Does anyone remember the advertising campaign for Spaghetti-O’s, I think it was maybe in the late 1980’s, where the jingle went, “Uh-Oh! Spaghetti-O’s!” ?

I do.  I think I remember it so well because I LOVED Spaghetti-O’s as a kid.  Actually… who am I kidding?… I love Spaghetti-O’s NOW!!  And they MUST have meatballs in them – otherwise it’s just not the same.  Yes, I know the meat in those little balls probably just barely qualifies as meat, and yes, I know the can is loaded up with more sodium than a person really needs to eat in one sitting.  I don’t care.  It’s a fantastic, fast, comfort food.

I bring all this up because I think I may have forgotten just how wonderful and exciting Spaghetti-O’s can be for a child.  This past weekend I was given a wake up call, no doubt designed to remind me what it’s like to be a kid.

You see, E was hungry one night over the weekend, which isn’t all that unusual an occurrence.  E is an unusual two-and-a-half year old, though, in that he typically chooses healthy, homemade foods over processed foods.  E absolutely loves meatloaf, and he would rather eat fruit for breakfast than pancakes or muffins, as just a few examples.  So when he went looking for food, I offered him some of the homemade meatballs I had cooked a few nights before.  The conversation went something like this:

Me: “Do you want to eat some meatballs?”

E: “Yeah!”

Me: “Ok, let’s go get them.”

E follows me into the kitchen, where I reach for the door to the refrigerator.

E: “No! Not there!”

Me: “They aren’t?”

E: “Noooo!  I’ll show you.”

E takes my hand and brings me to the pantry, where I am shown the shelf where all the canned goods sit.

Me: “The meatballs are in here?”

E nods.  This whole exchange is making no sense to me, so I head back to the refrigerator.

E: “No!!”

I take out the container of homemade meatballs, open it, and show them to him.

Me: “Didn’t you say you want meatballs?  Look, here they are!”

E: “NOOOO! Don’t WANT those meatballs!”

E then goes back to the pantry by himself, makes a bunch of things fall out, and emerges with a can of Spaghetti-O’s with meatballs.

E: “Want THESE meatballs!”

I made them for him, but I couldn’t help being mildly insulted that my homemade meatballs were shoved aside in favor of the processed ones!

{photo credit to Google Images}

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Not too long ago, someone made the following comment within earshot of me:

“If the engagement ring is any less than a carat, it means he doesn’t really love you.”

All I could think was, what is wrong with this person?  I initially shrugged off what I heard as someone being entirely too materialistic and unaware that other people could hear them, but the more I have thought about the remark, the more it has bothered me.

Who, exactly, is it that gets to decide the rules of what is and what is not a respectable symbol of a man and woman’s intention to spend the rest of their lives together?  I looked into it a bit, and the general consensus seems to be that DeBeers decided to run an advertising campaign promoting diamond engagement rings around the end of the 1930’s, and that combined with Marilyn Monroe’s famous “Diamonds Are a Girl’s Best Friend” raised diamonds to the status symbols they are today.

So, whatever, now a man is supposed to buy a diamond ring for a woman when he asks her to marry him.  I’d be lying if I sat here and wrote that I did NOT expect Alex to go buy me a diamond ring when he decided to propose to me.  But I also don’t think that is the only way to go.  I think it’s equally nice to give a girl a sapphire ring, or something else that is equally meaningful to the couple, as a symbolic, outward sign to the world that you are betrothed.

It’s not really that it’s supposed to be a DIAMOND that bothers me.  It’s the attitude so many people have about the expected SIZE and EXPENSE of the diamond that bothers me.  For example, many people seem to think it’s necessary for a man to spend at least 2-3 months’ salary on an engagement ring.  Other people, like the person I overheard talking, think the engagement ring ought to be as big as possible, and that certain smaller-sized rings are utterly sub-par.  I don’t know where this “wisdom” came from, but it seems horribly flawed.

Don’t people care about their MARRIAGE and their future AFTER the wedding?  Because if you’re asking a man to invest that much money in a ring, he probably isn’t going to be able to invest much money in anything else for a while after the proposal.  It seems perfectly ridiculous to put that kind of financial pressure on a guy, who is probably already completely nervous about pulling off the proposal right, and about getting married and being a good husband.  Not to mention, the engagement ring is supposed to symbolize love and commitment simply because he went and bought the ring and gave it to the girl!  Who cares if all he can afford is a quarter of a carat because he’s a waiter working his way towards a PhD, or a struggling actor, or a retail store employee?  Isn’t it the thought that counts, and not the net worth of the ring in this situation?

