Calm before the Storm

The week before our wedding was very structured, with certain activities for each day and a swiftly ticking countdown. BC Day was my last free day before the wedding, so we spent it out at Taylor Arm, my favorite part of Sproat Lake. It was a lovely day of swimming and hanging out with family and friends.

Then came Tuesday—a flurry of excitement because we were going to pick my best friend, Madeleine, up in Nanaimo. I had not seen her since we said goodbye at the airport in Toronto last August so I was quite excited. We spent a lovely afternoon at Rathtrevor Beach, and then in the evening Maddy, mum & I attempted Dress Try-On One.

Let's just say that mum's knowledge of corsets comes from tv (and watching the dress alterer), so she got me in like a proper Victorian mother would've done to her daughter—much too incredibly tight for modern purposes, however! My body is so disproportianate to my shoulders...I was kind of freaking out, but trying not to, since it took me awhile to realise that the dress was laced too tightly and it wasn't that I'd somehow had a strange body mutation from two weeks previous.

(cannot breathe!)

Following the dress attempt I took Maddy out to Little Bavaria, where we gorged on German food and had a really lovely chat. Then I gave her a tour of Port in the dark and we continued our chat. It was so wonderful to have my best friend around again. Makes me think I should visit Toronto soon.

(we also made a friend at Harbour Quay)

Wednesday was primarily devoted to cooking. The morning started off well, with mum & I meeting the city caretaker and discussing last minute things for the outdoor venue. But after that we had to run errands, and as the time slowly disappeared we both started feeling anxiuos. So I had a meltdown and then we got home and into the good hands of Madeleine, and soon everything was running smoothly. We did our day's work in about 2.5 hours, and what I loved so much about this day was the singing. I caught Madeleine singing to herself as she chopped onions, and without further ado we had a good old fashioned hymn-sing started up in the kitchen. The Mennonite blood in my veins was throbbing, for when else do I feel like more of a Mennonite than when I'm singing as I cook? I also dubbed Maddy an honourary Mennonite. I'd have made her a real one but I suspect she does not harbour anabaptist sympathies.

We finished our work so quickly that mum, Maddy, & I actually managed to sneak away to Sproat Lake for an afternoon swim. I also accidently dragged Madeleine on a 2km walk, but at least we got to see the petroglyphs for our troubles. Then home to a delicious steak dinner, and out again for a meeting with Gail (aka my mum's super amazing awesome friend who practically ran my wedding).

When I went to bed on Wednesday night I was actually feeling calm and confident. By Thursday morning, I was back to being a basket case...

(my brother got all arty with the photos)

Two Months-ish to go!

Just over two months out from the wedding—YIKES!

Things are, as my mother keeps reminding me, falling into place. There have been some bumps along the way (the latest being having to find a new hairdresser), but after a few mini panic sessions now and then I am able to regain a calm and cool composure. Or something. My mother is amazing, and each time there's a hiccup she finds a solution. It's nice having a mum I can trust—her decision making abilities certainly make this a lot easier.

The invites are finalised and so far, knock on wood, we are on schedule for posting them! I'm not leaving people much time to RSVP, but I figure since we sent out Save the Dates this is fine—the point of not leaving much time is to encourage people to not forget. We'll see how that goes. I think the invites look lovely, and after they get mailed I'll post a pic—very fairytale/woodsy looking, I think. I feel really blessed that David's dad agreed to design them for us. It's very special.

Our Canadian honeymoon (or honeymoon part I) is booked, although my significant other has requested that the location be kept secret. But it will be lovely, and we're both looking forward to it. I say Honeymoon Part I because we are unable to take a long honeymoon since we have to travel back to the UK and get back to work. Part II will consist of traveling about England & Europe over the next 2 years (or at least until we have a kid. Then the honeymoon is over, lol).

Today I went browsing in one of the malls and found the dress I'll be wearing either to the rehearsal dinner OR as a going away dress. I hope to get it next weekend—I just need David to have a look at it...and provide me with his student card for the sweet, sweet 10% discount.

