Wedding centerpieces

Dear Shayne,

Hard to believe, but I am still talking about the crafts I made for my wedding in July. Sorry for dragging it out so long, but it's been one of those years -- I'm slow.

Sooo... I made our centerpieces for the reception out of votive candle holders glued to decorated hockey pucks:

(Photo taken by Kevin Lam Photography.)

This was a pull-it-all-together-at-the-last-minute craft because we didn't want to take the hockey pucks and votive holders with us from California to Toronto. So we bought them there the week before the wedding. Exciting!

I made the puck stickers at home before we left -- I used Marvy's scalloped circle 3 inch punch on red and white patterned papers and then I ran the cut circles through the Xyron sticker maker (love that thing!) So all I had to do was stick the stickers to the pucks once we bought them. Then I glued the candle holders on top!

One sad part of this story is that my Crafty Group at work (Hi, Crafty Group!) knit candle cozies for me but one of them caught on fire at the reception, so we had to pull them all from the tables. Such a bummer. I had tested most of the yarns to make sure they were not flammable, but I didn't test the one that went up in smoke. So there's a lesson to be learned: Test every yarn. You know, so you don't burn down the Hockey Hall of Fame.

The fabric toppers were super fun to make -- each one was different. I collected red and white fabrics throughout the year and then brought them all with me to Toronto. We rented sewing machines at The Workroom to make the toppers -- Jenny came to town on Thursday and we headed straight over there to sew.

What a fun place! Karyn, the owner, was so helpful. I was nervous about using a serger on the edges, but she encouraged me and they came out great.

If I lived in Toronto, I think I would spend a lot of time at The Workroom. Look how great it is:


And here's a view of the other side -- just gorgeous!

(These photos taken from The Workroom's Flickr photostream. I was too stressed out to take photos while I was there.)

Making those table toppers turned out to be a real highlight of the week -- time to sew with my best friend was such an awesome wedding gift. :) My plan is to make them into a quilt at some point -- add it to the list of 2010 projects! (Or, er, maybe 2011...)

love,
kelly