A Calmer, Gentler Me

Woe is me! Not really, but boy was I feeling that way on Saturday! As many of you may know, since I've started dating A.P., who thanks to genetics will be perpetually slender for life, I've gained an unmentionable amount of weight. Seriously. It's like a 2nd grade child I drag around all day. As many you may also know, A.P. and I had a cake tasting event to attend on Saturday. Leave it to old Hank to rear his his ugly head on Saturday. After trying to find something, anything that fit and that I was comfortable in for about 30 minutes, I finally gave up in a fit of self-pity, half-crying and half-yelling at my closet and all its contents, not to mention at my reflection in the mirror. I've never had such a terrible time trying to lose weight! It's been terrible. We had a family get-together Saturday afternoon/early evening, and because it was taking me so damn long to get my act together, and because my tantrum lasted about 20-30 minutes, we didn't make it to the cake tasting. Now mind you this was a bridal expo type thing, not an actual appointment with our baker, so I don't feel that bad. But I do feel bad about acting like an infant with A.P., who for a little while humored me and tried to make me feel better before finally giving up and just leaving me to get myself together.

So yeah, no more angry rants on Friday dances, no more woe is me. My apartment is finally clean, I'm almost done with my back porch, and I've almost got all my little projects around the house done! And it's not technically July yet, so I met my goal to get it done before we get deep into the summer and it's too late!

Now, on to some wedding related crap, er, stuff. Have you guys seen what Dana over at The Broke Ass Bride has been up to? No, not her awesome Fresh Prince rap! I'm talking about the FANTASTIC idea behind her new web endeavor, Bride$hare. Basically, it's a website where brides can share the cost of wedding related crap, er, stuff. Seriously though, it's kind of a brilliant idea! I joined on Friday and though I haven't had time to peruse the site quite yet, I'm hoping it will be a cool way to save some money. Then I can splurge on more important things. Like shoes. Beautiful, beautiful shoes.

photo via The Ethical Style Blog

Anybody else trying to get their weight under control before the big day? Or just in general? If so, got any good tips? I know what I need to do, but I'm not above quick fixes either. : O )

I'd Rather Dance with You

photo by me!

This Friday dance might end up getting a little heated. I can't help it. I can feel the anger fires growing inside me. But before I get all worked up, here's a recap of my favorite stuff this week. It's short, but sweet! Or at least as short and sweet as I could manage to get it!

First, Nole at Oh So Beautiful Paper featured these lovely textile pretties, and then Janice at Scissor Variations, the blog of Papier Valise, showed us a most lovely way to display them. Imagine a beautiful painted wall with just this little heart pinned to it! It would be fantastic, no??

Speaking of decorating, how fresh and pretty are these centerpieces that Victory Bird at A Tale of Two Brides' friends made for her recent shower? I've been wanting to use mason jars in my wedding for some time, but I haven't thought of a way to do it, yet. I'm starting to think about ripping off these lemon lovelies.

photos via A Tale of Two Brides

Now, if you're like Victory Bird, and you're going to have a MOH, and some MOHettes (otherwise known as bridesmaids), I implore you to please have fun, patterned bridesmaid dresses like these. Or if you can't do patterns, at least do solid, but fun, color coordination. Do it for me, your dear old pal Marty, who isn't having bridesmaids.

Do you love moo cards like me? Then check these out. Some great project ideas from Vera at A Splendid DIY $10K Wedding! I especially love the save the dates! And if you don't want to DIY the save the dates, then go, go now and enter Oh So Beautiful Paper's giveaway! Yes. I'm ordering you around.

