Working on the details

we prefer to not give too much away, so I'll simply just post some pictures of the final details we've been cranking out in the last few weeks.

75F, Partly Cloudy, zero%

Its waaaay to early to call (considering the last two days has the forecast as rain), and hopefully I'm not cursing anything...not that I believe in that sort of thing...but here's the current forecast for 09.06.09

DJ Doug

One thing that DJ Doug Jastremski of Power Posse asked us to do was to provide him with a list of top ten dancing-type songs ...songs that will be sure winners for both the bride and groom when he notices out on the dance floor, and he might be able to take the energy to the next level.

Sounds like a pretty simple request, but...it turns out...this is a VERY difficult proposition, as there countless songs that I'd love to hear, but I'm pretty sure that I'd be out there by myself, busting out very un-choreographed moves, as most everyone else slowly slinked away, muttering 'what a stupid song...'

And its pretty clear that E and I have different tastes in music, often leaving each other slowly slinking away, muttering 'what a stupid song...'

I'm 100% OK with our different tastes, and actually can really appreciate we both have our own distinct styles and opinions (we ARE two different people, after all...) It is cool that we are actually able to find a good amount of common ground (ie, she's cool with my choices for MIA, Postal Service and I thought for her stuff, the Roots was a cool addition, and I do enjoy most of JayZ's stuff).

And our first dance song, which will remain a mystery for now, was something that we both absolutely love.

So, though I'm sure not all of these songs will be played, I'll leave you with the top ten lists we provided to Doug:

E’s top 10

1. “ Crazy in Love” JayZ Beyonce

2. “ Forever” Chris Brown

3. “ Untouched” Veronicas

4. “ Vivrant Thing” QTip

5. “ Boom Boom Pow” Black Eyed Peas

6. “ Dirt off your shoulder” JayZ

7. “ Step in to your world” KRS One

8. “ I know you want me” Pitbull

9. “ Beware of the boys” Punjabi MC + JayZ

10. “Here I come” the Roots

JC's

1. Body Movin’ (Fatboy Slim remix)-Beastie Boys

2. Excursions or Oh My God-Tribe Called Quest

3. Paper Planes (DFA remix), mix in to Swagger Like Us (JayZ rhymes only ~1:47 in to the song)

4. If it wasn’t for you-Handsome Boy Modeling School

5. 19-2000(soulchild remix)- Gorillaz

6. 1901-Phoenix

7. Such Great Heights-Postal Service

8. Time to pretend-MGMT

9. Ghettochip Malfunction (Hell Yes)-Beck

10. Bamboo Banga or Galang-MIA

Hilarious email from Kevin

From: Kevin Cimo
Sent: Wednesday, August 26, 2009 11:49 PM
To: Brendan Greene
Cc: Tetreault, Jean-Claude; jason telles
Subject:

hey, what did you guys do to yourselves. you look like sh*t here.

http://travel.webshots.com/photo/1278744692066027756RaqFEX

It runs in the family...

Spent a few hours in Acushnet today...Esther had another wedding dress fitting with Aunt Norma. She graciously offered her time and sewing expertise to crank out more tablecloths for the wedding. Mom has already put in some serious time on her retro cool 1970s era Orange and Yellow adorned Singer, but as both the wedding and school year draw near, she understandably felt the need to go to the bullpen.


The tablecloths are done, save a bit of pressing, but they really look beautiful...an unbleached natural fabric, full of character.

When we arrived, my mom was busy working on her lesson plan, Norma busily buzzing away on the tablecloths, and my Pop cutting, processing and making more of his soon-to-be famous hot sauce (this batch had his homegrown Serrano and cayenne). Norma took a break from the tablecloths, and whisked Esther away for some covert wedding gown tinkering at the other end of the house.

So, I took my usual stroll around the garden, checking the status of various trees, shrubs and perennials I had planted years ago. The Asian pears I transplanted from my city garden plot are heavy with fruit, and the pee gee hydrangea that we'll be cutting for the wedding are looking beautiful, a pure ivory color, somehow unfazed by the tropical heat and haze over the last week. They are heavy, soaked with last nights rain...almost fully opened now, just two weeks away from being taken to our florist who will add them as a personal addition to the arrangements.

Sitting around chatting about the wedding to-do list, Pop disappeared to the storage closet upstairs. He soon returned with a not-new looking gift box, and a plastic comforter bag, with something carefully packed with tissue paper inside. As he wiped the dust away from the box, he explained that Grandmaman, shortly before her death, had made me and my as yet unknown bride embroidered table cloths with matching napkins and quilt with matching pillow shams.


