So what am I going to make with all of these flowers? Here's the list:

One bouquet for me
7 bouquets for the bridesmaids
1 flower girl container of some sort (basket, flower ball, flower wand, etc)
3 corsages of some sort
15 centerpieces
Decorations for our altar/arbor
A cake topper
An arrangement for the entryway/escort card table.

Whew, right?

Nothing will be too fussy; the general idea is that by saving money we can have lots of flowers, and the beauty of the flowers will be in the fact that there are so many of them (1,885, to be exact!). I think it will work out beautifully. I might still farm out the corsages to a florist, but I have time to make that decision. Eric doesn't want boutonnieres, so I don't have to make or buy any, and the guys will wear pocket squares instead. The aisle decorations will be paper lanterns, so no flowers needed there. Anything I'm forgetting?

Now, for the logistics. First, I have to place the order, and I'm going to do that soon, assuming I don't decide to change the color scheme :) They'll be delivered on Thursday and Friday of the wedding week (Sunday wedding, remember), and I'll tend to them and get them into water and let them open until Saturday morning. Saturday will be flower day, and when they're all done we'll bring them over to the reception site to be stored overnight.

To keep the apartment chilly enough to not have the flowers burst open upon arriving, I'll be turning the air conditioning down a few degrees for a few days (ozone layer, please forgive me!). I have to acquire some 5 gallon buckets to hold the flowers in, as well as some floralife to keep the flowers happy, and some oasis foam forms for the arbor arrangement and cake topper. To make it a group project, I got a few pairs of floral shears (I got them in the Target $1 aisle sometime last year, when they were selling lots of gardenening stuff). I've already acquired about 100 assorted small vases from various thrift stores to use on the reception tables, so we'll be putting multiple small vase arrangements on each table to add to the feeling of overabundance. The plan is that any crafty bridesmaids, friends, or relatives who want to help out on Saturday, can, and everyone else can hang out on their own in Louisville or head down to Churchill Downs, where a group will be headed.

I acknowledge that it sounds like a lot, but I'm fully prepared to tackle this project, and to not freak out if for some reason it all goes horribly wrong. You read it here: I hereby promise not to freak out if for some reason the flowers go horribly wrong!

I don't have too much of a plan for the actual designs themselves. For the bridesmaid bouquets, if the bridesmaids want to pick out their own flowers or make their own bouquets, that will be great. For the centerpieces, all the vases will just have a mix of flowers, and same for the arch and escort card table arrangement. The only big question mark left is my own bouquet. Once upon a time, I really loved the idea of a cascading bouquet in all white. Right now, multi-colored hand-tied bouquets are really popular. I like the idea of both. What should I do?


All white, cascading bouquet (source). Granted, it looks a little dated with the ivy, but you get the idea:

Colored, hand-tied (source):

Another colored, probably hand-tied bouquet (source):


All white, cascade (source):

Maybe the fact that all of the cascade bouquet pictures I can find all line look so dated should tell me that I'm leaning toward a really 80s look?

But wait! Here are some viable options:

Colored cascade, smaller scale, with ruscus instead of ivy (source):

Another colored bouquet (it's even purple and green!), sort of a cross between hand-tied and cascade, with amaranthus to give it the cascading look (source):

According to The Knot, I should pick a smaller round bouquet because I'm petite, a smaller round bouquet because my dress profile is slimmer, a smaller cascade because the wedding is in a loft-type space, or a smaller hand-tied bouquet because the ceremony is outdoors. Hmm, that doesn't help me much, other than telling me I should keep my bouquet small (boo; I like big ones!).

Round or cascade, white or colored? Decisions, decisions. Something tells me I'll decide on Saturday, May 23, as I'm about to put it together...

Flowers chosen?

Sorry, I know it's been a long time since I've given you any sort of meaningful attention, Harry Kalas aside. There isn't too much big stuff going on, just lots of little progress every day, chipping away at various things on the to-do list.

Well, here's an update for you. I think I've decided what flowers to order!

I worked at a florist in college, which was by far one of the best jobs I've ever had. Even on the most stressful day (think Valentine's Day), you were super busy boxing and wrapping up dozens of beautiful flowers. How stressful can that really be? I loved seeing the wedding flowers that we put together, and developed a very strong sense of what flowers I preferred. I will admit to one day, 9 years ago (oh my gosh, has it really been that long!?), writing down what I wanted my wedding bouquet to look like. My tastes haven't changed too much in the ensuing years, I have to admit.

