Soul Mates

So, I was cruising around different wedding blogs looking for divine inspiration (haven't found it) and found this groovy little gizmo over at The Preppy Wedding. Mrs. Preppy has been MIA on the bridal blogging side, but she's about to have a baby, so we can forgive her this transgression, right?
She posted about these amazing doodads called SoulMates. You slide the little suckers on your heels and you don't sink into the grass! How awesome is that? I really wish I'd had these at my brother's wedding. It was a backyard affair and I was definitely sinking. I wish I was looking up in this photo instead of watching my footing!

I think these would be great for outdoor weddings, graduations, outdoor parties, etc. Brilliant. Why can't I think of these amazing things?

Stamp Love

OK, so I was doing my very best not to get caught up in cute stamps. I could go to Zazzle.com and pay more for all kinds of cute stamps. But I refuse. I swear, I will not get caught up in stamps, of all things. In order to avoid any further contemplation of said stamps, I went to buy mine. I needed them to start stamping the RSVP cards anyway. Off to the post office I went to see the new wedding stamps, in both the 44 cent and 61 cent styles.


OK, these are GAY (I know, I know, we're not supposed to use GAY for LAME anymore, but seriously? These are just so bad.). These are uber-cheese-wedding-bells nonsense. Why don't I just wrap my invites in pink tulle, shove my MOH in a poufy pink moire taffeta tea-length gown and have some operatic version of Ave Maria sung as I walk down the aisle? Ew. Don't these just smack of early 1980's Falcon Crest? They do to me. The only other 61 cent stamp has Africa-American author Richard Wright on it. Not that I didn't enjoy his "Native Son" novel, but I don't necessarily want him on my wedding invites. Now over at 100 Layer Cake they had an awesome post about vintage stamps, how to find them and coordinate with your invites. Way cool. However, my invites don't have that "look" and I just don't have the time or energy to hunt down a bunch of stamps that add up to 61 cents. Or 44 cents for that matter. What's a Thirty-Something Bride to do?

I didn't buy the stamps and left empty-handed. I went back to Zazzle. I thought about it, but couldn't justify the cost. I just couldn't. So after work I went back to the post office and asked to see all the available 44 cent and 61 cent stamps. Out of nowhere, the dude pulled out these:

How cute are these? I love these. I love these enough to get over the lame 61 cent wedding cake stamp. Love. Love. Love. So, I bought these for the RSVP cards and the lame wedding cake stamps for the invites. Thing is, the cake actually looks good with my chocolate brown invite color. So, not so bad, right?

So what this means is that I'm chugging through my invites. I need to be done before I leave to go overseas in June (don't worry, I plan to blog while I'm gone!). I'm about three-quarters through assembling the invitation to the pocketfold. I stopped and started stuffing some RSVP cards and sealing them shut, just to mix things up a bit (watch out, I'm going nutty!). Here's where I'm at:
I bought these sticky labels and printed our initials on them. The BRIDES invites I bought had seals that matched the little scroll design on the invites, but I didn't like them. I got these at Michael's and used a 25% off my total order coupon I got out of a bridal magazine.

Here's the RSVP card about to get tucked into the pocket fold. There's been discussion over wording in a few other blogs I read daily and this is what I put, just in case anyone is curious:

The favor or your reply is requested by
September 15, 2009

M______________

____Happily Accepts
____Regretfully Declines

This is what they look like ready to be sealed.

Here they are all sealed up. I'll show you the front once I get there. The pile on the left is money thank you notes that I got in my same design on clearance at Michael's for $2.00. I've printed all the names for people that need to be handed cashola on the day off The Big Show. I'm actually stuffing cash in these every week. I randomly ask The Candyman for all his cash and go fill the envelopes. It's kind of like setting your clocks ahead 10 minutes so you won't be late for work. Every little bit helps, right? Or maybe I'm just a freak. Either way, I've got enough stashed so far to pay the officiant and part of the ceremony musician fees.

Today I worked on designing some fun reception stuff. I've noticed that my blogs can be hella long, so will wait until tomorrow for this. I hope everyone in the wedding blogosphere is happy. All I know is that the American Idol finale is on tonight and that makes me happy. My vote is for Kris. Or Adam.

The Final Dress Blog - ABG!

Hey Everyone! Show Ashley a little love and head on over to Ashley's Bride Guide and read my final guest blog installment!

Cake, Shoes and JCP

Wow. What a weekend. The Candyman and I had an amazingly full schedule of to-do's all weekend long. We are both exhausted, suffering from allergies, but giddy and happy too.

