Tag Archives: wedding

Officiating a wedding.

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Hey folks! I have a whole set of questions for you!

I know that I know folks who have officiated weddings. What did this process entail for you?

Two of my former students are getting married. My girls will be the flower girls and I was asked to officiate the wedding. I feel quite flattered. <3 I had both of them together one year and the bride was my student aid the next year. She was one of the kids who helped paint my house. I feel quite close with her in particular.

So this is sweet and thrilling. But I'm all… Oh! That sounds like an adventure! With hoops to jump through! Oh gosh. What are those hoops again?

So I ask you, oh LJ because I know some of you have experience. 🙂

It’s been a year already?

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One year ago today Noah and I snuck off from the lovely B&B in Lake Tahoe and went and got married. It was with little fanfare as such things go, but strangely it is the most appropriate way I can imagine for us to get married. There have been a few moments when I am somewhat wistful thinking, “I wish I had the sort of family where having a big wedding would have been fun and a positive experience,” but considering the families we have I am glad we made the decision we did. Honestly, as much as I love my friends, I don’t feel like anyone is that big of a part of my direct day-to-day life other than Noah. I like that our wedding reflected the way our life actually works.

I love Noah so much that sometimes I feel like I am drowning in it. I enjoy his silliness, his seriousness, his playfulness, his focus, his lustfullness… The list is long. He is my best friend. He is the person I most want to talk to about any silly or important thing that happens. I’m happy that I never feel like I want to keep things from him. (Ok, sometimes I do for about half a day when I’m upset at him for some reason, but it never lasts.) I’m happy that we work through intense issues and come out the other side appreciating one another more. I’m grateful that even in the middle of a fierce fight we can stop and do something to affirm to the other that it is just a fight and not something that hurts our general feelings for the other. I am amazed that he is able to see so many parts of me and never judge me harshly for them. I am grateful that I don’t feel the need to withhold levels of trust.

I’m glad that we have sufficiently disproved any doubts anyone may have had about us getting married because we had to. 🙂 And anyone who was in a betting pool that we wouldn’t make it a year… sorry about losing your money. No wait… nevermind. I’m not sorry. 🙂 I’m quite happy in fact.

*And* he’s perfectly content with just me? Boy did I never think that would happen. It’s just another day in Paradise.

Awesome.

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The event was amazing. Anna came through and helped with food way more than I thought she would. My friends are wonderful friendly people. My husband is the best boy ever.

Delightful. Wonderful. Yay!! Does this mean we are well and truly married now? (I need to work on developing the pictures people took.)

What is the use of “perfect” anyway?- and Anna whining

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HEY! ANYONE DRIVING NEAR FREMONT!!! Apparently, the police are out in major force today. Don’t break any traffic laws even slightly.

Now on to the rest of my fussing..

We are about as ready as we are going to get and I’m pretty ok with that level of ready. Yay for ready.

My pissiness this morning centers around Anna. She’s here visiting for a while. I haven’t spent serious time with her in 3+ years. I’ve been uhm, busy.

Backstory: Anna had back surgery about 6 months ago and is in serioius pain a lot of the time. She can’t lift much and she often needs to go rest. I’m fine with this. However, I’ve been running around like a chicken with my head cut off. The only thing I have asked her to do was to iron the curtains. There were 6 panels. It took her about 9 hours over two days because she kept complaining about how much she hates to iron. Uhm, well, there isn’t much else you are capable of doing. And I have this awful Puritan work ethic that means I get bitchy about people sitting around doing nothing while I work. It really bugs me. However, I know she can’t do much so I don’t have that high of expectations. Even with really low expectations the fact that she was whining about doing the one small task I gave her really pissed me off.

Oh, and she has been fussing for two days that she had to go buy the Harry Potter book at 9am. Uhm, Anna–do you recognize that we are kind of busy? She gave me this long story basically repeating for me what I know about the fact that her life is really pathetic and she has nothing to look forward to except for this book. I have some sympathy for this, but I also have 100 people coming to my house today.

I didn’t kill her. She has her fucking book. She carried 10 bottles of wine and washed a few bowls. I think that is all I am going to get from her…

But we are done. This rocks. Now I can calm down! Now I get to breathe and chill out and stop stressing. I can do this.

I need to breathe.

