Asher's Baptism Artwork - First Attempt

Here's my first attempt at Asher's baptism artwork. We wanted a woodland/forest theme. I had a cross on the branch, but A (my husband) didn't get it :-(. Oh well. I will have to redo and see what I come up with. I do like my little owl. We actually have an owl living in our redwood tree so that's what triggered the idea. My little boy's eyes are also huge! I'll be doing a pen and ink, as shown, and when printed I'll be doing a watercolor splash...a new technique for us! Stay tuned...

Studio Works this week (August 9-13)

It's been a very busy week. So many bottles, so many ribbons! Jodi's light pink stargazer lily petal pochette invitations with triple ribbons! Nicole and David's custom beach initials with a new! white shell necklace. I really adore this idea! This shell necklace is like jewelry for this bottle! Hue and Adams custom tropical palm tree with vatican artwork bottles and down below, Kim and Jim's Botanical Love Birds of Paradise invitations. Off to the post office tomorrow to send some of the invitations to their guests! Whew! What a week!

Asher's Baptism - Part I

Hello! So with the studio working hard, we're also planning our son's baptism that's coming up this October. We've decided to do a whisical, woodland theme with trees, natural elements, flowers and owls. Colors would be white, light blue and some yellow. Our little baby will be wearing a traditional barong tagalog outfit from the Philippines and food would be Mexican. We're combining both filipino and mexican/american traditions into his event. The reception will be at our background that's very forest like with 2 huge redwood trees! Here's my inspiration board for some images I found. I just finished his drawing for his invitations. That image is coming up soon! I wanted a tree, an owl in a sketch feel like the tree with birdhouses. Decorations filled with flowers in mason or glass jars found around the house and baby food jars filled with candles. Our linens will be white with probably a burlap accent, like shown below and some bunting decorations and flowy banners...

Studio Works

Hello, here's what's brewing today at Passion Paper!

Kimberli's grapeleaf invitations. She decided on the sisel ribbon. It really gives it that natural look!

Stephanie's sketch of her and Donald:

Finishing up Amanda's Ocean Union II invitations. Also on the works Hue's palm tree small bottle invites and Nicole's large beach initials bottle invites. 

Enjoy!

Retro...vintage...modern...

Hello! I just wanted to share a board with you of something Rose and I are creating. I keep thinking it's a concoction of retro/vintage/modern feel to this board. I created this 3-d red poppy/flower (any color may be substituted) and used metallic papers and textured papers to give it that simple yet modern look with a touch of shabby whimsiness...is that even a word? For the inside, stay tuned. I'm thinking more simple, but still stylized.

enjoy!
~r.

Monday...Monday!

Happy Monday! I recently received two fabulous reviews from our clients this weekend, one from Sabrina who bought a custom Ocean Union Petal Pochette invitation and one from the bride's mother, Ileana, a custom white calla lilies and tulip beach inspired invitations. I enjoyed both of them very much. Here are the reviews:
From Sabrina:

"Thanks, Raquel!

They arrived on Friday, and my parents say that they look beautiful! What a special way to announce our wedding! I can't wait to see them myself!!

best wishes,

Sabrina"

And her invitation:

And from Ileana:

"We opened the box with the invitations yesterday. They are beautiful! You did excellent work and we are very happy.

Thank you!

Ileana"

And their invitation here:

 

For Ileana's invitation, they wanted something beach inspired with calla lilies, sand dollars, mums and tulips. All flowers will be in her bouquet. I made this mixture of flowers with sand dollar tucked inside. Coral was also a big color for them and after seeing some invitations in our projects and gallery pages, they found Lydia's invite with coral stripe band. We ended up using that and matched with light blue ribbon and gold palm wax seal. I used a light blue metallic crinkle paper for the hand lined envelope and to match their ribbon. I think this custom invitation came out so beautiful with all the textures and soft beach colors! 

What are we working on this week? We're working on Abbe's watercolor, Kim's grapeleaf invitations, Amanda's Ocean Union II Box invitations, Lynn's Nautical Sand Dollar box invitations... and others... Have a great rest of the week. I will try to blog as much as I can each day so you'll be updated on what we're up to.

~r.

