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Authors: Diane Warner

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Page 132

servers wheel carts to each table to serve the rest of the meal tableside, placing each food item onto the guests' plates individually.
Plate service
, however, simply means that the plates are prepared in the kitchen, brought out, and served. Obviously, plate service is much less expensive.

Our wedding is planned for 1 p.m., with the reception immediately following at the same location. We need to leave no later than 5 p.m., so this will allow about three hours for the reception. Can you give me a suggested timetable for the reception itself?

Assuming your formal photographs will be taken before the wedding and that you, having an afternoon wedding, will only be serving a light buffet of some kind, here is a possible timetable:

2 p.m.

The bridal party stands in the receiving line as the musicians play background music.

2:45 p.m.

The bridal party is seated at the bride's table where they will be served; the designated host or hostess invites the guests to line up for the buffet.

3:30 p.m.

The musicians begin to play livelier dance music and the bride and groom begin their "first dance," followed by other traditional pairings (the groom with his mother, etc.) and finally by the rest of the guests.

4 p.m.

The musicians stop playing as the best man offers the first toast, followed by toasts from the groom to his bride, his parents, and his new in-laws. The bride may also offer toasts to her groom, his parents, and her parents at this time, but only if she feels comfortable doing so.

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4:15 p.m.

After the toasts, the best man or host invites the guests to gather around the cake table for the cake-cutting ceremony. The cake is then served to the guests.

4:30 p.m.

Time for the bride's bouquet toss and the groom's garter toss.

4:45 p.m.

The bride and groom slip away to change into their traveling outfits and say private goodbyes to their parents white the musicians continue to pray and, hopefully, the guests continue to dance, visit, and enjoy themselves.

5 p.m.

The bride and groom then dash through a spray of rice, birdseed, or rose petals that are showered over them by the wedding guests as the couple jumps into their getaway car and zoom off to their honeymoon.

As you can see, a three-hour reception goes by very quickly and, unless you have a responsible person charged with orchestrating the events, the time can get away from you. So, if it's crucial that you leave the reception by 5 p.m., you must appoint someone to monitor the timetable. After you're off, by the way, your parents have the choice of extending the dancing and partying as long as they wish, or ending the festivities by subtly discontinuing the music and thanking the guests for coming.

I would like to save my bouquet and have it preserved somehow after the wedding, so what can I throw at the bouquet toss?

Do what most brides do these days: have a "pretend" bouquet made up ahead of time, out of fresh or silk flowers. If you have an arm bouquet of long-stemmed flowers,

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you may toss one or two of them, saving the rest as momento of your wedding.

Can you give me some theme ideas for our reception?

You can carry your ceremony theme through to your reception or you can use one of these ideas:

Spring garden party.

Country-western.

Nostalgia.

Polynesian.

50s sock hop.

Gay 90s.

Mississippi riverboat.

Mountain ski resort.

Winter wonderland.

Renaissance festival.

Roaring 20s.

Christmas.

Paris in springtime.

Cupids and hearts.

Victorian tea party.

Romantic candlelight.

The Love Boat.

Ethnic themes (Mexican fiesta, African safari, Scandinavian love feast, German Oktoberfest).

A theme customized especially for the couple, such as an airport theme if either the groom or the bride is a pilot, or a race car theme for the groom who's into stock car racing, etc.

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The main thing to remember is that you don't want your reception, or your ceremony for that matter, to have that same old cookie-cutter look. You want your wedding to be the one the guests are still talking about a year later. Try for originality!

We would like to have a smoke-free reception; how can we let our guests know this in a tactful way?

You can place "Thank You for Not Smoking" cards on each table or around the reception hall, but instead of banning smoking altogether, you may want to designate an outdoor smoking area, in which case you can post a sign near the guest book saying, "A smoking area has been provided on the east patio." By the way, be sure to have the catering staff remove all ashtrays from the premises.

What's a "dummy wedding cake"?

This is a fake cake made out of Styrofoam layers, like the display cakes ill bakery windows. Dummy cakes have become popular because they allow you to have a larger, more elegant cake for a fraction of the cost of a "real" one, without sacrificing the quality of the cake served to the guests. Purchase the inexpensive Styrofoam layers at a hobby or bakery supply store and build a cake as high and wide as you would like; you can even have side cakes with "bridges" connecting them to the center cake. The top layer should be the real thing, however, so it can be removed and frozen, to be served on the couple's first wedding anniversary. Frost the entire cake with a simple white butter frosting and then decorate the layers with fresh or silk flowers, trailing ivy, or ribbons. You can even add lights and a bubbling fountain, if you'd like. When the bride and groom cut the cake to serve each other bites, they cut from a small cake that sits between them and the wedding cake, or a

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wedge of real cake may be inserted ahead of time into the bottom layer of Styrofoam, frosted over in such a way that only the bride and groom know it's there. Then, after the cake-cutting ceremony, the guests are quickly served slices of cake cut from frosted white sheet cakes that have been stashed in the kitchen. Amazingly, the guests never catch on to this whole thing!

