↑ These ain’t your grandma’s pinatas we’re talking about.  Nosireebob.

Happy Wednesday afternoon/evening, ladies and gents!

Aaaannnnnd a quick aside before we start.  See that title, up there, the title of this here post?  The latter part, not the beginning part; the beginning part’s relevant.  However, the latter part?  That’s the kind of headlining of posts I want to stop encountering, internet.  I’ve been running into it a lot lately.  The kind of titling that has nothing to do with the content of the post, and therefore makes your eyes bulge out a little because you really wanted to read what the headline said, but what you found was a picture of a woman knitting.  So people on the internet who do that… stop it.  Stop.  Stop that.

Lovely afternoon/evening it’s shaping up to be, is it not?  I must tell you that, to my delight, the beautiful bride from this wedding - remember, the one who made me want to be up in the gym, just workin’ on my fitness? – well, she was totally cool and on board with the wet dream sequence that I told her [and the world] I was planning around her white ruffled clutch, so, that’s good to know.  Because you never know if someone’s going to be on board with it.  Wet dreams are funny like that.  Hehe.  Ummmmmmmmm.  Yup.

Moving on!  Let’s just move on.  As we so often have to do here, given my complete and unwavering submission to stream-of-consciousness blogging.

Okey dokey, today, I am attacking your collective facial unit with fringey, streamery, piñataey (piñaty? piñatish? piño? wait, piño is probably an actual word…?) party decor perfection.  You’ve probably noticed I have sort of a *thing* for pinatas on the blog, since I’ve blogged rather excitedly within the posts that contain them in the past.  Par examplaaaa:

A killer wedding we featured, shot by Amelia Lyon, and involving many a piñata occurrence…

The DIY ice cream cone piñata we kicked at you here…

The fortune cookie piñata situation we featured here, which had this to say:

Photography: Little Wunders Photography / Event Planning & Design: MOOD Events & Production

That time we featured the S**T out of Confetti System…

They call that a “crystal silo.”  It’s a piñata, by the way, but I’m all for making up creative names for things.  If that wasn’t obvious.

WELL.  There are sooooo many cool piñata projects and inspiration out there, and I would just DIE if you didn’t see it yourselves.  So, join me, on this, a journey into the world of diy piñatas and various other fringey delights.

Journey’s about three minutes.  Shouldn’t take more than three.

I LOOOOOVE this DIY from Jordan Ferney.  She calls it “How to Make a Number Pinata,” but I call it “How to Blow My Mind Into Little Pieces, Not Unlike the Fate of a Pinata.”

And then she had to go ahead and feature a project called “DIY: Fringey Monogram.”  I have other names for it, but you’re already pickin’ up what I’m puttin’ down here.

Photos by Michaela for Oh Happy Day

Man.  How freaking GREAT are piñatas and streamers and related s**t.  Hardly gets much better than any of this!  I’m tellin’ ya!  And yes, that installation is for a child’s birthday party.  Did the ’2′ give it away?  But obvs., the project’s highly versatile.  Sometimes, I think I try to make things clearer than they need to be.  Like explaining to you that you can adapt this project from a ’2′ into ‘something else’ that ‘isn’t a 2.’  I am making the sigh French today, my darlings…

Le sigh.

Spam Comment of the Day:

“How much will it cost to send this letter to ? female model chesty morgan nude male underwear models”

I can’t make these up, people.  But umm, I dunno, say, $3?  Do they live near you?

Anywaaaaaays.  Are piñatas your jam, too?  Or just fringey, streamery, ruffly things that look pretty?  And would you be able to start attacking one with a stick, with it looking as gorgeous as those featured up above?  I’d have some trouble.  If you’re me, you’d definitely end up featuring it as an art installation in your living room.  Forever.

