Rob and Kiesha Get Married

I’m not a huge fan of flowers, and looking online, I realized that wedding flowers are RIDICULOUSLY expensive.

I am, however, a huge fan of candy. I did a little more research and voila:

and

I also found short glass vases for cheap, so the plan is to fill up the vases with brown and green M&Ms, and then put in four Swizzle Sticks and four Whirly Pops. Instant bouquet! And then, at the end of the night, or even during the reception, everyone gets to dismantle the centerpiece and take candy home!

Holy lord.

This is pretty much exactly like the dress that I posted a picture of earlier. The dress that I absolutely love.

The main difference is that this one is a different material and “ivory” instead of white.

It’s $400 cheaper than that other one.

Why?

It’s technically a bridesmaid’s dress.

I don’t even care. It’s so gorgeous I love it. And the website says it’s available in every fabric and color, so I may even be able to get it in something less shiny and in white.

I gotta make an appointment for this joint.

There is no battle, by the way. Rob’s taking my last name.

(just kidding)

So we nailed down the location fairly quickly in this process.

We did some research using the Internets, but in the end, we didn’t even bother to go look at any other locations.

Tha Contenduhs:

White Star Farms

We liked this one because of a couple of things. It’s a very unique space…okay, it’s a barn. But the barniness appealed to me, being a country girl and all. I liked the idea of it being almost outdoors, very rustic, very homey. You can even rent a chuck wagon from this joint!

The other good thing was that you could bring your own caterer and alcohol, which is a HUGE money saver.

The downside? Well, it was raaather pricey. It was going to be about $1,500 to rent it for a Saturday. And all you got for that price was two barns and an outdoor area. No tables, no chairs, no linens, nothing. That would have cost extra.

Sorry, White Star Farms.

Tall Timbers

We liked Tall Timbers because it was cozy (re: small), and we could get married outside on a gazebo and then just walk into the building for the reception. The rental fee was great, something like $900 for the gazebo and the reception room, and look at that fireplace! It looked very pretty.

The downside for this one was that you had to use their in-house caterer, which was going to run around $3,000 (!!!) for our head count. YIKES.

Sorry, Tall Timbers.

We kicked around a couple of other places in our heads. COSI, The Columbus Athenauem, Franklin Park Conservatory. Then we realized we aren’t millionaires, and we looked into the YWCA.

We DJ-ed a wedding at the YWCA a while back and it was a really nice affair. You get a ballroom, a cocktail hour room and a balcony overlooking the city. I really liked the get-married-then-eat-in-the-same-room aspect of the place.

The price was right. We’re getting the whole shebang for $1,000 for five hours on a Saturday night. We do have to use one of their approved caterers, but we’re looking at Weiland’s Gourmet Market who will do it for a whole lot less than most of the places we checked out. And it’s good stuff, too. I’m looking at you, Chicky Parm.

The other great thing about the YWCA is that they’ll let us bring our own alcohol AND a Jeni’s Ice Cream cart. Now we just have to confirm that we can get those things.

Congratulations, YWCA! You win!

So far I have managed to purchase only one bridal magazine.

I pretty much have carte blanche at work to grab a stack and take them to lunch with me. I love reading the etiquette questions.

“Is it wrong of me to ask my bridesmaids to not cut their hair for eight months before the wedding? I know it’s weird, but I want them all to have exactly the same length of hair!”

“My mother picked out a scandalous dress that she wants to wear at the ceremony, how do I get her to tone it down?”

“My parents insist on inviting everyone at both their respective workplaces, but our venue can only hold 80 people!”

These are hilarious to me, because A.) I’m going to have two brideswomen, and they have been instructed that I will NOT be picking out their wardrobe or hairstyles, B.) It’s going to be a struggle to get my mom out of jeans and into something ‘dressy’, and C.) I nervously told my mom that I was only planning to invite a handful of my aunts, uncles and cousins (I have enough to fill the Schottenstein Center), and she told me, “Half of them probably won’t come.”

The other issue I have with wedding magazines is the endless pages upon pages of dresses that look exactly the same. Like sleeveless, low cut, lace-and-bead covered poufy ball gown monstrosities. I realize that most of the dresses are things that designers dream up and by the time they trickle down to retail they’ve lost most of that craziness, but still. No one seems to have what I want to wear.

Like this one, that I love, but is about $800 more than I want to spend.

I like this one a lot too. It’s technically a bridesmaid’s dress, but the price is right.

So you can see how these wedding magazines aren’t really for me.

Here goes.

The date has been set. October 25, 2008. The location has been picked. The Huntington Hall Ballroom at the YWCA downtown. Both the ceremony and the reception will be in the same location - I am not a fan of the two location wedding. The colors have been selected:

Chocolate Brown

and

Mint Green

My best friend Melissa will be my Best Woman and Rob’s sister Megan will be a brideswoman. (Maid is such an antiquated term).

The reception will feature a lovely buffet dinner (C’mon, stand up and go get your food! It’s good exercise!), an open bar (if we’re going to make you get your own food, it’s the least we can do), and a dessert that isn’t a cake. Wedding cakes always have the tendency to, well, not taste very good. Fondant isn’t that yummy. So we’re looking into pastries or cupcakes or cookies or something else. A Jeni’s Ice Cream cart may be in our future.

Here we goooo!