Help me understand DIY invites

[hoofbeats95]

One year I made all my Christmas cards. So this shouldn't be that hard for me!

However, I just can't grasp the invite thing. Maybe I'm scared of my printer! I hate paper jams and smeared ink. Is it cost effective to have a place like Kinko's do it?

I looked at Michael's and don't like any of the invites there. I need something springy and pink! Cute, not traditional. Could someone help me come up with ideas. We are splurging on a photo booth and an expensive cake. So I'd like to cut the cost of invites way down.

 

[jaylex]

I would be way too terrified to do my own invites lol...

Try vistaprint! They are ALWAYS (and I mean ALWAYS) having sales. If you buy anything at full price, you are crazy lol.
Just sign up and they will email you deals.
Here are some cute, pink and springy invites:

http://www.vistaprint.com/vp/ns/easypat ... breadcrumb

http://www.vistaprint.com/vp/ns/easypat ... breadcrumb

http://www.vistaprint.com/vp/ns/easypat ... =992687215

http://www.vistaprint.com/vp/ns/easypat ... =992687598

http://www.vistaprint.com/vp/ns/easypat ... 6xnid%3d96

http://www.vistaprint.com/vp/ns/easypat ... =992688588


There are more too!

 

[Clairitek]

Check out the DIY thread stickied at the top of this forum for links to tons of PSers DIY invites.

Also check out Target for cute print-at-home invitations if you don't want to do the whole thing 100% yourself and just want to print at home. They have so many awesome options from their Letter imPress line. I know two people who have used them for their wedding invites and I used some adorable dandelion design ones for my friend's shower last summer.

 

[Clairitek]

How about these Cherry Blossom invitations from Target?

http://www.target.com/Cherry-Blosso...rchRank=target104545&sr=1-13&searchPage=1&rh=

 

[hoofbeats95]

Thanks!

I'm trying to stay away from cherry blossoms as I not incorporating them into the wedding decor at all.

I'd love to do something like this: http://www.stlwed.com/forum/viewtopic.p ... 45&start=0 But I really have no idea how/where to start.

 

[wannaBMrsH]

If you have already designed your invitation, I would recommend taking it to Office Max or one of those places for printing.

We used Office Max for our Semi-DIY invitations and everyone raved about them. I call them semi-DIY because we bought the pocketfolds and had a graphic designer design our invite, but we printed and assembled it.

We did 150 invitations (including 2 5x7 inserts and 4 smaller, tiered inserts per invite) for under $200. We just laid out all the print work and took the flashdrive with the information to Office Max. Because we bought the paper and printing, they also then cut our invites for free. That meant that we could print two of each invite on a single sheet of paper (or 4 of the smallest inserts on each page) and they used their laser cut thing to cut them and give them to us completely finished and ready for us to mount.

I will try to find a link to my invites and edit this shortly.

ETA: Here is the link to my invites https://www.pricescope.com/communit...-invitations-pics.120601/#post-117975#p117975

Good Luck!

 

[hoofbeats95]

If you have already designed your invitation, I would recommend taking it to Office Max or one of those places for printing.

We used Office Max for our Semi-DIY invitations and everyone raved about them. I call them semi-DIY because we bought the pocketfolds and had a graphic designer design our invite, but we printed and assembled it.

We did 150 invitations (including 2 5x7 inserts and 4 smaller, tiered inserts per invite) for under $200. We just laid out all the print work and took the flashdrive with the information to Office Max. Because we bought the paper and printing, they also then cut our invites for free. That meant that we could print two of each invite on a single sheet of paper (or 4 of the smallest inserts on each page) and they used their laser cut thing to cut them and give them to us completely finished and ready for us to mount.

I will try to find a link to my invites and edit this shortly.

ETA: Here is the link to my invites https://www.pricescope.com/communit...-invitations-pics.120601/#post-117975#p117975

Good Luck!

Wow! These are GREAT! I'd have no prob doing something semi-DIY like this. I don't have them designed yet though. What is a good way to do that? You'd have to get pretty exact measurements and stuff?

 

[wannaBMrsH]

If you are getting a graphic designer to create them for you, let them know what you want (5x5 square, 5x7 horizontal, 6x8 vertical, etc.) and and no matter what you choose, make sure that you know where you are going to buy the envelopes for them BEFORE you print the invites or you might have a harder time finding envelopes for them.

If you are creating them yourself, set the paper size before you start. Then try to see if you can fit two side by side or on top of each other in one 8x10 paper to save on printing.

Good Luck!

 

[lulu66]

hey i designed my own; had them printed at office depot. i ordered my own cardstock though because i didn't like theirs. for 100 invites (with invite & rsvp postage), i spent about $200. to me it was totally worth it but i have a lot of free time on my hands right now (unemployed). i'm about to do a little post about my invites & i'll break it down for ya.

 

[hoofbeats95]

What program would I use to format a sheet of paper into two square invites?

 

[wannaBMrsH]

We used Photoshop for our invitations and that allowed us to use whatever dimensions we wanted.

If you don't have photoshop, we used MS Publisher for our programs, info packs, etc. and you can select your papersize from there.

I would think that you can lay out 2 5x5 on each legal sized paper (11x14), but I would confirm that the cardstock you want is available in that size. For example we used 80# linen paper and the biggest size our printer carried was letter size (8x11).

I hope that helps!