Category Archives: Wedding

married lady

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To sum up the Wedding Weekend:
* Thursday: Kris arrived. We went to pick up my dress, but there was a tiny spot on one of the sleeves. We left it at the shop for them to spot-clean it. Kris & I were going to have a big drunk party-girl night, and instead we ended up at home, eating Thai take-out and drinking while watching TV. I think we were sound asleep by about 11:00. Sad.

* Friday: Salon day. Kris, Mags & I went for manicures and pedicures. I met up with Dave (at the same shopping center where the salon is located) and we picked out our wedding bands – we sort of waited until the last minute to get them. Luckily, the first jewelry store that we went to, they had bands that we both liked and that fit us. No sizing necessary. Woo! Lucky us, since we didn’t really have time to get them sized. That night, my parents plus my sister and her boyfriend Adam arrived. Kris & I met up with them at the hotel and we all went out for dinner. We also saw my cousins Alphagal and her husband SNG at the hotel, but they were pooped and didn’t join us for food.

* I freaked out all day Thursday & Friday with stressed-out-ness. Went to bed on Friday night jittery and anxious. Woke up on Saturday and decided that I was NOT going to look back on my wedding and have bad memories associated with it because of how stressed out I was. Gave myself a mental ass-kick, and I had fun from then on. No, the house was not exactly perfect when all the relatives showed up for the rehearsal dinner on Saturday. And you know what? The world didn’t stop turning on its axis, either. The food was good, everyone had fun, and that’s that. Honestly, my family is loud as all hell, but my god, they’re a fun group. We have a picture of my sister and 2 of my cousins grabbing my ass. It will be posted soon, I promise. There’s a lot more to be said about Saturday and all the fun we had, but I’ll wait until I get all the photos from the various photographers that were there, and I’ll use those to tell the story.

* Sunday: Back to the salon for hair & make-up. Cell phone kept ringing with people needing last-minute stuff. Mom & I finished at the salon, and hauled ass out to the lodge where we had the wedding. The photographer got there about 2 minutes after we did. We started taking pictures immediately, and before I knew what hit me, it was 3:00 and time to go get married. The rest of the day is a blur of images that I’m still trying to process: how Dave’s hands were shaking when I held them (which he later told me was a combination of not enough sleep and too much caffeine, not nerves); how I grabbed his head for the kiss so I could get my red lipstick all over his face; that it rained almost all day and that I totally didn’t care; how my sister somehow got the idea to toss a dinner roll around the room like a baseball, and whoever caught it was the person who gave the next toast; how all of my girl cousins made me cry with their toasts, whether it was through laughter or real tears; the way my face ached from holding my smiling pose through so many dozens of photos; drinking way too much champagne with my bridesmaids (my sister, aka Cosmopolitan, and Kris) plus their respective dates in their hotel room in the middle of the night (and the ensuing noise complaint from a hotel guest who had the misfortune of getting the room next door); the hideous garden gnome from our house that was left on our honeymoon suite bed, a la the Roaming Gnome on those Tr@velocity commercials. So many things. I’m not sure that all of it has sunk in yet.

* Monday: we spent most of the day in bed. Yeah yeah, the whole newlywed thing, but we also slept a LOT. We both woke up in time for our massages in the afternoon, which was great. Oh, and the jacuzzi bathtubs at the lodge are indeed big enough for two adults. Good to know.

* Tuesday: I’m back at work, and counting the hours until I can go home and crawl into my own comfy bed with my husband (hee!) and my cat. I think everything from the last 2 or 3 months is starting to catch up with me, and I am completely exhausted. I feel like I could go to sleep now and sleep until Thursday morning. Sigh. Oh well, soon enough. And this weekend, the in-laws are off to Lake Chelan, so we’ll have the house all to ourselves for two glorious, fun-filled days. Whee! Awesome.

four days

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I think my blog has been pretty boring lately, since basically all I’ve written about has been either wedding planning or money problems. What can I say, I guess I have no other major drama in my life at the moment. I should count myself pretty damn lucky. Anyway, I doubt I’ll have another chance to write anything before the wedding, so I’ll leave you with a few last minute details:

1) The Wedding Weekend Weather forecast: it’s supposed to rain on Friday, Saturday & Sunday. Yee-freakin’-haw. Ah well, good thing we opted to have the canopy set up on the terrace for our outdoor ceremony, just in case this exact thing happened. It does put a slight damper (ha-ha! Get it? Damp-er? Yeah, I’m funny) on our plans for neat outdoor wedding photos, but we can work around that.

