What to Wear to a Winter Wedding

Thinking of what I would wear if I could wear anything.  

I would love to wear this to a winter wedding.

What to Wear to a Winter Wedding by marie-kinnaman 

Lace Trimmed Bar Towels

With only a few weeks to go before the woodsy winter wedding takes place, I keep dreaming up more to do; more ideas for crafting, more ideas for adding interest, more of everything for the entire event. I really need to stop and realize there is "enough already" and that I can relax until it is time to put it all together for the big night. But, I won't. I know myself pretty well . . . and I won't be able to stop thinking, dreaming, eating, and sleeping this wedding until it has happened.

some of my collection of lace trim

One of my most recent add-ons was to embellish the bar towels with lace trims. I found great tubs in gold and silver with a faux bois finish (faux bois is the French term for "false wood") for putting the drinks on ice. I knew a bar towel through the handle would be a nice touch for drying off the bottles when wet. Could not leave it at that. So, I added lace trims to each towel to jazz them up. It is such a good way to use bits and pieces of lace trim, which I have been collecting for years. (And, recently my cousin Joanne and I found a huge bunch of trim at a garage sale and scooped it up for our projects. More on the adorable headbands we're making for little girls next time!)

The finished products. Not only will they be fun for the wedding, but for using afterwards as well. Just a couple of these added to your bathroom towels will dress the room up.

 We'll have several bar and drink stations at the wedding, so I made plenty to go around. 

Finding the right towels to trim was the tricky part. If I had more time I would've scoured thrift stores for good linen towels to use, but I had to buy them new since time is in short supply. I like to wash linens before using (and I do believe towels dry better when washed first) and some of the cheaper towels shrank, so I was out looking again. In a perfect world, all the trim would have been preshrunk as well, but it wasn't. The towels I ended up using ranged in price from an inexpensive Target variety, to pricey (and beautiful) towels from Williams-Sonoma.

The wedding has so many hand-crafted details, I just hope to remember to get a photo of everything on the big day.

Using Map Themes in Decoration

Recently while in a Cost Plus World Market, 

I saw these letters covered in map paper.  

Seeing them made me giggle a bit - thinking of the Peace on Earth letters (below) I created around five years ago. I used a decoupage technique on paper mache letters from the craft store. Torn bits of map pages were pulled from an old college geography book I was keeping for just this kind of project.

 My letters have the map pieces going all around the sides (which I like) 

compared to just covering the top of the letter in the World Market version.

I made the letters for the last holiday window I decorated in my shop. Since I really liked them, 

they came home to hang in the entry.

They compliment the maps,
globes, and magnifying glasses
I have been collecting
for many years.

Maps might be going the way of phone books soon. Seems they are another thing smart phones and computers take care of now. But, I love maps and still like to follow along if I am a passenger in a car on a long road trip. My collection of old maps might fun to show the grandkids one day. Maybe they will want to tear them up for a decoupage project of their own.