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Life in Cambridge has been quiet of late. David has a writing deadline of Monday this week, followed by a defence mid-June, so our weekends have been fairly quiet. We did spend a lovely Sunday afternoon walking to Fen Ditton with some friends, and we also had a fun late night out with people from my work, but mostly things are just quiet and, at least for me, peaceful. There's currently an English heat-wave (ie: 26-30 outside) and I am pleased to discover that our flat stays nice and cool. The giant fire door on the kitchen is a blessing as well, because it allows me to contain all the cooking heat in one room.

Spring cleaning is off to a good start, and at the rate I'm going I should be done by the start of summer. As we're not entertaining much since everyone is busy with exams, and as we have no guests coming to stay this summer, I feel no need to rush.

Cattle in the Midsummer Common (I think we buy their delicious cow meats from our butcher)

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Cattle on the fens (en route to Fen Ditton)

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David and I outside of the very medieval church of St Mary the Virgin (or something like that)

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View from the lawn of The Plough in Fen Ditton where we stopped for afternoon pints. David rows by here during practice.

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Me + Colleague + Colleague's Husband relaxing at the work Rounders Game on Jesus Green

dress shopping trip

I’m sitting on the ferry on the way back from a very wonderful and relaxing vacation in BC. I’m looking forward to life becoming a little more relaxing again—I know that there will be stress, as that is part of life, but I think that the pressure and stress from this last year will slowly disappear. I don’t remember being this stressed all the time in Edmonton, which I think is because I could take breaks there without worrying that I had work to do. But, we’ll see.

One important part of the trip was organizing wedding stuff, of course. I already wrote a little on here about the fun day I had going around Port Alberni to find a reception venue and talk to the church. Two days later my mum and I headed down to Victoria to go wedding dress shopping. It was a really great trip, and actually one of my favourite things that I did on vacation.

My mum is essentially adored/idolized by many of the girls/women who know her, so I always have people telling me nice things about one on one time with her. I mention this because mum and I figured on our trip that this was the first time just the two of us have really spent any time together! There is always someone else around, usually John, Dad, or David. So first of all it was really nice to just have that time away to talk about both life and the wedding.

Our first stop was at Michael’s in Nanaimo, in order to get ideas for the wedding flowers. We made up some very bare mock-ups, and those coupled with some pictures and the aid of Sue will hopefully make something beautiful. We then went to Victoria where we picked up David’s mum and showed up half an hour late for a dress appointment (I forgot the time and then we were late on top of that!).

That was my favourite appointment. It was one on one and the lady was incredibly helpful with telling me what kind of dresses would work best with my body type, although of course she let me try on what I wanted, but she was seriously perfect. So I tried on six dresses, and then put my favourite back on while we talked over details like headpieces, bridesmaid options, colours, and alterations. Mum and Jen really liked her as well and we were all quite impressed.

The three of us left all liking the same dress a lot, but we decided to go to two more salons on Friday just to make sure. So Friday morning we met my cousin Tara and went to a fancy salon downtown, where the service was not nearly as good and the dresses were more expensive and nothing quite hit the mark. It was becoming quickly obvious to me that I had found The Dress the day before, and although I liked a couple of the dresses it wasn’t the same. But the store did have dresses in my size, so it was good to see what they’d look like when they fit properly.

Both of the salons I went to allowed me to take pictures, and after comparing those and how I felt in the dresses I’d made my decision by the time I got back to the car. I drove with Tara, and mum and Jen drove in mum’s car and they picked the same dress as well. They are both quite impressed that the dress comes with both a purse and a shawl in the price, and kept commenting on it (I find this hilarious—it is such a motherish thing to be impressed with).

So, The Dress. Neither of the places I went to had any of the dresses I’d picked. The dress I’m getting combines elements of them, but it does not really look like either of my favourites. I stepped away from chiffon, which felt too much like curtains, and am going with taffeta and lace. Strangely enough, it is very similar to a dress that I had a dream about, and which I had assumed was my subconscious revealing my dream dress to me. Go subconscious! I won’t be putting pictures up of the dress, because I don’t want David accidently seeing it AND I want must people to see it new on my wedding day. So ya’ll can wait and wonder. I will say that it is corseted and I don’t have to wear anything under it—that was a big selling point with me. Here’s to being braless on my wedding day! Woohoo!!!

