To Have and to Hold, The Wedding..sneak peeks

My daughter's July wedding is very fast approaching and the invites have been sent and acceptances received. My future son in law used to work for a print firm and they have been able to get all their invites, Order of Service, place cards etc designed at cost price and printed for free as a wedding gift.

I rather like the phrase they have chosen as I think that really is one of the best parts of a successful and happy marriage.

I also recently bought my daughter a garter which has a tiny blue ribbon on it. I am sure that this is a world wide tradition but a Bride is supposed to have,

"Something Old

Something New

Something borrowed and 

Something blue "

on her body/person on her wedding day. The old is her bracelet given to her by her Grandma (now sadly deceased) on her christening day. The new is easy...dress, etc, the blue is on her garter so we still had something she needed to borrow.

That set me remembering that I had a tiny blue ribbon sewn on the train of my own wedding dress. I suggested that if  I could find it I could take it off, add it to the garter which she could "borrow". She she could then give me back the garter which can be used by the next bride in the family. I managed to track my dress down to my parent's loft where it has been in a box for 30 years (31 in July).

I opened the lid and saw my beloved dress...now looking rather faded but I took it out and I will admit put it on....and I was delighted to find that it still fitted me! My dear Hb and I laughed so much with me dancing up and down the hall with it on ;0)

I found the tiny blue ribbon just where I had sewn it as my "something blue" all those years ago on the bottom of the train. 

Now I know at this point you are probably itching to see a photo of my dress?

I know I don't usually do personal photos but just to show my dress in it's former glory here are a couple from my Wedding Day, 25 July 1981. I had to photograph them in the album which has plastic protective covers so these are not good copies but you can clearly see my dress..

This is me with my bridesmaids Sarah and Anne. I will also prove that I did once sew...I made the bridemaids' dresses myself. After looking quite dated for years I think that the fabric is now almost Cath Kidston ;0)

And here is me and my soul mate.....that was the best day of my life. I met and married a man who I adore to this day. I was only 20 and he was 24 when we married and everyone said I was far too young and it would never last...well here we are nearly 31 years on from there. It's funny I still feel so emotional when I look at these photos. I spent a while looking through the album and I actually had a little tickle at the back of my eyes. Many of our family and friends in our photos have long passed away but the over riding memory is of such a very happy day and the start of an amazing life with M. I am truly blessed. 

OK enough reminiscing!! 

So here is that little ribbon I was looking for under the train of my dress. I admit those stitches are pretty rough but how could I possible know in 1981 that in 2012 I would be photographing it for a blog post. Goodness me in those days we had never even heard of a computer. 

I carefully unpicked it and carefully sewed it on the garter.

So here is the garter with the smaller blue bow that came with it and sewn above is the larger, paler blue bow from my wedding dress. I have given this to Milly and she loves it. I was recently going to throw out my wedding dress as I could not see any reason for keeping it but I am so glad I kept it a little longer. I also found my headdress and I have a great plan for the fabric flowers on it...watch this space.

I feel that today's card challenge needs to be wedding related so this is another card I made recently using the same lovely Lili of the Valley stamp called Wedding Couple. I am still playing with ideas for The Wedding Card and I will let you into a secret that it is now work in progress and looking good.

I added lots of layers to this card and made a box for it rather than the usual envelope to avoid crushing the lovely mulberry paper flowers I added. 

I have put this one up for sale in my Etsy shop here. 

I coloured the image with my trusty Promarkers pens and highlighted it using my Prismacolor pencils.

Rather than using matting for my image and paper I used my Martha Stewart border butterfly punch. I used the single punch for the green butterfly which I added jewels to for some sparkle. There are also jewels on the bride's headdress and at the centre of her flowers. 

My sentiment is one of my circular LOTV stamps. 

As you can see this is one really butterfly wedding card!

I would like to enter my card into the following challenges;

Lil's Little Fairies Anything Goes
2 Sister's Anything Goes
Make It Monday Linky Party #88
Pretty Little Ribbons #10 Blossoms and Butterflies
Sunday's with Chrissy #29 Things with wings I have LOTS of butterflies here.
Stamping for the weekend 4 layers on a card plus their 3rd birthday blog hop I counted at least 6 layers om my card.
Joanna Sheen Flower Power
Crafter's Companion Here comes Summer #24

It is a bank holiday weekend here in the UK so we get a day off today... hooray! The weather is still very dull and chilly but the torrential rain has abated here in the South East.

I hope this finds everyone well and enjoying the lighter days. I was amazed how far behind my garden is compared to last year. I happened to read this post  from my blog from the same weekend, last year and I had Digitalis in FULL flower! This year there is no sign yet even of the flower stalk, just leaves are visible. Come on sunshine, come back soon.  Thanks as always for your lovely visits and for those of you desperate for a Bear update he is growing fast and the only damage so far is one eaten laptop cable! I was on puppy sitting duties for a couple of hours last week. Here he is with my son....

Bye for now,

Jane x