Homemade Wedding Gift "Take 2"

Some good friends just got married. As I decided on a gift, I reflected on my own wedding 13 years ago.  I can only think of 3 wedding gifts that I still have and remember who gave them to me.  My wedding topper. (Which my kids just broke.  Thoughtful, I know.)  A painting made by our artist friend, Joe Penrod, and a recipe book scrapbooked for us by his wife, Michelle Penrod.  (Pictures are at the end of this blog post.)  The painting always hangs in the entryway of each house we move to.  We're military so that painting is well traveled.  :)  It's hung in at least 9 homes, 2 countries, and 6 states in those 13 years.  Several of Michelle's recipes have become family favorites and every time I open the recipe book I am amazed at the time and effort that went into the gift.

In light of these thoughts, I decided to make a personal gift for my friends.  Another picture frame similar to the first one I made HERE.  It seems to be the most popular thing on my blog.  I used their wedding invitation, save the date card, envelope and rsvp.  It has become my favorite type of art to make.  I think it turned out great.  In light of my reflections, I also decided to make my own version of a recipe book inspired by the one given to me.  I hope they like it!

This is the 4x6 picture frame.  The purple paper was the envelope the invitation came in.  That was so useful!  From working on the last 'wedding invitation picture frame' I learned that a mistake in cutting can be costly.  So this time I made several photocopies of each invitation/announcement I was going to cut up.  I could cut up the copies with no worries and once I had decided how I wanted everything, then I cut the originals.  

I always like to show the mess I make of the invitations.  This is only a 10th of the mess I made but, you get the idea.

The congratulations card I made for them.

 For the recipe book I used a photo album.  The front is also made out of the wedding invitation.

 I stamped the purple envelope paper with a background stamp in irridecent ink.  Hard to see it here but it is really pretty.

I made my recipe cards and category cards roughly a 4x6 size and slipped them into the photo slots.  The cards can be rearranged and added to easily.  The little pink tabs peeking from behind some of the cards had some extra info for the recipes and are to be removed by the recipient.  I only included a few favorite recipes so there is plenty of room for them to add their own recipe cards.

 The mini pumpkins are one of my favorite accents to any of the cards.  So cute.

If you want any of these recipes leave a comment with a way to contact you or email me at: natlukecannon@yahoo.com   and I will post them on my recipe blog.

Decapitated wedding topper.  Haven't been able to find the grooms head but I'm hoping it will turn up at our next move.

 My favorite art piece by Joe Penrod.  

A little sample of the care and hard work that went into Michelle's recipe book.