Styles aside, most importantly I feel like an absolute princess when I wear it. I kind of like I did when I was a little girl playing dress up and imagining I had a princess dress, and feel the same way I did watching Cinderella or Belle in the ball scenes in the Disney movies. I love it! It also is so incredibly ME, with beautiful little details and all that. Love it! So that is that. I’ll be ordering the dress when I’m home in September, and I’m really looking forward to trying it on again then (if she still has it there) and having that total LOVE moment.
Other things learned on this trip—I have very nice shoulders (according to one salewoman) and I am also the perfect height for wedding dresses (5’9”) and thus my dress won’t need alterations. Yay!

One thing I insisted on with the dresses I really liked was that I see them with a veil (thank you, Say Yes to the Dress). And this naturally led into discussions of veils and me wondering what to do. The only veil I tried on that I liked came with a $200 price tag, which is a bit excessive. The plan all along had been to fix up mum’s veil and wear that, but she is getting more and more certain that it is going to be trashy after 30 years of poor storage, so we’ve been going over options. She had made her own, but was telling me the problems with that. I guess she was complaining about veil prices to her friend, because the next thing I know her friend offered me HER veil, if I wanted it, to do what I want with (the headpiece being some giant flower thing from the 80s)...

So we took the veil home to look at it. It was perfectly pressed in a sealed box, and looking into the box I didn’t think I’d like it—it’s pretty but looked dated. But we pulled out and it turned out to be PERFECT. We can easily remove the flowered headpiece and the veil itself—love! It has the same lace idea that I wanted—just a few flowers along the edging, and to top it all of it is a cathedral length veil, meaning it is really fucking long, which is what I wanted. It also, unlike the mantillas I looked at, has the second piece to cover my face, like I wanted. So now all I need to buy is a head piece, and the place where I’m getting my dress sells those too and they are fairly reasonable.

So aside from needing to pay for all this those aspects of the wedding are pretty much settled. It’s starting to feel a lot more real now, and I’m quite excited!

yay for Bridesmaid!--ceremony, venues, and dresses

Two posts in one day! Today was my big wedding planning day, in which I toured the town to find my outdoor venue, and set things up at the church. My cousin Tara, also one of my bridesmaids, ended up coming with me which was awesome.

I'd originally thought of doing our reception at Blair Park, because it has a covered area where we could set the food up. But we went there and decided that it was way too exposed and playgroundy feeling. It was too sculpted, I guess. Plus the playground area isn't really separated from the picnic area, which means we can't really have our reception separate from the locals, and the dike pathway is really close to the picnic area, so we'll have people walking by. I could make it work if I had to, but I don't want to!

The other place we went was Roger's Creek Park, and I fell in love with it as soon as we got out of the car! I'd never seen the group area before and I love it. It's really separated from the playground part of the park, and it's down a little hill on the sides that border the road so that we'd be really cut off from traffic. It's got big trees providing lots of shade and enough open space that we could set up croquet and bocce (and Tara says softball). Its covered area is a little more rustic (haha) than at Blair park, but it has nice ledges that we could put the food out on. The bonus for me, however, is that Roger's creek runs along one side and it's just beautiful and natural and woodsy and great!

I am going to drive out to Sproat Lake park tonight but I don't think we can have our own area there, so it probably won't work. But we'll see! It's nice to have backups in case those other parks are booked by the time we set a date.

The best part of all this is the price. The park rental fee is only $25! I will also need alternatives in case we need to move the wedding date to a non-summer month, in which case we're looking somewhere between $200-$500 and indoors and the costs of decorating on top of it. So I'm really hoping I can get time off for end of July/early August next summer! I took some pictures but they're on my brother's i-phone. I'm going to take more tonight when I go in to church so that I can post 'em online and show David and his mum.

