Love and Happiness

I spent a few hours last night working on the playlist for our reception. Although I previously mentioned on here (a long time ago) that finding a DJ was a priority for us, we're going the iTunes reception route instead. My brother will man the laptop & speakers as much as is necessary, but otherwise, it'll do its thing.

So far, I've picked out about 4 hours worth of music that seems appropriate for the occasion. I don't know if enough of it is danceable - my music collection is mostly pretty mellow singer-songwriter sort of stuff. I do have a ridiculous(ly awesome) number of silly 90s hits included in the playlist. I should divide it out between music to be played while we eat vs. while we dance and such, and see how that works out time-wise. If there's not enough songs to dance to, maybe I can supplement that with music from my brother, my friends, or our family friend who has the largest music collection I've ever heard of. And he pays for all of his, unlike my buddio who torrents his shtuff like a mad-man.

Allow me to list a few songs on the list, because I'm sure you care. ;)

• Love and Happiness - Al Green
• Love Me Do - The Beatles
• Funny Little Frog - Belle & Sebastian
• Gonna Make You Sweat - C+C Music Factory
• I Love My Jean - Camera Obscura
• Dreams - The Cranberries
• Made Up Love Song #43 - Guillemots
• What Is Love? - Haddaway
• U Can't Touch This - MC Hammer
• Thank You (Falletinme Be Mice Elf) - Sly & The Family Stone
• String of Pearls - Glenn Miller
• Closing Time - Semisonic
• I Second That Emotion - Smokey Robinson & The Miracles

Aaaand so on and so forth.

My brother's a little bit of a music elitist, so he maaay try to nix a few of my more ridonkulous choices. There are only a few songs I'd fight him too much over since I want them *because* they are so ridiculous. Otherwise, he can largely run with it. I'll probably want to look over the final playlist before the day of, but this is one of those things I'm glad to hand off. I'll give him all the music I can, tell him what songs are for the first dance, father/daughter & mother/son dances, and then trust him to pick the order of the rest. If he just hits shuffle, I'd be cool with that too, honestly.

The Rings Are on their Way!

Yay! I finally got this happy little message in my inbox today!

"Thanks for your recent order. We would like to inform you that your order, which was shipped from Dublin, has cleared US customs."

It's about time, US customs. You've had our rings for about the last week and I wants them nooooow. Pretty pretty please? I promise our rings are not made of drugs or other illicit materials.

Nightmares

I've been having recurring nightmares lately.

In these dreams, I've left way too many things until the last minute. I haven't organized playlists for the reception. I haven't sent out invitations. I haven't put together any of the decor. I'm doing it all the night before, and worse yet, the day of the wedding. I'm late to the wedding by an hour and a half because I'm trying to pull everything together, yet still everything is in shambles. Gahhhhhhhh!

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I wish I could say that these nightmares are completely unfounded and that it's ridiculous for my mind to be playing out these scenarios as I sleep. Unfortunately, I have a well-established reputation as a Grade-A Procrastinator. I have a looot of things left to do for the wedding and about two and a half months left to complete them. Hee hoo, hee hoo, hee hoo, breathe.

I think I might ground myself from browsing the internet, and most certainly from reading wedding blogs, until I get a significant chunk of my To Do List crossed off. I am working a fair amount (I'm getting promoted, yay), but I have plenty of time to be getting this stuff knocked out. For this next week, I'll try to focus on creating our invitations, starting our registry, and gathering some more much-needed items for our centerpieces.

How We Met

or why we owe Starbucks

This is "our story" as I wrote and posted it on the wedsite I'm working on. Enjoy.

In May of 2007, Mary got a job at Starbucks. On her first day of work, Opie came in for his double tall no whip mocha. And then he came in again. And again. And again and again and again. Well, maybe not that many times the first day, but there were plenty of shifts with multiple visits from Opie.