OHHHH!  50 internet points if you can guess who is making their Bloggista debut on TKB tomorrow!  Probably only a handful of you are aware of our very first Bloggista at the moment, so this competition is totally fixed.

xoxo!  - Alison

↑ that’s how a *great* proposal can look.  but it’s not how today’s story went…

For those of you not keeping track, today is Monday, the official ‘first’ day of a typical American work week.  And it is currently late on Monday afternoon for me, on the east coast.  Anyway, point is, happy Monday afternoon my beloveds!

Now, I don’t know if you’ve heard, but today – MONDAY – is also “National Relaxation Day.”

Because that just makes sense! 

For some reason I woke up super tired this morning, and the annoying thing is I really don’t know why.  I know it’s not mono; I got that out of the way my first year of college, because I take care of business like that.  And I haven’t been through any forests lately, so it’s not Lyme.  I’m actually just saying these things so no one comes out with suggesting I have mono or Lyme Disease.  I don’t.  Anyway, so this tired thing is not just like “oh man, I’m feeling pretty tired right now, need coffee” tired; I’m talking “I feel like I ran the perimeter of Australia yesterday and then ate a turkey all by myself, along with three bottles of wine, immediately after – I said AFTER, Child Services - birthing a child the natural way (at home, by bending over and pooping it out = this is how I imagine it happening).  None of those things are things that have happened in my life.  And the birthing part is the only thing in my future.  I am *not* a marathon runner, nor do I ever plan to be.  Don’t ask.  Long story short, I ran track in highschool, and I was a sprinter, but our Super Aggressive coach forced everyone to participate in all types of races.  I caught on to the baton races, but cross country + exercise-induced asthma do not a pukeless race make.

I’m going to attribute this odd and unfamiliar case of fatigue to the fact that my body’s just forcing this special tribute of a day upon my brainstem and ligaments, where all tribute days should be enforced.  I’m sure the fatigue has nothing to do with my going to bed at 3:30am after reviewing nowhere near half of the more than 100 applications for Knotty Bloggistaship and then watching Family Guy on Cartoon Network.  I’m sure that’s all unrelated.

Seriously, do we have a carbon monoxide leak in this apartment today?  Or maybe someone’s trying to kill me?

Anyway, because I went to college, I was able to figure out that the best way to counteract my mental and physical fatigue is to put on this Meditation mix I’m listening to via Pandora.  You are lucky I am not currently asleep.

Back to National Relaxation Day for just ONE MINUTE MORE: I think days that assert how you’re supposed to behave should come along with legal implications to corporations that do not abide by the rules set for these special days, or these *special days* should not assert themselves at all (or at least only in tax haven countries, where a few filed papers and an empty conference room are sufficient grounds for proving your company is based in Switzerland and therefore must only abide by the laws set there, which may or may not include this bulls*** Relaxation Day).  Because I have a strong feeling that .001 percent of my friends who have office jobs are currently doing anything that even remotely resembles *relaxing* today.  So National Relaxation Day is more a mockery of modern day civilized life, than a day everyone gets to celebrate.  At this point I’ve worked myself up into HATING NATIONAL RELAXATION DAY’S GUTS, by proxy no less.  Yeeesh.  I’m too empathic, y’all.  Anyway, I’ma blog through the fatigue y’all… because I have bowel movements and proposal disappointment to address.  Bowel movements and proposal disappointments!  ONWARDS.  Here we go:

If nothing else, I think you guys know that the whole idea here on TKB can be whittled down to the fact that I do not purport to be the single girl in the universe who doesn’t go number two.  This is essentially the blog’s unofficial mission statement.  It’s of course not THE mission statement, because that would be *taking things a little too far*.  But what it is, is it’s a great way to provide an understanding of what goes on here, in the World of Knotty.

