(Don't) Let Them Eat Cake

I hate cake.  Rich hates cake.  So, I don't hate cake the way I hate - say - beets (I have nothing against beets for others but a personal history involving a beet smoothie - not a good idea generally - immediately followed by a three day stomach flu has sent beets to the top of my list of foods I cannot eat).  But cake doesn't excite me.  I don't crave cake.  I don't ever decide some rainy Sunday afternoon to bake a cake.  I never go to a restaurant and order cake off the dessert menu.  Pie?  Please and thank you!  Ice cream?  Good for breakfast, lunch and dinner.  And happily, I married a man who feels the exact same way (about cake, not beets).  So, in what must have been Decision #417 that no one under the age of 50 understood, there'd be no cake at our wedding.

Instead of cake, we opted for an ice cream sundae bar.  This news received two very distinct responses that seemed to directly correlate to the age of the ears and brains hearing this news: 50+ year old ears:  "An ice cream sundae bar?? Why??"  (Implied:  That's weird.).  Under 50 year old ears:  "Awesome!  Yay ice cream!"  Told this news at the wedding, one of our friends followed up this proclamation of joy by literally turning on his heel and jogging over to the dessert table.  That was exactly the response Rich and I had hoped for.  It was fun and delicious.  Plus, I found adorable little letter (and ampersand) dishes to put some of our favorite toppings in, furthering personalizing the whole thing.

And I will say this, had my father been alive for our wedding, he most certainly would have supported this decision.  That man loved ice cream more than anyone I have ever known.

Note:  When I said above that we didn't have cake, that wasn't exactly true.  There was a tiny, semi-melted, Carvel ice cream cake purchased by my wonderful maid of honor and her husband from the grocery store on their way to the islands.  It was there just so we'd have something to cut (very important, apparently).  And the photo to prove it.

Location, Location, Location



View from the inn of our tent

I realized last night, still in awe of my husband's incredibly touching guest post, that I had not yet written anything about our engagement or about finding our wedding location.  For most couples these two things would not be intertwined.  But for us, they were.  So the logical thing to do is to write about them in consecutive posts.  What's somewhat particular to us is that they're in the reverse order to what you'd expect.

Rich and I are practical people.  Not unromantic, but practical.  I had never lived with a significant other before Rich and knew that it wasn't in my plans to live with a man I didn't intend on marrying.  And, in my typical blunt fashion, I told him so.  Luckily for me he felt the same way.  So when we moved in together in May of 2011 it was fairly inevitable we'd get married.  Our hypothetical conversations about a wedding slowly changed from "if" to "when" and after living together for a couple of months we realized that we didn't want to wait too long.  And while we were comfortable discussing the practicalities of a wedding, neither of us wanted to spoil the fun and romance of an engagement.  Somehow we were lucky enough to achieve both goals.


Just married - beautiful lake in the background

As any realtor or house hunter will tell you, the three most important things about a home are location, location, location.  And for us the same could be said about our wedding.  Choosing the right location was very important.  Knowing we were getting married it took us about five minutes to come to the conclusion that we both wanted to get married in Vermont. Rich no longer had family in his hometown of CT.  We knew we couldn't easily afford a wedding in my hometown of NYC - nor did we want our guests taking out a second mortgage to afford flights and hotels. And our current town of DC is just too darn hot for anything but a winter wedding.  Vermont, a state which we both love and where plan to live (again, in my case) someday, was the very obvious choice.  So, after a week in Northern New York in August of 2011 - though not yet engaged - we headed to Vermont to scope out some potential locations.  I had laid out an entire itinerary for the weekend consisting of four locations per day.  We only had one weekend to look that summer and wanted to make the most of it.  Our first stop was Shore Acres Inn in North Hero, along the eastern shores of Lake Champlain.  The driveway leading to the Inn is right off a main road through the islands and happened to be on the route of many trips from Vermont to our family house in upstate New York.  I must have passed it two dozen times in my years in VT.  I always thought it looked lovely but had never actually set foot on the property.  We knew the minute we did that it was the spot for us.  The lakefront was expansive and pristine.  There were 20 lakefront rooms with a New England, beachy feel.  And the innkeepers were a warm, wonderful couple who took pride in their beautiful spot.  There was a 9-hole golf course, tennis courts, kayaks and swimming dock on the property, which fit perfectly with our desire for our guests to spend the weekend and enjoy Vermont.  They also had Labor Day weekend available.