One of the best/worst things about working at a florist was the development of the idea that I am capable of doing my own wedding flowers. A double-edged sword, to be sure, and I wouldn't necessarily recommend it for everyone, due to the stress that is sure to come with it. And who knows, after the wedding, I might not recommend it to anyone!

Actually, I'm really excited and looking forward to being able to work on my own flowers, although some of the logistics are going to require attention. Over the last few days, I've been perusing bulk flower websites, and here's what I've decided to order:


I'm aiming for mostly purple (all shades) and green, with a hint of pink. Sort of a wild, loosy goosey look, not too structured. Does this meet the mark?

Here's the flower breakdown:
Lavender roses
Pink/white bicolor roses
White spray roses
Purple lisianthus
Lavender sweet pea
White alstromeria
Purple alstromeria
Bupleurum (green)
Purplush/bluish limonium
Assorted colors of hypericum berries (for the berries in our "vines and berries" motif) (I'm hoping there's not too many red ones in the mix, but more of the green, pink, and peachy ones)
Assorted colors of statice (any color this comes in will be fine, except for maybe the hot pink)
And for greens, I'm using ruscus (evoking the vines in our motif) and lemonleaf.

I don't want too much of a pastel color scheme, but there are more flowers that come in bright pinks than come in bright purples. Hopefully the purple lisianthus will help keep things in the bold spectrum.

What do you think about the sweet pea? It comes in a variety of bold pink colors, but not a true purple, only lavender. Stick with the purple shade and risk being too pastel, or trade it for a darker pink and risk bringing too much pink into the mix? Similarly, trade in the lavender roses for something else (white or pink?) or leave them alone?

I actually have no problems with pink, and love bold pink flowers, but I've seen a few pictures of florals done in all purple and they're really nice looking, too, so I think that's what I'm going to go for. On the other hand, the eggplant bridesmaid dresses might look nice with a punch of pink, don't you think? Or should I stick with the color scheme and go all purple and green? You see where I'm getting stuck...

I traded the ability to pick the exact varieties of some of the flowers (roses and alstro in particular) for the lower price that comes with just ordering "lavender" roses. Hopefully they'll be blue curiosas, but if not, it won't be the end of the world.

Here's an interesting dilemma that occurs when ordering bulk flowers: They only come in bulk sizes! So if you want a huge variety of flowers, you quickly end up adding $3000+ worth of flowers to your online shopping cart and kicking yourself because one of the main points of doing your own flowers was to save money! Or you can find sites that let you buy in smaller quantity, but you end up spending just as much money because the unit price goes up a lot. For example, I originally had lilies, ranunculus, amaranthus, freesia, anemones, and delphinium in the mix, not to mention a bunch of other shades of roses, lisianthus, and alstromeria. But I really don't need 100 of each flower. Well, I'm sure I could decide that I did need them, but our budget can't take it. Instead, if the deliveries arrive and I still wish I had some lily, freesia, or anemones to help balance the color scheme, or I still wish I had some amaranthus just for the luxury, I can head across the street to our local florist or out to Whole Foods to see what I can get on short notice and in small quantities.

So that's the plan for what to order. Have any suggestions for colors/flowers? I welcome them! In a later post, I'll talk about what I'm going to make with all of these flowers.

Flowers

I LOOOOOOOVE flowers. I used to work at a florist in college, and it was by far the best job I ever had. Of course, getting to work in the Annapolis ER was very cool as well, and it made for some awesome stories and amazing medical experience that has worked out well for me in medical school, but seriously, if this whole medical thing ever fails, I'm going to become a florist/wedding planner.

The nice thing about having worked in a flower shop is that I learned a lot about working with flowers. By the time I left, I had learned the basics of doing a vase or foam arrangement, the basics of making hand-tied bouquets (hand-tied = the kind that are very popular now, a round bunch of flowers that you hold by the bunch of stems), and how to make boutonnieres. Plus lots of other tips and tricks like bow making (very handy!), garland making, and probably most importantly, how to care for fresh flowers and get them to open the way you want them to.

