Long Day

Yesterday I was at the office just after 8 a.m. and didn't leave until just after 7 p.m.

It was a long day. I cannot even begin to describe how nice it was to walk in the door and have Hunter greet me with his warm tongue and sparkling eyes. Even better, Sam had BBQ'ed pork loin and made us a spinach salad.

Sam then gave me 45 minutes to continue to wrap up a few projects from work and then tucked me into bed to start reading Fat Chance: Beating the Odds Against Sugar, Processed Food, Obesity and Disease. He read it on the plane during his trip out to Philadelphia and thought it was right up my ally being that I'm so focused on health. While I was reading calmly in bed, he took Hunter down for a short walk and then joined me. It was just what I needed to calm down and unwind after a stressful day at the office.

I am such a lucky wife.

Thai Cooking Class

The Menu: Pad Thai, Green Papaya Salad, Chicken Coconut Green Curry, Spicy Basil Shrimp

For my birthday this year, Sam's mom and dad gave me the money for a Sur la Table cooking class. Sam decided he would like to take one with me, so for Christmas I gave him an IOU. We decided to take "Secrets of Thai Cooking"since we loved our 2011 trip to Thailand so much.

We decided to take the class on Monday night, since it was right after we got back from our trip home for the holidays. I wouldn't recommend coming hungry, because we had to cook everything before we ate, and our 6:30 p.m. class was supposed to be over at 8:30 p.m., but that's when we started eating. Sam was about to pass out by the time we finally got to serve ourselves.

Sam was the star pupil! Our instructor brought him up to stir the curry.

All in all, the class wasn't what either Sam or I expected. There were 14 of us, situated into teams of 4, 4, 3 and 3. Each team prepared a portion of the recipe, and then the chef had us take turns preparing the final dish.

For the most part, we just watched other people putting it together and ate dinner super late. It felt like we were basically paying for the recipes, which we did get to take home with us, but we probably could have found them online. The techniques she used, such as how to cook the food in the wok, was pretty much what I remembered from the streets of Thailand.

One of the downsides to the recipes is the ingredients are all, obviously, pretty exotic. While the chef assured us that everything can be found at the 99 Ranch Market, the items come in larger quantities and have a shelf life of roughly three months. So we'd have to make the whole meal more frequently than once a month, and that's unlikely.

All our dishes prepped for dinner!

Christmas Time Is Here

It's tough to be away from our family and friends during the holidays. Obviously we miss out on many family traditions and are beginning to create our own, but its the people that cannot be replaced.

For me, this has been a pretty tough December. Work has been non-stop, and I'm quickly burning out on the long hours and relentless workload. I am looking forward to spending some much-needed down time with Sam and Hunter in Northern California.

Sam, by contrast, is having a very slow season. He's working at Kaiser and they are pretty much closed for these next two weeks. He's been filling his time writing papers and taking care of the house, which I can't complain about. In fact, he's got a to do list to take care of before we leave town tomorrow when I get off.

We're really looking forward to having Carina and Justin home for the holidays. Justin will be around until Dec. 26 and Carina arrives on Dec. 27 so we'll be able to focus our undivided attention on each of them while they're in town.

On that note, I'd better put the finishing touches on my packing and get to bed - we have a very long day ahead of us tomorrow.

Migraines

There are definitely some less-than-awesome things that I am prone to health-wise.  For one, my asthma makes it pretty imperative that I get my annual flu shot, and even still, I've had a serious bought of walking pneumonia or bronchitis every other year since I was a sophomore in high school. Lucky for me, this is destine to be that year.  :-(

One of the other, far more inconvenient, things I suffer from are chronic migraines.  Starting in college, they tend to be significantly worse around "that time of the month," but I seem to have cluster and migraine headaches regardless of my cycle, and sinus headaches accompany many of my head colds.

It's especially irritating because I have varied  warning that a migraine is coming.  I rarely have an aura, but my neck becomes very stiff and I find myself stretching in from side to side frequently throughout the day without really thinking about it.  As soon as I notice that, I know the migraine will be arriving soon.  Similarly, once I am suffering, my neck is the one thing that sees no relief from my medications.  Even once I've managed the pain in my head, my neck is still.  It's not until my neck begins to feel normal, that I know I'm in the clear.

