Brad and Lauren get married part duex

Ok reception.  So fun!  

Our first married wedding! :)

We got to our table, chatted with the other people at our table and ate some chips and salsa.  Some photos of the tablescape:

the view

They had a really really great band called Downtown Fever, they sounded really great and kept the dance floor PACKED the whole night!  

The dinner was really really tasty, we had skewers of chicken and beef, with beans and tortillas - and Brad even jumped in with the Pappa's crew to serve his guests, lol!

Another really cool thing they had was a photobooth type thing that made flipbooks!  http://www.iloveflipbooks.com/

You pretty much get in front of a webcam and have 7 seconds to dance and whatnot and it will print out a flip book!

And we had seriously delicious cake!  I know I am biased about cake and love it all, but this was really top notch.  I should have had a second piece...

The best part of the night though, was the dancing of the horah dance - which is a tradition at a Jewish wedding.  This is the dance where everyone is dancing in a circle and lift up the couple on chairs.  Super festive right?  Well Brad's family owns, and he works for Sunnyland Furniture in Dallas, home of the worlds largest patio chair...so we were all in for a big surprise:

How awesome is that?!

We had a really wonderful time, and thank you to Brad and Lauren for including us in celebrating your special day.  The Hinkley's wish you a lifetime of love and happiness!  Mazel Tov!

Sorry girls, he's hitched :)

Brad and Lauren get married!!

Aaron and I had the pleasure of spending the weekend in the Dallas area to see my friend Brad from college get married!

Our trip started in Greenville where Jeremy and Nicole let us stay over and hang out.  We drove to Rockwall for dinner at The Flying Saucer and it is right on the lake, so we had to take a pic or two :)

:D

Always fun seeing those guys!

Sunday afternoon we headed to Dallas to get checked in at our hotel.  We stayed at the Magnolia Hotel (Dallas edition) in downtown - it was a really nice hotel!

It was a bummer though, by the time we checked in, all the gift bags for guests had been handed out :\  I am sure they were lovely!

Onto the main event!

I will preface this by telling you that Brad is a very proud Texan :)  Brad and Lauren's wedding and reception were held at the Old Red Courthouse in Dallas.  It was such a neat venue, and the insides were just beautiful.  Elegant yet a little rustic.  There were so many neat details that really personalized the event, we just had a super great time!

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We entered the courthouse on the first floor and were greeted with the voice of Big Tex welcoming us to the wedding.  For the non-Texans, Big Tex is this cowboy character that welcomes everyone to the Texas state fair! 

We then were led to the fourth floor for the ceremony.  Brad and Lauren are Jewish, and this was the first time Aaron and I have been to a Jewish wedding, so we were really excited to see what the ceremony would be like.  The men were asked to wear the traditional Kippah to remind them that God is always above us.  Texas flag themed, of course :)

Some photos from the beautiful ceremony:

Married!

(sorry about the pic quality, the lighting wasn't cooperating with my camera)

Onto cocktail hour:

Awesome!  Pappa's catered the event with some excellent Tex-Mex foods:

We had quesadillas, an avocado bar, shots of poblano cheesy soup, grilled vegetable trays, and drinks on top of all of that.  It was deluxe, and mega tasty!

Katrina, Amanda and Aaron

The curly girls! :)

OMG yum.

This blog is getting really long, so I am going to do a separate post for the reception portion of the evening....

Cake! from Alphorn Bakery

I have not talked about cake in quite some time, and that just doesn't seem right!

So in order to not use all of my vacation days in the first week of the year, I made an appointment to meet with our cake baker at 7 in the morning last Friday.  I am glad that bakers start their days so early!

I had talked about some rough ideas when we first met with Peter at Alphorn Bakery but that was ages ago at this point.  It was also my first wedding cake consultation, so I didn't know what I was doing or what to expect.  Now that I have been around the wedding cake block about 4 times, I felt more able to convey what I want.

When I started this wedding process, I thought that for the most part I would find things that I like and have it turned into a cake.  Well, it turns out I like almost everything I see.  So trying to incorporate 7 different cake concepts into one cake is ridiculous.

So what I ended up doing is bringing in our cake topper, which is a miniature version of our wedding crowns, and explaining our theme and colors, and then left it to the professionals.  All the cakes I have seen are gorgeous, so I am going to trust the expertise of the bakery that mine will follow the same trend.  I did leave a few pictures of things I likes for a jumping off point, but the finished product will be a surprise to me!

