YAY! I Heart Flags

Today marks exactly 13 months until our wedding! Yes, yes - I know... that's still a loooong time before the big day. But the last four months have flown by and I'm sure before I know it the wedding will be two weeks away and I'll be curled up in a corner somewhere freaking out because I still have so much to do. Such is the experience of a DIY bride. Or so I've been warned.

Behind the scenes, Eric and I are chipping away at booking our vendors and making good progress. But, as a visual girl (and one who realizes how much work is ahead of her), I wanted to get cracking on something more tangible for the wedding. But something I knew I wouldn't change my mind on in the next year. One of the first details I knew I wanted was to provide each guest a cute little flag at the ceremony to wave after Eric and I are pronounced husband and wife as we walk down the aisle. I'd seen the idea for "YAY" flags online and thought it was so sweet and fun - a definite must for the ceremony! In all my excitement, I purchased the materials back in the beginning of March.

I contemplated sewing and assembling the flags myself, but when I crunched the numbers and thought about the actual work time I'd put in to them, I decided to buy pre-made flags. Luckily, the Oriental Trading Company had the exact-size blank flags I was looking for for super cheap. And for the "YAY," I decided to use a custom-made plastic stencil I ordered for about $5 at JustStencils.com.

YAY, indeed. Except, when I put the stencil on top of the flag, it was about half an inch wide on both sides. I was a little miffed, because I customized the stencil online so it would fit the canvas flag perfectly, but it came to me just a bit bigger than I would've liked. So, I took matters into my own hands and did a little.... editing.

Meet my ultra-jacked-up, but perfectly sized stencil.... held together by painters tape.

You know me - only the classiest, folks.

I started off with yellow acrylic paint, stenciling it on with a thin foam brush. 

After about 15 YAY flags were painted, I realized I wanted a little variety in these flags. I didn't necessarily want to make another word (I wasn't entirely sure I could fit another word on the flags besides simple, three-letter YAY), so I decided on something a little more graphic: A big ol' heart stamp!

I went to Michael's in search of a large heart stamp, but couldn't find anything remotely right at three different locations. Again, I took matters into my own hands and decided to create my own heart stamp.

I purchased a 69-cent wooden heart block for the stamp base.

Then bought a sheet of red foam for something like 30 cents and cut out a big heart from it. I glued it all together with super tacky craft glue.

It made for the perfect-size stamp. To make things a bit less sloppy, I painted the paint onto the stamp with a foam brush for a light coating (I used both pink and turquoise) and pressed the stamp onto the canvas flags - the stamp gives the hearts a nice, rustic, not-perfectly-painted look... which is just what I was going for.

I love the yellow, pink and turquoise colors together! Right away, guests should catch the vibe that this is a fun, relaxed, not-at-all stuffy affair.

I'm only about 1/3 of the way through making these flags, but I'm thinking I'll make 2/3 of them the YAY flags, with the other third as hearts. I'll probably change up my next 15 YAY flags with a different color, as well. I can't wait to see them in action! Hopefully it will make a great photo op, with everyone waving their flags as we walk down the aisle as husband and wife. Or, at the very least, I just hope our guests will actually wave their flags to begin with!

P.S. Did you catch how I used one of the pink hearts to dress up the new shelf in our guest room? Who says wedding decorations can only be used for the event itself?!