A Wedding Story: A great cloud of witnesses

Posted on October 11, 2012 by Hannah

Apparently, the original intent in having a bunch of your friends dressed alike standing up with you at the wedding was actually to confuse the evil spirits that might seek to harm the bride and groom.

Now, I think it is more so that you can have an army of photo-enhancing helpers on your wedding day, and force the people you love most to spend extensive time with you.

Whatever the case, I loved our wedding party. In the ridiculous emails that I started sending them months before the wedding, I happily christened them the Sweet Sixteen, with the ladies being the Awesome Eight. (And yes, I am still a camp counselor in my soul. Camp counselorness is an eternal quality, and one of its manifestations is the need to name everything.) 

I could not have asked for a better wedding party, which really means that I cannot imagine having better friends throughout my life. Having this great cloud of witnesses backing us up as we said our vows was a tangible reminder that we have people who care about us, are rooting for us and our marriage.  And considering the total nightmare of trying to get clothing for the wedding party (see unsolicited advice at end) I feel pretty fortunate that they still love us.

I could have easily continued lining up people I loved, but I made myself stick to eight, even though I was tortured to cut friends out of the party. Luckily the wedding industry has fabricated all sorts of other titles and positions so that brides can continue to recognize the ladies they love, things like “guestbook attendant” and “reception hostess.”

Here they are, the Awesome Eight. And yes, I picked this picture to label because I believe people’s de-facto funny faces give you glimpses into their souls. In order from left to right (and order signifies nothing else, as I skipped that maid of honor bit since I don’t have a sister and didn’t want to pick a friend):

Rachel: Sometimes I joke that Rachel is MVB, most valuable bridesmaid, and by that I mean that you should probably hire her to be in your wedding because her life skill is getting thigs done. She designed our save the dates, invites, created spreadsheets to organize me, went to all sorts of meetings with me, counseled me through many distresses, helped throw the best shower ever, AND when her dress fell apart as we were taking pictures (thank you David’s Bridal – see rant at end) she didn’t even flinch, but instead yelled for someone to sew her in.

Fun Fact: Rachel used to dream of being the Tinkerbell figure that comes down the zip-line at the Disney World light show. She also loves the show Duck Dynasty and knows all the words to every song from Seven Brides for Seven Brothers.

Bethany: Sometimes James and I fight over whom Bethany loves more, since we both claim her as one of our best friends. She and Jenny were there that moment I spoke the words out-loud in college — “ I think I will marry James” – and I borrowed her shirt the night of our first date.  We were also running buddies through several hard MI winters, and let me tell you, you know who your friends really are after they get up at 6:30 to run in the ice with you.  Bethany came to visit for a week in June, after Jared’s wedding, and she did an impressive number of wedding crafts in only a couple days.

Fun Fact: Bethany has seen pretty much every BBC miniseries, loves babies, dogs, literature, and cannot stomach anything with mayonnaise. She can also give you a rundown on all the clothes in Gap at any given moment.

Laura, James’ sister: I. Have. A. Sister. Now. Yay!!!!! After growing up in families with only brothers, Laura and I are pretty pumped to be related. When Laura visited me in France a couple years ago, we actually had this heart to heart where we decided that we would even stay friends if James and I broke up, and maybe she could still be in my wedding if I married someone else.  She is sweetness with a touch of sass and I love her so much.

Fun Fact: So many of the things I want to write here, I can’t put on the internet. So, suffice to say that Laura loves: apple dumplings, bright red pants, good movies, tye-dying unmentionables, and breaking campus rules.

 Megan: Megan threw a birthday part when she was in 8th grade and invited me because she felt bad leaving me out since I was friends with the other guests. And then we became besties. She has been a source of great wisdom, much laughter, and too many happy moments to count. She also assembled all 200+ fans for our reception, and periodically answers my medical questions, as she is in med school, and therefore Source of All Bodily Knowledge.

Fun Fact: If Megan could have one movie to watch forever on a deserted island, it would be West Side Story, because even after getting tired of watching it, she could spend forever learning the dance moves. She also does such a good job cutting up and seasoning her food, that even if we order the same thing at restaurants, I always want to try hers.

Janna: Our dads started teaching together at around the same time, and I don’t remember a time before we were together at holidays. There was that time we fought for a year in elementary school for a reason neither of us can remember, but it ended when Janna sent me a “make-up letter,” as in, an apology letter that had been covered in make-up. She also lived with me the year I taught in KY and was a co-foster mother of all those kittens.

