To top it off

As with everything else in this wedding, I've had my fair share of "ooh, I want that to be my cake topper" moments...so let's take a quick jog down memory lane before I show you where we landed on this issue.

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I totally wanted these little wood peg people. SO freaking adorable!!! OK, pretty much that was all I wanted to be on the top of the cake. I showed them to Eric and he didn't really care...then he saw what you see below.

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KILL ME! These are adorable. There are Zelda versions, Luigi versions, INSANE!! The downfall is that these toppers are REALLY expensive. Well, not REALLY expensive, but above the budget. Like I said before...you have to stick to the budget in some places, otherwise what good is the budget?

(images via Sears.com)

We actually bought these. We figured this was a good compromise. Mario Brothers (3) has always been my favorite video game and we figured the pink and green Yoshi were a good representation of something we both really enjoy. Their arms move and we were going to have them "fist bump" on the top of the cake.

I was pretty much done there. I figured this was enough for the top of our cake. Granted there is no love story between the pink and green Yoshi...but that didn't really matter right?

So one day we were picking out a birthday gift for the dude's sister at Urban Outfitters when I came across these amazing little action figures called Kidrobot. They create mini action figures from all your favorite cartoons (read : all MY favorite cartoons) including Family Guy, The Simpson's, and Futurama. Futurama is one of our all-time favorite cartoons ever. There are a couple love stories running through the show, so it kind of works. I knew this had to be our new cake topper. The only problem with Kidrobot is the toys come in boxes and you can't see what's inside...so it's ALL by chance. Yikes. At $10 per toy and with 9 different options, who knows how much I would end up spending trying to find the two characters I wanted. No thanks.

A couple weeks went by, but I was sold...I needed to switch our cake topper. The dude said I should just order them on Ebay, that way I could get exactly what I wanted. Today I finally made that purchase and got the action figures below:

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Fry and Leela! If you watch Futurama, you know their story. I'm so excited! Not only do they have a love story behind them, but we really freaking love this show. Also, I've used a quote from this show (from one of the other love stories) for other parts of this wedding. There are two characters named Kip and Amy, Kip in a particular episode called Amy his Smizmar. Basically, a Smizmar is your one true love. This word is used in Kip's culture and it means that you can ONLY be with your Smizmar, otherwise nothing else will ever work out. Eric and I refer to each other as Smizmar (it's even the title of our wedding website). I will have this word engraved in Eric's ring when we get it too.

So there you have it...our wedding cake toppers finally mean something to me! I mean US! :)

Who woulda thunk it?

I always assumed that my parents would be adding on guests to the guest list left and right. I mean, I'm the first daughter to get married, their oldest daughter...I just thought it would go with the territory that not only would I be a Bridezilla...

(rawr!)

But that my mom would be a Momzilla...

(rawr!)

And of course, my sister would be a Maidzilla...

(rawr!)

But alas, that we are not. I don't have many demands...in fact people are demanding that I start demanding so I stop writing complaining posts about how my dress will make it anywhere without me (yes, I know you all love me, I'll shut up about it...I think).

Anyway, the point of this post is not to call anyone a zilla of any sort...it's just to talk about the weird paradigm shift I am experiencing. I always assumed the dudes parents really didn't care about the 'who, what, where, WEAR, when, or why' of the wedding. I just assumed they would ask us to invite one friend and we'd move along. Well, the dude and I were very much mistaken. Very, very much mistaken. Our first guest list was comprised of people I thought would come to the wedding. I didn't think it was nice to send an invite to someone I knew wouldn't come. Maybe I'm naive, I just didn't want those people to think I was begging for a gift. Man, I really care what people think, don't I?

Our second guest list had numerous people added that I COMPLETELY forgot about (but love just the same as those on the first list). To this day, we are still adding people to our guest list. Mind you, all additions are being made by the dude's family (who have offered to pay for them, so it's no big deal). But it's totally weird! Our guest list is now at about 103 people! INSANE! (in the membrane...)

