When I was a little girl, I did what many little girls do.  I watched Disney movies like Snow White and Cinderella, where the heroine gets married to the prince and lived happily ever after as his wife.  As a little girl, I wasn’t particularly aware that when Cinderella got married she probably stopped being ‘Miss Cinderella’ and became ‘Mrs. Prince Charming.’  And even if I had been aware of this change, it didn’t bother me much.  MRS. was perfectly normal – all my friends’ parents’ names were Mr. and Mrs. So-and-So.  OBVIOUSLY being married made their last names the same.  End of story, as far as little-kid-me was concerned.

Well, here I sit, 4 months before becoming a “Mrs.” myself, and let me just tell you, it’s no longer so cut and dry, this whole ‘Miss, now Mrs.,’ thing.

Suffice it to say, the concept of changing my name is throwing me for the proverbial loop.

It’s not a feminist thing.  It’s not even anything to do with Alex’s last name.  Truth be told, his last name could be considered an improvement on my own.  No… it’s more of an identity thing.  It’s as if changing my name in some way forsakes who I was before marriage.  Like I’m not a member of my family’s “clan” anymore.  Which brings me to something else that has been rolling around in my head for a few days now.  I HATE that a woman’s last name prior to marriage is referred to as her MAIDEN name.  The word maiden conjurs images of damsels in distress and white knights climbing up the tallest tower to claim a prize.  I don’t want to be a maiden, thank you very much.  It’s like saying a woman isn’t quite… right… before she’s married.

I’m sure this all sounds like I’m opposed to taking Alex’s last name.  Whenever people ask me if I’m changing “it”, I freeze up and grimace, which probably suggests I’m at odds with the concept (and also probably makes Alex feel oh-so-good.  By the way, WHY do people ask this question?  It’s a bit nosy, don’t you think?).  But that’s not it.  And I more than likely will adopt his name, because it’s a gesture to him and because I would like our kids to have 2 parents with the same last name.  I don’t want to put hyphenation on a child.  My balking is about giving up my last name, not about taking his.

My current solution?  I’m thinking about compromising a bit and changing my last name to his, but also changing my middle name to my “maiden” name.  I think this ensures I won’t be LOSING the name I’ve gone through life with thus far, since that is the crux of the issue.  I have a good friend who did precisely this when she got married, which is how I got the idea.  But it’s still scary, at least to me!

Has anyone else had trouble with the whole changing-your-name concept?

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A couple of months ago, I wrote a post about finishing my first-ever knitting project, a scarf.  I also mentioned in that post that I’ve also been working on a blanket, and that it was taking forever.  Well, it’s still taking forever.  But it’s because I put it aside to work on a Christmas gift for my good friend Heather, and since Christmas is over and the scarf has been finished and gifted, I can now share it with you all!

Just a tiny bit of background here…

Heather’s favorite color is purple.  It’s difficult to find such a color yarn.  But I did find it, on my favorite website for all things knitting: KnitPicks.com.  I have bought a ton of yarn on that website, and a whole set of Harmony Wood knitting needles, which are the best knitting needles ever, in my humble beginner’s opinion.  I found the pattern I used for the scarf on Knitting Fairy, where it was free!  The pattern was all knit stitches, except for every other row, where there was a yarn over and a K2tog thrown in (for my readers who are also knitters!).

Here’s the finished product, which I was very happy with and proud of.  I loved making this scarf so much that I have already purchased more yarn (green this time) to make another one, and a hat to hopefully go with it (I’ve never made a hat before, so we’ll have to see how that goes).

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If you look around the internet, or in magazines, or at news programs on TV, you will probably be hard-pressed to find anyplace that doesn’t list money as a top reason for divorce in the United States.

If you think about this a little bit, it’s not particularly shocking.

