how is wedding planning coming?

Well, it is the question on everyone's lips - how is wedding planning coming.

So here it is:

We have a reception place (Clay Hill Farm in Ogunquit, ME)
We have a church (First Parish Congregational Church in York, ME)
We have a florist (Kate from Katherine's Garden)
We have a photographer (Deb Cram)
We have a baker (Gayle from Let Them Eat Cake)
We have a cake design / flavor (strawberry grand marnier, 4 tier, vine theme, buttercream)
We have food for dinner (surf n turf - petit filet with lobster stuffed haddock)
We have appetizers (scallops wrapped in bacon, pigs in a blanket, lobster bisque, etc)
We have alcohol (open soft bar for cocktail hour, wine for dinner, cash for anything else)
We have a dj (John Dionne, Cuzin Richard Entertainment)
We have a trolley (York Trolley Co)
We have accommodations (bridal party will be at the White Rose Inn, guests at Admiral's Inn or several other local places)
We have a wedding party
We have ushers
We have tuxes (silver herringbone pattern with tie)
We have bridesmaid dresses (moss green, chiffon, silk, long)
We have a salon (Freedom Day Spa)
We (I) have a dress
We have a registry (Bed, Bath, and Beyond)
We have bubbles
We have ribbons on the bubbles
We have invitations (printed by Jon and I)
We have a guest list
We have addresses
We have candles
We have a unity candle / holder
We have a guest book
We have a card cage
We have votives



Here is what we still need to do:

We do not have a house
We do not have a honeymoon
Our registry is not quite finished
We need to make placecards
We need to buy llamas (you will see)
We need to make the centerpieces
We need to spraypaint the placemats
We need to get stamps
We need to address envelopes
We need to start a second registry?!
We need to get gifts for our wedding party
We need to plan out who is staying at the White Rose Inn
We need to get presents for each other
We need to finish our wedding counseling
We need to make sure we actually have a pastor
We need to collect wedding pictures
We need to put together a website
We need to get our marriage license
We need to burn a dvd
We need to make a collage
We need a wedding topper??
We need to take off of work




I dunno, I think that about covers it. I am sure that there are other big things and little things that go on that list. Shrug. That is the update. I appreciate your asking, but it stresses me out when you do. Jon has been more or less on the road for about a month now, and I have done a lot of this by myself. So again, I am very thankful that you care enough to ask, but I am ready to tear my hair out. I never want to get married again, and not just because I always want to be married to Jon. (Though that is about 99% of it)

Blaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

scarred for life?

When I was about 7 or 8, I went with my mom and aunt to the outlets in Reading. Pretty normal-type trip. It was probably an early Sunday afternoon.

We stopped at a red light and my little self watched from the backseat as a guy stumbled out of a bar. I remember the who scene so vividly... he was in a brown suit. The sun was shining. He staggered closer and closer to the car. My mom hit the automatic lock on the door. He put his hand on a fire hydrant and leaned over to start heaving out his guts when the light turned green and my mom sped off.

About 30 minutes later, my mom and aunt were browsing the racks, but I was still thinking of that man. I might have been young, but seeing that cut me to the core. I started crying, and my mom asked me what was going on. I told her that I felt really sad for that man.


When I was about 10 or so, my brother and I went to pick up a motorcycle with my dad. I am not sure where it was... not a terrible place, but not too nice of one either. We waited by the car while he talked to the owner.

The end of the road came to a T and in the intersection was a boy of maybe 12 riding his bike in slow circles. He was smoking a cigarette. He had on a huge watch, which he kept checking. I presume he had limited time for his habit.

I sat in the back seat of the truck on the way home, with tears streaming down my face. Again, I just felt incredibly sad for the kid. I actually remember thinking that he did not know what he was doing, and that it was a terrible terrible thing to get into that at such a young age.



I am not sure why that stuff has always affected me that way, but it has. You would think I would be more used to it. My dad has smoked pretty much my entire life. My mom smoked when I was young, though my brother and I begged her into quitting. My dad has been alcoholic... geez, my whole extended family is pretty much a bunch of boozers... you would think I would see things differently.

Why I am not like them, I do not know.

Trust me though, I am so thankful.