2) My dad’s gout is flaring up, so one of his feet is all swollen and hurting. My mom told me that he may be walking me down the aisle in one dress shoe & one sneaker. I told her that if that’s the case, he’s going to wear sneakers on both feet so he doesn’t look like some kind of crazy homeless man with 2 different shoes on. (I think the Manolo would probably agree with me on this one.) My initial thought was “oh god, what will Dave’s refined British family and his well-educated, intellectual friends possibly think about his fiancee’s father from Mississippi who wears sneakers with a suit…” Then I decided that it’s actually kind of funny, and I’m not going to freak out about it. I figure it’ll just make an interesting conversation piece at the reception. I’ve even suggested that maybe he could wear his bedroom slippers, or just his black dress socks, or he could even borrow Dave’s flip-flops. The more outrageous, the better. It’s fine. There is no such thing as a Perfect Wedding, and I’m not going to have a nervous breakdown over the tiny details that go awry. I’m going to laugh about them and move on.

3) Our driveway is slowly but surely getting better. We had the first load of gravel delivered, which basically sank into all the mud that had accumulated from the rain that we’ve had over the past 2 or 3 days. So now we have rocky, gravelly mud instead of plain mud. Which means that you only get the bottoms of your shoes yucky, rather than sinking up to your ankles, so I suppose that’s an improvement? We’re getting more gravel delivered today, and I have been promised that the driveway will be looking great by the time I get home this evening. Fingers crossed.

4) Last night, I made my own little version of chicken curry, which I got from the recipe book that Dave gave me for my birthday. It’s been quite a hit in our house, I make it at least a couple of times a month. But last night was the first time I’ve cooked for the in-laws, and both Mags & Roger really liked it, so yay, I am a culinary success.

5) Kris arrives tomorrow, so I will have last-minute assistance from my best friend and bridesmaid, which makes me very happy. Not to mention that we’re going to squeeze in one last drunken girls’ night out on Thursday night. Whee!!

Ok, y’all, that’s it. If everything goes as planned, by the next time I post here, I will no longer be Cindy B, I will be Cindy W. Send happy thoughts for us on Sunday afternoon. Bye!

The family arrivals have begun

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On Saturday afternoon, Mags (my future mother-in-law) and Roger (her boyfriend) arrived from England. Dave went to pick them up at the airport on his own, as I was busy renting a dump truck so Steve can haul around all the dirt he’s excavating around our house. You know those old black-and-white movies of people exercising, and they have that rubber band contraption that goes around their hips and jiggles them to death to supposedly help them lose body fat? Driving that dump truck felt a lot like what I’d imagine those machines feel like. Translation: not fun. However, it did have one of the best warning signs I’ve ever seen, which I fully intend to take a photo of and post here. After I dropped off the dump truck back at the house, I went to meet up with Dave, Mags & Roger for a drink. That was fun, but being totally jet-lagged, they were ready for bed by 6 p.m., so we left them at the hotel and headed home.

Then on Sunday, Mags and I went shopping (I needed a jacket; she needed shoes & a handbag to go with her outfit for the wedding) while the boys went out to test drive cars. Dave has fallen in love with a car, and he really wants to get it. I haven’t actually seen this car in person, but based on the pictures, I’m not really a huge fan. However, if this means that Dave is excited about getting rid of his current car that I hate, then I’m all for it. It gets better mileage, has better maintenance reviews and safety rankings, and it’s big enough to be a nice family car. So, cool. Speaking of which, Roger made the mistake of telling Dave, in front of me, that for the money he would spend on a new car, he could buy a second-hand Porsche. I piped up with, “But you can’t put a baby seat in a Porsche!” Luckily, I’m not marrying a real sports-car kind of guy, so I don’t have to worry about that. (And the baby thing is still way, way off in the future, so no worries there either.) I was very impressed, though, that my betrothed told the persistent car salesman that he would have to discuss it with his wife first. I like that he’s practicing the terminology already. After all, we’re at T-minus 6 days and counting.