If you want fancy weddings to drool over, go here. If you want courthouse chic, go here. If you want gorgeous floral arrangements, go here. That's right. I'm ordering you around again. Get going. If you're hungry for celery and peach hued inspiration, go here. (I'm hungry for those key lime cupcakes!) If you want pure, unadulterated romance, go here. It's total girlporn. This one is my favorites.

photo via Green Wedding Shoes

Okay, let's talk about cake toppers. I saw this on Gangsta Bride. It's got Polaroids. Did you really think I wouldn't feature it here??? Then, my friend from across the pond, the Half-Breed Swede, emailed me the other day with these pictures:

photos by The Half-Breed Swede, emailed to me

The Half-Breed Swede (which is my new, most awesomely, awesome nickname for her...it just came to me) is one of two friends who knows about the surprise and the blog. Because I've been friends with her for 9 years now (good GOD!), and because she lives so far away, she has to know. It wouldn't be a proper wedding without her! Anyway, her friend, Anne made these cake toppers for a friend's wedding. She modeled the suit and dress after what the bride and groom were wearing. They're so detailed and lovely, I just had to feature them on a Friday dance. If you're interested in having Anne make one for you, drop me an email and I'll have her people call you. Or she can just email you. Whatever. (PS. I love that the groom has his hand ever so tastefully placed on the bride's ass. Yes. Awesome.)

Finally, there has been some debating around the blogosphere about judging people based on their budgets. I find it pretty annoying that everything has to get so political, and we can't just focus on pretty cake toppers and what we like/dislike and want to have/don't want to have, and move on. But, since so many people brought it up, I might as well throw in my judgmental two cents, right? A.P. and I aren't asking our parents to contribute to our wedding. We're adults, and it's 2009, we're capable of saving and paying for it on our own. That being said, neither of us wants to blow a ton of cash on a one day event, even if it is a big deal. We'd rather have a marriage, not a wedding. We'd also rather have a house. Haha. As of now, the numbers we're batting around are between 5K and 7K. No more than 10K. I'm going to try to DIY as much as I can, with A.P.'s help, and we'll cut corners and cost wherever we can. We also are keeping our budget low because of me. Because I work with a lower income population, and because I didn't grow up with a lot of money, I find it very hard to justify throwing so much of it away on one day. I also find it somewhat irresponsible to blow so much money when there are so many other, more lasting ways to use that money. Also, because of this part of me that believes in social justice, it seems wrong, especially in light of our recent economic downturn, to blow 50K on a wedding! A one day affair! I don't give a flying fuck if it comes off as judgmental. I really don't. My judgement is my problem. Not anyone else's. I have never judged a marriage by its wedding budget. NEVER. One of the loveliest weddings I've ever been to easily cost $40-50K, and I was happy to see those people get married. So please, spare the lecture. But if you must bring it up, it must be said that to talk about budget and picking and choosing what you need and what you don't need, and writing about hating the WIC, and then to write posts about how everyone shouldn't be judgmental about budget, well, it seems hypocritical to me. If you're going to tell everyone to mind their own business, maybe you start by minding your own business. And for Christ's sake...stop being so political. It's wedding planning.

Geesh - I forgot!

I meant to post about this right before last week's Friday dance, and instead, given my recent listlessness a week later, it finally makes its way to the blog. Congrats to Michele, over at A Surprise Wedding, and her now hubby, Eric. I've been reading Michele's blog for a little while since Kyley at Fringe Magazine alerted me to her site. I was so excited to see how a surprise wedding would play out, so I'm not going to lie when I tell you that I was a wee bit disappointed when they ended up telling everyone the surprise! On the other hand, I'm always just so happy when all my blogladies get married and everything works out and nobody, you know, dies or gets hurt or has large centerpieces fall on their heads. Plus the after wedding bliss posts are always the sweetest! So, another single lady bites the dust...congrats, Michele!


PS. You want a lesson in budgeting? Check out Michele's budget on the sidebar of her blog! Talk about a budget bride! And you know I'm secretly excited that a Holga camera was part of her budget, given my love for its cousin, the Diana F+.

It's Too Hot to Blog

A.P. asked me yesterday why I hadn't blogged yet this week? I replied, "It's too hot to blog!" And it is. It's been in the high 80s here lately, and today it rained and hit a high of 95! Can you say hot and muggy? Gross. I'm constantly sweating, and feel like taking four showers a day! The good news is that my summer job is in a non-air conditioned building! Wait, did I say good news? I meant ridiculous bullshit.

