San Francisco Bay Area | December, 2017
I was in the Bay Area for most of December (minus a week in LA), so of course I indulged in the time at home by making things, seeing friends, and also preparing for Tiffany and Greg’s New Year’s Eve wedding! See some of my highlights below. And if you’re curious about my full 2017 recap, go check that out here!
I made my own wreath this year at a workshop led by Little Petunia. It’s still hanging on my door!
I also stopped by a Delancey Street lot and picked up a tiny little Christmas tree. You’ll have to scroll all the way down to see the finished tree.
Being something of an honorary bridesmaid (but also the wedding photographer), I accompanied Tiffany to her final dress fitting! Take a look back at the dress shopping process here and see the final wedding photos here.
On the first weekend of December we also headed up to Sausalito with my Lean In ladies for a tour of Heath Ceramics. This is actually my second time touring the original factory, plus I’ve gone to make my own bud vase twice. So I’m a bit of a Heath fangirl.
I couldn’t leave without adding a serving bowl and platter to my collection.
And then it was time for the first of two craft days this month! First, Crafternoon at Kait’s, where I made some ornaments for my mini tree.
Lunch date with my friend Pam, who’s a watercolor illustrator in Oakland.
Such cute begonias! And a tasty lunch spread.
Our monthly accountability meeting, this time hosted by Meg.
La Tavola holiday party.
I pulled out my sewing machine for the first time in years to make some goodies out of this beautiful Rifle Paper Co. fabric! This was mostly spurred by wanting to make a custom bridal shower gift for Tiffany who shares my love of Rifle Paper. I picked their travel toile pattern, which not only shares Tiffany’s wedding colors of navy & gold, but also features cities around the world in honor of her love of travel, and in particular, I featured the Rio illustration, since she and Greg traveled there together.
Here’s what I came up with! For Tiffany, I gave her the sleep mask and travel pouch with some Rifle Paper x L’Occitane lotion and other little travel goodies inside. I still have more fabric leftover, so we’ll see when I get motivated to sew even more goodies!
I also gifted these two baby dresses that I had started knitting a year ago.
Our Lean In circle for December.
Cocktail Collective! Our inaugural December meetup at Hotsy Totsy in Albany.
Tiffany’s bridal shower! I contributed the lettering for this awesome charcuterie spread put together by Carrie and Joanna.
Carrie made the perfect sugar cookies with Michigan, California, and heart-shaped cookies!
And then Carrie made s’mores cupcakes too. Adorable.
Cheers to the bride-to-be!
Checking out the winter edition of the Piedmont Chamber Music Festival, which featured the entire cycle of Bach Sonatas for Violin and Keyboard, spread across two days.
Afternoon tea with my cousins!
The eclectic spread here at Dartealing is pretty cute.
We meant to go to SFMOMA afterwards, but we neglected to realize it was Wednesday, the one day of the week the museum is closed. Oh well, we made use of my other museum membership and headed to the deYoung instead.
Craft Day number two! This time at my studio, with Do-Hee and Chelsea. Do-Hee continued to make progress on her hat, Chelsea made adorable cacti ornaments, and I made yet another styling board (which appears in the background of Chelsea’s ornament).
Dinner with TAFers since Lester was in town! And we had a special guest appearance by newly published author Stephanie Suga Chen.
Helping my cousin roll out some pasta…
And getting fed beef noodle soup in exchange! WIN.
Christmas day: double feature at the movies, watching Downsized and Star Wars, and then heading to R&G Lounge for delicious crab. And stopping for some tree photos on the way.
Wedding prep: mani-pedi time with Alison, Tiffany, and Carrie!
One of these is not like the others! (Me).
I also went on a breadmaking kick in December, largely because I borrowed a breadmaking ebook from the library. I’ve made sourdough and country loafs before, but this time I tried my hand at sandwich bread, cheesy bread, and flatbread!
Also, I made a ton of alpaca sugar cookies. Adorable. And here’s my very stout little 2′ tree!
Finally, for the last two days of December, Justin came in to town and we drove up to Napa for Tiffany and Greg’s wedding festivities!
Rehearsal dinner at Lucy, where I was partly working but mostly enjoying the delicious meal! And then we headed to Park Winters, where we got to live in a skinny 3-story former windmill with Carrie and Nick. The bed was the size of the entire room/floor and Carrie and Nick had to climb over us to get downstairs to the bathroom, but it was cozy and quaint, and it was 10 yards from all the wedding festivities. And that was it for 2017!
Anna Wu is a wedding and portrait photographer based in San Francisco. She compulsively documents and blogs all of her daily adventures. Follow her on instagram and view more of her professional work at annawu.com.
