Wedding Gift Made Out Of The Couple's Wedding Invitation

Last weekend, my beautiful cousin got married at a chilly, outdoor ceremony next to the river. The day was gorgeous! I always love shopping for wedding gifts {that is, when target isn't out of everything!} but being a newlywed, I realize probably just want money more than anything! So in true diy fashion, I decided to make them a tiny, little gift to go along with their cash... and I made it out of their wedding invitation! 

Supplies: 

clear ornaments

foam paintbrush

the lovely couple's wedding invitation

ribbon {not pictured}

 I started off by taking their wedding invitation and cutting it horizontally into varying sized strips. I tried to cut them so that you could still read each line & see the cute little symbols and details that they had on their invites. They were made by another cousin of ours {who also made our save the dates!} 

 Here's what it looked like all cut out. The invitations were pretty small, so I ended up using two {i stole my mom's!} but I could have just used a smaller ornament! 

 I wrapped the invitations around a foam paintbrush handle. At first, I thought they weren't "curly" enough... but in the end I found that the bigger the curls were, the better. 

 I just love that you can read all of the sweet details! 

 I put them inside of an ornament & added a few strips of matching ribbon. Right before I rushed out the door, I ended up adding a few more strips of ribbon to make it look more full but I didn't get a picture of it!

 I love how it turned out! And they will have a sweet reminder of their wedding day & their first Christmas as a married couple. Mr. ji@h and I have a meaningful ornament from every year since we were engaged {ok, so, that's only 2 years} and I can't wait for the day when we can look back on the last 10 years and see all the fun things we did that year via our Christmas tree! 

 I apologize for these pictures... between the iridescence & the shimmer paper of the invites it was really hard to take pictures of! 

What other fun ornaments have you made? Here's to hoping that next year I will be making a baby ornament to commemorate 2012!! :)