Bad Blogger

I noticed recently that many of the regular bloggers have taken a hiatuse.  I am not excluded from this group.  I’m not sure why, but there seems to be a lack of material these days.  Here is a wrap up of the last month or two.

The holidays came, they were wonderful, and then they left.  We had a massive Christmas tree that I loved and managed to fill completely, all nine feet of it.  I was so proud of our Christmas tree decorating prowess that I had to have a girly party to celebrate.  We made a ton of Christmas cookies and a ginger bread house that included some “caulk” and a ribbon cutting ceremony.  Ben and I had our usual struggle of how we were going to split our time equally with our parents but we managed OK.

The economy has me completely freaked out.  I am scared I will lose my job, even though I have been reassured from many people at my company that I am fine.  I do know that there is a sales team restructuring on the horizon and no one seems to be talking about it… 

Ben and I would love to start the updates on our condo, but again, we are freaked out that the minute we write the check, I will lose my job.  We are crossing our fingers for a nice bonus check and tax return to start the loooooong list of things we want to do to our apartment, including, but not limited to: new kitchen, new bathroom, refinished floors, new carpet, paint job, fix the windows, new doors, closet organizers, and lots of accessories.

We managed to spend $210 in the matter of 24 hours on the ridiculous and unfair policies that make up the city of Chicago motor vehicle laws.  Our car was towed because of the city wide overnight parking ban.  On many streets, you are not allowed to park between the hours of 2am and 7am regardless of snow accumulation.  Apparently this law began because in 1970 something because the city was shut down due to snow plows not being able to get through.  Seriously? Ben did not know this and our car was hauled off to the far away corn fields of Calumet City.  This is far beyond the city limits and a completely ridiculous place to tow a car when there are 2 massive lots within Chicago city limits.  Regardless, it was a major adventure getting there since our only mode of transportation was taken from us.  Here is the process of us getting our car back:

Ben gets super mad and realizes that I will get even more mad at him.  He does his homework, makes sure he knows exactly where the car is and what he needs, then wakes me up to inform me he is off to get our car.  I had to remind him that the car was in my name and I had to go with him.  Oops, one thing forgotten.  Thank god I remembered our marriage license since my name has changed and is therefore different than what is on the lease.  We take a 45 minute bus ride that felt like we were on a third world country road…CTA buses are VERY bumpy when they go over 30mph.  We get to the end of the line…as in, the bus parked, bus driver got out, and said, “get out”.  We were in the middle of no where and didn’t have the slightest clue where to go next.  I see a parking lot full of cars over a hill and ask a nice CTA person, if in fact, that is the impound lot.  “Yep, sure is!”  Abbie: “Um, Ok, thank you, but, how we get there?”  We had to walk across a 5 lane highway, find the “side road” and hope that we actually found the impound lot.  Our only reassurance was that we kept seeing tow trucks along what I am guessing was a mile long walk.  We get to the lot and are encountered by a massive man with a CPD badge hanging off his coat.  “WHOSE THE OWNER OF THE VEHICLE.”  Ben points to me as I sheepishly raise my hand.  I walk into the double wide trailer as Ben is told he has to wait outside.  Abbie: “What! He has to wait out here, it’s 10 degrees outside!”  CPD man, “Oh, I guess he can wait inside the the room off to the side.”  So we walk in, I put on the friendliest face I can muster, and start the process of getting our car back.  It’s not a good thing that they wouldn’t let Ben in with me because he happened to know all the information.  So, we managed to yell at each other over the crazies, the clueless, the extremely hungover, and one other guy in there for the overnight parking ban.  Then, I walk outside to get our car.  The attendant points in a very vague direction and tells me to go get it.  As I am walking to the car, I see a gigantic bulldozer with two metal forks sticking out of it.  The bulldozer manages to hoist a car about 20 feet in the air and plop in down in a new spot.  The operator had no regard for me and that I had no idea where he was going with the flying car…it was a little scary.  I found our car, checked it 400 times for damage and bolted.  I managed to pick Ben up at the door and we were out of there.  About 18 hours later, we got a $50 ticket for “expired meter”, 1 minute past it’s expiration.

