The Frugal Bride

The advice in the book seems sound, though I mainly picked it up at the library for the “Questions to Ask” Lists. I have another book on saving money on weddings — Bridal Bargins by Denise and Alan Fields — that I actually own, so can dog-ear pages and mark up.

The Frugal Bride

by Cynthia Clumeck Muchnick

The Frugal Bride has lots of tips on saving money on a wedding. One of the best parts of this book are the “Questions to Ask” sections — when hiring a wedding consultant, buying flowers, hiring a photographer, and hiring a caterer.

A Bride’s Book of Wedding Traditions

by Arlene Hamilton Stewart

The book catalogs some of the roots of our current wedding traditions. Many traditions date back to ancient times — for example, using the fourth finger on the left hand as the wedding ring finger originated in ancient Egypt. The other traditions date back to marriage by capture, marriage as a means of property transfer, marriage as a means to produce heirs, or superstitions about evil spirits.

I want to avoid any of the fertility traditions — there will be no baby’s breath at my wedding! However, the superstition traditions are more than welcome. I’m not superstitious, but it’s still fun to buy into a little of the hype. Andrew will not see the dress, or me in the dress, before the wedding! And I’ll certainly be wearing “something old, something new, something borrowed and something blue”! Though I won’t go so far as making my bridesmaids dress exactly like me (to confuse evil spirits).

Unfortunately, I was often left wanting more explanations on the traditions — the short paragraph or two was often not enough.

Name Change??

Salon had an article on the whole name-change question:
Mrs. Femininst by Lynn Harris

Here’s my version of Harris’ first “doodles”

Barbara Jo Mattson-Kuchling
Barbara Jo Mattson Kuchling
Barbara Mattson Kuchling
Barbara Jo Kuchling

Mr. and Dr. Kuchling (looking ahead a few years 🙂
Mr. and Dr. Mattson-Kuchling
Barbara and Andrew Kuchling
Barbara and Andrew Mattsling
Barbara Mattson and Andrew Kuchling
Mr. Kuchling and Dr. Mattson

I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t torn. I think one of the interviewees in the article expressed my reasons for wanting to take Andrew’s name farily well:

“I don’t care less about feminism than I did before [deciding to take her husband’s name], but I’m still a little defensive about my decision to change my name,” says Tydlaska, who was a women’s studies major in college. “I would have kept my own name [alone], but there’s a symbolism to me that says ‘family’ when you have the same last name — not for the sake of ‘the children,’ because we aren’t sure we want them, but for ourselves.”

It’s not that I want to belong to Andrew, but rather that I want to belong with Andrew, and vice versa.

The flip side is that I will already have two referred journal articles in scientific journals as Barbara Mattson. It’s not that I couldn’t make people understand that my name changed, but I would have to list myself as an author under two names.

I don’t like the idea of hyphenating, because neither of our names is exactly short (though not long, either), so the hyphenated name, Mattson-Kuchling, is kind of a monstrosity. I’ve considered taking Mattson as a second middle name, and using Kuchling as my “official” last name. That way I could still write scientific papers under Barbara Mattson, but have mail correctly addressed to Mr. and Mrs. Kuchling.

Arlington Planetarium

The Arlington Planetarium was actually quite nice, and is a good candidate for the wedding site.

A few things:

• The planetarium seats 71. This may not quite be enough, since our guest list is currently at 67, and if we think of anyone else to invite, or if our parents request any other invitees, then we could be in trouble. In fact, we already know that we’d like to invite our respective music teachers, so that’s possibly 4 more people.
• The seating is all facing front, rather than concentric, which is much better for a wedding.
• It would be nice if we didn’t have to use the first row of seats (2 seats on either side of the aisle), because that would be very cramped.
• There were no really bad seats in the house — though there were a couple with partial views.
• There are a couple tables up front, which could probably be moved, but we would want to ask the director about that.
• There isn’t much room in the front area, so it could be difficult to have a live musician for the processional and recessional — though it might be possible to have someone play as part of the service, if we put them in the aisle near the projector.
• There is a black board up front that we would want to cover with something — a poster? a swath of celestial cloth?
• There is a mural painted in the hallway/entryway outside the main planetarium, which could be used as a celestial backdrop for pictures, if we wanted.
• The planetarium is very close to the Ballston area, where we could probably find a nice hotel for the reception.

