Tag Archives: Reception

The Dollar Store Wedding

7 Apr

Dear Future Hubby,

Dollar Store Dishes

I know you think Gaelic Gala is totally extravagant and no doubt a waste of money, but I mean, if we win the lotto, why not go all out? However, if we don’t win the lotto and must resort to a more frugal wedding, I’ve discovered the most amazing place for us to outfit our ENTIRE wedding….

THE DOLLAR STORE

Yes, you read that right.  I know what you’re thinking. You only go to The Dollar Store when you are totally out of paper towels and a Costco run is out of the question because it’s crazy there and not within the hours that they offer good samples.  But I made a pilgrimage to The Dollar Store this past week with a family member who was buying some joke gifts for people and I discovered wedding heaven.

While perusing the aisle for useless things I would never buy, I came across a plethora of $1 wedding items that will no doubt make the entire wedding special. Things we can get at The Dollar Store for our back up thrifty wedding:

Dollar Store Invitations

Wedding Invitations AND Thank You notes: Looks at the craftsmanship in the lovely white cards with chipping gold and silver printing. One stop shopping for all your wedding paper needs.

Dishes: We can serve all of our treats and meals at the wedding on fabulous plastic plates and champagne glasses, designed to make everyone feel like a king or queen. Plus, our cake will look amazeballs with a great faux porcelain cake topper. Classy.

Dollar Store Decorations

Decorations: We’re talking tissue paper bells, plastic mini doves, tulle circles, heart shaped paper centerpieces, automobile flags, paper garlands, even little bags for the almonds. Every single aspect of our wedding will be covered. I just hope someone doesn’t rip the paper garlands or steal the center pieces. Those are going to be costing a fortune.

Dollar Store Props

Ceremony props: Um, how cute would our ring bearer be walking down the aisle while rocking one of these uber fancy ring bearer pillows.  I bet it’s so nice he could even use it for when he falls asleep on the ground (which a lot of ring bearers eventually do).

Wedding Attire: Ok, I don’t care if I get a rash from rocking a Dollar Store garter, I got it for a dollar. How rockstar is that?  Plus, I bet if we raided the kids costume aisles of enough Dollar Stores, we could absolutely come up with enough costumes to sew together and make my dress and your tux.  I’m apologizing in advance if the various colors of black we don’t match as they’ve no doubt faded over time in the horrible fluorescent lit aisle of TDS.

Dollar Store Wedding Attire

So start saving up, cause we’re going to need at least $50…no, $100 for our shopping excursion to The Dollar Store. You do that while I keep praying we win the lotto so we can make Gaelic Gala happen.

Xo,

Your Future Wife.

I thought this was a party?!? Let’s DANCE!!!!

16 Mar

Dear Future Hubby,

A few weekends ago, Gabby and I decided that we hadn’t watching The Wedding Date in a while.  This is one of our favorite guilty pleasure movies EVER and nothing sounded better than spending a Saturday afternoon making muffins and watching Debra Messing take a male “escort” to her sister’s wedding to make her ex boyfriend jealous. If you haven’t seen it, hijinks ensue, they fall in love, blah blah blah. I won’t make you watch it because you’ll no doubt resent me for it some day and I’ll never find you as charming as Dermott Mulroney.  Ok, that’s a lie. I find you more charming than him, but seriously, boy has got it going on in this movie.

Insert Michael Buble song here

In said movie, the wedding party partakes in dance lessons prior to the big day. I am convinced this scene alone that made Michael Buble all the freaking rage as I cannot listen to “Dance with Me” without thinking of this movie and vice versa. Anywhooooo, Deb, Dermott, Amy Adams, the dude from Flash Forward and their awesome-crazy-bitchy-as-shit-I-totally-want-her-at-my-wedding cousin go learn to get there groove on as if they are going to be performing some crazy ballroom dance at their wedding reception. Excuse me, this is not Dancing with the Stars.

