Sorry about yesterday. This is what I looked like then:

I’m doing better today.

Anyway.

With all the talk we’ve been having about proposals of late, I thought I would ask what you think would be the perfect proposal. On the beach at sunset? In front of the fire after a day of antiquing? By flash mob when you least expect it? Christmas morning when you open up a box with the perfect ring that he chose all by himself? Would you want your beloved to talk to your parents first, or go directly to you?

For my part, I don’t think I had any set image of what the proposal would look like. I know that if Mr. Twistie had gone to my father first, I would have been miffed and Dad would have been mystified. I wanted to pick a ring I wanted to wear, and not simply take what was picked for me. In the end, what mattered to me was that Mr. Twistie showed he really was thinking about me. He’d picked a date for our wedding, and that date took into consideration several things about me that mattered. He picked june, knowing I would want an outdoor wedding. He picked the thirteenth knowing that’s my lucky number. And he picked it far enough away that I would have plenty of time to make my wedding lace, as I’d been saying I wanted to.

Was the setting romantic? No. Were the words flowery? Really no. Did that matter to me? Not one iota, amazingly enough. I would have thought it might have mattered more to me, but it didn’t.

So what about all of you? What’s your perfect proposal? If you’re already married or engaged, did it happen at all like you’d hoped? Did it matter if it didn’t? Tell me all about it!

When you start planning your wedding, there’s a lot to think about. In fact, there are things to think about that you may not realize need to be considered.

But those of us who have been there in the trenches and come out the other side have invaluable information and advice to give the newbies who don’t even know what they don’t know yet. So I thought I would ask all of you out there to give the best single piece of wedding planning advice you can think of.

Here’s mine: think about comfort. If you think about what will keep you, your bridal party, and your guests comfortable – both physically and emotionally – all through the event, you can’t go wrong. So consider that when deciding heel heights,venues, menus, the sound system and what goes in the vows. If you do that, you can’t go too far wrong.

What about all of you out there in Bridal Land? What’s your best piece of wedding planning advice?

Professionals.

Weddings do usually require some professionals. Many use them for nearly everything short of reciting the vows – and that works for many couples just fine. Others, though, prefer to do most of these jobs themselves, or to have them done by volunteers. Some would prefer to hand it over to pros, but are forced by lack of funds to do it all themselves.

So I’m curious. Of the following list, which two items would you choose to have done professionally if the rest absolutely had to be done by volunteers?

Photography
Catering
Flowers
Set up and clean up of the site
Cake
Making wedding clothes
Music
Decorations other than flowers
Officiant

Remember, there is no right or wrong answer here. There’s only what works for you.

Darlings, WordPress has only just let me in, for which I humbly thank it. But not daring to assume my time here is unlimited, I’m going to make this a quick one about dreamy wedding dreams.

Most of us dream of some fabulous thing for our weddings. For some, it’s a particular gown, for another, their favorite band to play the reception, for yet another, a magnificent display of glorious orchids.

My dream, if I had things to do again, is a spectacular dessert table bursting with delicious confections to delight both the eye, the nose, and the taste buds. Cake, pie, tarts, truffles, cookies of several kinds, a trifle, peanut brittle… whatever goodies I might decide I could churn out (with a little help from talented friends) in the days leading up to the festivities.

I love to bake, I love to feed people, and I do believe that dessert is an important part of the meal.

So that’s my dreamy dream of one spectacular thing. What do you dream of? Tell us all about it!

It’s a well-known fact that I love cake. I love baking, I love to eat baked items. It’s as simple as that.

Funnily enough, when Mr. Twistie and I got married, we didn’t have a cake. We had individual fruit tarts in half a dozen flavors. I had been thinking of a cake, but then I discovered that Mr. Twistie wasn’t much of a cake fan. Why make him eat something he dislikes for dessert at his own wedding? He was the one who came up with tarts, and they were a great idea.

Still, there are times when I dream of the wedding cake I would have liked to have had. It would have featured chocolate, with layers of hazelnut and coffee flavors, too. As for the frosting? Probably a cinnamon buttercream. Maybe some raspberry filling.

