Oh, how precious!

I know, I know-- how many times do we need to hear "precious" when it comes to something wedding-related? But hear me out.

Look at these little cakes:

I found them via The Kitchn blog, and they are super adorable. They're made easily via these little pans from Williams Sonoma:

 

Unfortunately, I never experienced the whole, "all-my-friends-are-getting-married-at-the-same-time" phenomenon that seems to happen to everyone in their mid/late 20s, but if I did, this would be my signature bridal-shower item.

However, I can imagine other uses for it: that time you're asked to bring something to a work wedding shower (being an elementary school teacher, this happens all the time), my own bridal shower, little girls' birthday parties. Says one commenter: "I've got a 5yo little princess, and I'm telling you we would use it ALL THE TIME. For birthdays, for tea parties, or for special-occasion dinners... I'm actually considering buying one to use for her next birthday party. They are just so cute." I think she says it all!

*Images credit: Williams Sonoma

Things I'll Learn from Wedding Planning

For better or worse, I'm putting a lot of my heart and soul into this wedding, and now that our engagement is starting to wind down (or wind up, as the case may be), I'm thinking more about what I'll take away from this engagement process. Here are some that immediately come to mind:

Self Image. I'll be writing another post on this later, but the fact that I'll be seen by many (and for many years to come) in my wedding dress has forced me to confront some truths about the way I see myself, and it hasn't always been an easy process.

I've re-discovered sewing and even purchased my first sewing machine. The process of having my dress made required me to think a lot about fabric, fashion, and how things are constructed, and I actually like that stuff! Go figure. I finally know what my mother was doing when she'd see a dress in the department store, look closely at the seams, and head to Hancock.

Organization. I've always considered myself organized, but my army of spreadsheets, charts, graphs, and folders have shown me that I really can organize a huge event and simultaneously deal with the merging of household finances. It helps that Mr. Oyster is constantly telling me how impressed he is. ;-)

After the wedding, I'm planning on working more with my photography business. I was always a little scared of starting a business on my own, but I have more confidence now that I could organize something as complicated as a business, if I wanted to.

Family drama. My family's relatively healthy, but there are always those family members that... well, you know what I mean, you've probably got some too. At this point, I really feel that (a) I can predict pretty well who will be dramatic and how they will act out, (b) I am too old and have been through too much to worry about what they think of me and (c) I'm too focused on my own life to care.  I find that having this attitude actually encourages people to respect me more. In fact, I anticipated drama where there wasn't much at all. Another "go, figure!" here.

Domesticity. I hope it was merely coincidence that, on the same day I told the D.J. I'd like us to be introduced as "Mr. and Mrs. [Fiance's Name], I went out and bought the sewing machine. I know there are some ways in which I'm thoroughly modern (hello, first marriage at the age of 30!) and others where I'm just like my great-grandmother. I still feel a little conflicted about it.

Really?

There are so many more things I could list. I think this post will require a sequel!

Anyone else? Is all this time/energy spent planning your wedding going to help you later in your life?

Some dreadful disaster

Today I was visiting with my future in-laws, and FMIL (whom I love, by the way; she is always telling funny stories) was recounting the days of planning FSIL's wedding, which was about 20 years ago now. It was a huge super-formal wedding, with all the requisite drama, and is the stuff of family legend.

While telling yet another story from this epic wedding, FMIL says, "Don't worry. On your wedding day, something will go wrong. It will be some dreadful disaster; just know that it will happen, but don't worry, everything will be okay. Just focus on what matters most."

I know people say this, but really? Don't some brides, somewhere, have perfect wedding days? Or at least, days that seem perfect?

And of course, this gives me the chance to think about my wedding fears. I have a bunch of them, from having kids mess up the wedding to vendors who, despite seeming reliable, suddenly choose not to show up or disappear entirely. Plus there are the logistics of getting 100+ people from different parts of the country to the wedding venue, and all the little steps of planning (what if I forget something?). It seems like every step of the way, there's something to worry about.