So after all the shopping and car-fantasizing was done, we took Mags out for Mexican food for Mother’s Day. Perhaps not the most traditional Mother’s Day meal (originally I had intended to cook, we just ran out of time), but it worked for us. Today, while I’m at work, Roger is going to help Dave and Steve turn the mud pit in front of our house back into a driveway. Long story, don’t ask – it literally makes me want to cry just to think about it. Ugh.

in which I whine about being groggy

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I slept horribly last night, and I have no idea why. I went to bed at a reasonable time, but I couldn’t fall asleep for ages and I woke up what felt like every hour. Consequently, this post may make no sense, and if so, I apologize. So anyway, today has been pretty miserable for me, struggling to stay awake at my desk. Thank god for the free diet coke. (And yes, I’m still drinking lots of water too. Don’t fear for my kidneys. Yet.)

Yesterday was the trial run for my hair and make-up. I loved the hairstyle, I thought it was gorgeous – although I counted the number of bobby pins when I took it down, and folks, it took 66 bobby pins to get my hair that gorgeous. That’s a terrifying thought. As for the make-up, that was good too, except that I had to keep telling the girl to put more on. Maybe it’s because I came in with no make-up on, and she didn’t want to overwhelm me, but I kept explaining that I am a southern girl and we do big hair and big make-up. She eventually got my eyes done the way that I wanted, but I’m going to have to do my own mascara, because she just didn’t get them nearly as big and curly as I wear them on a daily basis. (Even Dave said “yeah, you need more eyelashes” when I got home – and he normally doesn’t notice that type of thing, so I took that as a definite sign that I should do my own mascara.) I understand that a lot of brides want to look subtle and demure, but dammit, I am not one of those brides. I love make-up, I may very well have been a drag queen in a previous life, and generally my rule is the more the better. Glam me up! However, there is a limit – I didn’t like the lip line that she did because I thought she made my lips look too big. I usually keep my lipstick just on the inside of my lip line, and she filled it out all the way to the edges, so I felt very Angelina Jolie. Dave liked it, but it made me feel weirdly self-conscious (like my face was all lips), so I think I’m going to tell her to ease up on the full & pouty thing next time.

In other news, my mom called me at work today to ask me if it’s ok if she gets a French manicure for my wedding. As if I might have some strong moral objection to or deep-seated hatred of French manicures (or as Angie once called them, Freedom manicures). What the hell?? I think people are worrying that I’m going to be the super-sensitive control-freak bride, and folks, that’s just not true. Ask my bridesmaids, I let them pick out their own dresses! Seriously! I am the Super Relaxed and Cool Bride! I promise! Ok, maybe not, but I’m really not that nitpicky about little details. Like the color of my mother’s fingernails. For god’s sake, do some brides actually get worked up about that? I appreciate the fact that people are trying to be respectful, but the eggshell-walking is really not necessary. Sheesh.

Oh yeah, 13 days to go! Woo-hoo!!

another boring wedding update which probably only the girls will read

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Dave and I met our minister for the wedding on Tuesday night, and we both really liked her. She’s very warm and funny, and we felt very comfortable with her. She has a lot of different options for customizing our ceremony, so we can make it feel like us – and even though Dave and I are probably going to stick with the mostly-traditional vows, I like the idea that we have options. In any case, the ceremony won’t be too preachy – a few spiritual/higher power references, but no sermons about accepting Jesus or anything like that. (For any of you who care, I do consider myself a Christian, but I also don’t consider that to be something that I need to broadcast to the entire world.) She gave us homework – Dave and I have to write a “mission statement” for our marriage, which should prove to be interesting.

Then last night, I went to meet with our photographer – it was Dave’s only night off this week because he has a lot of work stuff going on in the evenings, so I went by myself. [Side note to Sally: I don’t think Dave is allergic to the photographer, but I’m going to keep a close eye on him just in case.] [Side note to Angie: She looks nothing like the pinched-sourpuss Starr on “Project Runway”. She’s got blonde curly hair and a great smile. They couldn’t look more different, for having the same name.] That was fun, I really adore her photos and she thought I was 24, so obviously I love her.

