Wedding Cakes!

I have a feeling the economy might get worse before it gets better, as a result I am looking for ways to trim our svelte wedding budget even further. I'm searching everything I can to make our day fun and cost efficient.

One of the things I kind of fell in love with was the idea of making our own cake. My mother made her own wedding cake- I think it would be a sweet tradition to make my own as well!

As I am not much of a baker, I am going to have a lot of practice ahead of me. So with $7 worth of materials on hand, here's what 4 hours got me:



I definitely won't have sprinkles on our actual wedding cake. I felt inspired by the swift approach of Valentine's Day to do something mushy and colorful.

Why Hello, Blog!

Fancy meeting you in a place like this!

Life has been a blur. A mix of work, school, and wedding planning.. mixed with a good dose of babies, medical issues and a slight struggle with mild depression. It's the end of January, and the world is still marching onward.

Speaking of marching... I want to elope desperately. I want to run off to Thailand, get married by the Andaman Sea in a Buddhist temple... The only thing in our registry would be hope for a more exotic life. Val wants to make me an honest woman in the most honest of ways- a classic church in a historical town. Herein lies the beauty of our pairing.

He is calm, thoughtful, meticulous. I am brash, irritable, impulsive. He has toned me down to be a better functuning member of the human population. Ah, to love and be loved.

Wedding Details

We've decided to get married at the Thornewood Castle in Lakewood, WA. After viewing it today in person, we watched There Will Be Blood. Ironically enough, the castle is actually featured at the end of the film.

Nothing in the world quite like looking at your sweetie and at the screen, knowing that next year you'll be married at that very location.

Here are some pictures that I took this afternoon of the castle.

Love is in the details.

I got engaged on a sea plane.

It's just as awesome as it sounds.

In honor of Valentine's day and our monthiversary, Val had made scheduled a tour of the Seattle area via seaplane and set a reservation at McCormick & Schmidt's directly following.

I should have noticed how nervous the poor guy was. And normally people don't tear up when the plane is taking off... but he was all sorts of romantic and nervous looking. I figured he was just excited to be flying on a float plane!

So while we were mid-air and just after passing a gorgeous lighthouse, he tapped me on the shoulder. I look over and he has an open ring box in his hands. He had tears in his eyes and asked... "Will you?"

I just stared. I was stunned.

After a few moments he told me to try it on, and it's been sitting on my pretty little hand ever since.

And for those of you who care about the specifics of the ring, it's a beautiful 2.33 carat reddish/pinkish/orange sapphire surrounded by half a carat of diamonds. It's a color changing stone, so the colors are dependent of what light you view it in. It's very close to a Padparadscha sapphire, although it has a tiny bit more red to it.

And for those of you who care about the specifics of the plane, it was a de Havilland DHC-3 Otter. More info here.

And for your viewing pleasure, here are some pictures of that fateful afternoon.

An Official Update? Nah...

I'm sorry I waited so long to really update this. Since my last post a lot has happened. Since the post before last, even more has happened.

There's really no pleasant way to say it, so here it goes. On November 26th, my dad decided to have a banana split, some cold duck, and some cranberry sauce. He ate these treats, went to sleep, never woke up. He was sick for a long, long time, and while it's a slight consolation that he's no longer suffering, it still tears me up to think about it. I miss him more and more each day as the realization sinks in that I won't see him again. He was almost lucid all the time towards the end... I'm glad we were able to talk as much as we did before he died.

On the bright side of life, my brother is getting married to a really wonderful girl named Sarah next year in July. My dad got to see the ring that my brother picked out for her, and he really enjoyed seeing it.

Val and I aren't wasting anytime on making wedding plans of our own. Since Saturday we've picked out the dress, picked out the date (May 16th, subject to change!), and have an idea for what we want our themes to be. I'm so excited... Val and I make a great team, I'm really really flattered he wants to make it permanent.

Engaged

We're getting married!