This morning, I have a particularly intense migraine.  I had my coworkers over last night to celebrate the Giants being in the World Series, and we made tacos and did a potluck.  Of course, with six girls socializing outside of work, we ended up hanging out and drinking margaritas more than watching the game.  But that was okay.  Sam was called in to operate, so I stayed up reading to wait for him.  We finally went to bed around 11:00, and I passed out thanks to the sinus congestion that has been zapping my energy the past couple of days.

Well, around 4:50 a.m., Hunter woke me up pawing at his water dish in our bathroom.  He does that to let me know when he's out of water and thirsty during the night.  Sure enough, as soon as I came to consciousness, I was in pain.  Deep, hemispheric pain that seemed to be radiating all the way down the left side of my extraordinarily stiff neck.  Waves of nausea were washing over me.

I sat up and the pain intensified, making it to the bathroom, bracing myself against the counter as I leaned down to pick up the bowl and then down to put the full bowl on the floor.  I reached into the medicine cabinet to find the Excedrin, my go-to over-the-counter method of relief.  I may have gone back to sleep, but at 5:30, Hunter was scratching on the front door to be taken out to go to the bathroom, and I figured it was well enough that I got up anyway.  My head didn't feel significantly better, which it usually does within half an hour after medicating myself.

Hunter and I headed downstairs and I was aware of the sensitivity I had to the lights on the buildings. When we came back upstairs, I dug into my purse and found my prescription strength migraine medication.  Then I settled in on the couch to wait.  Again, it takes about thirty minutes to kick in.

Around 6:00, Sam came out to find me sitting on the couch with my laptop and he inquired as to why I was up, and not in bed.  We chatted a bit and he proceeded to get on with his day.  Just before he left, he said that I didn't look well and he hoped I was feeling better by this evening.  I doubt that will be the case.  My head feels not quite right - not painful anymore, but not quite right, and my neck is still stiff.  From experience, I know that even if this episode is over, there will be another one on the way.

Boys Trip

Sam called me on Monday and told me he was taking off on a six-day trip with friends.  I had known that he had a week off and was planning on trying to coordinate something last minute, but I did expect more notice that I was given.

I also expected that he'd accomplish more than 1.5 of the chores I left for him before heading to work.  C'est la vie.

I don't want anyone to think that I'm a tyrant, I actually really encourage Sam to take trips with his friends and leave me home.  My dad has an annual fishing trip, which has evolved a bit over the years and now is a bit less about roughing it and more about relaxing and being man-pampered.  But still, I remember how much my dad looked forward to those escapes... and how excited he was when he got home.  Absence really does make the heart grow fonder sometimes.

This week I've realized that I am overjoyed to be marrying my best friend in the whole world.  He encourages me to push my limits professionally and personally while supporting me and making sure I know what a great person I am.  He's the first person I want to talk to, and maybe more importantly, he's the person I was to sit quietly with in bed reading books or on the couch watching a movie.

I'm looking forward to picking Sam up from the airport on Saturday.  Especially since he's leaving again next Thursday - Saturday and then again the second week of June for work functions.  Good thing he's marrying an independent woman!  And, once again, I'm thankful for our long-distance days in college.

Video Clips - O.A.R. Concert

As promised here are some of the videos from the O.A.R. concert at The House of Blues, Anaheim on Tuesday night.  Sam wanted to buy tickets so we did, even though it was a weeknight concert and I am so glad that we did.  I think they were the best performers I have ever seen live!

Cleaning Recap

Why did we wait so long to hire someone to clean our apartment?!?!

Everything looks just as nice as when we first moved in - shiny, bright, white, clean!

And I am finally not stressed about the state of the apartment.

Don't get me wrong, it helps that Sam was out of town this weekend so I was able to tidy some of the piles of clothes up and put away some of our other items.  This definitely takes a load of my plate as far as my responsibilities and tasks!

As an added bonus, Jack and Hunter were ABSOLUTELY smitten with one another.  Which was really great.

2014: Off to a Great Start!

I can hardly believe that 2014 is finally here!  

It's probably not a big surprise that the homestretch of 2013 was a little bit rough for me.  I'm not good with uncertainty and, unfortunately, there were a lot of unforeseen professional changes that happened during the holiday season.  