So naturally I have grand ideas about doing a lot of my own flowers for the wedding. It's possible, believe me. But I'm still realistic. I don't want to make boutonnieres, and probably not my own bouquet (depends on what I want to get, but more on that later), so I'll get a florist for those. But bridesmaids bouquets, aisle decorations, centerpieces, and possibly even arch flowers, I (with help) can totally do. The first step is to order tons of flowers wholesale from the internet. At prices like those, I can afford to splurge and order lots and lots of everything I love.

But here's the problem: there are tooooooo many options, and I love them all. (Note: in the following pictures, if there isn't a visible hyperlink in the text to the source, then the photo itself is hyperlinked to the source.)

1. Ceremony arch. I don't have an arch yet, but there are lots of viable options out there. Black wrought iron is probably the cheapest, and then there are the gorgeous-but-expensive wood ones. Making a wooden one would NOT be hard (that's what strong fiances and guy friends are for, but as I don't have a yard, finding workspace is the biggest problem). In any case, I would love to have it be overflowing with flowers, like this one:
So pretty! Each chunk of flowers is arranged on its own piece of foam, then attached to the arch. Totally do-able.
Or this one, which just looks so pretty.

2. Bridesmaids' bouquets. These are going to be hand-tied, and therefore very easy to make. But what kind of color palette? I'm initially drawn to multi-colored bouquets, like the flowers on the first arch above -- various shades of pinks, as well as purples and greens. Like this:
Or I really like the funky, wild look of these (from The Knot):

But then I saw these bouquets and I really liked them, too:
They're actually Mrs. Onion's bridesmaids' bouquets from Weddingbee, and her florist featured them on her website. The white and purple is so clean looking, and the purple really pops against the white. On the other hand, if my bridesmaids are already going to be wearing purple, then it might not pop as much, and the white is what would be seen. And I do love the look of the first bouquets with the multiple shades of pinks and purples.

Either way, I like a loose, organic feeling to bouquets; nothing too stiff, manicured, or formal. "Lush" is a good word.

3. Aisle decorations. Floral pomanders on shepherd's hooks?
Paper lanterns hung from the chairs?
Or pomanders hung from the chairs or lanterns hung from shepherd's hooks? I like the look of shepherd's hooks, but since the roof of Glassworks is a deck, attaching them to the deck might be rather difficult, so hanging things from the chairs is probably a better idea. Lanterns would bring in the Asian feel that I'm having difficulty incorporating otherwise...

Or how about flowers in buckets hanging from the chairs?
I think they moved those buckets into the reception area to decorate the bar after the ceremony. Or we could put buckets directly on the ground. It's too bad tulips aren't in season at the end of May, or else I would have tons of them at the wedding. Oh well.

If I can make the arch and the aisle interesting enough, then I don't want to have to bother trying to decorate the fence that goes around the perimeter of the roof. I've seen some nice pictures from past weddings where they decorated with things like tulle or Christmas lights, but if I can avoid it, I think I'd like to.

4. Centerpieces. This is where there are just TOO many options. I intend to just make vase arrangements for the tables, with lots of colors and flower types. If you have enough flowers, then it doesn't matter if they're not professionally arranged, because they will just look amazing on their own (that's my opinion, anyway). But what kind of vases? There's the short round or square vase that holds a short arrangement:

This is from a wedding my bridesmaid and former roommate Marjorie went to back in 2005 (yes, I've been collecting pictures from weddings for many years now).

This is from my bridesmaid Paula's wedding last year. If you go short, you should make sure that the centerpiece won't block the sight line for guests seated across from each other. I think I read somewhere that they should be no taller than 12-14".

Or you can alternate short and tall arrangements on the tables to add some visual interest:
This is one of the tall arrangements that was on some of the tables at Paula's reception. It's VERY tall. The clear glass vase, although it's tall, still allows for people to see each other through it, thus not halting conversation.

Or, you can mix and match things on a single table: 3-4 vases each with its own bunch of flowers in it (sorry, can't find a picture right now).

I have lots of random little vases hanging around, and I know I can always find a ton more at Goodwill, and I know I don't want everything to be completely matchy-matchy, so I think I might just start collecting vessels and then fill them all with flowers when the time comes and have them go wherever they look good. Tuesday Morning and Big Lots both have lots of vases as well -- in fact, I was at Tuesday Morning this week by chance and they have lots of really tall vases -- like at least 20" tall. They're a little pricey, but I'm pretty sure I could sell them after the wedding. If I'm going to do tall at all, then I probably need a full 50% of the tables to be tall, so things don't look odd. But if I go all short/medium, then I can definitely make every table completely different. I could also start looking for colored or otherwise more interesting glass, to play off the fact that we're having the reception at Glassworks.

