Left Handed Calligrapher

Dallas Calligrapher

Southern Tradition: Bury the Bourbon

Have you heard of the southern tradition to “Bury the Bourbon”?  As the saying goes:

“Bury a bottle of bourbon a month to the day to keep the rain away.”

You take a bottle of bourbon, and bury it at your venue a month before your wedding. Make sure to receive permission from your wedding venue first! The bottle must be buried one month to the day, full, and upside down. Then, on the day of your ceremony, you and your new partner dig up the bottle together as a part of the celebration. The freshly dug-up lucky bourbon is then incorporated into your party, either as a toast or shots with the wedding party.

So, how do you incorporate this tradition into your wedding festivities?  Here are the rules and grab a shovel!:

  1. The bottle needs to be completely full.
  2. It needs to be real Bourbon (your call on what brand).
  3. You and your partner need to bury it together.
  4. It needs to be buried upside down.
  5. It has to be buried exactly one month before the wedding– and preferably on a day of good weather.

A special treat is to hire out an engraver to personalize the bottle with your wedding date and names!  Then you can enjoy the bottle for many celebrations to come if it isn’t finished off on the day of your wedding.

engraved bourbon

 

Creating a Wedding Guest List

Design by Southern Fried Paper

Calligraphy envelope addressing is one of my very favorite activities. There is something special about sitting down to a stack of envelopes and carefully writing the names of the most important people in a couple’s life.

Creating a Guest List

Something I hear from couples after their invitation is designed and going to print, is that gathering the guest list is the most difficult part of getting married. I’m with you. How to narrow down who you invite based on venue space, budgets, or travel can be so difficult. I do have a few helpful tricks though.

First, Start Early! You are going to need a quantity count to order invitations, pick a venue, plan table arrangements and florals, ceremony seating and catering numbers. Pretty much everything you plan for a wedding will be based on your guest count numbers. So, my recommendation is to start putting your must have invitees into a list right away when you are excited for the planning process.

Second, Get Organized! A well thought out spreadsheet will make your life easier as you go through the wedding planning process. I have a free template on my website. My preference is to use the advanced tab so that the guest list can be organized by last name… and sorted anyway you please depending on the information needed. Always, have separate columns for the street address, city, state and zip codes. This will allow more flexibility for information processing. Also, your calligrapher will be thankful so they can layout your list as they like.

Next, Pester your friends and family. Gathering addresses from your friends and family can be a challenge. If you start early and get organized you will have enough time to have a completed list by the time you need to send out invitations. When you see them for dinner, double check their address (including zip code!). Text or call those you don’t see as often. A great time to do this is when you are talking about your engagement with them.

Finally, Send Save the Dates. I promise, I’m not trying to get you to spend your whole wedding budget on paper goods! Save the dates serve many functions. First, they communicate your wedding is happening and your guest should should check their calendars. It also communicates they are invited! The mailing also serves as a test run for the wedding invitations which are usually more expensive to mail. Here is where you find out if someone has moved, had a relationship change, the address is wrong. All the things that happen when dealing with a guest list. Then you have time to make corrections before sending out the actual wedding invitations that are a bit more time sensitive.

I do hope this advice helps you make a guest list with a little bit of ease. Next time, I will discuss a bit more regarding the etiquette of sending a formal invitation and how to address your guests.

Change of Plans

Change of Plans

Goodness.  It has been a week.  A month.  It’s amazing how quickly we must pivot and readjust when everything is shut down. Change of Plans. I’ve been hunkered down here in Texas for nearly 2 weeks and processing and thinking and crying.  I’m heartbroken for my couples that are having to reschedule and postpone their celebrations.  I am heartbroken for my industry friends who are now looking at 3 months without and income. They are such good people to even consider returning retainers if the events can’t be re-scheduled on a date they are available.

These are unprecedented times and I wanted to let you know:  I am here.  I am listening.  Call me and talk and share and I will cry with you.  I know this is hard times.  But we can make it through together.  I will listen and be angry and sad and celebrate the little things for you.  I’m in your corner and your cheerleader.  You got this.  This is a change of plans.  You can do this.  I can help you.

I know this isn’t much.  But, communicating the change of plans to your guests is one of the most difficult time consuming tasks of a postponement.  I put together a few pretty graphics you are free to use.  Want something more custom.  Just email or call.  I’m here (and not going anywhere for at least 2 weeks!). xoxo

Just right click and save.  Want to share – please give me credit.

DIY monogram bookmarks

custom crest

These DIY monogram bookmarks were so quick and easy that I’m sure I will be doing this again.

Since I already had the artwork for this little crest, there was very little design to do for this project.

First, I determined the size of the bookmark. For this project, 7×2 inches was perfect and fit 6 bookmarks per letter sheet of paper with very little waste.

Then I pulled my art into the file and placed the crest where I wanted it. Be sure to allow room at the top for a hole punch that a tassel will feed through. Since this left so much space at the bottom, I picked six quotes that were from some of our favorite books to place below the crest.

custom crest bookmarks

Finish them off by laminating, putting a hole punch in the top and then lacing a tassel through the top.  These would be great for baby shower gifts, valentines day, or even girls book club!