I thought that I was getting better with it. I mean, I can deal with people drinking around me... And I can even suffer myself having a small glass of wine once in awhile. I can sit with people while they get themselves into a drunk stupor and I can watch my friends smoke if that is what they do. It has taken a long time to get to that point... I would never ever say that I don't care... But that I have pushed that feeling into the back of my head, knowing that it is somewhat irrational. I mean, why should it bother me that much?

So yes, I think I have gotten better, but as I have always said to Jon, that is the easiest way to get a divorce from me... just start drinking or smoking. I just simply couldn't do it. I actually well up with tears when I just think about it. Sorry, I just couldn't be with someone like that. Not after my dad.

But anyway, I really thought that I was doing well and that this did not bother me so much. But then there was Thursday.


Thursday night, Jon and my parents and I had a 9 p.m. flight down to Orlando. My cousin Jake got married in a really nice ceremony and had a great reception at a local golf club. It went very well, I got to hang with my relative (you know, the boozers!) and a good time was had by all. The flight though, really got to me.

We got on the plane and sat down a row or two back from the wing. There was a guy sitting in the aisle with the extra leg room. My parents sat behind him, and we sat behind them. Jon was on the phone with his family and my parents were getting settled in when the flight attendant walked past.

She got a look of worry on her face and asked the guy in front of my parents if he was okay. He did not really say anything. She then asked if he had been drinking. All of a sudden, two rows back, I get a giant whiff of alcohol. Crud.

I immediately signal to Jon that we have to move, I do not want to be anywhere near this guy. He is in total confusion because he is on the phone and it is loud with people boarding. The flight attendant, by now, has an absolute look of disgust on her face. She asks if he is drunk. He mutters something. She calls out to another flight attendant and says that he has thrown up all over himself. And not like just liquid, but like the kind where everything you ate for a week has come up.

She is pissed, and rightly so. She tells him to get off the plane. He stumbles off. By this time, I have grabbed my parents and forced them to move. They were really confused too. My mom is like a bloodhound with her nose, but I think with all the confusion, she just wasn't paying attention to it. But after we move back MANY rows, she can smell it and starts feeling icky herself.

Meanwhile, Jon and I have moved to the BACK of the plane and the original flight attendant is trying to help clean up. She can't hack it and leaves because it is making her sick. Another attendant cleans it up while a third gets on the intercom and says, "Some idiot got completely drunk and threw up all over the place, we are working on cleaning it up, so give us 20 minutes". Ugh.




Now I am not sure if it is the fact that I have been sleep deprived or that I was extremely hormonal and not feeling so hot with that whole stuff anyway.... but it hit me hard. I felt sick to my stomach, but not because of the puke or anything like that... because of the guy. I prayed for him. I tried not to judge him. But that makes me literally sick that he was like that. I do not know him. I never will. I hope he is okay because he was alone and basically just went back into the airport. Who knows, maybe he went back to the bar? Maybe he got picked up by security? No clue. But COME ON!!! WHY did he have to do that? Why??? It makes me so sad for him and for people like that. It breaks my heart.

And like I said, I thought I was over this - that I had come to terms with the fact that people do what they want to do - but apparently not. I keep thinking about it. I was quite literally sick to my stomach over the state of humanity. How can it be so easy to be like that? How could a bartender keep giving him drinks? How could that man allow himself to get to that state? Why did he feel like that was okay? Why do so many people have dependency problems?

Of course, maybe it was just a stupid mistake. He could have been a business man, traveling to wherever, many different flights at once. Maybe he was lonely and he just started drinking and before he knew it, he was blitzed. Maybe it was a huge one-time mistake.

Maybe it wasn't.



Quite honestly, it hit me hard enough that I was nervous about the flight home. Like - what if there is someone else like that on our next flight? How utterly preposterous! Yet that little thought was running around my head and making my stomach churn.

I mean, it is not like I can change anything. I can't do anything if someone wants to be like that anymore than I can actually hope to convince people that I really DO care. In the past I have been called judgmental because, I think, not everyone can understand compassion. I don't mean to say I am Mother Teresa, but I do care and it cuts me to the bone for some reason.

Does that mean that those of you reading this should not drink around me? Does that mean you should not get tipsy or smashed or whatever? No. Do what you want. I am not judging you. I am not thinking you are an idiot. I am not being condescending. I am not looking down at you or thinking less of you.

