I have a super long list of things to do, many of which involve my sewing machine.
So, obviously, I'm focusing my attention on less important things that really don't matter at the moment.
Like nail polish.
I
don't do my nails very often. When I was little, I used to paint a
different color on each nail- that was The Big Thing in middle school.
I've only ever gotten a manicure twice in my life- senior prom (when I
got my one-and-only pedicure, aka the best thing ever invented) and just
before BM MrsL's wedding. For prom, I got a French manicure, but for
MrsL's wedding, I tried something a little different. I don't have any
pictures of my nails from that wedding, but I've since re-created the
style myself.
Showing off my nail polish skills. Also my ring. // {personal photo}
Have you ever seen this before- one finger painted a
different color than the rest? When I got it done for MrsL's wedding,
the girls thought maybe I was "trying to send a message" because Mr.
Geek and I weren't yet engaged, and that particular finger was the one
that got the different color. I swore up and down that this was A Thing
and I swear I wasn't trying to send any messages! (OK maybe I was.
But it's also A Thing!)
I'm
not entirely sure I'm going to pay for a manicure on the big day,
mainly because I'll have a million other things to do (because I'm
worrying about nail polish right now instead of working on those things)
but I'll certainly paint them myself- or maybe my sister will do it for
me! And then I'll paint hers. Slumber party!
I
really like this trend, and yes, okay, painting your ring finger a
different color definitely accents an already-special finger. Now the
question is...what colors?
I'm thinking maybe I'll go
super bright and use orange with green on my ring finger- those are our
"secondary" colors that aren't getting a whole lot of airtime compared
to the purple and red. Ooooor I could do orange with red on the ring
finger...red isn't quite maroon, but it would be a nice nod to my alma
mater! Or green with purple...or purple with red...or orange with
green...or...or...or...
Are there any nail polish
trends attracting your attention right now? Do you prefer to do your
nails yourself or have them done?
We talk a lot about wedding preparations here in the Hive, but we
don't often talk about marriage preparations. Ironic, isn't it, when a
wedding lasts only a day and the marriage lasts for the rest of your
life?
One of the things the Catholic Church does really
well (in my opinion...biased? Maybe.) is marriage preparation. Some
people view this as a series of tedious hoops to jump through in order
to reserve a pretty ceremony location. If you go into the process with
an open mind, however, the Church's marriage preparation requirement
really does prepare you for what marriage really is, and gives you the
tools necessary to create a healthy, lasting marriage and family.
Jesus
performed His first miracle at a wedding feast in Cana- turning the
water into wine (and not just any wine- really good wine). As such, the
marriage preparation requirement is called Pre-Cana.
The
exact requirements for Pre-Cana are different for each diocese, but in
general, you are required to meet with your pastor at least once, meet
with the priest marrying you a few times (which might be the same
priest, but for us, it isn't), and attend a Pre-Cana class.
Our
diocese offered three versions of the class- a weekend retreat called
Engaged Encounter, a series of 2-hour classes held once a week for 6 weeks,
or a "One Day Extravaganza" (my nickname for it) called the Conference
for the Engaged. Confession: we chose Conference for the Engaged
because it was the cheapest option and was only one day :D
CFE
was a wonderful experience, which I attribute to the fact that we came
into it with an open mind. We didn't have any preconceived notions
about what would or wouldn't be said; we were there to listen and to
learn. We arrived early, chose a table at the very front of the room,
and took notes through all of the talks. (Okay so I took notes...Mr. Potion just listened.) The conference was run by 2 married couples, a
priest, and a licensed family counselor; through a series of witness talks,
activities, and a video, we covered a lot of topics, and learned a lot
of helpful information. I'll be blogging about many of the topics we
covered from now until the wedding, scattered amongst the
wedding-planning posts.