Besides being too hot to blog, it's also too hot to wedding plan or do anything else for that matter. The dog and cat are dead to the world, lying around our apartment, looking as if the heat has sucked all the life out of them (and we have air conditioning!). I said I would start going back to the gym this week, to help get rid of Hank, and I haven't done that. I'm so tired everyday from working in the heat, and from being hot on the commute, and yeah...these days I'm just feeling so listless.

But there's hope ahead, ladies (and mr. nichols)! This weekend A.P. and I are going cake tasting, and perhaps I can get him to stop by my maybe venue on the way home? We'll see, either way, I'll at least be over my languidness and back to my old, not so damn hot (and let's be clear, I mean heat, not good looks. I'm still totally hot in that regard! : 0 P ) self.

Finally, I'd like to express my deepest sorrow for a blog friend. I read yesterday's post this afternoon and was floored. My mouth was open for several minutes. I really just couldn't believe it. I have had a couple of friends call off their engagement in the last year, and it is just so heartbreaking each time, even if it was for a good reason. It's so hard and emotionally draining for these friends, and I really do feel them. It seems there are never good enough words to offer up as some kind of solace. Anyway, I don't know the circumstances of the situation above, so I don't want to judge it as being good/bad in any way, but I do want to give her a big e-hug and hope that she's doing okay. Because as I told my closest friend who called off her engagement late last year, it's not about anything else besides her own well being (she was worried about telling family and friends); that's all that matters.

Dance All Night

photo by me!

As promised, here's a Dance Friday post for you! This includes stuff from last week, too, since the FILs were here visiting. But some stuff is just too good to not post even though it's a little, tiny bit old. Like Liz's chocolate mustaches and noses:

photo via avoision

Liz is Felix at avoision's fiancee and though I've posted about her awesomeness before, she really has gone above and beyond this time. Check out the latest favors she made! Chocolate mustaches and noses for her candy bar! How cool are those? Plus how freaking adorable is that picture of the two of them with their little chocolate face accessories? Liz=kitchen genius!

Speaking of genius, I'm loving Miss Bunny at Weddingbee's homemade place card holders. She's got a great attitude about not spending money and she fashioned these out of old cookie cutters and wire. And though that might sound a little too MacGuyver-ish to you, they totally rock. Check them out here.

Little details like the place card holders are my favorite thing about wedding planning. I know when people show up to my wedding eventually most of them probably won't notice, but I know there's always those two or three people who appreciate the little quirky details, like my friend Mimi's post about this totally unique cake topper. Although A.P. isn't the tall one, I am. I'm thinking we'll need a bride ostrich. Haha! Mimi was really on a roll, too, because she also posted these pictures of her arrangements from her own wedding. I'm loving all the different white vases. Fantastic! But I expect nothing less from someone who came up with such an awesome guest book.

I'm loving all the Save the Dates that Brooklyn Bride has been posting lately. But I adore these and those. These because I love photobooths, and those because I heart The Little Prince! So much so, I've been trying to figure out a way to incorporate him into our invites! No such luck yet, though. And though Brooklyn Bride also featured these, I saw them first at Once Wed.

So, as many of you know, I'm a city girl. A big city girl, born and raised. And with the city life comes the train. If you're from Chicago, it's the "L". Anyway, as many of you also know, I heart me some Jeremy Lawson Photography. And if you live a hop, skip and a jump from Logan Square, then these pictures will make you swoon. I've told A.P. a million times that I want to take train photos on our big day. He doesn't get it at all, but I'm hoping these photos will convince him. Look at that train rushing past behind them as they kiss! I love it! (Btw, go check out the original...my polaroid doesn't do it justice!)

photo via Jeremy Lawson Photography

Speaking of wedding photography, you heard it here first: Fuck balloons, shopping carts are the new trend. Seriously.

