My aunt and uncle celebrated their 40th wedding anniversary yesterday. Here’s wishing them all the very best and may Ruby turn to Gold …….
Archive for October, 2007
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A Vegetarian Special
I spent last evening with a very interesting young man. It had been almost a year since I had seen him and we finally fixed a date and stuck to it. (Although there were a string of broken dates before that) We met up at Bandra station and headed to my fav restaurant for a Chinese veggie meal. The man never ever fails to surprise me and this time round he stunned me with his knowledge of wines and the fact that he enjoys it. So over some red wine and veg teriyaki noodles we caught up on the year that had gone by.
The evening was spent in conversations that ranged from “why he has a tiny ponytail on the top of his head” to “work” to “careers” to “Harry Belafonte”. We topped up dinner with some yummy ice cream at Naturals. The man, chivalrous as he always was dropped me home. I must say it was a lovely evening, one I enjoyed a great deal. -
A series of birthdays
My calender for the months of September and October are full of circled dates representing all the birthdays and anniversaries of people I know. This time round I also got invited to quite a few celebrations. Like the saying goes, “when it rains it pours” but I’m not complaining.
Michelle’s birthday on the 29th marked the beginning of a week of parties. She was having dinner at her place. We were working that day so decided to go out and out from work. She warned us not to turn up too early, so killed some time on the streets of Bandra and then headed to her place. Did I mention she looked ravishing that evening. See for yourself.
It was a homely party with dollops of fun. Didn’t quite realise what a big family she had till I met quite a few of them. We played games I’ve never played at any party before. One was a modified version of “dog and the bone” and the other was a verion of “peek a boo” with our feet! Dinner followed but not before we had the most amazing chocolate walnut cake her Dad made. It was coated with a layer of chocolate that was to die for. Dinner was delicious with some of my fav food served.
Came back home in the morning as it got too late the night before. Sunday passed in a whirlwind of activities and before I knew it the day was over. However managed to make Priyanka’s card and bake her cake. I iced it Monday morning as Ryan was going to come pick it up latter in the day. I must say I was pretty impressed with the way it turned out.
Work was as usual and in the evening Michelle, Witty and myself headed over to Pri’s place. We were the first to arrive and promtly ploped ourselves in her bedroom to put the finishing touches to the cards and presents we had to give her. The party was a hilarious affair. I haven’t laughed so much at a party in some time! The fact that the electricity kept coming and going added a whole lot of fun to the party. There was dancing and dumb charades and we were even asked to put together a ‘naughty’ honeymoon package for Ryan and Priyanka. It was quite late by the time we had dinner and after most of the guests had gone we sat down to ‘help’ Pri open her presents.
Chetna was really sick by this time and so decided to call it a night. We attempted to watch a bit of “I dream of genie” but were fast asleep before 10 minutes were up. Woke up by around 9.30, had breakfast (yummy chicken curry) and headed to Bandra with Priyanka and Michelle as I had to go onto Andheri for the next party!
Reached Crispin’s house at around 12:30 and as usual I was the first to arrive. It was a double celebration as it was Crispin’s and Giselle’s birthday.
Crispin has been a childhood friend and a “chaddi -buddy” in the truest sense of the term! Born merely 2 months apart, we’ve grown up together and kept in touch over the years, first because of our parents but now I think we hold our own. He is the funniest person I know and there is never ever a dull moment when he is around (except of course when he decides to get a ton of sand in his pants and it decides to hurt him so much that he can hardly walk) I don’t know how many of his girlfriends I have freaked out with questions to him about his “sexuality” and the “other woman in his life” oh and not forgetting the famous “memorablia from his exploits” question
Have fun CL and if you ever wanna get rid of an irritating ‘good friend’, you know who to call A. June’s cooking was outstanding as usual (I wonder how people get so good yaar). It was a Chinese treat and yummy chocolate cake to go with it. I was really tired so decided to leave soon after lunch. Headed back home and made my Mum’s birthday cake as it was her birthday the next day.
Mum decided to stay at home on her birthday after many years. I think she enjoyed herself better that way. I managed to get her prety yellow flowers of the variety she loves. The best part about them is that they last for ages. We had a candle lit (after ages) chinese dinner, cut her birthday cake 5 minutes before midnight and called it a night.