On Saturday, we had a noon appointment with Sweet 16th - A Bakery and met with husband/wife team Ellen and Dan. While Dan handled the steady stream of customers (all of whom they greeted by name), The Candyman and I sat and discussed cake options with Ellen. While they do not typically do the standard stacked wedding cake, the do offer several varieties of cakes that sounded pretty darn good!

We tasted the chocolate with cream cheese frosting, the vanilla with cream cheese frosting and the red velvet with cream cheese frosting. The Candyman is not a fan of red velvet, but he really liked this one. When I had set the appointment up with Dan, I had mentioned "no banana flavored anything" because, well, banana flavoring tastes like poo. Ellen inquired to my "no banana" request and was determined to prove me wrong. She grabbed a banana muffin for The Candyman and he immediately scarfed and gave a nod of approval. Sweet 16th doesn't use the artificial flavoring that produces the metallic taste I hate. Nice. Ellen's presentation of her single wedding cakes is gorgeous. I wish I had a photo to share. As we have done with out other vendors, we have chosen based on how we feel about the people in addition to the services offered. Maybe that's why it took so long to find a cake vendor - no one quite fit. We think Ellen and Dan do. The cakes vary in cost from $25 (chocolate cake with cream cheese icing) to $45 (The Velvet Elvis: 2 layers red velvet cake, one layer chocolate with peanut butter cream filling and cream cheese icing!). We estimate we'll need about 4 cakes, so this fits into the budget nicely! I need to call them and book for certain, we just need to crunch a few more numbers. Keep your fingers crossed for the cake buffet!

After we were done with the cake tasting, we headed over to Off-Broadway Shoes to see if I could find a pair of cuties for our engagement shoot. I did and they are fabulous and hopefully, you'll see them when I get my engagement shots! TEASE!

However, I did come across these as potential wedding shoes. The blue (and optional cream) ones are lovely, but too high. The ones with the rhinestones were kinda cute, but they didn't have my size and The Candyman was not as interested as I.


The engagement shoot was a blast. Jonathon and Sharon really just are the best people. We had such an amazing time! We met them on Sunday in Franklin, hopped in their van and headed south to Leipers Fork, Tennessee. After several days of rain, the sky had cleared up beautifully, although it was a tad windy. We stopped at a few random places along the way: a discolored cement wall with a barbed wire fence, an old marquis sign and a lonely country road. The owner of the marquis offered it to Sharon and we (OK, it was me) seriously considered hooking it up to the van! I snapped a shot of the marquis and The Candyman along the way:


We arrived in Leipers Fork around 4:30pm or so and cruised around one of the antique stores and snapped a few shots there while we were still in our "casual" clothes of jeans and nice shirts. We changed into our fancier duds and really got down to business. The Candyman did not wear the hat, just so you know.


We took photos outside of store fronts, on an old truck, on benches, on a hill in front of a stream, under this giant gazebo/outside porch thing, in front of cool, old walls and in front of a replica of the General Lee (for those twenty-something brides, that would be the car from The Dukes of Hazard, one of the best 70's TV shows ever). Sa-weet! By the time we got back to our car, it was almost 8pm! I don't know why, but we were completely exhausted when we got home. I mean, basically all we had to do was stand there and make out a little. How awesome is that? OK, we didn't necessarily make out, but there was some smoochin' goin' on! :) I have a slightly higher regard for models now, but not much.

I know that Sharon did a ton of leg-work to scope out the locations and she did an incredible job. All these great photo op spots were within 600 yards or so of each other. It was the first time The Candyman and I had been to Leipers Fork and we will for sure be back! I can't wait to see the photos. I'm not sure when they will be "ready" but I'll be sure to share when they are! So excited to see the outcome of much anticipation and tons of fun yesterday! Thanks you guys! We had a blast!

3Bees Paperie - Save the Date Contest!

I just came across this gorgeous letterpress invitation company called 3 Bees Paperie. They are offering 50 FREE Save the Date cards to one lucky winner. All you have to do is name their new bridal suite collection! Go here to see the collection that needs the name. Go here to enter the contest! Deadline is June 30th!

I've got updates coming later today about the Big Weekend! SO exciting and SO much fun!

Big Weekend

No, not THAT Big.
Photo credit here.