Here is a random story: I went to the grocery store the other day to pick up chocolate chips.  I find them right away but there happens to be a young couple in front of the shelf I need to get to, so I wait.  I don’t think I looked impatient but they were very obviously stalling to keep me waiting.  I didn’t say anything and didn’t try to give off any non-verbal gestures.  In my head I was saying, “Damn, these people are rude, do they even know I am here?”  THEN, they started making out.  Right in front of me!  I started laughing at them because I was so shocked.  I mean, we are in the middle of Jewel at the ”baking needs” section.  Apparently frosting and chocolate chips turned them on.  I know they did it purposely, just to see what I would do, because after said make-out session, the girl looked at me like, “Haha! look what I have and you don’t.”  And I gave her the look  that said, “look at my left ring finger biatch, I married an almost-doctor!”  Very rarely do I like to bring this up, but it was advantageous at the moment.  Petty?  Just a little bit.

That’s it for now.  Hopefully there won’t be such a shortage of material moving forward.

Mr. and Mrs., The Finale

Where did I leave off, oh yes!  The actual wedding day.

Here I am the morning of the wedding showing off the famous “Whoa Face” and my dress:

This was at about 6am prior to a Starbucks run and before our 8am arrival time at the salon.

Here I am just as Patrick, the amazing hair and makeup guy, was finishing up (I was very happy with the finished product, can you tell?):

I don’t have many photos of us getting ready, but just know, it was a little chaotic.  Trying to coordinate 20+ people was a bit of a challenge.  All I really remember is sitting in the corner of the room eating my Jimmy John’s, while everyone around me was getting dressed and trying to find a variety of clothing. 

Next, was time for me to get dressed.  I felt like I was giving a peep show!  My mom, grandma, 5 bridesmaids, friend, and 2 photographers were all watching me get dressed.  I am fairly certain they all got a shot of my girls.  Just as I finished getting dressed, I got a letter from Ben.  That was the only time, up unitl that point, that I cried.  I thought I was pretty successfull considering I am usually a blubbering mess.

Then, it came time to see Ben.  After many months of deliberating, we finally decided to see each other beforehand, and boy am I glad we did!  Our ceremony didn’t start until 5:30 so it was going to be a logistical mess if we didn’t see each other before, not that it wasn’t a mess anyway.

Our photographer and wedding planner staged a semi-private spot for us to see each other.  I was so nervous and excited that when I saw his reflection in a mirror, I lost it.  We had our one and only moment with just to two of us (but really us, our photographers, wedding planner, and friend who was videoing us).  Benjamin also gave me some wonderful Tiffany bling during this moment of ours!

Then it all began.  SO MANY PHOTOS!  I am not a modest person, I don’t mind having my photo taken, I am a bit of a ham if you will, but my goodness!  After hours of it, I was ready to relax.  We had a blast touring the city with our bridal party and friends prior to our ceremony.  Here are some of my favorite pics:

It was cold, can you tell?

Next, came time to actually get married.  The ceremony location looked beautiful!  It was exactly what I had envisioned and I cannot possibly praise my florist enough!  Ben and I “designed” the entire ceremony from scratch so needless to say, we were a little stressed out about it.  We had some fairly creative and “out-there” ideas, but I think it went off really well and people really enjoyed it.  I personally loved it.  Ben and I have been to a lot of weddings that are always very nice, but they seem a little generic.  We wanted something that actually had a little of our personality in it.  I think we succeeded.

My 2 favorite parts:

We asked a good friend of ours to kick it off with a reading, except we asked her to actually write it.  She says she was nervous, but she delivered it perfectly!  Here it is.  

We asked everyone invited to our wedding to submit their definition of love.  We asked them to return them with their response card.  We thought there would be maybe, 6-10 but we ended up with almost 30, which we thought was impressive.  We then selected people in the audience to read them aloud (they knew beforehand, of course).  I personally think it was awesome.  The best part was that we had kids read their definitions…my favorite (from a 3 year old) “Love is a basketball!”  And he said it in front of 200 people!  One of these days, I’ll get around to posting all the definitions. 