Do you have any original ideas for cake toppers? Everything I've seen has been the same old thingand for no small price!

If you want something different and affordable, here are a few ideas:

Purchase fresh flowers from your supermarket or wholesale florist. Have someone arrange them on top of the cake as soon as it is delivered to the reception by the bakery. The flowers can also be trailed down from layer to layer. Be sure you don't underestimate the beauty of decorating your cake with fresh flowerseven Whitney Houston's wedding cake was decorated simply with fresh violets.

Use a wine glass filled with roses and baby's breath. Set the wine glass on top of a round mirror and fill it with flowers and narrow ribbons that spill over onto the mirror. You can also arrange a ring of flowers around the perimeter of the mirror, where the edge of the mirror touches the frosting.

Try a tiny white basket filled with the same, sitting on a round mirror or directly on the frosting itself.

Place a blown-glass figurine set on a mirror, with small rose buds and baby's breath around the base of the figurine.

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Use a Precious Moments bride and groom. There are several available. Does anyone in your family collect these figurines? Ask around.

Try a teddy bear bride and groom. Dress up a pair of tiny teddy bears with a little white veil for the bride and bow tie or tuxedo jacket for the groom.

Decide on a customized topper. Depending on your theme or your hobbies, you may be able to come up with something truly original. If you're really into downhill skiing, for example, you can make tiny skis out of tongue depressors; paint your names on the skis, tie them with white satin ribbons and "plunge" them into the "snow" of the frosting. Put on your thinking caps and come up with an idea all your own.

Other than the dummy wedding cake idea, what are some other ways we can cut down on the cost of the cake?

The average cost of a wedding cake these days is about $450, so it's no wonder brides are looking for some ways to cut down. One of the best ways, which I've done myself several times lately, is to order the cake from your supermarket bakery. In our little California valley town, the bakery at Albertson's Supermarket happens to have the best cakes for the moneythey are not only moist and delicious, but decorated as professionally as any you will find. The key is to watch for their sales and order the cake ahead of time during the sale, even though the wedding date may be some months off. Then, on the day before the wedding, you'll need to have someone pick it up, and it comes disassembled, by the way. But don't let this throw you because it's easy to put together. Each layer has a plastic plate at its base with ready-made "innies" for the columns' "outies." The innies and outies fit together nice and tight as you assemble

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the cake at the site. You don't have to worry about transporting a fully-assembled cake, four or five layers high, balanced on spindly columns, in a van or something, like you see in the movies. Another suggestion is to have the cake made by someone who does this out of her home; ask to see photos of other cakes she has done, along with recommendations of other brides who have used her. My last suggestion is only logical: Order a smaller wedding cake, but supplement with homemade sheet cakes.

By the way, don't be disappointed if you don't remember what the cake tasted like; you'll have your chance to really enjoy it when you drag the top layer out of your freezer on your first wedding anniversary. Most brides and grooms are so excited by the time the cake is cut they hardly remember the event at all, much less what the cake tasted like. The only bride I ever heard of who actually enjoyed her wedding cake was Roseanne when she married her exbodyguard, Ben Thomas. Guests at her wedding said she went back for thirds!

What's the worst cake disaster you've ever seen?

The very worst was when the top two layers of the wedding cake slid onto the floor. It was a hot July day and the fresh whipped cream filling (the only thing holding the layers together) melted. This was pretty disastrous because they had to make do with the one remaining layer. Another case was more humorous than disastrous: The family dog jumped up on a chair and helped himself to half a layer while everyone was out of the room. Moral of the story: Use butter cream icing and send Fido on a mini-vacation to his favorite kennel until after the wedding.

What is a "menu board"?

It is simply a board that tells what is on the menu for your reception dinner or buffet. All the items on the menu

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are elegantly listed in calligraphy on a piece of parchment that is matted, framed, and placed on a floor or table easel.

We're in a quandary about whether to serve alcohol at our reception. We've heard that the bride and groom can be held liable for a drunken guest who then causes an accident or something. Is this true?

Yes, in most states it is, which is why more and more couples are either doing away with alcohol altogether or serving it only in the form of a mild champagne punch. At the very least, the drinks should be limited so that, for example, there are a maximum of two glasses of champagne allowed per guest. If you have an
open bar
or a
cash bar
you are asking for trouble, not only from a liability standpoint, but from the standpoint of risking the beauty and joy of your reception by having a guest or two become unruly, obscene, or obnoxiousyou certainly don't need that!

Other than the ideas you've already mentioned, do you have any other suggestions for cutting down on the cost of the reception?

Yes. Here are a few:

Purchase sparkling wine by the box at a ridiculously low price (check out your discount grocery stores and food warehouses, such as Costco or Sam's Club). Then, pour the wine into carafes, one for each table.

Rather than rent crystal or china, borrow it or use paper products instead.

Call local vocational schools that offer programs in food service or decoration; hire their students or recent graduates.

Cut down on the size of your guest list.

BOOK: Diane Warner's Wedding Question & Answer

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