And so ended my series of birthdays. I don’t think I’ve ever partied so hard in a lon, long time! But like I said I enjoyed every minute of it
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Wedding “to -do” list
As we we discussing what had to be done for the wedding, we realised that there were a million things to do. Don’t believe it? Just take a look at the list that follows …….
I’ve roughly divided the list into Church related, Reception related, Personal related and General categories. Here goes…….
Church Related:
- Marriage preparation course
- Visit to priest and filling out the forms
- In case the priest who will be celebrating your mass is from outside the parish, a letter from him saying that he will be saying your mass
- In case the priest who will be celebrating your mass is from outside the parish, a letter from him saying that he will be saying your mass
- Appointing of witnesses for the wedding (one from each side usually)
- Preparing the liturgy – 1st reading, 2nd reading, gospel, prayer of the faithful, offertory prayer, thank you prayer
- Selecting people to do the above
- Items for the offertory prayer and people to offer
- Choir – Booking the choir, selecting hymns, liturgy/ hymn booklet,
- Church decoration (for the pews – it is optional – but it does look good in the pictures)
- Flowers for the altar
- Keep envelopes ready with money to be given to the priest who will say the mass and the sacristan
Reception Related:
- Booking of the venue. Keep in mind the convenience of both families. Avoid places that are susceptible to bottlenecks
- Tables/chairs
- Backdrop/decorations – balloons especially make the place look very nice
- Centre piece & back drop – this will have to be acc to the theme
- Caterer – Selection of menu/wine
- Cake – a piece of the bridesmaid dress material will have to be given if the flowers on the cake. Also u may want to decorate the cake table. Personally I think a completely white cake looks gorgeous
- Confetti… u can put them in small net pouches. Someone from each side to welcome the guests
- Emcee
- Music– DJ/Live band
- Selection of songs for the reception especially the first dance!
- Toastmaster/Mistress
- Reply to the toastmaster/mistress’s speech
- A couple of games for the kids if you are expecting many. This will make them feel involved and let them have some fun (Weddings were really boring affairs for me as a kid unless I was a flower girl)
- Someone to say grace before meals
- Alcohol – some places include a permit and alcohol charges others require you to make the arrangements
Personal Related:- Wedding gown
- Bridal bouquet – colour or white
- Comfortable shoes, handbag/jhola, mittens, stockings
- Bridesmaid’s dresses – colour, design, fittings
- Bridesmaid’s headgear, bouquet/ corsage/ handbag/ shoes, etc
- Groom’s suit, white shirt (and NOT yellow like my cousin attempted), shoes, buttonhole
- Best man’s clothes, buttonhole, shoes
- Flower girl’s dresses, shoes, headgear, baskets, socks/stockings
- Page boy’s suit, ring pillow, shoes, socks
- Favors for the male relations/ if the women feel left out it has to be corsages for them
- Wedding bands and other gold (if it were me I would keep this to the minimum)
- Customary wedding glass bangles – green/red
- Booking of the beautician / hairstylist
- Clothes for the family
- Keep someone in the hall on the stage in charge of the gifts – especially the envelopes and the gold
- Oh don’t forget the “Something borrowed, something blue, something old and something new” – for the bride
General- List of invitees – very imp (one advice – don’t call everyone and anyone –See if u can call only Mr. & Mrs. Also not everyone who is invited turn up for the wedding)
- Invitation cards to be choosen/ template finalized on so that production can get underway – making, printing, addressing
- Invitation Cards are to be sent out only after the banns are read except if your sending hard copies abroad then that will have to be done earlier. Another option is to scan and email the invitation cards to those living abroad
- Theme for the wedding
- Colour scheme according to the theme
- Bridesmaids dress colour
- Thank you pieces – (avoidable – unnecessary expenditure – you will save a lot of money plus the headache of ensuring that all get it)
- Wedding Car
- Decorations for the car
- Photographer
- Videographer (you will have to pay the church if you use this technology!)
- Don’t forget to do the booking for the honeymoon
Happy Planning!