Apparently, Mary had caught Opie's fancy; a fact of which Mary was gloriously unaware. Opie was the first customer whose name she memorized - it's a rather memorable moniker, after all. She certainly sat with him on the patio (and a slew of others) on her breaks. However, she had no idea that he was now a muuuch more regular customer since she had started, due to his attempts to figure out her haphazard work schedule.

For some reason or another, a rumor was spread about between coworkers and regulars that Mary was leaving for school at the end of summer. This was true, but a rather key detail was incorrect. See, Mary's new school was all of about 45 minutes (or 30 if you speed) north of her home and workplace. The rumor claimed that she was headed about 15 hours away to Colorado when September rolled around. Slight disjoint there.

It wasn't until sometime in July that Mary set the record straight for Opie. The very next day, Opie nervously asked her on a date (but only after pacing the lobby for a while, working up courage) over the drink handout bar while Mary worked. The answer was at first, "What?" since there were blenders whirring and espresso shots pulling, but he eventually got the "yes" he was looking for.

About a year and a half later, he got the even bigger "yes" he was looking for when he proposed on bended knee (but not at Starbucks).

2 Years and Counting

On Tuesday, July 14th, Opie and I celebrated the 2nd anniversary of our first date. This is our last dating anniversary before we tie the knot on October 10th. We enjoyed a fairly quiet evening after Opie put in his hours for the work day. We went to our favorite Chinese restaurant, Kirin Court, and then went home to enjoy some homemade pie and a bottle of port.

Pie and port have become an anniversary tradition, despite the fact that we've had all of 2 anniversaries. 2 occasions is enough to form a tradition, right? Last year, I'm pretty sure we killed the bottle between us that evening. This year we only had a modest glass each and called that good. Opie had pulled an all-nighter the night before, and my tummy just can't handle alcohol very well right now due to various gastrointestinal disorders, so it was definitely nice to sip a glass of port, but we weren't exactly in drinking shape, as it were.

We made a lemon meringue pie sans meringue the night before. An electric beater is one of the many things we (still) need to register for and my last attempt at hand-whipping meringue was such a miserable failure, we figured it'd be best to just skip that part of the recipe. Mmmm.. our lemon pie was delicious. Didn't even miss the meringue. Okay, maybe I missed it an eensy teensy bit, but it was still diviiine.

In a few weeks, we'll be going to Cape Breton as previously mentioned, in part also in celebration of our anniversary. I will be getting my software engineer honey away from internet access, television reception, and cell phone service for a good two weeks. [sighs] Sounds lovely, yes? At least until he goes bonkers due to reverse culture shock. Bwahaha. I mean.. I'm sure it's exactly the relaxing vacation we both need! Yeah! That!

Happy Anniversary, m'love. It's been an absolutely incredible two years. I can hardly recall how my life was before you, only that it was so terribly empty by comparison to life with you. Here's to many many many more years together. I look forward to growing up and growing old together.

Anxiety

I'm starting to feel the first tinges of anxiety about the wedding. Certainly not about marrying Opie, but about pulling everything together for this event we're hosting. As we passed that 100 day mark, we've also just passed the 3 month mark. Our wedding is in 3 months! It's going to be here soon! Good grief! When did this happen?!

Allow me to enumerate the things we still have to accomplish.

• Set up our registry
• Design/put together/mail invitations
• Finalize ceremony
• Buy tablecloths
• Buy candles
• Sew table squares
• Assemble bunting
• Create website
• Finish favor packaging
• Make table numbers
• Figure out guest book
• Figure out boutonnieres & corsages
• Find presents for the male attendants
• Create reception playlist
• Choose father-daughter dance song
• Choose ceremony music
• Hair trial
• Order pies
• Order carrot cake
• Rent tuxes
• Book rehearsal dinner location
• Ask people to do readings
• Get marriage license
• Book hotel for wedding night
• And other things that will arise as we get closer

Gahhhhh!

Gaaahhhhhhhhh!

