DIY Life

Cupcakes have come into vogue as a sweet alternative to the traditional wedding cake. No fussing with cutting the cake, and guests can choose from a variety of flavors. Besides that, a well-decorated cupcake is just plain adorable!

If you have a couple hundred guests, though, that's a couple hundred cupcakes, at least. Where on earth do you serve them? Cupcake stands are the norm, but generally these hold only a couple of dozen.

If you're an enterprising DIY bride, however, you might just want to craft a cupcake stand to beat all cupcake stands, and put a solid 375 cupcakes on the one, enormous tree! You could consider it the centerpiece to the reception hall!

So your wedding day is near, and you still haven't made up your mind about table centerpieces.

Last year, I wrote a post with ideas for 8 do it yourself wedding centerpieces. It's been very popular since it was published, but I know that there are hundreds of additional impressive ways to go about making a beautiful visual feature for your guest's tables.

Let's face it: you want your wedding day to be perfect, and saving money on your centerpieces will give you a sigh of relief. Knowing that you and your wedding party made them yourselves will also give you great satisfaction. "Inexpensive" does not necessarily mean "cheap"; anything that you can do for your wedding day or even your day to day life to save money will make you happier in the long run.

Follow me after the break, as I try again to give you some inexpensive ideas for creating your own beautiful centerpieces.

Let's face it: everything today is expensive. Where they really get you, though, is with anything wedding. You can always benefit financially from doing-it-yourself. You've probably thought about making and assembling your own wedding invitations and favors, but have you considered creating your own wedding bouquet?

Simple bouquets are more stylish these days, and that works in your favor. Some general tips for making your own wedding bouquet are at All Wedding Ideas and include:

• coordinating colors and tones with the bride's and bridesmaids' dresses
• making sure to have at least eight of the main flowers in your bouquet on hand
• arranging starting with the largest main flowers and work out from the center
• accentuating the finished floral arrangement with beads, tulle, ribbon, and lace

Weddings are so fun, but for the bride and groom, getting prepared for their special day can be a hassle. It is quite a feat to pull off a wedding without a hitch.

Although it is exhilarating to pick out flowers, the hall, the chapel, and those you've chosen to be in your wedding party, it can get a little frustrating to agree on all aspects of the day.

You can take the hassle out of choosing your wedding invitations with an awesome instructable that teaches how to print and assemble multi-layered wedding invitations.

A shadow box is a shallow box, with a glass framed front. You can put photo collages and other memorabilia inside, then hang it on your wall as you would any other picture frame. You'll find shadowboxes in a variety of sizes and style at your local craft store.

One of our most beautiful wedding gifts was a shadow box, made by a friend of ours. She included our invitation and dried flowers in our wedding colors.

I hope to make one for my sister's wedding, but I'm going to hold off until after the big day. This way I can include some wedding day mementos, like the groom's boutonniere, one of the wedding favors and a couple of place cards.

This is one of those projects where you have free reign to exercise your own creativity, and personalize it as much as you want. You can create a clean, contemporary look by choosing to focus on the invitation or one photo, then add a few embellishments to compliment it.

You can also make something regal with rich color choices, and an abundance of items decorating the box. Include the bride's tiara just for fun. If you're having trouble getting started, check out these step-by-step instructions on creating your own shadow box.

Bad days are rough by definition. Sometimes, you'll know from the moment you wake up that something doesn't feel right. Other times, you'll have a day that seemed fine until a turning point: a moment when you got bad news, or when someone was needlessly rude to you, or when you got stuck in traffic for two hours because of a storm. What can you do to turn things around?

Over at the sweet blog iCing, Gala recently posted 50 ways to salvage a bad day. For example, you can try:

• Treating yourself with a small luxury, like a fancy bath, a manicure, pretty flowers, or a few pieces of fine chocolate
• Changing your surroundings in some way: a walk in the park? a decision to go home and watch your favorite movie?
• Listening to your favorite upbeat music
• Spending time on adorable or funny websites, like Cute Overload and I Can Has Cheezburger
• Getting some exercise
• Baking
• Making art or otherwise working on a craft project for fun
• Seeking out supportive friends
• Making "a list of things you're grateful for"

There are many more suggestions in the original post... and in the replies it received (almost 100)!

Granted, some of these ideas are subjective: not everyone enjoys Tank Girl, zines, and books by Francesca Lia Block. Nor will they solve serious, clinical depression, the kind that merits medical attention. But there's at least a grain of truth in all of them, in that reducing each idea to its basic concept and then following that directive probably will comfort you and improve your mood.

The Print Gocco is a screen printing device from Japan. It's only about the size of an average shoe box, but it allows you to print just about anything you can imagine... as long as your design is around 4"x6".

Print Gocco was originally created as a card printing machine, long before electronic printers with good image quality were affordable and widely available for home use. So what better way to demonstrate its basic capabilities than by making some cool holiday cards? (You can also use what you learn in this tutorial to make all the wedding stationery you could possibly need.)

The process takes some set-up, but once you've chosen and prepared your design, you can easily print off a bunch of unique, artistic cards in less than an hour. Join me after the break to find out how!

Couples can now make their own (or probably each others) wedding rings. It used to be that you'd choose between buying something ready-made from the store, or having a jeweler custom-make one for you. Now there is another option: design and craft your own.

This innovative concept by New York Wedding Ring is offered in both their New York and San Francisco studios. Each step, from design to final touches, will be under the guidance and supervision of a professional jeweler. You don't need any prior metal arts experience, or any real understanding of jewelry. Most designs can be completed in a one day workshop. More complicated plans may require an extra day. This would be a really fun workshop to take together.

They also offer engagement ring workshops. Just imagine how impressed she'll be when you propose with a ring that you crafted personally just for her.

If you've been paying attention to my weekly Westravaganza feature, you probably know how involved planning and executing a wedding can be. The list of details and the involvement of so many people would make the heads of some CEOs spin.

But it can be done -- it's a huge labor of love that can't be denied. To that end, a sister blog of DIY Life -- AisleDash -- launches today focused on, you guessed it, weddings!

If you're planning to toast some nuptials soon, have done so decades ago, or are thinking about proposing to your significant other sometime soon, you'd be wise to check out all the great content over at AisleDash. It's already amassed a huge smorgasbord of content. Spend a little time reading over there and you'll see why the name is what it is -- you'll be dashing for the wedding aisle in reality. Or, you can relive your special day with the husband or wife while huddled around the laptop this coming weekend.

Every little girl wants to be a princess. Not every little girl is born into a royal family though, so she just has to dream. Now, thanks to this video that woman that has not given up the dream of being a princess can learn how to become one. Since I am posting this for all to see you may need to pick a different prince to try this out on but I would think that it would still work.

Just be cautious, this could backfire if not used with caution, and please don't blame me if you get arrested for stalking. (Yes, I know that this is and I am full of it)