Essentials For Every DIY Bride.

Essentials For Every DIY Bride.

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Long time no see! It's Lauren C here. I'm hoping you've heard all about Rock My Wedding's little sister blog, Rock My Style? If you have, we hope you've found a wealth of beauty, fashion and interiors inspiration, if not, where the devil have you been hiding?!

Over on RMS I can be found mostly talking about home décor and DIY's (as well as a whole load of other lifestyle chat) so I thought it would be nice to talk about do-it-yourself over on these pretty pages.

In the run up to my own big day there was a whole lot of punching and stamping going on. No, that wasn't me having a Bridezilla moment, rather myself and the rest of the family getting stuck in to some good old DIY. My own wedding is now a distant memory but my calendar is crammed with wedding invites from some of my closest friends and I'm only too happy to lend a hand with a home-made creation or two.

I'm not promising that I'm going to bring a whole load of new ideas to the table but I've gathered together a few essentials if you're planning on including a bit of do-it-yourself for your Big Day.

Washi Tape

I have a bowl filled to the brim with Japanese Washi Tape - I can't get enough of the stuff. There's a million and one different patterns and colours to fit in with your theme.

For weddings, it's ideal for making Drink or Cake Flags. As Washi Tape is sticky you can easily wrap it round your straw or cocktail stick and then whip out your scissors to cut into a cute point. Much easier than the paper and glue option that I went for as I seemed to get more glue on my fingers than the back of the paper...

Alternatively, give it a whirl wrapping around tea lights to jazz them up a bit, or for a more informal celebration why not try your hand at creating mini bunting for your wedding cake. Try Paperchase or Etsy for a fabulous collection.

Punches

Hobby Craft have loads of punches that are fairly inexpensive. I still use my tag style punch regularly to make my own gift-tags on birthday and Christmas pressies, but the original purchase was for making tags for our sweet stand and order of ceremony.

The great thing about using your own punches to create tags rather than ones that are pre-cut is that you can use them with A4 sheets of paper that you've printed your own patterns or designs on to (pre-cut tags are a pain to fit through a standard printer!).

How about scouring eBay or your local charity shops for old novels, dictionaries, maps or music sheets? Then use their heart version for making your own confetti (just double check with your venue if you want to use outside as usually you need to go for bio-degradable paper).

Alphabet Stamps

I picked up my set of Alphabet Stamps in Oliver Bonas and they are an essential in the DIY Bride Kit. Etsy has a huge collection of both upper and lower case versions.

You could use Dry Clay and use the stamp to engrave a name for a distinctive favour, or stamp a paper doily to create a unique place name.

If you're making your own stationery, they are super for stamping out place names and table plans. Let's be honest, it can be time consuming stamping out 100 or so names, so grab a friend (or a fiancé) and bottle of wine and make an evening of it.

Fonts

Alternatively if you're friendly with your printer (and I would really stress that you need to get to know your own printer inside and out before embarking on making your own stationery) and fancy making your own invites, sites such as DaFont and Font Squirrel are great for getting a fancy free font or two to jazz up your invitations.

Blackboard Paint

Yes, there is only one purpose for blackboard paint but if you grab yourself some MDF (those nice people in B&Q often cut it to size for free) and whack on a few coats, you can create yourself a backdrop for a table plan. A tin lasts absolutely ages and so the possibilities for bespoke signage are endless too.

Mini Pegs

You can pick up bags of Mini Pegs from Hobby Craft for next to nothing. If you're going for a photo booth they are ideal for hanging up your Polaroids, or messages for your guestbook. They're also fab for favours and holding table plans in place too.

Sharpie Pens

There are loads of shades of Sharpie available and metallic ones are particularly useful. They were good enough for David Beckham so they are most definitely good enough for your Big Day!

You can use them on plates as unique place names, or take a blank plate to make a crockery guest book (just bake in the oven afterwards).

Alternatively grab a pen to scribe a message on the bottom of your shoes, this makes for a really sweet photo opportunity too.

For my own wedding I used a chalk pen to transfer my stationery font onto glass for customised tea lights but a marker pen would work just fine too. I used the same technique recently over on Rock My Style to create a personalised drink dispenser.

If you've found yourself with a few vintage crates that have seen better days, slap on a coat of paint and then take hold of your Sharpie to letter up your crate with a personalised message; for example your venue location, your wedding date or maybe your new surname.

Spray Paint

Spraying paint is a whole load of fun and eBay is a great place to pick up a can for a few pounds. It's an easy and quick way to take a lot of objects and create some form of unity amongst them all. Whether it be candlesticks, frames, paper lanterns, plastic animals the world is your oyster.

For more wedding DIY ideas visit the RMW archives and I would warmly welcome you over to Rock My Style if you haven't yet ventured over!

I'd love to know what DIY projects you're planning for your own wedding? What are the essential items in your toolkit?

Big DIY Love

Lauren C xxx

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