Even though I knew I at the time that losing my job was probably a blessing, I was surprised how much I was overcome by feelings of failure.  It was really difficult to emotionally divorce myself from all the marketing that my former company was doing, especially because they were either abandoning or seriously neglecting so many of the things I worked so hard to build.  

In the end, I stopped following the company social media pages and focused my attention on my future.

I got up the courage to approach my current employer at a holiday party we both attended.  I had interviewed with her team twice over the summer by my media relations skills are weak and they are a marketing and public relations agency that does a lot of pitching to media sources so they had reservations about bringing me on board.  At the party, the agency founder and agency director were both happy to see me and told me they'd been talking about me recently.  I took the opportunity to let them know I was no longer working with my previous company and that I'd appreciate them passing my name along if they heard of anyone looking for my skill set.  To my pleasant surprise, they expressed an interest in hiring me (again) and I offered to freelance for them a bit so that we could all feel out the situation.

The next day, she called me and asked me if I could start immediately.  We hammered out the details and I was in the office the following Monday.  

Surprisingly, I only freelanced for them three days before they made me an offer to come on board permanently.  I think it was partially my personality (I get along with the other team members very well) and partially my writing skills.  They had me drafting a lot of press releases, e-newsletters and social media posts during my freelance tenure and I think they really liked what they saw.  

So I moved right on into a full-time position with them and today I got handed a big Chinese New Year project to manage on behalf of my team.  To say that I'm thrilled would not do my emotions justice.  

I needed to draft two press releases, and my boss came in at 5 to see if I could have them done tomorrow.  I happily informed her I had already given one to the account director for review, and the other would be on his desk before I left the office.  She seemed very impressed and said, "That's wonderful, I am so glad you joined our team!"

"Me too," I told her. 

And things are going well in my personal life too!  I woke up yesterday and thought, "I'm getting married this year."  It was about a year ago that we picked our wedding date, and now we're just about seven and a half months away from the big day.  It's coming up fast.

Carina and I picked out the bridesmaids dresses over the holiday week while Sam and I were up in NorCal.  Jackie and Carina already have their measurements in, and Lindsay is going to head over to the salon tomorrow to get her measurements taken too.  I just need to follow up with Carrie and Michelle to make sure they remember to get their orders in by Sunday.  

I have the date for my bridal shower (in NorCal) set, we have an appointment to do the menu tasting for our wedding entrees, I have a list of bakeries we need to visit to taste wedding cake and talk pricing, and I am feeling really, really good about everything.

I still need to work on the invitation wording just a bit and then order all the invitations.  And I want to sit down with our florist again so I can work out some of the details with the flowers and decorations.  And then it's pretty much all done except picking out the boys' attire and getting our wedding bands made.  Obviously the little details like seating charts etc. are still to come, but those are things that will happen in July and we're still a LONG way off from then.

The other great thing is that I'm totally 100% recommitted to my fitness goals.  I didn't do so well in 2013, but I realize now that putting all my time and energy into my profession isn't the smartest thing to do because jobs come and go but your happiness and health lasts your whole lifetime and affects your lifestyle.  

So, on that high, high note, let me say that 2014 is going to be my best year yet!

"I'm going to have to let you go"

I went into my boss's office on Monday at 2:05 for our usual, bi-monthly marketing meeting.  I was running a few minutes late because I had received an email from Twitter that our password had been changed so I had to alert them that I hadn't done anything of the sort and change the password back.  When I arrived at my boss's office, our HR manager was there, but I didn't think too much of it.  When I sat down, I had a page of notes to remind me to follow up on our ongoing marketing initiatives and plan for the following two quarters.

As I sat down, my boss began talking.  He said, "I was crunching some numbers over the weekend and it turns out we're not losing money, we're bleeding money.  And I think I'm going to have to..." he paused, and took a moment to compose himself.

He's going to renege on the raise he gave you 6 days ago,  I told myself.

He started again, "I've decide I'm going to have to let you go."

I sat there in a stunned silence.  He started going on about the checks he had cut me, one for the past pay period, one paying me out through the end of the week (which would have been my PTO), and then the reimbursements for my cell phone and internet bills.  My mind was wandering so I was only half paying attention to what he said.

