Six months ‘til the wedding and LAID OFF?

Upon my arrival at work last Monday morning my boss informed me that I was being laid off. Not the best news to hear when you’re planning a wedding. Maybe I should have seen it coming—working as an editor for a small company that recently lost a client. I was the last to join, I was the first to go. Logically it all made sense (for them anyway), but it was indeed a blow to my wellbeing.

Amid my stress and frustration, Mr. Cathedral Heights reacted with understanding and empathy, assuring me that we’ll make our bills and have the wedding we’ve been planning in September. Our parents are helping us with the wedding costs quite a bit, which saves us from having to drastically cut costs.

As I’m sure you’d imagine, the past week has been difficult for me—full of mixed emotions at this situation. I have had consistent, full-time work for more than nine years, since graduating college, so this state is rather unfamiliar to me. I've been attempting to stay positive by working out, searching job listings, networking, and continuing with the wedding planning, but I’ve also had days where I just want to hide in bed and read an escape book (The Golden Compass, by Philip Pullman, has been excellent for that).

I realize that I’m not the only one dealing with a layoff right now, and I need to appreciate the positive parts of my life—that I’m marrying a caring, kind, intelligent man and I am able to lean on him, friends, and family for emotional support. But, there’s always that other side of me that just wants to drown in sorrow and self pity, as hard as it is to admit that here.

My friends who have dealt with a layoff seem to give common advice: Take your time and figure out what you want to do. In the meantime, I have plenty of wedding tasks to keep me busy!

Wedding Lessons

In the beginning of my first Spanish class this evening, I felt frustrated. I couldn’t understand the teacher, I had trouble following her, and I didn’t know what she wanted me to say when she pointed at me. Over time, I felt more comfortable asking questions and stumbling over words and sentences in front of the class. My entire body went from stiff and anxious with worry to loose and calm. By the end of the class, I was giggling at myself with the group as I stumbled over verb conjugation.

Taking Spanish for the first time could be compared to many of my wedding planning experiences so far. Whether photography, decoration, clothing, music, chairs, transportation, or gift bags, almost every part of the wedding planning process requires learning a new skill—or learning a lot about a skill, which is tough in the beginning. I spend time researching, talking to experts, reading, gathering thoughts and ideas from friends and family, listening to more and more thoughts from friends and family, until I eventually feel more comfortable making a decision. I mean, how was I supposed to know about cotton versus linen napkins, or the timing of the speeches and dances, or the equipment that every wedding photographer should have on hand, or how long the first song should last? I never paid attention to things like that before.

I’m currently learning Spanish so that I can better communicate with Mr. Cathedral Heights’s family. Originally from Peru, his immediate family speaks English fluently, but they often mix in Spanish. And, since I know that they speak English when I’m around to make me feel more comfortable, I would love for them to feel comfortable speaking Spanish around me as well, and I want to be able to respond in Spanish. So, I figured it would help for me to understand and speak it myself (or try anyway)! My goal is to learn a little Spanish before the wedding in September, so that I am able to speak some Spanish with his relatives traveling from Peru.


We also decided to incorporate a bit of Mr. CH’s native language into our ceremony by asking our mothers to read poems in English and Spanish. I looked into this online and found out that bilingual weddings are a growing trend. Salma Hayek married her husband in French; actress Malin Ackerman and her Italian husband asked their fathers to read love poems in English and Italian at their wedding; and Eva Longoria said her vows to Tony Parker in his native French, while he recited his vows in her native English. Celebrities aside, I’m thrilled that the wedding will incorporate a touch of Mr. CH’s cultural background. I would love to find other ways to incorporate our family history, traditions, and culture into the wedding. For this week, though, I’ll focus on my verb conjugation.

Hasta luego!

The Sad Bride

Something borrowed, something blue, something old, yadda yadda yadda. The rebellious spirit inside me yearns to fight against the many traditions associated with weddings, especially the ones that don’t make sense to me. For example, if it’s easier for Mr. Cathedral Heights and I to have our pictures taken in our wedding garb an hour or so before the ceremony, what’s the big deal if he sees me in my dress? Yet, he’s absolutely against the idea. Why even take the chance of having bad luck, he points out. I understand his reasoning, but it still seems so silly to me.

Many of our wedding traditions stem from past cultural norms that no longer apply to present-day society. The lifting of the veil once symbolized the groom taking possession of his bride. The white wedding dress symbolized purity. The throwing of the rice symbolized fertility. I don’t need a veil, white doesn’t look good on me, and, really, isn’t throwing rice a waste of food?

Queen Victoria (at her 1840 wedding) is credited
with starting the white wedding tradition,
including the white gown.