What am I thinking, then? It depends.... sometimes (many times) I really am thinking absolutely nothing. Sometimes I feel a sadness. Sometimes I want to throw up with pain. Those are rare occasions, like Friday, apparently. I have not felt that way in a long long time. Yet it still surfaces once in awhile.


Bottom line, I am not sure why it happens. It just does. I am not sure why it hits me, but it does, and it is part of me that I won't ever "get past". I am sure it has to do with my family and how I grew up. I do not know why my childhood affected me this way instead of the other way - I could be an insufferable dancing naked on the table tops kind of drunk. It could have gone that way, but praise God it didn't.



So here I am, it is 12:25 a.m. on May 26th. I am27 years old today, right now. And I write to get it all out so that hopefully, when I wake up tomorrow, I can stop thinking about it and go back to ignoring whatever this is inside of me.

still alive

My parents, Jon, and I went up to Maine on Thursday night and came back today. It was a family/wedding/planning extravaganza. I am so freakin tired.


We got into town around 1 a.m Friday morning. Jon and I dropped off my mom and dad at a hotel while we stayed at Michelle and Jasons. The visit with them was brief as we had to go to marriage counseling at 11 in York.

This time, we got to talk about the differences in our family. I think that we are pretty much polar opposites. So why do Jon and I work? No idea, but we do.

After that... geez, I can't even remember. I think we went back to Grammies with a "rotisserie chicken". :) We ate, then ran off to Clay Hill for our second "big meeting". I can't tell you how much I love them there. They are just on it. It makes it much easier for us because they know what the heck they are doing.

After that, we went to the Admiral's Inn, which is where we have blocked rooms. If you are in the wedding party, we have reserved rooms at the White Rose Inn. Both beautiful and perfect and very nice. :)

At 5, we went for our taste testing. FUN! I tried the fin and feather - breaded chicken and seared salmon. I forgot that I like my salmon cooked all the way through. Jon had the surf and turf - petite fillet and lobster stuffed haddock. MMMMMMMMMMmmmmm. So good, you are gonna love it. We also had lobster bisque - freakin DELICIOUS. We will be serving that up as a passed hors d'evors. Or however you spell that.

That evening, we crashed after such a huge and tasty meal.

On Sat, we met the cake lady at 9:30. We picked the cake and it should be just lovely. Stupidly expensive, but lovely.

We had lunch at the Goldenrod (which just opened) and browsed the candy shop. After that, Jon and I had a very luxurious afternoon nap before Gwen and Christian and the kids and Aunt Susan and Uncle Don came over for dinner.

Today we got up early, met with the florist at 11. She was wonderful and I am actually excited about the flowers. She will do an amazing job, and is actually very reasonable... we are just spending a ton of dinero because we have so many people in the wedding. Can't be helped.


What is supposed to be a 6 hr ride home took 8 hours because my dad insisted that taking 95 would be faster. It wasn't.




Here is my schedule for the rest of the week:


Monday - work at school, then go work at the hospital
Tuesday - school, then board meeting for Project
Wednesday - school, then Jon's dad's final concert
Thursday - school, then fly to Florida that night
Friday - Universal Studios!
Sat - My cousin's wedding
Sun - Flight back from Florida

Monday - my birthday!




Please Lord, let summer come soon before I die.

I need sleep.

freakin fascinating

I learned two things so far this morning.


1. 360 waves. Go ahead, google it. Excuse my pathetically white self, but I had NO idea this was a style or required specific styling.

2. As overheard on Preston & Steve this morning from the "lovely" (cough :slutty: cough) Brianna Frost - "I am just not attracted to girls like that, but yeah, of course I have made out with them, I am a college girl, you know." So what did I learn here? Apparently being a female in college gives you license to be a total whore and make out with random girls and guys for kicks. AND you do not even have to really *like* girls like that. Nothing wrong with a little touchy-feely. Right. I want to punch her, and all girls like her. STUPID. Stupid stupid stupid.

Life: The Update

So it has been awhile since I have written, and that is because I have been ridiculously busy.