Let’s say a young couple (or even a not-so-young couple) gets married.  Everything is fabulous, and they decide they want to have a family, complete with a white picket fence and a neighborhood ice cream truck.  So they buy a house.  Then they have a kid.  Or two, or three.  The kids need STUFF.  The house needs STUFF.  Maybe now they need a new car.  And the couple themselves occasionally need stuff, too.  All these early marriage “stuff” acquisitions means the couple needs money… and may also mean the couple has to go into debt.  If the two people that make up this couple view and handle money differently, there’s a good chance there’s going to be friction, and over time, that it will be a major problem.

Like I said, it’s not shocking that money issues often = divorce.

As a soon-to-be-married person, this type of statistic freaks me out.  I certainly don’t want my marriage to be felled by money.  Money is, to a certain extent (you know, barring prolonged illness, alien invasion, and job loss), something that can be controlled.  So for Alex and I, I figured we could avoid problems if we talked early and often about how we are going to handle our finances as a married couple.

Turns out, I’m kinda dumb for thinking it’s that easy.  Because, when it comes to relationships and money, it’s not easy at all.

For Alex and I, we decided to split joint expenses – things like rent and electricity – according to the disparity in our incomes, but we keep our money separate so we can easily pay our pre-relationship obligations.  This was my idea, and I had read about this method of handling money in relationships in The Money Book for the Young, Fabulous & Broke by Suze Orman.  For example (and I’m making these numbers up):

He makes $40,000/year

I make $30,000/year

This means he makes 0.57 more than I do (40,000/70,000).  So if our rent is $1200 a month, he pays 0.57 x $1200, or $684, while I pay $516.

This is supposed to ensure that one person isn’t paying so much that all their income is gone every month, while the other person has tons to spare.  It has worked pretty well for us thus far.  The problem we are running into now is that this formula really isn’t going to work very well if we intend to buy a house, or have kids (which we do).  The person with more income is going to have to use a lot of that ‘more’ if we want a house that isn’t a shack.

Now, it isn’t that being able to afford these things is a problem.  They are do-able, achievable goals.  It’s the concept that all of a sudden it’s going to be pretty uneven financially, when viewed individually.  One of us is going to be paying a lot more, but we’re receiving equal benefits.  And for both of us, it’s the first time in either of our lives where our financial stability will be tied to someone else’s financial stability.  It’s the first time I can’t afford something basic, like housing, without the help of someone else in my adult life.  Our fates will be officially linked.  It’s like there’s less individuality there, somehow.  For two people who have been very independent and individual their entire lives, it’s a terrifying concept.

This makes me suspect that disagreements on this topic, not just with Alex and I, but with most couples, are not just about money.  This is stressful, emotional stuff because something important isn’t under your solitary control anymore.  Or maybe it’s an under-discussed fear about marriage in general, a fear about losing independence, and this is where it manifests.  Whatever the reason, the idea that it is not just MY money anymore is the hardest pill I’ve ever had to swallow.  I’ve worked hard to have a clean financial name, and it bothers the heck out of me that it won’t just be mine anymore.  I’ve never been particularly good at sharing.

I think that maybe this is why so many couples have trouble when it comes to money.  Money is power and control, and you can’t have much of a life without it.  Lucky for me, Alex and I do talk about money and the future a lot.  I suspect we will figure it all out intelligently and be fine.  Many people have trouble talking about this topic, though, so if anyone else is willing to share their thoughts and experiences, please do!

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The only thing I ever felt I would care about to the point of “bridezilla-ness” when it came to my own wedding has always been the wedding cake. I’m a baker, and I’ve dabbled in catering here and there, and so it only felt natural to have strong opinions about wedding cakes. I know that no one ever seems to EAT the cake, but I always imagined having an incredible tasting cake, with an even more incredible look.
Once Alex and I were engaged, the first thing I did was look at wedding cakes, in magazines and online. One of my first questions for potential venues was always about the cake, and if there were rules. So you can imagine my dismay when we found the perfect venue, a venue that includes the cake in the price, even, but were told: 1) you don’t get to taste the cake before the wedding, and 2) you have a set selection of designs you can choose from.