And our idea for Aaron's grooms cake is really cute, and very Aaron, and I am excited to see how it turns out as well :)

Here are the inspiration pictures I left with Peter, so our cake could possibly look something like these:

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Checking the cake off the to-do list!  Yes!

 

Rehearsal Dinner

check!

It has been a pretty productive weekend!  We have exactly 48 days until the big day, so I am really starting to feel under the gun about all the unfinished plans that need planning.  But I got some big things knocked out this weekend, so that is awesome.

The biggest accomplishment is booking rehearsal dinner!

Since we are having an elegant chicken oscar-esque event for the reception, we wanted a low-key fajitas and margaritas type dinner.  That would seem easy enough, especially in Houston of all places.

Well here is the thing.  Our rehearsal is Friday night, and Friday night is the absolute WORST time to be driving around in Houston.  The traffic is nightmarish, and this is coming from the gal that commutes an hour to her workplace that is 17 miles away.  That being said, we didn't want our rehearsal dinner attendees to have to deal with that, as they will already be in a foreign city.

true story.

 The second thing is that the closest Mexican restaurants to our church either don't have the space to fit our needs (we have about 40-50 on the guest list) or the food is mediocre and overpriced.  It is sad, but you go into these places and you don't see one Mexican dining in there.  That is your first clue that it isn't that good.  No one wants to celebrate with sub-par fajitas.

So we did a compromise, and are having the crew drive a little bit more than I would have liked, but for really good food that is good priced as well.  Plus we get our own little area away from the regular restaurant patrons.

My Mom and Jeff went for lunch there Saturday and we got to talk to the manager and get it all reserved, win!

 Ayi yi yi!

And as soon as I got home, I ordered our invites from Pear Tree Greetings:

Big weight off my shoulders getting that set up!  Now I only have about 499 things to do :)  

48 days away, eep!

Tasting at the venue!

Chicken Oscar!!!  Source

We had our tasting at the Petroleum Club this afternoon!  Usually these tastings happen a month or two before your even, but we were told we needed to schedule it earlier because they get super busy around the holiday season.  Aaron, my Mom and brother and I met up at the Club today around lunchtime and met with Cherie, our venue coordinator. 

We decided to go with the buffet so everyone can eat as much or as little that they want in both quantity and variety!  The buffet at the club includes a beef carving station which we didn't get to try, salad and soup, a chicken and fish entree, 2 vegetables and a starch.  This spread comes with rolls and a fruit display as well!

Here is what we tried, and my commentary:

House Salad: it was good, and the house dressing was tasty.  Not too much to say, it was just a salad.

Cream of Wild Mushroom Soup:  I thought it was pretty tasty and it will be nice in the hopefully cold winter.  I have to say hopefully because it very well could be 70 degrees outside that day.  Gotta love Houston!

Vegetables: Carrots Broccoli Squash and Zucchini - They are were good, we are going with broccoli because we are broccoli people, and a squash and zucchini medley.  Two for the price of one!

Starches: White Rice, Parmesan Mashed Potatoes - White rice was good, but *yawn*, mashed potatoes were not only pretty, but suuuper yum (though a bit cold).  So we went with the potatoes, but Aaron thought they were a bit on the salty side, so they are going to make them less salty.  Yes, they can actually do that.  lol

Rolls and Butter: Were very good, on par with other fancy restaurant rolls I've had.

Chicken Oscar:  WOW.  This is a chicken with crab on top with a buttery sauce and asparagus.  I thought this was really really good!

Blackened Snapper: This was also very good, but the blackened-ness tasted kind of spicy to me, but then everyone told me I was crazy so I dropped it, lol. 

At the buffet all the options will be present, so everyone will be able to have it all if they want!

Also at the tasting we discussed how the room will be set up, timeline for the day, the outside vendors that will be coming in, and several other details.  It was good to get all of that hashed out, and get all our questions and concerns addressed.  I am getting excited, it will be here before we know it!!!

Updates and such!

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If my schedule were a picture...

Hey guys!  Just wanted to do a general update and take a break from the 'look what I bought!' posts. :)

Last week was sooooo busy.  I was out and about every night of the week at either class, or a baseball game or church.  By the time Friday rolled around I was super exhausted.  So that resulted in a major lazy weekend, which I thoroughly enjoyed. 

