grading papers, bleh...

So one of the many joys of now being in graduate school is the hundreds of papers I get to grade each week now. School has pretty much entirely consumed the last week or so, with little time for wedding planning stuff. I have worked on our Christmas cards a little more. And I've bought most of the stuff for my cake decorating class now. We don't meet this week though. My mom is all excited about making this wedding cake now. The problem is, my mom's idea of a wedding cake, and what I want are two very different things. I absolutely HATE columns on wedding cakes. If I am going to have a tiered cake, it will not have columns. I am still not convinced that I don't want cupcakes, but if I do end up with a cake this is the one I want with slight modifications:

I am also considering having several small cakes displayed on pedestals.