Winner Announced!

The winner of Our Bracelet Giveaway is Dawn King!!  Dawn please message me your address and we'll get you your cuff and bracelet! Thanks for entering!

Rachel & Jennifer

December Holiday Giveaway!!! Handmade U and The Turquoise Tomato team up!!

Happy Holidays Everyone!

I'm excited to announce a fun giveaway from Jennifer over at The Turquoise Tomato and me here at Handmade U!  We love wearing our leather cuffs and beaded bracelets together and always are inspired to create bracelets to be worn as a pair!

After seeing Jennifer's "Seek Joy" bracelet I knew I had a perfect beaded bracelet to match!

Here is our Joyful Combo!  The Best News is that it COULD BE YOURS!!  Just an early Holiday gift for yourself or a friend!

The beaded bracelet is made with dark greens, browns, and burgundy gemstones with metallic glass beads in between.  The beautiful leather is stamped with words to live by this season "Seek Joy"!!

To win these bracelets please comment below with the one or both of the following for 1 or 2 chances:

Comment 1 - Visit The Turquoise Tomato etsy shop and comment here with your favorite cuff.  Also visit Shop Handmade U on etsy and also mention here your favorite bracelet from my shop.

Comment 2 - Visit us on Instagram and Follow us!  @rjmcgough and @jenniferallred

Wishing you a blessed Holiday season!  Good luck, we will draw a winner from the comments below on December 16th!  You'll be able to wear them for your Holiday get - togethers!

Share this with your friends and family!!

Cheers,

Rachel & Jennifer

Handmade U Fall 2013 - Day Two Class with Lexi Grenzer!

Our Saturday class of Handmade U was spent with the wonderful Lexi Grenzer! The project was decorating shadowboxes and creating a soldered necklace with them!  So much fun!

Lexi created these wonderful kits for us!  So cute!

The first step was to decorate with paint, papers, little doo dads, etc our shadowboxes.....

Here are some of the samples and goodies Lexi brought to share....

Michelle brought some fun little things to choose from to make her adorable shadowbox...if you know Michelle Geller you won't be surprised that she used a mini Dennison label in hers ;)

Kim and Jennifer working away.....

I make sure that the teachers at Handmade U have a chance to take the other teachers class!  You can see Stephanie is having a ball learning something new from Lexi!!  Love that!

Here is my shadowbox in progress.... I found the adorable flag pin at Second Chance antique shop that some of us searched through after dinner the evening before....  The other items were in my swaps that I'll share soon!!  I opted to used this great red ruffled crepe paper for my background instead of painting......  I am excited to make more!

We learned to patina the pieces and soldering....

Further progress on my shadowbox......I loved soldering, I need to do it more often!!

The class in soldering I had taken in the past was so huge I didn't get any time with the teacher.  I was so grateful that the size of this retreat was so that each of us were able to ask Lexi questions and get individual attention.  Lexi is a very patient teacher!  She broke down the steps to make it easy for even the soldering challenged!!  THANKS LEXI!

Lexi in action.....

Finished Shadow Box!

 The day was amazing....we worked through lunch with our boxed lunches since we all were so into what we were doing!  After such a successful busy day some may have taken advantage of Happy Hour specials that were ending soon..... ;)

We concluded the weekend at Twisted Fork, a Handmade U Favorite!

What a fun weekend of classes with the best teachers!!  Thanks ladies!!

-Rach

Handmade Wedding - Prep & Ceremony - A Look 2 Years Back!

Hi - 

The morning of the wedding I woke up and was very excited to get ready for the big day!  My friend Katy stayed with me the night before and we headed downtown to the Magnolia Hotel where our reception was to be held and where we'd get ready for the ceremony.

  

We had hair and makeup done at the hotel.  While we were doing this Jim had one of our nieces bring in the roses he got for me with a very sweet card.  Always thoughtful.

I was very excited to wear these shoes....I may just need to find another reason to wear them :)

My Mom and I went to one dress shop, this was among the dresses I tried on that first stop!  I fell in love!  Especially after the dress owner said I could have that one that fit perfectly for 50% off!!  WHAT!!??  Yes wrap it up please!!