Also, there were donuts. Donuts = pleasant experience. // {personal photo}
One of the most interesting talks was
called "Compatibility and Love" and talked about how commitment,
compatibility, and love are not things that happen to us, but, rather, they are choices we must actively make throughout our relationships. You can chose
to be compatible with each other. It sounds kind of counter-intuitive,
but it's true- compromising on things and accepting each others'
viewpoints, even when they're different, are all active choices we make
in order to remain compatible- in order for the relationship to keep
working. We believe that love is not just an emotion- it's an action. A
couple does not simple "fall out of love"; if a relationship fails,
it's because the couple stops actively loving each other, stops trying
to remain compatible, stops working on the relationship. Sometimes
marriage is hard; sometimes you don't always like each other. If you go
into marriage knowing that love is more than just the feeling of
butterflies in the pit of your stomach, more than just sexual
compatibility, and more than just having certain activities or hobbies
in common, then you'll be prepared when problems arise to know that,
even though there may be fighting and hardship and pain, you keep
sacrificing and working and trying until the problems are resolved. And
when one problem is resolved, another might crop up- and you attack it
again, together. These concepts seemed...well, not altogether foreign
to us, but we'd never heard them phrased quite like this. I think we
both came out of this talk feeling a new resolve to always work for our
relationship, even if it's not always easy.
The couple
shared with us some things that they did to work at being compatible in
the early days of their marriage. When they first got married, they
made the decision to get rid of their TV. For about 3 years, they did
not have a TV in their house and therefore could not arrange their
schedules around the shows they wanted to watch every night of the
week. This meant that their first priority had to be each other- they
couldn't retreat to the comfort of the remote control when they were
bored, they had to spend time talking with each other and spending time
together. As an added bonus, it actually strengthened their
relationships with their friends; if he wanted to watch a sporting
event, he had to go out to a bar with his friends, or if she wanted to
watch an award show, she had to go to a friend's house. They have since
purchased a new TV, but the habits and communication they established
during those first three years have remained; he still prefers to go out
to the bar with his brothers and friends to watch the game than to stay
at home on a Sunday afternoon by himself.
TV isn't
really a big deal to Mr. Potion or me. We both have shows we enjoy that
are currently on the air, but neither of them watches these shows
regularly. (I'm a few episodes behind on "Glee" but it doesn't bother
me- that's what the internet is for.) However, this talk inspired us to
talk about things we want to maybe get rid of in the beginning of our
marriage to ensure that we develop and maintain healthy communication
habits.
As geeks, we're both in love with our
smartphones. Carrying the entire internet around in your pocket can get
kind of addicting; I can spend hours playing Draw Something and he can
spend an entire evening reading articles on his Google Reader.
Sometimes we'll find ourselves sitting next to each other on the sofa
for hours, absorbed in our technology, not saying a word to each other.
CFE
was held in a Catholic school auditorium, and no one's cellphones
seemed to work. The moment you walked outside, however, you had perfect
service. I figured maybe they had jammers installed in the school so
high schoolers couldn't text during class or school assemblies.
"When we get married," I joked, "we should have a cellphone jammer in our apartment."
"You need your phone in your apartment, though," Mr. Potion pointed out.
"Well, we could use geo-fencing to keep it to just the bedroom," I said. "The moment you cross the doorway, you lose service."
After
we heard from the couple who got rid of their TV, I thought about this
solution more seriously. While installing a cellphone jammer in our
bedroom would be way too complicated- and, likely, expensive- that
doesn't mean we couldn't have some sort of rule. No cellphones in the
bedroom!
We've talked about it some more and arrived
at a solution that we think will work for us- no cellphones in bed.
This means that, when we're getting in bed for the night, if the phone
rings, you have to get out of bed to answer it. If you want to text
somebody, you have to get out of bed to do so. If you want to check the
score on a football game or update your Facebook status or read one
last article on Cracked, you have to get out of bed.
I've
read that some couples have very strict "no stuff in bed" rule- they
require the bed to be used only for sleep and...you know...that other
thing that happens in bed. That would preclude us from watching a movie
together before falling asleep or reading a book or playing X-BOX.
Banning just cellphones will force us to be present to each other, even
if we're just trying to fall asleep. Hopefully, if one of us gets a
phone call (and it's not an emergency), we won't want to get out of bed,
therefore the call will go unanswered and we won't choose technology
over our spouse.
