Fabulous Fourth

We were able to put some of the extra booze from the wedding to use and have some of our good friends over for the fourth! BBQ Chicken, veggies and too many desserts to name. 

The Wedding: Part 1

Well, as time would have it, the wedding came and went and is now officially taking up residency in the past. Kind of weird as how so much of the past 6 months went into planning and designing and creating and now poof......it is gone. Bins of crafting scraps and floral centerpieces in their last day of beauty are littered around the house. Normalcy is slowly returning with unanswered work emails that need tending to and five mile runs that now actually have a time and place........

The wedding weekend went off with a bang....or a pop shall I say.....

Thursday evening after a beautiful rehearsal dinner at Blair's, David and I noticed a strange noise on the highway. Wait. That strange noise was actually coming from my car. More specifically my tire. Driving got wobbly and as we pulled off the freeway onto Eagle Rock Blvd, we saw the damage to the rear tire. After unsuccessfully attempting to inflate the tire at the Chevron, we opted to take advantage of being SoCal AAA members and call for roadside assist. We could have attempted to change ourselves, but the night before the wedding just didn't seem the best time for amateur automotive repair hour.

Around 12:30 AM we were all set and ready to head back home on our sturdy donut. The excitement and stress and white wine was just too much and I began to see the all too familiar disruptions in my vision. By the time we arrived home, my migraine was building up momentum. I somehow fell asleep until 1:44 or so but at that point, due to severe nausea, had to relocate on the couch and remain completely still. There was no sleep during this period of stillness. I believe it was around 4:45AM when I finally made my last glimpse at the cable box and somehow drifted off to sleep.

At 7:20, I was up again and now trying to suss out the tire repair situation With all the trips that needed to be made hauling things back and forth from the house to Marvimon, driving on a donut was not the smartest option. I got ready and made my way to Glendale to America's Tire to get things fixed. The staff there was completely incredible as after I told them it was my wedding day, they bumped me to the front and fudged the schedule as if I had an appointment arranged from earlier. Amazing. Karma working in my favor there. I was in and out and home by 8:45 and after writing the remaining escort cards, took an hour nap.

My folks came by around 11 and we made our way to Celaya to pick up the pan dulce. I was craving salty snacks (migraine effect!) and we went to get me some fries at Jack in the Box. Fries eaten, I had some strength to load boxes of soda, beer, liquor and decor into the car. My parents and I caravan-ed over to Marvimon and began unloading before I needed to head to the salon for my hair. What a morning........

Under a Mexican Chuppa.......

More pics and stories to come soon. Everything was a dream..............................

Wedding Favors: Mexican Wedding Cookies

Paper source must love people like me. In the wedding world, those who are planning to do many of the details ourselves welcome a store like Paper Source because of the selection, colors and pre-cut goodies. Im sure the true DIY-ers would scoff at pre cut, but in the essence of time for those of us with full time jobs, the pre-cut template is a life saver.  I needed to figure out a wedding favor for our guest and immediately David and I liked the idea of Mexican Wedding Cookies. We placed an order down at Mr. Churro on Olvera Street and then needed a clever way to box them up. I picked up clear bags at Paper Source along with gold business cards. Using the lace heart stamp I had at the house, I embossed each card, wrote the names, punched the hole and tied on the string. Voila! The tags are complete. Just need to fill and tie on when the cookies arrive!

DIY Wedding Cake Stands

Ugh. Cake stands. Well, that was my initial thought...especially after pricing them on sites like Amazon. Sure 25 bucks a pop isn't too much, but when you need 5 and then factor in shipping it ends up being another $150 purchase added to an ever growing wedding budget. Plus, 25 bucks gets you a stand, but not the one that meshes best with the wedding theme. After doing some internet research, I came across a few sites that mentioned making stands yourself using found objects at the thrift strore. Bam! This seemed like the way to go. Many of the sites added the additional step of spray painting the completed project when finished to a color that matches your decor. While I went into the project with that step in mind, I quickly changed my mind after finding the amount of clear glassware (platters, candlesticks, glasses etc) in my search. The clear would be a perfect fit with the amount of color already in the works. 

Materials: 

Glassware

Epoxy

Heavy books

Goo Gone

Some of the dish finds from the 1st trip to St. Vincent De Paul. I washed them and found that I needed to use Goo Gone in order to get some of the yuck off from years of who knows what before their presence at the thrift store. 

Using a heavy book to help the epoxy set and cure.

Close up of two of my favorites

The final five which will be donned with cakes and sweets!

The project was pretty easy and just took a little over 2 hours....including cleaning and prepping the glass, applying the epoxy and letting it stand through the initial cure time of one hour.

Napkins! In every color!

After making the non-eco friendly decision to use paper napkins (hey...we are going on an eco honeymoon to Costa Rica!), I came across the website Smarty had a Party as a result of a google search. The website has every color napkin imaginable which was great as I could order turquoise and lime green
(dinner and cocktail) from the same vendor. I got hundreds of 3 ply napkins and some plastic tumblers (for when the bartender closes up shop) for less than 50 bucks. The package arrived in less than five days and had smarties candies in the box to boot! WIN!

Loteria! Escort Cards: Button Style!

With the wedding in just 22 days, you can imagine my excitement to have the escort cards arrive. "Cards?" you say? "They look more like pins." Right you are. For the wedding, David really had his mind set on having some sort of punk-rock-pin moment and the escort cards were just the place.  Each of the 12 tables will have an enlarged Loteria! card as the number. We've got La Mano, La Chulupa and La Calavera to name a few. On the escort card table (or jewelry spinner as my amazing friend Amy has set up) will be cards with guests names and their pin with table icon. The name cards have yet to be created but here is a sneak peek at the awesome pins. 

                                          la arana

                                                                         
                                                                       

                                          el tambor


                                                                     
                                                                         

                                          el valiente

Pins created at AffordableButtons.com

I will post more as the project progresses!