Fun Fact: Janna loves Romania, and just got back from a month working as a nurse there. She also loves all things Japanese, and when we were young, we created our own cooking company named “Stongells” (Stone + her last name of Dongell). We are still waiting for our trademark no-bake cookies (since we were too young to use the stove) to gain notoriety.

Susannah: I usually refer to her as Suze on this blog, but growing up we were Susannah and Hannah, two dorky girls, one with head gear and one with horse t-shirts. I feel so blessed that our lives have led us to now live in the same city. Because she is a wedding photographer, Suze was my source for all random wedding questions. There at the end I am pretty sure I called her every single day. And of course, she was the hostess of that amazing shower.

Fun Fact: Susannah is crazy flexible, and sometimes as you are talking with her, she will just stretch in kind of weird ways. She is also an insane game player, makes awesome soup, and speaks fluent Spanish.

Jenny: Jenny started out as my RA freshman year, then we led a Bible study together, and she has remained one of the people I respect most in the whole world. If Jenny says something unkind about someone (which happens rarely) than it must actually be true. I asked her to give the toast at our reception because I selfishly wanted to be the subject of her kindness and eloquence. Also because she took a speech class in college and the mock toast she wrote about Winston Churchill and Clementine made me cry.

Fun Fact: Jenny hunts, she shoots, and yet she is the sweetest most ladylike thing ever. She also falls asleep during most movies, makes French bread to die for, and would just as soon roller-blade as walk.

Amanda: I guess it could seem odd that I have only known Amanda for 2 years, and yet she was in my wedding party. But sometimes you meet someone and know almost instantly that you have found a kindred spirit, like Diana Barry and Anne Shirley. That is what happened with me and Amanda. And over the past 2 years we have wept, laughed, argued, shared, and grown together and I wanted to have her beside me. I also appreciate that in this world of Pinterest-induced Martha Stewarts, Amanda declared that she would love to help with wedding crafts, but she can’t even tie bows.

Fun Fact: Amanda loves Southern literature, cites poems and books all the time, insistes that she didn’t know what feta was before she came to KY (from Alabama) and loves her dog Chester fiercely. She is also the mother to a sweet baby girl who is due in just over a month!!!

And of course, we also had some handsome men as members of our party: four brothers, best friends, new friends, and one groomsmen who was absent at the last minute because his wife gave birth to their first baby (a totally legitimate reason to miss : ) ). And I picked the serious picture because I think James is especially cute in it.

Add to that 2 precious flower girls that I have babysat since their birth, and our army of 19 was ready to get this marriage going! 

Unsolicited Wedding Advice #5:

  • Pick clothes early and buy quickly:  Dressing that many people was nothing short of a nightmare, and not because our friends were slackers. We finally opted for David’s Bridal and Jos. A. Banks because they were the cheapest option, and seemed to have the best variety of fits. However, even though these two places are known for doing weddings, they were absolutely no help. David’s Bridal discontinued all of our dresses mid-spring (despite that being height of bridal buying season) and didn’t contact me (despite having all my info, including that I had chosen those dresses), which meant that I spent spring break calling David’s Bridals across the county tracking the dresses down one by one. Furthermore, as we found with the exploding zippers, the dresses were pretty shoddily made. The guys’ suits were equally difficult, though the service was much kinder.
  • Tie Bar: such a good decision for buying ties. So cheap, quick, useful, etc.
  • Think about what will really matter: In the end, does it matter what color my bridesmaids painted their toes? No. Does it matter if their jewelry was “blush and gold” or “blush and silver” No. Does it matter if they wore wedges or strappy sandles? No. Would it have maybe been better if I just said “Get a navy dress and clear it with me”? Yes.  So many things seem like big deals at the moment and they just maybe aren’t.
  • Spend your life cultivating good friendships.They will enrich your wedding day, and your entire existence.


Photos by Whitney Neal Photography.
 

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , | 7 Comments

A Wedding Story: Why you should absolutely definitely do a First Look

Posted on October 9, 2012 by Hannah

I have always been adamantly opposed to the “First Look” idea, that is, to seeing the groom before the wedding and doing all photos beforehand. One time I even got in a heated argument with Suze over this issue, informing her that the First Look was created by photographers as one more way to make the day about the photos, not getting married. I had always dreamed of that magical moment when the doors of Estes Chapel would open and I would see the man I was going to marry. And yes, it had to be Estes Chapel. It was where my parents got married and where all weddings are in our small town. I don’t think I realized that you could actually be married somewhere else until I was in middle school. I strongly, emphatically, passionately felt that a First Look would ruin all the wedding magic that I had always imagined.

