playing with my vitreous floater and chewing my lip...
cake is kicking my ass. this is Not Good. everywhere I go online, the cakes all look the same. all compact, smooth, solid-looking, with the same heavy fondant circles and diamonds and filigree and flowers. so stark. so plain. I want something... something delicate. something that looks like milkweed fuzz floating away on a breeze. something that looks like the wedding cakes in my mom's old wilton cake decoraing books. I'm sure I could bring those in and the decorators would look at them... but do they still have that kind of skill and training? it's not hard to cut out fondant polka dots and stick them on a fondant-covered cake. it IS hard to pipe buttercream ruffles and fleur-de-lis on a cake smoothed by hand with a spatula. I'm skipping the idea of having cake done by a relative (obviously) because I always thought that cakes that weren't homemade were like ones you buy at fry's or costco, and taste horrible with awful frosting, but it turns out that that isn't the case (again, obviously, or else the wedding cake industry would not be what it is). so yeah. cake. grrrr. or rather, frosting. I still like the idea of having no/minimal icing on at least one layer, but I have a very large cake topper to contend with, and I'm afraid a bare cake would look funny since it's pretty ornate. so - bottom layer, very large, dark in color - probably either spice cake or gingerbread with cream cheese filling. iced with cinnamon-flavored icing on the sides, with a doily pattern of powdered sugar on top. pillars to the second layer - white cake with raspberry filling and lemon-flavored icing, iced all over. pillars to top layer - yellow cake with honey-cream filling and vanilla icing, iced all over. optional pillars to cake topper since it is rather large, or just on top of top layer.
(it's so weird to type icing all the time. I grew up calling the stuff frosting, with the verb "to frost", and had no idea what icing was. but now it rolls off the tongue.)
invitations may be easier than previously thought. I've always heard that wedding invitations require extra postage because they're big/heavy and odd-shaped, etc. well... I was thinking, greeting card envelopes are bigger than normal envelopes, why don't they need extra postage? then instead of being jealous I thought, "work the system silly!" so I found that I can get cheap envelopes through current stationery in bulk, in yellow too! yay. so I will print invitations on nice paper, but not heaver than a greeting card - think just the front flap of a card. the invitation will be one of those all-on-one-page affairs so it won't fold. then there will be another piece of paper the same size as the first. on the upper, main part - probably 2/3 of the overall size - will be the reception invite. the bottom third will be perforated in order to be easily ripped off and that will be the reply card. and that's really all the necessary items of a wedding invite. it means I'm skipping stuff like an inner envelope, the bit o' tissue, and the reply card envelope. so there's extra postage saved right there! : ) if anyone gets bent out of shape cos they didn't get a tissue, I'll mail them a kleenex. and hopefully no one will be anal about having to hunt down their own envelope and stamp to mail back their reply card. actually... I think instead, I'll have them copy down the accept/decline form and have them email me the answer to a specific reply email address, like jhaveri_wedding_reply(AT)yahoo.com. that way it will come faster and no one has to pay for an extra stamp and envelope. plus I don't have to keep track of mail trickling in, and making sure I don't LOSE stuff. AND I can have someone else keep track of who is coming and who is not by just giving them the password to it. bwahahaha. I amaze even myself.
speaking of invitations, as I type I have font mockups for the invitation wording. I just have to match them to kitten pictures (which I need to photoshop to perfection) and decide which ones look the nicest. then import the whole thing to photoshop and tweak some more until they are magnificent. hooray!!
I was talking tuxes with deven today. turns out that at least with him and his brother darshan, mandarin collars are a runaway favorite. i.e. they will stage a revolt if they have to wear normal collars and ties. that's fine with me, I was going to have deven in a mandarin anyway cos they are extremely sexy. (then again this is from a girl who gets all hot and bothered over a mullet...) so deven is going to be in a mandarin coat and shirt (there's a mandarin collar style for coat and shirt) while the groomsmen are going to be in mandarin shirts and vests, no jackets. other people can do what they want as per suits/tuxes.
that brings me to another point - I am waffling on the formality of this thing. I know that about 50% or so of the decision is based on what time of day it is occurring... which is something deven and I ahve talked about many times but I can never remember the conclusion. go me. *rolls eyes* there are many factors. kittens makes it seem less formal. tuxes make it more formal. dinner reception makes it more formal. my dress makes it less formal (well... depending. the super #1 choice right now makes it seem less formal, but if I don't get it, the runners-up are more formal). the cake plus topper make it more formal. the type of food makes it more formal. the fact that all the foods are hors d'oeurves served buffet-style makes it less formal. the religious ceremony makes it more formal. my veil and flowers make it go "huhh??" spin around in circles and fall down in a dead faint. add that to both deven and I wanting to start the reception fairly earlyish (like 4-5pm) so that it doesn't go late into the night, cos we don't want to end up dead tired, since we'll be waking up early-early to go to daily Mass that morning, as will all other guests who want to go with us (probably just the Catholics and the curious). so with a late-afternoon ceremony, break for pictures, then eveningish reception....or midday ceremony and afternoon reception... giving time in the morning to set up the site and get all the vendors where they're supposed to be when they're supposed to be there (i.e. food, cake, flowers, anyone else), and get people ready in clothes and makeup and hair etc... why can't there be a half-way between semiformal and formal?? and what the heck does semiformal mean these days anyway??