At this, maybe I can apply one of my favorite quotes from President Obama. In response to something, some negotiation or another, he said, "I'm not going to anticipate problems." I took this to mean that one should be aware of the things that could go wrong, try your best to stop trouble before it starts, and then  go forward hoping for the best. I have applied this quote to many potentially stressful things in my life.

This seems like the best approach -- after all, on the day of the wedding itself, all you can do is let go and do your best to live in the moment.

What are your wedding fears? Have you faced them yet?


*The photo above has nothing to do with anything, except that she's a literal representation of a bride who's got "too much going on." From here.

DIY and the Dead Fly

Despite my insistence that I'm not a DIY type of girl, I find myself doing a lot of things for this wedding myself. Among my projects is the Martha Stewart flower pillow.

I love this pillow, and from the moment I saw it I knew I wanted one for my wedding! I have a little sewing experience and this seemed like a project I could do.

For inspiration, I studied carefully the diagrams and tutorial over at Martha Stewart, which boasts this beautiful example:

Then I also read the more explicit tutorial of Mrs. Perfume, whose mother helped her with this beautiful one:

I picked up some remnant fabric at Joann's to practice with, and set to work with my little sewing kit. Here was some of my inspiration while I worked:

Didn't you know? Michael provides the perfect sewing music.

First, I cut out those ovals just as Martha described: ovals with straight sides. Mr. Oyster pointed out that they look a lot like my little mouse, so I put them side by side. Twins!

Then, I got my sewing kit and went to work, following all the directions. I cut my little ovals out, and instead of pinching them with wire, I stitched them through the middle.

Then I started sewing them together. But I noticed something odd. Where the directions said there should be no gaps, there were plenty. And this didn't look like a flower at all! It was a weird, floppy thing. I tossed it onto my keyboard and noticed that it looked.... like a dead fly!

Mr. Oyster came over to see, and when I described it to him he immediately began holding it through the air, buzzing around with it. Guys!

Anyway, I quickly saw what my problem was: the ovals were too straight and too long. They really need to be more like circles. Why doesn't Martha say this? Wait, who am I kidding?! It wouldn't be a Martha project without some frustration.

So I cut out some new ovals.

These were quite a bit smaller (and the flower tends to get smaller as you add petals to it), so it was harder to sew. Still, there was an instant improvement.

And for good measure, we checked -- it's cat-approved!

Anyone else need multiple attempts at your DIY projects before you were satisfied with them?

The invitations arrived [it's real now]

Our beautiful invitations have arrived! Having picked these out nearly a year ago, I am happy to present them (in slightly altered form, sorry):

They are beautiful to me now, but when I picked them up I was a little disappointed with the accent color, a neutral-ish shade of pink that was a little different from how it appeared in the store sample book. Also, it was a bit of a struggle to get these invitations designed in quite the right way (multiple proofs), and this probably added to the underwhelming-ness of seeing them for the first time.

But I got over it fast. The first thing that helped me get over my disappointment was seeing Mr. Oyster's reaction to the invitations. Earlier readers may remember that it was him who turned me on to these invitations in the first place -- he has excellent taste!

When he came home, I showed them to him without comment, to see what he'd say. He didn't say anything for a long time, but he just sort of stared at them, smiling. Finally he said, "We're getting married!" It was very sweet.

These invitations, of course, are not about shades of pink and cursive and script and fonts; they're the first announcement that my fiance and I intend to start a life together. Seeing him hold the invitations in his hands and really get that for the first time was priceless, and everything else I'd been worrying about suddenly mattered much less.

Another thing that helped was a little design tweak that was inexpensive and only took a few minutes! I decided to round the corners.

Smock can round the corners of your invitations for you, but we didn't select this when we ordered them. When they arrived, I knew it was the "something missing" that I needed to fix. I ventured into Hobby Lobby and found this sturdy-looking "Corner Chomper" and its cute matching case:

 

  

This is the perfect tool for this sort of thing; it cuts clean, perfectly curved corners, and holds up really well. It's perfect for the super thick card stock of our invitations. 

And now for the results! First, the before: 

 

This tool cuts two types of corners; a quarter inch (it appears that this is the shape the company uses if you have them round the corners)...