Let me go, but you just gave me a superlative annual review on the November 7, and you gave me a raise on November 11 with another raise promised on June 1, 2014.  You can't possibly be letting me go.

It dawned on me that when I received an email from Twitter saying that our password had been changed it was because the HR assistant was already going through and systematically locking me out of all of the social media and website administration.

What a shot to the gut.

Not only were they letting me go, they didn't trust my professionalism and integrity enough to believe that I wouldn't vindictively tamper with the department and marketing program I worked so hard to build in the last two years.

I was completely removed from the system by the time one of my favorite coworkers helped me carry my belongings to my car.  Standing there, putting his contact information into my phone, I received a message alerting me that my Microsoft Exchange credentials had been changed.

I called Sam, then my Dad and finally my sister while I was driving home and they all expressed the same shock I was feeling.  People don't get magnificent reviews followed by raises and then get laid off.  Certainly not within a two week period.  But I guess they do, because it happened to me.

The bigger shot through my heart came the following morning when I had to watch the emails popping up in my inbox letting me know that I was no longer an administrator for this social media platform or that social media platform.  Yeah, I get it.  I finally logged into the remaining platforms and removed myself.  Pulling the bandaid off quickly is truly less painful than just sitting there waiting for the emails.

Roasted Tomato Basil Soup

This morning, Sam woke me up before he left to tell me a few things:

1. He was proud of me for getting the raise I deserve at work (I had my annual review last week and asked my boss to reconsider my merit increase and gave him four reasons I deserve the more money, and named my price.  To my surprise, he met my request yesterday!!!)
2. He wanted me to make the roasted tomato basil soup recipe he found in the crock pot cookbook
3. Our water heater wasn't working properly and he'd taken a lukewarm (at best) shower

Needless to say, it was a lot to take in at 6:00 this morning.  Hunter and I decided it was best NOT to lounge in bed, and we got up to tackle our honey-do list.  

First, I reviewed the recipe (which I included at the bottom of this post) and saw that I needed to roast the canned stewed tomatoes with brown sugar and diced onion in the oven for 30 minutes to create the base of the soup.  I was pretty confident I couldn't chop the onions small enough to make them smooth in the soup without a little help from my favorite emulsifier, so I pulled out the archaic cuisinart we got from Sam's grandpa several years ago when we helped him move out of his house.  The thing worked like a dream!  It took care of the chopping while I was spreading the tomatoes out on a baking sheet and sprinkling them with the brown sugar.  

Then, while the tomatoes, sugar and onions were in the oven, I took Hunter on his morning potty walk and tackled the pilot light on the water heater.

After everything had roasted, I popped it all back into the food processor so I could get the mixture as smooth as possible before tossing it into the crock pot with chicken broth, tomato paste, some spices and the left over juice from the canned tomatoes.  Needless to say, I did a lot better with the food processor than if it had been up to me to chop everything by hand.

Into the crockpot it all went, and then I started working on the dishes.  Unfortunately, the water coming out of the sink was still all cold, so I had to call our property manager and have her sent up a handy man to get the water heater functioning again.  Hey, at least everything was fixed before 9:30!

The final product was pretty delicious, if I do say so myself!  Sam has made a few comments to me that on the days I am working from home he would like me to get a home cooked meal put together so that it's ready when he gets home from work.  I suppose he's got a point that it would be nice if I did a little more cooking.  Even if some days it's a crockpot meal that I prep in the morning and then let simmer all day, rather than a complicated recipe I tackle at 5:00 when i get off work, it's nice to have home cooking and it's something we want to make a priority when we have our own family.

Wedding Planning Compromises

It's funny, and probably a good sign, that I don't mind compromising with Sam on wedding details.  I am really, really proud of him and how involved he has been in planning things like our invitations (which he seriously was SO meticulous about I was shocked!) and meeting different officiants.

He's also been really involved with my family of his own volition, which is really nice.  Not that Sam wasn't supportive of my family, but he's been really tight on free time and he doesn't get to spend enough time with his family so my family sometimes ends up taking a backseat unless they come down to visit us in Irvine - which they do A LOT and we really do appreciate that immensely!  