I definitely cannot say the same about myself at a younger age.  I mean obviously.  I played my part in perpetuating the Girls Don’t Poop! myth way back when I was swimming around in the dating pool, and yup that even includes the early stages of dating my Mr. Right. (hi Honey!  how much are you loving this post?  this much?  *arms spread apart the slightest bit, to indicate not at all*)  Acting like you don’t poop is just this weird thing girls try to do.  Sometimes unsuccessfully, because Mexican food is always gonna be the scissors to your paper in that unwinnable game of Rock Paper Scissors.  And I honestly don’t know a single girl who hasn’t at one point in her life been that girl, who fakes it ’til she makes it.  HAHAHAHAH literally.  We just for some reason think that most guys want to think we don’t do the “gross things” they do.  We think they don’t really want to know that we’re human.  That icky things happen.  It’s an unfortunate fact of feminine life, to believe you have to be perfect and pretty when you’re young.  Soon, though, hopefully, you grow out of that.  And hopefully, it’s sooner than later.  Because guess what?  EVERYBODY POOPS.  We’re at least a good two centuries away from being able to beam our crap to another dimension.  Yes I watched Family Guy last night at 3am where they beamed poop to another dimension.  Shenanigans ensued.  Best episode ever.

Why did I talk about poop for two whole paragraphs?  Because I wanted to get you super ready for another thing that lots of people don’t talk about.  And it’s in the area of marriage proposals.

Cheryl is a friend of mine.  Some of you may know her as the lovely lady who goes by the name Bridal Rehab.  Well, she shared a story with me recently, when I asked if there was anyone out there who wanted to share their disappointing proposal story on the blog.  Here’s her story.  She shares it not simply in an effort to bitch and moan.  She shared it because this s*** just HAPPENS.  It happens.  It does.  To a lot of women.  It is not *crazy* to be disappointed by something like a proposal.  After all, have you not built it up in your mind to be the most magical day ever?  Something you want to look back upon with fond memories?  While there are always exceptions, I don’t think it’s out of the realm of truths that many want it at least to be something special.  But… it doesn’t always go down like that.

I present to you, Cheryl’s story…

If you want to know how to ruin your proposal, look no further, I will tell you how to do it. However, let’s start with some background before I move into how to ruin your proposal.

The hubs and I have always had a bad track record when it comes to romance. It’s not a strong suit of either of us and when we try, it always comes out with a resounding fail. Don’t think that it doesn’t stop us though from attempting to be romantic. In the end it always comes out to be an awesome story that we have learned to laugh at.

Case and point, when I gave him his promise ring (now wedding band). He had given me a promise ring, so I thought it would only be appropriate if I returned the favor by doing so. I picked out a lovely tungsten ring and came up with a fail proof plan… or so I thought. To save you a super long story, my plan involved taking a stroll down a beach at sunset, which was ruined by a decapitated seal that had washed up and crying children who were understandably upset by the seal with no face. Not to mention a pungent aroma that permeated the air.  Needless to say it was more or less… yeah… it was at least indescribable.

After the whole promise ring fiasco, he vowed that the proposal would not mirror our un-romantic times. In a series of bullet points, I will show you what was warning signs for an un-romantic proposal.

Number 1: The cards are not the best this week. The week started off on a bad note for us. We share one car and on our way home one Monday night we had gotten into a car accident, which started the week off on a bad note. Upset that the right hand trunk area had been crunched in, I was distraught and moody for the rest of the week with all the running around that we had to do with the car, but there was a light at the end of the tunnel because it was Labor Day weekend.

Number 2: Unnecessary stress from visitors. That 3-day weekend brought us a visitor in the form of my brother and we ferried him around Las Vegas all weekend until he left on Monday morning. With our car being out of commission and work being stressful, it was definitely not as relaxing a weekend as we thought it would be.

Number 3: Arguing in the middle of the night is a no no. I think any rational person knows that starting a hostile conversation at midnight isn’t going to bring out the best response from either of you, so I would just avoid it period. However, in my crazy mind I couldn’t.

