DIY Wedding CenterPieces for under $100!?!?

first off, NO, I'M NOT JOKING.......
katie, my soon to be sis-in-law, (in just 2 days!!!) rallied my help to make the centerpieces for the big day. their colors are red n' black (same that me & my man had), they are having a big wedding, they don't have a lot of money (again, same as us).

we set out to make 25 CENTERPIECES with only $100.

WE DID IT FOR $90!

here's what we bought:

a glue gun, tea lights, scissors, japanese washi tape, a few spools of ribbon, glue sticks for the glue gun, black decorative sand.....

25 clear glasses and/or vases of different shapes and sizes,
25 black vinyl records with red centers!

we thrifted all of these last 2 and they were only 25 CENTS a piece- the glasses were even 50% off-SCORE!!

we started off by using the glue gun to attach the ribbon to the glass. then we wrapped it around, snipped it and used another dab of glue to set it:)

katie used sheer ribbon to tie bows around some of the tops and bottoms

then we attacked some glasses with a variety of japanese washi tapes. this was so much fun to make patterns with:)

use scissors to cut the tape at the top & press firmly down around the top edge of the glass

since we only bought 8 bags of sand we had figured out that we could get 3 glasses filled out of each bag. i like to be presise so i measured out each glass.... neurotic? perhaps:)

the last step was placing the tea lights in the sand. we pushed them down a little bit, about halfway, so they would stay centered

place glass in the center of a record and you're DONE!
(all the tablecloths are going to be white so the black will really pop against these)
here is the breakdown of the dollar bills:

1 glue gun $7.99

1 bag of tea lights $3.99

scissors were free because who doesn't have a pair?

6 rolls of washi tape $3.50 each

3 spools of ribbon $2.99 each
1 bag of glue sticks $2.99
8 bags of sand $2.99 each
25 thrifted vinyl records  $.25 each (a steal!)

25 thrifted glasses $.25 each (plus 50% off!)

we spent about 90 bucks including tax annnnd we've got plenty of washi tape n' ribbon left over to get crafty with at a later date!
this was fun, inexpensive and the end result looks so perfect and is SO VERY MUCH a reflection of the soon-to-be
Richard & Katie Demsick!
huge congrats to them:)

xox, rachel