Purple Passion

Oh how I love purple. It encompasses a lot in my life. It used to be most of my wardrobe (I’ve gotten away from that.) When I see purple jewelry I have to remind myself of all the “pretty shiny pieces” I have at home. In fact at work I have a deal with a co-worker that I get to wear purple every day of the week except Friday, which she’s taken.

I blame my mother for this purple obsession. Let’s take a time machine back to my Kindergarten class in 1984. At the end of the year we got to take home the felt sign in the shape of a crayola crayon that had our name on it. My favorite color was red at the time. When I brought my felt sign home it was purple and I was devastated because it wasn’t red. I remember my mom telling me it was okay because you know what, purple was her favorite color. So then purple was my favorite too! Funny how that happens with 6 year olds.

Pretty in……. Purple
After that I have no idea when purple really became my favorite but it is. Funny thing is that it is also a best friend of mine’s favorite too. But when it came for her getting married she decided on red, black and ivory instead. A choice her and her fiancée made as a nod to his asian heritage she said. I’m not that nice I told Chris our color was purple. Apparently she’s nicer than me.

So flash back to the present day and into the thicket of wedding planning. Purple was always my choice for my wedding color. Purple dresses, ribbons, napkins, flowers and whatnots. Anything that we have a choice on I’d like it to be purple. And to accent that color I’d like to use gold. Wait for it, wait for it. ……. Are you there yet? Minnesota Viking’s colors are purple and gold. My brother said if people heard about the colors they’d show up in Viking jerseys. I don’t care as long as they show up. Just to make it clear I couldn’t care less about Vikings or football in general. Chris likes the Vikings but he doesn’t get all twisted up about them. In a nutshell I like purple, I like gold. Tada! Purple and gold!

Pick a peck of purples

The other day Chris’ mom Elaine asked me what kind of purple I decided on. Um……. Purple purple? Um, plum purple? Oh whoa. It hit me; yeah what kind of purple DO I want? I mean WE want. (Truthfully Chris doesn’t care about this as much as the more fun parts of the wedding.)
So I went to Menards and found paint samples for inspiration. And I had figured as soon as I pick out what color I’ll get enough samples for all involved. Easy to show to the bridal stores so they don’t come out with something closer to puke than purple.

Silly thing is I knew there are many purples when she asked me. I went to college for advertising and graphic design. So I should have been ready for this question. Pantone is the company that makes the premiere color swatches everyone in the industry uses. I’d love to get my hands on a pantone book, but paint chips are a close cheap second.

So I grabbed all the purple paint chips I could find and narrowed them down to the dark purples. They have funny names which I guess tries to make them stand out. Here are the rejected ones:
Mirabella, Violet Prism, Crayola Violet DK69, Noble Crown, Crushed Grapes, Purple Onyx, Pansy Petal, Purple Coneflower, Aurora Morn, Royal Plum, Plush Purple, Imperial Purple, Pageant Pansy, Royalty, Pretty Polly Plum, Crocus Purple, Byzantine Purple, Cleopatra’s Gown, Elderberries, and my favorite name if not color, Paddywack.

So with all those to choose from it is a sure bet I was overwhelmed by all the awesome purple-ness! I finally narrowed it down to three, consulted Chris, narrowed it down to two then……… one.

The contenders; Boysenberry Frost (red-ish purple), Perfectly Purple (plain purple) and Precious Gift (has the most red of the three). Chris nixed Precious Gift. So it was up to me to decide between the last two. Who knew one stinking color could be so difficult to decide on!

And the winner in the race is………. Perfectly Purple because it is a plain and the easiest to match up. Now I just need to go and steal, um I mean procure, the rest of the Perfectly Purple paint samples from Menards….
Ah…….decision made!