The rest of the evening is honestly a bit of a blur.  We tried so hard to talk to everyone and make sure everyone knew how much we appreciated them being there.  Don’t get me wrong, it was a blast, just a little blurry.

Our florist was amazing, our venue looked beautiful and had excellent food, our DJ had everyone dancing like rockstars the entire night, and our wedding planner had me pretty much stress free the entire day.  Our wedding was seriously everything I could have asked for.  My vision of the evening panned out and it was honestly perfect.

We topped off the perfect night with a perfect midnight snack.  Us and 20 of our friends headed to Rock’n Roll McDonald’s for none other than nuggets and a coke!

Mr. and Mrs. Part 1

I am officially a Mrs!  Ben and I have been married almost 4 weeks now.  I’ve been thinking about how I would write about the event that was our wedding but I haven’t come up with anything creative or fun, so, I’m just going to write about it.  This is round one…everything leading up to the actual wedding.

The beginning of wedding festivities was marked with a facial the Wednesday before the wedding.  The plan was to get the facial then go pick my dad and step mom up at the airport.  Unfortunately, there was a major debacle with the airlines and they arrived 7 hours after they were supposed to.   

Ben and I spent the day hanging out together, not stressing about wedding things.  We had already finished all the program making, table card making, errand running, calling people, making final payments and so forth.  So how better to celebrate?  Go to our favorite place, Hackney’s (Dearborn and Polk), for an afternoon date and a couple beers.  That night we entertained my dad and step mom for the very first time ever.  This was their first, and most likely last trip to Chicago.  They aren’t fans of the city, or visiting their daughter for that matter.

Thursday, my BFF Charlotte arrived from Boston.  The moment I saw her I got a little choked up.  I can’t explain it, but for some reason, seeing her was like a flash in my brain saying ”YOU REALLY ARE GETTING MARRIED!!!”  We spent the afternoon delivering gift bags to hotels and picking up our dresses.  It was pretty surreal going to the bridal salon for the last time.  Also, a tiny bit stressful knowing that we were responsible for the fate of my dress. 

Thursday night my Dad (technically my step dad but I call him my dad, we’ll call him JimDad from now on) had a family party for Ben and I.  It was a very fun evening but the beginning of all the overwhelming-ness.  It was a good overwhelming, but at one point, Ben and I looked at each other and said “Drinks, now!”  This was also when I got to see my brother and sister-in-law for the first time.  Again, another flash, of YOU ARE GETTING MARRIED.

Friday was beauty day.  My bridal party, 3 of 5 ladies, 2 moms, and a grandma all went to get manicures and pedicures.  I also got lash extensions.  To all future brides: get lash extensions…they make you feel beautiful!!  We pretty much took over the entire spa and had a great time doing it.  It was so nice spending time with all the ladies.  Everyone was relaxed and having a good time.

It was then time for the rehearsal.  That’s when I saw my other BFF from St. Louis, we’ve been friends since 1st grade so of course I got a little emotional, this time though, I was able to keep it inside.  We all plowed through the rehearsal…we have a MASSIVE family, so it was a bit of an organized mess but it worked.  There was a bit of parental drama that I did my best to ignore but it raised my stress level just a tiny bit.  It then came time for me and my parents (mom and JimDad) to walk down the aisle.  Everything was fine, until I looked at Ben, and all 40 members of our immediate family staring at me, and I lost it.  Ben had a look on his face that said “Oh Man, she is never going to make it through tomorrow.  Crap, I better go buy Kleenex.”

Next was the rehearsal dinner.  The main attraction (for me) was seeing my third BFF for the first time in about a year and a half!  She’s been in Nicaragua for the Peace Corps, and she came all the way back for our wedding (and to see her family, of course).  It was so great to see her!  I can’t even explain how excited I was.

Ben’s dad gave one of the most heart warming toasts I have ever heard.  He is not an emotional man, nor is he a man of many words, so hearing him talk about Ben for about 5 minutes was just great.  I’d never heard him say such things- I don’t think he has actually said them before (in public), but it really set the tone for our wedding weekend.

