Wedding Tree Guestbook

This weekend two of our friends from college tied the knot. The wedding was at the Visionary Art Museum in Baltimore and every detail of their wedding was as creatively planned out as their venue. It was incredibly personalized and impressive. And I wish I had 1) explored the museum and 2) taken more pictures. I was not on my game.

Instead of a traditional guestbook, the couple wanted their guests to fingerprint a tree. I love this idea! Yet another reason why I'm sad Pinterest was not around when I got married.  Etsy has a number of artists selling these tree guestbooks. Lots of variations on this idea. You can even ask your guests to fingerprint balloons. People are so clever.

When I was asked if I could draw a tree for this I, of course, said yes. I didn't guarantee it would be awesome. But I would definitely try it. This was my first serious ink/marker drawing and I was slightly nervous. Ink is so... permanent. You can't erase or paint over mess-ups. Mess-ups require starting over.

After getting over my fear of failure, this ended up being a fun little project. Naturally, I first lightly sketched things out with (erasable) pencil to make sure I liked where I was headed. I did a lot of Googling for images of trees. Since Hurricane Sandy gave me the gift of time I was able to finish this rather quickly. In a matter of days! That almost never happens.

This was my sneak peak during the hurricane...

I was able to finish just before the winds got scary that night and before the heavy light flickering. I was pleased with the results.

Luckily my friends were also pleased and my drawing made it to the wedding. I even got to see it in action.

I particularly like how people made sure to space out their prints appropriately. Well done people. Well done.

It was awesome to have been able to contribute something to this special wedding. I celebrated by having another glass of wine and making my way to the dance floor.

Congrats again to the newlyweds!