But lately, since even before we got engaged, Sam's been doing little things as well as big things.  He's making the effort to see my family and celebrate big milestones with us the way I have done with his family over the last several years.  He came with me for Papa's 80th birthday when we got the entire Santi family together and he opted to stay at my parents' house one night when we were in town last weekend.  

He has been so great helping me manage my stress, too.  I was getting a little overwhelmed trying to please everyone and mediate every decision we made, so Sam stepped up and agreed that he would be the spokesperson for his side of the family regarding wedding stuff while I was the spokesperson for my side of the family.  That's reduced my stress a lot and makes me even more sure about making this huge commitment to Sam next year.  He is a great partner, teammate and friend.  I am incredibly lucky to spend my life with him.

Our Officiant is Official!

One of the biggest things stressing me out about wedding planning was that we hadn't found an officiant.

Thankfully that ended on Tuesday night at Starbucks in San Juan Capistrano!

Sam had found a couple of additional officiants for us to interview on The Knot and Tom was quick to respond and easy to set up an appointment with.

We were really impressed with how professional Tom looked and how he carried himself.  He was pretty much exactly what we were looking for!

Tom's an elementary school principal, but he has been doing weddings on the side for 6 years starting when his cousin asked him to perform their ceremony on a family vacation in Mexico.  Tom pursued a career in marriage and family therapy before he went into education, which was an unexpected bonus because he definitely gave us a little mini counseling session and didn't seem preachy or judgmental.

He also shared a lot about his own family and assured us that it's totally normal for couples to struggle setting boundaries with parents and in-laws as they enter into marriage.  He told us that from his own personal experience he cannot impress upon us enough the importance of setting boundaries with our parents and families from the very beginning of our married life.

He reinforced the crappy truth that people's feelings are going to get hurt by us setting boundaries whether we do it now or we do it when we have our own kids.  He said there was so much unnecessary drama with his parents based on his own inability to set boundaries with them and it really hurt his wife and his relationship with his parents.

That totally hit home for Sam and I, because we have two AMAZING families that would love to spend every second with us.  Unfortunately, we haven't been able to master the fine art of being in two places at once, so we're trying to split our holidays and time between our families.

If it were just a matter of our parents and siblings, that would be less difficult, but we have three extended families to fit in as well.  Sam's mom's side of the family spends almost every holiday all together, which is a bit daunting for me because I worry about the expectations they will have for Sam and I.  My parents split holidays between my mom's family (grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins) and my dad's family (grandparents, aunt, uncle and cousins).  We spent Thanksgiving and Christmas Eve with one side, Christmas Day and Easter with the other, and split up Mother's Day and Father's Day.

I think my family is prepared to have Sam and I MIA at family functions and holiday events now that they have to share me (more formally) with the Galles.  It's tough for me though, because I realize that I'm going to miss out on a lot.  We'll only be spending 50% of the holidays with my side of our family.  Of that 50%, probably 33% will be with the Santis, 33% with the Hunters and 33% with just my immediate family.

I am really, really excited about getting married, and I'm sure Sam and I are lucky to have been working on this whole family integration thing over the last 10+ years.  I just wish it was easier.

Kids

Lately it seems that a lot of girls I knew from high school are getting pregnant and having their first (or third) babies.

Is it making my biological clock itch?  Not so much itch, no.  But it does kind of make me pause and realize that Sam and I will (probably) be parents sooner rather than later.  And this whole wedding planning thing is definitely making us think and plan for the future.

On Friday, Hunter was being particularly needy and Sam made the observation that it's going to be really tough for Hunter when he has to share my attention with a baby.  I think life for Hunter is going to get tough long before a baby arrives, he loves to sit on my lap and sprawl across my belly when we go to bed at night so his adjustments will start when my tummy gets bigger.

I suppose there is a bit of a morbid fascination with these ladies who are pregnant because I am so curious about what they are going through, what lies in our future.

And I am acutely aware that life as we know it will completely change with kids.  Completely.

Until we do have our own kids, Hunter is a pretty good practice baby and Sam does such a wonderful job with him that I'm sure our human kids will be in great hands.

Waiting for me to bring out our bagel breakfasts

HBO Documentary Series

This weekend I got really interested in HBO's Documentary Series thanks to Kirellos's visit, during which he showed Sam and I that Apple TV has an HBO Go app.  With the new power of streaming HBO Go seamlessly, I found the amazing documentaries that HBO produces - Mondays in Racine, Open Heart, Lock Up: Prisoners of Rikers Island, First Comes Love, and Last Letters Home.