And again, the paper lanterns come into play. We can hang things from the ceiling of the reception room, which I think is a good idea, because otherwise it's a little too industrial-looking:
Booooooring.

I've seen pictures where they hung fabric/draping from the ceiling, which looked gorgeous, but I'm going to admit it's probably a little beyond my capabilities. But here's another opportunity for those paper lanterns to come in... we could hang them from the ceiling. There's so many pretty ones, too...

Here are some inspirational pictures:
Pictures Miss Penguin from Weddingbee collected
Another picture from Weddingbee


All these lanterns are from Luna Bazaar.

I could hang them all over, or if I did some tall centerpieces, then the lanterns could just go over the tables with short centerpieces. Plus some over the dance floor as well. There are lots of options for lighting them -- I already bought some battery-operated tea lights from Target months ago because they were on clearance. I figured that even if I didn't use them, I could re-sell them. Plus, there is a new craze sweeping Weddingbee: LED throwies. If I go this route, then this is a DIY job for the groomsmen to help with, as I can think of at least two of them who will find this amazingly cool, and the girls are already going to be apprentice florists.


So anyway, those are my decorating dilemmas. Any thoughts?

Jamie's wedding - recap

On April 12 one of my best friends, Jamie, got married in Baltimore. It was a really beautiful wedding, and of course, I took note of all the little details to obsess over myself.

The wedding was at the Renaissance Harborplace at the Baltimore Inner Harbor. The suite where we got ready (and where I got to stay for free -- sweet!) was up high, overlooking the harbor. This was the view from our windows:

Gorgeous!

The night before the wedding, the rehearsal dinner was held at Chiapparelli's (Jamie and Tim had a 16-month engagement, but deciding to have the rehearsal dinner there was one of their first decisions!), and it was delicious. We received our bridesmaids' gifts at dinner, which consisted of a little black insulated lunch bag embroidered with our names (mine was embroidered in purple; I think someone knows what I like!), inside of which was a picture of all the bridesmaids with Jamie at her bachelorette party in March, a gift certificate for manis and pedis the next day, a gorgeous rhinestone necklace to wear with our dresses, and an assortment of things that constituted a wedding day emergency kit, like chapstick, Shout wipes, bandaids, antacids, mints, and mini liquor bottles. Pretty cool.

Three of the four bridesmaids stayed with Jamie in the hotel suite where we would be getting ready the next day (the other lived in town and was post-call, so she opted to sleep in her own bed), and the next day we all piled into a limo to be chauffeured around to all the various appointments. In addition to the bride and four bridesmaids, we were joined by the junior bridesmaid, Jamie's mom, and the wife of the best man. After breakfast in the limo, our first stop was at the nail salon for manis and pedis.

Next up was the hair salon, where Jamie has been going for years. I kind of wish I had that kind of long-term relationship with a hairstylist (unfortunately, my mom doesn't count), not that I get my hair cut that often anyway (hence why it looks long and wild and crazy right now).

Here's Jamie getting the veil put in her hair. She had her hair in a really pretty low chignon-type thing and the short veil complemented it well.

I treated my updo as a wedding hair trial, so asked for half-up/half-down with curls. The stylist asked if I was planning to wear a veil, and in a split-second decision, I decided to wear one. So she apparently made the half-up part of my hair conducive to putting a veil comb in:
What it felt like she was doing was taking alternating strands from the right and left side of my head and sort of pinning them up so they lay horizontally across the crown of my head, then letting the ends fall down in curls. So the horizontal parts made loops... kind of like a shoelace with lots of loops? She curled all the ends more when she was finished. I had a side sweep in the front and some volume at the back/top, although by the time she had finished putting all the bobby pins in, she had killed some of the volume. I think it looks nice, but not particularly amazing, but I'm sure it will look nice under a veil and will certainly serve its purpose of keeping a veil secured. And of course, I did buy a veil when I got back from the wedding as a result. But do I maybe want an updo that's a little more visually exciting on its own? Plenty of time to ponder.

