728x90

Sunday, July 31, 2011

GUESS WHAT I DID!!!


Yep, I got married. I could fill thousands of posts full of the details, how much of me I put into this to make it a success, how stressful it was, how wonderful my family and friends are for helping and being there and how quickly something with such a build up went by, but I'll spare you.

There has been radio silence all up in this blog, I know. But I just wanted to share with whoever is out there that still reads. I've been busy with this whole wedding thing, and now I plan to be busy not being busy and just enjoying being married. We're headed to Walla Walla in a couple days to a precious little B&B and we're going to visit wineries, drink loads of wine and eat delicious food. It's going to be crazy hot and I'm going to lounge around in the sun relaxing and enjoying my new husband. I LOVE YOU DAN!!!

I set up a little photo account so that people could upload all their photos, so if you're curious, check them out here: http://knotpic.com/jessica

Wednesday, March 30, 2011

YarnCore? AWESOME!

Check out this crazy awesome blog! http://yarncore.wordpress.com/

Monday, February 28, 2011

Marc Maron: Part Eleventy Thousand

If you missed it on Twitter or Facebook, I totes got a photo with Marc Maron over the weekend like a huge comedy nerd (groupie?). We sat in the front row, too. The "other Jess" made him scones (that were effing delicious, b-t-dubs) and brought devon cream, while I brought him a basket of all my homemade canning successes. Although I think maybe I just made a big chore for him because he had to ship everything home to himself. Hope it's delicious and that once he tries it he doesn't mind the extra work? Yeah.

He was hilarious and raw, as per usual. Again I say, if you aren't listening to WTF, you're missing out. Plain and simple.

Here is the basket of crap I made him:
I even made little labels, how cute (dorky) am I?
And then here is the best photo taken in a dark club without a flash. The one with the flash makes me look so white I glow, and the other one I posted on Facebook is good, but this one he is smiling and it's cute, so here.


He's wearing his fan-made WTF ring, which you can't really see clearly. He tells a story about how a fan boy recently got his signature tattooed on him, and "does that mean we're married now?" And my answer is no, Marc, but I do think you're engaged to the guy who made you that ring.

P.S. I also met Moshe Kasher last weekend at the same club. He is also effing hilarious and I discovered him from listening to WTF with Marc Maron. So yeah, that was awesome too. I am apparently collecting a photo album of myself with comedians. Who is next? (maybe Greg Behrendt in a couple weeks if I'm up to going all the way out to Kirklandia again).

Sunday, January 16, 2011

Friday, January 14, 2011

DO YOU KNOW HOW MANY FORKS EACH GUEST WILL USE?!?

FOUR. FOUR FORKS. If you have 100 people, that's $200!

JUST FOR FORKS.

So I went to the Seattle Wedding Show last Saturday with my friends Jess and Lisa. Lisa is getting married next month, and Jess is one of my bridesmaids. Actually I think this weekend we determined that she is my bridespinster, or at least you'd think that from the way bridal vendors treated her. It takes more than a bride to get married, people, treat the party nicely.

Honestly, the whole thing is basically designed for you to sign up on people's mailing lists. "Want to sign up to win this awesome thing? Good, we'll need your name, phone number, address, email, social security number, first born child." So far I luckily haven't received too many emails, but I did receive one phone call. FROM THE DEVIL. Basically, the Wedding-S#*t-Show included samples of A LOT OF CAKE. And I love me some cake, but after about 2 1/2 hours of trying cake I needed real food before I went into a diabetic coma. We walked by a booth that looked like it had samples of real food and because we were desperate, when they asked if we were looking for a caterer we said yes. And honestly, I didn't have a caterer, so it was totally possible, right? They were some sort of tacky all-inclusive caterer - super cheap and kind of "wedding in a box" style (like a bed in a bag?). Anyway, the caterer had some fancy champagne giveaway so we started signing up. Oh, and turns out the food was JUST FOR SHOW. So that was completely pointless. Then this exchange happened.

Caterer lady (with hideous fake nails that I couldn't stop staring at): So, when is the big day?

Me: Oh, July

Caterer lady: WHAT OH MY GOD THAT IS PRACTICALLY NEXT WEEK! YOU NEED TO GET A CATERER LIKE YESTERDAY!

Me: Oh, you know, it's fine. We're still figuring out what we're going to do and we've got 6 months, we're fine.

Bat$#*! Crazy Caterer Lady: NO,  YOU HAVE NO TIME! NO TIME!  YOU MAY NOT EVEN BE ABLE TO HAVE A WEDDING. YOU NEED TO BOOK EVERYTHING TODAY.

Me: ...

My friend Jess: Whoa, calm down, don't freak her out.

