Wedding mode: engage!

That's right, it's time for me to start cracking.  We have a venue, we have a date--I can finally start planning this wedding in earnest!

What's that you say? You thought I was already planning a wedding? Well, yes, I was. But now it's really really REAL. Now I have a target--an end goal.Something to work toward that actually exists outside of my mind.

Speaking of the end goal--I think that's a large part of my wedding jealousy I've been experiencing. I've done some thinking, and here's what I've come up with:

I wanted to be the only one planning a wedding.

It wasn't just that I was jealous of my friend having a date and engagement pictures already (although I definitely was). I just wanted my engagement period to focus on MY engagement. If there were going to be engagement pictures on Facebook, I wanted them to be MINE. I wanted to be the one posting cryptic messages about "don't make any plans for XX/XX/2013!" I wanted other people to be excited about my wedding, and no one else's.

The problem was that I didn't HAVE a wedding at that point. I had a dress and some foggy ideas.

Now, though, I HAVE A WEDDING. A date and a location. That's all we really need. Will we have more than that? Hell yes! Flowers, vows, the whole nine yards (as long as the nine yards are cheap and practical).

I was jealous of my friend's progress because I didn't feel like I was making any. It wasn't about her, really, at all--we're friends, and I'm so excited that she's getting married, because this has been a long time coming. It was about me--I was feeling left out of my own engagement period, left behind by someone who had gotten engaged AFTER me.

Is this the end of my wedding jealousy? Probably not. I'm sure that as time passes, I'll see things that I want but just can't afford, or wish that my invitations were a little classier, or my engagement pictures were a little more unique--but that's for later. Right now, I'm just going to be happy that I have a wedding date--and that it's before my friend's. :P

AAAAHHHH

You guys.

You guys.

AAAAHHHHHH!

We may have a wedding date. That means we are having a freaking wedding, you guys.

AAAHHHH!

Corollary to the wedding jealousy discussion I'm having with myself

So relationship pictures. You know, the cuddly, sweet, "look at my BF isn't he the cutest" pictures that every new couple seems to post on Facebook every five minutes? Yeah, those.

I hate those.

For a while I think it was just bitterness--I wasn't in a relationship, so I automatically despised any photos of couples in a relationship. I was all "why do they get to be so happy when I'm so lonely, wah wah, blah blah."

Then I started being legitimately annoyed by them. Because relationship pictures are a form of bragging, a form of showing off your perfect couple-dom, how well your head fits under his chin or how perfectly you're able to match outfits with your sweetie. Even if someone isn't intentionally posting relationship pictures with the thought that "haha, now everyone will be jealous of my relationship," that's basically what's going on somewhere in that sweet, chin-tuck-under-able head. Even when you are in a relationship, seeing how someone else's relationship is "better" (or at least, more photogenic) than yours--it's frustrating. And I have a very low tolerance for other people bragging.

So for me, my very least favorite thing about Facebook is when I log in and "Blondey McPretty posted 27 new photos to the album Our Engagement Pictures." I don't need to see 15 pictures of Blondey and Hunky snuggling on the couch or holding a banner with their wedding date emblazoned on it. I don't care to see Blondey's engagement ring in 6 different illogical locations, like on a tree branch or perched atop a cupcake. So Blondey and Hunky are planning their wedding faster than I am. Perfect. Great. That makes my little breaks from work SO much better and less stressful.

But the weird thing is? I love other people's engagement and wedding pictures. On Pinterest, on blogs, anywhere else on the internet--as long as it's not someone I know, I like to see a couple looking into each other's eyes or giddy with excitement. I just can't stand seeing my own friends posting those photos on Facebook.

Am I the only grumpy old woman who feels this way? Maybe I take it too personally--after all, Blondey and Hunky aren't really posting their engagement pictures to make ME feel inadequate. I should just be happy that they've got a friend with a camera and want to show off their love a bit. But I know my Facebook friends don't care how my wedding planning is going--so why do they think that we care about theirs?

