flowers to dye for

My brave friend, Sarah, came over on Saturday to help me dye 200-something coffee filter roses. It took us about four hours, but much of that time was spent playing with the RIT dye trying to get the colors just right.

We (very scientifically) mixed different batches in mason jars, dipped coffee filter test strips into them, and put the strips on a cookie sheet in the oven at about 250 degrees for quick drying.



Satisfied with the spectrum we created, we began with yellow flowers, moved to shades of pink, coral, and red, and ended with the oranges. The tree outside was the best place to hang them to dry.



But we decided to speed up the drying process for a few of them, just to get a better idea of the final product all together.



Fluffed, to speed drying of the inner layers.



Annnnnnd... Flowers! Now, I have to decide between merely fluffed:



Or fluffed with each petal curled at the edges. Much more rose-like, but also much more work.



What do you like best?

DIY decoupage vases

A few posts back, I made mention of a literary theme to our wedding decor. There is a perfectly good explanation, and it's this: the library at Michael's university regularly cleans out its archives and puts dusty, old, crumbly books out on shelves in the lobby for anyone to take. Every time I visit him, I stop by the library to haul a stack of free books to my car.

They will be used in many ways -- probably even some ways I haven't thought up yet. But today I'll share one use for these tattered tomes.


I've been collecting smallish, cheap-o glass vases like these from garage sales and thrift stores...



... and decoupaging them with torn up pages.




Simple, cute, and cost-effective, but like many of my other wedding decorations, time-consuming, since I'm making enough for 20 tables. Only elect to do this if you're long on time or short on guests.

pretty things!

Wedding blogs are a blessing and a curse. They're a great source of inspiration, but every time I read, my list of DIY decoration projects gets a little longer.

I saw these pictures online a few weeks ago...

Source

And decided I had to have them. Which led to some new estate sale purchases, and a new mission every time I hit the thrift stores:



I'm a little torn over whether or not to paint such pretty frames. I think they would look awesome painted bright colors to match the rest of the decor like this one...

Source

...but I'd also kinda like to use them in our home after the wedding. At the very least, I plan to find paper related to the color scheme to put under the glass.

I have a few possible uses in mind:

1) As bases for groupings of pillar candles.
2) As a tray for the ink pads that will go with our guestbook thumbprint tree.
3) A place to stash bags of birdseed or bubbles (if we use those for our exit...)
4) Dessert trays

I'm open to suggestions, of course. Any other ideas?

sizing myself up

Like many brides, I would love it if my body looked a little different on my wedding day.

Unlike many brides, I don't want it to get smaller.

Last week when my mom, grandma and I were sitting around the kitchen table, talk inevitably turned to them telling me to eat more.

My grandma lowered her voice so my grandpa and dad wouldn't hear in the living room.

"Don't you want to be voluptuous for Michael?"
.
.
.
AWKWARD.

I get comments about eating more from my grandma a lot. Usually they don't bother me, but my mom has gotten in on it the last couple of weeks, and I started feeling frustrated.

But then I remembered a dress pattern I had bought at an estate sale earlier that afternoon:




It was made in 1985, and the size chart on the back made me feel a lot better:



Today, I am a size nothing. At J.Crew, I'm a double nothing. In 1985, I would have been a size 8! This is comforting to me. It makes me feel less abnormal.

This is related to the wedding, I promise. My wedding dress is a size 0, but it 's still a little tiny bit big. It would fit perfectly if I could just gain an inch all over. The problem is, I don't put on weight easily (I know, roll your eyes at me for calling this a "problem").

I always eat when I'm hungry and stop when I'm full. I thought this was the healthy way to go about it, but my trousers have been fitting a bit loose in the back lately. This may have something to do with my eating less meat since I read about the hormones and antibiotics that are fed/injected into the animals we consume. Blech. I'm currently working on my parents to convince them to by "happy animal" meat. Anyway, not the point.

The point is, I'm going to try to start eating foods with a higher fat content to gain weight for my wedding. And maybe just eating more in general, even if it's just slightly beyond a comfortable full feeling.

Luckily, I can get started on this right away. Dinner tonight is potato soup made with bacon grease and half and half, and homemade bread and butter. Yum! I'd better go get started on it now. Those potatoes won't chop themselves.

Until next time.

just dance

Lady Gaga, Kanye West and Usher are on our reception playlist, to my fiance's chagrin. He's not a fan of pop music.

A year ago, I wasn't, either. I never listened to pop, as it was obviously garbage made for the unwashed masses. Growing up, I never owned a single CD by Hanson, N*Sync, Smash Mouth or Britney Spears.

