I went to the Wedding Fair yesterday. It was one of those experiences that I have never had before. One reason, there has never been anyone in my family who has gotten married that required my expertise...namely cake tasting!
The idea of a fair is a good one. Vendors set up their displays...so beautifully. Each future bride is given a tiara as she enters and you have the perfect mixture for a highly emotional, fully charged event...where mom just opens her check book and they both say...ooohhhhhh how beautiful!. You could feel the excitment in the air!
It isn't long though before you notice the worry lines showing up on the future brides faces. The little seed of understanding, that as beautiful as this all is...so much of it is financially out of reach. That the fairy tale wedding could put you into a reality of debt...and most likely mom and dad have lost a good chunk of their retirement in the last 3 years.
As I moved through the crowd with a dear friend who agreed to be Franck 3...what would I do without my Franck's...I was on a mission...to find a cake...don't look right or left at all the things that one "needs" to have for a perfect wedding (ie, having your teeth bleached). It was shocking to me that wedding cakes are priced by the slice. With this understanding I started asking..."a cake like this one for 80 people...what is the cost?" The vendor would whip out the calculator and multiple the slice charge by 80...the price ended up being some where between $295 to you name it...there was one vendor who made cakes that cost $12 a slice! Costco was there and you could buy one of their sheet cakes with white frosting decorated with white roses for $16...a cake!
Some of the cakes were works of art, the flowers edible, the design amazing. My favorite was actually one made by The Cake Lady with pinecones and pine boughs...it was so Central Oregon and different...I have always like different...I have always walked to a slightly different drummer.
Although I tasted my share of cake...and pretty much made myself slightly nauseated with all that sweetness...I came to the conclusion that cake represents the wedding in way that is steeped in history. In doing some research I found this entry....
"According to one long-forgotten tradition, the bottom layer of a wedding cake represents the couple as a family, and the top layer represents them as a couple. Each layer in between represents a child you hope to have. "
With that said I have a big job ahead of me...how to convince Peter and Sarah that they need a cake with a least 6 layers...Byron could use a few more siblings...ah, but I am getting ahead of myself...it must be all that sugar!
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