I take it all back. Every. Last. Word.

Up until about 3 weeks before the wedding, I was standing by my First Look antipathy, despite frequent attempts by others (ahem… Suze….) to get me to change my mind. I would not, I repeated, I WOULD NOT make my wedding day about the pictures, as important to me as they were.

But then, I went to Gen’s wedding, and I marveled in how much she got to enjoy talking to her guests because her photos were done earlier. And I looked at my insane timeline and saw the tiny window of time we had. AND my mom and I got into it about how long photos would take and I started getting stressed about the timeline of the day and potentially fighting with my mother. AND I, for the first time in my extraverted life, started getting nervous about everyone watching my reaction to James.

But the final straw was when I went to my makeup trial and Rachael informed me that I would be a crying sweaty emotional mess (ok, so she said it a little nicer) by the end of the ceremony and I really should do pictures first. That didn’t totally sway me, but what she said next was how precious that walk down the aisle was as her last walk with her father before she became someone else’s wife. She was able to focus on him, as well as her husband, because she had already had that romantic moment earlier.

Thus, in a realization that the only way to make my day NOT about the photos, while still having the ones I wanted, was to get them out of the way earlier, I emailed my photographer with a new schedule and a plan for a First Look.

Best decision I made in terms of the flow of the wedding day.

Why You Should Do a First Look:

First, the practical ones:

  • Your guests will thank you. By the time I had dismissed everyone, was bustled, had my hair put up, switched my veil, etc. I still made it to the reception about 45 minutes after the first guest. If I had taken an hour or so to do photos (not that long, mind you), most of my guests would have left, or at least eaten all the food.
  • You will save money. Because we were getting to the reception faster, we didn’t spend money on the appetizer spread we had initially planned.
  • You will look better in whatever photos you do take. By the end of the ceremony, and people hugging me afterwards and yanking on my veil, I was indeed a frizzy, red-nosed mess.

The more important ones:

  • Speaking the moment. I decided to still do my First Look in the chapel, even though it wasn’t where we were doing photos. I had always imagined that moment happening there, so there it was. And it meant that it was even more perfect than I imagined, because I got to walk towards James (none of this “him blindfolded and I sneak up from behind business”) without anyone watching. We then got to actually speak to each other in that moment about what it meant. I wouldn’t trade that for anything. In fact, if I start talking about how I felt when the doors opened and I saw him, I will promptly start crying. So glad I didn’t have to share that with 300 people.
  • The Aisle. I cannot even begin to describe the tumult of emotions I had when I walked down that aisle a couple hours later. I was emotional about my father giving me away for starters, but that wasn’t all. As I walked down that aisle, I saw everyone from all the different spheres of our lives together for the only time this side of heaven. I saw my past, my present, my childhood, my adult life, my co-workers, my mentors, my teachers, my students, my friends, my family – all in one space. And I didn’t miss any of it, wouldn’t have wanted to miss any of it. I had already seen James, so I was able to soak in the people around us.

Taking that First Look allowed my awareness of the day and my enjoyment of it to be so much richer, so much fuller.

It doesn’t hurt that it also gave us some awesome pictures.

Unsolicited Wedding Advice #4:

  • Do a First Look. See above.  But also, make it your own. If you have dreamed of the church doors moment — do it. Don’t do some farm/urban wasteland/ city chic scene just because the pictures will be cool. Protect the beauty of the moment by thinking about what location makes it more meaningful, not more photogenic.  After our time alone, we went and did our portraits and then were met by the wedding party. This also meant that our friends were only out in the July heat for about half an hour.

(Photo credit to Whitney Neal Photography, as always.)

So, did you or didn’t you do a First Look? What are your thoughts on it?

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , | 12 Comments

A Wedding Story: THE DRESS

Posted on October 6, 2012 by Hannah

I left you at that awesome fist pump of excitement from James who was about to come meet me.  But before we get to the first look, we have to talk about something so important that it gets it’s own post:

THE WEDDING DRESS.

