[ Journal Index ]

December 2001 Men, Cake, and Flowers by Gill Cheshire ... Men!    Although this wedding is some six months away, I am beginning to think that these arrangements shouldn't be left for a man to organise. I really don't think they have any understanding of how far in advance these things need to be arranged and that you should ensure that agreements are confirmed in writing. Suffice to say far from Andy making all the arrangements, as he had wanted to do, I have now had to poke my nose in and take over. Why are men (particularly Libran men) so laid back about confirming things? Well, that's my moan over for now. The Cake    I didn't realise weddings could be so expensive and so we have had to look at making some savings to keep the costs from getting out of hand. Firstly, the wedding cake. I cannot believe that people want to charge so much money for a very plain cake. So, I have taken the bull by the horns and decided to have a go. Well, not at the cake itself - I rate myself as a reasonable cook, but not of the cake variety. I will have to get the cake professionally made; otherwise if I do it, it will be a complete disaster. No better than that, I decided to put myself on a Sugarcraft course in order to learn how to make various flowers out of Sugarpaste. So I signed myself up on a five-week course for two hours after work to learn how to make them.    I now can honestly say that I can see why cake makers charge such a fortune to produce these things. An awful lot of time and preparation goes into making these things and you have to build up the layers one at a time to ensure they all fix together. I managed to make varying little flowers used as fillers, carnations, roses and leaves. It was an excellent course and I can honestly say that I enjoyed myself thoroughly. I am now ready to start the process of choosing colours and flowers to flow around my cake and, with six months to go, I will just about have time to complete them. But where do you begin? I was truly amazed at the choice of flowers you can make, the hardest thing is making a decision. I like roses, freesias, lilies, but then I also like daisies and iris. I think the only thing I can do is go into the shop I learnt in, sit down with the owner and discuss what is best to do, because if I have all the flowers I want on the cake, I think I will spoil its look.    I didn't realise what different shapes of cakes you could have: petal ones, heart ones, and diamond ones to name but a few. How does one decide? It's a difficult decision but I think in view of the fact that I want to trail my "home-made" sugarcraft flowers down the edge of it that a round cake would be the most suitable, maybe with a couple of tiers. I decided to buy a magazine called Wedding Cakes, which was a great source of inspiration and gives you good examples of cakes: normal, unusual and eccentric. It is worth getting a couple of issues just to give you some basic ideas that you can then relay to the cake maker. Flowers    I have decided that another area where we can reduce our costs is flowers. I am not going to carry a bouquet for a ceremony, which will last about half an hour, so that's one less expense. Our guest numbers will be about 34 close friends and family, so we have chosen to have one long banquet table. Therefore, I am sure with my flower arranging experience I can put together two arrangements to sit on the table in amongst the candelabras. I will have to rob some greenery from my parents and then buy some flowers from one of the markets in London and then, hey presto, an arrangement. Fortunately our wedding being so late in the day I am sure I have time to do this and then we can transport everything down in one car.    I really was amused at people who reckon their wedding cost £30,000 plus. But I am beginning to realise how people end up at this figure as weddings costs can soon spiral out of control.