Good God this is a long post! That's why you don't ever stop blogging! But it's worth it, right? Especially if you didn't already catch these weddings: Bowen & Brett at Green Wedding Shoes, Emily & Chris at Snippet & Ink, and Wren Handmade's wedding as featured at Once Wed. Part of what drew me to all three of these weddings were the clothes. Chris gives good suit, and I'm in love with Laura from Wren Handmade's dress!

photo via Once Wed

photo via Snippet & Ink

Finally, since A.P. and I will celebrate our three year anniversary in a month, this post with all it's sparkler fun reminded me of our first date, when we made a cake and lit sparklers on my back porch. It was fantastic, and I, like Something's Hiding in Here, am looking forward to the next set of adventures!

photo via Something's Hiding in Here

Have a greet weekend, everyone!

The Comeback Tour

Hey there! It's nice to be back, y'all! Hope you didn't miss me too much! Well, the FILs are gone...thank God! We had A.P.'s brother and his family in town for almost a full week, and it was...interesting. I really felt towards the end that my relationship with A.P. would not survive, which is really uncool. I will spare you all the details, but needless to say that in the future, I think it will be A.P. who entertains them and I will jump in once and a while and show my face. Basically it comes down to the fact that I'm not trying to impress them: I'm okay with who I am and where and how I live. They really were not here to visit (they spent a grand total of 15 minutes at our apartment in the entire week they were here!), they were on vacation and basically happened to be on vacation in the city in which we live. And because of that fact, the whole trip felt like bullshit (to me, anyway), and as you may have figured out, I have a low tolerance for bullshit. Plus they have a kid who they baby and who runs the show, and last time I checked, I'm a grown-ass woman! I don't plan my life around a five year old. And having nannied for many, many years, I won't be a mother who does that either. So...yeah...not the best "vacation." But, I'm back and that's all over, and A.P. and I are now in a much, much better place.

photo by me (A.P. and the dog taking a nap)

Anyway, I'm happy to report that I've had a couple of big improvements in the A.P. wedding planning front *and* I've managed to catch up on my blogs, and so there will be a Friday dance this week! Double yay!

So, since last we talked about A.P.'s involvement in the wedding planning progress, he had picked up the Real Simple Weddings issue and flipped through it. That was a month ago or so. He has not picked it up since. Last week though, he comes home and he hands me a newspaper and says, "Here! I thought you might be interested in this. I read it and it's pretty interesting." I look down and the cover article is all about weddings in our city! My first concern was, is my potential venue in there? Because that would really suck. I'd like to think that my potential venue is the best kept secret and the thought of it being featured in a newspaper was kind of scary. But after a quick glance, I sighed in relief since I couldn't find any mention of it anywhere. Anyway, because the FILs were in town, I set the newspaper aside and haven''t looked at it since. Then, the other day, A.P., after having visited a museum with his family, goes, "Did you ever look at that newspaper article that I brought home for you?" I confess, I hadn't. He then goes on to tell me that they featured that museum in the article as one of the big picks for where to have your wedding. Ummm, yeah, it costs $17-35K!! WTF??? Actually, this calls for the real thing: WHAT THE FUCK??? That's a down payment on a house!! Not a cost for a reception venue alone.

Anyway, the story continues because after getting home from work today (my summer gig! sweet! money!), I check my email and there's this NY Times article about weddings. And even bigger than that is that we're going to a Knot sponsored cake tasting event in a couple of weeks. Though, to be fair, we're really just in it for the free cake and wine. (Not the best way to get rid of Hank, but you've got to have some fun, right?)

So, that's a lot of progress in a short amount of time. That's exciting! Plus he gave me a hint about when he was going to officially propose. It's not in December. What a lame ass hint, huh?

Men: Can't Live With 'Em, Can't Kill 'Em

photo from here

A.P. and I have been fighting a lot lately....about cleaning. I think if we had a maid to clean all the time, we'd honestly fight about once every few months. All our fights are about cleaning. I also think I'm stressed about a lot of things, and part of me knows that some days, between the lack of cleaning getting done and the overwhelming stress I feel I'm under to get a job, I take it out on him.

A.P.'s relatives are in town this week, which is partially why my blogging has suffered. Stupid "in-laws." No, but, I've been trying to get this place company ready and everything. I'm going to try to do my Friday dance tomorrow, but I may be on hiatus until next week. I start my summer job next week, too, so I've been getting ready for that, which is a pain in the rear! So many things to plan and do!!!