Why is it that the wedding dress is so important to us girls? (If you are reading this and thinking, beh, I could care less what I wore, I question your awareness of your own feelings.) I have a theory. I think that a lot of us women spend a lot of time dreaming about our weddings, not so much because we are dying for a party all about us, but because we don’t know how to dream past that day. I mean, yes, we dream of growing up to be a ballerina, or doctor, or president, or daytime talk-show host (was that just me?), but since we are children we are fed the dream that this magical future starts the day that we have someone strong and handsome by our side.  Obviously, that isn’t true, and if you can’t imagine a future without said man, you might be in for some painful reality checks when he fails to “complete you” as you have always hoped.

But the fact remains that the wedding rests in our childish dreams as the portal to happiness and adulthood through which we will someday pass. For most of us, we can’t imagine the groom for the majority of our daydreaming years, since we have never met him. So instead we imagine our dress, we imagine what we will look like when we see Him, whoever He is. We spend our childhood playing dress-up and marrying Barbie off to Ken in nine gazillon outfits, all simulacra, all rehearsals for our own Great Dress-Up.

For at least the  first 18 years of my life, my inner-vision of wedding dress perfection was pretty close to the dress my mom and grandma both wore: satin, BIG, simple. Emphasis on the big. I am a ball gown girl, always have been, always will be. We are the post-Princess Di generation and we grew up on reruns of eternal trains and billowing veils.

But in college, I distinctly remember one night lying on Bethany’s bed and panicking that no one was wearing ball gowns anymore — that they would go extinct. I charged upstairs and promptly fed my hopes on pictures of ball gowns for the next hour. (I can feel the judgement across cyberspace…)

In recent years though, I started seeing all these beautiful dresses that were lace, mermaid, sheaths — NOT ball gown. I loved them, even though they meant that someone could conceivably sit closer than 3 feet to me whilst I wore my dress. They were dresses like these:

When I went dress shopping last Christmas break, these were the dresses I went after.

And they looked HORRIBLE on me. Hips like mine are not friends with the simple sheath.

But a satin ball gown? So not practical for a wedding that had an outdoor casual July reception.

Which is why I originally only tried on my dress “for fun,” and then proceeded to try on so many lace sheaths that were, one after the other, disappointing. I found myself saying things like, “Well I’m sure that I will loose weight by then….” “If I could get my stomach flat…” “Maybe if I toned my arms….” News Flash: you cannot remake your rib cage or hip bones. Not happening.  Finally, after trying on all the dresses I had printed off of Pinterest, the sassy little attendant in Cincinnati Bridal and Formal informed me that I didn’t know what looked good on me and that I needed to get back to ball gowns.

Thus, after only 2 different shopping trips for a dress, I was back at Twirl purchasing a satin ball gown for my July wedding. And I love it. Because in this dress, I looked like the bride that I had always imagined looking like, and I couldn’t wait to wear it in front of the man who was so much better than I ever could have imagined.

Obviously, when outside in a ball gown, one must fulfill Disney dreams and commune with animals. Of course, in the Disney dream, you don’t have to jump back to avoid green horse slobber.

And because I feel a little self-conscious for having a whole post of pictures of myself, here are some of the handsome man I married.

Unsolicited Wedding Advice #3:

  • Make sure to look like yourself on your wedding day. Prom hair? Do you usually look like that? Crazy extreme makeup? Is this Halloween? I wanted to wear my hair down, curly, and big, like it was here, but a little more finessed. For the reception, as you will see, I just pulled it back in a more finessed version of my standard messy bun.
  • Buy a dress that fits WHEN YOU BUY IT. This was some of the best wedding advice I got. My friend Suze told me to be sure to buy a dress that you feel totally happy in on the day you buy it, not if some hypothetical diet works. Like my friend Fran said, you might not actually be at your thinnest ever, and it doesn’t matter. This meant that I ate fried chicken and mac n’ cheese the week before my wedding. It also meant that I didn’t have to wear any special body changing undergarments. PTL.  For me, this also meant no strapless dresses, because I always hate how they look on me in photos. Unfortunately, there is a wedding industry conspiracy to only offer strapless dresses. Mine was originally strapless, but we ordered extra gown material (lots of designers offer this) and an amazing seamstress sewed sleeves to match the folds of the bodice. She also cut out 2 of the 5 crinolines that were sewed in, because even I have ball gown limits.
  • Make/ borrow a veil.Do you know how much those flimsy comb things are? HUNDREDS OF DOLLARS. Not ok. I get the ones that are lace edged, etc, but I just wanted a plain one. So, instead of paying lots for nothing, my granny made it for under 20$. She also made a detachable blusher with the extra, and she and I got to enjoy a delightful afternoon of veil analyses.


