Bridal Showers, Rehearsal Dinners, Weddings, and Birthdays... OH MY!!!!

I can't believe how quickly this year is going.  Is it really the end of May?!?!?  The countdown to my sister's wedding has begun and we've been busy with bridal showers, graduations, and getting ready for the rehearsal, wedding, and my sweet boys' first birthday!  In between, I've done a couple of other projects (including a family tree made entirely out of scraps that turned out soooooooo cute), but I will have to post those later.

I think I've already blogged that I decided on a "retro" kitchen theme for my sister's shower.  I found the cutest red and teal polka dotted paper and a coordinating paper with a paisley print.  Those papers were the inspiration for the shower.

 Here's a picture of the entry table. I displayed an invitation, a picture of the lovebirds, cute plate that I wrote "best wishes Becky" on and a guest book that I made out of a journal I got at a craft store for a dollar.

 Delicious cake balls!!!  My middle sister ordered the cake balls from a bakery in Round Rock.  We had three different flavors.  She gave the baker (an artist, really,) an invitation and used it to create the different designs on the cake balls.

 Drink and present table.

 Close up of the drink stands.

 Each table had a framed picture of the lovebirds, potted plants, and kitchen utensil favors.

 Here's a close up of one of the favors.  I found these icing spatulas at a dollar type store.  My husband helped me create recipe cards to match the invitations and, finally, each favor was tied with  a bow and a monogram.

 The bride-to-be and some of her bridesmaids.

 Dessert is served!

 I also made some thank you cards.  I used a Hero Arts lovebird stamp.

 Once we got through the shower, it was time  to start working on invitations for the rehearsal dinner.  I used some paper that I found at Jo-Anns that was so similar to the paper I used to mat the wedding invitation and enclosures.  I used the same layout as the wedding invitation.

 I wish I had rotated the pictures before I uploaded them!!!

 I made envelopes (with my Martha Stewart Scoring Board) using the same swirled paper. 

 If a wedding wasn't enough to keep us busy, we are also planning my boys' first birthday!  I can't believe they are turning one!!!  I decided on a monkey theme for their party.

I can't take credit for these adorable address labels, but they were just too cute to pass up.  I ordered them from Amy Adele.  What a great website!

Not sure why this picture is blurry?!!??!

Love Birds and Babies

It's been so long since I've posted any of my design items, but time is just flying!! 

I've written before about my sister's upcoming wedding.  I have been tasked (and excited to do so) with making the engagement party invites and matching thank you cards, save-the-dates, invitations, and bridal shower invitations.  My sister, Becky, was really specific about what she wanted for the save-the-dates.  She wanted to incorporate a photo booth-style picture with each picture depicting the words "Save the date" and the date. AND she wanted to incorporate a bird somehow.  The difficult part was how to include the bird.  While visiting my family in Austin, my mom, sisters, and I went to one of my favorite scrapbooking stores, Archivers.  I found the perfect bird stamp!  It depicts two cute birds facing each other with the words "LOVE BIRDS" above them.  How fitting for a wedding save-the-date!!  On the back of the save-the-date, I stamped the love birds stamp and included the location of the wedding.

(I'll post pictures of the back later.)

One of my duties as Becky's matron of honor is to co-host her bridal shower.  My middle sister, Laura, and I decided to honor Becky with a kitchen-themed shower because she loves to cook.  As a new homeowner, she doesn't have a lot of things other than the basic kitchen necessities, so we thought this would be a great idea.  I loved the idea of making a kitchen-themed shower even more unique by giving it a retro 1950's housewife feel.  I tried to get Laura on board with my idea, but I couldn't sell it, so I decided to give the invites a retro feel by shopping for teal and red supplies.  I found the cutest polka dot and printed papers.

This picture shows the matching envelopes I purchased from envelopes.com.

I can't wait to send them out!

It seems like everyone I know is having a baby(ies) or just had a baby(ies).  Last year, the copy parent for my class (and my grade level) was AWESOME.  She went above and beyond and helped me sooooo much while I was pregnant with my twin boys.  At the end of last school year, I found out that she was expecting her third bundle of joy and within the past couple of week she welcomed a beautiful little boy.  I had seen an adorable "Welcome Baby" card on a blog that I "stalk".  The designer had a really cute stamp set that she used to create the card.  Since, I don't own the stamps, I used paper piecings to create what I think turned out to be pretty simple and cute.

I included this card with a small gift and a handmade chipboard scrapbook that spells out "BABY".  I'll post pictures of the scrapbook once I add her photographs to it.

Many more projects are waiting to be posted.  I made some adorable valentines cards and am working on something for my college roommate's baby shower.

So many projects...I don't know where to begin!

A friend from high school recently graduated with her MBA.  (I made the graduation ceremony invitations.)

 I love the way the invitations turned out!  They were exactly what I had envisioned.  I love the tassel on the graduation cap!  I was so lucky that Vanessa let me pretty much have free reign (sp?) to design what I wanted - colors, layout, etc.

