Cupcakes! Perfect for a wedding dessert station!

Cupcakes bring back lots of memories for me. I specifically remember always loving my birthdays in elementary school, because my mom would always bring a huge box of chocolate cupcakes from the local grocery store, so my classmates could all celebrate with a tasty treat. No knives, forks, or plates needed. Just two little hands around one big cupcake, and I felt like a cupcake queen.

A couple of weeks ago, I was in New York City and had the opportunity to try some mini cupcakes from Crumbs Bake Shop. It was a variety pack of 12 different flavors, and I immediately thought that this would be such a fun and colorful display for a wedding dessert station! The flavors were everything from chocolate chip mint, to oreo, to marshmallow, to coffee, to strawberry swirl, and they were all delicious!

New York City definitely has a lot of cupcake shops, such as Crumbs and Sugar Sweet Sunshine, but how about something more local around Boston?

Well, Boston is in luck! Sweet is a charming bakery that bakes fresh and gorgeous cupcakes each morning. They have one location in the Back Bay, and just opened up a new location in Harvard Square.

photos from Sweet

Aren't these the perfect little wedding cupcakes? I think any guest would love to see a table filled with these delicately decorated treats.

~Emilie

ASPIRE Mother's Day Brunch, May 9th!

I have the privilege of being the event coordinator for ASPIRE's First Annual Mother's Day Brunch on May 9th at the Hyatt Regency Cambridge. This is going to be a fabulous event, and a wonderful opportunity to hear some inspirational speakers. Here is some more information on the event.

Asian Sisters Participating in Reaching Excellence, Inc. (ASPIRE)
celebrates Mother's Day by recognizing exceptional Asian American women.


1st Annual Mother’s Day Brunch – A Fundraiser for ASPIRE
Riverside Pavilion, Hyatt Regency Cambridge, 11:00AM-2:00PM

Emceed by Channel 7 News Anchor Frances Rivera, the event is co-chaired by Tracy Palandjian, Managing Director, The Parthenon Group, Cheng Imm Tan, Director, Mayor’s Office of New Bostonians, and Dr. Faith Kim, Chair, Intercultural Education, Golden Gate Baptist Theological Seminary. The event is coordinated by Pink Orchid Weddings, and sponsored by Hyatt Regency Cambridge, It’s About Time, and Drs. David and Faith Kim.

In addition to honoring our mothers and hearing inspirational words of advice from our co-chairs, the event will also include a spoken word poet, music by Sam JC Lee and Takeshi Ohbayashi, a live and silent auction of prizes ranging from a day of healthy cooking by Chef German Lam, gift certificates to restaurants Myers & Chang and Elephant Walk, a signed Yao Ming jersey and many more wonderful items. Proceeds will go towards ASPIRE’s general operating funds. To purchase tickets to this event, please click here.

About ASPIRE:
Founded in 2001, ASPIRE was established to empower Asian American high school and college girls with career development and leadership skills through shared experiences and mentoring. ASPIRE aims to mentor and serve Boston-area young Asian women who seek to better navigate the lifetime of opportunities and career choices ahead, make the most of their academic and extracurricular college experiences, and learn from their Asian American sisters’ accomplishments and insights. For more information, go to www.girlsaspire.org.

Hope to see you there!
~Emilie

The Guilded Bride on Sunday, April 26th!

Our accomplished friend Allison is hosting a fabulous event next week. If you are getting married around Boston and are available on Sunday, April 26th, don't miss out! We hope to join in on the fun at the next event!

Here's more information about the “Guilded Bride” event:

click on the flyer to view full version

Polished Wardrobe Advising has partnered with Guilded Boston to host this unique event on Sunday, April 26th, from 12 noon-5:00 p.m. at The Algonquin Club, a beautiful, historic venue in the heart of Boston. What makes our event truly unique is that the venue will be set up more like an intimate wedding than a typical bridal show, which can be overwhelming for the bride-to-be. We've invited a fabulous group of vendors, but only one or two for each wedding specialty. While guests enjoy crudités and champagne cocktails, giveaways and goodie bags, they can peruse cherry-picked wedding vendors interspersed throughout the brownstone's interconnecting rooms, offering samples and creating relationships. We've focused on those who specialize in custom work, ensuring that each bride’s special day is completely personalized under their guidance.

Guilded models will stroll the rooms for the afternoon, serving as the “wedding party” featuring our vendor’s floral creations, formal wear, and jewelry designs. And finally, music will add to the wonderfully intimate atmosphere. BE Wedding Entertainment will feature three fabulous musical talents each hour: First Place, featuring Mark Greel, DJ Shyne, and the Boston Chamber Players.