Tonight, after I leave work, I’m going to get a massage. Hooray! I can’t wait. I called at least half a dozen places, trying to find one that could fit me in on this particular evening, because it’s the only free time that I have, since Dave has some dinner meeting thing tonight. The place that could fit me in had only a male massage therapist available. In the past, I’ve never really been comfortable with that idea because I have a truckload (or 3) of body image issues and a petrifying fear of negative judgment from, well, everyone, but men in particular. Right now, though, I am so exhausted from waking up a hundred times every night with my back aching that I just don’t care. If some man who I’ve never met before (and who I may never see again) realizes that I’m flat-chested and that I have cellulite on my thighs, big freakin’ whoop. It’s not the end of the world. Because guess what? There’s a fantastic guy out there who loves my pancake boobies and my jiggle butt, and he’s marrying me in 17 days. So there, body image issues. Nyah.

I'm a little ray of sunshine

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Since I’ve been doing an awful lot of blog-whining lately, I thought I would do a happy post today.

1) I woke up in the middle of the night, somehow convinced that I had overslept, and I bolted up out of bed. I looked at the clock, and saw that it was 2 a.m. Getting to dive back under the covers when you realize that you have 4 more hours of sleep is one of the most delicious feelings in the world. I should try to wake myself up at 2 a.m. every night so I can keep doing that.

2) We’re meeting with our minister tonight, Reverend Mary. Should be fun.

3) Since we signed the loan, I’m finally getting to make all the phone calls about all the house repairs that I’ve been wanting to do for ages – and which we haven’t been able to schedule because our finances were so uncertain. Today we have a guy coming out to give us a quote on putting in a driveway. Bye-bye, pothole-ridden gravel! And I want a cute little pathway/sidewalk that leads around the side of the house to the new deck, too! Next on the list are the exterminators to take care of our wasp problem – there are tons of nests under the eaves of the house, and one on the garage that is literally the size of my head. Third, we have to call a junk-hauling service for all of the work we’ve done on the house so far – we have pulled-up carpets to get rid of, a broken washer & dryer, all kinds of garbage. And finally, we’re going to have an electrician install lighting on our new, enormous deck. Fun stuff. I know it sounds weird, but I’m actually really excited to get these last few details ironed out. It’s all about making the house feel like a home, you know? So this is very happy stuff for me.

4) I am SO getting a massage this week. I left a message at a “healing arts” place near our house, I’m just waiting for them to call me back so I can book the appointment. I can’t wait.

It's not a tu-mah

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I still have a monster headache, but things may be showing slight signs of improving. For one, I found wedding shoes! And they’re pretty, too! I ordered about 5 pairs from Zappos, and I was thrilled to discover that one pair actually fits, feels comfy, and matches the dress. Hooray! And I’m excited that Zappos has free shipping and returns, so the other 4 pairs of cute-but-rejected shoes are already safely on their way back to the Zappos warehouse, free of charge. Very nice. I also found jewelry to go with the dress, but unfortunately I can’t find a link for that. Oh well, you’ll see it when I post the wedding photos.

On Tuesday, Dave and I were supposed to go meet with our wedding photographer, and Dave had said that he didn’t want to go because he wasn’t feeling well. I went into shrieking harpy bride mode, i.e., “You have to come with me, I can’t be expected to make all of these decisions by myself!!” So he got in the car. We got about 2 miles from the house when I had to pull over to let him throw up. Oops. Apparently he really wasn’t feeling well. So we turned around and went home (with me feeling horrible for dragging him out of the house when he was sick), and we’re going to reschedule with the photographer next week. No biggie. I’m still not sure what was wrong with him, but he appears to be ok now.

In other news, there is now the tiniest, faintest sign of a dim little light at the end of this loan tunnel, but both Dave and I have become far too jaded and disillusioned with the whole process to really get our hopes up at this point. But hey, keep your fingers crossed for us out there.

Not much else is going on in our little world. We’re both still worrying a lot, but at least things are starting to look somewhat manageable. Only 3-1/2 weeks until the Big Day!