What needs to go on top of a cake?

A cake topper!

My previous post had me on a quest for a cake topper with a big fat fail.

Well, I finally heard back from Goose Grease, and they delivered me some super cute cake toppers!

Here are their glamour shots:


{images taken by GooseGrease}

I got them to put the crest on our shorts and shirts. And the tops have the numbers that we play in rugby. (Well, mine is for open-side flanker even though I play wing. I'm still a flanker at heart!)

When I got them, they came in a nice canvas bag (with eco-friendly package stuffing):



Then wrapped in a soft piece of paper:



And here's my poor attempt of a glamour shot (via a terrible shot of some stuff on my floor. Oh well.):


I obviously can't take a photo with a steady hand. Meh.

Another thing checked off the list. Good times!

Yay, cake!

I think it was BM Y* who suggested Bennison's Bakery for my pyramid-of-wedding-cake-buffet-extravaganza (post on that setup forthcoming when my mom and dad actually make the structure). It was the perfect suggestion; it was our favorite bakery when we were at university. H* even took classes with their head baker.

It also had a bonus that none of the other places I considered had (yes, I check out Whole Foods, Costco, Dominick's, and Deerfield's Bakery): they could make all the cakes I wanted. And they delivered. Done and done.

So what did I get?

I'll start with the ones that are the most important and unfortuately are lacking in photos. Lee's cake of choice is Black Forest while I got the strawberry torte. I'm not sure which one will go on top, eh, surprise me.

Everyone seems to be most excited about the hazelnut torte:


{source}
It's going to be boozy, hazelnutty, and chocolately. Good times.

These do come in cake form, but Bennison's only had photos of their carrot and red velvet in cupcake form:


{source and source}
Do you think I can get some babies on those carrots?

Finally, I have a lemon curd and raspberry jam yellow cake with whipped cream. I'm guessing it'll look something like this:


{source}

But with whipped cream and yellow/reddish flowers. Or maybe they'll surprise me. Or not. Hmmm...I didn't actually tell them what to put on the cake. Man, if it's weird, that means I would actually have to send it to Cake Wrecks. Better call them.

And the grand total of cake with tax and delivery is: $176! Woohoo!

This is not supposed to be difficult

I can't really explain why I want to wear a veil. I'm not doing a traditional ceremony, I'm not covering myself up, I'm not getting married in a church. I think it's just "bridal." It's something that would make me feel like a complete bride. (Yes, I realize a big white dress and a handsome groom also make me a bride. Tough, I like the veil.)

However, there's no way in hell I would buy a veil from a bridal store. I don't want a rolled edge, beading, and jewels. I just want a simple unfinished edge veil on a comb.

From what I've read in several websites (like, this, this, this, and this), I figured making a veil would go something like this:

1. buy tulle in length necessary (I want an elbow to fingertip veil. So it's about 40 inches long and 108 inches wide.)
2. lay flat on floor
3. round corners of the bottom edge of veil
4. do a big straight stitch on top edge of veil
5. pull thread
6. attach to comb
7. done

Easy, right? Well, not really. First, my sister bought a pattern for like $2 on eBay. And then my mom bought a ready-made veil from Michaels.

I made my mom return the veil from Michaels. It had a rolled edge and it was ugly. We then went to work on the pattern.

Unfortunately, we didn't get very far because we couldn't understand why the pattern was so circular. Instead we modified it and got an oval shape, which led to a 2 layer cascading-like veil.


Yes, it's blurry. It's the best shot I got.

I wasn't a fan of the cascading nature of this veil. What did surprise me was how much I liked the two layers. I planned to just do one to make sure people could see the detail on the back of the dress.

We then went to all the websites and saw that all we had to do was clip the corners of the veil to have a softer edge.



My mom and I prefered this one more. Simpler, poofy enough. Mom is getting ivory tulle to make the veil, and if I have to wear a veil at my batchelorette, well, I have two.

Which veil do you like?

Yes, I can...

...make a multi-flowered bouquet!

Over the Thanksgiving weekend, I decided to try making another bouquet. This time it was for my sister.

When she originally told me her theme and that she wanted it to be as low cost as possible, I told her that I could do her flowers. She really didn't say what kind, so I went with inexpensive ones: carnations and roses.

Unfortunately, Dominick's only had spray roses and mini carnations, so I made do with those. I also added some hypericum berries so I could also attempt a buttonhole (I can't spell boutinere, or however it's spelled, britspeak it is).

Using the directions from my previous flower post, I made this:



I have to say, I'm pretty proud of myself. I had planned on keeping it simple for my wedding, but this was really easy. And the flowers were still going strong after 2.5 days...even with a number of them no where near water. There were hiccups:

1. Paper, tape, and wire do not get along. Good thing I now have a working glue gun.
2. Dollar Tree floral tape bleeds through ribbon. It did take 2 days to show, but still.
3. Roses along the outside of the bouquet need to be wired. There's a high chance of heads popping if you don't do it.

The costs were reasonable too:
1 bunch spray roses: $9
1 bunch mini carnations: $7
1 bunch hypericum berries: $5
floral wire: $1
floral tape: $1
ribbon: already had it
paper: already had it
tape: already had it

Even though it seems like a lot ($23), you only see one buttonhole. I had enough flowers left to make about 4 more.

I think I'm going to mix roses and carnations into my girls' bouquets. I'll change up the ribbon or something to show who gets what. What do you think?

His ring, part 4: What.

When I visited Lee back in October, I took his ring with me to make sure it was the right size. You may remember what the ring looked like when I first got it:



Well, when Lee opened the box, he noticed the brown stuff around the ring. Granted, meteorite is made of iron, but Johan stated that (1) he puts protectant to stop rusting and (2) there may be some dirt on the ring that will flake off with time.

I thought that the brown was the flake-off-over-time dirt. Lee thought it was rust. So I said that when I got back to the US, I would contact Johan and see what it was.
I then took this picture:



Yes, there is a noticable difference in color from the last photo. Lee was right; it was rust. After showing Johan the picture, he agreed and told me to send it back for cleaning and reprotecting. It actually took a while because he wanted to make sure the ring wouldn't rust.

I got it the day before Thanksgiving looking like the glamour shot. It's sitting at home home waiting for its moment to shine on our wedding day.

And that's the end of our ring story. Finally. It's only taken over a year.