I didn't slowly warm up to pop. It wasn't a gradually acquired taste, like grapefruit or wine. It happened in an instant.

I was on a charter bus full of American and Thai English teachers headed out to Kanchanaburi province for the weekend. The driver had a mix CD on, and about halfway to our destination, Lady Gaga's "Just Dance" came blaring through the speakers. My friend, Christy, was sitting in the seat across from me, rocking out a little bit until she noticed that a Thai driver in the next vehicle was staring. She yanked the curtain over her window and slid down in the seat, embarrassed. It was hilarious and awesome, and in that moment I experience a musical paradigm shift. I liked pop.

With my newfound appreciation for pop came an enjoyment of dancing to it. Before Bangkok, I had never been out dancing. Ever the bookworm, I spent my college years holed up in the library most nights. Going dancing in a big, foreign city with my girl friends was exhilarating and fun, and I'm so glad I didn't miss out on the experience before I got "too old."

So this new, dancing side of my personality wants to ensure that guests will boogie at our wedding reception. I am putting together the most irresistible dance playlist known to mankind. It will feature a mix of decades, from the Beatles to Beyonce, Michael Jackson to (dare I say it?) Miley Cyrus. Motown, a little disco, swing, and pop. And a little booze to get people loosened up. Yep, that's my recipe for a par-tay.

I decided to turn this into a wedding planning blog with the end goal of maybe, perhaps, possibly attempting to apply to be a Weddingbee blogger.

For those who are unfamiliar with wedding blog-land (which includes most of my friends and acquaintances who might be reading), Weddingbee.com is a big 'un. Its readership is far and wide and blogging there would be a great opportunity to put my writing out there.

My last couple of entries have been an attempt at the Weddingbee style of blogging. Or maybe just wedding blogging in general. And I found out that it's not working for me; it feels forced. I'm just not one to internet-squeal (OMGEEEEEEE!!) over the cuteness of a [insert random wedding-associated thing here].

And I want to write, rather than provide a brief commentary on various "inspiration pictures" I find.

I'm going to continue chronicling my wedding planning/crafting as long as I have things to say about it, I guess. But I'm going forget about being a blogger on a major website and start sounding more like me.

That's all.

guestbook 4.0

In the wedding blogosphere, the days of guestbooks like these are pretty much over:

Source

Traditionalists may cling to the white satin cover and the stark, lined pages, but, for me, it leaves no scope for the imagination.

Happily, there are lots and lots of more creative, sentimental, and aesthetically pleasing options out there today.


First up is one of my personal favorites: the fingerprint tree:

Source

Guests "leaf" a fingerprint and sign their name. I've seen these at two weddings so far. They turn out really cute, and it's something a couple will actually display and enjoy once the wedding is over.


Another arboreal option is the wishing tree. Guests write advice, a memory, or well wishes on a piece of paper and tie it in the branches.

Source

Another trend I've seen on a few wedding blogs is the vintage postcard and mailbox setup. It's basically another incarnation of the wishing tree.

Source

For those who are set on a bound book, there are some great options:

A book of engagement photos:

Source

A book of photography -- perhaps featuring a place that has special significance for the couple, an artist they love, a favorite sports team... There are unlimited options.

Source

For the couple with an incurable case of wanderlust, an atlas!! (Photo to come when I track it down.)


Music lovers could have guests sign old records with a silver Sharpie, and display them in their new home, like so:

Personal photo

When you forget the old pearl and satin standby, the sky is the limit.

So what would you most enjoy putting your name on?

cutting costs

I hope I'm not beating a dead horse here, harping on the money topic. But in every single wedding decision I make, cost is the first consideration. I thought I'd mention things we've nixed in an effort to save.


1. Favors

This was an easy one. I'm not sure why brides think guests are interested in taking home a piece of junk with someone else's name and wedding date engraved on it. Edible favors are a different story. If I could afford to give personalized jars of homemade jam... I probably still wouldn't do it, but it's a neat favor idea nonetheless! In conclusion, we're not giving out favors.

2. Boutonnieres

It turns out, guys don't really enjoy having a rose pinned next to their face. It's annoying and ends up getting smushed halfway through the day. Michael is in charge of finding pocket squares for his groomsmen. That way, we still get the little bit of color without the irritation.

3. "Toss" bouquet

We're not doing a bouquet toss. I've never enjoyed them at weddings -- they're kinda awkward. Same goes for the garter toss. Plus, I can't really picture any of my friends risking their limbs for a fistful of flowers.

4. Groom's cake

My fiance doesn't like cake. We'd planned to do groom's pies, but last week we hit on something cheaper, and easier. It's still a dessert, but I'm keeping it a secret for now.