Saturday my Mom and I went shopping and I got a few new tops, so that was fun.  We also attempted to find some more vases and light up tree things that we are going to make into centerpieces - so we were a tad productive!

I got a call last week from Alfred Angelo that my dress was here already!  We didn't get a chance to go pick it up, but my Mom made a good point: rather than lug the dress all the way home only to bring it back for alterations a few weeks later, I should just wait so I can knock it all out of the way at one time.  So my Mom gets the efficiency award for the week, lol.

This Wednesday is our tasting at the Petroleum Club!  I am super excited about this :)  It is going to be at lunchtime and we could have 4 people come, so my Mom and little brother are coming with Aaron and I.  When I spoke with our venue coordinator, she reminded me of the Club's dress code, so we are are going to get all dolled up and eat a fancy downtown lunch. 

Wednesday evening I am going to try and meet up with my friends for some much needed girl time, which I am also looking forward to!

Then Thursday evening Aaron and I are off to Vegas for Angela and Erik's wedding!  Super yay!  I love that Aaron is from Las Vegas, we get to go there all the time which is awesome!  Sorry I am going nuts with the exclamation marks!  lol.  I'm not sure what the exact schedule is but there is talk of a Greek Festival going on, a girls night on Friday, getting hairdo's at the blowdry bar on Saturday, an all dessert reception (omg,yay.), brunch with the newlyweds on Sunday.  So lots of fun things going on, so looking forward to the trip!  And Aaron, while looking forward to the trip as well, is mega excited that fate has smiled upon us and we should be checked into the hotel in time to not miss any of the new Thursday night TV shows (Parks & Rec, The Office, etc.).  We are TV addicts, and it is very sad.  But we get back Monday afternoon, so we should have a good long weekend trip!

School is going well, and I am staying on top of all my class work for the most part.  The bummer about this trip for the weekend is that I am coming back to a test on Tuesday, and I am missing tests on Thursday and Friday - so I am making up one of them Thursday, and the other one I can't retake, so whatever I get on my final will count twice.  Eek!  I am really thankful that I got good advice from fellow classmates about the courses I am in, so everything is manageable and not super challenging or time intensive. 

I am getting super excited for my upcoming bridal shower in San Antonio.  A little over a month away!  I already got a super cute dress to wear too :)

The diet, eh, things could be going better.  I sort of majorly fell off the wagon for the entire week.  I know being busy isn't a good excuse, but it is my excuse nonetheless.  When I get back from Las Vegas I am really going to hit it hard, and also add some exercise to the mix.  It has finally cooled off in this city, and the small bit of trees and nature for now has stopped catching fire so it is safer to breathe the air - no excuse to not exercise!  And I need to just give my photo with a sign to not serve me to all the fast food places around my workplace.  Maybe I should take a couple hours and re-watch Super Size Me...

And we are nearing the 4 month mark on the countdown to the wedding!  I have the bridesmaid dresses picked out (they are the ones from this post), so the action items for the rest of the month:  follow up that everyone has gotten their dresses, find some invites that I like so I can order them next month, book the cake maker.  Not too bad!

I think I have covered most everything that I can think of.  I'll have lots of fun posts to do for the next couple of weeks!  How are things with you?

Who Made the Cake?

www.whomadethecake.com

We ended our cake tour of Houston at Who Made the Cake?TM equisite cakes by Nadine Moon.  I knew we were in the big leagues when we walked in here.  There were huge beautiful fake cakes overflowing in the place and plenty of signs saying no photos allowed.  WMTC has a sigma in town of being the best wedding cake money can buy.  This lady Nadine, whom we met with, makes cakes for all the celebrities that come to town, and has had a big fancy cake in People magazine.  If this bakery were a city, it would obviously be Hollywood. 

We met with The Nadine Moon (lol) and she was really nice and had the cake design process down to a science.  The cake we sampled was excellent, and they had this cinnamon vanilla flavor with a hazelnut filling that I thought was outstanding, but probably too adventurous to please 200+ people.  So good though.  Then the design process began and what we did was flip though a binder that was at least 8 inches thick with wedding cake photos and bookmarked the ones that caught our eye.  Then we go back through those and find the common elements that I was drawn to and started the design based on those things.  She actually quoted two separate designs because I couldn't decide, and she was also extremely knowledgeable about everything related to cakes.  Surprisingly a Hollywood cake isn't that much more price wise than Cakes by Gina and Three Brothers Bakery.  But it was still kind of outside what we wanted to spend. 