I guess my point is that the people who have these crazy guidelines in their heads really seem to be missing the point of the ring in the first place.  I’m not advocating that a man should go grab the first cubic zirconia ring he sees – by all means, save up what you can and put thought into the process!  But going into major debt, with no hope of being able to pull yourself out, just to buy an engagement ring is ridiculous.  It’s also ridiculous to go into debt to put a child into pre-school, or summer camp, or to go on a dream vacation, but that’s really another blog.

My point?  It would be nice to see more people focus on the endgame when it comes to engagements and weddings, rather than on the materialistic crap (for lack of a better word) that so many people parrot to each other.

{For the record, my own engagement ring is not too big and not too small, and my fiancee was intelligent and bought it in such a way that he does not owe anyone money for it, and hasn’t for many months.}

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One of my absolute favorite things about wedding planning is not the wedding planning – it’s the honeymoon planning! I’ve written about honeymoons before, but this past weekend Alex and I achieved a momentous CHECK on our “to-do” list for our wedding: our honeymoon is now PAID IN FULL!! And after the cruddy winter the East Coast has had, who wouldn’t be psyched at the prospect of heading for Hawaii in a few short months?
Choosing Hawaii was easy, but not, for Alex and I. He felt strongly that we should go someplace neither of us has been before, and I’ve been to Hawaii before. In the end, we chose to go there because it’s much more affordable than Europe is right now (our runner-up choice). We’ve managed to make the trip new for both of us, because while I have been to Hawaii, all my time there was spent on Oahu, and we will be spending most of our honeymoon on the other Hawaiian islands.
Here is the final version of what we plan to hit while on our honeymoon – with a special shout-out to Kelly, who has been awesome to us while we planned out trip.

Our first stop is Oahu – because you have to fly into Honolulu, and because if nothing else Alex really wants to see Waikiki Beach and the North Shore.

Photo Credit: Destination360.com

Photo Credit: Aloha.com

We’re also hoping to stop by the Dole Pineapple Plantation, for some pineapple ice cream. We don’t have enough time to go to Pearl Harbor, so I have promised Alex I’ll dig out my photos from the tour I took when we get back!

From Oahu, we’re going to the Big Island, Hawaii. There are 2 main items on our agenda while we’re there: hiking Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, and doing the Mauna Kea Summit and Stars excursion (which we have pre-booked through Liberty Travel). The Summit and Stars excursion is something we are really excited about – we can’t think of anything cooler than star-gazing on Mauna Kea.

Photo Credit: NPS.gov

From the Big Island, we’re going to make our way to Maui, where we will hopefully relax after all that hiking and sight-seeing. There are a few things we’re hoping to do on Maui, though:

• Go to a Hawaiian luau

• Watch the sun rise over Haleakala Crater (which, I’ll be honest, I don’t think is going to happen).

Photo Credit: about.com

• Drive the Road to Hana in our rented convertible… which we’re told is absolutely worth the extra $20 per day by the 3 couples we’re friends with who went to Hawaii on their honeymoons!

Photo Credit: hawaiitravelreviewed.com

We’ve also heard there are a few wineries on Maui that produce pineapple wine, which sounds intriguing.
Anyone have other suggestions or ideas for honeymooning in Hawaii?

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Not too long ago, I wrote a post about how I planned to attempt the Couch to 5K challenge, both in preparation for the upcoming wedding and to get myself in better shape, for health.  It was an endeavor I knew I could not undertake on my own, so it was lucky that Whitney decided she wanted to try Couch to 5K at the same time as me.

The original plan was that we would each start the program on March 1.  Sometimes, though, life happens, and things come up that tear down the best laid plans.  Which is why Whitney started her program a month ago, on February 1, while I started yesterday.  (You can check up on Whitney’s progress here, where she is maintaining a log of her runs and accomplishments.)  I decided to stick with the original plan of starting on March 1, primarily because the weather around here stunk more than a skunk in a sauna this February.  I also have enlisted Alex to participate in the program with me.  He will be running with me most weeks, keeping me motivated, and hopefully getting in shape himself.