Were you required to attend any
marriage preparation classes before the wedding day? Did you hear any
particularly interesting stories or pieces of advice during those
classes? Would you ever consider getting rid of your TV to improve your
communication habits with your spouse/future spouse? Would you ever
consider banning cellphones from an area of the house?
When we first started talking about where to register for gifts, Mr. Potion jokingly asked me that question.
"Actually," I replied, "that's not out of the question."
His eyes lit up- he wasn't expecting that. He thought wedding registries were only for kitchen supplies.
When we get married, we'll be forming a household for the first time. Sure, we've both lived on our own before, and as such we've acquired hand-me-down and Wal-Mart-quality stuff, but between the two of us, we don't have all of the "necessities" required to truly have a grown-up home. Okay, okay, is a KitchenAid stand mixer actually necessary to have a home? YES. No. But things like a nice vacuum cleaner could be consider necessities. Or a full-sized ironing board- I don't have one of those. And the only bath towels I have are Miss Potion-sized, and they have my monogram on them- my maiden-name monogram. So upgrades, and, in some cases *cough*STAND MIXER*cough* straight-up new stuff, are "necessary" for us to begin our life together. No one can create a home from scratch- "it takes a village to raise a child," and such.
Spoiler alert- this is why we have wedding registries.
This is why we have WEDDINGS, actually. It's not just about wearing a pretty dress and meticulously choosing table linens and buying enough alcohol to keep your 300 closest friends entertained. We have weddings because we're letting our community know, "Hey, we're getting married. Can you help us out with that? In return, we'll give you cake." So that community witnesses the wedding vows, eats the cake, and provides the love, advice, support, and, yes, stuff, that the couple needs to start this family, this household. People want to give you stuff on your wedding day; most people consider it downright rude to show up to a party- any party- without a gift of some sort, be it a bottle of wine, a bag of chips, a birthday gift, or a card with well wishes and perhaps some cash to get the new couple on their feet. (Is that just a Southern thing, maybe? The concept of hostess gifts? Yes? No? Bueller?) A registry makes it easy on the guest- takes the guess-work out of gift-giving, because it shows exactly what the couple still needs, and ensures that the couple doesn't end up with, say, two of the exact same kind of ice cream maker.
Unless, of course, you're like BM K and her fiance, who registered for the exact same ice cream maker at two different stores, and therefore received 2 of the exact same ice cream maker.
They really like ice cream.
Anyway. If, like I was, you're hemming and hawing about the inherent selfishness of a wedding registry- if you feel uncomfortable telling people what to buy you- think about it the way I've described it above. Nobody HAS to buy you anything, but most likely, they'll want to, so rather than making them ask your aunt to ask your mom to ask you if you have a coffee maker yet, utilize some not-so-modern technology that makes a list of stuff where that stuff disappears from the list once it's purchased.
And now, on to the good stuff.
We decided, to keep things simple, that we would do two registries: one brick-and-mortar store (that also has an online option) and one entirely online registry.
For the brick-and-mortar, we chose Bed Bath & Beyond because they're everywhere, they have everything, and they tend to be reasonably priced (plus they give out coupons like candy). For the online option, we chose an Amazon registry, because it will essentially assemble a list of items from any store on the web and still function as a registry (ie check stuff off as it's bought).
Because I'm a little analytical, I wanted to make a list. I knew that if we just showed up at BBB and asked for a scanner gun, we'd scan literally everything in the store and be pleased with ourselves. We sat down together and thought about stuff we needed- and I thought about my dream kitchen- and assembled a list of items that needed to go on the registry. Then we pulled up the BBB website and priced some of these items, and looked for them in other places, too. If BBB had the better price, we decided to register for it there. If a (legitimate...as in, manufacturer's) website had the better price, we put it on the Amazon registry. Plus, things that we knew we wouldn't find at BBB went on the Amazon registry.
What could possibly not be found at BBB? An XBOX Kinect! [Will anyone buy this? Probably not. Would it be cool to have? HELL YES. Will we be sad if we don't get it? No. That's why it's labeled "nice to have" on the priority chain- not a must, but it would be pretty cool.]
