Weighty Matters

Last week, Mr. M and I met up with our awesome photographer, Daniel Krieger, for an engagement photo session. We started out at our favorite swanky cocktail bar in Brooklyn, where the bartenders mixed us up some beautiful - and yummy - cocktails while Daniel took pictures. Then we headed out on a walk around the neighborhood, where the trees had finally burst into their full autumn splendor.

It was a good thing I had a drink or two, I think, because I spent a lot of the session really nervous about whether or not I would look extra-chunky in the finished pictures. While a lot of the time, I can look in the mirror and be happy with what I see, I really hate the way I photograph. I have a lot of bad angles, you know - pretty much everything that isn't a straight up Myspace photo shot from above - so I worried about almost every pose. A profile shot? Ugh, better suck in the stomach. Craning my head up to kiss Mr. M? Might as well just shine a spotlight on my double chin! 

While I've lost thirty pounds since our engagement, and I'm much happier about the way I fit into clothes and how much healthier I feel, taking our engagement pictures made me realize that I need to step it up on a couple of fronts before the wedding. First, I should probably stay the course with my weight loss program. With eight months to go before the big day, I can probably shed another thirty pounds - and hopefully, that will make me a little more confident about my body in general.

Second, though, I think it's important for me to get to a place of peace with my body. Sure, I've got a tummy and a pair of flabby arms and chubby cheeks that get extra chubby when I grin wide - but I've also got a fiance who loves me just the way I am and tells me I'm beautiful every day. That doesn't mean I don't need to continue to strive to be as healthy as possible - for myself, for Mr. M and for our future little M's - but I also need to stop obsessing about my imperfections. I can't help where the camera focuses, but I can control where I focus - on the love pouring out of Mr. M's gorgeous face, the tender way we hold each other, the beauty that he sees in me. 

Paper garden escort cards

Once I had decided that paper flower escort cards was the way to go, I had to figure out how to make them happen without breaking the bank. Although they're one of the DIY projects that I'm most excited about, I didn't want to spend hundreds of dollars on pre-made flowers from Etsy or the pricey kits from Paper Source. I considered borrowing a Cricut machine from a friend, but after watching some instructional videos, I realized that it would take an awfully long time to cut out enough petals for 200 flowers with the Cricut. Yikes! Time to find a plan B.

I came across these video tutorials on YouTube and knew instantly that paper punches were the way to go! So I scampered on down to Paper Source to pick up some pink and gold cardstock and ordered four EK Success Retro Flower punches from Amazon - one each in XL, Large, Medium and Small. When they came in yesterday, I spent a good part of the evening following the video tutorials and doing a little bit of experimenting on my own. This is what I came up with!

Aren't they gorgeous?! I got through about fifteen last night. They're a bit time-consuming but not super tedious, and luckily we still have eight months before the wedding, so I think a few more crafting sessions (while watching Four Weddings, of course) should get the job done. When it's time to do the seating chart and write out the escort cards, we'll attach some little paper flags with everyone's name and table assignment. Scattered around our card table's display of ferns and jasmine vines, I think these will be absolutely beautiful! 

Love is a decision

This weekend, Mr. M and I attended our long-awaited (and long-dreaded) Catholic Engaged Encounter retreat. Long story short: it was amazing.

There were some parts we weren't crazy about, of course, like the creaky beds in our monastic cells or the stale croissants at breakfast. (Luckily, there was a McDonald's across the street! When we pulled into the parking lot of the retreat center and spied the Golden Arches, the knowing look that Mr. M and I gave each other was proof positive that we're a hundred percent perfect for each other.) But the weekend's bright spots eclipsed the not-so-hot ones by far. Some of the bonding we did was over silly stuff - like sneaking out for breakfast at 6:30 a.m. before anyone else was awake, or Mr. M crawling out onto the balcony to let me into my room after I accidentally locked myself out of it. But most of it was real, honest, emotional re-connection.

Living it up, monk style!

Our fellow fiances and fiancees were a smart, honest, fun group of people. Though most of the work we did was just with our own intended, there was a group session on Saturday night where we all sat around in a circle and discussed relationship issues that we'd written down and stuffed in the anonymous questions box earlier in the day. There was a really broad range of experience in the group, and it was really cool to hear other folks' thoughts on some things that come up in a lot of marriages. The two older married couples who led the discussions throughout the weekend were also fantastic. They did a lot of very honest sharing about their lives together, and I really appreciated their willingness to open up and tell us about how they have worked to create successful, happy marriages.

I was nervous, before the weekend, that Mr. M and I would be put through some sort of Spanish Inquisition about our living arrangements or subjected to a lecture about burning in hell if we ever even thought about using contraceptives, but that kind of thing never really happened. There was a discussion about Natural Family Planning and a couple of mentions in the written materials about the supposed benefits of not living together before marriage, but the judgement I expected was nowhere to be found. (Phew!)

All in all, the time we spent there was worth every minute and every penny. We loved it so much that we signed up to volunteer to be one of the presenting married couples someday in the future! It was so lovely to take some time out from our daily lives and just share with each other. I couldn't recommend it more highly!

