Homegrown Weddings

I posted this to facebook, but for those of you not on my FB - if you had a homemade wedding cake, could you post a picture or tell me about it? Did you make it yourself or have friends/family?

We're going to have a completely DIY wedding because I love crafting and cooking,so I'd love to see examples or hear stories!  Our US reception will have about 100 people at it, but I'm used to cooking for crowds, as 64 of the 100 will be my immediate family.

SIL made ours and it was delicious.  Chocolate cake with a white chocolate ganache sort of icing.  I have the recipe someplace.

I had what I call a "barn raising" wedding, everyone helped a little bit, and the whole thing was stunning and fantastic in the end. My mother and her friends did the flowers, we decorated the marquee and built the chuppah, many of the hydrangeas that we had came from friends gardens (that was my flower...) I wanted a cupcake cake, but in 1999 this was pretty much unheard of, so I asked our caterer to make us 100 cupcakes, and I found a woman through a Wilton Cake Decorating school to make 100 individual flowers to put on the cupcakes and then I bought cheapo candle holders at Big Lots (or something like it) A cheap cakestand from a Wilton shop and we put together what I think, was the most gorgeous cupcake cake around.

We got married under a HUGE tree....it was stunning.

I love it!  The cupcakes are adorable!

My aunt is making our wedding cake. We're getting married next month, so I will share pics then.

I picked out my dress pattern and the fabric last night! I didn't buy the fabric yet....the store we go to tends to have big sales at Columbus day, which is apparently Monday, so I'm going to go over on Monday!

I picked out my dress pattern and the fabric last night!

Ooh which pattern? I'm a big sewer, so drooling over eveningwear patterns is so much more fun to me than drooling over wedding gowns. 

I'm turning my grandmother's vintage 1949 wedding gown into something approaching Vogue 2965, but of course, I'm dealing with 60 year old silk satin that's in panels rather than bolts, but thankfully there's a HUGE train to utilise, too (and yes, my granny is delighted I'm cutting up her gown - she threatened to sell it on eBay or cut it up herself if I got nervous or precious about it!).

And racheeee, I love the flowers on the cupcakes! We're planning on doing cupcakes, too, since they're easier to bake in advance and freeze, and also for people to just grab and eat as they like without having to stop dancing.

http://sewing.patternreview.com/cgi-bin/patterns/sewingpatterns.pl?patternid=33156

the pink one in this fabric:
http://www.new.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=3758032&l=1481fab465&id=522022159

Ooh which pattern? I'm a big sewer, so drooling over eveningwear patterns is so much more fun to me than drooling over wedding gowns. 

I'm turning my grandmother's vintage 1949 wedding gown into something approaching Vogue 2965, but of course, I'm dealing with 60 year old silk satin that's in panels rather than bolts, but thankfully there's a HUGE train to utilise, too (and yes, my granny is delighted I'm cutting up her gown - she threatened to sell it on eBay or cut it up herself if I got nervous or precious about it!).

And racheeee, I love the flowers on the cupcakes! We're planning on doing cupcakes, too, since they're easier to bake in advance and freeze, and also for people to just grab and eat as they like without having to stop dancing.

Love that you're incorporating your grandmother's gown! That pattern is gorgeous - wish I had the figure!

I made my own everything for the wedding it was fun and stressful too.  All of it was fun etc etc but the wedding cake turned out fine but was sooooo stressful to make, I named one of the tiers the ugly one.  It was my first time using fondant lol.  Making the food was easy we did mexican food (which the hubby made and put all the diff meats in diff crock pots! While I made the wedding cake)  I can't figure out how to put a picture in here can someone enlighten me??
Lauren

I made the wedding cake for my sister's wedding.  Sorry we are in the middle of the big move so the computer available is not the one with pics.   What we did first was look through tons of pics in magazines and Wilton Wedding yearbooks and find out what she liked best.   For her she really wanted tons of yellow roses on the cakes. 

I also used the cake stand that SlicesMissus  posted in her post.  I have done stacked cakes directly on top of one another before but was really worried about transport and set up and logistics and that cake stand give you the height without the worry.  It took me and a friend about 15 hours to bake, frost and decorate the cakes - not including having made many flowers ahead of time.  That said, I think time is your biggest obstacle to DIY - do you have that time right before your wedding?

My sister's wedding had about 200 guests so in addition to the 3 cakes on the stand we did 5 8 inch cakes on the tables and then so "ugly/ reject" cake that we sliced from under the table.   If you are really going for budget and DIY, I would suggest the display cake and sheet cake method.  You can get a whole sheet cake from Cost-co for less than $20 - you cannot make a cake for that price.  So you have a smaller display cake that you could make and would take you less hours  and you cut that cake and then you can pass around that cake and a nice sheet cake.  Just an idea.  I hope it works well for you.

Our current plans are to get married on a Thursday and have the reception on Friday. Two of my close friends have offered to assist with the cake - I'll bake it,and they'll put it together, ice it, and decorate it!  (I just found out tonight)

That said, I think time is your biggest obstacle to DIY - do you have that time right before your wedding?

I agree with this. I knew some people who did a lot of things themselves rather than hire someone and they were still scrambling around right up to the last minute. For example, they didn't want to hire a DJ and instead just burned all this music onto CDs. They were still burning music the morning of the wedding. Erm....no. I don't want to be burning CDs on the morning of my wedding. I used a fantastic DJ from Baltimore, but he came up to York, so he might be willing to come to Lancaster. Let me know if you want the info and I'll PM it to you.

My other friend did a total DIY wedding, but they had wonderful friends who helped every step of the way, including one girl who acted like the wedding planner. She even bought all her flowers wholesale and we had to put together our own bouquets. It was nice activity for the bridesmaids to do together the day before the wedding. She was a member of a drum circle, so we walked in to the wedding to this drum circle. They had a friend who did catering on the side, so he cooked all the food on this huge barbecue. It was very cool and very them.

My sister's wedding had about 200 guests so in addition to the 3 cakes on the stand we did 5 8 inch cakes on the tables and then so "ugly/ reject" cake that we sliced from under the table.   If you are really going for budget and DIY, I would suggest the display cake and sheet cake method.  You can get a whole sheet cake from Cost-co for less than $20 - you cannot make a cake for that price.  So you have a smaller display cake that you could make and would take you less hours  and you cut that cake and then you can pass around that cake and a nice sheet cake.  Just an idea.  I hope it works well for you.

This is a great idea. My sister did this for her wedding and it was much cheaper and easier. The guests don't even know the difference. 

I'm fortunate that I have a small army of family and friends who are willing to help every step of the way, and I can even go to someone in my family for flowers.  We're probably not having a DJ, to be honest.  I've been working on a playlist for my iPod of songs Tim and I would want to have playing at the reception and we're going to splurge on a higher end ipod speaker dock (assuming we can find one that will be dual voltage).

I'm considering hiring my friend's daughter and her friend to act as waitstaff - make sure the elderly aunts and uncles have their coffee, clear plates, make sure food is replenished, etc. to try and keep that stress off of me.

I have full confidence that we can do this, especially since the wedding and reception will be on different days.

I'm fortunate that I have a small army of family and friends who are willing to help every step of the way, and I can even go to someone in my family for flowers.  We're probably not having a DJ, to be honest.  I've been working on a playlist for my iPod of songs Tim and I would want to have playing at the reception and we're going to splurge on a higher end ipod speaker dock (assuming we can find one that will be dual voltage).

Yep, I think that's a great idea. It's what we did for our wedding, and picking our own songs was something fun to do online while we were far apart.