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Tips On How To Personalize Your Wedding
By Robbi Ernst, III of
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3. Cake(s):

a). Have different flavors for the tiers. Serve your guests smaller
portions of two flavors.

b). One of my brides and grooms getting married in a California French
Chateau decided to be very bold. They had their cake designer (Elegant Cheesecakes, owner Susan Morgan, www.elegantcheesecakes.com) make a small traditional fondant cake as "the wedding cake". For each dining table, instead of using floral arrangements, Morgan designed individual cakes using fondant and rolled white chocolate (some she colored)shaped into woven baskets containing hand sculpted, edible grapes and grape leaves with a small bottle of champagne wrapped partially in similar fondant or rolled chocolate. After the bride and groom cut THEIR cake and posed for photographs, to the amazement of the guests, a waiter removed the table centerpieces, set them onto serving carts next to each table and began cutting and serving the centerpieces! So realistic were the "basket of grapes and leaves" that the guests did not realize it was dessert!

c). Caketops and Cake Decorations:
(1) Stay away from those ugly white plastic columns (or have the pastry chef cover them with icing)
(2) Instead of the cheap looking plastic and tulle bride and groom
caketop, use fresh flowers, pastry molded and shaped flowers, an elegant Lladro statue, a favorite momento that is precious to the bride and groom. Or, if you or someone close saves "collectibles", consider borrowing a favorite piece or add or start your own collection with your caketop.
(3) Be creative:
Two of my clients had met on a back-packing excursion and began making back-packing trips together. In addition to the wedding cake, we had a groom's cake. The pastry chef created a "hillside forest" with blue food coloring to give the semblance of a stream running through the woods. Ken and Barbie dolls were costumed in back-packing and hiking attire and placed on one of the "trails" of the cake. Another couple had met in a hot-tub (I don't ask too many questions). The groom built a miniature hot tub with a working pump and bubbling water. The wedding cake was created around the "hot-tub" in the center of the top tier. Ken and Barbie were this time outfitted in bathing suits and sat as if relaxing in a whirpool of water bubbling around them.
(4) A favorite of my creative but tasteful cake ideas had to do with the attendants' gifts. The theme of the wedding was art deco, black and white. A specially designed simple zebra striped cake was ordered for the rehearsal dinner. We had the cake designer make rolled chocolate boxes with lids that could be removed. The actual gifts were elegantly wrapped and then placed each in a chocolate box. The pastry chef finished the box by creating lovely rolled chocolate ribbons and bows wrapped around the lid and box. They were then painted in lovely pastels. After the rehearsal dinner, the waiters brought each box on a dessert plate and placed it in front of the attendant. Everyone gushed, oohed and ahhed. The bride's and groom's eyes twinkled mischievously as the guests began to cut into the dessert with their forks, only to find that as they peeled back the
covering, inside was the wrapped gift. Everyone got such merriment at the surprize. I've since called the idea, "Having your cake and eating it too!"

4. Gifts:

a) The groom should present his attendants with proper formal socks if formal attire is to be worn. Obviously this should be in addition to the actual attendants' gifts. This seems like a silly idea until you realize that many of the formal photographs with the men holding the bride up in their arms, hiking their legs up on a chair or even when all the attendants are posed for full length family and group pictures. You would be surprised how even navy blue, or thick wooly, fuzzy socks and shear fabric socks contrast in group pictures. Besides the length of the slacks, which sometimes are tailored too short (but more often than not are several inches too long!), it is the clashing of colors and fabric that stand out in otherwise beautiful group photos.


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