Gifts for Our Guests of Honor

We thought hard about what to get our guests of honor (which is what we're calling our sort-of bridal party that doesn't follow a lot of the rules). Apparently traditional gifts are jewelry for women and cufflinks or alcohol paraphernalia for men.

We considered vintage jewelry - Rebecca's parents have an antiques business and Rebecca grew up around that kind of thing - but hunting it down seemed hard. So then we turned to Etsy and perused and perused and perused . . . and came up with an idea we really like . . . with some assembly required.

I won't say any more because I want it to be a surprise, but I'm happy with the way things are going and I really hope the special people in our life like them.

I Kissed a Girl

So the plot for a few episodes of Greek, an ABC family dramedy about fraternity/sorority life at a fictional university, a character, Rebecca Logan, explores her sexual preferences, and this statement occurs:

"Last weekend I kissed a girl. And I liked it. Does that make me a lesbian? I just wish there was a way to know for sure. Like a pregnancy test for gayness."

This reflects the stereotype that lots of people experiment with same sex encounters during their undergraduate years. I have no idea what percentage of people actually do this, but I would guess it's a smaller percentage than one might think.

Unfortunately, this gives people the idea that attraction to members of the same sex is a phase, particularly if people come out later in life. I've run into this, as has Rebecca and at least one other gay friend. This gives people the idea that being gay is a choice, that something will change, that there's no permanence or stability to the life of an LGBT person.

In the show, Rebecca returns to straight life after a few episodes. This doesn't reflect reality for many of us.

After my first kiss with Rebecca, I knew that we were meant to spend the rest of our lives together. Annie on My Mind made so much sense to me; it spoke to me in ways that no other story had (and I was a voracious reader as a child). It wasn't fleeting or transient. I didn't need a pregnancy test for gayness. I finally understood myself and what had been going on for so many years.

I kissed a girl and I liked it.

More on Flowers

I also made corsages for a few people - the men who are guests of honor, Rebecca's parents, and the person who will be running sound for us. Also happy with how these turned out.

Mission Flower Power: Accomplished

I finished the bouquets this weekend! I'm really happy with how they turned out.

Flower Run

Went to Michael's today to pick up flowers for the bouquets. Even though a lot of the stems were half off, it still came to $70 or so, which is about what the first run cost even with a coupon. Still, it's a lot cheaper than having someone else do it even if there is a time commitment (each bouquet takes about two hours, much less than I thought it might), and it's one small touch in the midst of all the things we're skipping (centerpieces, pew bows, favors, etc). Rebecca came with this time and helped me pick out flowers that were a little different than the last time. In addition to flowers for bouquets, we also picked up some additional orchids that were on sale (and we checked in at World Market to make sure that they still have their orchids in stock in case we need more red - Michael's only carries white and purple).

Next task is to find Christmas lights. I meant to do it around Christmas, but things happened and I didn't. We're hoping that a hardware store will carry them - Aco didn't, but it's a lot smaller and didn't seem to carry a lot in the way of landscaping supplies. Our church is down towards the Lansing Lowe's, so we'll be checking there tomorrow.

Lastly, tomorrow is the deadline for RSVPs. Most people have gotten back to us already, but we'll be making some phone calls tomorrow afternoon.

Quick Update

Visited our venue today for coffee/Italian soda. They still don't have their liquor license, so we're thinking that beverage choices might be coffee, tea, lemonade, soft drinks, and Italian soda. That's fine with me - I've been to plenty of lovely receptions without alcohol. Hopefully the cafe will take a little off the price they quoted us.

We made a final decision about the space we'll use for the reception - it will be upstairs on the balcony. We love the feel up there, much better than the downstairs space. There are mostly booths, some rectangular and some round. The advantage to the downstairs space was that the tables are a little bigger and it would be handicap accessible, but I kind of like the intimacy of smaller tables, and I'm fairly certain that none of our guests need spatial accommodations. If they do, we'll find a way to set them up downstairs.

We also tried to estimate, again, how long the banisters are - we're planning to decorate them with white Christmas lights and silk flowers. I think we don't have nearly enough flowers, but I think we might supplement with eucalyptus, since it's cheaper for the amount of length it will give, and that will tie the bouquets and decorations together.

