So You're EnGAYged

Since last August, we have been planning on using Golden Rectangle Press for our invitations.  This is an amazing company based out of Brooklyn that specializes in letterpress invitations.  I adore them.  I adore all letterpress invitations. For me, letterpress invitations ooze old fashioned charm.  It makes sense then that the design we chose was titled Vintage Postcard.

Photo from Golden Rectangle Press Etsy Shop

They are classy and I like to think of myself as a classy gal and part of a classy couple. Plus, Golden Rectangle Press even has a same-sex wedding invite on their etsy shop homepage, which I think is huge.  A lot of people are LGBT friendly but aren’t that keen to advertise the fact.

Are they expensive? Well, yes.  Letterpress is hella expensive, but this company was more reasonably priced than the giant wedding invitation websites.  The invitations with RSVP cards and envelopes (with letterpress return addresses) were under $10.00 per invite, which I couldn’t find anywhere else online.  And they were so gosh darn pretty. Excessive? Probably.  We rationalized that since we were about $500 under our dress budget we could re-allocate the money to the inivtation section of our budget.  You have to understand that my love of letterpress undermined any rational thinking about just re-allocating the extra money into our savings account.

And then life went ahead and smacked us on the head and deemed it appropriate that all that money go elsewhere.  Apparently, Deborah’s youthful years as a gymnast have caused some early on-set arthritis in her lower back– but that’s another story.  The point is that a major casualty of the medical bill onslaught is the money we set aside for invitations.

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When it comes to wedding cakes Deborah and I approach the subject from two very different angles. Deborah is concerned with taste where as I tend to care more about presentation.  Okay, ‘tend to care’ is an understatement… Hello, my name is Michelle and I’m a Food Network Challenge addict.  I have high fondant covered expectations which Deborah humors because she oddly loves the taste of fondant.  From the beginning of our engagement, we knew we really wanted a ‘book cake’.

via Flickr Creative Commons, The Essex Vermont Resort and Spa

Thankfully, our area has an amazing cake lady that possesses major skills. Our initial meeting is in a few weeks. I get to bring in photo inspiration and then we take home mini-cakes to taste with our friends and family.  Guess which one of us is excited about which?

Now, fondant frenzy aside– Deborah and I are both huge advocates of two cakes at a wedding, regardless of what they are called. Why you ask? The answer is easy.  Two cakes = more deliciousness per square foot.  I mean, why just have one cake when you can have one cake per person getting married? Deborah and I don’t want something that looks traditionally like a wedding/bridal cake and a grooms cake.  We really want two cakes that reflect us but still hold a little traditional flair.  Cue: The Croquembouche.  A traditional French wedding cake that is composed of gazillions of cream puffs stuck together in a cone shape with caramel.

Via Flickr Creative Commons, andshewas

This takes my theory of two cakes = more deliciousness/sq. ft and multiplies it to the highest power! The cream puffs can be filled with a variety of flavored creams or chocolates, and often a combination of caramel and chocolate are used to keep the cone shape.  Are you drooling yet?

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Etsy, the online market for handmade goods, is a great resource for finding awesome ideas and items for your wedding. With tons of shops selling everything from birdcage veils to actual birdcages, it can be a little difficult to find that one specific thing you have in mind. If you are new to the site or haven’t had time to really delve into the handmade goodness, here are a few tips! In this little tutorial of sorts I’m looking for bridal shower invitations for a friend as an example, but these tips are applicable to pretty much anything!

Ok! Let’s Go! From Etsy’s homepage you’ll see a nifty sidebar that is divided into sections. Since this is a bridal shower thing, I’m going to go ahead and start in the ‘Wedding’ section.

Screenshot of the Etsy Wedding Front Page

From the sidebar on the homepage, I have gotten to the Wedding: Invitation section. Oh dang!  There are over 13,000 listings. I don’t really have enough time for to peruse that many, even though I am on summer vacation! So, I’ll narrow it down by using the additional options on the sidebar. This is what the orange arrow is pointing to. By clicking on the shower sub-category, I’ve narrowed the listings down to 2,000 and I haven’t even typed anything in yet.  My friend’s colors are Royal Blue and Yellow, so I’d like to find a card that fits that. She is also very eco-conscious, so I may want to keep that in mind too when I go the search box. The cool thing about Etsy is that it follows your search. This means that if I were to look for a specific color, say yellow, it would only search the wedding: invitation: shower section. It is really handy, but remember to go back to the homepage if you are starting a new search.

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In a little less than a week Deborah and I are going to meet up with our fabulous photographer, Katherine O’Brien in Austin to have our engagement photos done! Both being theatrical people, we lurve photos. And even better than loving to ham it up in front of the camera, we don’t have that many photos of the the two of us looking decent at the exact  same time! Since it is hotter than @#$! in Texas these days, we are starting at 9am and hoping to avoid the massive heatwave of awful that invades around noon. Sweaty people don’t look that hot in photos (get it?! that hot– ahhhhahaha)

Anywho, Deborah and I don’t live close enough to Austin to get up at the ass crack of dawn to drive and not want to kill each other, so we are turning our engagement session into a mini-vacation and driving down the day before. I found this great B&B, the Park Lane Guest House on Purple Roofs, which is database for LGBT owned and LGBT friendly bed and breakfasts!  Since we will be traveling, I emailed our photographer and asked her what we should bring with us for the photos. She replied promptly that it is best to bring something casual, something dressy and something that is just fun. Seems simple enough and yet, this is where everything gets complicated.

What constitutes dressy and casual for us is so drastically different that it is almost impossible to categorize. Deborah is pleased as punch to wear a long summer dress or a pair of Sofee shorts and a tank top around the house. If I’m not in my fancy teacher work pants, you will usually find me in leggings and a skirt or a pair of old workout pants covered with paint stains. So, casual means many things to us!

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If you remember my last attempt at a DIY craft, you will recall it was rather disastrous.  I am pleased to report that my latest endeavor has been much more successful! I still haven’t decided what sort of piece I want to wear in my hair, but I love the idea of floral head combs.

My best attempt at Zoolander's 'Blue Steel'. The placement of the comb is a little weird here, but I wanted to show it's full size compared to my head. It looks best when placed in the back-- say at the base of a ponytail or bun.

Our trusty, craft-tastic bridesmate Sarah came over and used her mad skills to assist me!

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Coming from a technical theater background, I was really excited about ‘wedding binders’.  I felt like these neatly packaged, knowledge filled planners would be a great way to keep my thoughts, notes and copious amounts of wedding information together.  In my line of work, a stage manager’s binder is basically the production’s Bible– everything needed for a show to function is in one 3″  binder.  Unsure of your blocking on page 83? I’ve got that written down, the sound and lighting cues for the scene,  AND a diagram of your movements on stage.

I was filled with such disappointment when I realized that most of these wedding binders were full of useless information that barely passed for common knowledge.  A life’s lesson learned I suppose.  If it is worth doing, it is probably worth doing yourself.  So, I bought a 3″ binder, some sheet protectors and binder dividers, and I made my own!

Here is my system:

A pencil pouch is a great way to store those little things that lack a specified place.  Currently I have a sample of our invitation style, some tiny book flowers I bought on Etsy a while back, floral/craft supplies (scissors, wire, floral tape) and, of course, a pencil and pen.

Binder tabs divide the contents into ‘user friendly’ areas.  I find most wedding planners are too broken down.  I don’t need a whole section dedicated to hair and questions to ask about my possible ‘I-do Updo’.

Venue: Here I keep all the information from our Texas venue: catering menus, reception decoration pricing, and general notes about decor.

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