Reverb - We recorded last weekend and are finally done! Hurrah! Recording went fairly well, but we have the job of mixing ALL of the songs we have recorded thus far. Mixing pretty much takes forever and is a very tedious task. Fortunately for me, I do not have to do much other than sit there and give my opinion when Josh asks for it. :)

Wedding - Plans are pretty much done. We have the reception place, the photographer, the dj, the florist, the cake baker, the church, the musicians, hotel, centerpieces, the wedding party, the ushers, the TROLLEY!, the dress, the bridesmaid dresses, the tuxes, invitations, save the dates... we started a registry at Bed, Bath, & Beyond. It is NOT finished yet, so do no go peeking at it. Our party is already planning my shower(s), which I believe are July 20th (for family) and August 3rd (for friends). Our bachelor / bachelorette paintball extravaganza is being planned, along with our separate functions that evening on August 2nd, I think? All we have left is accessories, wedding gifts, llamas, printing and sending the invites, blocking more hotel rooms, and putting together the centerpieces. We also have to do marriage counseling, which we are both looking forward to, actually.

Jon and I have known each other well since 1999. It is now 2008, so you do the math. Of those years of knowing (and loving) each other, we have dated for about 6+ years. People say all the time that the first year of marriage is really hard because you learn things about the person you married that you never knew before. I am not really sure how much that we do not know! He knows that I have high expectations and get frustrated when things are not done on my time frame, that alcohol scares me (and why), and that I get very sick on a regular basis. He knows all of my little bad habits (which I will not disclose!) and is more than aware of my various bodily functions. He knows the good, the bad, and the ugly about me... And I can say the same for him. So I am not too worried.

I think people often get married too quickly. Lots of times, people will get engaged within a year of knowing each other. Now, of course, adult relationships are different... you are a lot more sure of yourself and who you are. You know what you want, hypothetically, and so figuring out you have met your match should be easier. But lets say 1 year of adult life is equal to 4 years of semi-adult life... as much as I thought Jon and I would get married out of college after 4 years of dating, I realize now that I did not know him nearly as well as I know him now.

Of course, the argument then could be made that 10, 20, 50 (hopefully) years from now, I will look back and say the same thing of this moment. Yet, I still maintain I am in a much better position to make this decision and commitment. I am really not afraid of our first year of marriage. I know he is going to leave all of his dirty clothes all over the place, and it will piss me off. And I will leave all of my clean clothes in piles, waiting to be put away, which will probably piss him off. So I think compromise can be had - if I pick up his dirty, he can put away my clean.

See, marriage is easy!

Okay, of course it is not easy, but nothing worth doing is.


Grad School - I just had my last class this past week. I can honestly say that I learned nothing, and I am considering taking another class with her in the summer because I learned nothing. How awful is that? I have to admit, as much as I anticipate completing my Masters in Education, it has nothing to do with the depth of knowledge I have gained. Basically, I have two more classes left. I take the comps in Oct, and I will get my diploma in Dec. Why am I glad, you ask? Let me tell you!

a master's in education is a crock!

Now, I am far from the world's best teacher. I am not a great scientist. In fact, I am not really all that intelligent, either.... But teaching does come naturally, and so does common sense. You learn to be a great teacher by teaching, not by taking dumb classes. So while I have definitely improved my teaching skills over the past three years, it really has nothing to do with the fact that I am taking education courses. Maybe it is just my personality. I am reflective of what I do when I teach, I analyze it, and I am reasonably perceptive as to what the kids need. Trust me, I am not trying to be all I AM AWESOME, because I am not. But maybe knowing that is half the battle - I know I am not the best of the best, but I know what I do wrong and where my weaknesses are, so I try to work on those things and thus improve.

But seriously folks, education classes are a cake walk. I hate to say it, but it is true.

In the fall, I took two science courses. I had openings in my schedule and I was ready for something that was actually mentally challenging. And ya know what, THEY WERE! They were tough! I had to study! I had to learn stuff! It was awesome!

So I thought to myself: maybe education classes seem like a breeze because they ARE compared to science classes. And I think that is the truth. I also think that if I never took science courses in college or got a b.s. in biotech or anything like that, that maybe I would think education classes were difficult.

