
  
• 3 bars of Fels-Naptha
  
• 2 (13.2 oz) containers of Downy Unstopables (I used Fresh Scent-teal lid)
  

I found everything in the laundry section except the baking soda, I had to go to the baking aisle for that and bought 2 2lb boxes
Line your bucket with plastic bag

Open up the Fels-Naptha bars and grate them in a large bowl, it will look like shredded cheese. I cut them in half to grate easier, note to self buy a grater. I had to use the grater on my salad spinner :) Don't even bother trying a blender FAIL! I saw some people used food processors to grate the Fels-Naptha, but I don't have one of those.

Layer all ingredients in the bucket and mix as you go. This helped keep the ingredients proportioned properly. (I used one container of Downy Unstopables during this first mix)

I bought the large apothecary jar at Walmart for $10 and a 2 tablespoon coffee scoop for $1.67, however you could use the cap from the Downy Unstopables.

I mixed and transferred the mix from the bucket into my jar, I added my second container of Downy Unstopables as it went into to the jar.

They say you only need to use 2 tablespoons per load. We went with 4 tablespoons to be on the safe and clean side.

Here is my final product, I had chalk and chalk labels left over from the wedding so I added it to the front and wrote Soap on it. Jeff is in there doing laundry now...yes, my husband does laundry! I'm a lucky lady ;) I'll let you know how it works!

Cost from Walmart:

• Borax $3.38
  
• Arm & Hammer Baking Soda $2.48
  
• Oxi Clean $9.47
  
• Arm & Hammer Super Washing Soda $3.24
  
• Fels-Naptha (3 bars @ .97 each) $2.91
  
• 2 Downy Unstopables ($6.97 each) $13.94
  
• Total Cost without coupons: $35.42
  

*UPDATE- We have been using it and actually used 2 scoops (4 tbs) because we weren't sure the 2 tbs would cut it and I must admit the laundry smells really good and looks the same as it did before when we did laundry...clean! The fresh smell actually went through our house and it was like an instant air freshener. I think we will be doing laundry a lot to keep our house smelling so fresh and good. Happy Laundry Day!

Finally getting to test drive my Cricut with chalkboard labels

I became obsessed with seeing the chalkboard labels everywhere and decided I could cut my own if I had a Cricut. I luckily received a Cricut Expression for Christmas, so we ordered 2 rolls of chalkboard vinyl online, which is about 20 yards. I wanted to make sure we had enough to cut 400 labels for our guests to have on their mason jars at the reception. I had to cut out 12" x 12" squares by using a scrapbook paper as my guide before putting the vinyl in the Cricut to cut out the labels.


After cutting out the 12" x 12" squares I put the vinyl on the mat and inserted in the feeder. I selected my label option Bookplt1 Shadow to cut 10 times.









I began a system after the starting the Cricut up. I would cut my 12" x 12" piece while the Cricut cut out 10 labels, then I would switch them out and start again. 40 pieces later I had 400 labels ready to be placed on mason jars.

Personalized Hangers for the Bridesmaids

I decided that since I'm crafty I would go ahead and give this personalized hanger thing a try.

Supplies:

• 14 guage galvanized wire, can be found at Home Depot (OOK- 100' ft for $6)
  
• wood hangers, purchased from Target
  
• needle nose pliers/ wire cutter, found a 3-in-1 tool at Joann's for $4
  
• drill for holes to put wire in hanger
  
• hot glue gun
  
• patience and practice
  

I did a lot of searching online to look at how people did the letters, I practiced my sister's name, Olivia first because I figured it would be the most challenging. Once you decide to bend the wire, that is where you have to go with it, or start over. It is not forgiving and does not look pretty when you try to re-straighten it to start over.

This was definitely not a one night project. I ended up doing these over the course of a few weeks. I made them for my 10 bridesmaids, 2 flower girls, my mom and my mother-in-law.

For the first time doing them, I'm satisfied with the way they turned out. I added the burlap rose to the top to give them a little something extra. *We did have some issues with the hot glue not holding the wire in the drilled holes. I would either wrap the wire around the hanger or try gorilla glue.

*Photos of dresses are from our fabulous photographer Stephen's Photography

DIY coaster favors for the wedding

At our reception, we ordered 400 mason jars for everyone to drink out of. I designed this mason jar design with our last name replacing the Ball on it and put JA instead of the TM.

To make the coasters you need tile, which can be found at 4 1/4" x 4 1/4" tile,Mod Podge and a glue gun.

Cost savings: I purchased a large amount of tile on Craigslist, for a reasonable price. For the amount of tiles we made, we decided to hot glue 5 dots on the bottom of the coaster instead of cutting out felt and gluing it to the bottom as I have done in the past. We also ran out of the white tile and I had different colors, so we had to paint the tiles white to not let the blue or green color show through.

What to do:

• Print the design out, I could only fit 2 squares on each page.
  
• Cut squares out, I found it easy to do with my cricut trimmer
  
• Hot glue the dots on the corners and in center
  
• Mod Podge the design onto the tile, let dry
  
• After design is dry, Mod Podge over it to seal it to make it waterproof
  
• Let dry and you are done!
  

Thank you to my mom for helping me make the 400 coasters! Without her it wouldn't have been finished!

Hey! I'm crazy and decided to make my own invitations.

