I figured now would be an appropriate time to share our full menu. It’s an alternative twist on a Labor Day picnic, with locally farmed, grass-fed, organic meats. We’re not having a traditional wedding cake; instead we wanted to have a trio of desserts. Each guest will be served a watermelon gazpacho, whoopie pie, and last but not least, banana crème brûlée—a slight nod to my brother, who is a fan of banana-flavored desserts and was kind enough to approve of us getting married on his birthday.
Starters
Our honeymoon has officially been booked and we couldn’t be more excited. We’ll be departing the day after our wedding to head to Rome, an eight-and-a-half-hour journey from Philadelphia. For the first leg of our trip, we’ll be staying at Hotel Artemide in Rome for two nights (the photo below is an example of the room we’ll be staying in). We’re total TripAdvisor stalkers, so the 4 1/2 star rating (out of 1,822 reviews) definitely made it a stand-out hotel with a convenient location.
{Images via Hotel Artemide}
Since we’re planning a backyard wedding, we have been trying to come up with thrifty ways to dress up the dogwood tree we’ll be getting hitched under. I really wanted to take strips of fabric, cut them at different lengths, and dye them, ombre-style. (The Ginger: “What’s an ombre?”) Our colors are technically yellow and gray, so I decided to go with golden yellow RIT dye. I loosely followed the tutorial by Green Wedding Shoes on how to make an ombre fabric backdrop.
Sorry if I’ve been quiet here lately in the hive. Now that our backyard wedding is just three months away, The Ginger I are on the hunt for vintage, gold-rimmed china for our mismatched dinnerware. Here’s a glimpse of our collection so far—we’re probably about 50% done finding everything we need.
I really enjoy going out when we have free time to search for items to add to the table. Our friends and family have been chipping in with giving us a plate or bowl to add to the collection to make it more personal.
It’s been quite some time since I announced our engagement, so I wanted to share some of the inspiration The Ginger and I have been gathering along the way, mostly thanks to Pinterest. To give you a quick recap, we’ll be having an uber intimate wedding in our own backyard with 15 guests (our parents, siblings and significant others, and our pooch, Betty White).
For starters, we’re planning on having two long, wooden tables in our backyard, picnic-style, with benches for our guests. It’s been quite a challenge trying to nail down a vendor for renting a few rustic tables, but I think we’ve finally found a reasonable option thanks to Craigslist. We snagged some yellow, grey, and gold streamers which we plan on slinging over bulb string lights to give the yard a pretty glow (and hopefully not catch our house on fire).
We had been debating whether or not we should make an arbor, but I think we’ll be dyeing and tying ombre-style pieces of yellow fabric to the dogwood tree, along with hanging mason jar vases with flowers and candles. I really love these tissue paper-covered lanterns and we already have oversized yellow balloons from our barbecue party that never happened, so those should look pretty (assuming we don’t get another Hurricane Irene).
{1: Image via Once Wed / Photo by Jose Villa 2: Image via Once Wed / Photo by Our Labor of Love 3: Image via Green Wedding Shoes / Photo by Katherine Elizabeth Photography 4: Image via Martha Stewart}
I know it’s been a while since you’ve heard from me, but I wanted to check back into the hive with some exciting news! It seems to be true that good things come in threes and yesterday was proof of that little theory. When my boyfriend (who we will enthusiastically call “The Ginger” from now on) came home from work, I spent a good twenty minutes rambling about how giddy I was since: 1.) I managed to land a job interview with an amazing company and 2.) I found our foster dog a home with a loving family. I asked him about his day and we exchanged our usual stories about each others’ latest happenings. He asked what I wanted for dinner and I told him we could make pasta since we are in need of groceries and it’s one of the only edible things in the house right now. Apparently since he made dinner last night (which consisted of scooping tuna salad I had made onto bread), it was my turn to do the cooking since we switch cooking and cleaning every other night. I cluelessly didn’t realize at the time that he was trying to lead me into the kitchen.
