It's a Piece of Steak!

Part of my desire for our other wedding (you know, the one we chose not to have but I keep planning in my head anyways?) was the option for having a fantastic meal.

Before I get into what the meal would entail let me explain the situation. My parents have owned a restaurant for the past 24 years. What started out as a local diner with homemade food has transformed into a Food Network featured restaurant that serves delicious, fresh seafood every weekend.

Our family is very lucky to have access to fresh seafood like we do, every weekend in the summer my dad grills out clams, mussels, soft shell crabs, shrimp & fish. We gorge ourselves on fresh seafood that is prepared simply and tastes wonderful.

When I dreamt about my outdoor beach wedding I knew that we would have a clam bake/grill feast hybrid.

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Even when we decided to have the wedding in our hometown I still couldn't get the idea of grilling the food out of my head.

With access to tons of fresh food we've decided to grill out shrimp, chicken and steak along with a brightly colored vegetable medley. Initially I wanted to serve the meat on long skewers a la a Brazilian steakhouse.

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After months of sitting on this idea we decided that the Brazilian steakhouse idea would require too many servers and could get dangerous with servers trying to stick skewers in between our guests (and skewered MOB doesn't sound too good).

Now our guests will be served a plate with a three short skewers, one shrimp, one chicken and one steak; the plate will also have a cold asparagus vinaigrette and a grilled veggie medley (like that in the first picture). The nice thing about three shorter skewers is that if our guests don't like one type of meat they can pass it to their neighbor.

Like my mad power point skills?

Later this month we're having our first tasting (and by tasting I mean my dad will grill this yummy meal), I'm so excited to be able to serve our guests delicious food that is cooked well, tastes good and isn't all "junked up" with too much sauce and garnish.

The only problem?

We don't have a caterer yet. Yep, we tend to do things ass backwards around these parts. (Don't worry, we're looking!)

Did you pick out your menu before you found your caterer?

My Craziest DIY Project Yet

I've been working on lots of DIY projects that I haven't shared with you yet but the one that we've been working on lately is pretty crazy.

A couple of months ago I spotted this coffee filter garland and fell in love. I immediately set to work creating a cupcake liner & fabric garland to hang on our headboard.

A little while after I made this I got the idea to make garlands to hang at our reception. If you remember our reception venue has high ceilings and I think it will be romantic to see twinkle lights floating in between fluffy coffee filter garlands.

Fortunately, my parents own a restaurant so they were able to order me a box of 1000 twelve cup coffee filters. I tea dyed about 750 and dyed the rest in red Kool-Aid. I spread them around our kitchen to dry (which took FOR-EV-ER!).

One side of our kitchen (Plus Jack the cat)

And the other half (Don't mind the dirty dishes)

Once the coffee filters were dry Jus & I strung the coffee filters onto crochet string. We try to use 2-4 beige coffee filters for every 1 pink coffee filter, we're also adding a dab of hot glue to every filter so they won't slide around once the garlands are hung.

Half finished coffee filter garland

So far we have made about 6 garlands out of approximately 3500 coffee filters. We're planning to hang them ten feet apart which means we will need about 14 garlands. I can't tell you how excited I am to see our coffee filter garlands hanging in our space all of the hard work is gong to be worth it, I just know it!

Do you have any huge/crazy DIY projects?

Cause the Groom Can't be Naked

I've known what I wanted Jus to wear for the wedding since Oscar night. While watching the pre-show I caught a glimpse of Tom Ford and fell in love with the simple, classic look of his tux

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I love the large bow tie, the nice shirt without a vest, and the slim fitting black suit. I knew immediately that this would be what my groom would be wearing. All we needed to do was find a store that carried nice quality tuxes.

Unfortunately dressing Jus wasn't this easy, he had his hopes set on wearing tails. At first I was a little surprised, I thought tails were maybe a little too fancy and a little too outdated.

But I kept thinking and realized that if my dress was so fancy why couldn't Jus be all fancy too?

Plus his face lights up when he talked about wearing tails, and if he cares about his outfit this much why shouldn't he wear tails.