Okay. I can do this. I don't have school again until January, so that's a big chunk of time and energy I don't have to worry about for the next 3 months. I could certainly stand the extra money, but I'll keep my work hours right around what I'm already doing, and get busy on knocking this stuff off my list. As much of a procrastinator as I naturally am, I really want to get as much as possible if not everything finished before the week of the wedding.

I'm a little concerned about the 2 week vacation we're taking in August since that's a big chunk o' time out of the next 12.5 weeks. That being said, we're going to one of my very favorite places, it's our first real vacation together, and it should (hopefully) prove to be exactly the stress-free sort of trip we'll need at that point.

Here I am on my beloved island at age 16.

This, my friends, is Cape Breton, Nova Scotia.

Cape Breton, here we come.

I love Cape Breton for its beauty, for its people, and for its music. Cape Breton is where I honed my skills on the fiddle, and where I learned to dance into the morning. I seriously considered having a destination wedding in Cape Breton. It would've been logistically far more difficult and would've meant most of our friends and family would not have been present with us, so overall I'm glad we're getting married near home, but there's still a little part of me that yearns to declare our love in a place I love so well.

I can think of a few candidates for venues in Cape Breton. What comes to mind first for the ceremony is St. Andrew's Presbyterian Church in North River. It's a delightfully simple small white church, painted robin's egg blue inside. It probably has about 10 rows of pews with a single aisle, and glorious natural light comes in through unadorned windows all around. I'm not religious by any means, so it's interesting that a church comes first to mind in a land of such natural beauty, but I've always felt so welcome in this tiny congregation. I feel downright spiritual in this simple structure, which I'm not sure I've ever felt anywhere else indoors.

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This is in my mind what churches ought to be about. They should be about simple worship and welcoming fellowship. Bake sales and parking lot lingering and down to earth sermons. If I found a church like this at home, I'd consider attending despite my lack of faith.

The next "venue" that comes to mind is White Point. This location is a tough competitor against castles and pastures of Ireland for my favorite place I've ever been. I get wistful every time my mind wanders to White Point.

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It seems like the wind is always blowing like the dickens out here. A rain contingency plan would be nonexistent. I'm not aware of any viable reception locations anywhere near here. But still, my heart leaps in my throat to think of marrying my fiance here, on this strip of land that juts into the sea.


Maybe we can renew our vows in Cape Breton a little ways down the road.

100 Days & Counting

My google countdown claims our wedding is in 100 days! This seems significant somehow. I think it's because we're about to enter a countdown in double digits, when it has previously always been represented by three numerals. Another big day is approaching - our last dating anniversary before the wedding. We'll have been together for 2 years in precisely 2 weeks. It's been an exceptional two years, I must say. Here's to many more!

We ordered our wedding bands a few nights ago!

I love them in the photos, so we'll just have to see how well we fancy them in person. I really hope they work out. We don't exactly have back-up rings picked out. Mine will be 14ct white gold in the 3.1 mm width. I hope it's not too wide to look good next to my almost 2 mm engagement ring. I thiiiink it will work.

My engagement ring. Simple white gold 1/3 carat solitaire with a partial kite setting.

Here it is on my hot li'l hand. Click to enlarge.

Opie's is 14ct white gold at 6.2 mm wide, so exactly double the width of my ring. I love the delicate knotwork on my ring. I hope Opie is pleased with the chunkier equivalent on his larger ring.

Here are a few more angles of my ring:

We'll have to wait a few weeks to meet our rings in person. Le sigh. I want them nooooow.

Our rings are something for which I'm not going to fully divulge the amount spent, but I am proud of my internet haggling. I found a 15% off coupon on the site that already offered the lowest price for Opie's ring. Then I noticed that they also offer a "Best Price Guarantee." This means that since I found my ring for a lower price on another site, they'll sell it to me at 10% below the competitor's price with free shipping and a *gift from Ireland*. Oh boy! The percentage off and free shipping is grand, but I suspect I'll be amused by whatever cheesy something gets sent our way. I'll let you know if there's a leprechaun in the box whenever it arrives!