Ted and Shay: Put it in my mouth!

My birthday cake from Ted, 2008.

I love cake more than almost anything in the world and a wedding is not a wedding without lots and lots of cake! One of the very first decisions we made about the wedding was where we would get the cake from.  Who else, but our favorite baker ladies in the whole wide world at Cake Eater Bakery.

Sheela, Jimena, Emily

Ted and I stopped in today to narrow down our flavor options and lock in the order.

We knew, without a doubt, what our cake toppers will dance upon, the ELVIS!!!! A scrumptuous banana cake with peanut butter marshmallow frosting and bacon! Ahhh, let the angles sing an hallelujah folks!  This is what Shay-dreams are made of!

The Elvis!

We're not doing cupcakes though. After helping out with a few deliveries at the bakery, I've witnessed Jimena's incredible frosting skills and I really want cakes, lots and lots of cakes! Well, maybe only six.

I drooled over their menu list trying to narrow down the options, but couldn't get my choices smaller than 12!  We're having them make six 8" cakes so we sat down with Jimena and hashed it out.

The Elvis, the Surly Coffee Bender Chocolate, Strawberry Lemonade, Vanilla Bomb, Pumpkin Butterscotch, and the Peanut Butter and Jelly!

I can hardly wait to sink my face into each and every one!

xoshayox

It just wouldn't be a wedding without cake and my heinous sweet tooth has been beyond excited to place the order. Of course we're ordering from my favorite baker ladies in the whole wide world at Cake Eater Bakery.

Sheela, Jimena, Emily

Ted and I stopped in today to narrow down our flavor options and lock in the order.

We knew, without a doubt, what our cake toppers will dance upon, the ELVIS!!!! A scrumptuous banana cake with peanut butter marshmallow frosting and bacon! Ahhh, let the angles sing an hallelujah folks!  This is what Shay-dreams are made of!

We're not doing cupcakes though. After helping out with a few deliveries at the bakery, I've witnessed Jimena's incredible frosting skills and I really want cakes, lots and lots of cakes! Well, maybe only six.

I drooled over their menu list trying to narrow down the options, but couldn't get my choices smaller than 12!  We're having them make six 8" cakes so we sat down with Jimena and hashed it out.

The Elvis, the Surly Coffee Bender Chocolate, Strawberry Lemonade, Vanilla Bomb, Pumpkin Butterscotch, and the Peanut Butter and Jelly!

I can hardly wait to sink my face into each and every one!

Ted and Shay: Headless, Legless Clone of Shay

On our only day off together in FOREVER, I roped Ted into wrapping up a duck tape clone of me.

Lots of great DIY tutorials are available online, so after a bit of research we began the mummy-process.  We started at the bottom, wrapped it tight below my butt, around my waist, and around the shoulders. All of my girly areas we kept it loose as to not squish them.  The boobs took a special cross-your-heart, up and around the shoulder maneuver. No major clumps of hair were caught in the tape, and Ted managed to cut the entire contraption off without slicing me or my bra/ooo la la's! 

What looked like a molted shell of me has now been sitting in my closet for a solid two months. I've gone to the hardware store multiple times trying to come up with some sort of frame to drape the form around before filling it with foam. No luck and worse, no motivation. First DIY of the wedding failed.

A few weeks ago I saw an ad from a fabric store that announced 50% off dressforms. I've read countless reviews about how shitty they are, and how they fall apart, snag, collapse, etc, but it's getting down to crunch time and my custom dress form will be a great halloween prop someday, but it will never become what it was conceived to be, so I gave in.

I bought a Dritz My Double model, and couldn't be more smitten! I took my measurments, adjusted the dials and doo-hickies, and voila, my shape on a stick!

Even if it cracks as soon as the dress is done, it's been worth the $117 it cost on sale.  On with the dress!

xoshayox

Ted and Shay: The Dress, Part 1: Fabric

One night I started sketching up what my dream dress would entail. After drooling over countless PFT Couture, Alexander McQueen and Vivienne Westwood dresses I had a vision. A bottle of sauvignon blanc later and I had it on paper! A lovely tulip-shaped sheath with a feathered bottom skirt that is convertible (long-dress for the ceremony, party dress for the reception). Boom!

I'm not a very experienced seamstress. I was too busy taking all the math, science and writing classes my high school had to offer to consider home ec. In fact, an ex-boyfriend had to teach me how to thread my first sewing machine when I was in college. But I did make a winter coat using a Built By Wendy pattern a few years ago, so I figured as long as I could find a pattern, the rest was just following instructions.

I scoured the fabric stores and found a Badgely Mischka pattern similar to what I sketched (on sale for $2 from $30!)

A few dress colors popped into my head but I was hesitant to make a decision. I'm still not sure what color my hair will be in October, and as I learned from my recent adventures as a blonde, hair color can mess with your skin undertones and completely knock certain colors out of your wardrobe.

My lovely Mom and I hit up fabric stores one weekend while she and my dear old dad were visiting (he slept in the truck while we shopped). S.R. Harris, our first and final stop, is a remarkable place for fabric lovers! I felt like a kid in a candy shop the second we walked in, but I was on a mission. We found our way to the satin section and the work out began. Bolt after bolt of blush, tiffany blue, lavender, dove grey, mint green were pulled from the shelves and lined up. It came down to the pinks. Only problem with S.R. Harris is the lighting is pretty terrible, it is a warehouse after all!  I went back and forth between several different blush pinks, some were too peach, some too pale, etc. In the end I decided on a lovely shade and five yards cost a whopping $17!

