Confessions of a Newlywed

Hello again! It's been so long, I hope you still remember me! My confessions aren't going to be in bullet points today. They're better served with paragraph-like form.

I've been married 48 days, and, to be honest, I think that the newlyweds who gush that newlywed life is, "so great! We've never been happier," are just being cliche. That's not to say that I'm not happy. I am. I love my husband and I'm very glad to be married to him. But this whole newly wed thing just seems like a natural extension of normal life. It's not the fairytale that I used to think it would be. He leaves the toilet seat up right before bed, and I fall in when I go to the bathroom in the middle of the night without turning the light on first. I creep him out by leaving hair in the shower. We bicker about who takes up more space when it's time to sleep. Then I apparently kick him in my sleep while I'm having nightmares about getting pregnant and being chased through the street (no more NCIS before bed). He tells me he's leaving for work and then scares the crap out of me when he comes back upstairs, looking for his keys (no wonder I kicked him). I make dinner and he does the dishes. I fill up the trash can and he takes it out, although after last trash day, I feel the need to check the locks after he comes in. He tickles me when I'm not paying attention to him. I do laundry (it works better when you don't get the fabric softener mixed up with the detergent) and bake (also works better when you don't confuse baking powder with baking soda), he acts like I'm a culinary genius when my first attempt at yeast rolls turns out perfectly risen and moist and yummy and gratefully stops eating when his picky, but creative wife proclaims the new recipe she tried is absolutely disgusting. 

All of this is just life. It's messy, and boring and fun and normal. 

I guess that's what happens after the fairy tale ending. After the credits roll and the music ends. Life just happens. And I guess that IS the happily ever after. Because the alternative is life not happening. And that;s just a buzz-kill. 

Welp, it's date night, my hubby will be home in about 2 hours and I still haven't washed my hair or shaved my legs, so I should probably sign off. 

I go back to work August 17. School starts again August 22. My principal called me yesterday and instead of being the library aide this year, I'm going to be the computer teacher. I'm excited to try something new, but I'm sad that I won't be in the library. Wish me luck, I probably won't have anything new to post until after school starts. Most of what I do these days doesn't merit being written about.

Take care, everyone!

A Wedding Story

I know it's been almost a month, but I finally got the pictures from the wedding! So now I can tell you the story of our wedding. (Since I know you've been waiting with baited breath to hear all about it)

The first thing I learned about planning my wedding is that I should have taken more pictures myself. Or else I should learn to draw. I am fairly certain I will never forget June 10-11, 2011, but I didn't take the pictures that speak so much more than the descriptive words I could use. Oh well. On Friday, I spent all morning and the afternoon at the church setting up for the wedding. I could not have done it without my wonderful friend Amanda Jo who stepped in at the last minute to be my maid-of-honor (that's a story for another day), packed up her laptop and Star Wars movie for her little guy to watch, got me a sandwich from Chick-fil-a, and came up to the church to help me set everything up; my mom and sister Amanda, who also came up to the church and helped set tables, dye water, distribute Hershey kisses, etc. We also made the buttonieres for all they guys. Even some of the groomsmen came and helped move tables and stuff. We set each table with a white table cloth, a 12" by 12" square mirror, a half-fishbowl type of bowl half-filled with purple water and floating ivory candles, and a mix of milk and dark chocolate Hershey kisses.

The guestbook table

I chose not to decorate the sanctuary, so there aren't any pictures of how we did that. :-) (Side note, I think not decorating the sanctuary was a GREAT idea. Less to do = less stress = happier bride)

After decorating all day, I had just enough time to go home, shower and get ready for the rehearsal dinner. 

Everything went smoothly, and we walked down the aisle for the first time.

The dinner was yummy. Matt's family did most of the cooking, and we had barbeque. After we ate, I went back to my apartment with Matt, John (the Best Man) and his girlfriend, and Cody (one of our ushers) and his wife Sarah. Then I realized I didn't have any shaving gel, so we had to go to Walmart. 

Saturday morning, I woke up at 6:45. Not because of nerves, but because my sister CALLED me to tell me that I was getting married that day. I was rather mad at her for waking me up when I was so peacefully unaware that in just 7 hours and 15 minutes, I would be walking down the aisle, but I was also happily excited that in just 7 hours and 15 minutes, I would be walking down the aisle, so I didn't even give her a hard time for waking me up at such an ungodly hour.

We stopped at the florist to pick up the flowers for the girls and everything was BEAUTIFUL. I wish I had taken a good picture of my bouquet, but there were other things on my mind... In addition to looking beautiful, our flowers smelled lovely too, thanks to the addition of purple freesia. Mmm. FYI, if you need flowers and live in the DFW area, call Cooper's Florist in Bedford. Jamie is a wonderful Christian lady and she did a beautiful job for a very reasonable price.

Then we were at the church and it was time to get ready! (And I'm totally about to blow it up with photos. (Yay!) 

My dress! I was so excited to get to wear it. My momma picked it out and it is so beautiful. Now I'm kinda sad that I won't get to wear it again. (Nerd alert!)

I will never, EVER wear a petticoat in June again. It made my dress look AWESOME, but it was hot. 

As in, I had to put anti-perspirant on my upper thighs.

Yeah. 

Ugh.

My momma laced up my dress. In the top picture I was apparently talking animatedly about something, but I don't remember what. Sorry. In the bottom picture, I was holding my breath and sucking in, praying that the dress would fit. Guess who had nightmares about ballooning to the size of a gorilla?

Amanda's friend Crissy gave me a HUGE blessing by coming up to the church and doing our makeup. She even had fake eyelashes for me! (They kinda freaked Matt out at first, but I thought they looked epic!)

And after my hair was fixed, the veil in place, makeup done, dress on, flowers in hand, this was this finished product.I felt so absolutely beautiful. Which I have decided is a minor purpose of weddings. 

After all the pre-wedding photos were done, we still had to wait 45 minutes for the ceremony to start. One of my bridesmaids prayed Proverbs 31 over me,

and I ate a granola bar. But I don't have a picture of that. Aren't you sad? I'm sorry.

Then everyone left me to go line up, but I couldn't leave the dressing room because I didn't want Matt to see me, and he wasn't in the sanctuary yet. And I had to watch my flowergirl because there wasn't anyone else to keep her from running amok and messing up her sash. So we sang songs from the Sound of Music and then it was time to go. I got in line with my grandpa and waited for the doors to open. 

Then I walked down the aisle and got married. :-)

My Ring Bearer and Flower Girl

The doors opening

I'm not sure why I made this face.

"I...

...do."

Alrighty, I know I'm stopping in the middle of the ceremony, but my computer is freaking out and I've been working on this post for 3 days and I really don't want to lose it. So I'll post the second half of the ceremony and the reception pictures later.

Hope you're having a good week!

~Allison~