Gilmore Girls-themed Bachelorette

For my best friend's bachelorette, we headed to NOLA for the weekend.  It was such an amazing trip.  NOLA is definitely a place I would revisit, just for the fried chicken alone.

Anyways, the bride to be is a huge Gilmore Girls fan, so she requested a Gilmore Girls theme for her bach.  Challenge. Accepted.

At first I thought incorporating Gilmore Girls into a raunchy bachelorette weekend in New Orleans would be weird, since there didn't seem to be an obvious connection between GG and NOLA (EXCEPT ZYDECO). But I realized I was just overthinking it.  Not everything has to blend together theme-wise in a bachelorette party.  A bachelorette party is just a regular party but with an inflatable penis added to the mix (and in this case, penis straws and penis candles (also, I can't believe I just said penis on my blog)).  

Whenever I searched Pinterest for Gilmore Girls bachelorette parties, there wasn't that much content specifically for a bach, but just for regular viewing parties.  So to be honest, I'm posting this on here and adding it to Pinterest to fill that Gilmore Girls-themed bachelorette void.  To keep with the theme, but make it personalized for the bride,  I made Team Dean/Logan/JESS buttons, but photoshopped her face onto the pins.  Not enough Team Jess fans like me in our party tbh, but its okay.

We also wanted souvenir shirts for the occasion.  If you search bachelorette party shirts online there would be cute ones that say "Bride Tribe" or even NOLA themed ones like "Bourbon Bach " or whatnot.  All of those are cute and all, but me being me needed something more personalized, and something that went with the theme.  So I designed Kirk shirts!  But instead of "Babette Ate Oatmeal",  I made it refer to the bride saying YAAAS.  (If you are wondering what font Kirk uses for his shirts and his films, its Arial.)

Here is the Kirk shirt reference.  Is he underrated? I think so.  I think he hustles hard but still manages to be an idiot and like that about him. lol.  Anyways, I love Stars Hollow.

I loved them so much.  I used uberprints.com since I've always used them during my coaching days and had no problem with them.  My only con about the shirts would be the fabric wasn't as soft as I wanted them to be compared to the shirts I ordered from them before.  I also had an issue with one shirt having the design smudged, but customer service was great and they sent me a replacement shirt.  Delivery was really fast for custom shirts, especially when you order digital screenprinting.

As far as other Gilmore Girls theme bach ideas, we decorated the airbnb with Luke's diner images (you can print out the "No Cell Phones" sign online for free).  And the first night in NOLA was spent ordering hella takeout and watching all the wedding/bach-themed Gilmore Girls episodes (the airbnb we stayed in had Netflix!)  Always over-order food, that is the Gilmore way.  Also, its a really good idea for bachelorette weekends anyway because leftovers are a great late night snack.

Iron-on Transfer Experiment (Part 2)

Okay, so I finally used those iron-on transfers I made of my dog.  I had some leftover canvas fabric lying around and I wanted to make a pouch that was larger than the ones I usually make.  Kind of like a big clutch, to place in my tote bag to keep smaller stuff together, and take out if I didn't want to carry the huge tote.  Also, I decided to sew in some nylon lining to give it some weight and make it more sturdy.  The most frustrating part of this project was ironing on the Mochis.  They didn't iron on as nicely as I wanted them to. The transfer paper was from like, 10 years old, so I will blame the quality of these transfers on that.  Regardless, I still liked the outcome even tho it is not perfect because: 1. It has that worn-in look that complements the canvas material and 2. I like anything with my dog on it.

Iron-on Transfer Experiment (Part 1)

I had this iron-on transfer paper lying around from an old t-shirt project (my college intramural volleyball team if u really want to know) and I wanted to play around with it.  I thought it would be funny if it involved my dog's pretty face.  I mean, obviously! The guy is good-looking!  This pic was taken after he had his annual vaccinations done.  You'd think he'd be sad that he was poked with needles, but he's just happy we left the place.

I used Photoshop to trim out his face, and smooth the edges.  His left eye had an annoying piece of hair covering it, so I fixed that too (clone stamp tool), just to make  his eyes clear and round.

Since my printer only has black ink, I had to make the photo greyscale, and adjust it to a shade dark enough that it can show up on fabric. Make sure to print out the mirror image, otherwise when you iron it on it will show up backwards.

I printed out two sheets (for now).  Hancock Fabrics is out of business, and I hate that there aren't any fabric stores nearby. :-(  Once I get some suitable fabric, I'll be able to use these puppies. ;-)

TO BE CONTINUED...

Simple Photo Magnet

Do people even get photos processed/printed anymore?  Everything is all digital nowadays, but I really wanted to print this photo out.  It was taken at an event where everyone was able to come and support the kids, and knowing that, I felt the need to have a hard copy of the moment.  I wanted to personalize it, so I used my limited photoshop skills to label and make them wallet-sized so that 8 wallets (4x3) can fit on an 8x12 print.  2-8x12 prints aka 16 wallet-sized photos were just under $3.50 at Costco.  I then bought plastic photo sleeves, trimmed the ends and used double stick tape to stick magnetic strips I had lying around to the back.  I mailed them out w/ thank you cards.

Design Update

When my old laptop died after over 8 years of good times, it was sad.  That thing had its moments, but it also had a fan replacement, a hard drive crash, and basically died a slow, broken hard-drive, overheated death.  It was sad, but what was most upsetting was Photoshop 7.0 was installed on it, you guys.  Trying to design a blog to make it my own without the use of my trusty old photoshop software was kind of a challenge.  I didn't want to shell out the money to get Photoshop again,  it's not that serious.  So I ended up downloading GIMP.  For a free program, it is really good and I can see why a lot of people recommended it.  But I was used to Photoshop,  and already knew it was going to take some time for me to get used to all these features and such.  I tried to find the user manual online and ended up googling other Photoshop alternatives again.  Fortunately, I found out that Adobe released Photoshop CS2 for free on their website.  It's been on there for free for over a year.  Like, an actually legal download of Photoshop software.  For the free!  ::fist pumps::

Anyways, my point is that I updated this blog's design and it looks more crisp than the design I made using PhotoScape.  I like how it turned out,  but I need more content.  That, is something I am working on.