I'm glad we were able to make these decisions, since we have just over a month left until the ceremony. I can't believe how quickly the time has gone! I hope that we're able to get everything done.

First Floral Foray

I've never really arranged flowers before. I mean, I've set up flowers my mom received in a vase, and helped her with a couple projects, but it's never been my responsibility to select and arrange a bouquet.

Here's my first attempt:

I used orchids to match our planned decorations for the venue and added a white lily and white hydrangea. The greens are eucalyptus and ivy. I've decided that I want the bouquets to go but not match. For one thing, it's more fun that way, and for another, it takes the pressure off me if I don't have to exactly duplicate a bouquet. I'll post more pictures when I have another one done.

To bouquet or not to bouquet

Is the question.

We've decided that we won't carry bouquets, since we're coming down the aisle on each others arms. The more I think about it, though, the more I think that our women guests of honor (we're not having a traditional bridal party, since we didn't want to divide up our friends or gender balance) should probably have something to hold. After all, what do you do with your hands if you're not on someone's arm and there's no bouquet?

So I did that thing again, where I spent more money and created more work for myself than is probably strictly prudent. I had some silk orchids already, so I decided to use those and supplement with some other stems. The trick is that I will need to create new stems for almost every individual blossom out of florist wire and tape. I'm hoping that won't take as long as I think it will take.

I've decided that each bouquet will be a little different, since our ceremony is going to be very eclectic anyway. I'll put up pictures when I have something done.

And the winners are . . .

Today was a big day in reception planning . . . our cake tasting!

Our baker, Roseanne Sherwood, works out of her home in a licensed kitchen and she prepared seven cakes for us to try. We're planning on having six bundt cakes for the reception (a bundt generally serves 10-12 people, and we're still thinking 50-60 guests). You can check Roseanne out on Facebook - her goodies are delicious and very reasonably priced.

The cakes, in no particular order, were:

Carrot - spicy, moist, with a lovely twist of orange, this recipe was converted from my favorite carrot cupcake recipe.

Spicy apple - similar to the carrot cake, but sweeter because of the apples.

Chocolate raspberry - almost a pudding cake it was so moist. Roseanne said that she infused it with raspberry, and it showed.

Lemon Poppyseed - a recipe that Rebecca's sister found for me. Intensely lemony and yet delicate at the same time.

Mocha - The perfect balance of chocolate and espresso in a light, tender, moist cake.

Blueberry - This is one of Roseanne's specialty's, and we could see why! It was lovely with the contrast of blueberries on a white cake, and was the lightest and airiest of the cakes we tasted.

Chocolate orange - You know those chocolate oranges that you smash on the counter and then eat in slices? Yeah, it's like that.

So it was a hard decision . . . in the end, we decided to go with everything except the apple. For a fall wedding, the apple would make sense, but given that it was so similar to the carrot cake, we thought it just didn't fit. That choice was validated when we took some of the cake home for Rebecca's parents to try . . . we've decimated all but the apple. I'm really impressed with how much cake we've managed to eat!

If you're in the Lansing area and want to stop by, there's some of a few of them left, and you're welcome to help us devour them!

Just over a month . . .

And I'm overwhelmed. I said I wasn't going to be, I said I was going to be chill . . . but it's starting to get to me. I feel like there must be things I'm supposed to be doing that I'm forgetting (please let me know if you think of any), and it's not too much longer before we need all of our RSVPs in so we can give a count to our venue.

I just have to remember:

I can do this.

This day is going to be wonderful no matter what.

I have the support of lots of people who are willing to help.

Oops!

It's been more than a month since I posted! Now, what has happened in the last month that would keep me that busy?

I presented a poster at the American Association for Applied Linguistics conference in Boston! It was great to network with people and see what's being done in the field. Boston was also a lot of fun to visit.

Other than that, I've been working on papers for class and Rebecca's been studying for classes and trying to prepare for her boards. She had her first dress fitting a couple weeks ago (after a fiasco at the original first fitting where we forgot the dress!) and will have the next one next week. We also registered at Bed, Bath, & Beyond, which was an interesting exercise in balancing thrift and consumerism.

Lastly, we have a cake tasting on Saturday! A few people are going to come out and help us make the tough decisions of which flavors to keep and which to let go. Hopefully, there will be a post about that this weekend.