"WFW" Book Centerpieces - Final Reveal!

Yes folks, I'm throwing my blooming books wedding centerpieces into the ring to try out for Creating with the STARS!!  Click over to vote for me - the stars pick the top 11 and the submission with the most clicks gets the 12th spot! Find my submission in the linky party (Scroll to #177) and CLICK ON IT! Wish me luck!

And if you landed here because I asked you to vote on my Facebook page - thank you! Success!

And now back to our regularly scheduled program:

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Prepare yourself folks.  I'm jam packing this post with lots of pictures because I still have a ton of wedding projects to share. Last we left off on the topic, I was a string-gluing fiend, trying to get my "books" in order for our centerpieces.  After I finally got all of our "pages" glued on, next up were some finishing touches - another layer of spray paint (they got a little scuffed up from being handled constantly), some gold paint on the spines, cutting the actual holes for the planters, and a few layers of spray sealant (to avoid more scuffing).

Imagine my elation when I realized I needed 20+ somethings that were a few inches tall to raise the books off of the ground while spray painting and I knew just the thing to use:

I blame/am proud of the fact that I have so many shot glasses because I went to college here: Go Danes!

After a long time of looking for alternatives, we finally decided to just keep our little succulent plants in their green plastic pots, and we simply cut holes in the top of each book.  The cardboard was surprisingly hard to cut through, and we ended up using a combination of hammering holes around the circumference of our circle-to-be, and then using a pair of heavy duty shears to cut away the opening.  The outcome wasn't the cleanest, but once the pot was in there, it was hardly noticeable.  I contemplated adding a paper doily to the edge, or draping some more burlap around the edge, but in the end, we were getting lazy and running out of time.  I was overall extremely happy with how they came out!

The table numbers were hand drawn on resume paper - quick, cheap, and easy!  I had tons of this turquoise wire from a failed project and decided to make my own table number holders by simply wrapping the wire around the mouth of a water bottle.  I added my paper rosettes to my succulents and we were practically ready to go.

Those tall succulents on the right were actually called a "matrimony" plant!

The table runners were another agonizingly long project, strictly because of the volume. Twenty two runners ended up costing me approximately $130, which was muuuch cheaper than renting linens.  I simply cut out strips of the rosette fabric 120" x 6", and with my 4" burlap strips folded over creating a hem around all four edges, they ended up being approximately 122" x 9".  

Helper Cats

My god they love to iron.

I found it worked easier if I ironed the burlap in half first, then went back and covered the edges of the rosette fabric and inserted my iron on hem tape on the top side.  I didn't bother adding it to the bottom because it seemed to catch enough as it was, and since there was already a nice iron fold, I wasn't concerned about it coming apart.  I also purchased plain white 124" x 14" table runners from a wholesale linen company for $3.30 a piece, and rented gold linen napkins through our tent company. They looked great together!

I plan to sell off most of this decor now that the wedding is over - once I get my inventory organized (some people took some things after the wedding as keepsakes so I need to figure out how much I have left of each  item) I'll be back with a post of what is available! Leave a comment if you are interested in anything or would like more explicit details on how to make any of these items yourself!