Wedding jealousy

One of my friends from high school got engaged a few weeks after I did. We haven't talked in a while, actually--we sort of drifted apart since we went to different colleges, and haven't made that much effort to keep in touch. We have very different lives and very different relationships. She and her now-fiance have been dating for over four years, since our senior year of high school, and she's been planning their wedding for almost as long. I've always known they were going to get married, and figured that she would do so before me.

But now that she's engaged, and I'm engaged, I'm feeling this incredible urge to get married earlier, and better, than she does. She posts something wedding-related on Facebook, and I'm just filled with jealousy. I judge every one of her wedding pins on Pinterest to see if it's as pretty, or as unique, or as fun, as what I've pinned that day. I take a LOT of comfort in the fact that her fiance is two years younger, so that even though Dave doesn't have a full time job, at least he's not still a student.

It's appalling, really. I'm embarrassed even to admit how jealous I am. But a couple weeks ago, this friend posted on Facebook about talking to her mom about wedding dresses and bridesmaids dresses, and I was so jealous. Why wasn't I talking to MY mom about wedding dresses and bridesmaids dresses? Well, because I already have my dress figured out, and because I'll probably only have the one bridesmaid (maid of honor), and because I don't need my mom's input on every little decision. I can do this on my own--and I plan to.

Last week, my friend posted something hinting that they've set a wedding date--for a day in July next year. My first though? Oh, I hope we get married in May, then.

Over the weekend, my friend posted some pictures of her and fiance that look like engagement pictures--and one has them holding a bit of bunting with what must be their wedding date (and I was right, it is in July next year). I'm blaming this on low blood sugar, but I actually felt a bit of nausea mixed in with my grumpy jealousy.

What is wrong with me? I'm a normal human and have been envious of other people before--but this is completely out of character for me. Is this a normal part of being a bride-to-be? Anyone else having big Wedding Jealousy thoughts?

Fancying up

Because I've been reading wedding blogs for *cough* a while now, I didn't really "plunge" into wedding planning like I think some people do. I've sort of been wading in the shallow end of the wedding pool, while some people get engaged and just cannonball off the diving board. So I'm doing wedding things by stages. One of these stages is picking a dress. And I think I have!

First, backstory. I LOVE vintage styles. I sewed my high school graduation dress from a vintage Vogue pattern, and over the years I've had a few very cute, vintage-y pieces. But since I've always been on a high school or college budget (i.e., no budget), I haven't been able to buy the vintage dresses, tops, and skirts that I love.

Vintage dress on Etsy via Pinterest

Retro-style shoes on Modcloth via Pinterest

What does this mean, wedding-wise? It means I wanted this:

Grace Kelly's wedding dress, 1956

And could afford, well, maybe this:

Vintage-style dress from UniqueVintage.com

What's a low-budget bride to do? Try to find a used dress for cheap, of course. And did I ever!

This is my mother's wedding dress and veil, which she wore in 1981. The dress hasn't been out of the box since she got it cleaned when my oldest brother was born in 1985. (We had an uh-oh moment when I pointed out that if the cleaners had sent her a box with something else in it, we'd be stuck with it--but that was just me worrying, and everything was fine!)

It fits! Perfectly! Do you see how perfectly it fits? The sleeves aren't too long, or too short, or too tight! The skirt touches the floor but doesn't drag! The bodice--okay, the bodice is a little tight, but I can go braless--problem solved.

Is this my ideal wedding dress? No. But I've been thinking, and I have the rest of my life to buy a dress like this.

I don't have the rest of my life to wear my mother's wedding dress. If I wear my mother's dress, I'll be connected to her in a way I never expected, which is pretty awesome. I'm always touched by stories of brides wearing their mothers' or even grandmothers' dresses, and I am really excited to be one of those girls.

Plus, free, vintage Alfred Angelo dresses don't just fall into your lap every day.

If you had the chance to wear your mother's dress, would you? (Or, for the dudelier types, are there any family-heirloom-things that you would wear?)