We also stopped at the church and I got to tentatively reserve a date (YAY OMG!!!) and Tara knew all the right questions to ask so we ran through that with the office manager. Unforunately Fr Marek is away right now, but hopefully I'll be home in September and can talk to him then. We'll have a better idea of things by then.

I'm really looking forward to my trip downisland with mum at the end of this week. I did end up having to change one of the stores where I wanted to shop for a dress because the one salon wasn't answering their phone or email! So in changing stores I started looking at the designers at the new store, and I also fine-tuned and changed my dresses. I scrapped the two-tone dress idea and have been looking at ones that play with fabric a bit. It will certainly be interesting to see what I end up with!

I really like the skirt on this one.
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I love the way the bodice moves into the skirt, and I do like pickup skirts. But I wonder if the slightly wrinkled look would drive me nuts.
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I promise to forgive everyone who burst out laughing at this dress. I *think* I showed it to David a long time ago and he said it looked like a cake. But when I saw it yesterday I loved it--it's weird and different and I like the contrasting directions of ruffles. It's over budget and perhaps a little too fancy for a mid-morning wedding, but I really love the uniqueness off it! So we'll see what happens. In the end I'll go with what I feel comfortable in, even if it is totally bizarre.

dress porn

First off: DAVID DON'T READ THIS POST!

Ok, so I finally had a chance to show my dresses to my mum. I'm not going to post all the ones, just our top four at the moment:

The back of this one is stunning. However, the front is really plain and that's why I'm not totally sold on it. But I always come back to this picture, so we'll see. This dress is also way over my budget, I think.
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This is my "princess" dress. I really like it, even though it is satin and doesn't have the flow I mentioned. However, it's not quite "me", at least in the picture. I'm not one, usually, for stiff fabrics like that.
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When I look at this one, I melt. Mum and I both had the same reaction--that this dress reminds of us Grandma. Not just that, it completely fits with my love of vintage clothes and the pre-fifties eras. And it is simple with just little touches of detail, and it flows beautifully to the ground. BUT neither of us is sure how the fitted bodice will look. If i get this I will probably need to be corseted, which is something I would probably do anyway... and I pointed out that my breasts are the perfect size to pull off the plunging neckline. So this is top pick #1.
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This is top pick #2, and this one is mum's favorite. I love the off the shoulder look with bell sleeves, and the way the chiffon falls to the ground. It also has little designs all over it and some silver beading. My reservations: a) that it may be too hot for August, b) that the finishing in the close ups didn't look perfect and I'm wary that the dress may be too cheapy feeling to wear, and c) that it is too predictablely "me".

So that is that. Right now it's really close between the last two, and I think it will end up coming down to fit... or coming down to what they find for me at the salons! I may end up with something totally different. I do know that I'm excited!

random thoughts connected by wedding

I am heading home for a vacation on Saturday. I’m really looking forward to it. I know I’ve mentioned this numerous times, but!!! Having lived away from home has really made me closer to my family, more appreciative of seeing them because there is no longer that idea of them always being there. And my extended family on mum’s side is so close that I really miss being away from everyone, and see them a lot less.

David was very thoughtful and made sure that he proposed to me when we were home for Christmas so that I could share it with my family before leaving. But we only had a day or two to be excited about it, so I’m really looking forward to having a longer time to enjoy it with them. It’s also nice having a proper ring now that I can show off.

My dress shopping trip has its members adding up and it’s subsequently taking me out of my comfort zone but in a way that I’m really excited about. I’m not someone who is comfortable with people seeing me “as is”--I think one of the reasons that the internet is a chosen means of communication for me is because I can constantly edit and ’perfect’ what I’m saying. I know that on my wedding day I am going to be too full of joy in the face of the one who knows the real me (and loves her) to be anything but that person. My whole vision is just focused on making my vows to David before God.

Anyway, dress shopping. So the original plan was to go shopping with my mum, because it seemed to me like this is the sort of thing mothers and daughters should do together (and I think my mum is almost happier for me than I am). But then through various thought processes and people being around, I now have an entourage of my mum, David’s mum, and [probably] two of my bridesmaids. (Julia & Tara). Which is CRAZY, at least as far as I’m concerned, because I’m someone who does not do girly things like this at all, ever. I’m learning to change, to become a softer person, but it is still weird to me. I’m actually disappointed that Madeleine and Sarah won’t be there.