We have an appointment for him to try on tails tomorrow so I'll be sure to show you some pictures later this week.

Does your groom have a strong opinion about what he's wearing? Did it surprise you at all?

The 5 Month Mark.

Yesterday was exactly 5 months until the wedding. The day came and went without much celebration other than Jus & I working on some reception decorations (a project I'll share later in the week).

The five month mark felt like crunch time this week. The list of things we need to do is not much shorter than it was a month ago and that fact scares me. This past week I was overwhelmed and had Bridal Brain to the extreme. (True story: I literally forgot to shower on Thursday)

But this week is different. I'm jumping into wedding planning with both feet. We have an appointment to try cake and another to see tuxes. We also got started on some DIY projects and have supplies for others. I feel positive about where we're headed and am excited to marry my love in 5 months.

How do you handle the stress of wedding planning?

Bridal Brain

Please forgive me for being a bad blogger this week, but I have a doctor's note.*

I'm suffering from Bridal Brain.

The symptoms include a nervous ball in the pit of your stomach, the inability to multitask, and a one track mind that can't get anything but worrying done.

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I hope this sounds familiar, I hope I'm not the only one slowly going in sane. It's just that I have so much to do and can't help but freak out a little bit. Luckily, we checked off some big things and got some supplies for other things yesterday so next week I'll get my head together and share some of our projects & plans.

Have you ever suffered from Bridal Brain?

*Of course I don't have a doctor's note, my doctor would think I was crazy too.

I Have a Confession to Make

Sometimes I'm a total jerk to my mom.

My mom and I have a wonderful relationship. We spend at least seven hours a day together during the week and often choose to see each other on the weekends too. Not only do we look alike but our temperaments are almost identical. My mom is truly my best friend.

But wedding planning sometimes brings out my bad side.

My mom is a planner, as soon as she knows the date of an event she is ready to have all of the details flushed out. I am a dreamer and procrastinator, I like to come up with huge ideas and spend time thinking them through.

Throughout our planning there have been many times when I rush to my mother with a crazy idea and every time she has supported me. Unfortunately I can't say the same for myself.

There have been many times when I've told my mom "Oh, that's a cool idea" and she's started asking the questions to make these ideas realities. As soon as she starts asking questions I begin to get defensive. After getting defensive I start to get snappy.

The other day my mom asked about table numbers and after I showed her an idea I had she started flipping through a catalog showing me idea and asking questions. I immediately jumped all over her insisting that I just didn't know what I want.

Obviously this is not something I am proud of. My mom has been nothing but helpful and I've been a big ol' brat. I know part of our disagreements are because of our natures, she wants to get things done while I need to think about them first.

After the first couple of these spats my mom decided to step back and try to give less opinions and more support and I promised to do the same, but I've failed.

So this is my pledge to you, to my mom, and to myself. I promise to be more conscious of what comes out of my mouth. Our wedding is a day to celebrate love, not just the love between Jus & me but all of the love in our lives, and not just one day's love but love that started before and lasts after the wedding.

I am embarrassed that I am at this point, I promise I'm not always mean, I promise I hug my mother far more than I snap at her, I promise she doesn't want to give me up for adoption (trust me, I've asked). But I also promise to work on this, because I love my mom and I want her to enjoy the planning process as much as I do. Our relationship is far more important than wedding planning.

Have you had to check your attitude during the planning process?

I Need a Favor

Almost immediately after we decided to have an October wedding we started talking about our potential favor.

In all of my wedding blog scouring I came to the conclusion that edible favors were the way to go. And of all fall related foods there was one that I knew we had to have.

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I loooooooove me some caramel apples. I always try to snag one at our county fair and love to have my little cousin over to make them in the fall.

We're planning to wrap the apples in cellophane, tie them with bakers twine and add a sweet note thanking our guests.

I want to use local apples and dip them the week before the wedding, but my mom is pretty sure that this will stress me out too much and thinks that we should source the apples out. I'm not sure which way we'll go but I'll be sure to keep you posted on our sticky situation.

Do you have ambitious plans for your favors?