After looking at hundreds of different invitation options and receiving so many this year (13 weddings plus our own to attend) , I couldn't relate to any. None of them portrayed our wedding the way I wanted it to. So, being the control freak that I am, I decided to make them myself. I figured, how hard could this really be? People make them all the time. Wow, did I have some interesting moments during the invitation process.
First I looked online at different card stock options and found this site called cutcardstock.com. They were very reasonably priced and had the colors and sizes I thought I needed. They shipped them to me extremely fast and arrived in perfect condition.

I ordered:

• Pop-tones "Whipped Cream" size A-7, 5 1/8" x 7"
  
• Brown Bag Kraft square flap A-7 envelopes
  
• Pop-tones "Whipped Cream" size A-1, 3.5" x 4 7/8"
  
• Pop-tones "Whipped Cream" size A-2, 4.25" x 5.5"
  
• Brown Bag Kraft square flap A-2 envelopes
  

I used A-7 for the actual invitation, A-1 for hotel accommodations and response cards (a minor mistake) and A-2 for the thank you cards.
Wanting them to have the diy rustic look I came to terms with printing them on my computer printer. I designed my invitation, accommodation card and the mad lib response card and decided to start printing some. Fail. My printer would not allow me to insert random sized paper into the feeder. I called my mom freaking out and she said don't stress, bring it to our house this weekend and I'm sure one of our 3 printers will work. Success! I began printing away at her house until I ran out of ink...not once, but twice. Also the border was a cm off when I printed them so I had to trim 220 invitations so the borders were even on the paper. I was printing invitations, response and accommodation cards all the way up until Jeff said, Amy if we don't leave now we won't be able to get our dog from the kennel, it's a 2 hour drive.
When I returned home I was feeling pretty good, minor printing and trimming issues were resolved, I was happy with the look, next steps were to stuff, address and stamp.
I decided I wanted to put burlap squares behind each invitation to give it that rustic country feel. So I spent a few nights cutting 220 squares of burlap. Random fact: Dogs love the smell of burlap! I can't tell you how many times I had to swipe a piece of burlap from Tucker. Finally I gave up and let him play with a piece. I wanted to wrap a piece of jute around the pieces, but it was too bulky in the brown bag envelope.
In the few days that I was cutting all those burlap squares I decided I should go to the post office to make sure it was up to par. He made me remove the piece of jute, which I had already figured I'd remove, but tried it anyways. I asked him for stamps for the invitations and postcard stamps. He then asked to see the post card. As he takes it from me, he puts it on his measuring board and tells me, "You are going to have to get these re-printed, they are a half an inch to short." After a breath I looked at him with tears in my eyes and said seriously? He replied with well it's either re-print them or buy envelopes to put them in. I wanted to just start crying at that point, but I held it in and said fine, I will go buy some envelopes because I am not re-printing these, I had enough issues with them. I bought the stamps for the invitations and walked out quietly cursing to myself over a half of a cm.
Once I was in the car I called my mom with another freak out moment and she was busy so I could only vent for a moment. I then decided to call our friend who's mom works at the post office to see what would happen if I put a regular stamp on them and sent them off anyways. Her mom told us that if it has a stamp on it, they normally ship it. She saw a piece of cardboard come through with a stamp on it so she figured I would be ok with my wedding response cards. Then I called a bridesmaid to discuss my frustration and she calmed me down and determined to give it a try. Isn't the post office complaining it needs more revenue? I'm trying to buy stamps to mail my 220 wedding invitations along with 220 response cards, so I will buy the regular stamps and they can make an extra $28 by having me send the 45 cent stamps on everything even if it's half an inch too short.
I hand addressed all my invitations myself, along with the return address. I only had white return address labels and I didn't like how it looked so the perfectionist in me made it match. I wish I would have bought one of those cute stamps on Etsy.
I must admit I did have a helper, Jeff helped me stuff all the invitations and seal them with the Scotch Scrapbookers Glue. After what felt like weeks, it was really days, we finally finished all the invitations. I was extremely pleased with them and our mail man delivered them back to us. He even stopped me and said you seem to be planning a very large party, best wishes to you both! Made my day especially after thinking I wouldn't receive any of our response cards because they were a little short. Thank you to the usps workers that allowed me to receive my response cards!

*Fonts used were Bleeding Cowboys and Bookman Old Style.

Flowers and BBQ

While out in Columbia, we have been doing some planning from a distance trying to coordinate times to meet with a florist, caterer, decide on centerpieces and get dresses and vests made for the wedding party. So when I'm in Hillsboro for the weekend, I take full advantage of wedding planning time with my mom.

During my birthday weekend we went to Drummond Florist in Desoto, and picked out the bridesmaid bouquets and some flowers for the centerpieces. Here is the inspiration

My bouquet is going to be a brooch bouquet like Miranda Lambert's bouquet, my mom and her friend Holly are making it for me.

The boutonniere's will be made of cotton bolls, wheat and jute. I am making them myself :)
Here is the cotton boll

While we were at the florist, our caterer dropped off the bbq to sample. We will be having Pulled Pork from King Daddy's Catering. It is the best pulled pork I have ever had.

We then hit up hobby lobby to look for unique centerpiece ideas, to give the reception a very vintage/country feel.

I can't wait to see everything come together!