Sco's ring

I am in love with Sco's ring - not as much as I'm in love with him, but the ring is awesome.

We found this Japanese artist living in Brooklyn who makes these rings and other jewelry on NOTCOT.org, a wonderful blog of art and design that Sco looks at just about every day. Her name is Sakurako Shimizu.

Sakurako takes a voice recording and then laser cuts a hole through metal in the shape of the sound wave form generated by the sound recording program. She makes necklaces of giggles, bracelets of bell chimes, and wedding bands of a spouse saying "I do" or something else.

Giggle Necklace

I Do Wedding Bands

We recorded my voice saying "I love you" and sent it in an email to Sakurako. We met with her in Brooklyn to discuss the ring and which metal she should use. She is so sweet. Apparently, we're the first people for whom she's made jewelry that she's actually met. She bought us brunch, too. :) We were smitten with her (Sco's cringing at the use of that word, I'm sure) and her jewelry, but I only just learned that she's socially responsible, too! She only uses 100% recycled gold and precious metals from Hoover and Strong. And her prices are very reasonable. I just loved the whole experience.

Our rings together on a funky flower

Eco-wah?

Have I told you about our plates? When my caterer said he might not have the staff to use real dishes, he suggested disposable plates. I said I wanted to have a "green" wedding. He said, "No problem. We can get green plastic plates." Yeah... not what I meant. We started thinking of eco-friendly, disposable options (though it did occur to me to ask people to bring their own plates.) We looked into bamboo plates since bamboo (a grass) is much easier to replace than trees, but it didn't seem to be all that biodegradable. Styrofoam was obviously not an option. Plastic didn't seem very good either. Enter Verterra.


Their plates are pretty, made from renewable resources, chemical free, and are fairly traded.


After collecting fallen leaves that would normally be burned, Verterra applies steam, heat and pressure to transform the leaves into durable products that will naturally compost in 2 months.

VerTerra products are made in South Asia, where employees receive fair wages in safe working conditions and are provided access to health care.

Fire!

My hanging jar lanterns with candles have been approved! I met with the grounds keeper at the site today expecting him to take one look at my sample lantern and go, "You want to put THAT in MY trees?!? Fire in a jar held up by twine?!" Instead, he said, "Oh, that? That's no problem. I'll even have my guys hang those up for you." SWEET!!



Sco and I tested them out recently and they look gorgeous!! I jumped around all giddy then and today. I'm glad there's more giddiness than screaming and pulling my hair out. Over all, there has been little in the way of panic during this whole wedding planning process.

Happy! :)

Jars, jars, jars

Every nook and cranny of my apartment is filled with jars. My friends and I have been collecting them for use in our wedding - hopefully as hanging lanterns, but that will depend on what the fire marshal says.

In spite of having so many free jars on hand to recycle in this lovely way, I think I need to buy some jars. Cookie jars, specifically.

As I've mentioned, we're having cookies instead of cake. While the caterer will provide the cookies, he will not provide the pretty jars to put them in. And I don't usually buy my pickles and salsa in 3 gallon glass jars.

So, I'm on the lookout for cute, vintage-ish cookie jars. Preferably clear. Go forth, my jar-hunting minions...






empty jar photo credit: P.J. McAdie, flickr

cookie jar source: Real Simple

Flowers in jars and bottles - yes!

Look! Someone else did flowers in jars and bottles! And I think she might have stolen my groom - well, maybe just his name. Check out Wendy and Scott's beautiful wedding at Martha Stewart's site. They do have really pretty jars and bottles. I might need to work on my collection. I have my eye on my friends' bottle of maple syrup liqueur I saw last night. They have been expressly instructed to give me the bottle when they're done. :)