Now, I do LIKE to run.  I don’t like how I feel AFTER I run, because between asthma and my blood pressure, I usually have a recovery time of at least 20 minutes, which is lame.  I’ve been looking forward to starting this running program, and to joining the ranks of people who can say, “yeah, I run.”  To me, that just sounds cool.  I thought about going nuts and spending loads of money on fancy workout clothes and other running paraphernalia, like a GPS tracker so I’d know how far we’d gone, but then I realized that, a) I have plenty of old but still functional workout clothes, and b) right now there are much better things I can spend my money on.  No GPS tracker for me.  There is also no C25K iPhone/iPod app for me at the moment (I have an iPod Touch, by the way, not an iPhone).  Alex and I tend to talk while we run, so I don’t have faith in myself to use the app properly – and it’s not free.  (I am a cheapskate with the iPhone apps, if they aren’t free, I generally will not download them.)

After some discussion, we decided to try running at Kensico Dam first.  It’s off the road, but is paved and flat, with loads of people there at any given time of day, even in this crappy weather.  Here is what the route looks like, courtesy of MapMyFitness.com (which is a fantastic resource for runners looking for routes, by the way!):

I’ve got to say, I really enjoyed our first run.  We stayed pretty true to the C25K program, walking half the time and running half the time.  It was chilly – probably a tiny bit below 40 degrees (Fahrenheit) – but I did not need to use my inhaler or stop to catch my breath once.  Alex did well, too, and I suspect he could have run more than he did but held back because of me.

I’m really psyched to go running again tomorrow, especially since we’re going to try out a different running route.  I’m not planning to bore everyone with daily updates on our progress, but I am thinking of doing weekly updates through the end of the program.  Does anyone have suggestions for a different level of frequency for the updates?

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I have often wondered why the world needs Twitter.  Facebook I can understand, but there are definitely days when Twitter’s purpose is lost on me.

Well, that ended last week.

You see, last week I almost had a major wedding disaster on my hands, but Twitter came to the rescue in a big way.

As I’ve mentioned before, my sister is a degree-wielding, butt-kicking, graphic designer.  She is also my maid of honor.  As such, she has been happily designing all things paper for mine and Alex’s wedding in June.  Over the last couple of months, she has done a phenomenal job designing our wedding invitations.

Since we used Vistaprint so successfully and with such fantastic results for our Save-the-Date cards several months ago, it was only natural that we tried Vistaprint first when Lisa started looking for a printer for the invitations.  She ordered 10 sample prints, just to test them and to get a feel for what type of quality we were going to get.  The samples arrived and they were PERFECT.  So we went ahead and placed the full invitation order with Vistaprint, feeling we were going to get great quality at a great price.

I couldn’t wait for the invitations to arrive.  I even tweeted about how excited I was for our order to come, a tweet that was actually acknowledged by Vistaprint’s Twitter customer service people, who assured me if I had any questions about the order they could help me out.

The day came when the invitations arrived – a day early, I might add.  That’s when disaster struck.

Everything about the appearance of the invitations we received was just wrong.  The words were right.  But the rest of each invitation looked like something my 2-and-a-half-year-old, soon-to-be stepson printed out, not like something we PAID to have done, and certainly not like something a trained graphic artist had designed!  The invitations were cut crooked in places.  They weren’t the size we had ordered.  And, worst of all, the black background wasn’t black, it was more of a charcoal gray.  They looked nothing like the beautiful samples we had received only a couple of weeks earlier!

To say I was upset would be an understatement, but my emotions were nothing compared to my sister’s.  She was utterly horrified.  She immediately wrote an email to Vistaprint’s customer service through their website, detailing all the problems with the order and asking what could be done.

This is about when my Twitter epiphany happened.  I realized I had already been in contact with a Vistaprint customer service person, on Twitter, and that this person seemed to be quite efficient and able to help if a problem occurred.  I decided I would contact Vistaprint customer service myself, through Twitter, and see how well that worked.

(By the way, I really wanted to insert a few screen shots to prove how fantastic this experience was, but I can’t work out how to crop my screen shots.  Sorry!!  But believe me, this really was awesome!)

