The end of April

As we come upon the end of April, I look back on this month - which has felt incredibly long and somehow has sped by - and instead of feeling like I somehow survived it, I feel pretty good. I got a lot of projects started, which is awesome-rific because that means that I'm not sitting on my hams doing nothing.

I'm one of those people who, when faced with a large, time constrained project (one that doesn't involve writing... with writing I am totally the other way around... hence why I have started a million stories and finished none) I like to do it now, get it over with, and sit back and relax as it comes closer. I have heard many brides telling me that the last two weeks before the wedding they had nothing to do, so they had to rest on their laurels till the big day. They like to note how miserable this was.

Just to take a look into the future (and to prove my point) the last two weeks of my wedding contain Christmas (a Saturday) and New Years Day (also a Saturday). The last two weeks of my wedding year will be spent running around during all the craziness of the holidays, trying not to break any nails/teeth/eyelashes/limbs, and holding myself back from eating every cookie in sight. There will be no "two weeks before my wedding." I've come to terms with this.

My mother has asked me "What are you going to do in July and August when you have done all your wedding stuff too early?"

The short answer, "Either sit on my hams and enjoy it or I won't have everything done by then." (sorry, I liked the 'sitting on my hams' analogy so I wanted to use it again).

The long answer is that there are no two ways about it that there will be now ham-sitting. If you take the amount of months until our wedding - pretty much 7 months and 8 days... just because we happen to be sitting at the end of April - and divide it vaguely in half, that's about as much time as we have. Every other month or so of the next year is FULL of non-wedding related things. Looking forward:

April - VENDOR MONTH, all wedding, all the time
May - Nothing, no time at all. Brain Tumor Society Race for Hope, a birthday party, baby shower planning (or something, I'm just doing what I'm told), Mother's day, Trip to NY so Fiance can meet most of my family (and hopefully not run screaming back to NoVa)
June - My plan is bridesmaid dresses and a trip to Men's Warehouse so boyface can try on some tuxes and we can come to a decision on that. I also hope to have the bouquets done before this time.
July - Non-wedding related hell month - My birthday (I'm turning 25! So this constitutes an entire weekend dedicated to the celebration of it. I told you I wasn't going to let this wedding define me and I'm certainly not going to let it ruin my quarter century birthday!), the fourth of July, a baby shower, my brother is leaving for bootcamp and my parents are going out of town. Mom also wants to go to see hotels for our out of towners sometime in July. I'm not sure when that's going to happen...
August - SCRAMBLE! I want to get the invites out early November so we best be getting the last minute details figured out. I also need to start getting appointments ready for the fall. ie: hair/makeup trials, underwear, try to get my dress designed, get the bridal part uniforms ordered.

I don't even want to think about what happens after that... It goes something like a baby being born, a halloween party, various wedding satellite parties, and me red faced, standing over a paper cutter with a paper punch in one hand and eggplant cardstock in the other, and a intravenous bag of sweet tea vodka directly to my right...Note that there are only 4 weekends in each month... and I work full time so if it's happening, it's happening on the weekend. I also didn't count any of the DIY projects I have set up for myself. Here's a small list of what I can think of at this exact momenet: bouquets, boutenneires, card box, French memo board for 'guest book', cards for 'guest book', programs, out of town bags, table numbers... That's all off the top of my head. And a lot of them I can't do until we get closer.

So, I started this post feeling fulfilled that I had started all these projects and gotten almost all of my vendors signed.

I have somehow managed to stress myself out by describing the year ahead. Running off at the pen (keyboard?) as usual for me...

But at least I have vented my stress for now so Boyface doesn't have to listen to it anymore...

Oh, and as an aside... I have never, ever had allergies before. The 'screw-you' fairy has bit me... hard... on my hams...

-Bo.J.