Let's talk about the (ongoing) additions, they're BIG additions. Not really numbers wise...STATUS wise. Seriously. I will not divulge what it is the dude does for a living, but let me break it down in business speak. Say you worked for a company of approximately 12,000 employees and the CEO was invited to your wedding. This is all good because you know the CEO on a first name basis and vice versa. Cool. But what if inviting that CEO meant you also had to invite the VP of Operations and the VP of Finance...both of whom you don't know. Oh, and by the way, the VP of Operations is married to the CEO of the company across the street. Yeah, big wigs are invited (and likely attending) our wedding.

What the WHAT???

The sad part? The dude won't receive any special treatment for (sorta) knowing and (definitely) partying with these people. My dude likes to be EXTREMELY professional at all times, so I really hope he can get past all of this.

As for me? I'm not inviting anyone from work, and I'm A-OK with that.

Needless to say, I can't wait to send out our invites so there can be no more additions and we can move past all of these surprises.

Did you have any surprise additions to your guest list? How did you deal with it?

We made it...let's talk about favoring our favorite people

So we made it past the 'rapture', welcome my fellow survivors. In all seriousness, I am merely jumping on the 'rapture' bandwagon because other people WON'T SHUT UP ABOUT IT. I have no idea where it stemmed from or why anyone would take it seriously. I work too many hours to even consider wrapping my head around this rapture. Either way, we made it...so let's talk about 'favoring' the guests.

I have had about 9 million (seriously) ideas about what to give as favors (I still think they're ALL cool...and may use them in the future at another party, ya know...if I ever get a day off).

Here's a quick run down of all the favors that could have been:

Option one : Hot Chocolate
Secret : I HATE hot chocolate, but was DYING for a warm fall-inspired wedding, this totally fit the bill.


Option two : Miniature bags of seasonal fruit
Secret : I really just thought it looked adorable. I didn't care that it had nothing to do with ANY theme I had ever imagined.


Option three : Personal deserts for AFTER the wedding
Secret : I will never deny the absolute adorable-ness of this, but do you have any idea how expensive this favor can get? Holy cow!


Option four : Succulents, succulents for EVERYONE!
Secret : This falls right in line with my theme. Couple downfalls though, I hate getting plants...they all die...why force my taste on someone else? Second downfall, again, VERY expensive.


Option five : Salsa!
Secret : This falls right in line with the Mexican fare we will be serving. I wanted to take this one step further and have a friend MAKE all the salsa. Yeah, that would take a while...and none of us know how to can...anything.
SUPER Secret : I wanted customer labels, and I want them to say:

Amelia & Dude...keepin' it spicy


Cheeseball!

I know, no one at the wedding really NEEDS a favor, but I'm not going to lie...I think they're fun, albeit mostly useless in daily application. Do you really use the heart shaped measuring spoons you got at a wedding in the past? Probably not...but they likely rusted at this point, because they were likely $2.

That being said, here's what I've finally decided on...

Cactus Cookie Cutter
(source is just for picture purposes, not where they will be purchased)


To be paired with homemade cactus (sugar) cookies!

Along with the cookie cutter and homemade cookie, guests will receive the recipe for both the cookie and the frosting (family recipes). I'll just have to figure out a way to package it all together.

It's no secret that my top choice would have been to make salsa with one of our best friends (what's up Steve!) and can it...and label it. But honestly, I just don't have the time or patience...and simply think this will be easier. Good thing is, it TOTALLY goes with the theme. Win-WIN!

Did you have favors? How did you pick them out? Do you like getting favors at weddings?

A big giant Lull

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If you have read even a little bit of this blog, you know that I am a planner. I have already started planning how we will pack for the honeymoon. I have planned what restaurant we should take my parents to for my dads birthday (just a few days prior to the wedding...for the record, we have chosen the Stammtisch Restaurant in Seaside).

But I feel like the picture above so perfectly sums up the way I feel right now. I feel like everything looks beautiful (you can't tell me the above photo isn't beautiful)...but there's a storm a-brewin. Seriously...I haven't been able to make it to my home town to even have a face to face conversation with the man I want to marry us (more on this later), I haven't picked linens, I'm completely rethinking our cake topper, I have NO CLUE how my ceremony dress, all my stuff, and our gifts are going to make it out of the wedding site without ME having to haul all that junk in my reception dress and Choo's. To be honest, I'm getting a little nervous about the storm...but I'm stuck staring at the beauty.