See, the thing was that the hubs and I had started planning the wedding before I had actually gotten the ring. I know, I know, don’t judge. It took us a long time to find the ring that we had wanted, so we thought what the hell. Let’s just start planning everything. On top of that, we had also just moved in together and we all know how much of a picnic it is the first couple of months. In hindsight, we should have probably waited to plan everything, once he had gotten the ring, instead of overloading all of eggs into one basket.

The next week we were going to drive down to San Diego to meet up with some vendors. Stressed out about the car and then the money situation, I stupidly brought it up as we were going to sleep that Sunday night. We fought relentlessly about money, the ring, etc. If it was something ridiculous, I probably brought it up in my sleeplessness.

Which brings me to number 4: don’t ever say anything you don’t mean. The reason is that you’re definitely going to be served a piping hot piece of humble pie. This is just common sense. However at 1:00 am, you could be lacking some of it.

After fighting about basically nothing, I blurt out in my rage “I don’t even want the stupid ring.” The argument came to a crushing halt and there was silence in the room. He got out of bed, open the door to the bedroom, brought in his backpack. Out of the backpack came the famed Tiffany blue box with a white ribbon tied perfectly on the top. He then said loudly “Here,” and walked to my side of the bed “I got you the ring already.” At this point, I had already slid down under the covers in embarrassment and guilt and found myself bawling my eyes out. As I lay under the covers, I knew I messed it up and there’s no going back. THIS WAS IT. This was what I had been waiting for.  My impatience has finally hit a wall. I eventually emerged out of the covers to find him standing over me with a frustrated look over his face. “If you had just waited till next weekend, this would have happened where we would have been getting married.” Basically, a cliff overlooking the ocean in La Jolla but instead because of my impatience, I was getting this.

The rest is history and the reason that our proposal will be one of my biggest regrets.  Which leads me to the last bullet…

Number 5: Be Patient. Things will work out, as they should. If you poke and prod it to happen on your schedule it will blow up in your face eventually. Sure, we joke about the proposal now, but the fact of the matter is that this was something that could have been avoided and I blame being caught up in all the hoopla that wedding planning can consume you into and the expectations that you think is suppose to happen. Not everything can be planned and some times go with it. I wish that I did. Learn from me and just go with it.

xoxo –  Cheryl of Bridal Rehab

Now, here’s the question part…

Were you absolutely thrilled with the way your marriage proposal went down?  Were you in any way disappointed, but possibly feeling guilty about feeling that way?  On the flipside, do you feel that there’s undue pressure on men to perform up to the standards set by videos you see showing incredible proposals caught on film?  Further, do you think that’s redonk, to be worrying about “undue pressure” on men with regard to proposals, because we have to take care of the child birth part?  Do you think I’ve been watching way too many documentaries on the difficulties of child birth?

Let’s talk.

xoxo!  - Alison

Images: Submitted by Alexa Stutts, of Alexa’s Photography / Nope, they aren’t of Cheryl of Bridal Rehab.  But if you read this blog post, you should probably already be able to tell that.

ATTN MY FAMILY: Kindly refrain from reading the first paragraph of this post IF YOU WANT TO LIVE TO SEE TOMORROW.

Hey lovies.  Top o’ the afternoon to ya!  Hope you guys are having a happy/productive/loving/profitable Thursday thus far.  Mostly hoping it’s happy.  I’m doing pretty well myself, despite the disturbing/frustrating fact that it’s become painfully clear – based on the nice-to-meet-you smirk on the boyfriend half’s face of our new neighbors who share a wall with us… that the things I *say* when I’m bedroom wrestling ARE AUDIBLE and entering our neighbors’ ears.  Sooooooooooo yeah.  Officially struggling with whether or not I should crank down the verbal excitement, or just say screw him and be on my merry way… to continuing to screw the other him.  Ohhhh I am so inappropriate.  I am so inappopriate!  Someone tase me, bro.  Sigh.  But yeah I really don’t know what to do about this.  The awkward factor is sort of through the roof on this dilemma.