After getting ready, we went down for pictures. By that time, the florist had assembled the chuppah:
Each post of the chuppah had one of these arrangements on it, and there was really pretty up-lighting from the floor. Gorgeous!!!!

This was the view as you entered the ceremony room. Those tall arrangements had the largest calla lilies I've ever seen. They were absolutely stunning. After the ceremony, they were moved into the ballroom to flank the sweetheart table.

We did the girls' pictures in the Harborplace Mall, which is attached to the hotel we were in. The mall is in a 4-story atrium with tons of natural light. It was kind of weird to be taking photos in a mall with actual mall customers walking around, but it was also kind of cool. Everyone was looking at us like we were celebrities or something. Some of the cooler shots we took that I can't wait to see included one where the photographer went down an escalator, then pointed his camera up, and we all lined up on the escalator and he shot as we came down; another set was taken in front of this really gorgeous fountain in the mall lobby; and another set was taken in front of Victoria Secret's, with Jamie looking sexy and all the bridesmaids looking shocked -- except I just cracked up hysterically. The photographer took the guys into the mall as well, and took shots in front of Brooks Brothers and sitting at the shoe shine booth. I can't wait to see the photos.

After photos we had some time to kill before the ketubah signing and we were hungry, so we made the wedding planner that came with the hotel get us McDonald's. I love this picture:

That's Jamie and her sister, the maid of honor, chowing down on nuggets and fries. Mmmm.

At the ketubah signing, I started to cry, but we also at that time discovered that our dresses had pockets, so I was able to stash some tissues for the ceremony (which I needed). Our camera is getting on in years so Eric wasn't able to take any good photos of anyone during the processional, but here's Paula and I being escorted by the groom's brother during the recessional:



I have almost no pictures from the reception, since I was dancing so much and having such a good time, and that's fine, except for the fact that I didn't take a picture of the cake, which was done by Duff of Ace of Cakes! We were taking bridesmaids' pictures when the cake was delivered, which is a shame, because Jamie had been told that Geoff was going to deliver it, and I would love to have talked to him in person. He has such a dry sense of humor, I love it.


One thing I did get a picture of was our table. The tablecloth was white and it had this sheer overlay with that black vine pattern on it. I was very jealous, because as I may or may not have mentioned (possibly not; I can't remember anymore and am too lazy to go back and check), a vine pattern is going to be the theme of our wedding! It can't be that exact pattern anymore (and it probably wouldn't have been anyway), and I want more color (Jamie's wedding was all black and white and very formal), but I still had a pang of "Oh no, I can't use that idea anymore!" before I snapped back into reality.

They had a photo booth at the wedding that served as both the guest book and favor. You went in, had 4 photos taken, and it printed two copies of the set of four. There was an attendant from the photo booth company who cut the two strips apart, put one in the guest book and let you write your message, and gave the other to you as a favor. There were lots of great, silly and cute photos, and tons of great messages as well. A surprising number of people (us included) kissed for the camera, too!

It was a great wedding, and I'm sad it's over, because for the last year wedding events for Jamie have been the only way we've all been able to get together! It's up to my bridesmaids now to plan events for our wedding so we can continue to get together for fun times in the next year...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
And since I never posted about Jamie's bachelorette party, here's a quick update: We met up in Pittsburgh, which is where Jamie lives, and we organized a night at Bar Louie in Station Square. They had an awesome bachelorette party deal where for $20/person we got 2 group appetizers, 2 drinks of our choice, a round of lemon drop shots, a champagne toast, a huge chocolate cake, and beads and bachelorette games and assorted accessories. Plus we were in a private corner of the bar up on a raised platform with curtains we could pull to make it all VIP and exclusive. There were a lot of fun girls there who haven't known Jamie for quite as long and therefore were more willing to make her do embarrassing things (the bridesmaids, on the other hand, were in mortal fear for our lives if we tried to make her do anything too crazy). We had a guy come take off his shirt and flex for us, and a few more came over and sang to her (You've Lost That Loving Feeling, a la Top Gun). Good times. If you're planning a bachelorette party in Pittsburgh, I highly recommend Bar Louie as a starting-off point. Plus we waited for a Restaurant.com sale and got a $75 gift certificate for only $15. We totally should have gotten the $100 gift certificate, but I chickened out and wasn't sure if we would meet the minimum (but of course we did). Anyway, it was a good, good night.