Having bridesmaids is weird. I’m not sure what I’m supposed to do with them, actually. We each live in a different city, which makes working on wedding DIY stuff hard to orchestrate. My original plan of slave-driving my MoH won’t work as well now that I’ll be living thousands of miles away from her.

Hmmm… internet research tells me that my bridesmaids are to be my MoH’s bitches. This could be fun, except I think Madeleine is too kind to exploit anyone. It also tells me that they have to help decorate. THAT is good news--they have much more flair than I do. Ah internet, where would I be without you!
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One thing I’ve been mulling over in regards to the wedding ceremony is the problem of communion. We’re having a Catholic mass, of course, which means that we will have communion…which is only open to practicing Catholics. This leaves about 75% of our guests out of receiving it. I’m thinking of putting a special invitation at the front of the wedding program to invite our guests to come up and receive a blessing on our special day. I’m also hoping I can convince the priest to phrase this nicely before the ceremony… I don’t want people to feel left out, and although I realize that a blessing may not be the same for my Christian family as receiving communion would, I hoping people get behind the idea. The question really is about how I can inspire everyone to see this as a beautiful way of participating in our ceremony, instead of seeing it as something they are being left out of.
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Finally, we are probably going to do silk flowers and make them ourselves. I’m going to go over ideas with Sue when I’m home, because she offered to help. These are ones I like:

I like the size of this one. I don`t want anything massive.

This one I love for the colour explosion.

It is so bright and cheerful, I love it. And it got me thinking about doing something with sunflowers.

Simple but bright.

This is maybe more traditional. It might be too large for my tastes...

the philosophy, or sophistry, of the dress

I am going home in just under two weeks! Hooray! Unfortunately I have to get through two term papers before then, one of which I’m not very inspired to write. In good news, I passed the Level One (formerly known as the MA) Latin Exam, which has given me a boost of energy. I’m pleased that I can say I not only got my MA, but also passed the exam that, until this year, was a requirement for getting the exam. I figure that with a BA in Latin Language & Literature it’s more than due!

Latin exams have little to do with weddings, however. Wedding wise…I googled to try to find the prices of the dresses I love, and where I could find them listed online (as in “this dress normally costs X, we sell it for Y) the normal cost was right on my budget, so I’m very happy. There is nothing worse than falling in love with a picture and then having to end that love before even trying on the dress! Although I don’t want anything extravagant, I am all about unique details and those can add up. So, one more reason to be pleased. I feel a little silly thinking about dresses when we haven’t even set a date, but we can’t set a date until I get a permanent job, and I can’t get that job until we move to Britain. So!

I like watching “Say Yes to the Dress” on Slice. There is always all this talk about what dress defines Bride for that woman. Maybe it is a sign that I’ve been doing too many facebook quizzes lately (just like it is a sign that my spell check is a bit old as it insists that “facebook” is two words) but I feel like there should be a “what does your bridal gown say about you” quiz. I was all set to write about how I don’t have some sort of ideal in my head, and then I realized that wasn’t true.

So what do my dresses say about me? The ones I keep coming back to have a definite vintage feel, some of them even medieval, or what I prefer to term “romantic”. Lets get me away from medieval clichés, please! I love pre-Raphaelite art, and I love movies from Hollywood’s Golden Era, and the styles seem to reflect that. I don’t have some sort of tangible ideal in my head, just a bunch of misty ideas that various pictures seem to hit. And as a reflection of personal style, that is essentially my closet--mostly things with something unique, and something romantic (or so I’m terming butterfly sleeves and lace), or something vintage (like retro, or retro-inspired, shirts and dresses). But that’s exterior, so can I dissect my personality from this? Can I say that my clothing style defines me as a person, or at least as a Bride? Because the dress symbolizes more than just clothing, or we wouldn’t all spend a lot of time or money, or time & creativity, into having a garment we wear for one day. I don't want to be the Lady of Shalott, or the Medieval Bride, or a copy of a pre-raphaelite costume, or in-style. I just want to be me!