June Studio

Hello there again! Just wanted to post some images of what we finished in June. These are only our custom invitations, not showing other invitations from our portfolio section. There's Hannah's Abalone Seashell, Cristina's beach inspired calla lilies, Alexandra's Sea Island, Alexandra's Hawaii map and turtle save the date and Tara's Ivory Camellias. We've enjoyed all of these invitations! I love all the blues and greens that came out this June. We're beginning to start off on our autumn colors this month and we're so very excited. Any questions, please let me know. Enjoy! ~r.

Eco-friendly, Eco-chic Favors

It's been awhile since I last blogged. The studio has been very busy with so many custom invitations and so many new and unique artwork to be done! We're working on  sand initials invite for Nicole, a jewish shawl for Amanda and Abbe, and a custom couple artwork for Stephanie.

Besides Passion Paper, as a family, we've finally finished our daughter's 4th birthday eco-friendly flowers and bug theme party! It was a success! Now, we're off to a baptism for our newest member of the family.

I've been thinking about different themes for his baptism. First it was "The Little Prince" with light blue, silver and cream colors...lanterns hanging from our trees, simply elegant and petit! But after much thought, I wanted to go for a more down to earth, natural theme for him. It seems fitting for our little guy. Since the venue will be on our own background and in October, I thought more of just a simply natural nature theme for him. Our backyard consists of two huge redwood trees and surrounded with jasmine vines! With all that said, I've been doing research on decorations and favors. I love, love eco friendly favors, favors that can either be planted or reused. We used this idea for our wedding back in 2003 (when eco-friendly wasn't much of a hype yet). Ours is the bamboo favor. Can you believe that after 6 years (coming onto 7 years in October 11) we still have our bamboo plant.?! I had added the A loves R stamp on the pot and in the final version, we also had a custom tag that I designed.

As for Asher's baptism favors (that's our little guy's name), I love the idea of the cactus or the redwood tree, but not sure if the redwood tree would be cute for a little guy! Have fun and enjoy. If you have any ideas on eco-friendly favors, send them my way and I'll post them here. I would love to see what you come up with too!

Enjoy, -r.

credits:

1) Bamboo favor: our own personal favor

2) Birdseed favors by Dream Green Weddings

3) Redwood Tree Favors by edmontonweddingplanner.amodernproposal.com/

4) Pots of Herbs: by Heather and Jason, Manitou Springs, CO

5) Handmade soaps from 100 Layer Cake

6) Cupcake favors by Blissful Brownies

Redwood Tree Nature Inspiration Board

Hello!
One of my high school friends, Grace gave me an honor of creating her invitation for them. They are getting married amongst Redwood Trees. I was very excited! I love redwood trees. We actually have 2 huge ones in our backyard and they are one of the reasons why we bought our house in the first place.

When my husband and I were engaged years and years ago (ah, how time flies), we were actually thinking about a Redwood Forest as a wedding venue. But at last, we ended up with a mission style/old world venue because of family etc.

If I were getting married at a Redwood Forest, here's my inspiration board. I hope you enjoy them! I think they are quite lovely. There are so many possibilities out there, and nature is the best inspiration!

Enjoy!



If any of these images belong to you, thank you so much for letting me share them to my viewers. I will be happy to credit you for your images. The only images that belong to moi are the invitations that I created for my good friend, Grace.

Thinking about the oil spill

I've been extremely saddened by the Gulf Coast oil spill and every moment I have, I try to see what's happening at CNN. We've lately created a sea turtle for one of our clients, Alexandra and everytime I look at it, it reminds me of all the sea and land creatures affected by this catastrophe.


I've even discussed what's happening with the world with my soon to be 4 year old. She wanted to save the turtles and in lieu of presents, she's asking her guests to send a donation at http://www.savenature.org. Although not a direct donation to save the gulf coast at least save some part of our planet. I'm so proud of her! I've also been brainstorming on how to make her party eco-friendly...so paper scraps we have at Passion Paper, we'll be using as craft items for her birthday projects. I think any way to reuse, recycle and have less waste could benefit somehow to the environment. Here at our studio, we try to use every bit of the resources and therefore have less waste. That's why we also have no set quantity, just minimum cost. You order what you need with just a few extras and we make exactly that quantity - hardly any waste and of course, any waste, we recycle!

Hope everyone has a great Memorial Day weekend!
Raquel