Insomnia

For the first time in my entire third year of medical school, I can't fall asleep. This is so disturbing I might have to call a... doctor?

In any case, I'll take this opportunity to write this post I've had brewing in my head for a day or so.
~~~~~~~~~~~
In case it's been confusing (in my other blog) as to what rotation I'm actually on right now, let me clear things up: I'm just finishing with internal medicine, which I've been on since returning from winter break. Internal medicine is a 12-week rotation, but 2 weeks of that is vacation. My vacation happens to be the last two weeks of the entire rotation, namely, last week and this week. Only instead of taking vacation, I chose to do a Career Exploration Elective, wherein I do a -- you guessed it -- elective to figure out what I want to be when I grow up. So that's why I've been talking about Ob/Gyn recently; I'm shadowing in the REI clinic.

Except they were extra nice to me (or had trouble finding people for me to shadow), and I only had to work 4 half-days last week, and only 2 half-days this week. So I'm kind of still on vacation. And next week, I'm really on vacation -- spring break.

The only problem with all of this pseudo-vacation? I have my internal medicine final this Friday. So this is what my brain has been doing the last week and a half:

Need to study.
Vacation!!
Wedding planning!
Need to study.
Wedding planning!
Need to study.
Wedding planning!
Little bit of actual studying.
More wedding planning!

It's quite frustrating on all fronts. I've probably been more productive at wedding planning, so I figured I might as well show off the fruits of my labor.

Back in September, a Weddingbee blogger wrote about these floral puppies, and I thought a floral puppy in a basket would be an adorable thing for our flower girl to carry:

Last month, Eric bought me some flowers when he came to visit (awww), and when they were finally ready to be thrown out, I salvaged some of the poms and did a little proof-of-concept experiment to see if I could pull this puppy (haha) off on my own:
I stuck the flowers in a pot of dirt and used buttons for the eyes and nose. It's not half-bad, if I do say so myself. Needs to be fleshed out a little, but it definitely looks dog-ish, and I'm sure with a fresh bunch of poms it will turn out great. How exciting! (OK, I actually did this a few weeks ago, so it didn't contribute to my non-studying directly.)

I spent one evening this weekend practicing my penmanship in preparation for the invitations we'll be sending out ONE YEAR FROM NOW (had to point out my craziness there):
When I was little, my mom made me practice my cursive as at-home homework. I had a bunch of those copy books where you would trace the letter a couple times, then there would be blank spaces for you to write your own. She wouldn't let me write my own letters, though, and instead made me trace the pre-printed ones over and over and over again. I used to throw fits about this, saying that the blank spaces were there for me to use, but her reasoning was that there was no sense trying it on your own if you couldn't trace the perfect one perfectly. (This is how Chinese children learn to write characters, by the way. Trace, trace, trace. Because if you mess it up, you create a whole new character.) I've always been a doodler in school, and by the time I got to middle school I doodled three things: hearts (who didn't), flowers (I drew a pretty flower that my friend Kim was jealous of), and the alphabet. I would write out the alphabet over and over and over again (the first sign of me turning into my mother -- ack!). In seventh grade, I changed the way I made my cursive upper-case "F" after an extensive doodling session in civics class (why I remember this, I'm not sure).

In any case, all that practice has paid off, and I get lots of compliments on my penmanship at work. And while a compliment on penmanship in the medical field isn't all THAT exciting, since most doctors have chicken scratch that is absolutely illegible, I won't look that compliment-bearing gift horse in the mouth. So if there's one time in my life that it would be semi-normal for me to show off my pretty penmanship, it's when we send out wedding invitations. So I'm going to buy a calligraphy marker and calligraph my heart out.

Here's a sample invitation with my chosen "hand" (that's actually the term for a handwritten font):
Also not half-bad, huh? Since etiquette apparently frowns on computer-printed envelopes and calligraphers charge an arm and a leg (prices start at $2 per envelope on Etsy), I might as well do it myself if I can, no?


The other thing that's been percolating around in my head recently is growing mint. My initial idea was to grow little pots of mint and use them as our wedding favor. Mint is related to Louisville via mint juleps, and I have a secret crush on the wedding pun "Holly and Eric, mint to be" even though all those puns are super-cheesy. Plus it's super-eco-friendly and not something that's going to gather dust in a drawer. Even if you throw away my pot of mint, it will decompose nicely, and the pot is recyclable. This is my third spring in a row planting herb seeds for my window box (I always have basil and some combination of flat-leaf parsley, oregano, thyme, rosemary, and cilantro), but I have never been able to grow mint. A while back I heard that mint, while notorious for spreading like wildfire once rooted, can be difficult to grow from seed. Nevertheless, I tried again.