5. Pro hair and makeup

My cousin, quite handily, finished cosmetology school this year, so she'll be doing my hair. I'll do my own makeup and nails.

6. Ceremony musicians

I come from a very musical family. So does Michael. But, honestly, I can't remember whether a wedding I attended five years ago had live musicians or recorded music. To me, this detail is just not that important.

7. Floral centerpieces

As much as I love ogling the gorgeous, lush floral centerpieces over at Martha Stewart's wedding website, there is just no way. I've already posted on my coffee filter roses, but there will be other components to our centerpieces as well.

8. DJ

With the rise of the iPod reception, we didn't think twice about cutting out the DJ. I feel confident in our collective ability to pick out awesome dance music and sort the playlist into an order that flows well. Plus, my grandpa has all the needed sound equipment, so no rental fees there!

in my dreams

I thought I'd do some wishful thinking and plan my budget according to what my friend spent on her wedding. I give you the $14,000 dream budget:


Bride's attire:
Dress - 1,500.00
Shoes - 50.00
Alterations - 200.00
Veil - 50.00
Earrings - 30.00
Makeup - 60.00
TOTAL: 1,890.00


Ceremony:
Church fees - 400.00
Decorations - 100.00
Bouquets/flowers - 400.00
TOTAL: 900.00


Reception:
Venue rental - 600.00
Food/drinks/alcohol/cake - 4,000.00
Centerpieces/decorations - 500.00
Linens/chair rentals - 800.00
Music (band?) - 1,280.00
Guestbook - 30.00
Invitations/postage - 500.00
Photography - 3,500.00

TOTAL: 11,210.00

GRAND TOTAL: 14,000.00


Basically, I'd get my dream photographer, the dress I really loved, not make the invitations myself, and spring for fancier food.

Oh, and if they were in my price range (and it's entirely possible they wouldn't be), I'd hire one of two bands: "Queen for a Day" or "Hard Night's Day" -- Queen and The Beatles cover bands. How fun would that be?

todos los flowers

The overtly Mexican Fiesta themed reception has been shelved in favor of something more... literary. But more on that later. Today, I want to share my flower project.

Problem? I want lots and lots of beautiful flowers I can't afford.

Solution? Make them. Hundreds of them. From paper.

Crazy? Maybe a little. But right now I'm short on cash and long on time (being underemployed has its benefits, I suppose), so for me, making my flowers makes sense.

Here are my first experiments in flower crafting. The yellow ones are made of tissue paper. The pink ones are crepe paper.




I was envisioning vases of lots of different shades of yellows, pinks, corals, and oranges. As it turns out, unless you're prepared to buy huge bulk quantities, it's pretty difficult to find a wide variety of subtly varied shades in tissue and crepe paper.

Aside from paper problems, I wasn't crazy about the pink flowers, and they were about three times more time consuming than the yellow carnation-style flowers.

I discovered coffee filter roses on Martha Stewart's website. They are beautiful, but also super-extra-time consuming. Plus, you had to paint each individual petal. I'm not that crazy.

Then, I saw a post on the discussion boards at weddingbee.com by a girl who made 200 of the suckers for her wedding and dyed them with fabric dye. When I learned this, I knew there was no going back.

I present to you, coffee filter roses, dyed with food coloring:



My goal is 300, completed by Christmas. I'm guessing I have about 70 so far.

Aaaand preliminary guesstimates on costs for 70 roses:

Floral wire - $1.25
Floral tape - $5.00 ($1.00/roll)
Coffee filters - $6.00 (~$2.00/200 count pack)

That comes out to about $0.18 per rose. When it's all said and done, it should cost me about $60.00 (and countless hours) to make 300 roses. I'll have a better cost breakdown when they're all finished and dyed.

I'll have to play around with them, but I might end up mixing the carnations and roses in the arrangements. What do you think?

cheese and whine

It's time for a small and not especially well-written gripefest.

I'm tired of filling out job applications, writing cover letters, and tweaking my resume! Tired of it, ya hear?! I couldn't even get an interview for an elementary school receptionist position. How insulting!

But more than the tedium of applications, I'm tired of not being employed. It leaves me with way too much time to sit in front of the computer screen looking at wedding blogs and stressing out about how to decorate the reception and other decisions that don't really matter in the end.

I have an interview in Waco on Monday. Praying that this job is it.

the bottom line

The average wedding in Texas costs more than $26,000, according to one statistic I read.

That's like all of my student debt, plus almost all of our wedding budget. Unbelievable!