???????????!!!!!!!!!!!!????????????????

The above was my internal reaction when we were told we don’t get to taste the cake, and that they prefer it if you pick the design out of a book. In all fairness, the venue we chose is only on the map because of their catering reputation (which is stellar), and they are quite willing to attempt to make any cake design you show them, it’s just that it may cost you more. AND YOU STILL DON’T GET TO TASTE IT.
This blew big holes in my plan to spend inordinate amounts of time and energy choosing a cake. Plus, I totally miss out on cake tasting, which I’ve always thought would be fun. Luckily, my mom went to 5 bakeries before choosing one to make our engagement party cake, so I’ve had my fill of cake tasting for a while.
As far as pointing to something in a book… that’s just not for me. So I have been on the hunt for pictures of wedding cakes that I love, with the hope that the bakers at our venue will be willing and able to re-create one of them.

Here are a few that I keep coming back to:

This one I think is wicked-cool because it involves a snow globe as the cake topper, though I probably would not choose this myself:

And this is my absolute favorite:

It’s just so classic and clean looking! My florist told me she will give me as many loose flowers as I need (no charge!) for the wedding cake if I decide to do this.

Whatever we decide to go with, I will certainly post about it when the time comes.

Where are other brides finding wedding cake inspiration?

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A couple of weeks ago, I wrote a post called “Dressing the Groom.”  When I wrote it, I left out a crucial element of my groom’s wedding-day look, and I did that on purpose.  I knew I was going to be buying him something to wear on our wedding day – I just didn’t want to write about it until I was sure it was happening! Happily, I finally managed to place an order for the final piece of Alex’s wedding-day ensemble this afternoon. I intend to give it to him the night before the wedding, at our rehearsal dinner, but he already knows he’ll be receiving this particular item, so there’s absolutely no element of surprise.

A bit of background…
Alex and I fell in love over a telescope. Literally. We both have a passion for astronomy, and I happen to have saved up my money and bought myself a super-cool 5-inch Schmidt-Cassegrain telescope a few years ago.  (I write a separate astronomy blog, but it has been some time since I’ve had a chance to update that website.)   Alex and I spent a lot of time when we were first dating  looking at stars and planets through this telescope. One time, Alex saw a shooting star and made a wish, then many months later told me he had wished that he would be able to marry me one day – NO JOKE!
When we first started talking about wedding bands, we were seriously considering buying wedding bands made from the Gibeon meteorite, which crashed to Earth in Africa a couple hundred years ago. Here’s what those wedding bands look like:

They’re completely appropriate for us, but there were a few concerns. First, they aren’t exactly cheap, at least not if you want the high-quality, not-going-to-fall-apart versions. Second, you have to buy them online. The thought of buying our wedding rings online seemed way too scary for us. Finally, while they are a unique idea, they in no way match my engagement ring, and given my penchant for getting upset when things don’t match, we thought this might be a poor decision, long-term.
It took me a while to come up with an idea for a gift to give Alex for our “Zero Year” Anniversary. But since we scrapped the meteorite ring idea, and he had been so psyched to possibly wear something from space at the wedding, I eventually decided I needed to find something he could wear that is NOT a ring, but still came from space. That’s when I found Starborn Creations. They make jewelry out of the same meteorite the rings would have been made out of, including… drum roll please… CUFFLINKS.
Alex doesn’t normally wear clothes that would require cufflinks. But he will be wearing cufflinks with his tuxedo at the wedding. So I am giving him these:

Like I said, he knows he’s getting them. But I still can’t wait to see his face as he holds pieces of a space rock in his hand and knows those pieces belong to him!

