Step by step

So, I think a lot of major wedding websites might want to steer you away from do-it-yourself invitations because they are supported by advertisers who want you to spend big bucks on fancy letterpress custom invitation packages. Maybe that is just my cynical outlook from being in the ad industry myself. Regardless, it was pretty hard for me to find much of anything on the web for DIY invitations. Yes, I mean doing it YOURSELF. The horror.
I've thought it over a lot and I think I will try to do the invitations myself now that I've had a trial run with the save the dates. It was amazingly inexpensive (which I love) and turned out super cute. For those who are interested, here is how you can do a save the date card (or invitation) all by yourself. Minimal craftiness needed (trust me--this is time consuming but you don't need to be martha).
1. Locate graphic designer friend with access to Illustrator or similar software. I realize not everyone has this at their disposal, but even if you pay a friend of a friend to do the design for you, it is probably worth seeking out someone who knows what they're doing and knows how to prep files for printing.
2. Let your designer know what you're generally thinking about style-wise and provide wording. Give samples of the colors you want.
3. Review 5+ options from your designer
4. Revise and pick a winner
5. Go to an art supply store and pick out really cool paper. I got some that was textured and cream colored. Comes in big sheets (22"x30"). They can probably help you at the store. Paper is cheap. Make sure to get enough (5 sheets made just enough for 90 4.25x5 cards).
6. Cut the paper down into sheets that will fit in your printer (note on printer quality: we used my friend's Epson printer. It worked just fine but we did have a few issues with 'streakiness', but it was no big deal. any good color printer should work fine.)
7. Have your designer prep the files with bleeds so that you can print 3-4 cards on each printer sized sheet that you've cut down. This means that you can have some extra color 'bleeding' off the edge so that when you cut it down to size, you don't have to be exact.
8. We had to feed the paper into the printer one sheet at a time. My paper was kind of thick.
9. Use an exacto knife and a ruler (to give a straight line) to cut to the size you want for the cards. I also used a scrapbooking exacto slide cutting tool, which was way easier if you aren't too steady with the exacto, like me.
10. Stuff into envelopes (ordered from Paper Source, online) and you're done! Total project cost very minimal.

If you're still reading this, sorry. That was long. The project was not too too hard and it was fun to work on the designs. I may choose to get a 'professional' printer to do the printing/trim for me for the invitations. Depending on the cost :)