As  with all these posts, photo credit to the oh so talented Whitney Neal Photography.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , | 7 Comments

A Wedding Story: The only time people take lots of pictures of you while you are getting dressed

Posted on October 4, 2012 by Hannah

I had heard so many people tell me that they barely slept the night before their wedding, which I can understand, as you are simultaneously stressed, anxious, excited, thrilled, emotional, happy, and tired – so tired that you can’t sleep. I don’t sleep even when there is nothing wrong, so I gifted myself some strong sleeping pills that knocked me out for a solid eight hours and had me waking up refreshed and bridal.  Bless medicine, bless it.

But when I woke up, all of the above emotions kicked in and I did what any emoptional 25 year old woman would do: I went and woke up my parents and climbed in bed with them. Yes. I did. It meant that for one last morning, I still got to be their little girl before becoming someone’s wife.

Of course, this sweet bubble was still rather brief because BEAUTIFICATION (yes, it was on the schedules everyone got as that. And yes, everyone got a schedule… emailed out many weeks earlier…. with columns and contact numbers….. and yes, I am that person.) was starting!!!!!

Remember dances when you lived in the dorm, and the bathroom became a communal place and you didn’t even know who’s clothes you were wearing or who’s curling iron you were using? That is how it was. Times a million.  I was surrounded by my best friends, in the home that I love, feasting on food that the parents had got up and made as well as bagels from Great Bagel, giggling, and leisurely getting ready to marry James.

Some notes before you see photos:

  • I unashamedly wore a cute getting ready outfit. Usually, I get ready in my grungies, but not when I am being photographed. And I totally charged into Bethany’s room the morning of my weading complaining that I had nothing to wear, hence the cambray shirt.
  • Rachael did my makeup. She is Suze’s older sister, a Mary Kay pro, and has been trying to teach me how to do makeup since I was like, 10. Plus, she listened when I explained that I wanted to look “like myself, but better.”
  • Barbara, from Zoë Salon and Spa did my hair and she is amazing. She cuts it on a regular basis and when we did some trial hair she kept on calling it Victoria Secret hair, which made me feel like a star. Most importantly, she is not stingy with the hairspray or teasing comb, two things I find essential to good hair. And yes, I briefly looked like a poodle, but everything turned out ok in the end.
  • There are lots of black and white ones, because it made me feel like I was in a documentary. Plus, I just really love b/w photos!

And then I saw my daddy, and it was just too much. I sat here for awhile and tried to find a way to write about our relationship, and how emotional this day was for us, but I can’t find any words that aren’t trite. I guess these photos will have to speak for themselves.  

The guys also had some getting ready time, though significantly less than us ladies used. I think James said that he went to Bob Evans with his dad and brothers, then about 1 o’clock they went to the church. I met him at 2, so I guess that means he spent an hour getting ready for the most photographed day of our lives.  

Unsolicited Wedding Advice #2:

  • Try out your makeup and hair first. I wasn’t the slightest bit stressed about how it would turn out because we had already done it earlier that week.
  • Have someone bring you bagels. Ok, so maybe that is just life advice. I. Love. Bagels.
  • Don’t  Over-DIY it. There are some times where it just isn’t worth it to do it yourself, unless you have lots of spare time and are Martha Stewart, which I am not. Yes, our friends helped so much. But having the bouquets just show up in a box as we were getting ready – such a blessing. Sometimes you will spend just as much money and use up precious time doing things yourself.
  • GET A GOOD PHOTOGRAPHER. The photos were really important to me, and this was the hardest decision of my wedding. I finally narrowed it down to three, then two, then forced everyone who came through my home to wacth a slideshow I had made from pulling photos off both of their websites and mixing them. Yes, I am a crazy. At one point I was lying on the floor and flipping coins over and over. Finally, James announced we had to decide and we did, and I have no regrets. Our photographer gave me exactly the style of photos I wanted and she captured the most perfect expressions and moments. She also happens to be one of the nicest people ever, which is good, since you are with your photog A LOT of the day. (Shamless plug: She travels! So wherever you are living and reading this, you should probably just book her. I might have, at one point in the planning, written her a gushing email about how relaxed I felt knowing that she would do our photos. It was like a fourth grade love letter. And then I saw her the next weekend and was I totally awkward like if you told a kid you wanted to be their best friend and then saw them and didn’t know what to say. )

 

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , | 13 Comments

A Wedding Story: First comes love, then comes a whole lot of work, then comes marriage

Posted on October 2, 2012 by Hannah

And so begins the overwhelming wedding posts.