 

...and a half inch, which is the one we're going to use:

 

You can see the corners better in this shot:

 

I have to give major props to the Crop-a-dile. The corners it cuts are absolutely perfect... no flattening of the paper or extra weird notches. It's amazing how different the invitations look now. The softer edges really help our names to stand out, since they're now the only angled things on the invitation. I think the soft corners provide some much-needed balance and definition. Not only that, but with this hard cardstock, they're much easier to get in and out of the envelopes.

Oh, and another thing -- did you notice? Several of you mentioned wanting to see our invitation suite, and this is it. We went with our simple-is-best mantra with this wedding and decided to splurge on this one beautiful card (which we got on sale!) and eliminate the things that were less important to us. Even the language on the invitation is super-simplified.

So, no STDs, no response card, no postcard, no maps, no folding things, no menu, no programs. It's all on the website, including our rsvp! We'll see how that goes.

So for now, that's the story of our invites. Nothing left to do with them but send them out (but not until we finalize the guest list... oh, no!).

*Photos by me.

Andrew Young and the Sanctity of Marriage

Every so often, I bring my ipod of podcasts to work with me to catch up. This week, I listened to the New York Times' book review and interview with Andrew Young, the staffer who covered for his friend John Edwards and was unceremoniously dumped when Edwards' scandal broke and destroyed everything. Then he wrote a book about it.

I kept listening to Mr. Young's account of things, and, later in the interview, his admission that his own role in the cover-up was morally inept, and I kept wondering: what does his wife think? I know what I think.

How many of us have ever covered for friends when we were younger? "Hey, can I tell my mom I'm at your house?" Or covered for a boss if s/he's out of the office? I haven't done either of these things (my friends weren't cool enough, I guess... and I haven't worked in enough offices to take calls from a boss' relatives).

But what would you think about the fact that your husband, the one who promised to love and honor you, helped to cover up a sexual compulsion as nasty as John Edwards'? How would you feel knowing your husband was so politically ambitious that he was complicit in the actions that led to the destruction of a marriage?

Much has been made of the "what would you do if your spouse was cheating" issue, but this is a little different. Andrew Young may have remained faithful to his own spouse, but what do his actions say about his belief in marriage? At what point would you determine this a line crossed? What would you say if someone asked you to cover for them, and you knew they were having an affair? What would you say if your spouse did that for someone else? How would you balance that with the need to keep your job? If you were in on the betrayal, would you feel complicit in the deception? Would you keep quiet?

*Photo from flickr.

We'll have our cake, and we'll eat it

FH and I were adamant about our desire to eliminate traditional, cheesy wedding cakes. I just couldn't get into the idea of the cake as "the center of the wedding" as one famous local cake baker has said. I can't find that quote (which was part of the intro of one of those "bake a wedding cake" shows), but I did find this cute clip of a someone making a wedding cake in 3 minutes:

We were content with our idea of having some kind of alternate cake structure, cake table, or dessert table, or maybe even little Whole Foods round cakes for each table (mmm!). What we weren't content with was the idea of having to pick up all these little cakes, deliver them, and set them out ourselves... and what would we put them on? Sure, it would save money, but I don't think my sanity is worth the small amount we'd be saving.

So, we caved. Since Mr. Oyster is an artist, he can appreciate the idea of a wedding cake that is also a work of art. But our philosophy (as it is with many aspects of this wedding) is that we should either get exactly what we'd like, or nothing at all. Since we can't afford one of these lovely works of art, we'll just get a very simple cake and call it a day.

Our wedding is a classic ballroom wedding in an urban setting (This is what I mean by "urban black-tie..." I don't know, I made it up!). This means we should have a cake that's a little modern, subtly interesting, and not too flowery or "froufy." Serving about 130 guests, our cake should be about 4 tiers. Here are some of the choices we're looking at:

 

via ProjectWedding.com

I love it: nice and simple! A clean, classic design with double beading at each layer reminds me of a nicely painted room with crown molding. The scroll designs are pretty, but we are not really into them. If we did have a scroll-y cake, though, I'd like to mix things up by combining shapes and a little color.

via Dallas Affaires Cake Co.