Close Encounters of the Engaged Kind

Mr. M and I are packing up to go on our Catholic Engaged Encounter this weekend. I'm looking forward to it - but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little nervous!

Engaged Encounter is a weekend-long retreat that the church offers as an alternative to the traditional pre-cana classes. We'll be staying at a retreat center in deep, deep Brooklyn, sharing dorm rooms with a same sex roommate and spending the weekend learning about married life from other Catholic married couples. From what I can gather, we'll be doing a lot of writing and sharing with each other rather than with the whole group, which takes a little bit of the edge off! But still... it definitely takes me out of my cozy comfort zone to be sharing a room with a stranger... and possibly sharing things about my relationship with a big group of people I don't know!

But at the end of the day, I think it will be a good experience. Mr. M and I have pretty awesome communication, if I do say so myself, but there are always more things to talk about. And I've heard that EE is actually a really wonderful experience. Some of my friends have gone through it, and they say that it's really strengthened their bond as a couple and brought up a lot of discussions that might not have come up otherwise. Mr. M and I share a lot of the same values and dreams for our future, and I think we've pretty much covered all of the relevant topics on our own: the timing (and raising) of future little Ms, our financial goals, our feelings on the topic of divorce, our respective childhoods. But who knows? There is always more to learn.

So wish me luck!

Put a ring on it! Part 2

On a very long and drizzly ride back home from a cousin's wedding in upstate New York a few months ago, I spotted an outlet mall with a sign for a Zales outlet along the highway. Discount jewelry?! "Pull over!" I shrieked. "We need wedding bands!"

Turns out, outlet doesn't really mean what it used to. Mr. M and I tried on a bunch of rings, but the prices seemed comparable to a regular Zales store, and even with the slight discount, we didn't feel moved to buy anything. On the bright side, though, we did make some decisions about the styles we like! Mr. M fell in love with a tungsten band with black detailing and I realized that my engagement ring's setting meant that I would either have to get a curved wedding band or rock a considerable gap between the e-ring and the wedding ring. I liked the curved look a lot more than the gap, and when the saleswoman showed us how it would look with two curved diamond bands - one on either side of my engagement ring - Mr. M and I were both sold. Sparkles and curves was the way to go.

Back home, I started looking for the perfect curved band, and I found it at OroSpot!

Picture from OroSpot website

It was not only just the right amount of bling, the price also sounded pretty excellent. Last night, we pulled the trigger and ordered it! 

I can't wait til it arrives - I'm totally going to put it on and start prancing around, practicing for married life. "Oh, this ring?" I'll say, "it's my wedding band. My husband bought it for me!" 

At least until my friends start giving me those "you're crazy" looks, of course. Then I'll tuck it back into the box and put it away until the big day in June. 

Put a ring on it!

There's already one ring on it, of course - my engagement ring. But in a little less than nine months - yay! - it'll be time to add another one - the wedding ring! 

But before we get to that, let me take you back to the day we bought ring #1. Mr. M and I had been discussing marriage for a while, and he told me that he'd like to propose around my birthday in January. He also said that he really wanted me to pick out the ring myself, since he's not much of a jewelry fan and I'm... well... picky. After nixing the idea of buying a ring at a chain store like Zales or Kay's, and being somewhat terrified at the prospect of wandering around the Diamond District with a wad of cash, we decided to go visit my parents for a weekend and take a trip to my family's favorite independent jeweler. 

On our way to the jeweler, my mom mentioned that she'd seen some really beautiful rings at Sam's Club. I had a hard time believing that they'd have anything worth looking at, but Mr. M and I agreed to go check it out. (I was secretly hoping to be able to prove her wrong!) So we waltzed up to the jewelry counter at Sam's and started looking at rings in our price range. Some were pretty, but I was mostly unimpressed... until I saw The One. 

Holy sparkles, Batman! It was beautiful - a simple white gold band with a beautiful .58 carat round diamond surrounded by smaller diamonds in what they call a "unity" setting. Although they were all graded I1, I couldn't see any visible inclusions, and whatever was there definitely didn't take away from the beauty of the ring. Because of all the facets clustered together, it sparkled like crazy - and the halo-like setting looked perfect on my big ol' size 11 ring finger. Was this it? Was this my ring?

Picture from the Sam's Club website - which really doesn't do it justice!

I couldn't decide. To be totally, brutally honest, I was having a slight snobbery attack. Could I really rock a ring from a big box store? I had to think about it some more, so we left Sparkles there and continued on to the family jeweler. Once we got there, we gave them our budget and started looking at our options. Long story short - we could really only afford a small-ish diamond in a very plain setting. While I truly think that "smaller" diamond solitaires are gorgeous, classic, beautiful rings - I did have the size 11 finger to think about. A half carat solitaire that would look perfect on a smaller hand looked like a tiny chip on my large finger. 

Thus, the decision was made. We hopped back in the car, went straight back to Sam's Club and purchased Sparkles. I haven't regretted it for a moment since. I still get that "squee!" feeling every time I look down at my hand! And my snobbery attack passed quickly - every time someone admires it, I proudly tell them, "Sam's Club!" We saved some money and got a truly gorgeous piece of jewelry - what's not to be super proud of?