Anyway, if our arguments followed a script, this would be the script:

ME: Why didn't you clean XYZ?

A.P.: I cleaned it last month.

ME: So cleaning it last month means you never have to clean it again? And what about the bill for ABC, did that get paid? Why is your shit everywhere???

A.P.: Why is your shit everywhere? And, why are you always yelling at me about stupid shit?

ME: Because if you didn't do stupid shit, I wouldn't have to yell!

And then it devolves into nothing, and two hours later we're talking about Conan. Whatever. Sometimes, I don't even remember what we were yelling about, and sometimes I can't help but laugh. I'm a girl. He's a boy. I feel like 90% of our fights come down to that very issue. He deals with things in his boy way, and I deal with things in a mature, rational, logical, awesome, totally correct girl way. : O )

Does anyone else here have an argument pattern??


PS. I'm in love with today's photo. I randomly found it on some site, and it combines my favorite things to photograph: feet (hello! Friday dance posts!) and stencils. I haven't even broken out the stencil photos for you guys yet! They are extensive! I secretly wished that was my photo, but again, it comes from here.

Yay! Another Wedding to Celebrate!

Well, I mean, it is wedding season! Congrats to vipperj at Chuckle's Blog. She tied the knot with Kirk, and it sounds like the wedding went off without a hitch! Can't wait to see the pics and hear the details! Congrats again, Mrs. Mitchell! While he sleeps, you can blog! : O )

A.P. on Autoerotic Asphyxiation

I'm sitting here reading an article on death in baseball, and on the side there was a link to another article about David Carradine, who is speculated to have just died of autoerotic asphyxiation. I remembered that Michael Hutchence's death was also speculated to be the result of autoerotic asphyxiation. So I turn to A.P. and say, "How come so many famous people die of autoerotic asphyxiation?" (Apparently two deaths allegedly the result of autoerotic asphyxiation equals "many.") A.P. asked if I was talking about David Carradine's death, and when I said yes, he offered this awesome response:

"Because he was trying to choke his dick and his neck at the same time. And that shit never works out."

I love this man.


PS. The terms "autoerotic asphyxiation" have lost all meaning.

As Promised...A Giveaway

Granted it's not my giveaway, but that doesn't mean it's not worth entering! Oh, Hello Friend is hosting a giveaway from SIXTEEN etsy shops! The details of the giveaway can be found here. Hurry! As far as I can tell, it ends Monday with the drawing. Don't let it pass you by!

Come Dancing!

photo by me!

It's that time again! Can you believe how fast this week went? I have been seriously pounding the pavement dropping off resumes! It sucks. I went to seven places this week, and I'm about to go to three more today. But before I do...let's do a little dancing.

It seems that this was the week of video invitations, save the dates, and thank yous. The funniest was definitely from DIY Wedding Girl, who featured The Broke Ass Bride's video. You can see it here. My favorite part is when he says, "I was doing stuff you do in 2002," and you see Friendster in the back! Classic!

There is also this save the date, via Brooklyn Bride, and this invitation which is awesome and must have taken FOREVER to make via A Cup of Jo. A.P. saw this on one of his econ blogs, which means it must be making the rounds big time!

There are several beautiful weddings making the rounds. One of my favorites is this one from The Wedding Cabaret. I love the intimacy and the last picture where it looks like they're trying to hail a cab is classic. If that were my picture, I would frame that bitch right up on the wall!

These two, both via Rock 'n Roll Bride, are amazing as well. I love the bride's hair in this one, and I think these two might secretly be making a Belle & Sebastian album cover.

This engagement/wedding comes from The Wedding Chicks. I just love the picture of them in the restaurant.

This wedding was referred to me by Liz, Felix's fiancee from Avoision, one of my favorite everyday blogs. Liz is awesome! She makes yummy food, and is making all these cool wedding favors like homemade vanilla extract and rock candy!! Anyway, she is much faster around the internerd than I am, and she found this surprise wedding on 100 Layer Cake. It's nice to read/see how another surprise wedding played out. I'm telling you, ladies (and gentlemen), this is going to be the new trend!!