Ok, that concludes the part of today’s post you shouldn’t have read if you are: my Dad, one of my brothers (especially my little brother; my older brother is more comfortable with such topics – ok no scratch that – both brothers), my neighbors, my niece and nephew, my Aunt can read it she’s cool, so can my Mom – she knows my menstrual cycle which is synonymous with nothing is off limits.

Alrighty!  On we go, to what this post is actually about.  And yes, I like ending sentences with prepositions on occasion.  Some of us like to live on the edge every once in a while.

Ok, first, behold some of Rhi’s lovely work – both from her own wedding, and from her work as Rhi of Hey Gorgeous Events.  Yup, she’s one seriously amazeballs event designer.  :)

↑ oh my god, right?  like, oh my god.

Ok, NOW.  HERE WE GO…

When we, as regular people, get engaged, we hope that everyone in our lives is going to be thrilled for us.  It’s a natural reaction, a fact of life.  Totally normal.  Our happiness in that period time is at one of its highest heights, and we want those around us to feel that same sense of happiness… for us.

Fortunately, for so many, that’s a pretty accurate reflection of how things end up going down.  Because that’s how it should be, right?  Our loved ones, our friends, our family, and in some instances our coworkers – all of these groups of people in our lives should be excited for us.  You’re engaged!  You’re getting married to the love of your life!  It’s without question a cause for celebration.

… Of course, since we live in the real world, unfortunately, for whatever reason, that’s not always how things go down.  It’s deeply upsetting for those who experience it, and there are tons of unique reasons why *total excitement* might NOT be the reaction each and every member of our circle expresses.

Today, we’re featuring the second part of Rhi’s personal story about her experiences with her mother from her engagement to her wedding day.  This story is a painful one, but Rhi wanted to share it, as she did with Part I, and as she will be in the near future in Part III, because she knows that she’s not the only one who has experienced the things she’s experienced.  On a personal note, I want to say that Rhi is an amazing, thoughtful, deeply introspective, voraciously social and immensely talented and creative young lady, and I consider it an honor to know her and to be able to call her a friend.  She brightens people’s days, and doesn’t hold back when it comes to her own life, and her love.  She’s an inspiration, and simply by sharing her story with us today, she’s making a difference in countless lives.  I love ya, Rhi.  People like yourself make this world shift a little bit, in a good way, as it continues to go round.

Ok, I now present to you Part II of Rhi’s story.

First off, let me just say how totally cool it is that so many chicks out there can relate to my story. I’ve spent the last three years almost ashamed of my relationship with my husband because it never felt like my mom approved or at the very least felt excited for me and the happiness we had found/created together. And believe me, that was tough to handle. It actually still is sometimes considering my career and the number of mother-daughter-doing-wedding-things-together relationships I witness on a daily basis. But the bottom line is, I love you guys and have really enjoyed reading your personal stories over and over again. Not only that, the unexpected outpouring support from you all has turned on the pressure for me to segue into part two so here goes nothing.

. . .

After our summer 2008 engagement, I headed back to start my final semester of my undergrad degree, and Andrew headed back to finish his. Every now and then, I’d throw a bridal magazine in with my groceries at the store, or I’d google ambiguous wedding terms in hopes of finding inspiration, but the entire concept of actually making decisions, or even paying money for anything pertaining to our wedding, was out of the picture. I knew in my mind, well before I could even admit it to anyone else, that our wedding wouldn’t be happening when we’d want it to and for the sake of my sanity and in hopes of avoiding any version of a pity party, I learned to be OK with that. I created a wedding webpage. I picked my bridesmaids. I printed out photos of things I liked. And at night, I dreamt and dreamt and dreamt of what it would feel like to have a wedding and be married to Andrew. It’s extreme but it felt like I had an eating disorder. I kept wedding things very private, careful not to let many people in on, what felt like should be a secret. Sometimes I wouldn’t wear my ring. Because it felt like I wasn’t worthy of being happy about it if those around me weren’t.