I feel like I've come a long way...but have SO FAR to go. I only have 4 months left...how do you smack yourself back into reality?

Things that make you go 'moo'

As I've stated on one...or two occasions, I'm not investing too much into my invitation suite. In fact it took me approximately 30 minutes to entirely design and test print our invitations and RSVP cards. We'll talk about those at a later date though, I want to make sure they're nestled in our guests hands before blowing the surprise completely. A girls gotta have her secrets right?

While getting ready to send out the save the dates I had a last minute 'oh crap! what about our website?' moment. I didn't want anything like that to end up on the actual invites. I wanted a very cohesive, thought out look to these.

Look at those sad labels

So I just kind of forgot my goal and figured 'something would come to me'. HA! What that really means is, I didn't really think about it until I read something awesome on another blog and decided to take it as my own.

Enter WeddingBee, only my most favoritest blog on the interweb. I read this post, and was sold. That's it. That's how I will make sure our guests know how to get to our website for their accommodation, and recreational needs. What I'm talking about are Moo cards. Moo makes business cards of all sorts, but more importantly...they make Mini Moo cards that are just 1/2 the size of a regular business card. You can so quickly design them and see your proofs...it's the fastest easiest way to spend your wedding budget yet!

But seriously, look how cute!

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You can use up to 100 different pictures...or 1 picture for every single card. On the back you can put any information you like.

For me, the best part is getting to use my engagement photos for something other than for me to oggle all day long. Now my guests can oggle them. They'll oggle them right?

I ended up choosing 8 different photos, all of which contain the information regarding our website on the backside in the same font as our wedding invite. I can't wait to reveal these to you guys! I ordered them last week and they arrived today! The quality is amazing and the packaging is so cute!

How did you personalize your invitations?

Martha strikes again

I may have to refrain from purchasing another Martha Stewart Weddings magazine for the remainder of this engagement. This breaks my heart because I'm trying to live this engagement to the fullest...but HONESTLY, it gives me TOO many amazing ideas. Ideas = More money.

My newest 'must have'?

Meet the Calligraphed Address Stamp

I've mentioned before that my invitations aren't really my top priority for the wedding. I want them to look nice, but it's not on my list of items I'm 'willing to blow the budget on'. That being said, I don't really want to hand write all addresses...in particular our address approximately 70 times. No thanks. Between invitations and thank-you's...that's a lot of our address to be writing...and hell, for all cards for every occasion for as long as we live where we do.

Enter Martha and your stupid magazine with awesomeness. Martha's magazine sent me to Emilie Friday where I perused these gorgeous stamps and found one that would set the theme for my invite suite (and by theme I mean, set the font). I ended up choosing the Spencerian stamp.

I admit that this purchase seems frivolous...but I do think I'll use it...a LOT. I send thank you notes for everything and know I'll get lots of use out of this over the years. Change of season? Change the ink pad. Bada bing bada boom.

So, I must say...thank you, Martha, for the (newest) idea...my Amex wants us to break up. I think it may be right...we need to end this. Clean break...

I say this knowing that I searched ALL OVER the grocery store for the newest issue (couldn't find it). It's going to be tough, anyone have any advice for quitting Martha?

Caring for your skin...and yourself

True statement, not my most creative title to date.

Not that you shouldn't care any other time in your life...but you really do pay a LOT for a wedding (regardless of your budget...any amount spent on it, is a big expense), and by George you want to look good. I'm going to talk about how I take care of my skin and myself...it seems to work for me. I don't have many complaints (except during THAT time of the month...)

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I'm not doing anything out of the ordinary for the big day...just following my usual skin care path...but I'm open to (budget friendly) suggestions that anyone may have.

Daily Routine
-Wash face in the shower (I use an exfoliating scrub) with Target brand Acne Wash Scrub
-After shower, before moisturizer, I use a Noxzema Triple Clean Anti-Blemish face pad, meant to take away a lot of the bad oil. Ironically, this often still comes out slightly dirty even after a shower.
-After my face dries and I finish all my other bathroom stuff, I put on Exuviance Daily Defense with SPF15
-Side note, I also use the Vaseline Protecting Aloe Fresh with SPF15 lotion on any part of my body that will see the light of day.
-When I run, I use an SPF15 Daily Facial Moisturizer by Cetaphil
-When I return home from work, I use the Noxzema pads to take off any surface dirt and then I pass out.