It's a big weekend. The Candyman and I have a cake tasting tomorrow at a little joint called Sweet 16th - A Bakery. We have our engagement shoot with Jonathon and Sharon on Sunday down in Leipers Fork. I have lots of printing to do for favors. I still am needing cute shoes for the e-shoot and I cannot find any that are just right. Dang. I need to find some sort of boob-lifting-cleavage-creating device for my dress. And shoes. I need wedding shoes too. I know The Candyman wants to lay tile in the backyard too. Like I said, it's a big weekend. Stay tuned, party people.

Favors and Free Filigree

Hey Folks! So, I've been working on my favors sporadically over the last month or so. In order to keep my DIY from getting out of control, I'm sticking with my BRIDES brand color theme and purchased the coordinating pieces from Michael's using their in-store, on-line and bridal magazine coupons. It's saved me a ton of money thus far. But wait, I'm getting ahead of myself here....

I had a couple of ideas for favors and I'm still coming up with new ones, but The Candyman got his vote in early on, so I need to keep my eye on the ball and not get distracted (Oh look! Something shiny! What? Oh, right. Focus.) . Some of the first ideas color coordinated with my ivory, chocolate and sandalwood (bridal lingo for beige) color story. My first thought was to do pretzel rods dipped in milk, dark and white chocolate, placed in clear cellophane bags and tied with ribbon. I've done these before and they are a piece of cake (this has nothing to do with my cake baking trials, just so you know).

Photo courtesy of Dawn's Popcorn.

I also considered making my famous Chocolate Covered Cherries, but they are a pain in the ass to make and pack and I only make them every other year for Christmas because they are such an ass-ache. The do seriously rock. Seriously. I really don't understand how anyone can not like chocolate covered cherries. Seems like a crime almost, but there are people out there. Me? I can't wait until the day after Christmas when all the left-over boxes at Walgreen's go on sale, 2 boxes for a buck. Hell yeah.

Man, I digress easy. OK, so no pretzel rods, no cherries. CD's printed with our faces? Nah. I wanted it to be something a little special, but not hard to do. I didn't want M&M's with our faces on them. Or little plant your own tree branch things (you know people are just going to toss those suckers) or whatever little gay, throw away thing I could come up with. No. No. No.

I casually mentioned The Cookies to The Candyman and he was all for it. There was no further discussion, The Cookies won. The Cookies are from a recipe someone sent me claiming it was the Neiman Marcus urban-legend recipe. It is not that recipe. I've checked. It has similar ingredients, but it's not quite the same. At any rate, they are damn fine Cookies. I've given them as birthday gifts to several people and the response is always top notch.

The Cookies needed a gift package vehicle and I was trying to figure out what to do. Martha had her little cookie jar Idea of the Day, but those jars are not cheap. I looked over at a great resource called the Sunburst Bottle Company, but I couldn't find what I wanted there either. Back to Michael's I trudged (oh, who am I kidding, I freakin' love it there now). The cheapest packing I could find were 3" square little DIY boxes that match the card stock color of my invitations. Sweet! I had one 50% coupon and one 40% off coupon, so I dragged my mom with me over Easter and got two boxes of 50, which will be plenty. My mom bought one box of boxes for me, so that was cool!

Photo courtesy of Michael's.

I was able to fold most of the boxes together pretty quickly over a few evenings. Last weekend, I did a test run on a batch of cookies (I needed a cake-break) to see how many would fit and I can get 3 cookies in each box! I'm planning on lining the box with tissue paper too. I will need to enlist The Candyman to assemble these, hopefully without eating all the cookies! The boxes come with the ribbon shown in the picture, but you know I'm not going to settle for just that. I'm not sure how I'm going to do it quite yet, but I have this mocked up for a potential tag that I'll print on ivory card stock (sorry about the blur, trying to keep The Candyman sweet). I got the outline border from Martha's down-loadable monograms, edited out the monogram and added my own text to match my invitation font. I also changed the color to my R95 G42 B0 colorway.
I will include The Cookie recipe printed on ivory card stock that I can slip inside the box, on top of the tissue. I wanted to put my filigree-scroll pattern from my invitations on the recipe card but it looked kinda crappy, to be honest. I went on-line and Googled FREE FILIGREE CLIP ART and found this amazing website called FotoSearch (kinda sad I didn't find this prior to STD's and invites!). I grabbed a clip and modified it a bit and came up with this to match my font color:

I've put it at the top of my recipe card on the front and the back and it looks pretty cool! I've just got to print and cut everything. That is, unless I change my mind about all this. Thoughts?