I think perhaps then, I should apologize.... I still think education classes are, for the most part, a crock. Some ARE very interesting, but not exactly the mental olympics. Yet, I can understand people thinking them tough if they have never taken harder classes.

Anyway, two more classes and I am DONE and so thrilled... the next course of action: doctorate. Dr. Nicol, I guess it will be. I still like the sound of Dr. Samuels. It is just sweet! But I can deal with Dr. Nicol. I am not sure what I want to go for, but I think it will be a science. We shall see! :)


School - School ends the first week of June, and teachers should be done by the 11th or so. I CANNOT WAIT. This year has brought WAY too much drama. I would love to give you all the gory details, but who knows who reads this thing? A lot of it is top secret bs.

To amuse myself in the last few weeks of school, however, I am working hard on grading (I am so freakin behind), doing more planning for Costa Rica, and trying to locate the Count. One of my previous entries did detail that little story. It has been fun, and I have a plan for our next "attack". It will be good, I will try to post it here when I get the chance.


Hospital - Apparently I still have a job. No one has really told me what my official job is, but I figure if I keep signing up for hours, they will not kick me out without any notice. Right??? I have picked up every Monday in the month of May. Let me just tell you how super fun it is to work at school for 8 hours and then go directly to the hospital and work for 8 more hours. Loads! It actually is not too bad though because it is such a switch of gears, it could almost be called refreshing. Almost. Hopefully I will busy myself this summer with picking up hours and making enough money to give us a pretty sweet honeymoon, or at least give us more to put down on a house. How typical of my mom's side of the family! The Wolf women work their tails off while the men are slackers. Sigh.


Sickness - Jon's nephew, Tait, has given me a rip-roaring cold. I had one a little over a month ago that left me sounding like a man. It took a full 4 weeks to get over fully. I had a week off, and now I have this lovely sinus infection. Joy. I am actually feeling better today, though I think my stomach is sloshing with snot. (Beautiful picture, no?)


House Hunting - Jon and I went to see 10 houses in the d-town area yesterday. We saw a few that were do-able, which assuaged my fears that NOTHING was out there for us. At the same time, nothing was WOW, so we packed it in at 2:15 and I went to work. Yeah, that's right, very sick, didn't sleep much all week due to this cold, woke up early on a Sat to go house hunting for 4 hours and then went straight to work. It is no freakin wonder that I can't get healthy.

Anyway, it was good to go look at the houses and I daresay it might have been fun if I didn't feel like I was going to throw up the whole time.

I have to tell you though, doing this brings out one of my "fears". I mean, it is not really a fear, so much as it is a totally deranged thought.

When you are house-hunting, you basically go into the house and look at EVERYTHING. I mean, if the house is empty, that is one thing, but usually the people are still living there. Often they have cleaned things up for you - vacuumed some... put on classical music.... put out mints and stuff. But I mean, you are rummaging through someone's living space! You go into all the rooms, look closely at the infrastructure, go into the basement, the attic... you look at everything.

Now, ever since I was little, I have had this fear (again, this is just for lack of a better word) that when I open a closet, a dead body is going to fall out.

I think it might relate to having seen Beetlejuice at a young age. Remember the part where they are hanging dead in the closet because they are trying to scare the new owners away? Yeah. I think that has stuck with me, and since then, I always think something dead is going to be in the closet.

I feel this way not only about closets... but pantries, laundry rooms, any basically any large door that leads to a small space.

It is ridiculous, I know! Trust me! And it is not really a FEAR because I am not all that afraid of dead bodies.... but I think of it every time I open one of these doors. And I mean every time, even in my own house. Even my own closet! There might be skeletons in there, but no dead bodies! Every time I open the pantry in our house, I think about it.

And so here we are, in houses of people I do not know and will never know... opening all these doors to the unknown. I must have thought about dead bodies at least 5 times in EVERY house. That means I thought about it at least 50 times yesterday. Am I crazy? Not sure, but it was definitely on my mind pretty much every other second.

Other than that, looking at houses was fruitful from the fact that we know even more about what we want and what we are looking for. It is a step in the right direction, though it feels that there must be about 1000 steps before we really find what we want.

Jon will be gone this week, so my mom and I will go off on our own to look and see what we find. Shrug.






Other than that, things are slow and quiet....???!?!?!

Yeah.