The fourth time I went wedding dress shopping, I felt grouchy and tired of looking at beautiful gowns that seemed an amalgamation of overpriced white lace, silk, and frills. I honestly couldn’t even tell which dresses complemented me—during the last three tries I had more than one moment where I thought I was feeling the sparks of the one. Wedding dresses are almost their own entity—they could probably walk down the aisle by themselves and do fine. They don’t even need my seemingly-large-compared-to-wedding-dress-sample-sizes body.

“You’re such a sad bride,” said my bridesmaid, K, with a slight smirk on her face.

She knew I couldn’t stand being stuck in the tiny bridal store filled with mothers and aunts and friends gushing over super-skinny brides and clerks ignoring me even though I was exactly on time for my appointment (for once in my life). However, when I took K’s advice and tried on a dress that she pulled off the rack that I never would have picked for myself, my smile broke through the clouds. It wasn’t an “I found the meaning of life” moment, but it was a special moment, I have to admit, especially when the store broke into applause at my announcement that this indeed would be my wedding dress.

When the salesperson brought over a veil for me to try on, I told her I would not be wearing a veil. Moments later I stood staring at myself in the mirror, veil and all. I admitted that I didn’t hate the veil, in fact I kind of liked the veil, even though I didn’t want to like it.

Another salesperson passing by, who had given me a slightly annoyed look when I arrived with my grouchy attitude, turned to me and spoke. “We don’t have many traditions left in our culture. I think it’s okay to enjoy the few that we do continue to follow.”

And with that sentiment in mind, I said yes to the dress even though it was well over my budget and I graciously accepted K’s generous offer to loan me the veil she wore at her wedding. Now I can check off something borrowed and something new.

How to Choose a Reception Venue

In spite of the fact that my account at The Knot insists that I have 361 items to do on my checklist before our wedding this September, I feel pretty good about the current state of our wedding plans (ask me again in five minutes). We have decided on the venue for the reception, which proved to be the first big choice that we had to make. As I mentioned in a previous blog, I always pictured myself having a small wedding, maybe 30 people tops, barefoot on a Caribbean beach. Plans have changed a bit.

We chose the Marriot Key Bridge in Arlington, Virginia, as our reception locale. Where it lacks waves crashing against white-sand beaches, tropical plants, and the salty smell of the ocean, it makes up in convenience for us and our guests. As Mr. Cathedral Heights’s family is from Peru, Colorado, and Miami, and my family is mostly in Maine and California, with a few sprinkled in Texas, a large percentage of our guests are traveling to D.C. for the occasion. It was important to us to have the wedding in a location that offered nearby, affordable lodging and convenience to public transportation. The Marriot Key Bridge sits across the Potomac from Georgetown, not far from the Metro, and the DC Circulator bus passes right by, taking passengers to Georgetown, Dupont Circle, and downtown DC. This will work very well for our families and it will offer them the chance to explore the city in the off-wedding hours.

Choosing a venue for the reception proved a difficult task. I had so many thoughts racing through my head--whether to base the decision on what I wanted, what Mr. CH wanted, what would be most convenient for guests, what would be the most eco-friendly approach. Did I want to base the whole event on budget, attempting to keep the numbers at an all-time low while sacrificing more of my sanity or did I go with the hotel that barely fit in our budget and came with planners to help with the entire procedure? The Marriott package came with a cocktail hour, three-course dinner, cake, tables and chairs, centerpieces, table settings, discount rooms for guests, a suite for the newlyweds on the night of the wedding...need I go on? For a gal like myself, who isn't especially experienced at planning events that include more then chips, dip, and a keg, the Marriott sounded better and better. Plus, it had been recently renovated and offered a beautiful view of the city from the top floor, where the reception would take place.

We breathed a huge sigh of relief the day we put the deposit down on the Marriott Key Bridge. The first major step was complete. Now, for the other 360 to do's...

Wedding Website Woes

Mr. Cathedral Heights works as a computer programmer, so naturally I’d envisioned him being incredibly excited about putting together an amazing wedding Website for us. Right? Wrong.

No matter. Plan B: Make the Website myself. I figured it couldn’t be that hard—just choose a service, fill in the information, and you’re set. However, as I spent more time researching each site than I thought I’d spend actually building one, I began to realize that it isn’t so easy. As with every piece of the wedding planning puzzle, complicated details emerge that you would never have imagined, details that constitute entire college majors. I scoured the net for affordable or free packages and finally decided on one that coincided with a very well known wedding site. This particular one appealed to me because, for a small fee, I could have the domain name I wanted, which meant the url would fit on the Save the Date postcards we were soon sending. I entered my credit card information and reserved our domain name. Or so I thought.

The morning after purchasing our domain, which the site assured me was available, I prepared to get to work and instead found that suddenly the domain name we bought was unavailable. Unfortunately, my aunt, an artist, had already put the url we created on the handmade original Save the Date that she’d planned on bringing to the printers that day. (Please note: If you are getting married, this type of incident will most likely happen more than once in the planning process). I asked her to hold off while I sent a barrage of messages to customer service. Days passed and I didn't hear back. I finally called my credit card company and asked them to dismiss the charge, as I couldn’t get in touch with the service provider.

