How to Do And Assemble Your Wedding Invitations
Your wedding invitation will be the first thing that your guests see from your wedding. It may be displayed for weeks on their mantelpiece, and will probably be one of the things that they keep as a momento of sharing your special day, perhaps even ending up in a frame. They should reflect your sense of style, personality, and theme of your wedding. There are endless choices in designs for wedding invitations, from traditional and classic to bold and modern.
Although professionally printed, personalized wedding stationery can often be expensive, with a bit of creativity it is easy to make your own wedding and bridal shower invitations. As well as saving your wedding budget, creating your own wedding invitations can be a fun process to share with your fiancé or bridesmaids. Your design will be unique to you, and your guests will know that their wedding invitation was handmade by you, making it even more special.
When your order of wedding invitations arrives, you may feel a little overwhelmed by the stacks of envelopes, tissue paper and ribbons. We simplify how to do your wedding invitations in ten easy steps.
Traditionally, wedding invitations consist of a folded invitation, a sheet of tissue paper to protect the printed inside, an inner envelope to protect the invitation, and an outer envelope used to post each invitation. Some invitations may also include response cards and envelopes, reception cards, and maps to the venues. Many popular wedding invitations now include ribbons to tie the invitation closed or to hold top sheets of velum over a patterned background paper, and stickers or seals to fasten the inner envelope closed.
‘How do you assemble wedding invitations?’
Here are some top tips on how to do wedding invitations, making the fiddly process easier.
- Make sure your hands are clean, as paper easily absorbs oils, grease and dirt from skin. You should also avoid coloured nail polish, which can leave marks on your wedding invitations if the back of your nail rubs against the paper.
- Make sure your work surface is clean and free from any clutter. It should also be large enough for you to spread out the elements of the invitations easily.
- Be organized. Work out what supplies and tools you will need, such as scissors or glue, and have them to hand before you start.
- Many hands make light work, but too many cooks spoil the broth. Invite your head bridesmaid to help you and your fiancé do your wedding invitations, but avoid having too many people working at once as this can cause confusion.
- Assemble your wedding invitations in batches. Sort each element into piles of, say 30. 30 invitations, 30 pieces of tissue paper, 30 envelopes etc. This way, when you are finished there should be no extra elements left over. If there are, then one (or more) invitations are incomplete. Working in small batches lets you check that all invitations are correctly assembled, without having to go through your entire stack of invitations to find the one that has a reception card missing!
- All inserts should be placed inside a folder invitation on top of the letter, and above the tissue paper. Reception cards are put in first, then the response card, then any other enclosures. The invitation is then placed into the inner envelope fold down so that the items do not fall out when the guest pulls it out of the envelope. The actual writing of your invitation should always face the back of the envelope so that the invitee doesn’t have to turn the card over to read it. The inner envelope should be placed into the outer envelope with the front facing the back of the outer envelope so that the guest sees his or her name as soon as they open the invitation.
- Avoid wearing lipstick when you are assembling your invitations if you will be licking the envelopes to seal them. To save tongue fatigue, invest in a small sponge roller pen that can be filled with water to seal envelopes.
- Decorative seals should be used on the inner envelope, rather than the outer envelope to prevent them from being damaged, dirtied or pulled off while in the mail. If you are using any type of sticker use a small PVC roller that you can pick up in any craft or hobby store to make sure all of the adhesive meets the paper. Using your fingers can cause the sticker to move, or create ugly smudges on your invitations.
- If your wedding invitations include ribbon, spend a bit of time practicing the perfect bow before trying it on your invitations. Don’t tie the bows too tight or you risk tearing the paper. There are some good tutorials online about how to tie a perfect bow.
- Always make sure you have ordered some extra invitations in case one or two are damaged during assembly.
Websites:
www.wedalert.com
http://www.invitedesigner.com/
http://sewing.about.com/od/bowsandribbonshowtos/ss/tiebow.htm
http://www.bhg.com/crafts/weddings/real/bow-making-basics/