My six little peat pellets, 15 days ago.

And here they are today, looking pretty much the same. There's some faint green fuzz on a couple of them, but it might be mold, to tell you the truth.

So all of that led me to the internet. It turns out this grower sells 16 varieties of mint -- I never knew there were so many kinds! Pineapple mint, chocolate mint (reminiscent of an Andes chocolate, they say!), apple mint, and ... Kentucky Colonel mint, perfect for mint juleps! Ding ding ding! We have a winner. So if these seeds don't sprout by the time I get back from spring break, then I'm going to buy myself a pot of KY Col. mint and start rooting cuttings into 100 3" plastic green pots. Good thing I have a year to do this. The only problem I foresee is that mint, being related to catnip, is very pleasing to kitties. Good thing they're spending a good chunk of next year on the east coast, then.

One of the small green pots. It's 3" in diameter and 2.5" high -- in other words, small. Only 5 cents from the local plant store! The brown pot is a 2" diameter biodegradable pot, which is even more eco-friendly, but it's meant for starting seedlings and then being buried in the ground, so I don't think it would last a year of waterings. If I can actually succeed in making 100 favors for a total of $20.00 ($5 for the pots, $5 for the mother mint plant, $10 for assorted other things like a bag of dirt and something to make the pots pretty), that might be a world record. The only thing still nagging at me: should I arrange the mint pots in the center of each table as a big, green, minty centerpiece to be deconstructed as the guests leave, or just leave them as favors on the table and use floral centerpieces? The floral centerpieces would be DIY, FYI.

Next up are my wine corks. Ever since we moved into our apartment, we've been saving our wine (and champagne) corks, for an unknown reason. After we got engaged, I decided we were saving them to use in the wedding somehow. I also have my brother (who has been working part-time at a liquor store for some extra cash) saving corks from the wine tastings they do at his store, and my friends David and Amy saving theirs from the many bottles they drink (not that they're alcoholics). A couple months ago I decided I would make a bulletin board out of them, and pin our escort cards to them. Easy to do, problem solved. It doesn't exactly match the venue, per se -- it's not like we're getting married at a vineyard, but it's not like I care about things like that, either. Anyway, this weekend I saw an even better idea on Style Me Pretty:
It's kind of hard to tell, but the description said, "Upon entering the reception, there was a tray that I had made with old wine corks with little escort cards tucked in it." Ding ding ding! Another winner. This solves the one nagging problem I had with the bulletin board idea: I wasn't sure how, exactly, it was going to be hung up. But there will definitely be a table in the entry area at the reception where a cork tray can go. Another problem solved!

I don't even know how this happened anymore, but I also set up part of our wedding registry over the weekend. Well, I know why I had the idea, but I really don't know how I actually allowed myself to spend so much time on this non-studying project. I had the idea because Etsy's Storque feature is having a Handmade Wedding Series, and one of the posts this weekend was about custom registry websites. Thank goodness! I've been trying to come up with a way to register at stores that don't have registries and this is the perfect solution! I tried out Wist, but while it allows you to make a "web-list" it doesn't have a registry function that indicates if something has been purchased. So I ended up going with MyRegistry.com, and once I had set it up, I just sort of started adding things... and more things... and thus the registry was born. There are so many awesome things out there that just aren't available at Target, Macy's, or Bed Bath and Beyond (or, like most things, they are available for less money on the wonderful internet). But don't worry, we'll be setting up some store registries as well. Because I just can't register for towels without putting my hands on the towels to feel them first. And in case you go snooping, we're not going to un-password protect our online registry quite yet, because it's nowhere near finished... and there's still plenty of time for you to buy us a present, so just have patience, little grasshopper.