There is so much I want to say about this day that I want to apologize in advance for being wordy. I will try to let the pictures speak for themselves when I can.

Before I start showing you the beauty of this day, and telling about all the things that happened on it, I need to spend a post talking about the people who made it all possible.

There are so many ways to do a wedding, and I am positive that we did not pick the easiest way, though we didn’t really have a choice. In trying to do things around various constraints, we ended up asking for a lot of help from our friends and families. And they came through, which meant that the wedding weekend is a blur of all of our favorite people gathered around us and supporting us.  I would not have it any other way — though who knows, they might, if given the option.

A small army of our Hillsdale friends came in Friday night for Bachelor(ette) activities and then they showed up the next morning to help us decorate the reception site. We had our reception in a public park, reserved by my little brother who literally slept on the courthouse steps back in January to reserve it for us. The space is beautiful but it needed some work which means everyone pitching in: all of the bridal party, plus any spouses or significant others that were tagging along, plus anyone who innocently happened by. This meant that our friends – some of who had travelled 12 hours, others who had flown in from another country – got up early to clean a public pavilion. (I am pausing to reflect on how AMAZING our friends are. Feel free to join me.)

Then, because it was a public space, we had to have park sitters for the next 24 hours. This meant that some of our friends stayed late on Saturday, got there early on Sunday, or stayed up until the ceremony to help. One of my former students watched the pavilion during the actual ceremony, which just shows I wasn’t above asking everyone.  Sunday morning a big group of my girlfriends from college showed up to help set up tables – some of who had also spent so much of the day before working. I. Am. Blessed.

I can’t even go into all the people who helped in other ways. Jordan, who did every task I threw at him and DJ’d our whole wedding. Ana-Joel who worked, decorated, and then did most of the bridesmaids’ hair. James’ mom who made the world’s best cake and supplied so many of our decorations. Abby and Elyse who provided the amazing music for our ceremony, who established the soundtrack for our day. Jeremy’s dad for doing something so amazing that I am not even going to share it yet because it is a surprise. All the people who hosted out-of-town guests in their homes. The countless girlfriends who were conned in to spending many summer hours assembling wedding things. The list goes on and on forever.

Over the next week (s), I will share so many photos and stories of the day itself, but I didn’t feel right putting those up without this first post. Before the wedding was the work. And behind the work were all the people who love us, who have been rooting for us from the beginning, and who rejoiced with us at our wedding.

We love y’all.

 

Unsolicited Wedding Advice #1: Find a way to get all your friends in from out of town early because you are going to be craving time with them and the actual day goes too quickly. You don’t have to put them to work, obviously. We had some stuff Friday but also a big bonfire Saturday night. The bonfire took very little planning but was a ton of fun and a great way to see the people who had traveled far to be with us.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , | 7 Comments

NASHVILLE*

Posted on September 30, 2012 by Hannah

Sometimes weekends are for fun, sometimes they are for work, and occasionally those two things happen to be the same thing. Such was the case last weekend when I was…

….for a graduate conference and also got to spend the weekend with some of my favorite people.

You will notice that there are no pictures on here of the actual conference, but let’s be honest – who actually wants to see me reading a paper on post-colonial identity and intertextuality in a mostly empty room? This is not to say that the paper was not deeply appreciated by the nine people who heard it, but still – not what you care about seeing on a blog.  Although I did look pretty professional and snazzy…. except for the big bandaid on my knee where I had obviously cut myself shaving and then forgot to remove the bandaid.

Rachel moved to Nashville this summer and the conference’s location near one of my absent besties was indeed an encouragement to submit a paper. When Sarah heard that I was going to Nashville she decided to come too.

When I was a freshman in college I decided to go and visit Rachel at her college. Two weeks before I went, I got a big envelope with a menu from their local ice cream shop. This meant that I spent the next two weeks planning my ice cream sundae. It also shows that Rachel is a) a planner and b) a foodie like me. I give this story as explanation for the expectations I had in coming to Nashville, expectations that were totally met, as you shall see in the photos below.Rachel works for a fancy-pants talent agency and upon seeing her office, Sarah and I collapsed despondently and moaned over how much we want to work in the private sector. (Yes, that is me reposing on the swank staff lounge settee. And yes, I am drinking a juice box, because when offered anything from the crazy stocked kitchen, I decided I wanted a juice box.)