A whole lot of things happened. The fiance and I, we both graduated college. I moved home to Canada, husband got a job in Chicago. We both moved to Chicago. I moved back home to Canada. I worked a couple jobs trying to figure out what to do with my life as Rhi. I decided to go back to school to study for a year. I lived in my parents basement. I watched that bratty little brother grow up before my eyes. Andrew and I both travelled back and forth, getting way too used to airports but never accustomed to saying goodbye to one another. We celebrated other people’s milestones; engagements, marriages, new homes. And funny enough, in between all of this, rarely was our wedding, my ring, our future plans or even really us, ever mentioned. I started to believe that this is what an engagement was. I thought to myself “How dare you feel sorry for yourself Rhi! You are so so lucky and just because everyone isn’t dancing circles around you, doesn’t mean you need to be a Debbie Downer about everything.” So I wasn’t. I just grinned and said thank you when everyone Congratulated me on my engagement; over a year and a half after it happened. And I took down the wedding website; it made me feel like a teenage girl scribbling I Heart doodles across my binder. I was dreaming of things that were well, in my mind and in reality, only dreams.

I could write for hours about what happened over the next year leading up to our wedding. But in a nutshell, what happened is I ended up taking my Dad aside and letting him know, that I was no longer a child and that I have the right to get married regardless of if him and my Mom liked it or not. Because without that talk that day, who knows if Andrew and I would be married by now. I told him, if he and my Mom felt like they could or would want to donate any kind of money towards the event that would be fabulous and totally appreciated, and husband and I would be entirely grateful. But I needed to know either way, because this would determine what sort of wedding we’d be having (i.e. any wedding at all). He gave us a number, we found a venue, took the only last date available and for the next 10 months, I planned a wedding; in between managing a part time job, a full time school schedule and a relationship with a man who lived 14 hours away.

. . .

Our wedding has come and gone. And I get sort of depressed about it every now and then because of a few reasons (which hey, this could be a whole.other.post, my friends, I promise you that). But what I’ve really learned about the whole experience is my Mom’s behaviour and lack of interest in the whole engagement-planning-wedding-thing, while hurtful and some what annoying, was her way of letting me know she cares about and loves me; in her own somewhat very confusing way. Call it a quick fix for my sadness, or a way to make her seem like less of a Mommy-monster but me marrying Andrew, meant me moving away to a different country. It meant me doing something that was to her, the equivalent of her situation where she had a baby at a young age (which was obviously not the most glamorous choice for a 21 year old single waitress). Her choice to sit back and shut up, or speak up when a decision was brought up that she didn’t agree with (like my wedding colours or my wedding dress) were just a way of saying “I really want to be there for you! But I’m upset, and I’m hurt, and I’m confused at how to act so instead I’ll just remove myself from the situation. Please make sure you are making the right choice!”

My mom was diagnosed with breast cancer, two days before this past Christmas. She nonchalantly brought it up while I was decorating gingerbread cookies for her. She told me with a sadness in her voice I will never ever forget. I’ll also never ever forget that it was only four days before I was set to make the move across the border to finally put an end to the two years of long distance that my new husband and I had been spending apart. And as heartbreaking as that day was for her and I, and my family, I instantly knew that her diagnoses was symbolic of a few things. First off, that we all experience our emotions differently. Fear for one may translate into excitement for another. Anger for some, can be shrugged off and accepted for others. We all have expectations on how one should react to a specific circumstance yet in truth, everyone reacts very differently.