I felt humbled, solemn and very close to her all at once...I was pretty quiet, snapping pictures, wanting to be sure that I could remember those feelings, hoping that these pictures could help.

Then I looked around at my family, smiling back at me, and had a sense of ...just, well, just like I was at Home, surrounded by true family, people who, without a second thought, see it as a family right, a privilege to make these truly meaningful contributions to our wedding with their own skills, talents and efforts.

Wedding Beers, good to go!

Best man Jason and I had a great time finishing the image transfers on to the bumble and pot & kettle wood beer cases that will help transport the beers from Boston down to Ct for the wedding (2 weeks?!).

Just need to give the wood a coat of oil, apply the labels to the bumble and the 2nd half of the pot&kettle, and the task is finished. Ok, so maybe I'm not completely done...

We also had our hand at waxing the pot & kettle (thanks to all that voted for the oatmeal stout) bottles to finish the could-be-a-commercial beer appearance for our momentous day.

I really enjoyed this process...of course, I love to make beer, but knowing it was going to (hopefully) be enjoyed by our guests, involving and getting help, feedback and recommendations from so many of my closest friends and family, and the full support of Esther on this project...well, that is what I'll remember most about it.

For more details, tasting notes, and pictures, head on over to:
http://www.trilliumbrewing.blogspot.com/

Tailoring the suits

J, B and I went downtown yesterday to get our suits tailored by Brendan's standby tailor-man in preparation for the big day. We went with relatively modern but casual two button notch collar suits, flat front pants. Opted for some nice textured fabrics for subtle interest.

The tailoring process was pretty quick and painless, albeit reeeeaaaaalllly sweaty from traipsing around downtown Boston in the 95F heat and 142% humidity.

Kevin's completely perfect and symetrical body needed no tailoring, so he was conspicuously absent from these shots.

Guest book ordered

Esther and I wanted a little something more personalized than a guest book w/ blank lined pages, so we opted to use blurb, a great online custom book making website. You can download some very intuitive software and work with either a template they provide, or whip up your own 'from scratch'.

Just ordered it tonight, so we don't have it in our pre-wedding frantic hands, but you can flip through the first few pages of it...virtually, of course.

click HERE!

Bachelor Fishin' Weekend

My buds and pop took me down to Newport last weekend for my bachelor party...we rolled in to our rented house Friday night, and went out for a great laid back dinner, hit up 7Eleven for some breakfast staples, and watched the sox game back at the house over a couple beers.

The next AM, some scrambled eggs with a bit of de-seeded crazy bastard jalapeno, bacon and english muffins started the day off right.

Prior to the trip, I had strongly urged the guys to forgo the raunchier options in in lieu of something that had the potential to be a little more vertigo and nausea inducing...so, after breakfast, we left the house at quarter of 7 for the docks, they had chartered day boat for a fishing trip.

We brought a cooler with some ice and some great beers, hoping to swap out the contents with some unlucky marine friends

...and though our captain said our take was pretty light, it was more than enough food for the guys. We hauled a bluefish, a just-over-the-size limit striped bass, and two black sea bass. Pop was hauling 'em up left and right, but mostly smaller stuff. J, Kev and I seemed to all come in behind Pop, but B...poor, poor B. He caught one lonely, measly, itsy, bitsy tiny 3 inch baby scup, despite our constant admonishing for him to catch a real fish.

I'll leave you with some shots from the day, and (WARNING) carnage, and beautiful simple meal that followed.

now, a little food porn...

Started the meal with the above bluefish cakes + quick homemade aoili.

Then on to the crusted striper, pork belly braised (homegrown) blue potato, and grilled summer squash from my pop's garden. What a great meal...

Cake stand from a tree

After looking through quite a few images of how a wedding cake could be displayed, we wanted something that looked relatively natural, but with design elements that really could tie alot of other aspects of the day together. We decided on individual/different cakes displayed separately on wood platforms.

The various cakes would then have piping that mimicked the green branch on our invite stationary, and various other natural floral additions would be made. Not sure if the frosting would be a white, or more of a natural ivory color...probably the latter.

During a trip to Acushnet this past weekend, my dad showed us the cake stands that he and my Uncle Richard created by rough cutting sections of a tree trunk with a chain saw, then planing them to level (very important, though I suppose we could always just shim them, if they are less than perfect).

They still need to dry out a bit next to the dehumidifier in my parent's basement, then we'll take a stiff wire brush to clean off any excess bark and lose material, maybe then lightly sand, and probably spray a coat of poly or maybe just rub w/ a bit of tung or linseed oil. The individual cakes will be on the usual bakery cardboard foundations, so no worries there about cake compatibility.