This one is from one of the vendors we're considering, Dallas Affaires Cake Co. Their cakes are beautifully designed and consistent. I like the two-tone effect on this one.

Here's one from another cake vendor we like, Elena's Cakes. It's another combined shape one... but what if the vertical stripes were just stripes (and not flowery stripes)? It might look nice. Plus it would mimic the light fixtures at our venue, which I initially hated but have since made peace with.

 

photo via Elena's Cakes

A post like this wouldn't be complete if I didn't include our dream cake. We love the idea of this incredibly unique and beautiful cake by Sylvia Weinstock, featured on the cover of Martha Stewart Weddings' anniversary issue:

Wow! What beautiful, stunning work. Mr. Oyster makes the excellent point that sugar flowers are pointless if they look exactly like real ones. With florists decorating cakes nowadays, why pay for all those hours of labor? 

But if the flowers look like something you'd want to eat? If they look so organically a part of the cake that they seem to have grown out of it? Well then, they seem perfectly justifiable in that sense. It's true; cake was among the lowest of Mr. Oyster's and my priorities, and paying for something whose value seems intangible is difficult for us. But this cake? It's just beautiful and *different*. It doesn't look like cake! It's just a mound of beautiful white flowers. Who wouldn't want to eat that?

Barring the Weinstock masterpiece, I think I like the simple square cake best. A version of it is featured on the front of Martha Stewart's wedding webpage (and in the "Real Weddings" feature of Christopher & Liezel):

 

Oh, and this is our cake cutting song! Why not have a little fun with it?

**Update: Mr. Oyster, who is currently suffering from a cold (poor sweetie!), has pointed out that the Weinstock cake now looks to him like a big pile of wadded up tissues. Ew! Nothing like a guy's point of view to make you see things in a different light.

The foundation of it all

My mother always said (why does so much of my wedding-related writing include references to my mother?) that your foundation garments are more important than any clothes you put on top.

She would be astonishingly embarrassed to find out that for the past several months I've been wearing a bra that barely fits. It doesn't lift, separate, or support, and it looks awful and worn out. I've been trying to order new bras for months, both for everyday wear and for the wedding, and I haven't had any success.

But Thursday, when my most recent shipment arrived only to not fit properly (again!), I got mad and frustrated. FH, hearing my complaints, got online and found me a local specialty bra shop. I don't know why I didn't think of this; probably because I didn't want to deal with being fitted and having to show my so & sos to some strange shop employee.

But desperation overruled my shyness, and I went to the shop, got fitted, and came out $110 poorer, but with TWO custom-fitted bras in hand. After a bit of a wait, I received excellent service. The ladies are very nice, if a bit awkward, and they have a custom seamstress on staff. My bras needed two darts in the sides, and she put them in for free while I waited. I must admit that I'd never even considered custom-fitting a bra. And I look *great* in my winter sweaters now!

My only complaint is that I wish I'd found the shop months ago... I could have saved so much money & frustration if I'd just been more willing to be a little embarrassed for a few minutes!

Have your wedding plans inspired you to overcome embarrassment or fear in some way?

*Photo from barenecessities.com.

Interculturally speaking...

In the past I've dated men outside my race, and there can be some less than successful results. One young man (we were in college) decided that color didn't matter -- at all. As it turned out, what that meant was that my color didn't matter to him. Whenever issues of racism or culture came up, he said, "Color shouldn't matter." Um, okay.

I was in this relationship when my father died. Seeing his face upon exiting the funeral -- the traditional, African-American Baptist funeral complete with gospel coir, singing, wailing, etc. -- was priceless. It mattered.

Another boyfriend was almost indifferent. Black culture was foreign to him, and he liked it that way. I think I was a little "exotic." ::sigh::

My fiance, who is white, offers total acceptance and understanding. I find it easy to talk to him about issues of race and culture, and he really "gets" me. This of course, is due to his loving personality, openness, and incredible cultural & societal awareness.