After we'd made our Amazon registry, we took the rest of our list to BBB. Compiling this registry actually took two trips- the first night we went in, we didn't realize we'd arrived less than an hour before closing! Our consultant was super sweet; she explained how the scanner gun worked, gave us a bag of free goodies, explained their incentive programs with certain brands, and gave us advice for how to populate our registry- register for approximately 3 times as many items as guests to give people options, fine china is a good thing to have, register for cookware as separates and you'll be more likely to get the whole set...and then she let us out into the wild! She would check in on us every now and then to see if we were finding things and, of course, to push certain hot items- but thankfully she wasn't too pushy. I had my eye on a cookware set by Rachael Ray that wasn't available in store, so she added it to the online registry for us while we walked through the store!
Unfortunately, I was a bad blogger bride, and didn't take any pictures of this process. Sorry. But believe me when I say that Mr. Potion really enjoyed the scanner gun- I mean REALLY enjoyed the scanner gun. He actually really enjoyed the process of picking out kitchen stuff, too, because with each gadget, he'd ask, "Ooh, what are you going to cook with that?!"
Some of our favorite items off the BBB registry include:
THE STAND MIXER. Honestly, if we don't receive any other gifts- if all of our guests contribute $1 to a pot to buy us this- I will be a happy camper.
The Keurig. Almost every morning, when I call Mr. Potion from work to say hello and ask if he slept well, the conversation ends with a heavy sigh and the observation, "I can't wait till we get that Keurig..."
A vinyl shower curtain printed with a world map. Is it weird that I'm excited about a shower curtain? Whatever, it's awesome. We picked out bath towels and bathroom accessories in the various colors on the map- pink, green, blue, and yellow.
Getting excited about a shower curtain might not be weird, but I'm pretty sure that getting excited about a vacuum cleaner definitely is weird. DON'T JUDGE ME.
Confession: I haven't actually made it to Matt Smith's Doctor yet, I'm still on David Tennant, WHOM I ABSOLUTELY ADORE. Cut me some slack, I just started watching the good Doctor a few months ago.
Ahem.
So you may remember that inan earlier post I mentioned that we were looking at bow ties for Mr. Potion and his groomsmen. Originally, I brought up this idea because it looked more "day time" to me than any other style of tie. ("How does something look 'day time'?" WHY ARE YOU ASKING ME DIFFICULT QUESTIONS?) This was one of the few discussions where Mr. Potion didn't have much of an opinion- we looked at some inspiration pictures together, and he said, "Sure, I could wear that."
And then I foundthis tutorial on Adore by Chloe for homemade "fake" bow ties.
I can do that! I can totally do that!
Remember how I said my attendants will be in purple dresses? (And my honor attendant will be in a red dress?)
Well, Mr. Potion's attendants will be in red bow ties. (And hishonor attendant will wear a purple bow tie. JUST KIDDING. I thought about it, briefly- asking her to wear a bow tie like a necklace- but I'm thinking now she'll have a purple pashmina. More on her outfit later!)
While I'm at it, I'm making Mr. Potion a purple bow tie, too.
And little white bow ties for Mr. Potion's two tiny attendants (neither one of which will actually becarrying the ring, so we can't quite call them "ring bearers").
And purple bow ties for the FOB and FOG.
And purple bow ties for our ushers (I'm making 4 of these, though I'm not sure if we'll have that many ushers).
Crazy? Who's crazy?
In all seriousness, these little puppies aren't that hard at all. I'm almost done!
I won't recreate the step-by-step from Adore by Chloe, but I will show you some pictures of the work-in-progress:
**all images in this post are personal photos**
stitch stitch stitch
oh noes! sewing through all those layers bent my needle :( I did this twice before I learned to just hand-sew at the last step
taking shape as a bow!
Okay some of them look a little squished and wonky >.< it adds character!
I'm deviating from the instructions a little- I'm actually stitching the middle section around the bow first with space in between so I can slide the collar part in through the back. This way, the bow isn't attached to the collar and the boys can slide them around as they adjust the Velcro closures. (This all makes more sense if you take a look at the tutorial.)