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So little time and so much to do. I actually do this sort of thing to myself on purpose. Many of the things on my To Do list have been there for months, but I only get around to doing them when I have a huge bunch of people who will notice if I have done them or not. The funny thing is–people will notice the really drastic stuff (the house being painted a bunch of very different, very dark colors) but no one but me will notice many of these things. I still care that I want to hang the pictures before the party. I want to feel settled in that way at the party. There is no way that we will be finished with painting before the party, but Noah has requested that I fix the bathroom because it is really badly painted. (The kids just skipped parts they didn’t feel like doing. The paint is incredibly uneven and you can see white wall through big chunks.) Looks like I will spend tomorrow doing that.

Noah told me last night that I should take today off and rest but I fiercely argued with him that if I take today off and I start running behind later in the week then I won’t be able to finish on time and then I will be not sleeping the nights before the event as I try to finish and… All bad. But then we didn’t get out of bed today until around 10. It is very rare for us to stay in bed so long. I’m exhausted and there aren’t very many parts of me that don’t hurt. I have a list of stuff to get done that is growing instead of getting shorter despite the fact that Noah rocks and has been working like mad.

Side bar–Noah and I don’t have the same values or priorities about housekeeping even slightly. Nevertheless he has been working very hard lately to meet and exceed my desires for our house. I’m deeply grateful that he is stretching himself in this way because it means I don’t have to do everything. It is a weird cognitive thing to wrap my head around that he is doing this stuff for *me* instead of just because it “should get done.” He is such a lovely boy.

Anyway, so I’m exhausted and grumpy and fussy and there are miles to go before I sleep.

I find it very funny…

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that all of my significant ex’s are coming to the reception. Stephen, Tom, and Puppy represent the serious long-term relationships where we lived together and were monogamous. Then I have James, Anthony, and Erik representing the shorter term more serious attempts at poly. Then there are the myriad of people I dated/slept with who are coming.

The less funny part is that not many of Noah’s ex’s are coming. Uhm, I mean one is coming. Yeah. See, my ex’s are all non-drama and friendly and good-natured about just about any/every thing. Noah’s ex’s…. not so much. Of course I feel guilty anyway. (Not every single one of his ex’s are drama, but the ones who aren’t drama either don’t want to come to our house or aren’t interested in this event or aren’t in the area.)

I haven’t hosted a party this size in… well… ever. I’m getting nervous.

Home Desperate doesn’t love me.

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I do declare that the gods of Home Depot hate me. But! I do finally have paint and all necessary equipment to start painting my house. I have about 10 days in which to paint my house and get completely ready for the reception. I can do this. I painted each room in Tom’s house, by myself, in a day. I have 4-6ish students who will be here helping me. No sweat.

The plan:
Monday- do all of the pre-painting stuff (cleaning walls, removing blinds/outlets, fixing drywall, filling holes) with maybe doing some primer, but it isn’t mandatory it would just be nice. The last hour or so of kids being here will involve at least one or two of them doing a bunch of yard work so we can fill the green waste bin for this week before filling it again next week.
Tuesday- primer the whole house and do more yard work.
Wednesday- paint at least half the house and maybe yard work (depends on painting).
Thursday- paint the last bits of most of the house with probably some kitchen stuff remaining.
Friday- finish the kitchen and do yard work.

This way, if I slip I will be slipping with time on the weekend and next week to finish. I don’t think I will slip much with the painting, if anything the yard work will get pushed back. That way next week will be spent getting the house in perfect order before the party. I can do this. I can so do this.

Pressies

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Alright. It’s done. I’ve freakin registered. We are registered at Target and at Crate and Barrel. Target has stuff that is more day-to-day useful and C&B has the perty stuff I would really like to have, but will probably never buy for myself because I am too practical.

I would like to say at this exact moment that I am not expecting anyone to buy us anything. I registered because people have been pressuring me to do so. I have a strong dislike of the societal rules that dictate that we should expect gifts just because we were foolish enough to get married. The entire gift giving culture is one I have a hard time with. I love to give presents; it makes me happy to see people enjoy the things I give them. However, when I give someone a present it is 99.99% of the time with no expectation of reciprication or of particular acknowledgment. (I expect Noah to give me Christmas present–but he and I are clear on that so I’m ok with that exception to the normal rule.) I believe that Thank You notes are neat things that are fun to give/get sometimes but should in no way be mandatory. I was not brought up in a family where such things were standard and I have been shocked as an adult by the number of people who have told me that I am rude for not sending them. ?! Wait–aren’t *you* the rude one for rebuking me for the behavior based on my culture?!

