Mrs. Irish P's wood veneer invitations

Well, here are the long awaited veneer wood invitations instructions. First, here is the list of supplies that I used.

1. Veneer wood purchased off the web (www.ebay.com). Make sure that the veneer wood is 1/42” thick so it is able to feed thru a printer- I bought maple cherry wood and white tiger oak. The wood needs to be light in color so that the printer ink and image will appear on the wood.
2. Printer
3. Gold business card envelopes
4. Papersource A2 rounded cards in color beet
5. Peacock feathers
6. Small green jewelry beads- purchased from wal-mart
7. Medium blue clear beads- purchased from wal-mart
8. Gold 3/8" Satin Edged Organza Ribbon- 25 yard for $2.50 at website www.smartyhadaparty.com
9. Wood burning tool from wal-mart that  comes with various attachments

10.  Tissue paper - target

11.  Crinkle shred – target

12.  Scissors

13.  White address labels

14.  Personalized peacock feather stamp purchased from for sending the invitations and for the response cards from zazzle.com

15.  White card stack

16.  Pearl Jewelry Box 7 X 5 X 1 1/4  50CT ESPRESSO- at $0.78 per box

17.  Kraft brown wrapping paper

18.  Peacock feather stamp

19.  Black stamp ink Ruler

20.  Pencil

21.  Microsoft word

22.  Paper punch edge rounder

This seems like a long list of things but it really isn’t. Most of the items I bought from target, wal-mart and big lots. I am all about the bargain.

First make sure that the printer you have can print on the veneer wood. A standard printer will do. I used my old Lexmark Z2420 printer. Cut the veneer wood to the size you want the invitations to be. (Make sure you cut them about 1/4" larger on all sides so that you can trim later.

Go to Microsoft word and choose your font and size for your wording. Before printing on the actual wood test the look out on a piece of standard paper. Make sure you change the size of the paper in Microsoft word so that the wording will fit on the invitation.

Once satisfied with the wording and font print the wording on a piece of the veneer wood. If you like you could also find a black and white clipart design and print that on the invitation as well. Then you would not need the stamp and stamp ink.

Place the stamp on the ink pad and stamp your image on the wood.

Use a ruler to measure out the size of the box on the wood to make sure the complete image will fit within the box without cutting any of your design off.

Once size has been established plug in the burning tool and after tool has been thoroughly heated (about 4-5 minutes) start burning your design.

The completed invitation. The back color is the white tiger oak and the front is the cherry maple.

Take rounded A2 cards and print directions on them. Make sure you change the paper size in Microsoft word program so that the word will fit on the card.

Print map on white cardstock and adhere to purple cardstock.

Go to Microsoft word and design a response card. I was able to print 4 response cards per sheet of veneer.

Cut the peacock feather to about 3-4 inches. Feed the beads on the end and add a small dot of hot glue to make sure the beads do not fall off.

After making all invitations and response cards cut to size and use the paper punch edge rounder and round the ends. You do not have to do this but I think it makes it look a bit cleaner.

Attach the printed address labels and stamps to the response envelopes. Those are our customized stamps.

Lay tissue paper in box. Add a little crinkle shred.

Assemble invitation, response card and envelope, directions and feather with ribbon. Place in box. Fold paper over to cover. Lay another feather on top and close box.

 Wrap in brown Kraft shipping paper. And it’s ready to ship.

Per invitation it cost $1.50. My business major finance, Mr. P, did all my calculations and divided it by 100. If you are not willing to go thru these lengths then by all means purchase the veneer wood invitations. But I myself was not willing to spend $2,000 on veneer wood invitations so I did it myself.

Awesome, Thanks! These are so unique. I love your ideas!

oh my word... these are absolutely insane.  Amazing job! I would love to be a guest at your wedding to receive one of these in the mail.  What did they cost you to mail? 

They cost around $1.60 to mail. To make them took no time at all. We got about 50 done in a two or three days. So with mailing and the cost to make it totaled around $3.10.

No I did not get paperbacked veneer. I used white oak and curly maple veneer. If the wood is thin and not to dark it will feed thru a regular printer and print perfectly. I tested this with 20 types of scrap wood veneer I bought off ebay and it worked. Just make sure your printer is a standard printer, the one that feeds paper from the top and it comes out of the bottom. I actually instead of making a bow I made faux wax seals using gold hot glue and my glue gun. If you have any questions or concerns please do not hesitate to ask  :-)

Just curious, what size did you make your invitations? I see your boxes are 7x5. Are the invites the same size or more like 4x6?