(Photo credits: ring pictures from ArizonaSkies.com // cufflink pictures from StarbornCreations.com)

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You know why the age of 2-3 is great?  It’s because it’s the age when kids… or toddlers, if you prefer… start to figure things out.  Cute things, like that on their birthday they get presents, or that if they move a stool to the counter they can climb up to reach the candy they saw from across the room.  It’s the age when they start to reason with you, even if the reasoning is not always clear.

Unfortunately, this is also the age when kids learn they can make up excuses that may get them out of trouble, because now they know what trouble is, and that they don’t want to be in it.

Alex and I are learning this the hard way when it comes to E.  E is quite a character at times, which I have written about before (like when he pointed out my white socks to a room full of people).  E is also no stranger to long-winded explanations for why he did something that, in retrospect, he wishes he hadn’t done (like when he destroyed our 1,500-piece puzzle because he wanted to help clean up the living room).

Lately, E has developed a habit of smacking people.  He especially likes to go for the face.  We don’t know where he learned this, and we’re trying hard to teach him that hitting is not OK.

This past weekend, we went out to lunch with my family.  My dad, grandma, brother, and sister were all there.  So was one of my sister’s friends.  E knows all these people very well, and loves them all, so he was having a great time at lunch.  He even got to have a big plate of french fries all to himself.  Lunch was going well.

And then it happened.  For no reason at all, E turned to me (I was sitting next to him) and whacked me in the face.  Hard.

Time stood still.  My grandma was horrified.  My dad was watching to see how Alex and I were going to handle it.  I think my brother and sister may have been torn between horrified and amused.  E shrank away from me and then bee-lined for under the table (his most-favorite hiding spot ever).  Alex got him out and then took him for a walk, as close to a time-out as possible at a restaurant.  When he came back, E apologized to me and gave me a hug – the little guy definitely felt bad.  That’s when Alex told us all WHY E had smacked me.

“He says he did it because you took one of his french fries.”

Now, I had been nowhere NEAR E’s french fries.  Not that this is a good reason to hit someone anyway, but it was a blatant lie!  Everyone at the table backed me up on that, because Alex actually BELIEVED E!!  So not only is he capable of thinking up plausible excuses, he’s also capable of GETTING HIS FATHER TO BELIEVE THEM!!

I’ve said it before.  We are in so much trouble.

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If you follow this blog, you know that something I do from time to time is participate in something Whitney and I call “collective blogging.”  We come up with a topic from to write about, and then we both write our own versions of a post on the chosen topic.  To check out past collective blogs, please click here.

Today’s Topic: The C25K Challenge

To read Whitney’s post on The C25K Challenge, please click here.

Last week, Whitney and I wrote about New Year’s Resolutions.  One resolution we both happened to have involved physical fitness.  Big shocker, right?  Who doesn’t make a New Year’s Resolution about getting into shape every year?  But this year is different.  Really, it is!!  This year, I’m getting married in June and then going on a honeymoon to Hawaii.  Getting in shape is not an option – it HAS TO HAPPEN.

I’ve made valiant attempts over the last few months to find a fitness routine and stick to it.  I was doing pretty well around October-November with a combination of yoga/pilates/weight training, using my DVDs and hand weights in the living room to start toning up.  But then December came and it all went to crap.  I felt guilty… but not that guilty, because I was rather enjoying sitting curled up on the couch watching TV and knitting.  And as much as I like my Women’s Health: The Wedding Workout DVD, it just isn’t all that motivating once you’ve done the workout for a week.  It gets boring.

Then I happened to see someone tweet about something called C25K.  What was this?  I wondered.  So I googled it, and discovered that C25K is a running program/schedule designed to get you off the couch and running a 5K in nine weeks.  I’ve dabbled in running here and there, but I tend to give up because it’s either too much of a time-suck for me, or I get discouraged by my asthma.  So I thought about it and realized the C25K program might be just the thing to get me to run on a regular basis without… well, wanting to DIE.  Since running is one of the best ways to get in shape quickly, it seemed to solve my problem as far as looking my best for the wedding.