This would be an impractical amount for my family to spend for a wedding, so I've been scouring the web for stories from brides who have planned low-budget weddings. I've discovered a few things:

Most of them keep their guest lists short. Really short. Sometimes it's just family.

Most of them are best friends with a whole slew of people who have the precise skill sets they need in their vendors -- their aunt is a baker, their cousin is a photographer, or their grandparents happen to own a manor with several acres of beautifully-kept grounds.

A lot of them do short, afternoon weddings.

Most of them take a nontraditional approach. This could mean anything -- nonfloral decorations, casual attire, receptions in local parks, or even foregoing the white tiered wedding cake.

I had some good, nontraditional ideas, but my enthusiasm was not enough to convince my mother.

I pushed for a carnival-themed reception for months. Visions of cotton candy were dancing in my head, but my mom refused to accept hot dogs, funnel cake, popcorn, and soft pretzels as "wedding food."

(Side note: Who even likes "wedding food" anyway? Wouldn't something different be refreshing? I think so.)

So my parade, unfortunately, has been rained upon.

I'm also playing with the idea of a fiesta theme: paper decorations (tissue and crepe paper flowers everywhere, papeles picados, etc), fajitas, salsa, guacamole, margaritas. Ooh! Buñuelos.

Who doesn't love Tex-Mex? It beats cheese cubes and finger sandwiches any day of the week.

a perfect match?

I hate bridesmaids dresses. I don't care what the David's Bridal catalog says -- there is no cardigan, necklace, or interesting belt in existence that is going to make that royal-blue bubble hem monstrosity into something wearable in the real world.

I started out with the notion of mismatched bridesmaids dresses -- sending each girl a few paint chips in different shades of pink and saying, "Find something as close to one of these as possible." Part of this was laziness. Mostly, though, I just love the eclectic look.


Then I was on the J. Crew clearance website a couple nights ago and found this beauty --

in every size from 0 to 12. What are the odds?

So I called everyone, sent them a link to see if they liked it, and asked them to send me their sizes.

Today, before placing the order, I returned to the mismatched dress photos I loved before. I decided, again, that mismatched is more my style.

Back to square one. My wonderful friends have all agreed to carry the little paint chip index card with them and go out in search of dresses.

Where to work?

I'm hopeful and excited about job possibilities for the first time, and let me tell you -- it feels great!

I'm not sure why this shift occurred, or if it will last.

It could be the compliment on my writing I received this morning. I've realized not everyone can write, and it is one of the most marketable and transferable skills I've got.

I've also realized I don't need to limit myself to newspaper journalism. There are PR opportunities that don't involve promoting massive, soul-sucking corporations. I could work for hospitals, schools, local governments, or nonprofits.

Switching gears completely -- a conversation with one of my former teachers pointed out the need for Spanish teachers. I could teach. It would require some brushing up, sure. And an emergency certification. But teaching Spanish to Americans couldn't be harder than teaching English to Thais, right?

So I'm broadening my search, and hoping the confidence levels stay buoyed.

Picking up where I left off, sort of

I'm returning to my blog, once again -- partly at the urging of my former roommate, partly because I need to get my jumbled and sometimes-frenzied thoughts out of my head and into a place where I can look at them, and partly because I finally feel I have things to write about, namely:

Preparing for marriage
Planning a wedding
Hunting for gainful employment
And, possibly, cooking

I hope to make this blog as entertaining and informative as I like to believe my Thailand blog was. Anyway, enjoy!

ah-choo

Working at a desk all day is adversely affecting my posture, I think. And staring at a computer screen for eight hours certainly isn't doing my eyesight any favors.

I think yoga would help me feel better, but there's not a sufficiently large, flat floor surface in the house in which I'm currently living.

Speaking of the house I live in: it has a dog. I mean, the house doesn't have a dog. The owner of the house has a dog. I live there with her and her dog.

Anyway, my whole life I told people I was allergic to dogs and cats. My grandmother has dogs and a cat, and she always had to vacuum all the carpets and furniture and lock up the animals before we visited, or else I'd wallow in a sneezing, itchy-eyed state of misery for the duration of our stay.

But I never reacted to my aunt's Yorkies or her Pomeranian. And I didn't react to a high school boyfriend's Sheltie mix. I just put two and two together in the last couple of months and realized I'm only allergic to cats!

To be honest, it was a little jarring to find that something I'd always believed to be true of myself was actually not true at all. Here's to self-discovery and non-allergies!

mind boggled

Out of curiosity, I just added up all my paychecks and tutoring money from my 10 months of teaching English in Thailand. I was a little obsessive and kept exceptionally good records of everything I made and spent.

