My girls and I are booked to head down south for a week!!!! I have the greatest friends in the world.

Where we are going to be, leathering up our bodies.

It has been a while hasn’t it? I’ve been so busy with life and work, and now all the wedding stuff is creeping up. I was waiting for this time to come so I would have more to write about, but it seems that there’s no time to blog about all the current events! I can’t believe we are down to double digit days now… we were over 400 days away when this blog started.

Last week was our tasting at the hotel, and J and I both took our mums and had an absolute blast. Why couldn’t every meal involve nibbling off everyone’s plates, unlimited beverages, customized desserts and perfect service?

Overall, the food was quite tasty and we were happy with our selections of entrées. Of course, how the food will turn out on the wedding night is questionable – I’m not that naïve to think that a meal for 5 is the same as 250, but it’s still good to know that food was yum at the tasting and the presentation was nice. I’d be on the right track to think that I won’t be eating much that night anyway.

I know everyone loves food photos, so here are a few of the desserts that the chef made that night – and I’m only showing them because we aren’t going with any of them. From top to bottom: Lemon Meringue tart (it was so fun plucking off each one of those spikes and eating them), Key Lime tart and Warm Apple Blossom.

Problem was, as lovely and sweet they looked, the desserts really left something to be desired. After discussion between us and the hotel, we’re heading back for a dessert re-tasting. Yessss!!!! If anyone has any good ideas for dessert, please pass them over to me because I can give the chef some suggestions for our next tasting.

I’ve spent the entire holiday sick as a dog, and being at home and with my mum has encouraged some serious wedding prep work. One of the things we started working on are the floral details.

My mother was a florist once upon a time, and I remember being about 10 or 11 years old and accompanying her to 6 a.m. flower auctions and visits to the wholesalers out in Mississauga. She’s long since abandoned that line of work, but has become our family’s go-to wedding florist. Even though it’s not exactly her choice role.

In 2008, she did the flowers for my brother’s wedding (see my SIL’s bouquet below), and a few years before that she arranged the flowers for my cousin’s wedding.

I was torn at first – because who actually makes their mother arrange flowers the night before their kid walks down the aisle (besides my brother)? It took a bit of guilt-fighting, but after my mum “convinced” me by helping us save money, we’ve gave her the fun job of official florist. Ahem, in addition to couturier and mother of the bride.

Anyway, J recently got me the current issue of Wedluxe, and I finally found a bouquet that was fit for me.

I don’t like to give away too many details of the wedding before people have seen it, but this bouquet is too gorgeous to ignore. Seriously, it’s to die for and it has my name written all over it. No joke – my mum and I are gonna pluck branches off my neighbor’s insanely huge and usually annoying tree for it! I knew that tree was there for a reason.

Yesterday we stopped by the awesome Kay & Young’s on Avenue Road, and I think I’m well on my way to getting all the flowers of my wedding dreams. Thanks mum!!

Happy new year lovely folks!! This is the year to be everything you want it to be.

We got these in the mail the other day from our fab photographer, and there’s no way I’m not sharing some with you! Thank you again to everyone who made it all happen – Tara, Keith, Stan, Joan, and even Tara’s dad who made lots of friends sitting around with a bunch of furniture in the forest.

There’s a photo of a bee in the flowers… not sure if Tara knew that J and I only call each other by our first names if we’re fighting (all other times it’s Bee), but how appropriate!

As you may know by now, I was part of Tiff’s bridal party this summer, who happens to be one of my bridesmaids. We threw her and Ken a Jack & Jill, and celebrated with both the bride and the groom and their family and friends.

As the bridal party, we were originally disappointed because we had a rather feminine theme planned for Tiff’s shower: Breakfast at Tiffany’s. When Tiff decided she wanted a co-ed shindig, we had to quickly come up with a new unisex theme. Luckily, I scouted a most perfect party location and realized we could keep the original theme – the space was contemporary and ultra-chic, and fit the Breakfast at Tiffany’s theme perfectly. We renamed it to Breakfast at Tiffany’s (and Ken).

Thanks to our group of DIYers, we had all the details set. I designed the invitations (with a fittingly graphic Audrey Hepburn), Lisa created scrumptious and beautiful mini-cakes to look like Tiffany boxes, and Kat (the groom’s sister) crafted a nifty sign that the couple ended using at their wedding, too. The Sunday brunch went without a hitch, and I must say, it was sad when we didn’t have any more bridesmaid meetings to plan this thing!

I am newly obsessed with this blog by La Partie Events, a florist stroke event design company based out in California. They’ve even done a wedding shot by Max Wanger. Cool stuff.  Anyway, La Partie Events has the most beautiful ideas, and looking at some of the bouquet and centerpiece sizes, they’ve got some excellent budgets to work with, too.

Definitely a bookmark if you’re looking for unique and modern floral inspiration.

photos from lapartieevents.com

I’m so excited… they’re here!!! No, not aliens from Krypton by the name of Clark Kent (yum), but our engagement photos! They are so awesome even though J and I both hate our faces. One of our favourite shots:

And I love this little series of J and I having a… dance off? Pose off?:

High ressies are coming soon… that’s all for now folks!!

Months ago, when we were still looking for our venue, we fell in love – no, make that lust – with the Board of Trade, exclusively catered by O&B. You may remember? I never gave you the scoop on what happened with Mr. Oliver and Mr. Bonacini.

J and I visited the BOT a good 3-4 times (once was for Eight Chefs, one of the more delicious foodical events of ‘09), which I would say makes us pretty good candidates for booking a venue. The final meeting with Lisa, the event co-ordinator, was to talk about what kind of menu we were looking at. Going back through my emails, that was on May 1. After we discussed all our wants, Lisa was going to have a chat with the chef, and see what he could come up with in our budget. On May 11, I followed up with an email, and was told it had been very hectic but she was going to sit down “with the chef tomorrow morning”.

On May 12, the next day, she emailed me with a few questions, to which I promptly replied. And then we waited. Loads. Believe it or not, I received a final menu from Lisa on the 26th of June. By this time we had already signed a contract and paid the first deposit to the Westin. I couldn’t believe how long it took for them to get us a menu to just take a look at!

We had pretty much forgotten about the BOT after our first visit to the Westin, because we fell in love, not lust, at first sight. But we still wondered where on earth Lisa went with our menus to take 6 weeks to get back to us?! As delicious as their food is, I’m totally disappointed in the way Oliver & Bonacini handled this. Damn them for making yummy brunch that keeps me going back!

So I’ve been battling with the idea of a wedding cake ever since I got hooked on Cake Boss (you can read about my lack of desire for one here). All I know is that I don’t want a traditional wedding cake nor do I want cupcakes. I have narrowed it down to two ideas: mini cakes, and a macaron croquembouche.

I love miniature cakes. I love all things miniature!!! I came across these beautiful pictures online of some really nice mini cakes.

Some of you may wonder what a croquembouche is… well, let me show you. They are awesome little towers of delicious delight! Usually croqembouches are made with profiteroles (read: cream puffs), but ones made with macarons are available, too. I had some really delicious ones at the O&B Eight Chefs event earlier this year; I think I might just contact that pastry shop for a quote and taste test.

There’s often confusion between macarons and macaroons – the latter is the coconut baked goodie, while macarons are French meringue treats.