Fortunately, a friend mentioned iWeb, a Mac application that helps the average user make a Website. I’ve always been a PC girl; however, I recently started a new job and have been using a Mac for the first time in years. Along with a tiny bit of help from my brother/Man of Honor and Mr. Cathedral Heights (it’s amazing how little advice they had to share with me, both being in technology fields…men…), I figured out how to build us a site using iWeb, and my brother generously offered to host the site with his mobile me account. I don’t have a full understanding of how it all works, but I’m almost finished adding photos and text and I was able to snag a short yet personalized domain name.

And, of course, the original wedding Website got back to me as soon as I finished building the site on my own. One piece of advice for the brides out there: read the reviews that you can find on website hosts, as some are much more reliable than others. Oh, and don't be too disappointed when plans go awry--you'll find a way to fix it.

I Am The Warrior…Worrier?

I am convinced that some of the wedding Websites out there are attempting to make me even MORE anxious about the big day. I recently received an email from one of the numerous sites I’ve signed up for with the subject line, “Have You Thought About Your Wedding Kiss?”

The email went on to explain that there are many little things that us brides forget to practice, which, for me, translates to all the little things we forget to worry about while we are preoccupied with worrying about the big things. I admit it. I am a worrier. My fiancé claims that it’s one of the things he loves about me (well, maybe he refers to it as “caring”). However, being a worrier and planning a wedding don’t always jive.

When I woke up three different times last night and couldn’t get back to sleep, I tossed and turned, consumed by minute details regarding the big day—Did I pick the right colors? Is Mr. Cathedral Heights ever going to look at tuxedos? Will I get so anxious walking down the aisle in front of all those people that I pass out? Is it crazy to be spending so much money on one day when I don’t even have a car? And I still have seven months of worrying to go!

I remember when my best friend and bridesmaid—I'll call her K—got married. She said something about being concerned for me when it came time to plan my wedding. She knows me very well and had the foresight to predict how my personality might clash with having hundreds of details to organize and choices to make while everyone I’ve ever known tells me what they think I should do.

After racking my brain—and my mother’s, and K’s, and my fiance’s—over the past few weeks, I came to the understanding that I need to allow myself to not worry about some of the details. I’ll focus on the big items, or the items that matter most to me, and I’ll ask for help with the other stuff (I supposed this realization seems obvious to most). I had a moment of clarity today as well, when I took a step back and looked at the big picture. We’re planning an enormous party for ourselves—a day surrounded by loved ones, celebrating our relationship, our future, and our families joining together. This should be fun!

So, no, I hadn’t thought about practicing our wedding kiss. In fact, I want it to be spontaneous (or, as spontaneous as a planned moment that happens in pretty much every similar event can be), filled with excitement and love and nerves. I’ve made a decision: I’m going to give myself permission not to worry about the kiss.

I Was Destined to Elope

I’m sure many gals claim this, but I never envisioned myself having a wedding—or, the typical wedding anyway. If I did picture it, which happened rarely, I imagined a tiny ceremony on a beach or maybe even a wild trip to Vegas where we would recite vows in front of an Elvis impersonator (after all, I had a massive crush on the King for years).

So, when my Peruvian fiancé proposed to me in the garden next to the National Cathedral (even though he claims not to be very religious), I began researching destination wedding venues, citing off prices for beachside ceremonies in Jamaica, Antigua, St. Lucia, and emailing him postcard-perfect photos of the azure waters and white-sand beaches of the Caribbean, partially obstructed by a beaming bride and groom. I told him that we could have a small wedding. Maybe 30 people, tops? He replied that he’d rather have the opportunity to celebrate our love and the giant step we are taking with our families and friends; however, he wasn’t completely against my idea.

“Why don’t you make a list of the 30 people you would invite?” He recommended, slyly.

I sat there with my laptop, typing names into Excel—parents, siblings, aunts and uncles, cousins, family friends, high school friends, college friends, post-college friends—scattered across the country from Los Angeles, California to Veazy, Maine. I tried cutting the list down. How could I not invite these people who had watched me grow from infant to early 30s, who had loved me even through my angry, depressed goth phase in high school? As the list teetered off around the 80s (just for my side) I decided he might be right.

So, here I am, the newest addition to DCNearlyweds.com, thrilled to be blogging about the ups and downs of planning a wedding. As you may have deduced from my pseudonym, I live in the Cathedral Heights neighborhood in D.C. Our wedding will take place in this area in September, but I need to leave some substance for my upcoming blogs! In the meantime, I’m just happy I decided not to elope.