I tweeted that there had been a problem with our ordered, and almost right away the Vistaprint customer service person had tweeted me back, asking what they could do to help.  When they say they monitor what people on the internet are saying about them, they are not kidding!  To make a long story short(er), within 3 hours of my initial tweet, Vistaprint had looked into our complaint, read my sister’s email, come up with a solution (there was a manufacturing issue), and processed a new, expedited order for us!  Is that great service or what?!  AND we had the new order 3 days later, so my timeline for assembling and addressing the invitations remains intact!  Oh, and the new order looks PERFECT, just as beautiful as the original sample order was.

I have to commend Vistaprint on a job well done, and particularly on the speedy customer service their Twitter representatives @Vistaprint and @VistaprintHelp provided.  Not only did they save a sale, but they have made me a customer for life!

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As many of my loyal readers may have noticed, I haven’t posted anything in about a week now.  That’s because I’ve been sick.  Really sick.  And I was stupid and stubborn and didn’t go to the doctor to try and shorten the time I spent being miserable.  I think I may have had a picture in my head of my immune system being something like the American fighter pilots at the end of the movie Independence Day, sending antibodies flying straight up into the heart of the viral plague that has been wreaking havoc on my body and dealing a swift and deadly blow to the illness.  Sadly, it seems my immune cells are not equipped with “green sh*t” to shoot at viruses at will.  (And yes, I know it was the aliens, not the fighter pilots, with the “green sh*t,” but work with me here!)

I’m feeling much better now, and I’m trying to catch up on my blogging.

On that note, I have an exciting announcement!  My good friend Tiffany and I put our heads together a couple of months ago and came up with what we think is a pretty darn good idea for a new blog.  After weeks of work, I’m thrilled to announce that we have launched our new venture: Pink Elephants and Purple Gorillas.

Check out the blog, we are really excited about it!  No worries, though, I will still be writing on here as usual.

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As we get closer to our wedding date, I asked Alex if he would be willing to share something he has been thinking about regarding the wedding here on The Table Has Shoes (and Other Ambiguities).  I am proud to present you with the fruit of his labor:

From the Groom’s Point of View: How Do You Choose a Stand-In For Mom?

My mother has always been my guiding light and I have been able to count on her for as long as I can remember. But my mother is no longer physically with me; she died over 7 years ago from a massive internal hemorrhage in her brain stem.

She had been taking COUMADIN^® to break up a blood clot in her right atrium. This weakened her endothelial lining and facilitated a cerebrovascular attack. The doctor essentially told me that they would keep her alive on life support in hopes of preserving some of her organs so others may live. She was only 57. That day changed my life on multiple levels, one being that I lost any chance of being able to dance with her at my wedding.

I strongly believe in the American custom of dancing with one’s parent.  And I intend to up hold this tradition the best way I can, so I need to pick a surrogate. I have at least five female family members from which to choose:

• My mother’s cousin once removed, Pauline, who has been to every memorable family function in my life. I have very fond memories of being one of many cousins enjoying summer breaks at her family home.

• My godmother, Serena, who was technically first in line as my mother’s proxy and was the first person I considered. But Serena lives in Vermont and we probably won’t have an opportunity to practice dancing together.

• My mother’s closest cousin, Evelyn, who gratuitously took in Murphy and me as tenants after my mother passed. Murphy was one of my mom’s three cats that needed a home.  During my 6 years under her roof, I had an exciting life engaged in local politics, studying for my Master’s degree, and thinking up conversations to have with my future fiancé during our biochemistry class. And there is always the fact that at 71, Evelyn can still dance circles around me.

• My first cousin, Erinn, who is by far my favorite relative.  And even though she lives a few thousand miles away, I need no rehearsal to dance with her. She is truly like a sister to me.

• Christina’s mother, Betty, who has openly accepted me and was the first person I turned to when I needed help designing Christina’s engagement ring. She is someone I like and admire, and not to mention a terrific holiday chef.

All of these family members mean a great deal to me, so it is not going to be an easy decision. Not to mention that I also have to choose a fitting song. If Mom were around I would have found an appropriate Neil Diamond song to reminisce to.  Each of the above women represent a different aspect of my life, and finding an unforgettable song to match is probably going to be harder than picking which relative to dance with.

Hopefully Alex will share what his final decision on this turns out to be.  Stay tuned!