Today I spent an embarrassing chunk of time looking through ceremony readings (completely Lauren's fault!), which led, oddly enough, to an idea for my graduation speech next year. Seeing as how graduation speech --> graduation --> medical school --> sort of relates to studying (suuuuuure it does, Holly), I allowed it. I'm quite excited by this speech idea, but as graduation is also a year away, there's no sense in spilling the beans quite yet. Plus there's still this year's graduation to attend, and I want to see what the graduating class president has to say. Last year's speech was horrendously long, and the one before that was nice, but unremarkable. I have high hopes for this year's class president, though.

Well, that's the end of today's session of "How I spent my time not studying." Tune in next time (I promise, there will be a next time) for more!

Jamie's Bridal Shower

A few weeks ago I flew east for my friend Jamie's bridal shower. It was a lot of fun, as showers go (you know, all that playing hostess for for women you don't know from Adam... or Eve), and it was great to see my friends again for a couple days. There were tons of awesome little details:


It was a travel-themed shower, so the bride's sister/MOH Emily had guests submit a photo and description of their favorite trip with a loved one. I sent a picture from our Alaska trip back in June. Emily and I had grand ideas of doing a digital scrapbook that we printed out, but in the end, time constraints won out and she inserted everything into a photo album.


Emily also got lots of flowers from Sam's Club and made vase arrangements for all the tables. We played a game that sent us "around the world" (we even had passports to write our answers in) to identify various international things, including identifying the phrase "I love you" in various languages (shown on that poster board -- I only knew the Chinese and Italian). Each vase also had a flag in it from a different country, which we had to identify. The wedding colors are black and white, hence the black-and-white polka dot ribbon.


All the presents were displayed in open suitcases. This also made it very convenient to pack all the presents up at the end!


A family friend made this bride cake. The "skirt" is the cake, and the bodice is decorated with icing. When we got back to Jamie's house and ate it, we discovered that the doll was just a head and torso with a long stem in the bottom instead of legs -- maybe it's meant for this kind of thing? The cake stand was decorated with extra flowers from Sam's Club.



The around-the-world food included various international cheeses and appetizers (sushi, potstickers, appetizer meatballs, falafel, stuffed grape leaves) and the flags for the passport game were stuck in the various foods as well.


These ice bowls were absolutely amazing. The bowls for the shrimp and cocktail sauce were actually made of ice, with the lemon slices frozen within them. They were very well-received, and it was eventually revealed that the instructions came from -- who else? -- Martha Stewart. To keep it from melting all over the place, the ice bowls were on top of the polka dot fabric that was on top of a shammy that was on top of a cookie sheet.


Here's Jamie holding one of the gifts from me and our other friend Paula -- a towel cake! It's two full sets of towels, rolled to form a three-layered cake, and decorated with ribbon I had at home and post-Christmas clearance decorations. I have to say, it was a pretty big hit.


This picture's pretty crappy, but I wanted to show off the other part of the gift from Paula and me (it was lingerie), with the pretty black-and-white damask-like print wrapping paper (they were actually chandeliers printed on the paper, not a true damask print). Do I know how to coordinate or what?


While Jamie was opening her presents, my job was to make the bow bouquet.

Pretty good, huh? I even made it one-sided, in a cascade shape, with a ribbon-wrapped handle. Too bad I'm the master of a non-money-making skill.


A shot with the towel cake and bow bouquet. You can see the doll cake in the background, too. The shower was held in the clubhouse of a local housing community. Jamie's mom knew someone who lived there, so we were able to have the shower there. It was really nice -- like the living room, dining room, and caterer's kitchen of a very large, fancy house.



Group shot -- from left to right, Jamie's friend from med school, Devon; me; Jamie; and our other bff Paula. We played that game where everyone got a clothespin when we walked in and were told we couldn't say the word "wedding." Later on, it was expanded to include the word "Jamie" as well. If someone caught you saying those words, she got to take your clothespin, and the person with the most clothespins at the end won a prize. We also played bridal shower bingo, which was fun. It was a game-intensive shower, for sure.

After the shower was over, we acted like the pathetic, then-26-year-old med student/interns we are and did absolutely nothing on a Saturday night. Well, we ended up playing Cranium, which is always a good time. All in all, in was a lot of fun, and we have the bachelorette party coming up in Pittsburgh at the end of March. Jamie's wedding is April 12 -- I probably need to get my bridesmaid dress altered because the next six weeks are going to fly by!