We gave out our gifts which consisted of earrings, a shawl, and a homemade (by my mom) purse for the girls, beer mugs and a monthly membership to a beer club for the groomsmen, and a bow ties and funky green socks for all the men in the wedding, including dads and grandpas.  Ben’s paternal grandfather is a very dapper man, he doesn’t mess around when it comes to his attire, and I think he was a little blown away that we really did want him to wear green and white argyle socks with his tuxedo.

The night ended at the Palmer House.  My mom, grandma, and I all shared a room.  It was a mini sleepover if you will.  There was some major mother daughter drama that ended with my grandma yelling at us.  I am fairly certain that if she hadn’t been there, my mother and I would have gone to bed not speaking to each other.  Thank you Mimi.  Everything got smoothed over and everyone went to bed happy.

Mr. and Mrs. Part II to come.

Name Change

So my name has officially changed.  I know, I know, I need to get around to writing about my wedding.  I’ll get to it, I promise.

So, I think I may have had the all time best experience ever with the Cook County Vital Records folks.  I can normally find plenty of things to complain about it when it comes to Chicago and it’s various processes, but today, I’ll applaud Cook County and all it’s employees.

I arrived at the vital records department this morning not long after they opened.  I needed to get a copy of our marriage license in order to begin the process of changing my name.  I walked up to the desk, asked for a copy, gave them my debit card and, Viola!  5 minutes and $16.25 later, I walked out with an official copy of my marriage license.

I then decided to walk over to the DMV to try and get a new drivers license.  I didn’t have all the necessary documentation and I knew that, but since I was about 10 feet away I decided to try anyway.  I walked up to the information desk, told them my situation and was directed to a nice lady that helped me out.  I am not joking when I say this, 10 minutes later I walked out with a brand new license with my new name and address.  They even took my picture.  It would have only taken about 7 minutes, but I had to walk down the hall to the ATM since I didn’t have the $5 in cash to pay for the new license.

THEN!  I walked through a miserable bout of rain to the social security office.  I walked up to the desk told them I needed a new card, and 5 minutes later I was on my way out the door with a new card in the mail.

Seriously?  I think someone was looking out for me today.  A friend of mine told me she did the same thing and it took her 4 hours.  My adventure took a mere hour. 

Good job Cook County!  Now, let’s talk about all the bogus parking tickets you keep giving me.  Oh yeah, and how about the governor of our fine state of Illinois getting arrested this morning….for what else?  Trying to sell a seat to the Senate…Barack Obama’s seat…uh, Rod, did you really thing no one would find out?  Serves you right!

All because of a lid.

This morning marked the beginning of life being back to normal.  The alarm went off at 3:45am and Ben and I began our usual rituals of getting ready and getting to the airport on time.  I’m headed to Charlotte, NC today for work.

All went well until I decided I wanted a bottle of water and a banana.  Not a hard thing to find in an airport, right?  Well, at 5:45am, not all of the little shops are open so I had to resort to Starbucks.  Not a huge deal, but I usually feel a little silly not ordering any coffee.  I save that for the arrival airport.  In my mind, I think it is a waste of a caffeine buzz to get it right before I get on the plane.  I am inevitably going to fall asleep so really, all a cup of coffee will do is give me horrendous breath.

So I walk up to the Starbucks line and it moves quite slowly.  The guy in front of me order a grande coffee and then asked if, by chance, they had a light blend.  WHOA!  Hold the press, what?!  It really threw the Starbucks employee for a loop.  The guy ended up with a tall coffee while the other Starbucks employee whipped a venti carmel machiato for they guy’s friend (they were quite the pair).

So I get up to the counter, I order an oatmeal (they didn’t have bananas) and a water.  I see they look a little flustered but they didn’t say anything.  I then see them start looking around for a mysterious item.  Turns out it was the lid for the oatmeal.  After not finding this precious lid, they inform me what was going on and that I can’t have my oatmeal.  I tell them to scratch the lid, no big deal, I’ll have it anyway.  Employee #1 says to Employee #2, “She wants it anyway”, WHAT?! WHOA!!  I could just see the guy flipping out because he couldn’t figure out how to make the oatmeal without to lid.  To their credit, you are supposed to let it sit and “cook” for a while, lid on of course, but it didn’t seem like the biggest deal to me.  After them looking at me like I was the cruelest person on earth, I finally told them to scratch it.  They then looked at me like I was a saint, as in, “Oh thank God lady!  You saved me!  I didn’t how on earth I was going to make you your oatmeal without a lid!”