So I will say this: I made gift registries because I know that giving presents feels good. However, keep in mind that your culture around gift exchange and my culture around gift exchange may be very different. If it is important to you to get a thank you card, tell me and I will make an effort in that direction for you because I make efforts to accomodate/appreciate my friends as they most appreciate. DO NOT EXPECT ONE AS A MATTER OF COURSE. That custom is not part of my life. If you will feel like I am ungrateful/unappreciative if I do not respond in a certain way, just don’t give me a fucking present because I don’t need more guilt in my life.

(Oh: event date is July 21, 2007. If you don’t know the last name ask me.)

Date Save!

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This filter is including a lot of people who are not in my part of the country, but I think that maybe you might be interested in having this information.

On July 21st Noah and I are having our wedding reception. If you see this you will be getting more information as we get a bit closer to the date. We just think a date grab is smart. 🙂

I would like to point out that a lot of this is Noah’s idea. He thinks that we should announce to our community that we are married or some such nonsense. I figure if ya’ll don’t know by now then us having a party isn’t going to inform you–but it’s all good. 🙂

Oh–please don’t pass information about this event around. We have a rather considerable guest list of people we want to invite and this is absolutely not a DHP. I repeat this is *not* an open invite party.

Evil speaketh its name

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And it is… Procrastination.

I swear to god I have made a lot of progress today. It’s just not super easy to see because I am a dork and I get stuck in small details. *sigh* I went over to Ikea today looking for a few specific things and then realized that I didn’t know what sizes/colors I needed so the trip was kind of silly. But I wandered around and got ideas. Then I went to Target for big plastic containers. I didn’t buy too many because I wasn’t sure how things were going to shake out. I came home and realized I need a bunch more. S’ok. Buying more is easier than returning stuff I don’t need.

Cleaning house is a pain when I don’t want to do much with Noah’s stuff without him around. I don’t yet actually feel comfortable just going through his stuff without him present. I’m sure I’ll get over it. 🙂 But at Target, in honor of telling Noah that I would actually marry him (so far I’ve been saying maybe) I bought a wedding organizer and promptly almost had a panic attack. Jesus Christ. Am I actually doing this?! Looks like I am. Alright. Suck it up and get through it. (For the record: the scary part is the wedding, I’m looking forward to being married.) So now I am procrastinating mightily because I just pissed off my back by trying to move the monstrous filing cabinet without help. Sometimes my impatience is counter productive.

Things to deal with in the next few months:
Start actual wedding plans.
Remodel the house.
Put together at least two more unit plans before the start of school so that I walk in with a full year plan for juniors and a good start on… whatever else they give me. (WHOO HOOO! Just checked work email. I have three classes of Juniors and two classes of comp/lit. They are the low performing/behavior problem kids. I’m really excited! No really–I asked for them. 🙂
Get ready for Burning Man.
Am I helping organize TNG4?! Scary thought. It’s been brought up and discussions are starting… that will be decided in the next month probably.
Oh dear lord. I think that is going to be enough to eat my brain for the next year. Good thing I’m plucky!

(Travel stuff coming soon… I swear.)

Busy busy busy

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The last couple weeks have involved many a deviation from my plans, but such is life.

I now own a really spiffy Prius. Yay! I walked onto a lot and said, “I want!” And he went and got it for me. How cool is that? No waiting for me.
I moved in with Noah. It happened faster than we planned, but my life works like that. I now get the daunting task of making this house somewhere I am happy living. 🙂 I forsee lots of painting and fixing up in my future. Not till July though. It has to wait until after New York.
Oh, I leave for New York in seven days. *squeel*

Today I need to:
Unpack more and start getting settled.
Get the last load from my apartment.
Turn in my keys.
Have dinner with a friend.
Stress over weird drama with a boy I’m having a date with on Friday. (Ok, I don’t need to do this–but I will.)
Oh, and I need to go see the jeweler to see if I like the mock up of the ring. You know–the ring.