Paper

According to everyone's favorite source, Wikipedia, a tradition started in Germany a long time ago giving every wedding anniversary year a theme for gifts.  The cool part, I think, is that a lot of countries use the same tradition today.  How fun is that?  Husband and I decided we wanted to start this tradition and since we're on a tight budget, we were pretty stoked to hear that paper was the theme for the first year (however, I am really excited to see what we come up with for our 11th anniversary...)

There are a lot of creative things you can do with paper, too.  Some more expensive than others, but so many options.  Concert tickets, plane tickets (well, any kind of tickets basically), books, newspaper from your wedding day, scrapbooks, so many ideas!

We both got really creative because we didn't really want to spend a lot of money. 

As you can see in the pictures above, husband made me a gorgeous paper bouquet of flowers.  Impressed?  Yeah, I was too!  I actually thought they were real at first.  He is very talented.  And also sneaky!  He worked on it for a few hours while I was at work as well as at 4am before he went off to work and I was still asleep!  I love it!  Here's the breakdown:

          Vase:  $3.00 from a local thrift shop
          Paper:  $4.00  (he bought a big packet, so we have a ton left over)  
          Wire Stems:  $2.00 from Michael's
          Total:  $9.00

I put together a message frame that we could write notes to each other on.  The "I love you because..." is behind the frame, and we can use a dry erase marker to fill in the rest.  I spray painted the frame to match our room and I covered the matting with paper I got in Florence.  My husband was so kind as to let me travel to Europe for almost a month during our first year of marriage, so I thought it was appropriate for this first year paper wedding gift.  Here's the breakdown:

          Frame:  $3.00 at a local thrift shop
          Spray Paint:  $3.00 (50% off at Michael's)
          Paper:  Free!  (it was packaging in Florence)
          Total:  $6.00

Oh, and just to keep with the paper theme, I wrapped my gift in a brown paper bag and tied it with string.  :)