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I don’t think I am alone when I say that as a bride, you often have to deal with a lot of advice that you JUST. DON’T. WANT.
For example, you and your fiance have not a single bone in either of your bodies that desires a wedding ceremony that takes place in a church. Not everyone understands this decision, so even your grandmother’s sister’s friend’s uncle’s goldfish calls you to ask if they can help you find a church for the wedding. Or maybe you want to use a non-traditional song for your processional, and your friend doesn’t like the idea, so you now have to listen to her ideas for processional songs every time she calls. Maybe it’s something as simple as whether you ought to have a signature cocktail served during the reception, or if you should go with the lobster or the filet mignon as the third menu choice for dinner. EVERYONE has an opinion to share. Sometimes the ideas are good, and sometimes they are just plain ugly. (And, yes, some of those things have happened to us!)
This doesn’t affect Alex and I as much now as it did when we started our wedding planning process, but in the beginning it was both overwhelming and frustrating. We wanted to make everyone happy, but we also felt it’s our wedding, and it ought to be about us, not about everyone we know. And when you shoot down an idea, or pretend you are taking someone’s advice and then obviously go in a different direction, feelings get hurt. There is a difference between asking for help because someone might know something you don’t know, and being pulled aside for a dissertation you didn’t ask for, right?
Then we got a piece of advice from a rather unlikely source: our landlords. They live in the apartment below ours, and they got married about 3 weeks before Alex and I got engaged. The first thing they told us when we told them the good news was this:

Everyone’s going to have an opinion they want to share. You listen, and thank them, maybe even say there are a lot of ideas you’re sifting through right now and you are certainly going to add theirs to the list. Then you do what you want anyway.

I know this sounds really simple, and perhaps even obvious, but when you’re in the middle of everything, it’s truly difficult to keep this in mind! Adopting this strategy has been one of the best things we did for ourselves with the wedding. It has actually worked out so well that we have decided to carry it over into all aspects of life – you know, for big stuff, like having kids and buying a house. There is so much advice to be had when it comes to these things, it becomes easy to lose sight of what you want, or what you envision, just because you don’t want to insult someone.
How do all other brides, or newlyweds, or anyone for that matter, deal with superfluous opinions while in the midst of planning your wedding, or your life?

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As many of my loyal readers already know, several months ago I became a “Featured Bride Blogger” for a wedding website that is currently still in beta: Weddzilla.com.  Our blog is up and running, with tons of posts and opinions and advice, but many other features of the website are not quite ready yet. I often post things on Weddzilla’s blog that I don’t think are appropriate for The Table Has Shoes (and Other Ambiguities), so if you are curious about what I write over there, you can click the icon on the right-hand side of your screen, or you can check out my posts here.

What, you may be asking, is my point?

I will tell you!  Weddzilla.com is getting ready to launch itself out of beta, and it’s going to launch itself in high style!

On February 24th, in an undisclosed location in Washington, DC, there is going to be a “Weddzilla Launch Flash Mob,” featuring Steve Kemble.  If you don’t know what a flash mob is, don’t feel bad.  I didn’t know what one was, either, until I went to this YouTube link and saw one for myself.  Weddzilla is looking for people to participate in the flash mob, so if you think you can dance and you’re in the DC area, check out the full details by clicking here and signing up to participate.

Then on February 25th, there is going to be a launch party from 6-9 pm, held at the National Museum for Women in the Arts, also in Washington, DC.  There is also a silent auction going on for the launch, which benefits the Children’s National Medical Center.  If you’re interested in attending the party and meeting some of Weddzilla’s bloggers and gurus, you can get more information here.

Also!!!  If you happen to be a wedding vendor you can donate to the Weddzilla swag bag, which is a pretty darn cool thing to get if you’re a planning bride.  Weddzilla gives away one swag bag for every 1000 fans they collect on Facebook.  If you’re a fan on Facebook, you also get notifications everytime a new blog posts to the site, and there are loads of great bloggers on there, with tons of fantastic suggestions if you’re planning a wedding.

I’m really excited that I am a part of Weddzilla, and I can’t tell you all how many times I’ve had a wedding planning problem solved for me by searching the blog there.  It’s going to be a great website – it’s for brides, by brides, with advice from REAL BRIDES.  I won’t be able to attend the launch party (I’ll be at my second dress fitting – PRIORITIES!!!), but if you’re in the DC area and can either go to the party or spread the word, I’m sure it’s going to be great.

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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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