I should also say that Rachel is an awesome tour guide, with comments like “That boutique doubles as a cat adoption center” to spice up our Nashville experience.  She also managed to swing us free tickets to the symphony because she knows people. The fact that I have a friend who “knows people” does serious good to my reputation, I’m sure.

When in Nashville, buying cowboy boots seemed like a good idea moral imperative.  I wore them, with a little black dress, to the aforementioned symphony. This too seemed like a good idea.

Nashville, we loved you. 

*Nashville just seemed like one of those words for which the caps lock key was invented.

PS: Rachel made those awesome pumpkin cinnamon rolls from this recipe, and added chocolate chips, which was another very good idea. The coffee is from Crema, and I did actually drink that whole cup — without any chocolate. I am quite proud.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , | 6 Comments

Definitely Call Me Maybe

Posted on September 28, 2012 by Hannah

Confession: James and I can’t get enough of Carly Rae Jepsen’s “Call Me Maybe.” Before you judge, I want you to actually try to make it through one full listening without singing along. It is impossible. When we were on our honeymoon we had satellite radio in our rental car and I am not ashamed to admit that we would actually search for it to sing along. Yes. We maybe have some choreographed dance moves to match by this point.

Before you whip out your condescension fueled by love of some band that actually plays their instruments, hear me out. We have had about 10 years of bands who make real music. Grungy music came in, music where people don’t dance along, don’t perform – they just sing. And that’s great…. But sometimes I miss the shininess of  bubble gum pop (judge judge judge).

Enter Carly Rae.

So, to start your weekend off right, here are some doses of “Call Me Maybe.”  The original music video is pretty horrible so I propose:

I promise that by the time you finish these, you will wonder how you lived before this song. I guess you could say that before it came into your life you missed it so bad, you missed it so, so, bad.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , | 2 Comments

Happy Birthday to the (recent) Mother of the Bride

Posted on September 26, 2012 by Hannah

Today is my mom’s birthday. I know I promised to start finally telling you all about the wedding and share lots of photos, but that might take a couple days. And really, there is no better way to start the wedding sharing than talking about my mother.

James and I had so much help on this wedding, so many people who sacrificed so much to help us have the perfect day. But there is no person whose effort equals that of my mother. Not only did she work lots of extra days to help pay for it, but she invested herself in so many details. My mom was my companion for all of the shopping, planning, selecting, tasting, tears, joys, etc. She was the one who stood there and cried with me when I found THE DRESS, and who got excited about my plan for using all the old mason jars and antiques (read: old junk) around our house to decorate, and the one who found the caterer. She encouraged me that people really would like chicken almondine — even if it is a potentially scary southern casserole, and that people would want to read a letter from James and me with a description of where our lives are going. She spent hours driving out to the reception site at all hours of the day to analyze where sun would be during the reception, and she and my brother both spent weeks suffering from an attack of chiggers after they weeded the gardens around the park where the reception would be. Did you catch that? She also weeded and planted flowers in the public park where we had the reception. She found “a man” (My mother has all sorts of “men”: hay man, clay man, squirrel trapping man, tree-chopping man, etc. She is like, Queen of the redneck workers.), to give us about a hundred cut tree wedges for free, and when we were missing half of the table clothes the morning of the reception, she got on that phone and made it happen.

Planning a wedding brings everything to the surface, every insecurity, character flaw, old feud, and personal failing. This is why people become the worst version of themselves on their way to having the best day of their lives. And my mom and I did have a couple moments where we had it out, like when I thought she was serious about wanting to put goldfish in bowls on every table. All I could see where visions of dead fish bodies being plucked out and thrown at us while we danced, and what I couldn’t see was her just teasing me. I also battled fears of her wrapping everything – stationary or not – in tulle, though in the end the tulle she wrapped around the pavilion banister did make it look like it was hovering somewhere between reality and dreamland.

This week, I have been drooling over our photos, and I can’t help but feel a little sad that my mom isn’t in more of them. I am not blaming our amazing photographer, I am just recognizing the sad reality that so often, my mom was off working on the next thing to move along my beautiful day. I got to be pampered and bridal, while she worked to make sure that our day would be perfect in every way. And it was, because she made it so, and I won’t ever be able to thank her enough.