OH back to invitation envelopes - I can get these great yellow ones that aren't too bright, and I was thinking well, they look kind of plain. so... you know those henna tattoo designs that look kind of like a paisley pattern? well I found a place where you can get nice-quality wood-backed rubber stamps for cheap, like a 2"x2" for 12 bucks, and they let you put whatever graphic you want on it. (rubberstamps.net) sooo... I was thinking a nice henna-style paisley stamp on the lower left-hand corner of the front of the envelope in a dark orangey-red ink. very pretty, no? and then on the other side there will be a classy initialed sticker-seal. I'd love to get embossed gold, but current is failing me. oh well, they have some other nice ones that would work in a pinch. aha, and I also found a supercool paisley-looking stylized peacock that is PERFECT! it's an actual henna tattoo pattern too, and won't need any fixing by me other than cropping out from the other designs in order to send to the stamp company. it all looks SO COOL in my head...
hopefully tomorrow I will do laundry, take a shower, and tackle some of the photoshopping.
=^.^=
p.s. there is also a site that lets you make your own postcards, and I am totally using their cute picture of a kitten and two ducklings for the save-the-dates. it's so fuzzy!!
(it's so weird to type icing all the time. I grew up calling the stuff frosting, with the verb "to frost", and had no idea what icing was. but now it rolls off the tongue.)
invitations may be easier than previously thought. I've always heard that wedding invitations require extra postage because they're big/heavy and odd-shaped, etc. well... I was thinking, greeting card envelopes are bigger than normal envelopes, why don't they need extra postage? then instead of being jealous I thought, "work the system silly!" so I found that I can get cheap envelopes through current stationery in bulk, in yellow too! yay. so I will print invitations on nice paper, but not heaver than a greeting card - think just the front flap of a card. the invitation will be one of those all-on-one-page affairs so it won't fold. then there will be another piece of paper the same size as the first. on the upper, main part - probably 2/3 of the overall size - will be the reception invite. the bottom third will be perforated in order to be easily ripped off and that will be the reply card. and that's really all the necessary items of a wedding invite. it means I'm skipping stuff like an inner envelope, the bit o' tissue, and the reply card envelope. so there's extra postage saved right there! : ) if anyone gets bent out of shape cos they didn't get a tissue, I'll mail them a kleenex. and hopefully no one will be anal about having to hunt down their own envelope and stamp to mail back their reply card. actually... I think instead, I'll have them copy down the accept/decline form and have them email me the answer to a specific reply email address, like jhaveri_wedding_reply(AT)yahoo.com. that way it will come faster and no one has to pay for an extra stamp and envelope. plus I don't have to keep track of mail trickling in, and making sure I don't LOSE stuff. AND I can have someone else keep track of who is coming and who is not by just giving them the password to it. bwahahaha. I amaze even myself.
speaking of invitations, as I type I have font mockups for the invitation wording. I just have to match them to kitten pictures (which I need to photoshop to perfection) and decide which ones look the nicest. then import the whole thing to photoshop and tweak some more until they are magnificent. hooray!!
I was talking tuxes with deven today. turns out that at least with him and his brother darshan, mandarin collars are a runaway favorite. i.e. they will stage a revolt if they have to wear normal collars and ties. that's fine with me, I was going to have deven in a mandarin anyway cos they are extremely sexy. (then again this is from a girl who gets all hot and bothered over a mullet...) so deven is going to be in a mandarin coat and shirt (there's a mandarin collar style for coat and shirt) while the groomsmen are going to be in mandarin shirts and vests, no jackets. other people can do what they want as per suits/tuxes.
that brings me to another point - I am waffling on the formality of this thing. I know that about 50% or so of the decision is based on what time of day it is occurring... which is something deven and I ahve talked about many times but I can never remember the conclusion. go me. *rolls eyes* there are many factors. kittens makes it seem less formal. tuxes make it more formal. dinner reception makes it more formal. my dress makes it less formal (well... depending. the super #1 choice right now makes it seem less formal, but if I don't get it, the runners-up are more formal). the cake plus topper make it more formal. the type of food makes it more formal. the fact that all the foods are hors d'oeurves served buffet-style makes it less formal. the religious ceremony makes it more formal. my veil and flowers make it go "huhh??" spin around in circles and fall down in a dead faint. add that to both deven and I wanting to start the reception fairly earlyish (like 4-5pm) so that it doesn't go late into the night, cos we don't want to end up dead tired, since we'll be waking up early-early to go to daily Mass that morning, as will all other guests who want to go with us (probably just the Catholics and the curious). so with a late-afternoon ceremony, break for pictures, then eveningish reception....or midday ceremony and afternoon reception... giving time in the morning to set up the site and get all the vendors where they're supposed to be when they're supposed to be there (i.e. food, cake, flowers, anyone else), and get people ready in clothes and makeup and hair etc... why can't there be a half-way between semiformal and formal?? and what the heck does semiformal mean these days anyway??
OH back to invitation envelopes - I can get these great yellow ones that aren't too bright, and I was thinking well, they look kind of plain. so... you know those henna tattoo designs that look kind of like a paisley pattern? well I found a place where you can get nice-quality wood-backed rubber stamps for cheap, like a 2"x2" for 12 bucks, and they let you put whatever graphic you want on it. (rubberstamps.net) sooo... I was thinking a nice henna-style paisley stamp on the lower left-hand corner of the front of the envelope in a dark orangey-red ink. very pretty, no? and then on the other side there will be a classy initialed sticker-seal. I'd love to get embossed gold, but current is failing me. oh well, they have some other nice ones that would work in a pinch. aha, and I also found a supercool paisley-looking stylized peacock that is PERFECT! it's an actual henna tattoo pattern too, and won't need any fixing by me other than cropping out from the other designs in order to send to the stamp company. it all looks SO COOL in my head...
hopefully tomorrow I will do laundry, take a shower, and tackle some of the photoshopping.
=^.^=
p.s. there is also a site that lets you make your own postcards, and I am totally using their cute picture of a kitten and two ducklings for the save-the-dates. it's so fuzzy!!