Tickets are $5 per person when you pre-register online (http://www.guildedboston.com/bridal/), or $10 at the door.

Have a great time!

~Fiona

Inspiration from Japan - A Cherry Blossom Card

Cherry blossom season in Japan only lasts for 10 days, so to plan a trip to Japan and get the timing right is nearly impossible. Luckily for me, my trip to Japan last month was at the start of an early cherry blossom season, and I was able to see a few beautiful trees here and there that were starting to flower.

So one of the few things that I brought back with me from Japan was some custom card inspiration. My friend, Elizabeth, celebrated her birthday last week, and I spent some time trying to recreate the beauty of those cherry blossoms in a birthday card for her. She loved the end result, and even though the card only has one single line of words and a cherry blossom tree, I think it makes quite a statement. The chocolate metallic envelope was addressed in white ink, and the pearlescent white card was covered with hundreds of dots of pink glitter to give each flower blossom a bit of sparkle and texture.

I love how the second photo captures how the glitter changes to different color tones in the sunlight. If you have an idea for a custom card, email me at info@pinkorchiddesigns.com!

~Emilie

Cheap Orchids and Rainbows of Ribbon.. What?!?

Yes, exactly. What?!? Where?!? Well, unfortunately, this post isn't talking about Boston.

I had the privilege of recently traveling to Hong Kong and Japan for two weeks, and enjoyed everything from shopping to sight seeing, with tons of eating in between. But, the two things that I wanted to share were actually both in Hong Kong.

There was a flower district in HK that contained more orchids than I have ever seen in my entire life. The kicker of it all was that all of these gorgeous orchid plants in an array of colors were only $5 each, and I couldn't take any home with me! There were some varieties that I had never seen before in my life, and others like the phalaenopsis orchid that I absolutely love (especially the pink ones!). I think that if Boston had orchids priced at $5 each, everyone would have orchids in their homes, at their weddings, and anywhere else you can think of!

In another section of HK, there is an area that is meant for craft lovers. There are literally whole city blocks and blocks just dedicated to selling beads, ribbon, and rhinestones. Then after going though multiple blocks of every variation of ribbon you could ever think of, I started to see buttons! I didn't go much further past the first few stores of buttons, but I could only imagine how many blocks of buttons there were! I heard about this area from a Boston bride, Jen (we're the DOCs for her August 2009 wedding), and she said that when she was browsing through the ribbon in HK, she thought of me! Thanks for giving me directions, Jen! So basically, if Boston had ribbon resources like they do in Hong Kong, I would be in ribbon heaven. *sigh*

As much as I wanted to buy tons of ribbon that day, I actually only ended up purchasing some rhinestones and feathers. It's hard to purchase ribbon to use on projects, because when I run out, I would never be able to get it again unless I fly across the world. But, overall, it was great to get to see and feel everything!

~Emilie

Wedding Day of Coordinator in Boston

Wedding season is about to come into full swing, and we thought it would be nice to give a quick highlight on our Blush package. This package is all about wedding Day of Coordination. Many times, an engaged couple spends months or even years planning their big day, and with so many different components to a wedding like eight different vendors, the menu cards, the chair sashes, the caterer, the guestbook, the champagne flutes, or even those handy bathroom baskets, who makes sure that all of these details are in the right place at the right time?

The couple could ask their mothers to help, or their bridal party, or their friends, or their relatives, but a couple of things could happen. One, is that everything falls into place, but whoever is doing a great job organizing everything, is probably not able to really enjoy the wedding. Or two, everything doesn't fall into place and the couple is upset because all of those hours laboring over the handmade favors are gone to waste because they were misplaced by the very distant relative. Well, that may be a bit of an extreme case, but definitely a possible one.

The solution for all of this would be to hire a Day of Coordinator (DOC). A DOC usually comes into the picture about a month or two before the wedding to help put together timelines, to gather all of the details, and to confirm all of the vendors. Then on the day of the wedding, the DOC will be there to manage the entire wedding day, make sure that vendors are where they are supposed to be, set up all of the place cards, table cards, and guestbook, direct the processional, and take care of any other issues that may arise so that the couple does not have to worry about a single thing.

We absolutely love weddings, and really enjoy what we do. Plus, if we're both available on a wedding day, we love working together so you would actually get two DOCs!

So, if you think you might need a DOC for your Boston area wedding, or know a couple who might need one, please take a look at the full list of services under our Blush package on our website and contact us at info@pinkorchidweddings.com.

~Emilie