They have all been really touching in different ways.

And it makes me think that there are so many amazing things going on out there in the world that (thankfully) I don't have to manage on a daily basis.

Coupled with these documentaries, Kirellos, Sam and I went out on the Newport Beach Peninsula last night to a new (to us) bar with Kirellos' sister and one of her friends.  The bar was overly full of dudes, super slutty girls and really hammered people.  As we were climbing into bed at 3:00 this morning, I rolled over and snuggled up next to Sam to say 'thank you' for sparing me years of running around trying to find Mr. Right.  And he agreed that we are both lucky to have found each other so early on.

Weekend Recap

Sam has taken up soccer and joined a men's league that plays on Sunday afternoons about 10 minutes from our house.

He played a little bit last season (summer) with Ryan Quigley, but this season (fall) he made his own team and recruited two of Ryan's teammates to play with a bunch of the UCI surgical specialty residents.   

It's been interesting, because the surgeons are so back with commitment since they've got call, vacations and really busy schedules in their free time.  Finally, this week, they were able to get together a group of guys who have been at several of the games and are getting used to playing together.  Additionally, Bo brought two of his friends who are pretty good.  

Last week was the first goal of the season, and this week they scored 4 - 2 of which came from MY FUTURE HUBBY!  :-)  I am still super proud of Sammy if you can't tell.  Not only did he score twice, he made a huge save while he was playing goalie at the end of the first half.  It was a great day for him and I know he finally felt like he was getting his touch and endurance back.  

Luckily, next we the team has a bye coming up because we're going to be gone in NorCal this weekend.  The following weekend, they have a double header so I'm going to bring an ice chest of water bottles, gatorade and orange slices.  I haven't done that yet this season because I don't want to be TOO much of the team mom, but I do think they deserve a little pampering if they're going to play two games in one day.

In other news, the Niners looked fantastic against the Houston Texans and I cannot wait to be at Candlestick this Sunday night!

Succulents and Cactus

With all of Sam's free time, we're working on cultivating hobbies that we both enjoy.  

One of the things I suggested is gardening.

I love gardening!  

I wish we had a real backyard so I could really do some serious landscaping, and it turns out Sam really likes outdoor home improvement activities.  Win-win!  

I've had a couple of different plants since I moved to Southern California.  There were some short-lived  geraniums on the Newport Peninsula that fried in the all-day direct sunlight.  Then I had an orchid that lived for about 2 years but couldn't find the right amount of sunlight in our current apartment. 

So far, my biggest success has come from a rubber plant my brought down after we moved into our apartment.  It's managed to survive (barely) for 2 years despite numerous periods of neglect.  Which got me thinking, maybe we needed to rethink the kinds of plants we were trying to cultivate.  Perhaps we should move away from the florals in favor of succulents.

So Sam agreed to check out succulents with me this morning and we headed to Lowes to see what we could find.  When we arrived, Sam found some cactus plants that looked pretty neat next to the succulents.  He also found some really neat pots that fit in with the ones we already have as well as the patio furniture for housing potted plants at different heights.  Major win-win!

Interestingly enough, we bought one pre-potted compilation of low-moisture succulents and cacti but we bought loose plants to put into 3 additional pots.  It's the perfect mix of do it yourself meets prefabrication.  And they are actually pretty cool looking when you mix them together.

 So hopefully we'll have better luck with these bad boys than I have had with previous iterations of potted plants and patio gardening.  At the very least, hopefully Hunter won't be eating these plants since these plants have spikes and prickly needles. 

Decisions, Decisions

There are probably going to be many moments over the course of the rest of my life that I think to myself, "wow, I can't believe this is the guy I got to marry."  Luckily, those moments are already happening.

This past weekend, we spent Saturday doing a bunch of wedding stuff that needed to get taken care of sooner rather than later.  We scouted two very different, but very nice officiants and prepped our invitations at Papyrus.

Wow, was I blown away by Sam's involvement in all the planning.  Not that Sam hasn't been involved, but mostly he has been so focused on work and relaxing in his free time that I seem to be doing a lot of the recon for our wedding and he's been picking from the options I bring to him.  (Honestly, I thought that's how most grooms are, but maybe I was wrong!)