Finally, check out all these wonderful little things you could buy/make/add to your own wedding! You could get this charming cake topper (found via A Splendid DIY $10,000 Wedding)! You could turn these toothpicks from Party Perfect into more than just food labels. Hello! Place cards!

And finally, given my recent photo project, is it any wonder that I wouldn't love these engagement photos from Steep Street photography??? Just fantastic!

photos via Steep Street

Stay tuned tomorrow...I usually don't post on the weekends, but I'm going to post on a giveaway I've spotted!!

Craftzilla!

So, as many of you know, the best part, for me, about this wedding planning has been that my love of crafting and making and doing has been renewed. Other than my wheel pottery class last year and my paintings that I did last year, I haven't done anything creative/crafty in a long time. It's been so awesome getting re-inspired by all these fantastic, crafty people who leave me in awe all the time!! Plus, it's gotten me excited about what I may/may not craft for our wedding.

A while back, I saw these paper flowers on Vintage Glam Blog, and fell in love with the idea of having paper flowers. A.P. was not really into this idea. He said, "I like real flowers." I told him I would make some sample ones and he could see how beautiful and cool and inventive these flowers could be. As you can see by the date on the original post, that was months ago. Finally, last week, I made the flowers as part of my (late) spring cleaning and massive efforts to re-organize this place. When I was all done making these suckers, I said to A.P., "See? Wouldn't these be lovely at our wedding?" He says, "Yeah, but I still like real flowers." Oh well. I think I'll still incorporate some of these (perhaps on the guest book table? Or as part of a centerpiece or something? I'm working on it...), but we'll have real flowers. For those of you who are interested, you can follow my directions below. Otherwise, check out the pics and behold my craftiness!

PS. I apologize for my lack of polaroid pics, but the size of this board was cutting off many, many photos.

PPS. I think even if A.P. had said he wanted these flowers, I'd have a hard time making all of them without help. It took me all night and the next afternoon to get all these done. But, I still want to incorporate some pretty paper crafts.

photos by me!

Paper Flowers w/Vase

What you need:

For flowers:

Craft paper
Scissors
Soft Lead Pencil (#2)
Floral Wire
Floral Tape
Jewelry Pliers
Glue

For container:

Craft Paper
Ribbon
Coffee Can
Glue
Modge Podge

Directions correspond to pictures, from left to right, row by row.

1. Gather together what papers you want to make your flowers out of. The original directions called for velum, I used pretty craft papers from Martha Stewart (on sale at Michael's for $2.99!).

2. Lay out your pretty paper and admire it. Isn't it beautiful? Yes. Figure out how many of each pattern you want. Some of my paper was double-sided, so I used 4 from each paper.

3. Using the stencil from the original directions found here, trace your circle on the back of your paper with a pencil.

4 & 5. Cut out the circles. Place them in pretty pile. Wish that you had a really big pile of pretty paper circles that you could roll around in. Imagine it raining pretty paper circles, water pretty paper flowers. Life's a crafty dream.

6. Fold the circles in half.

7. Fold the halves in half.

8. Fold the quarters in eighths.

9. Cut the tops of the folded circles so that they resemble petals.

10. Now grab your wire, and floral tape.

11. Have your cat help out. Zuzu Petals likes to craft, too!

12. Cut your wire into different length stems. At one end of the stem, using your jewelry pliers, create a small loop. Cover in floral tape. This is your stamen. Repeat for all your stems.

13. Now, go back to your petals. On the crease of one of the folds, make a small cut to the center point. Then, cut about 1/8 of an inch away from the opposite crease. You're basically creating a little tab that you will use when gluing the petal. You are cutting out a V. The part you cut out looks like a heart with a wing (I'm going to make a little mini banner out of these leftover hearts later). This part is tricky, and I think that Jeffery Rudell on CraftyStylish (where this project originally comes from) does a great job of illustrating the exact cut you need to make. Again, you can get his directions here.

14. Glue all your little petals, and crimp the petals to give the flowers some life. Rudell's instructions say to crimp the flowers outward, but I did them in all different ways. It gives them more dimension and makes them look like different flowers, especially since I used a variety of paper.