I try to get 8 hours of sleep per night...I usually end up in the 6-7 hour range.

I take vitamins daily (not sure it's helping with my skin). I take the following vitamins, daily:
-Glucosamine (2 tablets) - Helps with my joints from the running
-Calcium (1 tablet) - Because I'm lactose intolerant, and even though I consume SOME dairy...it's nowhere near what the body needs.
-Multi Vitamin (1 tablet) - Women's one a day. Always good to take a multi.
-Fish Oil (1 tablet) - Good for the ticker
-Super B Complex (1 tablet) - By far the best (and worst tasting) vitamin I take. This vitamin gives me so much energy! Vitamin B turns the food you consume into energy. I can't take this vitamin any other time than in the morning...otherwise I can't sleep. Seriously. I love it.

I always take my vitamins with food.

I try to work out at least 4 times per week. Lately I've been working 11-12 hour days, 6 days per week...so the work out routine has suffered. I'm only able to maintain thanks to working in management for retail...I'm on the go ALL day. I think I sat down for maybe 2 hours total yesterday. My feet still hurt.

I don't wear make up, and I'm a chapstick junky.

Those are my 'secrets'. What are yours and do you have any recommendations for me? Right now I'm focusing on not burning, and not getting a farmers tan. I don't want weird lines anywhere.

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What the WHAT?

Thanks for the title Liz Lemon

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So I never followed up on what I ended up doing in the shoe department. I ended up choosing the Choo's. It took a lot for me to break down and do it, but I did. Armed with gift cards and the dude right next to me literally begging me to get them (so I'd stop looking at them on the website...and possibly driving him bananas), to Nordstrom we went. We entered the shoe department looking roughly like nerdy teenagers. I walked straight to the shoes, grabbed them and waited to be mobbed (seriously...you get mobbed in places like the shoe department, we all know this).

Nothing. Salesmen looked at us, looked at each other, and walked to the flip flop department (I'm sure that's where they went)...anywhere but to the two obviously out of place children in the designer shoe department. So we stood...and waited...and waited. I was getting really irritated, and when I get irritated, I get loud. I started making comments like "I guess no one here depends on commission" and other such things. Seriously, don't judge a book by the 11 year old Chuck Taylor's...just saying.

Finally my comments got a sales person in our direction. I wanted the shoe in a 39.5 and I quickly asked for it just like that. What did the guy bring me? The rattiest looking pair of Choo's in the store (I'm sure). There were spots of glitter missing, there were strings hanging all over the place. Seriously? This was downright rude. I put them on and said, "Yep, this is my size, now I'll take a pair that isn't totally screwed up". He looked at me like I had two heads. I simply told him there was no way I was going to spend this money on a jacked up pair of Choo's. He said this was the last pair, so I told him that he would need to order me a good pair. He was thoroughly annoyed. Come on guy, I was handing you a HUGE shoe sale without ANY effort!! He made his way to the back to see what he could find. He finally returned with a brand spanking new smaller pair, but I gave him the benefit of the doubt and tried them on. They fit like a glove. done deal.

The Choo's (pictures from original contact on the day we all tried on dresses in San Jose)

Glittery Champagney Goodness


Excuse my road map feet


Initial Choo dilemma

So that was settled. My first dress is long, so you'll never see the shoes and they are SMASHING with my reception dress. Easy Peasy.

Or so I thought. This is where the 'What the WHAT?' comes in. About a week ago I took my ceremony dress into a seamstress. There are portions of the dress where the lace is coming up and I need to get it repaired. No big deal really, will be simple. Brought the dress in as well as the shoes. I figured I better have everything so they can note if there are any alterations that need to be made. I suited up and put on the shoes, step up on the pedestal and...omg...there is approximately 4'' of floating space between my dress on the floor.