Anyway, Sam was so talkative with the officiants I was almost looking at him like, "Who are you and what have you done with my fiancé?"  At one point, Stephanie looked at me and said, "So, what about you, Gianna?"  It was one of the first times that someone has had to shut Sam up so I can get a work in edgewise.

And then we went to Papyrus to check out invitations.  That blew me away even more.  I was surprised that Sam was so involved and wanted to customize the invitations completely - pick his own paper, fonts, colors etc.  So much for going with something they had stock!  And as annoyed as I was at first, probably because I hadn't eaten yet, I was also very aware that I am incredibly lucky to have someone who cares so much about this moment in our lives that he wants to be involved and make everything as perfect as he possibly can.

Which became even more apparent when we met with the second officiant who is a Reverend and brings a lot of spirituality and experience to officiating weddings.  I have to say, it was Sam who first broke the silence in the car and said that he thought we should really consider having the Rev. perform our wedding.  There were a few too many "God" mentions for my taste, but I know what Sam was getting at.  There was a certain heaviness sitting there with that man.  As he spoke I felt my spine tingling and it kind of hit me all of the sudden that we are getting married... as in this isn't just a big party, there is a serious commitment going on.

Of course I know we're making a commitment, but we've been together so long that it sometimes doesn't feel like we need to go through the pomp and circumstance that is a ceremony to make our love official.  That said, in that room, it did hit me suddenly that this is going to be our one wedding day for the rest of our lives and we owe it to ourselves to take it seriously.

Even if we don't go with the Reverend, I am glad we met with him.  If we go with Stephanie, Sam and I will be better prepared to make this a serious (and lighthearted) ceremony that carries the appropriate weight for the moment while celebrating the unconditional love we share and our love story - the journey that got us here.

The First Time (Again)

I hope after years of marriage Sam still feels this way about me:

 

Awwwww.  :-)

Dr. and Mrs. Wolson

Our last wedding of the 2013 wedding season was this past weekend.  To sum it up, Elton John may have said it best: "Can you feel the love tonight?  It is where we are."  This weekend was so full of love that it was palpable.  

The weekend started off with a little time at the pool with Sam's family.  It was nice because I had the opportunity to tell Lisa and George how much it means to me and how honored I am to wear their mother's diamond in my engagement ring.  

Sam and I were also able to show his parents some of the wedding planning we've been doing over the last several months.  It was neat too because our tastes are similar to Pete and Margaux's and we were able to see some of the same themes from our plans at their wedding on Sunday.  Rich and Sue helped us pick out our Save the Dates too!  I made a bunch of mockups for Sam to check out last week and he picked the two he liked the best for them to decide between.  

We met up with all of the out of town guests and local friends who were staying at the hotel for drinks at the hotel bar on Saturday night.  While everyone was mingling it gave me a chance to talk to Leo about it and thank him for picking out such a beautiful diamond.  I told him that I love him and I will always think of him when I look down, and he told me that he loves me too.  It was a really bittersweet moment because it's so evident how much he's aged in the 10 years Sam and I have been together, and he's really starting to show his mortality.  I guess that it reminds me a lot of Papa Hunter and Papa Santi too, which can be a little hard to think about.

The Celniker/Marcus family kept the party going with dinner at Red O.  Here's my Instagram pic from dinner, we were sitting on the patio watching the sunset and enjoying some yummy food and delicious beverages but most importantly fabulous company.  It was nice finally meeting Pete's relatives (who are also related to Sue, Lisa and George) from the East Coast.  We also had a great time catching up with Sam's cousins.  We don't get to see Dan, Sean and Mikaela often enough and rarely all together.  I get to chat with Mikaela on the phone every so often, and I keep up with Dan a little bit online when he posts interesting articles, but I really only get to catch up with Sean when we're in person and we don't get to see him very often.  

On Sunday, I spent a few hours with Miss Margaux in her suite with the ladies from her bachelorette party and we had a great time watching her get her hair and makeup done.  It was really, really fun to see all the girls again and the vibe in the room was awesome.  Margaux seemed totally calm and relaxed, all the girls were so happy to be there with her and it was just the nicest afternoon.  

