Deck the Walls

Our apartment is 900 square feet of white walls. White kitchen. White bedroom. White living room. White white white. We’re prohibited from painting. I bitch and whine about this, but in all honesty, it’s fine. I’ve watched my mother agonize for weeks over selecting a wall color. Just like her, I’d carry paint chips in my purse, tape them on the walls, order sample pints, and interrogate a husband who just wanted me to make a decision. My mother once cried for an entire afternoon when she saw the color she’d chosen up on the entryway wall (only to love it later). So perhaps it’s good that I’ve been spared from this emotional rollercoaster.

To combat the wide blank expanses, we’ve been accumulating wall decorations: the obligatory arrangement of travel and wedding photos, enlarged pet portraits, prints from parents’ basements…and some honest to goodness art.

The most recent addition is a painting from Bethany (creator of this most awesome mixed media piece that was our wedding present).

It’s a little watercolor, my half of a swap that started with me sending Bethany a cherry red kami hat. What color frame and mat do you picture with it?

The other artwork in our apartment was painted by my dad. After a long career  managing my hometown’s city parks, he retired and started to paint. He joined a local art guild, took classes at a nearby college, then started to sell his work. I think it’s so cool.

When I was home for Christmas, I helped him photograph his work so that I can build him  a website. We followed the instructions in this youtube video for photographing work on the cheap. There were a few glares that try as we might, would not go away, but all in all we got what we needed. I’m going to use wix.com, which is free and offers some readymade portfolio templates.

If you’re wanting something new for your walls, may I suggest an 8 x 10 photo of Samson? No? FINE. Okay then, perhaps the contact information for one of these super talented artists I’m lucky to know and love?

Our six cent Save-the-Dates

Save-the-Dates are a great place to venture out into DIY. Invitations have to contain a lot of information, but Save-the-Dates just require a date, your names, and a friendly message. Making your own can save a lot of money too. Forget $1 color copies at Kinkos. We saved the file in a 4×6″ jpeg format and printed it at Walgreens just like it was a photo. Glossy paper, bright clear colors, all for 6 cents apiece. SIX CENTS! Including stamps, we printed and sent 200 Save the Dates for about $80 total.

You don’t even need to own an image editing program because Adobe offers their design suite as a free 30-day download. With that said, here are my step-by-step instructions for how to do this yourself:

1. Take a photo of the two of you together. Make it fun.

2. Open a new file in InDesign (or your program of choice). Set the resolution at 400-600 pixels per inch, and set the size at 6 inches wide and 4 inches tall.

3. Experiment with fonts & backgrounds. I’m a big fan of www.1001freefonts.com…anything to break out of the default font rut. And look for backgrounds with a little texture and depth. I had fun searching online free scrapbooking databases, which have lots of interesting backgrounds.

4. Save the file on a jump drive. Save it as a jpeg and print as a 4×6 photo at a drug store or any photo-printing kiosk. If you want to email the file, save it as a pdf as well.

Here’s our Save-the-Date:

I got the idea to write the wedding date on a chalkboard and then take our picture with it in Italy. We took SO MANY pictures…Read was very kind to entertain me on this. The shot we chose was taken in an alley in Venice with my camera’s automatic timer (we set it on a windowsill). I’m wearing a hat in all the pictures because my hairdryer made ominous electrical noises when plugged into an adapter and then an Italian outlet. The background I found by typing “green fabric” into Google images, and then sorting the results so that I could view only the “large” files. I played with the fabric’s brightness and contrast in Photoshop.

Here’s another example that I just did last week for my coworker:

Terrie and Jill used the photobooth at the mall, which automatically added the “old-film” edging (cute!). We originally put the whole photo strip in the design, but after playing around with the layout Terrie decided she preferred just this one. I like how the couple seems to be looking up at the text. I found this background on a scrapbooking website. Terrie and Jill emailed this as a pdf attachment to all of their guests.

What are some fun Save-the-Dates that you’ve seen around the web? What tips and tricks do you recommend for anyone wanting to design their own? Any website or font recommendations?