But the biggest and most symbolic thing about that day was for me, learning to accept things. I have to accept the phrase “My mom has cancer” just like I have to accept the phrase “My mom wasn’t a part of our wedding planning process.” I can’t go back in time and prevent a tumor. And I sure as hell can’t go back and make her jump up and down and shriek like a girlfriend on the phone with me when I told her I was engaged. I have to accept that she’s tired and weak and can’t visit me right now just like I have to accept that it rained on our wedding day. I’ve learned that sometimes you just need to Let Go. And regardless of these things, I know my Mom loves me as much as I love her. When I look back on this crazy emotional ride we’ve all been on I don’t think of how ticked off I was to hear that my dress “was way too much money,” but instead I picture my beautiful Mom, standing beside me as my Dad gave me away to Andrew, silently beaming with happiness and pride.

And now, if you missed it earlier, here’s Bam *in his element* -

MAN that rainbow toy was a smart choice on my part.  Just look how it photographs!  Oh, and uhhh, it uhhh, he loves it, too.  Yeah, THAT’s the reason I got it.

So, what are your thoughts after reading Part II of Rhi’s story?  Do you feel you can identify at all?  Have you experienced anything similar with anyone in your circle?  Or maybe your friends are suffering through some less than extremely uplifting personal experiences of their own as they continue the planning process?

Also, feel free to share any tips or tricks you might have that could help anyone who might be experiencing their own version of Rhi’s story.

Rhi and I look forward to hearing your thoughts.

xoxo!

P.S. – Rhi will be back with Part III in the coming weeks, where she’ll share thoughts and advice on how to deal with less than thrilled mamas.

P.P.S. – I’ve embedded some recent work Rhi sent me within today’s post.  Gorgeous, eh?  Rhi, you really chose the perfect name for your biz.   Such a perfect fit. :)

P.P.P.S. – if you’d like to check out Rhi’s lovely DIY wedding, by all means, click dat s**t.

Hey Gorgeous Events is a member of Vendor Love. To view this listing, click here.

Happy Wednesday, darlings.  Today’s post is a little different from most, and I’m looking forward to hearing your thoughts and reactions to what we’re doing today.  Because today, a gorgeous, smart, super real, super talented, and above all exceedingly cool and kind young lady is telling her story on TKB… and it’s kind of a big deal.

First, I imagine you’ll remember Rhi’s beyond lovely DIY wedding, which we featured back in April.  She pulled off that numba one stunna because Rhi, who has an event design company called Hey Gorgeous Events, is brilliant when it comes to innovation, attention to detail, and just generally knowing what it takes to achieve that wow factor we crave so much here when it comes to wedding design.  Here, take a quick look at a few of my favorite bits and pieces for a second… no it’s ok, I’ll wait…

Great stuff, right?  Don’t you just wanna eat her up?

And, even though she, like many, did her fair share of Monday morning quarterbacking after it was over… it still looked absolutely PER-FACT to me, and I’m pretty sure to all of you, too.  I mean every last nook and cranny of that thing was fanfreakintastic!

But nothing’s ever completely perfect.  That’s just not reality.

Wedding planning often turns out to be one of the most intense, consuming, exciting, obliterating, thrilling, relationship-testing AND relationship-building experiences of one’s life.  It’s an amazing thing, wedding planning.  I’m obviously a big fan. :)  Thing is, in this world of pretty pretty prettiness and shopping for the perfect dress and putting together the perfect guest list and just generally working to achieve one’s ideal, most memorable and most meaningful celebration of love – all of which are the coolest things EVER – there are more than a few upsetting stories along the way.  There’s no denying it.  Certainly not in all cases, but enough.  And many brides feel the pressure to hide these stories and bad days or even make believe they aren’t happening, and that’s likely because they’re rarely if ever discussed openly in the wedding world.  These stories can be embarrassing.  These stories can be difficult to admit, even to yourself.  But that doesn’t mean they can be ignored.  Which brings us to Rhi’s story…

So, without further adieu, here’s Rhi with Part I of her experience…

It only seemed fitting for me to write about this topic because it’s been brought to my attention that I’m so far from the norm on traditional life ‘stuff’. Don’t believe me? Well for example my last name, I didn’t change it and instead I still proudly rock my maiden digs. My bank account? Remains just that. Mine and mine only. And kids? I don’t think I’ll ever have em, I’m too into my space, myself and my life. I’m a control freak and I like to be different, I like to stand out instead of fitting in and I thrive on knowing I’m sort of a breed of my own. Which is why in 2008 at the age of 22, when I called home to tell my Mom I was newly engaged that I should have known she would be less than thrilled.