What? Those are some of my favorite desserty flavors, and I would have wanted them. And while fondant make a particularly smooth and pretty cake that lasts well, it just doesn’t taste as good to me as a good old-fashioned buttercream.

So what about you? What would your dream cake look/taste like? What flavors do you want? Or would you rather have something other than cake?

I’m curious, so tell me all about it!

When this photograph was taken somewhere around WWI, the duties of everyone in the picture were pretty clearly known and generally not too onerous. They had to show up on time looking clean, wear what they were told, do a little hand-holding if necessary, and deport themselves with reasonable dignity. The MOH would – funds, time, and first-time bridal status permitting – be responsible for any bridal shower that might be held. The best man would hold some sort of stag party for the groom, which usually consisted in those days of giving him a nice dinner, providing some cigars and decent whiskey, and kidding him about his soon-to-begin sex life. Oh, and those flower girls? had to look cute and strew rose petals.

These days the rules aren’t quite so cut and dried. The duties of bridesmaids and groomsmen now range anywhere from ‘show up on this day and wear something in this general color range’ to spending a year being the bride’s personal slave and whipping girl. You may be told to wear whatever you like within a color/style range, or you may be informed that you’re getting matching shoes, jewelry, mani pedis, updos, make up, and Botox injections… at your own expense, natch.

What did I expect of my attendants? Well, I expected they would all show up on the big day wearing the skirts and blouses I gave them patterns and fabric for. I told them to trim the outfits any way they liked and to wear whatever flat shoes they preferred. I expected them to keep their naughty bits covered and have as good a time as they could at a party. One of the bridesmaids did sew my gown, and I expected she would get it done in time for me to wear it down the aisle… but when it nearly didn’t happen, I considered the friendship a lot more important than my wedding gown. My MOH held a lovely shower for me, helped address envelopes, and drove me on a couple errands, but these were voluntary things I appreciated, not orders from me.

As for the men, they were entirely Mr. Twistie’s bailiwick. I think all he expected was that they would show up on the day wearing what he wanted having read his mind. One of my brothers called me three weeks before the wedding asking what he was supposed to wear as a groomsman. He threatened that if he didn’t hear from Mr. Twistie soon, he was going to show up in a kimono and top hat. I told him that was more than fine by me, but I would have Mr. Twistie call him with any instructions he might have. It seems he just assumed that all his guys had some form of formalwear in their closets and would simply wear that. I told him to let them know that for certain. Drat. I kind of wanted to see the kimono and top hat combo.

So while the women all wore the same basic pattern in the same basic fabric with wildly divergent accessories, trims, and hairstyles, the men wore everything from kilts to tail coats.

Other than that… we really didn’t expect much.

But I’m curious. What did/do you expect? How much do you care about matching outfits, parties in your honor, and help with DIY projects?

(Image via Jared Wilson Photography)
Okay, so yesterday I asked you all what would have utterly ruined your wedding. But we’ve talked quite a bit about things going wrong, disasters, etc. of late. But this week is all about thankfulness and positive thinking, isn’t it?

And so I thought I would ask you all what single detail beyond the fact you get hitched would make your wedding perfect? And for all you old married ladies like myself, what happened that really made the day for you?

For me, it was a moment with my father. As a child he’d played the violin in a classical quartet. Then he gave up playing for decades. Oh, he loved music. There was always music in the house. He and my mother loved going to the opera together, and Dad was always looking for a better recording of his beloved Beethoven. But he didn’t play, anymore.

That is until one day when we were at a party with a bunch of musicians, and one fiddler asked him to hold her instrument while she popped into another room for a minute… and he put her fiddle under his chin and began to play. No fanfare, no warning. Just all of a sudden, he was making music again for the first time in about fifty years.

After that, he pulled down his old fiddle, restrung it, and began to teach himself new music.

Well, on my wedding day a couple years later, he brought along his fiddle and played a couple tunes with the band. Even just typing this out, I’m choking up at the memory of my father making music at my wedding to a musician. At the time, Mr. Twistie just pulled me a little closer and handed me a hankie. It was the only time that entire day that I cried, and the tears were pure joy.

So what’s your wedding dream or wedding memory that makes everything worthwhile?