"Something is always going to go wrong..."

“Keep a sense of humor. No matter how perfectly you plan your wedding, something is always going to go wrong. Accept it and laugh about it. Getting upset isn’t going to make it better, and the person that said laughter was the best medicine wasn’t kidding!”

I have had to remind myself of these very wise words multiple times this weekend. I decided to use the extra days that I had off of work for Thanksgiving to tackle the remaining, large projects (ceremony programs, escort cards, seating arrangement (ugh), table numbers…) for the wedding and reception. I decided a while ago that I was going to design and make my own ceremony programs. I knew the type of program that I wanted and so last weekend, I spent hours (LITERALLY) printing and designing these programs just perfectly. The programs are actually called “layer” programs. There are 4 pages total and each page “steps down” from the one in front of it. I know it is hard to picture, but, they are really cool! It was a trial and error type of thing to get the wording perfectly “stepped” down from the previous. So, when I say I spent HOURS…I was not kidding! I bought a black backing for these programs that has two holes at the top to hold all of the pages together with a bow. I decided to buy a hole puncher and start punching all of the holes myself. Well, we have 150 guests with 4 sheets per program. That’s A LOT of holes to punch! My girlfriend suggested I take them to Kinko’s and have them punch the holes for me. Since I work in King of Prussia, I decided to take them to the one right down the street from where I worked. I had never been to this one before…but, they are all the same, right? WRONG!!!!!!!!!!
I dropped them off and the kid that took my order ASSURED me that he took notes on EXACTLY what I wanted. For some reason, I still felt really uneasy about it all. I ended up getting out of work early on Wednesday so I went over to pick them up. The programs were COMPLETELY destroyed. They punched the holes in the wrong spot and they didn’t even come CLOSE to lining up to the black backing. I lost it! I just stood there and bawled in front of the poor girl at the register. She was so taken back that she ran to get her manager. I was so devastated that I had spent SO MUCH TIME getting these programs just perfect and now they were ruined. The Manager realized that it was their error and offered to re-print all 600 pages of the programs and then punch the correct holes. What a waist of time and 600 pages of ink! I was so bummed!!! I agreed and said I would be back on Thanksgiving Day to pick them up. (Can you believe they are open on Thanksgiving Day?!?!)
Let me just tell you how amazingly awesome Doug is! He was SO supportive throughout this entire ordeal and so understanding. Most guys would laugh and think “it’s just paper.” Doug was so understanding!!!
So, after brunch with my family on Thanksgiving Day, we drove back to Kinko’s. AGAIN…they messed them up! We had to have them cut the programs down so that the “stepping effect” would work AND the holes were still not perfect. I was so frustrated and Doug kept reminding me not to stress over the little details. I look at these programs and all of the flaws instantly pop out to me. Everyone else looks at the programs and they don’t see any flaws. So…I have had to remind myself over and over to just laugh at the things I can’t control. At least we will have programs, right?
Thanksgiving was really nice and really relaxing! We had dinner at Doug’s family’s house and ate SO much. His Dad is an AMAZING cook!!! Everything is homemade and unbelievably good. So much for the pre-wedding diet!
On Friday, Doug and I got up early and went to the Montgomery County Courthouse to get our marriage license. Several people at my work told me that we needed a witness for this, so we brought my Sister, Ashley. It turns out, we did not need one. She posed as our photo journalist instead. :) I put a few pictures of this above. I have never been to the Courthouse before this and it was absolutely crazy that we were going to apply for a marriage license! Doug and I could not believe how easy it was to do! We answered a few questions about our parents and our occupations and then we put our right hand on the Bible and swore that everything we said was true. (I thought it was really cool that they still incorporated the Bible into this process!) Then…we paid $45 and had our marriage license. That’s it! It is actually official today. She said that we are officially married (based on the certificate) but not legally. It didn’t really make sense to me, but it sounds cool!!! I guess nothing else matters. It’s all just little stuff from here on out.
Tonight I am going to try and finish up tying all of the little bows onto the ceremony programs and, if I have time, put the black backing on my escort cards. The only thing left to do is print out the menu programs (which I actually think Doug will do tonight) and then put the backing on those.
We are 12 days away today and I couldn’t be more excited. After having the programs out of the way and getting over that hurdle, I don’t feel stressed anymore. Just REALLY REALLY excited!!!!!! I can’t wait to be Mrs. Shade! :)

Bachelorette party in NYC

WOW! Where do I even begin??!?!? What an amazing 24 hours this has been!
My entire bachelorette party was a surprise to me. (Actually…the date was supposed to be a surprise, but I found it out. Oops.) I was told that Doug was going to pick me up on Saturday at 1:30 and to pack an overnight bag. That’s it!!!!!!! Doug said I was on a “need to know basis” and I didn’t need to know at this moment. So…I tried my best to enjoy the surprise. Doug ended up picking me up and driving me to my Aunt Kristin’s house in Valley Forge. The girls had planned a mini lingerie party for me there and they had snacks and fun gifts…LOTS of fun gifts! ;) We hung out for a little and then the girls told me that we were going to NYC. I was SOOOOO excited that we were going there! I couldn’t believe it!!! :) I LOVE NY and no matter where we were going, it didn’t matter. It was going to be in NY!!!
My friend, Joy, ended up driving us up to NYC in her SUV and we got to the hotel. Ashley had done SO much research on the hotel and found a place that sounded AWESOME and it even said that Madonna had stayed there. When we got into our room, all we saw was a sink in the middle of the room. We all stopped dead in our tracks and asked where the bathroom was?!!!!! Turns out that the bathrooms were shared….as in, everyone on the floor (20-30 rooms) had to share the same bathroom!!!!! It was the most bizarre thing I have ever seen!!! The entire hotel was really odd. The elevator was SUPER tiny and Erin was freaking out! She had to take the steps EVERY time (and we were on the 6th floor) :) When I stood in the hallway of the hotel, I tried to put both of my arms out and couldn’t even stretch them completely out without hitting the walls. VERY ODD! Luckily, we were only in the hotel for a few hours.
We got to the hotel and started getting dressed. Ashley, Erin and I were in one room and then Kristin and Joy were in another. Stephanie (our Best Man’s wife) ended up meeting us at the hotel and got ready for the evening with us. Kristin gave me a white feather boa and a “bride to be” crown with a veil attached. Then, Stephanie got two pins for me to wear and a candy bracelet (that was VERY embarassing). HAHA! I don’t know what it is about bachelorette parties and having that stuff. I guess it is just a big preview of what is to come after the wedding? WHO KNOWS. Anyways…there was a lot of that kind of stuff and it was EXTREMELY embarrassing!
So, we get to our dinner place and little did I know the type of entertainment that awaited me there. The place was called Lucky Cheng’s and all of the guys were dressed up in costumes and some were dressed as girls. It was HYSTERICAL but the strangest thing I have EVER seen!!! Ashley had ordered an entire bachelorette package for me. They even pulled me up on stage and had a banana eating contest. (I absolutely HATE bananas!!!). It was all so funny! They had a HUGE cake (I'll let you imagine what the cake looked like) and they had a balloon guy that came around and made "interesting" balloons for all of us. Mine ended up getting strapped to my waist and I carried it around with me everywhere we went. It was such a fun night and SO crazy!!! I really don’t know how I didn’t get beat up walking around on the streets of NYC with a GIANT balloon that looked like....well...I'm sure you can imagine... strapped to my waist. Everyone loved it and seemed to think it was as funny as we thought it was.
The girls all did such an amazing job of thoroughly embarrassing me and taking me out the last time as a single girl.
Now the wedding is REALLY here. Less than 1 month to go………………..