Enjoying our reception on the lakefront

But we had seven other locations to see.  Just like you can't buy the first wedding dress you try on or the first house you look at, you can't reserve the first venue you see!  So, we thanked the innkeepers and kept moving.  We went to two other places in the Lake Champlain Islands that day.  Neither held a candle to Shore Acres.  It had everything we wanted.  But we still had so many places to see!  Could we really commit without seeing the other locations?  Rich was convinced we could.  But that's his way. He's the decisive one in our relationship.  I'm the one that needs a little more time to make sure I'm making the right decision.  I'm still a pretty decisive person (except when it comes to a menu of any kind, as Rich will readily tell you) but I just need more time than he does to make big decisions.  But, convinced Shore Acres was meant for us, buoyed by their Labor Day weekend availablity (and slightly terrified someone else might snag it if we waited!), we called and put down a deposit and held a block of rooms.  It was that simple.  We were done!  And the bonus was the rest of our weekend was now free to enjoy Vermont, which we happily did.

Rich left Vermont that Monday morning while I stayed for work.  That night, I drove back to the Islands and met my mom for dinner to show her the spot we had chosen.  Because we weren't yet engaged, we decided to only tell our parents we had chosen a location.  Everyone else could wait until the engagement, even our close friends and our parents close friends.  So as my mother and I sat at the Shore Acres Restaurant for dinner that night, I swore her to secrecy.  Told her she could share this news with even her best friends.  What I didn't know was she was already keeping a secret of her own....

The unbelievable sunset on the night of our wedding

Guest Post: Rich's perspective on THE dress

Below is my husband's guest post which he volunteered to write about his perspective on my dress. Completely unedited by me.  I expected it to be filled with musings on the cranky mood I'd get in each time it was a dress shopping (or fitting) day.  Or how he learned what ruching is.  Or how he diligently set the DVR to record countless dress shows.  Just generally a lot of good-natured poking fun at me.  But he went an entirely different way. No photos necessary on this one.  Tissues may be, though (they were for me!). 

I'm a very lucky gal:

I suppose every couple is slightly different in how they plan a wedding. Some grooms are assigned a few day-of-the-event tasks by their bride, some just have to show up. From the beginning Kate and I agreed we didn't want that. I felt like planning the event was just as much my responsibility as hers. So we shared responsibility for some tasks (venue selection, rentals, catering). For others, one of us in charge of the things we do best. My wife's style and crafting ability is well documented on this blog so the big decisions of color and decoration were hers. I make my living as a designer so all printed material was up to me. But even when one of us was assigned the lead on a task, the other was right there offering feedback. Our wedding was definitely a partnership.

 

Except for one thing. The dress. Wait, I said that wrong. THE dress. Ladies, after months of coordinating and agreeing on everything else, you should know that it's a bit of an odd experience to be cut out of a major event. It's especially odd because we didn't make a habit of sharing things like fork selection or early invitation concepts with our friends. Meanwhile, as a groom you get the sense that dress pictures are swirling around as her mother, my mother, heck my father, her friends, and all of the women between ages 15 and 50 in the DC metropolitan area see pictures of your bride in various dresses. It was a struggle for my personality to decide which way to run with it. On the one hand I'm innately curious (nosy) and resourceful (sneaky) and I've never liked missing out on anything. On the other hand the various dress selection expeditions looked stressful and packed full of much trying on and commenting—not my favorite task. And for once I had a valid excuse to miss it completely.

 

Only now, two and a half months after the wedding I'm just beginning to understand why getting the right dress was so important to Kate. The entire time she had to worry about how she'd feel it in, and what other women would think about it. But mostly, she was worried that I'd like it. And that blows my mind. I guess she wasn't in my head when I turned around on the beach and saw her for the first time, and the thought that ran through my head was I had to be in the wrong place because there was no way this beautiful creature wanted to marry me. And she must have somehow missed the epic struggle I had holding myself together as she walked down the aisle. Her dress was simply perfect. It was a little vintage for her love of her family and where she comes from. It was a little sleek because she is, and always will be, a Manhattan girl. It was little understated because when you're smart you know it and don't need to show off. And it was elegant. Because that's who Kate is. And I'm the lucky guy who got to marry her.

