Here Comes the Bride…..

"Here comes the bride" dum dum da dum….. dum dum da dum… dum dum da dum dum …….No not me…Pul-eeze!  I celebrate my 17th Wedding Anniversary next month.  What is the proper gift for a 17th anniversary these days?   His and Her Smart Phones?  My name in a Domain Name?  IPO of some hot social networking company?  A quick check and Google tells me it is watches or furniture.  Seriously?  That is sooooooo boring.  No wonder people get divorced, they don't want to have to buy their spouse a 17th anniversary gift.   I will have to think of something much better than furniture.

The bride reference really is because I made a wedding gift for a cousin of Rick's and it turned out pretty good, if I do say so myself.  I worried at one point if it was too over-the-top, even describing it as Hello Kitty threw up.  You see, I went all pink, back, and white.  Hello, kitty.  Hopefully if they hate Hello Kitty they like handmade gifts…. made with love…..or just need a photo album for wedding pics.

I made the book using digital files from the late, great House of 3; altering some of the pages in Photoshop Elements (PSE).  I glued it all onto the pages of an acrylic book and then threw lots and lots of glitter at it.  Luckily, a lot stuck!  Never can go wrong with glitter…  Speaking of lots of glitter, I had a continuous glucose monitor on for 5 days as I try to determine if I am pre-diabetic, diabetic or just almost-prediabetic.  I had the unit in the pocked of the pants I wear to make messy crafts.  I pulled it out and found it was covered with glitter from the last time I crafted.  I had immediate visions of "Oops, sorry sir, I ruined your $500 monitor".  Lucky me... it still worked but I had brush it off really carefully.

This is my Black, White and Pink Wedding Album (not to be confused with the work in progress Black, White, and Red Wedding Album).

Cover page, I added the names and colored some of the designs pink in PSE.  The rose is made with Tim Holtz's Tissue Tape (Directions on Ranger.com)

Close up of bottom of cover.  The gathered ribbon is seam binding.  I am obsessed with glittering the small lines and words using a Zig glue pen and Martha Stewart Glitter which I think is the best glitter- it is affordable and widely available.  Art Glitter is terrific as well but expensive and harder to find.

I love this pocket I made out of vellum.  I glued decoration on the front but my favorite part is the little journaling tag I made from a piece of one of the pages that I cut up.  The darling polka dots are made with a Ranger pink paint dauber.

I folded the paper on the bottom of this page with a little pleats and glittered the edge.  The "LOVE" is also glittered.  Too much?  NEVER!

The dark pink glitter was applied using the glue pen and MS glitter.

Here you see the acrylic transparent page and more seam binding.

Two page with blank spaces for the bride to add her own pictures.

More of the pleated paper and glittered embellishments.  The embellishments on the 9 square from the top left square: piece of paper and plastic corner decoration,  a punched circle with a rub-on layered on another punched circle with dimensional adhesive in between,  the crown is  metal, the Butterfly is a vellum sticker, and the flower is from two punches held together with a brad.  Lots of glitter and a button complete this page.

More space for photos and a little charm made with a Tim Holtz Fragment with a rub-on and vintage book page.

I love the plastic flowers that are so popular right now.  I glued one to this page which I also highlighted with grey seam binding and faux-flatbacked pearls.  The poem is from my favorite Brian Andreas

Again Brian Andreas poem and glitter.  Poems were added to  page using PSE.

In other news, I took my daughter to see Taylor Swift in concert in Detroit.  It was quite stressful getting there- between Ryann's mandatory dance rehearsals to Rick's work schedule to Chase needing adult supervision to the idiot(s) who scheduled a Tiger home baseball game and Taylor's concert to start within 15 minutes of each other (they are located literally right next to each other).  Making it all so much more complicated was the fact that we would get to town just in time to hit the stadium but I did't have the

Ryann and Ally at Taylor Swift "Speak Now" show

tickets… my sister did.  We couldn't come up with a viable plan to change hands was about all I could take.  The stadium wouldn't let us use Will Call and going to Michelle's house before we headed to the stadium would guarantee we would miss the concert or at least a good portion of it.   I almost called it all off and stayed home.  Luckily my husband was more sane and rationale and late Friday night came up with a plan that, I must say, was as stroke of genius.  You see. he had to leave at 5 am  to get to work at Fed Ex.  He usually flies out of Grand Rapids but has the ability to jumpseat out of Detroit as well, as long as there is room.  At midnight we took the chance that he would be able to do just that and booked a nonrefundable room at the Westin.  The Westin just happened to be 3 or 4 blocks from the concert venue; walking distance.  This plan was so brilliant because it solved all the problems: Michelle dropped off the tickets Saturday afternoon at the front desk so they were waiting for us when we got there.   Rick got the Captain's permission to jumpseat out of Detroit and took a cab to the airport at 5 am.   We parked the car at the hotel valet which was a huge benefit of staying over.   Rick watched Chase until I got back from the concert and then I took over as he went to work fulfilling all legal and moral parental duties.  Somehow, someway the route we took to the hotel-although only a few blocks from the stadiums- was completely hassle free and we did not sit in traffic for even a moment.  This plan became the gift that kept on giving when Michelle, who was bogged down in the huge parking lot that was I-75 was able to change plans, hop on over to the Westin and park in the valet.   She arrived just as the final opening act was wrapping it up. Thankfully, I left Kalamazoo at 3:00 and was checked into the Westin and in my seat watching the opening acts by 7:00.  The Westin was swanky, we had a good night sleep, a $50 breakfast, and were on our way.

Laters...