The End.

Phew!

Wow.  I almost don’t even know how to start this…it was just amazing!!

Tuesday night, my little family and I headed over to a friend’s house to watch the election results roll in.  We decided to have a “snack-fest” and had some of the most fattening treats ever made.  We started with Totinos Pizza Rolls, moved on to Mozz Rods, then tater tots, then veggie potstickers, then Lean Pockets, then Krispy Kremes, and finally homeade chocolate chip cookies (complete with 1/2 c. of Crisco and a stick of butter).  I feel so fat…

We watched the results starting at about 6pm.  As stereotypes would predict, the women cooked put stuff in the oven while the men sat at their computers and watched the results on a variety of websites and a massive TV.  I think the final count was 4 Macs running at all times.

Our little crowd was a little rowdy all night long.  As soon as an important state would come through for Obama, we would hoot and holler a little.  Nothing quite like when they showed the countdown, though.  When they finally called it for Obama, we all started screaming!  It was even said that we could be heard two stories up, where one of our other friends was participating in a dinner sans election results.  He quickly came downstairs with a bottle of scotch in hand.

It was crazy though, these friends of ours never have a silent moment, ever…until Obama gave his acceptance speech.  There wasn’t a single word spoken as we were all glued to every sylabal.  Some of us just stared in excitetment, some of us shed a couple tears.  Text messages were flying to and from people at the rally but we were all silent.

Then we popped the champagne and took photos of the glorious moment.  I even received a call from my BFF in Nicaragua.  She was watching the results in the Peace Corp volunteer office and I am SO happy she decided to call me.  I could hear her excitement through the phone…all the way in Nicaragua!

Now it is time to see what will happen.  I realize there are probably some hurt feeling out there and I am sure people who voted for McCain do not like this post.  All I will say is, poilitics aside, Obama inspires me.  I don’t think our generation would be as involved with the recent campaign if it weren’t for him.  I think we owe him a tiny bit of gratidute for getting most of the country off their butts to vote this year.

I hope everyone out there, no matter how they voted, comes together to fix the mess we are in.  I am personally happy to have the leader the country has chosen and I hope all the negativity surrounding him will end soon.

In addition to the TV, we have 4 of these running:

Everyone after the big moment:

The almost bride and groom (I am so happy Obama won, otherwise Ben would have turned into a major buttface):

Molly had to get in on the snack-fest too…

VOTE!

I voted this morning!

I woke up before 6, threw on some (more) decent looking PJ’s, attempted some eye make-up, you know, just in case Obama decided to vote at my polling place, and walked downstairs.  We are very lucky to have our building as our polling place…I mean seriously, all I did was walk out my door, ride the elevator and viola!

To our surprise, there were already about 50 people waiting in line and a news camera (thank goodness I put on some makeup!).  It took about 45 minutes and a little patience to make us official voters.  We walked away with a little slip of paper saying we voted and were told we get a free cup of coffee from Starbucks if we show up with the paper.  Honestly, we really wanted the “I Voted” sticker.  It was pretty exciting casting my vote this year.  I’ve voted in the past, but this year it just seemed more meaningful.

Now we wait.  It will be a long but exciting day.  We are hopefully celebrating tonight at a friends house and possibly going to the Obama rally.  It is literally being held outside our front door.  Yesterday they were testing the speakers and I could hear everything.  It is absolute mayhem where the rally is being held.  Last night there were probably 20 news vans, tons of reporters doing stories, tourists and people like me trying to get in on the action.  We weren’t fortunate enough to get tickets but we may still try and go anyway. 

