Gifting the Girlies- Part 2

My girls all know what one of their gifts is. I just couldn't help myself and I told them. haha. Technically, I didn't want them to spend money on their jewelery since I was planning on having it made. So I told them I was taking care of their jewelery so that they wouldn't waste their money on it.

Although they know what their big gift is, they have no idea what it looks like. And I'd like to keep it that way.If you are one of my bridesmaids, you are not allowed to click on the "read more" link.



Let's start with the Jewelery boxes. After scouring online for some super cool hot pink or turquoise boxes with no luck, I bought them all at the $1 store. Oh yeah. The pink and turquoise boxes were white when I bought them. I painted them with acrylic paint. 2 coats did the trick. I bought the pink ribbon at Walmart and adhered it to the boxes with double sided tape. I then added the little pink bows (which was also a $1 store find).

Inside each box you will find a Jewelery set containing one set of earrings and one necklace. I had the jewelery made with Swarovski Round 6mm beads in Clear AB and Blue Zircon AB that I scored on ebay for a lot cheaper than any bead store. The round swarovski beads were a lot pricier than the bicone beads you usually see, but I wanted something differen--- something special for my girls. I hope they find many uses for their jewelery after my wedding. I seriously want a set for myself.

There is a 10mm Clear Ab drop pendant (I forget what the name of the exact shape was, and it doesn't show up very well, but it is there looking beautiful).



The earrings are made out of a cluster of Swarovski crystals dangling from some o rings and some fabulous squiggly findings I found on ebay.

I got lucky on the jewelery front. My little sister (bridesmaid mini-me) recently became interested in making jewelery (last year) and I simply asked her if she might be interested in making the jewels for me. She said yes. I told her she would obviously know what he gift looked like, and she didn't care. I knew she'd do a good job and she was easy to work with. I simply told her what I wanted the necklaces to look like and she made me 4 samples to choose from(they were all so good it was hard to choose). For the earrings, I asked her if she knew how to make the clusters,and she admitted that she didn't but she'd try, and they came out awesome! So I told her to make them all like that. She does good work doesn't she?

I have one more surprise for the girls, but I probably won't blog about that until after the wedding.

What did you gift for your girls?

Gifting the Girlies

One of the fun parts about being a bridesmaid besides attending all the fun things is getting Gifts from the bride and groom. After spending all that money on the parties and gifts for the bride and groom, it certainly is nice to get something that shows all of that has been appreciated.

I would love to get my girls tons of gifts, but unfortunately I'm not made of money. I don't have a money tree to hit up, but I do have some serious craftiness that comes in pretty handy.

If you are one of my bridesmaids and you thought you'd come and check out my blog, you need to stop reading now. No more reading until after the wedding or you will ruin the surprise and it will be all your own fault. I will not feel one bit sorry for you if you peek.

you've been warned.



One of the bridesmaid gifts I have decided to give the girls is a pair of flip flops. While this may not seem like much, I do have girls traveling from out of town and I don't think they'll think to bring an extra pair of shoes. I thought this would be something really sweet for them to have in case their shoes start hurting them.

I went to Old Navy and bought them each a pair of silver flops. The really comfy ones, yeah, you know which ones I'm talking about.
I wanted to Glam them up a bit. So I went to AC Moore and bought:
all purpose spray adhesive
Silver glitter
and at the grocery store, some small white plastic bags.

First I took the small garbage bags and wrapped the part of the shoe I didn't want glittered so that it wouldn't get hit with adhesive my accident. That's how I roll.


Next, I shook up the spray adhesive and sprayed the silver thong part of the sandal that I wanted to cover in glitter. I then took a spoon and sprinkled the glitter on the thong, and let dry, then cut off the plastic bag.

Hello gorgeous.


I then Cleaned off any excess glitter that I may have gotten on the shoe, or in a spot I didn't want with some packaging tape. Just press down the tape and the glitter comes up easily.

The glitter wasn't sticking as well as I imagined and the thong part felt sticky to me, which I didn't want at all. To resolve this problem, I busted out some Clear Acrylic Sealer that I already had (previously bought at the craft store), and gave the thongs two good coats. That did the trick!Easy, cheap, and fabulous. I know I'd love a pair. In fact, I want to make myself a pair now. You could do this with any color that you wanted to use. Just find the perfect glitter and go to town.

*I did this project outside as it's very messy.
** I HIGHLY suggest using rubber gloves because if you get the spray adhesive on your hand, it's really sticky, gross, and takes forever to get off.

What fun finds do you have planned for your girls?

To Bling or not to Bling, that is the question.

These are so amazingly cute. And if I was a rich bride, I wouldn't think twice about buying them for my amazing bridesmaids, but since I'm not a rich bride, and I have six (6) bridesmaids, these cute havianna flops with swarovski's that sell for $56/pair are out. Way out.
Drool. What a great bridesmaid gift this would be. I sure know I would dig it.

Would I, could I, make them myself? For an Insane moment I seriously considered it. I had some swarovski flatback crystals hanging around leftover from my cake topper project when I decided smaller was better. ... hmmm.

I grabbed a pair of flops to try it out and realized:
1. Adorning flip flops with swarovski= super time consuming, time in which I do not have to do 6 pairs.

2. the rubber cemement I thought would work wonderfully, sadly, did not (I bought to craft rubber cement, totally different than the real rubber cement. The craft one sucks and the crystals were wiping off).

3. It was not turning out as pretty as these ( I think larger swarovski's were needed).

4. I was not buying more swarovski's.

Like I said before, these were out, but something else was in. A better idea, a cheaper idea, a way less time consuming idea....

Have you started a project only to flip flop halfway through and go a totally different way in the end?