Not so gratin

I have a file folder full of recipes I've torn out of old Southern Living and Cooking Light magazines. When I'm at a loss as to what to cook in the coming week (you know, when I actually remember to plan what I'm going to cook in the coming week) I'll flip through the recipes to find something Dave and I might like. This week, I pulled out this recipe from Cooking Light.

Garlicky Spinach-Sausage Gratin

Verdict: something is wrong with this recipe. I consider myself a pretty decent cook. I'm awesome at macaroni and cheese and make a great vegetarian chili, and I can follow a recipe (i.e., I can read.) Rarely do I end up with something that's inedible. This dish was okay last night, and the leftovers I brought for lunch are unpalatable.

I will admit that I didn't follow the recipe exactly. I fudged some of the cooking times--cooking onions for four minutes was taking too long and I didn't check exactly when the sauce started boiling so it might have cooked a little more or less than two minutes. I also completely skipped toasting the breadcrumb topping. But in general, I did what the recipe called for, so there has to be something wrong with the recipe because it's runny as a toddler's nose.

Read the reviews on the recipe--most of the others who have cooked this found it runny and kind of gross. I have to say I'm really disappointed. I'm always impressed by the variety of recipes in Cooking Light, and the last one I made (bacon potato leek pancakes that were eaten before I even thought about taking a picture) was really really good. Something went wrong with this recipe, because it was not so gratin.

(That's supposed to be a pun on "great" but I think it only works if you're not really sure how to pronounce "gratin.")

***

In other news, I may have found my wedding dress! Yes, it's early to be thinking about dresses. So I'll spread out the love a little, and wait to talk about the dress in another post. :)

Life hack (sort of)

I'm supposed to take multivitamins but I always forgot because I was always in a rush in the morning before work. But I brought them to work with me and keep them on my desk, so that when I get bored at work (which I *never ever* do) I look around, notice my multivitamins, and take one. I'm still not taking them every day, but at least I'm taking them more than once a month. Plus, it gives me a little break from work. :)

Stress dreams

Everyone has stress dreams, right? Worrying about the first day of school or first day at a new job--maybe you dream you get there and realize you left your clothes at home. Maybe you have a presentation coming up that you're nervous about, and you dream you're totally unprepared. Or you're freaking out about meeting your significant other's family for the first time, and in your mind the family grows crocodile heads and try to eat you (no? Well that's good then). There are stressful times in everyone's life, and it makes sense that your subconscious would take whatever you're worrying about during the day and make it ten times worse at night.

So why am I having stress dreams about school?

Twice last weekend, I dreamed I was back in school (I graduated over a month ago). The first night, I dreamed I had to study for an all-important exam, but the power went out all over campus and I couldn't read my notes (also Chandler from Friends was terrified of the dark and wouldn't shut up about it, but that's not as important). The next night, I dreamed I was preparing for my Capstone presentation, but forgot about it. Then by the time I remembered and got to the presentation (which seemed to be happening in the hallway of my high school), there was no one there to watch my one-woman play (about pirates).

Stress dreams totally make sense when you're stressed about something. They're a way for your mind to cope with whatever's going on to stress you out. But I'm not stressed out. Yeah, Dave didn't get the job he wanted, but that's really not going to affect our day-to-day life. It's not really even affecting the wedding that much, since at this point we don't have a wedding--just some half-formed ideas. I have very little responsibility at work, so it's not like I have anything there to be worried about. And I've been out of school long enough that I shouldn't have any stress left over. I didn't even have school-related stress dreams when I was a student--so why do I now?

Do school stress dreams last your whole life? Or, even worse, do they get replaced with other stress dreams? Are there crocodile heads in my future?

Well, that was disappointing

One of the main reasons Dave and I decided to wait to start planning the wedding is because we don't have a budget. Well, we do have a budget (it's what I do, after all) but we don't have any money--especially not for a wedding. Dave isn't working full time, so I'm the "primary breadwinner," and I just don't earn enough to cover rent, food, student loans, and other expenses, AND save up for a wedding.