THE DRESS

Me and my honey (and, of course, THE dress)

Every magazine, website, and television show has made it their duty to ensure that a bride understands the magnitude of the decision of finding THE dress.  I swear to all that is holy most of these sources are fairly convinced the dress decision is at least as important as the groom decision.  The right dress is the holy grail of the entire wedding planning process.  And heaven knows, it cannot be just A dress.  It must be THE dress.  And so it's not surprising that even the most level headed of us can crumble under the pressure of finding THE dress.

A month after our engagement, my MOH flew down to DC from Boston for the weekend.  We went to a dress shop recommended by a friend who had gotten married the year prior which carried the bridesmaid dress I had found online.  She tried it on and we agreed it was a winner.  And then, surrounded by white satin and lace, I succumbed to all the hype.  I tried on a ruched satin dress with a single strap.  Lovely, but not what I wanted.  And then two more - a beautiful raw satin dress with a full skirt and rose bud detail and a lace trumpet dress with a flowered belt.  Both were beautiful and totally different from one another.  I loved them.  Both.   One, the satin one, was exactly what I thought I wanted.  I thought it would look beautiful at our venue.  The other, the lace one, was stunning and different than anything I had ever seen.  Modern, yet vintage.  But I wasn't "really" looking that day.  Just essentially playing dress-up.  I would wait another month until my mom came to visit.

The on-sale David's Bridal option

When mom did come town she and I went back to the same bridal shop along with Rich's mom.  I put the three dresses back on for them.  They both agreed it was clearly between the second two.  Mom and I had another appointment that day at a fancy shop in Georgetown.  We walked in and they started pulling dresses without even discussing our budget.  This made me nervous.  I had seen enough bridal shows to know the cardinal sin of dress shopping is to try on a dress you can't afford.  I used this same tactic years before when buying my first road bike and understood exactly the rationale.  So, in the midst of undressing, I piped up "Um, should we talk budget before I try these on?".  The salesgirl responded cheerily, "Oh.  All of our dresses are between about five to ten thousand".  Oh indeed...  Mom and I looked at each other, smirked, shrugged, stifled a giggle, and I kept undressing.  Five thousand was well over my budget.  But we were there, so why not.  The good news was that the five dresses I tried on couldn't hold a candle to the two back at my little shop in Virginia.

The expensive DB option

Before I was ready to commit though, I decided the wise decision would be to investigate the options at David's Bridal.  I had nothing to lose and figured if I could find a pretty, cheaper option, why not?!  My MOH had found her beautiful dress on the clearance rack there for a steal.  So, with two willing and helpful local friends in tow, we hit the store.  Unlike my previous experiences, this was a much more hands-on situation.  We dug through the racks and found dresses that could possibly look nice on me and dragged them to a dressing room.  Two were pretty nice and one of them was on sale but in the end, I couldn't bring myself to make the decision of my dress based on price.  I had bought into the hype.  It's my DRESS!  I can't make Such an important decision based on price!!  It's as if someone suggested that maybe I should marry Rich because rent would be cheaper.

In the end - and after much contemplation - I chose the lace trumpet dress from Katherine's in VA.  It was the dress that I thought looked best, that I knew my mom and Rich's mom liked best.  But most of all, I chose it because I thought that of all of them, Rich would like it best.  It also helped that I had a wonderful experience with the shop.  That's something that I definitely hadn't thought about but was wildly important.  From the time I first tried on the dress until my last fitting I had lost fifteen pounds.  I knew I would and I did.  But it did mean that my body changed and that the dress needed to change too.  In the end the seamstress at the shop brought the dress in a full two sizes and every piece of lace, every bit of trim was perfect.  It took three fittings but when it was done it was gorgeous.  And if I hadn't gotten my dress from a wonderful bridal shop, I'm not sure that would have happened. 