So I did what any good twitterer does: I tweeted about it, asking the twitterverse how they felt about C25K.  I got a few responses, all saying to try it because they were doing it and it was pretty good.  Then I got a tweet from Whitney, saying if I do it, she’ll do it with me.  AH!  PERFECT! A buddy to keep me motivated!

And so it was that Whitney and I decided to start the C25K program together… on March 1.  You’re probably wondering why March 1, and not now.  Seems like procrastination, right?  But there is a good reason, I promise!  I CANNOT run in my current physical state in the cold.  I absolutely will have an asthma attack – it’s happened before, more than once.  And because money is a little tight because of the wedding, I can’t go join a gym to get started on a treadmill now.  So I figured out that by March it should be a little warmer than it is now on a regular basis, and that gives me around 12 weeks to be up to a 5K by the wedding.  Perfect! (As a sidenote, I have this pipe dream about running on the beach while we’re on our honeymoon, I think it sounds very cool.  I don’t really know why.)  We’re going to be keeping tabs on each other using MapMyRun, which should help since Whitney and I don’t exactly live down the road from each other!  I’m also considering purchasing the C25K iPhone/iPod Touch app, which is supposed to tell you when to run and when to walk, without interrupting your music.  Anything to help me along!

I have made a vow to be on a healthy-stuff only diet, and to do my yoga and weights at least 3 times a week – starting… now! – so my body isn’t completely shocked come March.  Wish me luck, please!  I will need it!

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I’ve been back and forth about whether I wanted to admit to this or not… but when I first saw our ‘Save the Date’ cards printed out, just waiting to make their way to our future wedding guests, I got goosebumps.  It was so weird to see my name and Alex’s name on paper like that, informing the world they we “are getting married.”  Maybe other brides have this same reaction, I don’t know.  But, as a person who had actually begun to believe she would never be getting married, the in-print declaration that it’s happening was almost overwhelming.

I absolutely love our ‘Save the Dates,’ too, so maybe that is part of the reason I got all teary over them.  All the stationery items we’re using for the wedding are being designed by my sister, Lisa, who is a freelance graphic designer.  I showed her a font I kept gravitating towards on Wedding Paper Divas and she illustrated a font to be similar, then drew the stars herself. We used VistaPrint to print them out, which is a company I would absolutely recommend to anyone looking to design/print their own ‘Save the Dates’.  There’s a chance we’re using them for our wedding invitations as well – Lisa is almost ready to order a test print of those as we speak!

Because I’m a bit paranoid, I asked Lisa to remove our last names and our wedding website URL from the design of our Save the Dates. Here they are:

Aren’t they cute?  Our invitations are completely different (they’re more formal-looking), and once they are mailed out I’ll be sharing those as well!

If you’re interested in Lisa’s other design work, please contact me through this blog and I will be happy to provide you with her contact information.

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Welcome to another installment of what Whitney and I call ‘collective blogging.’  This means that we have each written a blog post on the same topic – but we wrote our posts separately.  Her take may not be the same as mine, and that’s the fun of it!  If you’re interested in reading past collective blogs, please click here.

Today’s Topic:  A Day in the Life of a Geeky Kid (and her mom)

To read Whitney’s post about her experience as a geeky kid, please visit her blog, My New Chimerical Kit.

This won’t surprise those of you who know me personally, but for those of you who don’t, when I was a kid I was a bit of a geek.  A nerd.  A goody-two-shoes, if you will.  I NEVER did anything to make a teacher call home, or get sent to the principal’s office, or get detention.  Technically I did have a teacher tell my mom that I wasn’t prepared for class once during parent-teacher conferences, but that was my AP English class and that teacher hated me because she once asked me what I thought about the book TESS OF THE D’UBERVILLES (PL 25) and I told her I didn’t care very much about the book.  That might be a separate blog post at some point, because that class was horrible and I hated it and someone could probably write a sitcom about it if they wanted to (right, Jen?!).