No cake for you! Image via busybeingfabulous.com. Angry red X from me.

(It is possible that my family will be helping finance the wedding, but we haven't had that conversation yet. Dave and I would like to pay for the wedding ourselves as much as possible, and without both of us working full time, that's not going to happen--so we're putting off that conversation. I'll return to this topic when we get there.)

Dave talked me into not discussing the wedding for a while; since we can't afford anything right away, it didn't make sense (to him--I'm not convinced) to pick a ceremony space and an officiant, etc. And I agreed to hold my tongue for a while. Specifically, until he did get a full time job. Once Dave got a full time job, we'd be ready to start talking and planning and making decisions.

Did I just hear a "that's crazy"? Some muttering about "this economy" and "new graduates" and maybe even a whisper about "pipe dreams"?

I know--there are lots of people un- or under-employed right now. I'm the person I know from my graduating class who has a full-time job. It could take a new graduate months or years to find employment--why would I risk putting off my wedding by that much?

Because Dave had applied for and was in the interview stage of an awesome, wonderful, perfect job that he was totally perfect for, and we were expecting him to get it.

Well, if the title of this post and the tone of the last paragraph didn't clue you in already--Dave didn't get the job.

Seriously, no cake for you. What part of that don't you understand? Get out of here!

We found out yesterday--I got home from work and he was bumming hard on the couch. Cue hugs and a trip to our new favorite burger place, and some very careful skirting of the issue. And some mild panic on my part.

I was certain Dave was going to get this job. He had three interviews and did a great job on the final assessment/assignment thing. It's exactly in the field he's looking at, right down the road from my work AND our apartment, and he's already working part-time in the same office. How could he NOT get this job? It's the perfect situation for him.

But these things happen. We're very disappointed, but it's not the end of the world. We'll still be able to make ends meet while we keep looking for another job (and maybe my fervent wishes that whoever did get the job decides not to accept it will come true). We're very lucky that I found such a great and convenient job. And we weren't going to get married for about a year anyway, so it's not like we have to put too much on hold.

I'm actually very proud of myself for not worrying about the wedding. Not talking about it for a while was actually a GREAT idea of Dave's. Although earlier it was stressing me out a little (thoughts like it takes months for a dress to get ready! MONTHS! What if our wedding day comes and I don't have a dress! may have run through my head a time or two), now I'm SO glad that we haven't made any decisions. Imagine setting a budget on his anticipated income, only to find out that that income has gone down to 0. Now, instead of worrying about cutting the guest list and cheaping out on favors, I can focus on helping Dave find somewhere else to apply.

I know people have more life-altering events happen during wedding planning, and I'm inspired by their strength. I'm not saying that this is a horrible situation, by any means--but it is disappointing.

Anyone else put off a wedding until you're more financially stable? How do you deal with unexpected pitfalls during wedding planning? Know anyone who needs to hire a writer? Any good tips for making someone reject a job offer with your mind?

I'm so hardcore

I'm hardcore Type A . I never really thought of myself as this way because it just comes so naturally. I make packing lists, I organize my bedroom, I make charts and calendars to figure out what needs to be done when. I mean I don't do this all the time--I procrastinated my way through high school and college just like everyone else. But if I'm making a big decision or planning a big trip, I'm very methodical about it. It made moving last month really kind of awful--I was so paralyzed by "what am I going to pack first, no I need that, no that's too heavy," etc. that it took me a while just to get going. But if it's something important, that I want to plan, I spend more time doing that than other important things (like, say, showering).

You see where this is going, don't you?

Wedding planning.

Yes, I'm one of those girls who has been secretly (or not-so-secretly) planning my wedding for a long time. And honestly, it's not because I'm super romantic, or because I want to feel like a princess on my wedding day, or because I want to have the fanciest, danciest, funnest wedding of anyone I know. It's because it's the most fun planning something I will ever have.