Waist detail on THE dress

And looking back today, I'm happy with my decision and loved my dress.  It was unique but classic, fit with our venue and flattered my figure.  The strangest part though is that sometimes, deep in the back of my brain, I still wonder if I chose the right dress.  Intellectually I know I did.  When I look at photos I know I did.  When I heard all of the genuine compliments from friends and family, both in person and from those who had just seen photos, I know I did. But there is something about the hype around it all, the magnitude of the decision (however artificial), that leaves me with a little voice in the back of my brain wondering if there was something better out there, something I hadn't tried on.  And I guess that is a lesson in itself.  Because of all the hype and all the pressure to choose THE dress, no one ever really tells you that there is no ONE dress.  There are lots of dresses.  Lots of good options.  But eventually a decision has to be made and the most you can hope for is that you're happy with your choice and have a good experience in the process.

Bustling THE dress

Note:  And just to show what a ridiculous, consuming process the dress hunt really was, my next post will actually be a guest post from Rich, sharing his perspective on the whole experience.  It should be interesting!

Dresses, Dresses and Colors Galore!

Our tent in the midst of being decorated

Few things about our wedding planning process were easy.  Two of the things that were fairly easy were our wedding colors and the bridesmaid dresses.  At first I thought colors would be daunting, with all the colors of the rainbow to choose from (and infinite combinations!).  But when I really stopped to think about it, there were certain colors I was instantly drawn to.  When I was the Maid of Honor (MOH) in my bestie's wedding, I kept a little box in my apartment filled with wedding ideas I found and would bring the contents to her on each visit to her in Boston.  Among the contents of the box was a catalog of J. Crew bridesmaid dresses, with a collection of dresses in green and cream on the cover.  I loved the combination.  I thought it was elegant yet fun.  And four years later, when planning my own wedding, I remembered that image and decided that the green/cream color combo was strongly in the running. Green is also a nice unisex color, which I thought Rich would appreciate. But I also loved photos I found f bright color palates.  We were having a late summer wedding and I thought bright colors would also be a fitting option - red, fuchsia, orange, yellow.  I was having four bridesmaids (or so I thought) and thought I could give each of them one of the colors.  They could each wear the same style dress but in a different color.  But the more I thought about it, I was drawn more to green and cream.  Rich agreed so I was sold. 



Bridesmaid dresses in action



So I instantly started the search for the perfect green bridesmaid dress.  Undeterred by the fact that I had yet to buy my own dress, I scoured the internet to see what I could find.  I was in a good friend's wedding two summers before and she had chosen beautiful bridesmaid dresses from Alfred Sung  (it's a beautiful eggplant color and I've worn it at least 3 times since and gotten compliments each time!).  I decided to start my search there.  I filtered by "green" and within a grand total of 10 minutes, found the dress.  It's fun, classic, unique and would flatter the body type of each of my fab bridesmaids.  One of my bridesmaids happened to be on gchat at the time so I sent her the link and asked her opinion.  She agreed it was a great dress.  After convincing me she wasn't "just saying it" to be a good bridesmaid, I sent the link to the other girls.  Everyone agreed they were great.  And I even liked the "pistachio" green it came in.  My MOH was coming for a visit in a few weeks so we decided she'd try it on so we could check it out in person.  Once again, we were sold.  The dresses were done.  Winner!  I then ordered a yard of the fabric, which I figured I could put to good use.  I sent a small swatch to each bridesmaid, gave one to my mom, one to Rich's mom, put one in my wallet and gave a few more to friends of my mom's who would be helping with various projects along the way.  I used that swatch a thousand times over the next year.  Keeping it in my wallet was a perfect place since I would have it with me even when I changed purses.  We used it to find the right PMS for all of our printing, during our trip to the hardware store for paint, finding ties for the groomsmen and a million other things.