Anyhoo, there is only one time that I am aware of where a teacher actually sought my mom out to let her know I had done something rather… geeky.  The teacher’s name was Mrs. Gorman, and she was my preschool teacher (age 3 and 4).  Ah… preschool.  It’s such a wonderful time.  You get to play, make messes, and take naps.  There’s snack time.  Your biggest concern is whether or not you’re going to get a good seat in the “music time” circle, and the day you got to make a new letter picture (and by letter I mean A, B,C) was more exciting than anything else you’d ever known.

There was this one time when the whole preschool class was finger-painting for the afternoon.  This was, in retrospect, probably not a great call on the part of Mrs. Gorman.  Twenty-five 3-year-olds with paint on their fingers and no sense of the consequences of putting those fingers places other than the paper?  Probably not the best idea.  She must have realized this halfway through the activity, because she called out to all us little kids,

“Don’t get the paint on your clothes, your moms won’t be happy!”

I’m going to overlook the fact that she suggested only moms can do laundry.  That didn’t bother me too much at age 3.  Besides, I knew MY mom would be just fine if I got finger paint all over my cute little outfit (did I mention that I ALWAYS had to wear a cute little outfit when I was in preschool?  And that it absolutely HAD to match, or else I would pout and be upset all day over my mismatched garments?).  To little, geeky, 3-year-old me, it seemed that my mom could get dirt and paint and food out of all clothing.  So, being the darling child that I was, I stood up and told Mrs. Gorman,

“Don’t worry!  My mom will do everyone’s laundry if they get paint on it!”

I’m not sure what exactly happened after that – Mrs. Gorman may have had to leave the room so-as to not laugh in my face.  Years later I found out from my mom that when she came to pick me up from preschool that day, Mrs. Gorman had pulled her aside and told her that her daughter had volunteered her to do the entire class’s laundry for the day.  I think my mom said they had a good laugh over the whole thing.

Something tells me a child less geeky then myself would have kept the bragging about her mother’s laundry-doing abilities to herself.  Bragging about having the coolest new Barbie, yes, bragging about laundry, no.  But to me, this was information everyone needed to have – it was COOL.

And yes, to this day I am still convinced my mother has a laundry secret she has not yet shared with me.  I’m thinking perhaps she’s saving it for my wedding night.

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Alex has kept to himself when it comes to planning our wedding. He cares about it, and will give an opinion when asked, but if I’m talking about the difference between magenta and purple, he isn’t particularly into the conversation.

So you can imagine my surprise (and delight!) when he told me he had an idea for the wedding – specifically, an idea for the music at our wedding. We’ve already hired musicians for the ceremony, cocktail hour, and reception, but we haven’t quite gotten to the point where we’re choosing which pieces of music should be played when. I was all ears!

Before I continue, though, I have to give you a bit of background about Alex. He is waaaaay into the TV show NCIS.

(image from CBSTV.com)

It’s no joke with this show for him.  He can watch it for hours.  For Christmas, me, my brother, and my sister got him the first 3 seasons on DVD.  And you know how they constantly play it on TNT (or whichever cable channel it is)?  Guarantee you that channel is on if you come to our house.  I think it’s cute – I don’t think I’ve ever seen him so engrossed by TV, ever.

Maybe you see where this is going.  Alex’s input for the music at our wedding was this: he would like to walk into the wedding while the theme music for NCIS plays.

Yes, he’s serious.

I initially wanted no part of this idea.  But then I thought about it a little more, and while I just can’t see asking our ceremony harpist to figure out how to play the NCIS theme, there really isn’t a reason why we can’t ask the DJ to play it.  So I told Alex a couple of nights ago that I think I’d be OK with walking into our reception while the theme music plays.  He was excited – I’m not sure if he’s more psyched about the music or the fact that we’re using his idea.

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