Crazy bad nails Caterer Lady: DO YOU KNOW HOW MANY FORKS EACH GUEST WILL USE?!?! FOUR! FOUR FORKS PER GUEST! FORKS ARE 50 CENTS EACH! IF YOU HAVE 100 GUESTS, THAT'S $200. JUST FOR FORKS!

Me: ...

Jess: ...

Lisa: ...

Caterer woman I hate: TAKE ALL THIS INFORMATION, YOU NEED US. IT IS SUPER CHEAP AND YOU DON'T HAVE TO DO ANYTHING (Translation: you don't need to have a personality, we can provide one for you. Mediocre food is fine, as long as you don't have to deal with it) CALL US TOMORROW BECAUSE YOU HAVE NO TIME! NO TIME AT ALL! 6 MONTHS IS LIKE TWO DAYS! YOU SHOULD PANIC!

Me: .... (backing away slowly)

Me - 10 minutes later: I HATE THAT LADY F:LSDJR:EIJF:LKSDJFSLJ!!! @$)($&Y#W@#*@!@#!!! NEED FOOD AND WINE NOW DAMMIT!! IF I SEE THAT WOMAN AGAIN I'M GOING TO PUNCH HER IN THE *&$@*#HFHFLDJF@!)$rJHFI2E4UR4E

So yeah, that is the most stand out thing from the day. And I received a phone call from them. I have half a mind to call them up and tell them to shove their low rent catering you know where.

Turns out a few good things did come from going, though. I figured out that food trucks aren't overpriced and are a super awesome way to do something cool for food. And it is way easier than potluck, which was starting to cause me to feel slightly insane from trying to figure out all the logistics. So we're going with a street food truck called Maximus/Minimus that serves the most delicious pulled pork sandwiches ever. AND the truck is shaped like a giant pig!

Mmmm, delicious pig.

So, that is fun and exciting. And I also talked to some florists that I really like, hopefully we can still afford it. Although I'm starting to think if I just throw some ball jars on the tables and fill them with market flowers it will still look pretty. I just keep telling myself, it doesn't have to be perfect. I want it to be the opposite of what some of those horrible vendors at the wedding show wanted it to be, I want it to be inexpensive and unique.

Also, I'm back on the wedding planning wagon after a hiatus. The holidays were too distracting, and for a few months I also was under the impression that I still had a year even though the year was dwindling away. Now I'm back to feeling nuts about wedding planning. I made this little mood/inspiration collage that I like to look at every time I feel stressed, though. It has one of the bridesmaids dresses on it, my dress, my headpiece and my beautiful necklace (purchased for me by my wonderful friend Meredith). Oh, and it has the shoes I'm going to wear. If you've been around me lately and heard me talking about wedding shoes, you would have probably heard me say something like "I hate shoes" or "maybe barefoot?", but I realized that the no shoes thing really only would go well with a hippie dress, and I just didn't buy a hippie dress, so I needed shoes. I also don't wear heels. I just don't. I don't care if it is only for an hour, I don't like it and I am no longer purchasing high heeled shoes. That is just the way it is. So I made the decision to buy these cute little custom made brocade flats. Of course, immediately following my purchase I showed someone my collage and said those were the shoes and they were like, "Oh, you mean the reception shoes for when your heels get uncomfortable?" and I was all, no, the shoes I'm going to wear and she was like "But you want to wear heels!" in this way that made it seem like it would be the saddest thing in the world and I'd be making a huge mistake and deep down I really want to wear heels. And for about 10 minutes I sat there thinking, yeah, I should get some heels. I want to wear heels. I need pretty big girl shoes. And then at the end of those 10 minutes I suddenly went WHAT THE HELL? WHY AM I LETTING PEOPLE GET IN THE WAY OF MY VISION? I need to trust my damn instincts and go with what I want.

Same thing happened about the rehearsal dinner. I don't want to have one. It isn't necessary. The dinner/party will be the actual wedding, end of story. But someone told me I needed to have one as a thank you to the wedding party and family and I went around thinking for the rest of the day that I needed to have one. And then I remembered why I didn't want to have one to begin with. I don't need two events, I need one. I only have money for one. We're already providing a big dinner and cake, I think that is enough. I'm not traditional, why should I follow traditions that I don't want to? When did this stop being about Dan and me?

I just have to learn to take what other people say with a grain of salt. Everyone has an opinion - about my wedding, about your parenting, about my diet, about how much television you watch. Judgypants, EVERYONE. I know I'm guilty of it, but I now try to keep the opinions to myself because I know how it can make someone crazy. I mean, I'm already crazy enough without someone laying their anxiety inducing advice all over me. Am I right?

UPDATE! I'm not usually one to call out terrible businesses by name on my blog, but I just read the few reviews on Yelp of the catering company I was referring to above and OMG, they're terrible and I had to share:
http://www.yelp.com/biz/browns-catering-renton