Table decorated with green gingham runner, green hurricane
lamp, movable type 'R's & 'K's, apples and colorful flowers

 And as we chose decorations, I still wanted a little "pop" of color.  And I decided that I could take my love of the red/orange/fuchsia/yellow palate and incorporate it carefully into our design.  I decided my bouquet and Rich's boutonniere  would be colorful.  I also found fabulous paper lanterns on a Vermont wedding site being sold in just the right colors.  For $20 I scored 10 large lanterns and about 40 small ones.  I wasn't sure what I'd use them for but I figured they were worth the price.  We also decided that we'd have colorful napkins.  Our linens would be green or white, and the colorful napkins would be the perfect pop of color along with the flowers on the tables.

So in the end, I got everything I wanted and Rich and my bridesmaids were pleased - cute dress, great color and ideal accent colors to keep it all fresh and fun.  All in all, I think both or bridesmaid dresses and our color choices helped us continue to strike just the right "tone" for our wedding, which made us very, very happy.

Mailboxes, Etc



The finished product -
along with our favors and photo of me and my dad.



I grew up in Manhattan and today we live in a condo building in DC.  Why do I mention this, you ask?  Because to me, a mailbox is a small locked box in a row of other small locked boxes in the lobby of a building.  A lone mailbox, standing freely on the edge of a driveway with the residents' names painted on it is very bucolic to me.  So, when planning our outdoor Vermont wedding, I thought a mailbox would be a great home for cards we'd receive from our guests.  Not exactly the gilded locked birdcages of many weddings I've seen but I thought it would work well.  Once again, with the internet at my fingertips, I found a standard mailbox on Amazon for $15.  There are two issues with a "standard" mailbox.  First, mailboxes are significantly larger than they appear when driving down a country road or grandma's driveway.  They're really just quite long.  It was about 8 inches longer than I needed but figured for the price, it would do.  Second, a "standard" mailbox, as the word would imply, is a boring mailbox.  It would need some sprucing up.  And I had the perfect thing to spruce it with - chalkboard paint!  Before you think I painted chalkboard paint on everything without two (or four) legs, this is the last chalkboard paint related project.  I swear.

 

So, with the tarp still down in our living room floor - it stayed there for a solid month or two - I got to work.  Typically, it is recommended that you scuff smooth surfaces before painting.  But, I'm a bit on the lazy side and figured I'd first give it a whirl without this annoying scuffing step.  I'm not proud that I'm lazy, it's just a reality I've come to live with.  Maybe lazy isn't the right word.  It's just that I like things done, and I like them done quickly.  I'm impatient more than lazy, really because I don't mind hard work. But in addition to this tendency toward impatience, I'm also a perfectionist.  These two characteristics do not go well together and have led to more than one fight in my home.  But impatience ruled the day and I put brush to mailbox.  Three coats of paint and 24 hours later, I was done.  It took me another day to touch up some of the hard-to-reach places (like around the little red "you have mail" flag) and I was done.  When it came to the day of the wedding, my dear friend with the great handwriting simply wrote "Cards" on either side of the mailbox.  It was placed on the gift table along with our chalkboard reading "Cards & Gifts" and worked out well.  One thing I would note is that there is some risk with this option.  If you're at all concerned about the theft of envelopes - a particular concern if you're at a large venue with a large staff and multiple events - you may not want to use this idea.  A few people raised the concern that our mailbox didn't lock someone could steal the cards.  We had a plan that someone would check the mailbox throughout the night and collect the cards, but that never really materialized.  I sort of shrugged it off figuring that if someone stole wedding cards, karma would get them.  In the end we didn't lose a single card but I am aware that this is not a good project for all people and all venues.

 

One funny note about this project:  This is something I had never seen before.  I didn't steal the idea from Pinterest, a bridal show, or a blog.  I came up with it all in my own little head.  But weeks after my mailbox was  painted and packed away for the trip north, my mother called me excitedly.  That day at work she spotted one of her employees coming back from the mail room with a large mailbox in hand.  Knowing this coworker was getting married around the same time as me, she inquired - "Karen, what is that mailbox for?" to which Karen replied "I'm using it for the cards at our wedding!".  My mom then showed her a photo of my painted mailbox and they had a good laugh.  I guess sometimes great minds really do think alike!