In that time, I earned about $7,300. Not much, right? And I brought home nearly $4,000 of it (in cash, on my person, on three flights, mind you).

My mind was just boggled at the amount of things I was about to do with a mere $3,300 in that length of time. Things like...

- Four weekend trips to various beaches (two to five hours away from Bangkok)
- Daytrips to various parts of the city and other provinces
- Four-day trip to Cambodia
- Three-week trip through Vietnam, Laos and northern Thailand
- Weeklong trip to southern islands
- Bought a professionally-tailored work wardrobe, including a black suit, five pencil skirts, four trousers, five long-sleeved button-down shirts, a tailored jacket and a little black dress
- And, you know, paid electric bills, got massages, ate breakfast most mornings and dinner every night, saw movies, had coffee and smoothies and bought loads of souvenirs and jewelry

If only my American pennies would stretch so far.

summer internship: first impressions

Yesterday I began my stint as a communications intern with the Baptist General Convention of Texas. It started off with a bang as I had a chance to attend a staff retreat where the topic of discussion was the next year's media/marketing plan.

Before Wednesday, I didn't know much, if anything, about corporate meetings, media plans, or Baptists. So I learned a lot over the last day and a half. For example:

1. Most Baptists under 50 don't mind dancing.
2. Same goes for drinking.
3. Texas is the only state with two separate Baptist conventions.
4. Baptists love acronyms.

I spent a good portion of the time feeling slightly overwhelmed. I didn't grow up in a Baptist church, but I attended two during college. In spite of those few years of exposure, I had no idea how the relationship between the convention and individual churches worked.

There's a lot of catch up for me to do, but I think I'll learn a lot about writing!

pop quiz

Yesterday, I got engaged.

Here's what happened:

He and I were in his car, driving back to his parents' house from the jeweler's house. We had gone to pick up a custom ring made by a jeweler who had connections to his family. His parents had given us the stones from his maternal and paternal grandmothers' wedding rings, as well as his mother's wedding band. They also gave us gold settings to melt down and re-use.

I got to help design the ring. I brought pictures of rings I liked and the jeweler told us what he could do.

Yesterday, we drove out to the house so I could try it on (without looking at it!) and he could pay for it.

When we got into the car to leave the jeweler, I begged and pouted because I really wanted to look at it. He made a big production out of telling me to be patient. I gave up.

The next thing I know, he's pulling the car off the road and into a foot and a half tall weeds and thorns and thistles, saying it felt like there was something wrong with the tires. He asked me to get out and check out the tires on my side. I opened the door and stood up. Not wanting to walk around and get my legs scratched up, I opted to lean over the door to see what I could see, which was nothing. I told him as much and sat back down while he walked around the car, examining his tires.

"Come here and look at this," he said.

Having no desire to come anywhere, I instead leaned from my seat to look over the door at the front tire.

"I don't see anything wrong with the tire," I said.
"No, look at this," he said from behind me.

I turned around to see him kneeling in the poky weeds. It didn't register at first.

"What are you doing?"
"I'm proposing to you!"
"Oh!"

So I stood up. It seemed like the thing to do at the time.

"Will you marry me?"
"Yes!"

And then the ring was on my finger.

The end!

functions are radical!

My last blog had a purpose -- documenting my time teaching in Thailand for the amusement of myself and others. This one is a bit lacking in direction at the moment. I just missed writing, and maybe I'm a little self-indulgent. But who isn't these days?

I'm in a between-job state of limbo. I'll be moving to Dallas in the summer to begin an internship, but until then, I'm living at home. I made a halfhearted attempt at finding a job in my little hometown -- an application at a donut shop and a resume at a temp agency.

Thanks to an ad my mom put in her corporate newsletter, I found myself gainfully employed for two whole hours today! A girl called me about tutoring her in college algebra. I'm good at math -- or I was five years ago when I took my last math class -- so I said I'd do it.

After some rummaging, I found my high school algebra notes. I skimmed through my notebook and panicked a little when I realized I had no clue what any of the formulas and equations meant anymore.

I spent a few hours last night and several more today reteaching myself algebra in preparation for this tutoring session. Luckily, it was like riding a bike. It all came right back to me.

We met at the public library. About halfway through our session, she left to get a drink of water and a guy about my age walked up.

"Hi, I don't mean to bother you, but I was sitting over there and I noticed that you seem like a cool person. I was wondering if maybe we could get together sometime." I told him I had a boyfriend. He left, and I laughed to myself.

All in all, it was a good day. I brushed up my graphing calculator skills, earned a little extra money, and got an ego boost from a guy who picks up girls in libraries.