I really appreciate when I get to sit down with the actual big boss who is in charge of and putting their name on the cake that will be at our wedding.  Assistants and sales people just make me a tiny bit wary because who knows if the word they give me is what goes?  They aren't the boss.  So that was a nice thing about this appointment.

I have to say though, after the appointment from earlier at Three Brothers and lunch, I felt ill after eating all that cake!

Three Brothers Bakery

Last Friday Aaron, my Mom and I had our appointment at Three Brother's Bakery.  They are a really cool, really award winning bakery here in town that has been around for something like 60 years.  And they are family owned, which is another really cool thing that I like. 

Here is a list taken from their website:

Recently we have been humbled with several accolades and honors by our loyal customers and foodies:

• As seen on Food Network's Outrageous Food
• Chosen Best Pecan Pie "America has to offer" by Country Living - November 2010
• Preferred Bakery of the Houston Astros Birthday Parties
• 2011 Best Chocolate Cake MyFOXHouston
• Best Bakery 2010 - KPRC CityVoter Poll
• The Knot Best of Weddings 2010 & 2011 Pick
• Best Bakery 2010 & 2011 - Houston's Culinary Stars - HTexas Magazine
• Pastry Chef of the Year Nominee 2010 & 2011 - Robert Jucker
• Chosen by The Houston Chronicle Food Editor, Greg Morago, to collaborate and bring to life his idea of the Pumpecapple Piecake
• Readers Choice Best Bakery - Houston Press - 2010, 2009, 2008, 2007 and other years
• NAWBO Woman Business Owner of the Year 2009
• WBEA Supplier of the Year 2008
• Readers Ultimate Birthday Cake 2005 - Houston Chronicle
• Best Bread - Houston Press - 2002

So yeah, they are pretty good.  We sampled, I believe, nine different types of cake which were very delicious.  The lovely young lady who was helping us design our cake was super nice and friendly and had some really creative ideas for designing our cake, with sugar snowflakes falling between the tiers.  I mean, awesome, right??  The final price tag was competitive with other bakeries aside from our super cheap find, Alphorn.  I just really like this place and feel like I am supporting something good if I were to go with them.  It is going to be a tough choice!

Cakes by Gina Appointment

http://www.cakesbyginahouston.com/

Hi Friends!  So sorry I haven't been updating regularly, shame on me.  I'll just get right to it, we had an appointment last Saturday with Cakes by Gina.  It went alright.  We did not meet Gina, but rather a nice lady Millie.  Well let me back up, we pull into the shopping center and it looks pretty rough.  So after asking Jesus to protect our cars in the parking lot, we went into the shop.  When we met with Alphorn Bakery we were just in a back room of this bakery.  Like we walked past all the ovens and giant mixers and stuff.  Cakes by Gina was much more 'we are pros in the wedding circuit' feel, we had a lovely table set up with fancy linens and such.  The cakes and fillings we tried were quite good, and they have all these different sized styrofoam shapes so you can stack them up and really visualize the cake look you are going for. 

A bit of criticism that I have is that while Millie was nice, I felt kind of rushed (I guess).  Like I have no idea what exactly I want each tier to look like or whatever, but she wanted answers right then and there.  So had I not been shopping around, I would have gotten a mediocre cake that I wasn't super into but I was suggestively sold.  So I wasn't a fan of that.  Plus their cake we 'designed' with delivery fees and everything was about $500 more than Alphorn, who has better tasting cake and whom we actually met with the baker and not some sales person. 

But don't get me wrong, their cake was very good, and they had so many fake cakes around to look at which was really cool to see all the different designs in person.  And if you need a groomscake idea, you should totally go to their website because they have TONS of pictures and ideas and they are the cutest!  OH and I almost forgot my favorite part:

We got to sample these cake truffles that were out of this world!

I could cake shop forever... :)

Alphorn Bakery

Yum!

