My birthday gift to Mom and Dad was this invitation:

The front of the mock vinyl record invitation. I based it on an old Capitol Records design.

The back of the mock vinyl record invitation, with more information and some cutesy clip-art graphics.

I initially made up both sides of this invitation as two separate design ideas because Mom liked the colorful 50’s-themed graphics and I liked the more realistic record.  In the end, I used them both so we could include all of the necessary information.

Mom asked if I could do something with The Hop’s logo, which had a cool-guy bunny rabbit leaning casually up against it.  She wanted me to add a girl bunny next to him.  After a few unsuccessful attempts to Photoshop the low-resolution photo she had of the logo, I finally just drew it by hand, scanned it, and re-worked the file from there.

The invitations were printed on glossy circular labels and affixed to die-cut black linen paper circles for a realistic vinyl record effect.  I used bright orange square envelopes (not pictured; we had to mail out every single one!) and printed address labels for the mailing and the return address.

Want invitations like these?  Purchase a sample from my Etsy store and contact me to customize the text for your order!

After the party, I made up some business cards for my parents to send out in their thank-you notes so people could see the professional photos taken at the party and share their own images.  The best part of that was that I got to reuse that bunny logo!  Here they are:

This was a business-card sized insert that Mom sent out in the thank-you notes.

It was a fun project all around, and the guests seemed to really enjoy the invitations.

I went through about four very boring ideas for this invitation before inspiration struck.  I used a high-resolution photograph of a $20 bill and Photoshopped it into a $30 bill with my husband’s picture in the center.  This was printed on ivory linen paper with the information about the party on the back.

Note:  If you decide to attempt a project like this yourself, be aware that Photoshop has some surprise limitations in place when you’re dealing with a photo of actual currency.   Who knew?  I had to find some interesting workarounds to actually be able to print it.

This is the final result – it was sized to fit in a standard #10 envelope:

Front of the $30 bill invitation

Back of the $30 bill invitation

Interested in something similar?  Let me know!