My initial reaction was, well...now I can show off the shoes more. I stick out my foot to take a look and they look AWFUL together. I never, in my life, envisioned this scenario. I never thought you'd see my shoes with my ceremony dress. So now what? I'm keeping the Choo's. But what about the ceremony? I wanted to just wear ballet flats, but then the dress will drag all over the place...so maybe 3'' heels? GAH! TWO PAIRS OF HEELS? WHAT THE WHAT???

So I'm thinking green heels...anyone have any shoe shopping advice? I don't do this often and don't want to get anything too pricey (obviously). HELP!

Princess stole my dress!

Alternate title : Public Defense

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Ok, not really. But really. If you click all the way back to the beginning of this blog...I posted photos of me in my ceremony dress (aka my moms dress, aka the dress I was going to wear before these two folks above were engaged...hell, the dress I was planning on wearing before even I was engaged).

Refresher:

Hey look, me and my Pippa...I mean sista...


Long lace sleeves, collar that stands up


Training day

This is just a public service announcement to say "Hey, Princess stole my dress, and NO, my goal was not to copy her on my wedding day" for I am certain, many people, will assume I wanted to be a princess on my wedding day (quite the opposite...can I be supreme dictator of my own island? President of a fortune 500 company? All of these options seem much more my speed. I am not proper enough for 'princess', and I'm OK with that).

Maybe the designer read my blog. HA! Just kidding.

Cake cake cake....Cakey Cakey CAKE (Part 2)

Just like most things in this wedding, I was taken aback when we stumbled upon the cake we wanted...at the bridal expo in Monterey. I had envisioned in my head going to about 4 different bakers throughout Monterey and sampling their amazing creations, falling in love, and then worrying about the price they quote me.

It didn't happen. Is nothing in this wedding going to give me a headache besides my own neuroses?

So as we were walking around we come upon FB&C bakery sandwiched between two stationary vendors. As with every other baker...we grab one of each flavor and taste away. The first one was too sweet, the second one was too dense, but the last one was JUST RIGHT.

Get it? Three Bears scenario? (source)

Anyway, Freedom Bakery & Confections (FB&C) is located in Watsonville, CA and had THE most amazing cake I had tried out of three wedding expo's. I knew it from the moment I tried it. Mom loved it, dude loved it. I kind of wanted to take everything that was left. The cake was an amazing mango mousse cake. Very simple, very clean. Will blend AMAZINGLY with the spicyness (it's a word today) of our Mexican themed menu.

How much could it possibly cost? Everywhere I had been looking into wanted about $5-$10 per slice. FB&C quoted me about $3.75-$4.00 per slice, given that I wanted a very simple design. GOAAAAAAAAAAAAL. I mean, Score!

So, of course, I did not make a decision at the show. I left to think about it. Hoping I wouldn't think about that cake again and I could simply move on to my "try every cake baker in a 30 mile radius" plan. But I kept thinking about it. And thinking about in. And thinking about it.

The dude and I decided to just go for it. Initially I thought we'd have about 3 different flavors, but we loved this so much, we're going with one. SO SIMPLE.

The Santa Cruz (Mango Mousse Cake)

I called Joe (the gentleman I met at the expo) and let him know that we had decided that we wanted them to do our cake, and would he have us (ya know, dates and all).

They said they could have us and asked all the technical questions about how many people, time, etc etc. I let him know that we are inviting about 99 people (guest list EXPLOSION) but expecting maybe 75, but that the dude's family loves sugar, so making a cake that would provide leftovers would be an a-ok move. He quoted me a cake for 130 people (seriously). And get this...

It's under budget!! (and I'm certain it will be on time)

Due to my desire to have cake styled like this:

Minus the roses, just look at the frosting


Textured frosting GALORE


Actual inspiration photo that will be used to design our cake (I kind of lost the website)

Paul asked if I'd like him to do flowers on the cake and I said that we'd put them on ourselves...I didn't want a $100 up charge for something I deemed (hopefully) really simple. Paul emailed me back and said he would really like to do it, and he'd do it for free so I didn't have to stress about it.

SERIOUSLY PEOPLE....WHAT AM I GOING TO STRESS ABOUT??? Throw me a bone here!

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So there you have it. Our cake, our style, the first item to stay under budget.

How did picking your cake (or cupcakes, or cookies, or pies...) go?