Shower The People You Love with...

Not sure why the day before Easter is a desirable date for people to throw parties. As in, the day of both my future sister in law's baby shower and my bridesmaid's bridal shower. Let's list the reasons for going to each, shall we?

Baby Shower
Pros
She is my future sister in law
It is organized by the woman who my future mother in law says would like to plan me a shower
My future mother in law thinks that "I've done everything to exclude her from the wedding" despite my hours long conversations about the color of her dress
FH totally wants me to go
I need to beef up my in-law interaction

Cons
She's having four baby showers. yes, FOUR.
It is in Ohio, on easter weekend, flight prices are already at $250
The drive to Ohio is death because of the state of Pennslyvania and their penchant for 2 lane highways
I would have to stay with in-laws, at the intersection of anger and passive agressive
I need to beef up my in-law interaction

Bridal Shower
Pros
She's one of my bridesmaids
It's local, meaning I could still spend Easter with my family
She's only having one shower, see above
Her FH is a chef, it will be delicious
I heart her already and have no emotional baggage

Cons
I can't be perceived as choosing friends over family
I haven't gotten the invite yet, have received invite for baby shower

Complicating factors
Before I knew about the bridal shower, FH already told his mother that we would try, but probably wouldn't be able to make it that weekend.

Budget Friendly*

Yeah...budget friendly and NYC do not go together. Don't get me wrong, they definitely go together for all the lovely couples down at city hall, on the waterfront or small intimate restaurant celebrations, (all of whom I love and bitterly want to be at various times) but for me....well, I have a 254 person guest list. Thank you over-breeding grandparents. Dad's 1 of 12, Mom's 1 of 4. And yes, there are two priests and a spinster in those numbers who didn't produce children.

We discussed cocktail receptions, I brought up a bbq truck, we thought about renting gyms. Turns out a cocktail reception costs as much as sit down because you 'have to provide continuous food for four hours' yeah, we heard that. FH didn't realize how big the list was and denied the bbq truck/surprise picnic wedding. fatal fiscal mistake. And I'd already rented a school gym for my sister's bridal shower 9 years ago, we were poor and had 100 women for a bridal shower. yup. ridiculous.

So we decided to copy a wedding we loved. My cousin and his wife had a church wedding, greeted people at the door, which I LOVE, and afterwards had a mid-day brunch at a restaurant they rented for the day.

So, budget-friendly meant keeping the cost per person at our venue to under $100 per person. How hard could it be to rent out a restaurant for under $100 a head? v. if you are doing Saturday night in or near NYC.

Then I found kvetch.indiebride.com, where there was a whole thread about Bubby's Brides. Bubby's the brunch spot? with the pies? YES. And message board brides raved. We went, met Jojo, found the price to be justunder $100 with food and drink (not including tax and gratuity) and fell in love.

The best part? We live right across the East River from Bubby's and can point out the building to ourselves.

The worst part? We're getting married in the Bronx and having the party in Brooklyn. Think everyone can handle getting a metro card and a map and figure it out? And my parents think they are getting eggs for dinner, but I can't fix that.

And yes, you have now multiplied $100 by 254 and come up with $25,400. I have too. I know. It's a lot. It's our little part to keep the economy alive.

Lazy about color decisions

Ugh, decisions. They haunt me like the haunt no other Libra out there. I'm feeling pressure, and by pressure I mean I've fielded a few questions from the future MIL, about picking a color scheme. My only rule is no brown. My mother had brown bridesmaids dresses in 1970 and for some reason, they're back. I made fun of her then and my words to one recent bridesmaid were, "at least you can use it as a costume later" but that was for a very specific trend combination: brown + material gathered randomly in the skirt. horrid.

Thanks to Kathryn at Snippet and Ink, my favorite color schemes thus far are:

Pumpkin and Wheat


Burgundy and Blue


Green, White and Black


I'm too lazy to come up with my own!