They also had feather trim for $5 a yard, compared to $20 a yard online! But they only had about five yards in stock so the feather search continues. I suppose it wouldn't be a terrible thing if a few hundred dollars is spent on feathers, considering what brides tend to pay for dresses and my grand total thus far is under $20.

This past weekend I scooped up a soft gray lining fabric on clearance for $1.40 per yard. Now the scary part begins, CONSTRUCTION!

xoshayox

Ted and Shay: This project just might kill me

I’ve decided to make my own wedding dress. After looking through tons of vintage and new dress websites, I realized nothing really captured what I want my dress to look like and if I’m going to spend more than $500 on any article of clothing, it better be designer, and I’m going to want to wear it more than once.  

A few weekends ago, my partner-in-crime, Jimena and I decided to wiggle our toes (you have no idea how literal this became at one store) around a few wedding dress stores just to make sure I couldn't find anything that would save me the time and trouble of crafting something from scratch. I also wanted to try on a few things so I could get a good look at the guts of the style of dress I had in mind.

We only made it to two places before giving up and getting cocktails.  First stop, Andrea’s Vintage Bridal, which is quite the gem of a shop. Unfortunately I was more enthralled with the Art Deco mirrors on the walls than any of the dresses.

Images via Andrea's Vintage Bridal

There were some amazing vintage party dresses that I would love to prance around in, and the jewelry they have is incredible! I just can’t see myself wearing white or any other virgin-like color for several reasons: 1, Mr. T and I have been shacking up for the past few years so big shocker that white isn’t very fitting, 2- I’m blond right now, not sure if it’ll stick until October, but white, beige, champagne, and all BLAH colors make me look completely washed out. Finally 3- I shouldn’t be allowed to wear light colors, especially if there are dark, alcoholic liquids around, nuff said…

Next stop was Brides of France, which I seem to remember as a place that always had amazing shop windows with crazy loud dresses and oodles of rhinestones.  Maybe it’s been forever since I’ve been to the Calhoun Square area but the shop window looked like any other bridal shop: white, boring dresses. We stepped inside and were immediately halted by a florescent sign taped to the floor demanding we remove our shoes.  It was gross and soggy outside so I understood the need for this but the crusty, raggedy slippers that were sitting there, terrified my sockless feet.

A perky shop girl approached us and posed the question I have learned to loathe: “Who’s the bride?”  Repeat it in your head with an over-the-top enthusiasm and squeakiness that sounds like nails on a chalkboard.  I know they have to do this and I realize that many girls love this kind of attention. Those are the girls that want to be treated like a princess and have attention showered on them from the minute the engagement ring slips onto their finger.  I totally get it, but I’m still going to gag when they try to treat me in that fake sort of way.

We managed to shake the shop girl, which wasn’t difficult after she gave us the once over.  Apparently brides-to-be don’t show up to wedding stores in ratty jeans…

The dresses all looked the same to me with few distinct details to tell one from the other. Jimena noticed that the two girls trying on dresses were wearing almost identical gowns, but no one else seemed to noticed. I did find an amazing vintage hat made entirely of tiny feathers!  Other than that, it was time to duck out.

We gave up after that and went to a bar. Bridal shops are great for some girls and there are tons of different kinds of shops. I guess it's just not my thing, which is just fine because my wondrous dress is in the works after a long Memorial Day weekend! More adventures to come! 

xoshayox

Ted and Shay: Headaches, they were bound to happen

It's been smooth sailing up to this point with the planning. Since our budget is tiny we're trying to nail everything down that's going to cost us, and keep on track with our savings.

Getting our reception site to confirm has been trying my patience, but I actually made progress a few weeks ago and started to get it finalized, and then devastation reared it's ugly head. 

We're planning to close down the bar we met at and always hang out at, for the reception, but this particular bar is located in the middle of a certain, shall-remain-unnamed nightmare of a bar crawl that happens around the time of our wedding. Our contact at the bar is hesitant to close it down if the crawl is the same day of our wedding, but I'm having a hell of a time getting answers out of anyone.

We're T-minus 5 months till the wedding and reception location options are running out. Apparently October is a big month for weddings now a days and places are filling up quickly.  We don't want to just rent out any old place but our budget is slim.

Our options at this point are 1- do the whole damn thing in Ted's mom's backyard, but then we wouldn't be able to invite anyone other than the small group invited to the ceremony; 2-scramble to find another location and pick up a part-time job on the side to pay for the new expenses; 3- Vegas anyone?

I'm starting to twitch about the whole thing mainly because everything is resting on the reception. We haven't set the ceremony time because we don't know what time we can close the bar down for the reception. We haven't sent out save the dates for our reception guests because we don't know how many we can invite (already cut down the list from 500 to 300 and are willing to go lower, but not by much).  We haven't reserved a block of rooms at the hotel we are planning to use since it's close to the bar, and if we have to change the reception location who knows where it will be held and we don't want people cabbing super far. Our budget is just lingering out in limbo because we have no idea what the cost of the bar's catering, booze, etc will be.  Let the shay melt-down begin...

So, how long should we wait before scrapping the whole idea and coming up with a new plan? I've emailed all the details multiple times to this person we're working with, but haven't heard anything for a few weeks.  Suggestions?