In all honesty, I haven't been planning my wedding as long as some people have by the time they get engaged. Dave and I have been talking about getting married for a few years, and I honestly didn't even think about weddings until then. But once we had that first conversation, I was off and running. I read wedding blogs, like Weddingbee and Offbeat Bride, pinned dresses, bookmarked rings, and dropped hint after hint after hint. Dave came to just accept it. I read wedding blogs and sigh over proposals, and he got used to it. Sort of.

Then we got engaged. And I, the spreadsheet-making, budget-calculating, closet-organizing fiend that I am, took that to mean "I'm ready to have this wedding you've been planning! Let's do it! Soon, before you can plan anything else!" And Dave really meant it to mean "we've been together three years and we're not going to break up! Let's celebrate with jewelry!" Which I was fine with--but I still want to plan my wedding, and Dave isn't ready for that yet.

I totally understand where he's coming from. We've been engaged about a month, but we don't both have full time jobs and we don't really know how we can pay for a wedding. And we also JUST graduated and JUST moved in together--it makes sense to take some time to get used to that before diving into DIY and dress shopping.

But I want to plan, dang it! I want to email venues and meet with photographers and have cake tastings! Dave wants to enjoy being engaged, but I want to enjoy planning a wedding.

Anyone else a planning nut (wedding or otherwise)? Where are you on the wait-to-wed vs. planplanplan! spectrum?

I made shrimp chowder

It was pretty good.

The recipe I used is from Southern Living's Busy Moms Weeknight Favorites, which somehow showed up at my house several years ago. I brought it back to college with me, hoping to use some of the recipes as I cooked in my on-campus apartment. But most of the time, it was easier for me to eat in the dining hall (or let's be honest, at Taco Bell) than to cook for myself.

Now, Dave and I are making a much more conscious effort to plan our meals ahead and cook for ourselves. It helps that I'm eating meat again (after seven years without red meat and almost four years totally vegetarian), but it really really helps to sit down together and think about what we're going to cook in the upcoming week -- and then we only have to make one trip to Harris Teeter.

This isn't my favorite cookbook. I don't know that I have a favorite cookbook, since most of my cooking up until this month has been baking. The Busy Moms Weeknight Favorites focuses on easy-to-make main dishes, utilizing a lot of shortcut ingredients like prepared biscuit dough or, in this case, easy-peel frozen shrimp. That's how I turned this

into this

into this.

Quick Shrimp Chowder
Recipe from Busy Moms Weeknight Favorites, Southern Living, Oxmoor House 2006.

In the bottom of a medium saucepan, saute half a medium yellow onion in 1 T butter or margarine until translucent (I undercooked my onions--don't do that! Make sure they are thoroughly done as you won't heat the soup long enough to cook the onions farther).

Add a 10 3/4 oz can of cream of potato soup, 1 3/4 C milk, and some ground red pepper (about 1/4 tsp or more to taste) and bring to a boil. Add the peeled, deveined shrimp of a 1 pound bag, reduce heat, and simmer 5 minutes or until shrimp are pink. (I bought ready-to-eat shrimp; I advise against this, as the shrimp were sort of tough, but if you're as wary about cooking seafood as I am, you may want to follow in my inexperienced footsteps.)

Stir in 1/2 C shredded Monterey jack cheese to melt. Serve with crackers. (The recipe advises a garnish of fresh parsley; I decided not to spend my money on decorative foodstuffs, but it may be nice if you're fancier than me.)

This would serve four to five people.

A month and a half later...

I posted again!
Starting a blog a month and a half before graduating may not have been the best idea. Blogging sort of (okay, completely) took a back seat to, oh I don't know... term papers, my thesis, group projects, final exams, getting an apartment, getting engaged, wrapping up my THREE jobs (and starting a new one!), moving and of course GRADUATING.

Whew. That was a lot. Maybe I should slow it down some and take this step by step.

Engagement bling.