Arlington Planetarium

We went to see Just Imagine, a show at the Arlington Planetarium. I frankly wasn’t expecting much from such a small planetarium, but the show was quite good! It is broken up into four parts, each asking the viewer to explore different areas of astronomy.

The first section, Just Imagine A Sky Full of Stars, talks about the stars in the night sky, and the constellations. It points out that the pictures seen in various star groupings vary from place to place, and that no one way of describing those constellations is better than another. Astronomers have chosen 87 standard constellations, but only for convenience.

The second section, Just Imagine The Earth Without the Moon, discusses the effects that the moon has had on the Earth over it’s lifetime. The Moon caused the Earth’s rotation to slow, and also causes our tides. In addition, the Moon was our first target for extraterrestrial travel — perhaps without such a close extraterrestrial body, we would not have been so driven to travel off of our world.

The third section, Just Imagine The Last Days of the Universe, introduces the two main theories of the fate of the Universe: infinite expansion or eventual collapse. In the course, dark matter is briefly discussed, and a picture of what the night sky might look like in both scenarios is presented on some future world 15 billion years from now.

Finally, the fourth section, Just Imagine Our sun as a Different Star, talks about the different classes of stars, and how life might be different if our sun was not a run of the mill yellow star.

Overall it was an excellent show.

It also gave me the idea to explore how to fund a planetarium show that either focuses on women in astronomy or somehow relates to the missions I work on. I’m certain there could be a way to develop such a show through an E/PO grant through NASA.

Making Soap

Last weekend I bought some soap-making materials, so I tried making them yesterday and today. They look great! I’m using clear glycerin soap, blue and yellow dyes, honey almond scent, and star and moon shaped small soap molds. Making them is incredibly easy, and I don’t think it should be too much trouble to make enough for all of our guests.

For one tray I used 5 soap cubes (there are 32 cubes in the 2 pound brick of soap that I bought). I melted them for 40 seconds in the microwave, stirred and then cooked for 10 seconds more. Then, while the soap cools a bit, I applied a thin coat of petroleum jelly to the molds. For the blue soaps, the best color mix seems to be 6 drops of blue and one drop of red (making it fairly close to navy-blue). For the yellow soaps, 9 drops of yellow and one drop of red (for a slightly goldish yellow color). I also used 3 drops of scent, and for some of the soaps, I used a small “shake” of glitter. I poured this in the molds, and let it sit for 30-45 minutes. To aid in removing the soaps from the molds, I put the molds in the freezer for 2-4 minutes, and the viola, the soaps came out easily with constant, even pressure by my thumbs on the back. They still need to cure for a while, but the bulk of the work is over!

Now I just need to see if I can get the supplies for less from an online vendor.

The Ring Has Been Ordered!!!!!

We went out today with the thought of comparing diamond prices, since that seemed to be the sticking point. I pretty much knew what setting I wanted, and we had seen it at two places, Bailey Banks & Biddle and Jared. Jared’s price for the setting was less, but they carry the Leo(R) diamond, which I didn’t really want. It’s possible that they carry regular cut diamonds as well, but we didn’t ask about it. Since they aren’t in a mall (they are located in their own building near the Target that we frequent), it’s not as convenient for us to get there.

When we got to the mall, we first stopped at BBB. The salesman showed us a .50 carat diamond with its GIA certs, and it looked pretty good. In fact, it was near colorless with SI1 clarity and good cut (I don’t remember the numbers exactly). Even better, it was within our price range. We also looked at the Tacori settings, and found the one I wanted. It was actually a bit less than at the other BBB were I’d first seen it. On the other hand, it was a bit more than at Jared.