Plus, the Niners won!

At about 3pm I headed down to Sue's hotel room where she and Mikaela were getting ready with Lisa. Mikaela did a great job on Sue's hair and makeup and it complimented her dress fabulously.  Lisa wore a gorgeous dress (perhaps from Sean's wedding) and looked really beautiful as well.  The boys all looked very dapper in their tuxes, and for the first time, I really felt like I was part of the family when we grabbed a drink in the hotel bar before we headed down to the wedding. 

The best part was that Sam made it to the wedding!!!  He was waiting for us when we arrived at Cafe la Boheme and looked so handsome in his black tux with his red tie and red pocket square.  We were all looking so good the photographers took a bunch of photos of the whole family while we were standing in the courtyard.  In fact, we were the subject of a BUNCH of photos in the courtyard.  :-)  Then it was time to head on in and take our seats.  It was really interesting, we all were seated at our tables and then Margaux came in from outside, walked across the dance floor and up to the beautiful giant fireplace to meet Pete.  They were married right there, with all of us sitting at our tables, and it totally worked.  Margaux had been saying she wanted a non-wedding feel and without an aisle and the rows of seats it definitely seemed a little more intimate and personal and fitting for their personalities.  The vows were just amazing!  They memorized their own vows and they weren't short little things!  They were just so heartfelt! 

After dinner, Sam and I did a little bit of dancing, but the DJ portion of the night seemed SO short!  It was fun though, and Sam and I got to dance a bit.  It's funny to think the next time we're all together at a wedding it will (probably) be ours unless one of the other cousins has a REALLY short engagement.  

Sam and I had to drive in tandem home after the wedding was over since he had to come up after being on call.  Because it was late and  we talked on the phone the whole way back and then fell into bed and passed out!

All in all, this was a WONDERFUL wedding weekend and I am so happy for Dr. and Mrs. Wolson!

A Second Full-Time Job

Woah, wedding planning is slowly taking over my life.  Not that I'm complaining, and I'm not overwhelmed (yet), but it's definitely taking up the majority of my free-time.

Even little things, like getting the room block together for the resort we're getting married at, have become bigger projects than I anticipated.  Thankfully, Sam's been wonderful so far and only chimes in when I have some options for him to choose from or when he feels really strongly about something - which is rarely the case.

The one recurring point of contention is the officiant for our ceremony.  The rabbi that married Sam's parents is still alive, and Sue has been pressuring me to have him marry us for what seems like the last six years.  To my credit, I have firmly stood my ground that I feel uncomfortable having the rabbi who married her perform our ceremony because the priest who married my parents is also also still alive.  Beyond the officiant, I don't think it would be fair to either side of the family to choose to be married in a religious ceremony when there are such varying degrees of religious commitment in our families.  Sam's dad is agnostic, his mom was raised by a Jewish father and Irish Catholic mother, my father grew up Catholic, my mother converted to Catholicism to get married in the Catholic church and both my parents attended Catholic high schools and a Catholic college.  Because of this, choosing an officiant is was one of the main things I have been dreading about wedding planning since long before we were engaged.

I have done more than my part to learn and celebrate the Jewish holidays and customs, but, despite pressure from Sam's mom,  I have been adamantly opposed to converting to Judaism.  I would never dream of asking Sam to give up his family customs in favor of mine, and I think it's insensitive that I would be put in the position where I would feel pressured to do so.  

Luckily, Sam is not pressuring me about having a Jewish wedding or asking the rabbi to perform our wedding (yet).  The rabbi will be performing the ceremony at the wedding we attend on Sunday, so it will give Sam and I an opportunity to see him in action.  Sam has promised his mom that we'll meet the rabbi before we make any decisions, but he has been very careful not to commit us to anything or make any comments for or against the rabbi.

To help us make our decision, we have appointments later this month with two well respected officiants who are local to the area and very comfortable performing interfaith marriages.  It's my hope that we will click with one of them and this will save me from having to compromise on something as big as who will preside over Sam and I committing ourselves to one another for the rest of our lives.  Obviously there will be compromises I have to make over the next couple of months, but this isn't one that I'm comfortable with and I don't feel like this is something I can brush off without having serious regret later.