I’m a little nervous, though.  Ben reminded me of the 1968 riot that really did take place outside our front door.  To add to the riot scare, last night when we were walking Charlie, we noticed that all the mail boxes, trash cans, and anything not bolted to the cement had been removed.  My first thought was that they make targets for bomb placement, Ben said riots.  Either one is quite scary and I’m not sure if I want to be here for it.

We are trying to figure out what to do with our car…since again, it is parked right in the line of fire.  Also, our dog…he may have to join us at our friend’s house tonight.  He will be scared to death if something happened tonight and we aren’t here with him. 

I am hoping all the worry is unnecessary…if Obama wins, I hope McCain and Obama supports can agree to move forward together and if he loses, I hope for the same thing (although I will have to do everything in my power to keep Ben from moving to Canada).

History in the making my friends!

Because I think I need to update this

There has been a severe lack of blogging going on here.  I can only blame it on the fact that I am absolutely consumed with our wedding.  I am shocked at the amount of things that come up last minute!  I mean, we were the couple that had everything planned a year in advance…what happened?  Oh, I remember, people refuse to get back to us about a variety of things.

First, our printer, who was wonderful when it came to printing our save the date, has basically had Ben running zig-zags trying to figure out the best way to get a hold of them.  He has been telling us for well over a month that he would get us a proof on this day, or call us on that day, which of course he never did.  We finally decided to tell them “WE WANT TO GIVE YOU MONEY, DO YOU WANT IT?”  Or something along those lines.  I’m not sure what Ben said, maybe he threatened them with his enraged fiance, but miraculously, Ben got them to respond today.  We still do not have anything printed but we are close(r).

Then, I am shocked at the number of people that just simply do not return the response card from the invitation.  I mean, we already addressed it, we already stamped it, all people have to do is write a little check mark, put their names on it and stick it in the mailbox.  Not hard right?  Apparently it is a very difficult task.  I found out today that one of our friends that we haven’t heard from for months is coming AND bringing a date (even though they weren’t invited with a +1).  We are still missing about 8 responses 12 days before the wedding.  I know, I know, not the end of the world!

At the moment, those are the only things really bugging me.  I guess in reality, we are in really good shape.  It’s just frustrating having to wait on other people to do things.  Have I ever mentioned I am a bit of a control freak?  Although, there is no way I could ever do all this on my own.

I almost feel bad for Ben, he is so sick of listening to me rattle off things we need to do.  Yesterday, we had a mini screaming match in the car about how I wish he would just “act” like he is interested in helping out and not procrastinate on everything I ask him to do (did I mention he is the biggest procrastinator I know…drives me nuts since I am the girl that has things done three weeks in advance).  Mid-way through the argument, I realized that pretty much every groom must feel like him.  They want to get married, they are excited for the day, but they just don’t think like women and we can’t expect them to do so.  He has been a major trooper and I have to say, we haven’t really argued over wedding things until the last week.  We’ve both been a little stressed out so it is only to be expected. 

Anyway, in 12 days I will be a Mrs. and all planning drama aside, I can’t wait to marry him!

Charles

We have the cutest dog in the world.

See…

I will also add that this photo was taken with our brand new Canon XSi (prior to me figuring out how to focus on a particular setting).  There are about 93,480 more pictures of Charlie to come.

Invitations

I’ve mentioned our invitation debacle before…but now it has hit a whole new level.  Not only did they arrive 6 weeks prior to our wedding but they arrived DAMAGED!! 

Here is the box they were shipped in:

Really?  Who ships the most important stationary of a person’s life in a box like this?  Then just throw all the pieces in there without securing them together or protecting them in any way?  I mean, our invitation has 8 pieces to it…most of which I will admit came out OK but the 2 main decorative pieces are completely ruined.  One is unusable due to damage, the other was printed incorrectly so we can’t use it either.  The one that was printed incorrectly…yeah, that was the main decorative piece for the outside of the invitation and bound the entire thing together.  We’ve basically had to scratch that entire piece and improvise.

Also, we got these really radom things that we didn’t even order.  I have been to a bunch of weddings and I have absolutely no idea what these things are for.  Fortunately, they have the same design as the damaged decorative piece so I am hoping to have them cut down today so we can use them.

Oh, this is fun!