Then we moved on to Christian Bernard. They were in a temporary location in the mall, and seemed a bit disorganized because of it (though, that is not why we didn’t buy their diamond). They showed us a diamond with slightly better color and clarity that the one at BBB, but that was at a lower price. The reason? The cut wasn’t as good. They also didn’t have any settings that struck me. They did have a couple antique-looking settings in platinum, but they were a bit much for me (not price-wise, but too big, too flashy).

Andrew and I talked for a bit after visiting CB to see how we were feeling. We were both very tired of having sales people talking at us, and tired of ring shopping. We decided to just get the whole thing at BBB — both the setting and diamond, even though we could get the setting for ~$100 less at Jared — since that would be the least hassle (and we wouldn’t have to carry around a loose diamond to Jared, which made me a little nervous). We went with the BBB half carat diamond rather than the CB one because of the better cut. Every source we’ve consulted has said that the cut is what really affects the brilliance of a diamond, so it seemed best to skimp just a bit on color and clarity (though both seem just fine to me anyhow) to get a better cut.

I think we’re both relieved that we’ve finally made that decision. I’m happy with it, and very comfortable buying at BBB. (Yay!) Now we just have to wait 6-8 weeks for the ring to arrive. (Sigh)

Jubilant Crown Diamond

I’m a bit concerned that there’s no chatter about this cut of diamond online. I found the Hunt Country Jewelers web page, claiming to be home of the Jubilant Crown Diamond (they are situated in Virginia, interestingly enough). But, of course, one can’t exactly trust the sellers of these diamonds to be completely unbiased about the diamond.

The only other references I found were on Ask The Diamond Guy:

• One guy asks “Have you heard of a jubilent crown cut for a round diamond? Looks like it has 49 facets on the crown instead of 33. It would have different recommended proportions than a normal cut, I guess. Any downsides to a stone like that for an engagement ring?”, and the Diamond guy answers “A jubilant crown cut is a high definition diamond due to the increased number of facets on the crown,” and points the guy to the Hunt Country Jewelers page.
• Another person asks whether the jubilant crown cut should affect the brilliance or the cost of the diamond. The Diamond Guy answers no to both questions.

This leaves me unsure what to do. When I looked at a regular cut diamond and the jubilant crown diamond, I could see a difference — the jubilant crown did seem to have more fire. And maybe that’s my answer. As long as we are happy with our purchase, anyone else’s opinion shouldn’t matter. On the other hand, it’s possible that we could afford either more diamond or more setting if we went with the regular cut.

So…Many…Ideas…

• Possible favors — moon and sun shaped soaps. I bought some materials at Michael’s on Saturday to try and make them myself. This is something that could be done well in advance, as long as the soaps were stored in a relatively cool place (don’t want them melting)
• Possible centerpieces — use navy and yellow pillar candles in combination with a small flower arrangement. I need to play around with this a bit, and see what fresh-cut flowers are available this time of year. Possible downfall — I would need to either arrange the flowers myself or enlist a friend or two who aren’t yet directly involved in the wedding.
• Bouquets — here, too, I think we could just use some flowers that are fresh-cut and tie them with a nice ribbon. Either we could have the florist do this, or order flowers ourselves. The Bridal Bargins book pointed to a California florist online, 2G Roses, who do overnight deliveries of flowers, and it’s possible to get roses for less than $1 per stem. They have a list of flowers that are in season for each month — delphiniums are the only blue flower, and are available in September and October. However, they don’t deliver cosmos, the October flower, because they don’t travel well. I might want to look these up at a local florist to see if its something I want to include.
• Reception Ideas — Brides magazine had a list of 30 things they like to see at weddings, and one struck me as something I would like to include in ours. One was to have wedding pictures from the family at the reception, so we could have wedding pictures from Mom and Dad, his Mom and Dad, our brothers, and maybe our grandparents somehow incorporated into the reception site.
• “Rice” Substitute — there are three things I like: seeds, bubbles, and a sweet-smelling send-off mix from exclusively weddings. (Hmmmm, they don’t seem to have it anymore on their website. Oh well.) I’m thinking that bubbles are the most appropriate, considering how much I love to play with them.
• Cameras — I do want to have one or two of those disposable cameras on each table for guests to take pictures at the reception.