My Daddy



My daddy and our dog Tag-A-Long



My father was 58 when I was born.  Even though he never seemed any different than the other dads, I was always aware he was older.  The downside of an older parent is knowing they might not always be around.  I grew up with the awareness that my dad wouldn't be around forever.  I always understood there was a significant chance that unless I married young, my father wouldn't be around to walk me down the aisle.  And given that I come from a long, proud line of late-marrying ladies (not to mention my penchant for dating less than fabulous guys in my formative years), marrying young was not likely.  Because I was aware of my father's age and mortality, I was at least somewhat prepared for the eventuality that he might not be alive on my wedding day.  The downside of an older parent was also an upside because I did not have the struggle, sadness, and challenge of someone who loses a parent unexpectedly, having never given such a reality any prior thought.  I have friends who have had that experience and my heart breaks for them.  For me, getting to have my dad around until 27 - to see me graduate from college, start my career, begin graduate school - was more than I had hoped for.  I felt lucky to have him for as long as I did.  

But as prepared as I may have been intellectually for a wedding without a father the reality still completely and utterly... well... sucked.  I'm not typically a very emotional person but nothing turns on the waterworks like a girl without her daddy on her wedding day.  And my skin did not thicken to it.  After planning a wedding for ten months, it was all i could do when - two months before the big day - our band leader asked us what song we'd like for the father/daughter dance.  I held it together while I explained there wouldn't be one, that my father had passed away, but then lost it as soon as we hung up the phone.  

And so, we decided to skip the father-daughter dance.  And I asked my mother to walk me down the aisle.  It has been just the two of us for five years.  And I decided I didn't need some male relative - even though I have great ones - stepping in to walk me down the aisle.  My mama and I would be just fine together.  We included language in the program to honor my daddy but I wanted something more.  I needed another way to have him with me on that day.  And so I began to think.  And after a great deal of thought, I came up with the beginnings of a plan.  My father was a printer - a great printer.  And some of my fondest memories of my father from my childhood are of him working.  I can see him bent over our dining room table (which gets great natural light) intently examining a print with his loop.  I used to love going with my father to the printing presses.  There were two in the shop, which I had named Big Bird and Snuffleupagus (Snuffy).  The smell of printer's ink can quickly bring these memories flooding back.  And so, we decided to subtly incorporate some printing materials into our decorations.  We went to Eastern Market - the best outdoor market in DC - and found exactly what we were looking for: movable type and a type tray.  We bought about $100 worth of "R"s and "K"s and one type tray.  The letters would go on each table and we'd find a use for the tray.  We eventually decided to use the tray to display the mini boxes of altoids we had purchased for everyone (more on the altoids later).  I loved this stuff but knew it wasn't quite enough.  It was reminiscent of my father but I wanted something more.

One evening I was watching one of countless bridal/wedding shows that I had become addicted to over the year of our engagement.  It was one of those makeover type shows where they don't just find the girl the dress of her dreams but also the veil, makeup, and perfect hair style.  And typically these women had some sort of heartfelt story to boot.  For one woman, it was a father who had passed away.  Her father had served in the military so the industrious makeover king found one of her father's epaulets and wrapped it around her bouquet.  It was a perfect idea.  I loved it.  The only problem was i had no idea where my father's epaulets from his days in the Navy were.  We do have his medals though so I thought about using those.  But somehow that wasn't quite right either.  My father was in the Navy but it didn't define him.  Finally, it came to me.  His watch.   My father had a beautiful gold watch that I vividly remember him wearing for years which my mother kept in her jewelry box.  And so, with a few pins and a clear hair band, on my wedding day we fastened the watch around my bouquet.  It was perfect.  It was beautiful but subtle.  I could hold it as I walked down the aisle, like my daddy was holding my hand.  It was the perfect way to honor him in a way that made him feel close but wasn't too overt.

 Long ago, when I'd ask my mother about the decision to marry a man more than twenty years her senior, she'd always respond the same way.  She said she'd rather have 30 great years with a man she loved with all her heart than 50 mediocre years with a man her age.  Now, a married lady myself, this makes all the sense in the world and I couldn't be luckier that she followed her heart.  I, too, would rather have 27 great years with my wonderful daddy than 50 with anyone else, even if it meant walking down the aisle with his memory rather than the man himself.