Mom and I go way back. We’ve been buds for almost 25 years now and although we don’t always see eye to eye we share many similar qualities like our relentless nature to know what we want when we want it, our ability to do good for others, our overly warm giving and caring hearts, our hip less frames, our soft mid sections, our problematic skin, our creative, innovative ways and our soft spot for carbs, sweets and chips. We both hate to work out. We both love baths. We both get teary eyed over the same shit. We’re related that’s for sure. But we’ve both lived two different lives. And as a result see experiences and value things quite differently.

I was born in 1986. Mom was only a month into her 21st year, working as a waitress with no near plans or money for college. And I’m cool with knowing I wasn’t a planned babe. Her and my Dad weren’t married yet. Dad was actually out for the long weekend in May that year that I was born, on a fishing trip with buddies. He missed the whole thing. We didn’t (like I can’t remember, ha) have a ton of money growing up, the three of us. We lived over a bakery at one point. Fresh bread smells drifted up into our little apartment. Mom made me a tiny little backyard in the parking lot out back with a blow up pool, potted tomatoes plants forming a makeshift fence for privacy. While we never lived lavishly, I always had food in my belly, a Mom and Dad who loved me (and would later get married), a roof over my head and life would go on and we would continually be blessed. I went to school, moved around a lot as a kid. Welcomed a bratty little brother into my world the Christmas before I turned eight. I went to camp. Had sleepovers. My Dad worked hard and still does to give us the life he believed we deserved. I became a national level gymnast. Broke curfew. Fought with the bratty little brother. Bought an ugly and way too expensive graduation dress. Went to school on a scholarship. Met my husband. Got engaged. And that’s when the world stopped spinning.

After a little pause on the phone that day on the beach I was given a “Well-that’s-exciting-news-and-how-do-you-feel-about-it?” kind of response from my Mom. Planning my next response in the most carefully executed manner wile trying not to be all “Rawr I wanna rip yo face off for not squealing like a girlfriend and being all excited for me,” was tough but somehow we mustered up enough respect for one another to get through the conversation with what felt like the verbal equivalent of a congratulatory handshake. And with that I frolicked off into the Anna Maria Island sun probably to make a sand castle or something. It wasn’t like we’d get married right away anyways, I convinced myself. So we didn’t. And we held off on planning our wedding. Because my Mom, the one person I love the most, wasn’t having it and that was cool. I was game for making her happy and doing what she thought was best. But ever so slightly the fine line between people pleasing and doing whatever I wanted and whatever I needed to be happy, became so blurred that things got really bad before they got anywhere close to being in the same zip code, of better.

xo, Rhi

In Rhiannon’s next installment, coming soon, she’ll continue her story, and hopes to “lend some insight to other brides who may be stumped or hurt or upset or frustrated that their Moms may not want a thing to do with their daughters wedding.”

And now, to lighten the mood a smidge… here’s a little picture present my girl Em of Gem Photo sent me yesterday, which caused me to experience cuteness-induced cardiac arrest and only additional looks at the photo relieved me of the attack.  I mean, the double chin alone…

Em, he looks so much like what I imagine McPuppypants will look like as a grownpup it’s frightening.

So, what are your thoughts after reading Part I of Rhi’s story?  Can you identify in any way?  Were you fortunate enough to have everyone on board for your big day, with no real hiccups at all?  And do you have any ideas or experience in dealing with situations like this?

Rhi and I look forward to hearing your thoughts.

xoxo!

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