This, of course, got me to thinking.  I’ve often heard of friend’s parents or other older people who took dance lessons before their wedding to ensure no awkward moments are had on the dance floor. I even think my parent’s may have taken them.  You’re probably sitting there thinking “Oh fuck, she’s going to make me take dance lessons” before the wedding. Well, you’re wrong mister.  We’re not.  Unless you’ve got a club foot or I suddenly lose all sense of rhythm, I think we can sufficiently move around a dance floor for 3-4 minutes without causing each other physical harm.  Most people sway in a circle anyways and I am totally on board for swaying in a circle.  I’d rather spend 3-4 minutes with you, enjoying our first dance together than be stressing out before hand that we’re going to mess up the steps to the freaking Viennese waltz that we’ve spent 4 months learning while you hyperventilate into a bag in the corner. So not down for that shit.

The ONLY reason dance lessons should be required prior to a wedding is if you’re going to freaking rock it old school style and bust out an awesome staged dance number from a cult movie classic that I’ve probably made you watch a million times. Dances which are acceptable are…

  • The end dance from Footloose: You’ll wear a maroon jacket. I’ll wear a chiffon dress with ugly hair. We’ll pay Sarah Jessica Parker to show up with her original hair color and mole and then we’ll make all the guest dress in early 80s garb.
  • The end dance from Dirty Dancing: You’d have to learn that whole spinning on the floor on your knees thing Patrick Swayze does so well, but admit it, every guys wanted to be Johnny Castle growing up.
  • The dance from She’s All That prom:  Usher will be there to DJ and everyone will be rocking dated clothes from the 90s. I’ll be Rachel Leigh Cooke and you can be FPJ, I just swear I’m not going to let Paul Walker try and take me back to his hotel room.
  • The African Ant Eater Ritual from Can’t Buy Me Love: Admit it, you secretly want to be Patrick Dempsey.

    Jump Back!

Other acceptable group dances:  The Encino Man dance, the Teen Wolf dance, the Ferris Bueller Parade “Twist and Shout” dance, Thriller, the Breakfast Club Library dance, and the Austin Powers opening dance.

So unless you’re down for getting every single one of our guests involved with a group dance number (which they will no doubt hate you for), rest assured you will only be required to sway in a circle.

However, I have always had a thing for Kevin Bacon and I bet you’d look really hot in a maroon jacket.

Xo,
Your Future Wife

Team Wedding Planner

8 Mar

Dear Future Hubby,

We are having a wedding planner, end of story. I know what you’re thinking. Why hire someone to help plan our wedding when my Type A personality is going to overtake her and I’m just going to do everything myself? I’ll tell you why. Because it’s fucking exhausting.

See, the thing about me is I LOVE to plan parties. I love entertaining, I love cooking for people, I love everyone gathering and having a glass of wine. Not to toot my own horn, but I kind of rock at being a host. However, this can be beyond exhausting. Last night, I hosted my annual Oscar party which turned out wonderful. Tons of people, tons of food, tons of screaming in joy when The Hurt Locker won. The problem was about halfway through the ceremony I wanted to go to sleep. At one point, I’m pretty sure I dozed slightly leaning against the door jam. Pathetic. I had been shopping, cooking, cleaning all weekend that by the time the actual ceremony rolled around and our living room filled up with gobs of people, I was too exhausted to enjoy it and struggling to just make sure we had enough food and everyone was having a good time. Not to say that I didn’t have a good time, I did, but I would have liked to enjoy it a little more and not be falling asleep in my drink.

Every wedding planner should have a Secret Service headset

This WILL NOT be happening at our wedding. If a weekend Oscar party can knock me out and make me feel like I’ve been run over by a truck, then Gaelic Gala is sure to do me in. I want to enjoy our wedding, have fun, not be the one running around worrying about if there is enough food, if people are having a good time, did the florist show up yet, etc. That is why we will have a wedding planner. I, and you of course, will be there to consult on every single step, but if I had to make decisions and then execute every single one of them, we’d be getting married with me hooked up to an IV for dehydration while in a hospital bed. So not sexy.

I say this very easily now, but please note that you will have to help me with this. I do have a tendency to want to control everything and just do things myself. Please pry my fingers away from everything. Think about all the great things our wedding planner can help with.

