I WANTED my hubby's birthday and at the same time, my first baby shower's gathering to be as budget friendly as possible without compromising its quality. I opted for simple yet very personalized invitations and party favors, so I decided to go for DIY (do-it-yourself) crafts and explore my creative side.
Since my hubby and I are both Teachers and thus, keep a lot of books, notebooks, note pads, pens and other stationery items in the house, I came up with an interesting idea for the invitations and party favors ideal to our jobs and career.
DIY PERSONALIZED INVITATIONS
For our invitations, I decided to make some bookmarks (and hey, I love reading, too, so this is an ideal one for me). I just lay-outed one of our photos with the help of Google's Picassa photo editor. It's user friendly, simple and very easy to navigate. The software can also be downloaded for free, so it's cost-friendly and hassle-free.
I added the information about the party on the photo -- the event name, date, time and venue of the event, etc. -- and did a quick fix with its color and exposure. This is the partial output...
I also included the directions and pasted them at the back of the picture below the name of the person to be invited. Then I had the small, card-sized photo laminated.
Oh yes, a laminator is needed here. I just bought mine about two years ago for our personalized wedding favors, so it's the same one I used here. In case you don't have one, you can just cover the photo with a (2-inch or more size) scotch tape, so it would also look like it's being laminated. Just make sure you avoid any air from forming inside the tape.
Then with the help of a puncher, I punched a small round hole at one side, then tied a silk ribbon on the hole. The outcome was really neat, simple and overall, beautiful.
DIY PERSONALIZED PARTY FAVORS
As for the party favors, I prepared few goody bags for the kids. I made some colorful paper bags from recycled gift wrappers and filled them up with some sweets, cookies and crackers I bought from the supermarket. For a personalized touch, I folded the opening of the paper bags twice (about a centimeter and a half size) then punched a small hole in the middle of the folded area. I inserted a silk ribbon in the hole and attached the laminated "Thank You" card I personally formatted in Google Picassa photo editor, then tied the ribbon in a creative knot to hold the card in place.
It's so easy to make the paper bags for the goodies. You can use any recycled gift wrapper or even old magazines to make some. I was able to save a few bucks on them. I will include a step-by-step tutorial on how to make your own paper bags from recycled materials for some eco-friendly gifts or party favors in another blog-post.
For those who do not consider themselves kids anymore, I also prepared another party favors for them. Since I love writing, I decided to give out personalized notepads. I bought very small notepads from Daiso, a 100-yen shop. There are 3 notepads in a pack of only 100 Japanese yen (equivalent to about a dollar or about 41 in Philippine peso), which means, I only got each notebook for 33 yen (about 0.3 dollars and 15 in peso).
I just pasted some animated pictures on the front cover. I made a personalized poem and pasted it on the back cover of the notepad. I also printed small oval-shaped photo of a baby boy, put a silk ribbon on it then laminated the photo so the ribbon is firmly attached to the photo. I then attached the ribbon with the laminated photo in the inner back cover near the spine of the notepad to serve as a book mark. The output was really neat, personalized, budget friendly and pretty!
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