I found these super fun feathers at Tinsel Trading Company in New York City during a trip earlier in the year.  I thought how fun they'd be as hair adornments, so I bought a bunch!  I love them.

As far as my hair goes I had made these fun beaded flowers a year or so before while I was in California at an Art Retreat.  I was lucky enough to scoot on over to the French General  and take a class that Shea & Debbie from A Gilded Life.  I wanted to use the flowers for something special, so I turned it into a hair adornment!  Loved it!

It matched very nicely with the surprise jewelry Jim gifted to me for the ceremony!

I decided at the end to have a veil made!  So glad I did, I loved it!

I made simple necklaces with cream cabachons for each of the girls too.  The earrings, which you can just make out in the below pics were a little more complicated!  Thanks to Kaari Meng who helped me design them while we were in France that summer.  Lots of little pearls dangling away!

The Beautiful St John's on the Creighton Campus

The Program was done in our colors, Navy and Lime Green, to match our Invitations.

We opted for simple bows on the pews.

I had mentioned that I always thought a bagpipe player would be so cool before the wedding, and guess who Jim surprised me with!

We couldn't ask for a more beautiful church full of all our family and friends.

What a wonderful day!

More to come after the ceremony!

-Rach

Handmade Wedding - Rehearsal Dinner, a look back 2 Years!

Hi Again,

As we celebrate our Anniversary (yesterday and the rest of the week!) I thought it would be fun to share all the handmade touches we had for our wedding, starting with the Rehearsal Dinner.  

Since we were engaged within 9 weeks and married within 10 months, we didn't spend a TON of time planning, however I think we did a pretty good job pulling it all together!  With the help of Family and friends we had a great wedding experience!

Jim's Parents hosted a fun dinner at our favorite Italian Restaurant.  It was such a fun night of friends and family!  Jim's Mom had gathered some fun family photos to share at the entry table which was a special touch.

We also enjoyed live piano music throughout the night too!

My Mom, who is Super Quilter at Acorn Ridge Quilting was the Tote and Quilt Queen for our wedding party and participants gifts!  A BIG THANKS to her! 

She made these cute ruffles totes with each girls' name on them in our wedding colors.  We filled them with treats and the necklace, earrings and feather hair adornment that I made for my bridal party (which I'll share tomorrow.)

Each of the guys received a quilt made in their favorite sports team fleece!  Perfect for those Fall/Winter days watching the games on the couch or at the stadium!

Mother and Father of the Groom checking out their gifts!











For the rehearsal I was happy to have purchased a handmade wool felt bouquet from Princess Lasertron!  I love her bouquets and was so happy to incorporate this one into our weekend!

One of my other favorite things were the Wedding invitations!  I found these cute ones on etsy and was happy to support a small business.  They came with glassine envelopes and the retro Nebraska postcard for the reply!

Much more to share tomorrow...onto the Wedding Day!

Thanks for reminiscing with us!

-Rach

2 YEARS!!

Hi Everyone,

2 Years goes by FAST.  I can't believe that it was 2 years ago today that I woke up anxious to marry my Best Friend!  I couldn't wait to FINALLY marry Jim!  We'd just met not quite 10 months prior but I was waiting for him for 36 years and we weren't going to waste anymore time.

It was a fantastic day in November, a little chilly but sunny and bright! 

 Our family was surrounding us and friends from all over the country flew in for our special day!

 I was ready to walk into a new life with Jim that I had been dreaming about for a long time!

We are both grateful to have such loving parents with strong long-lasting marriages!

I was also so happy to have my Dad to walk me down the aisle to the man of my dreams!

Sitting besides Jim at that moment was so comforting!

And now, Husband and Wife!

Walking TOGETHER into our future.....

Our future just beginning, and it is looking BRIGHT!

Joy!

Bonded forever..

I love you Jim! You are my best friend and you make me so happy!

Hugs,

Rach