He/She can make sure that our wedding party has ordered their attire so we won’t have to chase people down. He/She can get hopefully better deals with vendors for flowers, locations, photography, etc because of relationships she has established in her career thus far. He/She can make sure the reception is being set up while we are free to just get ready for the ceremony. He/She can make sure I remember to do things that I would otherwise forget, like who to thank at the reception, who still needs to be paid, who I need to blame for stepping on my dress and ripping it. That sort of thing. He/She can help me keep my sanity. I’m one kick ass multi-tasker and one hell of a party planner but when it comes to my wedding, I’d probably lose my mind.

So jump on board Team Wedding Planner. Jennifer Lopez made it look cool, and rarely does Jennifer Lopez make anything look cool, so why the hell shouldn’t we have one? I swear it will be worth the money because you do not want to start our marriage off with a completely fried wife who wants to sleep for a week. Actually, I’ll probably still want do that as I’ll be stressed that I have given up control when executing things for GG, but it’ll hopefully be coax me out of a my sleep coma.

Something to look forward to.

Xo,
Your future wife

Photo Source

Wedding cake Jenga with Michael Flatley

4 Mar

Dear Future Hubby,

On Tuesday night, I was fortunate enough to attend Kick Ass Cake Bash, the launch of the Broke Ass Cake Collection from Broke Ass Bride, Fresh Hubby, and Fantasy Frostings. It was a fabulous event, complete with delicious cake, rocking tunes, and male models galore. My favorite had to be the guy wearing the black leather shirt underneath a white leather blazer. While there with my friends BowieBride, Kate, and new friend A Los Angeles Love, I found out some interesting information regarding wedding cakes. Did you know that most cost $7 a slice? Dude, if we have a huge wedding, as I’m sure it will be since hell, it’s called Gaelic Gala, that’s going to be something like $1750-$2000 for a cake alone, never mind if I want to do something redonk fancy to it. I mean, yes, we will be winning the lotto in order to make Gaelic Gala happen, but speaking as someone that is currently paying off students loans, that number is insane.

Why, hello there Lord of the Dance!

I love that Broke Ass Bride and Fresh Hubby have teamed up with Fantasy Frostings to create a line of cakes that are beautiful and taste delicious, but are more reasonably priced than $7 a slice. No joke, they are delicious. Like “Sweet Lady Jane Triple Berry Cake” delicious, and I don’t just say that about every cake that comes around the block. Every girl should be able to have the cake they want on their wedding and this is a great way for it to happen.

Cakes are so expensive that it has spawned many new trends in the wedding cake world, the most popular being the cupcake wedding cake. Rather than having a large cake, the couple has a spread of various delicious cupcakes. I’ve been to two wedding that featured this and let me say, I’m a fan of finding a massive amount of red velvet cupcakes at a wedding after I’ve drunk myself silly. However, this trend is become overdone that if we do not win the lotto and cannot afford an amazeballs cake for Gaelic Gala, I would prefer that we actually don’t go this route. Why? Because there are much better route to go that will no doubt start a trend of there own.

Instead of a cake or cupcakes, we could have…

I want the reindeer one

  • Pillsbury cookies – the seasonal ones: Everyone can pick their favorite cookie, whether it be the one with the snowman, the pumpkin, the turkey, the shamrock, theheart, the American flag, the Christmas tree, or the Easter egg. Nothing says wedding like a sugar cookie with a turkey on it.
  • Twinkies: We’ll just unwrap 250 Twinkies and create a castle out of them. People can come take one and whoever makes the castle fall wins. It’s wedding Jenga.
  • Decorate your own cookie: Nothing is more fun than drunk-decorating cookies to see who can come up with the most obscene decoration.
  • Rice Krispee treats: Because we’re all four years old at heart.
  • Jell-O Shots: Desserts PLUS your next drink.

If we do win the lotto though and Gaelic Gala can go on as planned, we’re going balls to the wall with this cake. Do not underestimate my ability to come up with the most random, Ireland themed cake. What kind of Irish wedding would this be if the cake wasn’t representative of that. Here are some options for you to peruse.

Idea stealers!

