H: Pre-Cana

Hehe. Real original title, I know.
I know I said I was going to post about our separate bouquet and garter toss for the kids next, but I've opted not to. It's a woman's prerogative to change her mind! ...about blogs. And paint colors. And...anyway. There's not much to say about it right now, we're thinking that we'll do something different with it, so not much point in blogging at present. I know what you're thinking; "but Helen, you blogged about DIYing the DJ!" Hush, you. That was a work in progress! This is different!

Josh and I had our Pre-Cana conference today in Sacramento. It was...nice. The people were nice, the building was nice, etc. It was facilitated by a couple around 15 years older than my parents and they've been married for 46 years (the couple, not my parents). They have 8 children and a very stable marriage, so it was wonderful to hear from them. Most of what they've talked about Josh and I have already touched on/settled on, so we felt pretty prepared. And we got a nice, shiny certificate proving that we went through the training! It's quite nice. Yeah. Nice.
As a non-Catholic, it was interesting to get a bit deeper into the Catholic perspective. It may have been just a *touch* on the dull and at times frustrating side due to the tangents, but I think it was useful. They covered Natural Family Planning which - as it turns out - is very effective. One of these days when Josh and I are considering having children, we'll give it a go.
It was a pretty long day. We were up around 7 to be there by 8:30 and we got out about 5:00.
*sigh*
I'm tired. :-)

H: "Just relax and have fun,honey, Mommy and Daddy are going to get their groove on." Part I

Like so many other couples who have come before us, we had to make the decision of whether or not to include children at our wedding. There are several schools of thought on this. Those that have children at their wedding typically do so because they like kids or come from families that like kids, they see children as a part of the life process and therefore want them at their wedding, they don't want to anger anyone or have someone not show up either because of childcare or out of protest, or any and all of the above. The opposite school regarding not having children at weddings typically is facilitated by wanting a more adult atmosphere where the guests can leave the kids at home for a bit and enjoy the evening, but also stem from the notion that because of the time/location/etc it may not be appropriate to have children present. In some cases, it's a matter of cost; how much it costs to have children present vs. whether or not they'll remember it/have a good time. Space does have a factor. If, for example you only have a small number of slots, you then need to decide if you're going to invite a friend, or your 2nd cousin that doesn't know you from Santa Claus but is nevertheless family. It's tricky.
For us, because we like kids and respect and appreciate both schools of thought, we wanted to find a happy medium.

We've opted to have some children at our wedding, and in so doing our goal is to ensure that all of our guests have a good time, be they 5, 25, or 50 (um...this is not to say that those over 50 won't have a good time...*ahem*). We wanted the adults to not have to worry about watching their kids or having to rescue them from the tempting clutches of mischief, and we wanted the kids to not be bored out of their poor little gourds listening to their parents "drone on" about something completely uninteresting to them. We kicked around all sorts of ideas; kids table, separate pizza party, scavenger hunt, babysitters.....wait a minute, go back one....
Babysitters. Yes!
I mentioned in my last post that we had met Jenny from The Special Event Nannies. What they do is set up the upstairs as a child haven and staff it with one nanny for every five children, or 1 nanny for two children under the age of 2. They set up age appropriate games and projects and parents can then drop off their kids and go downstairs and shake it without having to worry about who is watching their children and if they're behaving or not. Meanwhile, little Jimmy is playing and laughing and having a grand old time doing something that interests him. It's a win-win!

In my next post, I'll comment on our other little project for the wee ones: a separate bouquet and garter toss.
Here's a sneak peek:
Because of the tradition of the next one to catch the bouquet/garter will be the next to get married, we thought including children under the age of 17 would be grossly inappropriate. We've heard too many horror stories of 20 somethings putting a garter on a 5 year old to which we say "no sir!"
Instead, we're hearkening back to the days where people on floats in parades threw candy to youngsters. Because we next remembered that said youngsters occasionally got hurt in the ensuing stampede and the last thing our parents want is zipped up kiddies in the backseat on the way home, we've opted to throw toys and have enough on hand to throw a little adorable something to each wee one.
This is something I'm extremely excited about! We haven't decided what exactly we'll be throwing, but we do know it will be appropriate, fun, and absolutely adorable.

H: At long last...the tasting

Yesterday we were in Foresthill at the Monte Verde Inn for our tasting. There was a variety of food from all over the menu, and due to space restrictions as well as time restrictions and I'm sure money restrictions on their part, we sampled only the most popular portions of the menu. These included garlic chicken, Santa Fe styled tri tip, and veal roulade. Side dishes included scalloped potatoes, mushroom risotto with white truffle oil, and potato gnocchi. Then of course, there was cake:

(Trust me, it tastes as good as it looks)

The tasting was also an open house where we could meet vendors that we hadn't yet (Shana Beals make up and O'Shays flowers), and meet some that we didn't expect to see there but were so glad that we did (Event Nannies). It was also a wonderful opportunity to catch up with one of our vendors already established; our darling Mr. Joe. After sampling his DJ skills, we are even happier that he's our man! Simply fabulous.
As far as the food goes, it was, as expected, very good. We decided on beef (oh-man-delicious) for dinner and are so far undecided on the second entree. We were very regrettably unimpressed with the chicken (though others seemed to love it), which was very disappointing for us since we really, really wanted to enjoy it and have a chicken and a beef entree. Josh enjoyed the Veal loin roulade, but I'm hesitant to have two beef dishes. But no matter, we are very confident that the matter will work itself out. We thoroughly enjoyed the potato gnocchi and the mushroom risotto and - even though they're on another menu - we plan to incorporate them into our meal.
As for one of the most important parts - the cake - we were most impressed with the chocolate eclair cake: golden pound cake soaked with hazelnut liqueur filled with Bavarian cream and topped with chocolate ganache. Actually, Josh isn't big on chocolate so we'll be substituting the ganache with Chantelly cream. Hello YUM!!!
All in all it was a productive day, and we look forward to continuing on with our planning!