The six purple bows shown above are for our dads and ushers; I've actually already finished all the other bows, too, and now I just need to sew the collar pieces, put the bows on the collars, and add the Velcro. Almost done!
After consulting The Unofficial Guide, asking friends and coworkers, and weighing our priorities, we decided we wanted to go ahead and get theDisney Deluxe Dining Plan. [That link takes you to the official Disney website which explains what's included in this plan and how it works.] I'll save you the gory details of this particular decision-making process...we have heard that this dining plan gives you way more than enough food, but we figure it's better to have too much food than not enough, and we'd rather have one less thing to need cash for while we're there.
So where will we be spending those dining credits?
Once again, The Unofficial Guide proved invaluable in deciding on Disney restaurants. They rated the food and ambiance at each restaurant, and even gave recommendations for what to order. Since Mr. Potion and I had been to Disney before, we'd already eaten at a few places, and decided we wanted to try something new. The Unofficial Guide also gave recommendations for which places need reservations in order to get a good table at a decent hour, so we made a list of all the places we definitely want to eat at and when, and gave that list to Kim from Dreams Unlimited so she can make our reservations for us.
Sunday: Dinner
Cinderella's Castle at Magic Kingdom // image viaInteractiveWDW
We'll be arriving in Orlando on Sunday, checking in to the resort, and basically taking it easy all afternoon. We'll probably grab lunch at the on-site restaurant at the resort, then head to the Magic Kingdom for the rest of the day to meet some characters and do a little shopping and maybe take a spin on the Teacups. Sunday will be the most easy-going day of the honeymoon, and I want us to dress a little nicer than shorts and t-shirts, because we're going to have dinner at Cinderella's Royal Table! The "Character Dining Experience" means we'll be dining with the princesses, and the package includes professional photos! Cinderella's Royal Table was definitely the top of our list for must-visit restaurants, so the first night seems like the perfect time to eat there!
We plan to spend the first half of day 2 at Animal Kingdom, ending with lunch at Yak & Yeti. The menu is Asian-inspired American food and, as with everything Disney, every little detail is perfect.
We'll spend the second half of day 2 at Hollywood Studios, capped off with a late dinner at the Hollywood Brown Derby, a replica of the real celebrity hangout, down to the caricatures that cover the walls. Can't wait to try the original Cobb salad!
Tuesday we plan to spend most of the day at Epcot, so of course we have to eat lunch here! Mr. Potion has actually eaten at the Biergarten Restaurant in Germany but he loved it so much and it comes so highly praised that we just can't pass it up! A nice big buffet lunch of German favorites will give us the energy we need to finish the day in Hollywood Studios.
Tuesday: Dinner
Yachtsman Steakhouse // screen capture taken fromDisney's website
After squeezing in a few more roller coasters, we're going to head back to the resort to change into something a little nicer than whatever we spent the day romping around in, then zip over to the Yacht Club Resort for a nice dinner at the Yachtsman Steakhouse. I probably don't have to tell you that the big draw on this menu is the steak :D
Wednesday will be spent at The Wizarding World of Harry Potter :) and whatever time is left in the day will be spent back at Magic Kingdom. We plan on popping in for a late dinner at The Crystal Palace featuring a "Character Dining Experience" that we're very excited about!
We're going to start Thursday early with a breakfast buffet at Trail's End Restaurant inside Fort Wilderness Resort before heading back to Magic Kingdom for the entire day, to make sure we get to ride absolutely all of our favorite rides.
We'll relax after a long day at the Magic Kingdom with a nice dinner at California Grill inside the Contemporary Resort. I'm really looking forward to the California-inspired menu featuring seasonal, local produce.
Finally, our last Disney dining experience will be at Les Chefs de France in the France pavilion of Epcot. Hopefully, Remy, the little mouse from Ratatouille, will make a visit to our table while we're there!
Phew! That's a lot of food! Where are your favorite places to eat in Disney World? Have you ever used a Disney Dining Plan?