  • A Guinness flavored cake: Because Guinness alone just isn’t already like drinking a whole meal. The cake will be Guinness flavored as well.
  • A cake shaped like Ireland: The green frosting would turn everyone’s tongue green
  • A cake shaped like Michael Flatley: He’ll be the one that rolls the cake out, while he Riverdance’s at the same time.
  • Leprechaun/Pot of Gold cake: Every wedding needs a leprechaun.

Ok, so maybe that’s a little too over the top. I do always like “simple.” At the end of the day, we’ll probably go with something classic, but you have to admit, Michael Flatley rolling out a cake shaped like him is a great mental image. I’ll leave you with that little gem.

Xo,
Your Future Wife

The Photo Sources

Table 4, you are dismissed to get your food!

25 Feb

Dear Future Hubby,

We are doing a sit down dinner at our reception. End of story.

www.nope.com - on all fronts

I know that everyone has their reasons for having a buffet.  It’s less time consuming. It’s cheaper. People can go back for seconds or thirds if they want.  It’s easier. Well, newsflash world.  I don’t like to take the easy road.  I like to make shit complicated, and since it’s our wedding, I’m doing just that.  A sit down dinner really isn’t all that complicated really, but it does force people to choose between only a couple of options when a buffet has more options.  Clearly, I’m just a sadist that wants to force people to pick between chicken, beef, or fish.  Honestly, I just think it’s more elegant and formal and by now you should know that this shit is going to be redonk off the hook elegant and formal. Sorry, guests.

sooooo pretty

Isn’t it nice though to go to a reception and have servers bring you courses of food rather than to be herded like cattle into a line to get salad and a slightly stale dinner roll?  I want our guests to enjoy themselves, be treated like kings, and be able to have good conversations while drinking wine and having delicious food. It’s not going to be your standard meal either. We’re not just doing salad, dinner, desert. We’re going to do more than three courses. Hors d’oeuvre, salad, soup, dinner, cheese plate, desert, fortune cookie, anything else you can throw on a plate, it’s coming out as a course.

At the end of the day, we’re not doing a buffet for the following reasons:

  1. It reminds me of Soup Plantation/Fresh Choice/Sweet Tomatoes. These are the over the top, have-every-food-station-you-can-imagine buffets, where you walk around with a tray, load it up with tons of carbs and maybe a little salad and then finish it off with some Fro-Yo topped with sprinkles. Our wedding WILL NOT be having a salad bar, pizza station, soup bar, bread station, baked potato bar, pasta station, or desert bar. However, if you twist my arm enough, I may give in to a Fro-Yo machine, but we are NOT having plastic trays.
  2. It reminds me Chinese all you can eat buffets. In grad school, a friend and I made it our mission to try all the Chinese all you can eat buffets around our school. This was a great idea in theory. No so great after we ate there. Everything is always way too greasy and they always find the need to serve chow mien next to chicken nuggets and mac and cheese.  I’m sorry, but when did mac and cheese become a traditional Chinese dish?
  3. It reminds me of every single event my family has ever had at the Monterey Peninsula Country Club growing up.  Easter, Thanksgiving, Mother’s Day Brunch, Anniversary parties, wedding receptions. You name it, if it was a big event for our family and we were at the club, there was a buffet. And while I was always a fan of the shrimp cocktail and Baked Alaska, I don’t want our reception reminding me of every single time I’ve been to the club.

    Power eating in Vegas with B-Swizzle

  4. It remind me of all you can eat buffets in Vegas. You know, where you stand in like for 40 minutes waiting to get in while one of your friends tries to sweet talk some casino employee to give you passes to the front of the line. Do not get me wrong at all. I am a fan of the Vegas buffet, but only in Vegas and only when you eat so much that you end up looking like BowieBride over here.  I don’t want people looking like that at our reception while trying to count how many different types of food there are on their fork.  This may happen at a bachelorette party if we go to Vegas (like it will for BowieBride’s) but please not at our reception.  There will not be a pile of lobster for you to eat, sorry.

So I’m sorry if I burst your bubble and dashed you dreams of having a contest with your groomsmen  to see how many plates of food you can go back for or how many dinner rolls you can stuff in your mouth at once.

Smooches,
Your future wife

Photo Sources

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