One of my favorite bloggers likes to say, "deciding who picks up the socks off the floor has nothing to do with race." I agree; in the day-to-day, it doesn't impact us much. But I'm writing this because I came across two intriguing articles about interracial relationships this week.

The first article is by guest author "C.L." from Stuff White People Do. C.L. is an Asian woman who describes her experiences traveling internationally with her white boyfriend. I imagine the situation she describes will be familiar to some Asian Americans; the way her boyfriend re-frames and dismisses her issue is painfully familiar to me. The many intelligent comments posted there are also worth a read.

Over at Confessions of a Cybernegress, the author describes her husband's embrace of her culture:

And for Rob, I think that's the biggest part of it: family. He said something recently that struck me as both odd and true: "Black issues are my issues now. And when we have kids, they'll be even more important to me." My initial reaction was, "why aren't black issues everyone's issues?" But I understand his point of view: this is a world he'd never known before, and I can't fault him for that. And while I won't say that my husband is as invested in the health of the black community as I am, he does embrace my family as his--as much as I embrace his family as mine. And because I'm his wife, he wants to know how I see the world so he can adjust his own view. Because he'll some day have black daughters, he wants to learn how they will grow up seeing the world, and how he can make their lives happier and healthier. He wants them to know their history includes strong, intelligent, good people--both black and white.

I think she gets to the heart of the issue here; her husband isn't just interested in black issues because they're "new" or "exotic" or some kind of novelty. He's interested in those issues because they are related to her, and thus, to him.

Having a husband and who wants to understand your perspective and who truly embraces you, your family and your culture, is essential -- no matter what color he is.

*Photo of Bershan & David by Justine Ungaro. 

If you're about to marry outside of your culture, how does this intercultural relationship compare with others you have had? How have you discussed your different viewpoints?

Everybody Jump!

Well, early on Mrs. Penguin mentioned a "pink broom" wedding! I call my wedding that because I love pink and I'm going to "jump the broom," as they say. So I figured I should focus on it a little.

Jumping the broom is an optional tradition for African-American weddings. Its origins are a bit uncertain, but its significance is clear.

After the minister has pronounced us "man and wife," and we kiss, and we turn back to the congregation, we'll jump the broom just before we walk back down the aisle. I think it will just be a joyous moment and a great signifier that "we are married." Here's an example that shows exactly that; they jump the broom at about 1:30. Very cute couple!




But this post is more about the broom itself. Although it only appears in the ceremony for an instant, it's symbolic for me and I imagine it will have a prominent place at the front of our wedding album.

I have a vision in my head for this broom, and the feeling that it has to be handmade. It just seems like that type of item. I don't have too many ideas yet, but I do plan to have a basic, "old-looking" straw broom, and decorate it with ribbon, wrap it in a little fabric (maybe some fabric from my wedding dress), and some handmade silk flowers. Here are some pictures:

 

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When it came time to think about it, I was surprised by how emotionally invested I was in this broom. Yes, I'm an American, a Westerner, and in planning a traditional "white wedding" (that term just refers to the dress, by the way) I'm acknowledging that I've absorbed many of society's wedding traditions, and that they resonate with me. But the broom, I guess, is the only tangible evidence we have in the ceremony, the only part that says, "Here is a black woman getting married." I'm very lucky that my fiance, who is white, is as excited about this as I am!

I was also surprised to find myself thinking of it as an heirloom broom. Maybe we'll have a son or daughter who gets married, and wants to jump the broom? Or, in the even nearer future, what if one of my little cousins (I'm the oldest of 8 girl cousins) wants to get married and jump it? The "family broom." What a great tradition!

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Chicago!

In January, I got an email showing that our engagement portraits were up. Our engagement shoot happened near the Christmas holidays, in Chicago! There will be a whole post later about why I ended up hiring a photographer from a thousand miles away, but in the meantime, here are the photos.

Of the 90 shots given to us after our session, we marked half of them as our favorites. I'm not sure what we'll do with these shots. I plan to put at least one or two on our wedding webpage, and I'm going to order a print or two to display at our rehearsal dinner.