15. Poke the stem through the dried flowers, so that the stamen is in the middle. Cover the stem in floral tape. This is the hardest part, think. Floral tape is sticky and it took me forever to get it to stick to itself. Again, Rudell has good tricks to fix this in the comments here.

16 & 17. Now go make your vase. Take a used, cleaned coffee can (16) and some pretty paper in contrasting colors (17).

18. Wrap the coffee can in the paper. It's hard to iron out all the wrinkles, but do your best.

19. If you're like me, your paper doesn't wrap the whole way around.

20. So get some ribbon!

21. Put some glue down that paperless strip (that sounded dirty!).

22. Cut a strip of ribbon and glue it to that strip.

23 & 24. Put a loop of ribbon at the top and bottom of the can. Modge Podge the whole can and let it dry completely.

25. Put your flowers in your vase.

26 & 27. Arrange artfully on a shelf. I took some old glass jars I was saving and covered the lids in color coordinated papers. In the smallest jar I put some shells from a beach we camp on every year, and then I put the starfish in front. I also covered another can in some corresponding paper. In that can are some craft supplies. I'm going to add one more jar later with giant binder clips in it. Fun, fun!

Voila! Paper flowers! Last forever, and seriously spruce up my whole desk area! You could also skip the coffee can vase and do mason jars!

If any of you decide to take on this craft, let me know your results! I'd love to see other takes on this project!

Shutting Up to Stay Sane

Yesterday, I was at a friend's house rehearsing lines with her for an upcoming audition. While taking a break, we started talking about plans for the future and how A.P. and I were trying to deal with certain things (like my not having a job, and how that will affect our time frame for getting married). Anyway, I started to talk a little about wedding planning, and I immediately felt uncomfortable. Let me also say that the woman I was talking to is in her 60s, has never been married and has no kids. I was talking about how traditional wedding stuff makes me uncomfortable, and how the idea of me in a white dress, in a church, with a hundred and fifty people standing around is just not my thing. Anyway, then I mentioned that there was one white dress I've seen that I loved a lot, but for the most part, I'm not interested in the typical wedding accoutrement (that's right, people, I know fancy words!). This woman didn't really respond, except with a slight eye raise, and a smirk. And then I shut up.

So, why did I shut up? Because, I think I'm always very reluctant to talk about wedding stuff with people because only 5% of the people are truly happy for you. This is true in life, in general. The rest resent you, or judge you, or have their own ideas for you. I don't really talk about wedding planning to anyone outside of A.P. and a couple of friends, and that's mainly because, well, A. we're not doing any serious planning now, just batting around ideas, and talking about what we love, what we don't, etc., and B. I know it's not everyone's cup of tea. The more I realize I want to be married, and have a nice, albeit non-traditional type of wedding, the more I realize that the only people who really seem to be happy for me are the ones who either are awesome, supportive people (like the ones I've been talking to, and btw, these people are few and far between...I'm lucky to have 2!), fellow bride-to-bes (like the bridal bloggers), or people who are married and had to endure the same kind of judgement.

A.P. tells me all the time that I'm too sensitive a person, but it's easy for him to say that when his whole family is responding by saying, "So, when's the date? We can't wait!" and my whole family is saying, "You're getting married? Is this something you think you're ready for? Don't you feel like a sellout?" Don't get me wrong, I'm not sitting at home right now, and crying over my lack of audience, I'm just saying, perhaps, just PERHAPS, there's a reason why I'm choosing a surprise wedding.

Has anyone else had to shut up to stay sane?

Sure You're Getting Married, But Can You SAVE LIVES?

I know this is a short post, but I read this article and had to link it here! Can you imagine? I want to be this bride! I want to save lives, look hot, and be the hero? No, but seriously, the whole story is kind of unbelievable and I'm just glad everyone is okay.

Alright...I dropped off resumes at THREE places today, which meant a whole lotta running around today! I'm pooped, and I have blisters! : O ( I have a longer post I'm working on for tomorrow. Until then...