1. I graduated! Whoo! No big deal, just completed four years of study and two majors, AND get to stop giving all my parents' and my money to the school (well, except for my student loans). A friend (who still has a semester left before graduating) asked me what it's like to have graduated, and the best analogy I've come up with is this: it's like getting in bed after a really long day. You've been working and studying and whatevering for fourteen hours (or four years, or more) and you finally get to just rest... but you know you have to wake up and face another day soon. Yeah, now I have a "real life" and a job and all that, but I'm still enjoying "yesterday" (college) being over.
2. Soooo I got engaged. :) That's pretty cool. It's not like it was unexpected; the Big D (that's what my brothers call him) and I have been talking about marriage for about two years. But I'd been getting more and more antsy about it (to the point of even saying that if he hadn't proposed by the end of the year, I was going to propose for him and he'd better not say no!) and couldn't stop bugging him about rings, and bling, and proposals, and locations, and everything... It happened on the first. We walked into our new apartment (more on that later) for the first time. I was busy checking out the bathroom (our tub is huge!), the closet, the other closet, the OTHER closets (there are a lot of closets). Then Dave stopped me and turned me to face him. "Meg, we're starting our lives together," he said, "and as such--" "YES!" I didn't even let him ask the question, I just said yesyesyes and kissed him a lot. (Like you do.) I did eventually calm down and make him ask the question-- "Will you marry me?" And I got this sweet "engagement bling" that is really just perfect for me (I'm a huge Harry Potter nerd).
3. And yeah, the apartment. It's pretty self-explanatory, we got an apartment and with it, free furniture (we scavenged TWO free futons during move-out) and lots of bills. Since I'm the one with the real job and the savings account, I'll be paying the rent and bills for a while, and Dave'll catch up once he has regular income. It's pretty nice, and I'm excited to get to decorate--maybe there will be pictures! Who knows!
4. Finally, my job. My REAL job. I wrapped up editing for the school paper, working in the bookstore, and being a Resident Advisor (all that on top of being a student--it was tough!) and started doing some contracting with my company so that I could learn what exactly I'll be doing for the next 18 months plus. I start full-time on Monday, but I worked full days this week so it won't be that much of a switch. My job is copy editing for tax software, and it's about as interesting as it sounds, so hopefully this old guy will be a way for me to at least pretend I have a creative outlet.

That's enough of that. If I talk too much today, I might not post again for another month and a half!

On the first day of spring

I got a job.

It blew my mind.

It wasn't entirely unexpected. I'm about a month and a half away from graduating with BAs in English and Environmental Studies, and I'm no slacker. I knew I'd find a job eventually. But I certainly wasn't expecting to get a job right after college, let alone while I'm still in school. I definitely wasn't planning on taking the first job I interviewed for.

But that's what happened.

Backing up:
My name is Meg. I'm an almost-graduate of Guilford College, and I've spent most of the last year freaking out about finding a job, a career, getting married, starting a family. Sound familiar? Stick around, I need to commiserate with you.

I'm not exactly a writer. I can write (as you can see, since you're reading this). And I don't mind doing some here and there. But I like to think of myself as primarily an editor. I much prefer cleaning up other people's writing to doing all the work on my own. As an editor for the school paper, I get to rearrange sentences, insert commas, and insert transitions to (almost) my heart's content. It's what I'm good at, and it's what I expect to do for at least a little while.

I am also working on a senior thesis. It's about environmental journalism, and after seven months, it's kind of a snooze-fest for me. It's a large part of why I'm starting a blog right now--otherwise, I would be working on the thesis. That's what I should have been doing during spring break when I applied for this job.

"Copy editor position." Not my dream job, but I'm an almost-graduated English major. I kind of have to take what I can get. I sent in my resume. I did an editing test. I got a phone call.

"We want you to come in for an interview." You want what now?

Two aptitude tests and three interviews later, I'm walking out the door with an offer letter in my hands, exhilarated and overwhelmed and wondering what I've gotten myself into.

Are you wondering the same thing? Let's figure it out.