Three favorites from the photographer's blog:

 

We very much enjoyed the snow! It was unbelievably fluffy and fun to walk on. It was the most snow I'd ever seen in my LIFE! Little did I know that just two months later, we'd get a record snowfall right here in Dallas. Here's a shot of me gleefully kicking some snow towards FH. Take that!

 

Here are some more great shots, though they are still watermarked:

Oh wow, what a romantic snowman!

After I saw these, I said to Mr. Oyster, "Wow, I sure look as though I love you very much!" It's nice to see so many shots of me looking adoringly at my future husband. It felt weird to see pictures of us kissing!

I was a little anxious that I never found the "perfect" coat to wear, and, true to my Texas/California roots, had never been in weather this cold, let alone photographed in it (do I *really* need to put on this hat?). But our photographers are great, and in the moment, at least, I was able to totally relax and enjoy the experience!

So that's the story of our engagement photos! We'll be ordering one or two to scan, so I'll post them later. I can't wait to show you the shots of our "snow dance!"

*Images via the incomparable David & Nancy Wittig.

Shopping with the Moms

After I decided to have my dress made, and after meeting two unsuitable seamstresses, I was lucky enough to discover the resource that is Fabrique! Fabrics. I went there this summer, met the owner, and was sold! Problem was, I wasn't quite ready to decide what dress I wanted to wear.

Fast forward to this fall, when my mother and grandmother visited me from out-of-state. True, I would never have that "trying-on-dresses" feeling with my mother there, but this turned out to be even more fun.

My mother is a third generation sewing enthusiast. She learned the craft from my great-grandmother, with whom she spent her summers as a little girl. My mother made many of the clothes I wore as a kid. Old Christmas ornaments, many of my baby clothes, a quilt, and a Christmas dress that I remember being made from a pattern my mom cut out of paper bags. Eventually, we moved too many times and my mother remarked that buying clothes became cheaper than sewing, so I haven't seen her pull out her old Bernina in quite a while.

But I have many great memories of sewing with my mom. The picture shows the sewing machine my mom used, a Bernina 830 (circa 1979 or so -- the photo is from the manual). She'll be happy to emphasize to you that it "still works, thank you very much!."

When I told her about Fabrique, that it was a couture fabric store that had an entire section dedicated to bridal fabrics, she was so excited! So I made sure to take her and my grandmother, and I felt like I had two experts on hand to help me in this first stage of bridal dress shopping.

The store has a good selection of bridal fabrics; almost any bridal dress fabric you've heard of is there: silk satin, silk dupioni, shantung, mikado, and even a few high quality poly-satins if I remember correctly. Here's my mom checking them all out:

And here's my beautiful grandmother, looking on (and surrounded by trim):

But my favorite is the lace. Lace!!! I don't want an all-over beaded lace dress (although I think they're beautiful), but I want to incorporate lace in some way. The laces at Fabrique range from $50 to over $400 per yard. Some are domestic, some are imported, but every one of them is stunning. Here, the store owner shows a hand-beaded lace, with crystals attached. You just have to click these to see the beautiful lace up close!

Yep, you read the price tag correctly. Moving on...

And this is the one I bought!

I bought some trim, and the beads happen to be nearly identical to this lace. Perfect!

My grandmother's hands rest next to my iPod. I bring that thing everywhere -- it's so helpful to be able to show vendors exactly what I want. I even have some runway videos on my iPod; it's indispensable. If you look carefully, you can see one of my sketches in the foreground.

Also in this picture, my grandmother is wearing her original wedding set. I wish I'd taken a better picture. She recently found this after it had been packed away. The set is over 50 years old, as it was given to her by my late grandfather when they married. How sweet!

Despite wanting to wear a matte fabric like silk dupioni or radzimir (if I could ever find it), I ended up choosing a smooth, lustrous silk satin. Silk satin is responsible for beautiful gowns like these (click to see the fabric in motion):

Along with the fabric, I chose the beaded lace, and the matching trim. My grandmother decided to buy the dress fabric for me as a birthday present! I am so humbled by this and hope the dress is as beautiful as we envision it.