We were invited to her graduation party, so for a little giftie I made her some note cards.

 I used my embossing tool for the first time on these note cards.  My husband couldn't get over the fact that the green cardstock was flat and untextured before I got started.  I really like the way they came out.

Thanks to my mom's help (watching the babies and her sewing expertise), I was able to participate in my first vendor show.  I had so much fun!  It was also great to see some old friends that stopped by and meet some new people!  Many thanks to Andrea for opening her home to all of us!  One of the products that I added to the Escamilla Designs repertoire are burp cloths.  These burp cloths can be made to coordinate with any outfit, nursery, diaper cake, or shower theme.  I had made some diaper cakes for an upcoming shower, so these burp cloths were made to coordinate with them, but the possibilities are endless!!!

The burp cloths are $6.50 each and are padded down the center for extra absorbency.

More coming soon!

Cards and Tags

This week I started working on projects for my first vendor show in December.  Before I did, though, I needed to make a couple of cards and a thank you gift.

The cards include a thank you card for a little girl and two belated birthday cards.  So that there is no question, I purchased the papers from Close To My Heart.  They came in separate paper packs. 

First, for my special friend, Faith:

I hand stamped the hearts and embellished with glitter (which is still everywhere and my boys are still covered in it!),

Next, two belated birthday cards:

I hand-stamped the flowers, the background of the tan cardstock, and the phrase "much happiness".  I doubled layered the flowers to give them a little more dimension.  The picture is a little blurry.  I took it while holding a squirming baby.  Lol!

This card is completely hand-stamped.  Each cardstock was a solid color and I stamped the backgrounds, flowers, and phrase "much happiness".  I embellished the flowers and bottom half of card with rhinestones.

As I am typing, we are packing up for a weekend at Possum Kingdom Lake.  Our neighbor, Kenny, is being kind enough to keep an eye on our four-legged kids.  I made him two types of muffins, raspberry white chocolate and crumble-topped raspberry (the raspberry white chocolate were delish!!!).  I decorated each ziplock bag with a 4x4 tag in paw-themed cardstocks and then decorated the gift bag.  Each tag was embellished with varying sizes of paws that I cut out from the cardstock scraps.  I adhered them to the tags with three dimensional foam squares.  Very easy and very cute!  The gift bag would have come out cuter, but the babies were in desperate need of a nap ;)

Please look past my empty k-cup carousel in the background!!! ;)

Check back for items that will be featured at the December 4th vendor show.  I'll have sets of notecards, gift and luggage tags, Valentine's Day card, and more for purchase.  I'll also be displaying my custom invitations and announcements for order as well as diaper cake centerpieces.  Hosting or attending a baby shower soon?  I'll have handmade boppy covers and burp cloths that can be made to coordinate with the baby's nursery, shower theme, or better yet, with a a handmade diaper cake by Escamilla Designs!!

Diaper Cake Centerpieces and Baby Shower Invites

I had so much fun making these diaper cakes!  I made six "mini" cakes wrapped in cloth diapers.  I topped them with wooden letters to spell out the baby's name.  Each "mini" with a wooden letter is $15.  ("Mini" cakes without letters are $10.)  I'll discount the price for the purchase of multiple letters.

 For the same shower, I made three other centerpieces.  They were each topped with sailboats which is the nursery theme.

Each diaper cake has approximately 28 size two diapers rolled around a 9 oz. bottle, wrapped with receiving blankets and tied with ribbon.  I embellished each one with different baby "necessities" like bibs, teethers, pacifiers, rattles, and so much more!  My favorite are bootie rattles!  They are shown on the first diaper cake.  If they had two more sets I would have purchased them for my boys, too! 

I can make the diaper cakes to your specifications: diaper brand and size, colors, themes, etc.  Prices vary based on your specifications.

I also enjoyed making these baby shower invitations for the highly anticipated Atticus Oliver Cruz.

  I love the jungle theme!  This specific invite is 5x7 and costs $2.50 per invite (including envelopes in a coordinating color).  I apply a discount for quantities of ten or more.

Check back for more projects and products!  Contact me through email escamilla.design@gmail.com, my website www.escamilladesigns.com, or through my facebook page "Escamilla Designs" for more information.

Lots of new cards! :)

I'm trying to "hand-make" all of the cards I need for card-giving occasions.  Here are a couple:

I made this card for a friend recovering from surgery.  I hope it brightened her day!

I made this "bee - lated" birthday card for our six year old nephew.  I thought it was cute to have the card's message inside the gift box that the monkey is standing in front of.

This is an anniversary card.  I made it for my husband to commemorate our fifth wedding anniversary.  The inside message is quoted from Emily Bronte, "still the one...whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same".

I've also been working on the invitations for my sister's engagement party.  I think they came out great!

I am currently working on some awards for my friend's business and some diaper cake centerpieces for a former co-worker's baby shower.  Stay tuned for more pics!!!

Finished Name Tags

I finally finished the baby dedication nametags.  I think they turned out really cute!