This morning Aaron, my Mom, brother and I went to our very first wedding cake consultation at Alphorn Bakery!  I am 95% positive this is the place, but choosing them right off the bat means that I don't get to try more cake, so we will entertain the other bakery's cake for our own selfish gain.  The owner of the shop, Peter, has been in the biz for like 17 years, and I think he is originally from Switzerland because he has a super fun accent.  And he totally knows the chefs at the Petroleum Club - they used to work together!  We got to try 4 little slices of different cakes, and they were so.flippin.good.  We tried a white cake with raspberry filling, a strawberry mango cake, italian cream cake, and chocolate with a chocolate mousse filling.  I don't know how we are going to decide flavors?!  But anyway, we sat down and went over the head count, and looked at a bunch of pictures, came up with some general ideas that we liked.  The think I really enjoyed (aside from eating cake) was the straightforwardness of Peter.  I never felt shmoozed, or like he was trying to be tricky in any way.  He was like, this is the price, and the other people will try to nickel and dime you so be careful, and that he stands by his work and that is that.  This guy is actually off the beaten path of wedding cake bakers in Houston, he even asked how we heard about him since he doesn't really advertise - and I think this is reflected in his prices, which were majorly under budget (win!).  He was recommended to me from my friend from school.  Her sister got married last spring and she said they went and saw Peter, then immediately after, canceled the rest of their scheduled tastings because it was the best cake they'd ever tasted.  If that isn't a rave review, I don't know what is!

So the first cake testing went pretty phemnomenally.  Three more to go, but I think our decision is pretty much made!

Appointments and Faux Pas

Guys, I messed up.

I believe that last week I was going through a mid-engagement crisis.  Sort of like a mid-life crisis minus the buying a sports car and getting a new 22 year old boyfriend.

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 I was just so.over.it with thinking about wedding stuff, which is kind of out of character for me.  I think with the school semester coming up, I was letting my thoughts get clouded with all that was left to do and how much time school is going to take up, and how my seeing Aaron schedule is going to get smaller, and it got me kind of bummed/stressed.  Which is a horrible situation because I act impulsively.

So on Sunday night when I should have been heading to sleep, I was looking at wedding stuff and I bought a wedding dress from Asia.  It was a really good price.  But yeah.  It seemed like a good idea at the time.  But after telling my Mom and BFF, I learned that this was an absolutely terrible idea.  Thankfully, I should be able to recoup my investment by selling the dress - it is a really popular style and was really very cheap as far as wedding dresses go.

After my temporary insanity, it lit a fire under my butt to start getting some of the wedding things scheduled in these last few weeks before classes start.

I have dress trying-on appointments with David's Bridal this weekend, and Alfred Angelo the following Saturday, so I will at very least have an idea of what I want to wear, and can get the bridesmaid dresses verified (I haven't seen the ones I like in person yet).

And I have FOUR, count 'em, four appointments with bakeries for wedding cake consultations!  We are going to visit Alphorn Bakery, Who Made the Cake, Cakes by Gina and Three Brothers Bakery in the coming weeks.

I feel super accomplished (minus my dumb purchase) and as always, excited about cake :)

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Cake!

My favorite topic! :)

So we have come to that portion of the program where we need to figure out a cake concept and find a bakery to make it!  I have had a couple referrals of some good places around town that are reasonably priced, so I just need to schedule a time for Aaron and I to go sample some of the goods.  This will no doubt be my favorite part of wedding planning, I can already tell!

As far as cake concept goes, I am still proceeding with caution.  We don't have a humongous cake budget, and we need it to feed 200+ people, so I have no idea what I can afford at this point.  I only know the obvious - the more detailed = more expensive, fondant = $$$, regular icing = $$.  With that being said, here is the picture dump of cakes I like from the internet!  (they are all from http://www.weddingchannel.com/)

I like the interesting texture on this cake.  Aaron is like dead set against fondant because he claims it tastes horrible, so I think something like this could make everyone happy.

I think the details on this cake are just gorgeous!  It is just my style too.  I like simple, with a touch of something to give it some personality. 

I sort of dig the square shape.  And I adore the vibrant colors, and how each tier is a different design.

I like how the middle tier is different, and I like the birds on top :)

I like this cake because it is tall, and I like the criss-cross-ish design.  Very modern looking.

Bows <3

How cool looking is this?

I like all the different shapes, makes a simple cake much more interesting!

Man, I wish I had some cake right now.