Even sadder than that is the fact that in a moment of overwhelming emotional/ heat induced wedding day stress during the reception (read: most fun party ever), I snapped at my mother.  Pause so you can all judge me – yes, I deserve it. That is my only real regret from my wedding day. Other than that, it was perfect in every way and the most fun day of my life. As I am reliving it through our photos, I see my mother in all of them. She is in my decision to wear my hair down, to refuse the false eyelashes, to opt for comfy flats over heals, and to rock the sparkly earrings. She is in the flowers we carried and in the decorations that adorned every pew.  She is in the food our guests ate, in the design of the programs they read, and in the practicality of the fans they waved. Yes, this wedding was all “James and me” but so much of me is from her, so much of the best of me.

Happy birthday mom, I love you.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , | 15 Comments

Bacon and Brie Quiche

Posted on September 25, 2012 by Hannah

I love living with James, but he is a boy.

Sometimes you just need a little girl time.

Which is why I periodically like to get together with my amazing roomies from last year for some girl time, and by that I mean Gilmore Girl time.

Last weekend we had brunch together and I made a bacon and Brie quiche, which I have to share with you, because it was delicious. I am still using up cheese from the birthday cheese bash, and when life gives you Brie and bacon, you have a duty to make a quiche.

Of course, I would make all of our food into quiches if James didn’t disparage them as “egg pie.”  I credit the Quiche Lady and her goat cheese fig quiche for this impulse. Also, I like making bacon in the oven like this because it is so much easier. I’m sure James would interject that it is impossible to clean the rack afterwards.

Note: I mostly followed this recipe, though I doubled the cream instead of using half sour cream, and I just used Brie instead of the two types of cheeses. I made the pastry crust from this recipe, and I pre-baked it for about 10 minutes before filling and baking it.  While you are looking at the crust recipe, you should really just read every post on her blog, because they are perfect. She isn’t the my-life-is-perfect-and-I-love-being-a-mom-all-the-time-and-I-just-make-great-food-while-being-perfect type of blog. In fact, she is often profane and irreverent, and you get the impression that she loves her kids but sometimes they drive her crazy, and I usually end up crying in half her posts because they are so human and beautiful.

Ps: This has nothing to do with cheese or bacon or quiche, BUT today our wedding photos are online which means that very soon I can start sharing them and telling you all about the wedding, which I have been dying to do for the past two months, but I wanted to wait till we had the photos first. Stay tuned for an overwhelming number of wedding posts. You will feel like you were there…. multiple times.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , | 5 Comments

Blog-iversary

Posted on September 23, 2012 by Hannah

Happy birthday little blog.

Two years ago I started blogging again, mostly so I could share wedding photos from this wedding.

A lot has changed in those two years, but I have come to really love my little corner of the Internet, silly and pointless though it may be.

In theory, I actually think blogging is really stupid, pointless, and maybe narcissistic, as it is pretty much keeping a public journal on the Internet.

But I do love being able to keep up with my family and friends who are scattered around the country and world, and this seemed as good a way as any.

Plus, there are some blogs I really love reading, so I guess they can have some point. These days I am especially loving these blogs, among many others*:

  • Erin’s blog (the bride pictured above) because it is perfectly poetic and well written. Plus I love that she and her husband moved across the country with no jobs and no reason. She also has a huge yellow cat who is one of my favorite felines.
  • Fran’s blog, because it is everything I wish mine was. I also feel that she and I should have been besties but were kept apart by logistics and are thus estranged kindred spirits. Of course, everyone feels this way about Fran, and if you don’t after reading her about page, then maybe you and I wouldn’t actually be friends in real life.
  • Bethany’s blog, because now she is back at work after the summer so she shares really funny stories about her students. She also shares just enough literature to keep us all cultured. Actually, all three of these ladies are bookish English major types… because I like to surround myself with book lovers.
  • My dad’s, because he is in Jerusalem all fall, and I think he’s pretty great.

So little blog, even though I think that having you is kind of ridiculous, I’ll probably keep you around at least a little longer.

*I really could go on forever listing all the blogs I like, but I will stop for now and just try to give lots of links periodically to the others. If you have/know of any good blogs that I can use as material to aid in procrastinating from grad work, please leave them below!

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , | 8 Comments