So, to the kitchen I went, where I asked what type of pasta he wanted. I rattled off our options and asked boring inquisitive questions like “what’s the difference between linguine and fettuccine?” When I went to grab a pot from our cabinets, just about our entire cookware set came toppling over. Typical Ms. Candy Corn spazzery was taking place. I started boiling a pot of water and filled our Brita water pitcher, which I put in the fridge without realizing this was waiting for me:
A while back my boyfriend Pete surprised me with tickets to a Bethenny Frankel speaking engagement. He was one of the only men in the room, apart from her husband Jason Hoppy, so he was a total dear for taking me on a date to see her in person since he knows how much I love her insanity.
Fast forward to this past Monday, when Pete and I were entering our apartment after a long evening of wallpaper removal at our new house (!!!). I flopped my purse on the counter only to hear a stream of voicemail beeps coming from inside of it. I wondered who would be calling after 10PM on a Monday and got a little nervous to see a few voice mails and email alerts all around the exact same time. In my head I was freaking out that someone had died, but as soon as I pushed the voicemail play button I heard our friends telling us that we had just been on the season finale of Bethenny Ever After on Bravo. Oh boy. Now Bravo addicts around the world would know that the ginger and I were at the show. Pete’s man cred is definitely lacking now. He’s going to have to eat a lot of hot dogs and pump a lot of iron to make up for this huge hit.
Most of you probably don’t recognize my name around these parts, but as a refresher, I’m the bee who got divorced. Don’t worry, the story has a happy ending, I promise! As you might recall, I met the boy of my dreams and we’ve been happily living together in our apartment with our five pets for over a year.
Recently we had quite the tragedy with our dog Betty White. To catch you guys up to speed, I adopted Betty White from the SPCA about four years ago. She has always had major separation anxiety, which causes her to bark non-stop when no one is home. We were going through dog training for months and considered giving her up for adoption to our dog trainer. We thought he could give her a better life since she would be able to spend her days with him at work and learn how to be a more confident pooch overall. This backfired when he called several days later to say that she escaped from his training center during a huge snowstorm.
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It’s hard for me to come up with posts for Weddingbee, as I am the only bee that I know of who has documented her divorce process after blogging for well over a year about wedding plans. Several bees have also sadly gone through divorce, but are now writing about their “encore” weddings (high five to them!). As the lone bee who has opened up about a failed marriage after blogging about all things wedding-related, it can be a bit strange to try and figure out where I fit in here.
I am now in a healthy and happy relationship with Pete and we are already almost coming up on our one year anniversary. I can’t even begin to explain how nice it is to be in a relationship that is free of emotional abuse. I’ve read a lot of posts on the boards that make divorce out to be terrifying and something you should only do if you’ve been physically abused, and certainly not if you haven’t even been married for at least a year. No one is a fan of divorce, but to stay in an unhealthy relationship with no hope rather than admit that things have failed, is not good for either parties.
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As some of you may recall, I’m drawing our table number cards to fit in with our bird theme. I haven’t numbered this set yet because I won’t be sure of how many tables we’ll need until we receive our RSVP’s, so some of the drawings that I’m not as fond of will go into a pile of misfit bird drawings that I won’t end up using. I drew the hummingbird at a friend’s house with different lighting than I’m used to, which I hadn’t really considered at the time. It’s much darker and not the same quality as the others, so it’s going to end up in the reject pile since I know I can do better.
Short-tailed Pygmy-tyrant, or as I like to call him, a cute little pudge muffin.
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Miss Candy Corn, Philadelphia Age and Occupation: 27, Freelance Writer, Photographer and Illustrator Fiance's Age and Occupation: 25, Front End Web Developer Blogging Since: May 6, 2008 Engagement Date: November 10, 2011 Wedding Date: September 2012 Venue: Our backyard! About Me: I’m a 27-year-old photographer, writer and illustrator who enjoys shooting weddings, catching typos in magazines, geeking out with Google Reader, watching Wonder Years marathons with my fiancé, and hanging out with our menagerie of pets. I’m an encore bride planning an intimate, offbeat backyard wedding with my fiancé (known around these parts as “The Ginger”), as we explore our adventures of homeownership.