So, who am I? Because that is the question I keep coming back to, wedding dresses aside. If I’m planning a wedding that is about me, and David, about us--who are we? And I think what makes me uncomfortable is that I can’t neatly compartmentalize our personalities into something Germanicly efficient (as David would say). I cannot define myself, aside from IMAGINATIVE. So is that the key? Is the key to all this that we are both highly imaginative people, and that no matter what we pick, or I pick, it is going to be a reflection of that? Actually, I think I’ve just hit on the key. And solved my problem. Hooray for blog!

Everything I look at for this wedding in some way or another relates to something imaginative--a reminder of a book, or of a concept, or an artistic portrayal. I want something that feeds into my imagination, and speaks to my inner self. The question now is, on this one day of gathering friends and family together to see us at our best and at our beginning, do I take the plunge and do something very rare for me--expose my true inner self to many people who don’t know that self? I think the answer is that I don’t have a choice--I know I will be crying all through my wedding ceremony, and after being that open in front of people it seems that there will be little hope of me hiding my inner self. Also, shouldn’t I be going to the altar as completely myself as possible? This isn’t so much about a dress then, as it is about openness. So what will my dress say about me?

Also, I promise I will put pictures up soon of the ones I really like. I just want to show them to my mum first, and I don’t want to ruin the “awww omg” moment by putting them on the blog and risking someone directing her here, or her missing seeing them before her friends.

dress excitement

I’m really excited right now, and David is not having an appropriate girly-jumpy moment with me, so I have to turn to blogging.

Basically, it is this--although I’ve been looking at lots of wedding dresses, I’ve been having trouble finding one that seems like me. I don’t want something totally period (ie: medieval), but I also don’t see myself in many modern dresses. It just so happened that I found a dress that looks perfect (to me) online. The catch is that the store selling it is in Toronto, and it is a “no name brand” in the realm of wedding dresses. Until David’s Cambridge news came this didn’t matter, because if I had to I could buy the dress here and then take it home with me for the wedding. But now it seems doubtful that I am going to buy a dress in Toronto, since we won’t be here.

But today my googling brought me into contact with a discount bridal store in Victoria that just happens to carry the same line as this Toronto one, and the dress I love is one of the ones they carry! I’m so happy! The price also happens to be UNDER the low end of my budget by about $100.

So, I’m pretty excited. The only potential downside at the moment is that the store is not open on Fridays, which is the day we are going shopping. But they have evening appointments on Thursdays, so I’m just trying to convince my mother to drive down early to Victoria. AND if I’m unable to get an appointment, it doesn’t really matter (aside from my initial disappointment) because I’ll be able to try the gown on in Toronto and see if I like it and then place my order at another date--like when/if we’re back in September before flying to Cambridge.

Obviously, I don’t know if I’m getting the dress. A lot is going to depend on the quality of construction and material. For example, if the dress is smotheringly heavy it’s probably not going to be ideal for August. And I’m still planning to go to two other bridal stores on the Friday “just in case” and I may end up finding something better on me there. BUT, it still makes me really happy because when I saw this dress the first time I melted and thought “THAT is what I want”. It has all the elements of the medieval-style “arran” gown that I loved when I was younger, but toned down a little. It’s satin with a chiffon overlay, so it has a nice ripply/moving effect (I want something that flows), and it has just a little train at the back.

So, we’ll see. I’m definitely moving towards chiffon as a dress material, because to me the shade-depth of the fabric seems richer than satin, and the chiffon dresses I’ve seen just seem to have more flow to the fabric. But, I’m not posting any pictures until I actually try on dresses because there is no sense in planting one idea only to have it change.

And I would like to state that, even if you see my walking down the aisle in a dress that looks like it’s from the pages of “cliché medieval book”--THIS IS NOT A MEDIEVAL THEMED WEDDING. I just happen to like bell sleeves!