Hey That’s A Nice Life

courtesy of Me

Whee!  The invitations are in the mail.

Wedding elf Kristen came over last week and helped me address, emboss and seal the envelopes.

Today - in the middle of the blizzard - we took the invitations to the post office across from Lost Dog Cafe (yes, we had lunch while we were in the area).  I asked the man behind the counter if we could have the invitation postage cancelled by hand.

As I expected, he gave us a funny look and then handed over the stamper.  Don got to work and a few minutes later the invitations were cancelled and in the mail.

There are pictures documenting the whole thing, but I am way too tired to post them now.  I’m off to Florida through the weekend … so maybe Don will post them in my absence.  Ha ha ha.

[So there. --Don]

For some reason I can no  longer remember, a few minutes ago I told Don about a strange wedding photography trend that is compelling in the oddest way.  Fake mustaches.  He seemed skeptical that this is actually a trend. 

But it’s true.  A number of wedding blogs that I read have written about it and showcased pictures.  And not a number like 2 either.  A big number.

So I hauled up the laptop and googled ‘wedding mustache’.  This was one of the first pictures that appeared:

See?  Isn’t it odd and strangely compelling?  Offbeat Bride says that fake mustaches are the new red wedding dress so you know it’s for real.

I don’t see us going this route - it didn’t even occur to me to get a red wedding dress - but I sure love looking at the pictures. 

On the other hand, Don’s surprise project does need a few props, so maybe we’ll spring for a few fake ’staches.

moustaches for all! by racheℓ ✈ mergeweddings.com’ s

When we first launched our wedding Web site, we mentioned that the Friday evening Welcome Picnic would feature entertainment by those in attendance.   This was an idea that Don casually mentioned one day, and that I immediately loved.  Probably even more than he expected.

It came about when Don pointed out to me that in addition to all the talented wedding elves who would help us make invitations and take photos and just be all round helpful before, during and after our wedding that we happened to know an extraordinary number of people with talents in the performing arts.  He thought it would be cool to ask all of them to perform the night before the wedding instead of asking one of them to perform during the ceremony.  As soon as he said, I was determined to make it happen.

So we started by casually mentioning it when someone would mentioned his/her talent.  Then last week, I updated the Web site with actual information about the “Talent Showcase”.  But the full court press started today.

This morning we had some folks over for brunch.  After we had plied some of the talent with lots of mimosas and bloody marys, I started in earnest.  And surprisingly, everyone agreed.  Some really got into it, making plans for acts and making notes about what numbers they would perform.

Others agreed reluctantly, and if you’re one of those people I’m telling you now that we don’t want you to be uncomfortable and will not hold you responsible for anything you said today.  Well, most of you anyway.

Here’s a list of some of the things people agreed to do:

EP - Sing opera
KD - Maybe play a secret new instrument and perform a lounge act with MD
MD - Perform a lounge act with KD
TB - Emcee and perform a 5 minute comedic stand up
TB - Sing
EW - Play the flute
LW - Play the guitar
KW - Irish dance
KH - Sing

We have some out of town friends attending with similar performing abilities that we’re hoping to recruit as well.  EG has said she will sing and play guitar and we’re hoping CVR will sing as well.  FBIL2 also is working a little number for us.  

The best part about today was that we learned about talents people had that we didn’t even know about and were reminded about talents that we had forgotten about overs the years.  So, I bet some of you reading this blog who will be our wedding have a talent that you’d love to show off - it can be serious or silly - and we’d LOVE to include you.  Drop me e-mail (susan at fussellwhiteside dot com) and let me know what you can do.

We going to show off our talents, too.  Don is considering a little juggling act for Friday night, in fact.   As for my talent, well … you’ll see it in the wedding invitations, the programs, the menus, the escort cards, the Save the Date cards, the thank you cards, and so on.  It’s hard to perform, but you won’t be able to attend this wedding and not notice it.

An official e-mail will be sent about the Talent Showcase AFTER the invitations get mailed after which time we’ll need to know what you will perform for our lovely emcee, but feel free to tell me now if you’ve already made up your mind.

I’m going to tell right up front that we’re not having a bourbon bar OR a cigar bar at our wedding.

Sorry.

I was out of town for work last week and caught a bug on the way home which kept me housebound all weekend.  Finally, on Sunday night, I asked Don to spring me for a super casual dinner and we ended up at a soup and sandwich joint in Old Town Alexandria.

We sat down near a table with two women and the fattest binder I have ever seen.  In a super scrolling font, the homemade front cover read, “Tying the Knot.”  I almost sprained my eyes rolling them, but I could not stop myself from listening to the women.  I kept trying to look out the window onto King Street, but I keep turning back to them.

And after a few minutes, I looked at Don and said, “Those two don’t know each other.”  It was some kind of bridal meet up.  Among strangers.  A very small bridal meet up among strangers.

One is having a bourbon bar.  The other is having a cigar bar.  One told her fiance she just couldn’t get married in 2010 because people would say they got married in twenty ten (instead of two thousand ten) and she couldn’t stand the way that sounded. 

Seriously. 

That’s what she said. 

Don paid attention to exactly none of it and when I hit the highlights for him on the way home, here’s what transpired.

DW: I want to go to wedding with a cigar bar.

SF: Oh.
(feels slightly ashamed)

I’m sorry.  Do you want me to look into arranging a cigar bar?
(I can literally hear the cash register ch-chinging in my mind.) 

DW: No. I want to go to a wedding with a cigar bar. I don’t want to pay for one.

And THAT’S how I know I’m about to marry the right guy for me.

So, we’re not having a bourbon bar and we’re not having a cigar bar, but I sincerely hope you get to attend a wedding with each some day. 

And, please, take Don with you.

I’m not sure how it happened.  For a long time, I thought there was every possibility that we were not going to register for gifts.  And then one day I went online and started a Macy’s registry to complete the four colors of Fiesta ware that we currently own (cobalt, sunshine, plum and tangerine).  And then Don agreed that Bed, Bath and Beyond would be a good place to register.  When I saw the amazing plates that are fancier than our Fiesta ware (but not too formal and stuffy) at Pottery Barn, I wanted to register there, too.

This is the Emma pattern from Pottery Barn.

And then it was basically done.  Last week, Don and I headed to each of the stores to make our final selections.  There were a few things I wasn’t happy with at the end of the day.  The silverware we selected at Macy’s turned out to be $60 a place setting (we saw the sale price at the store) and we immediately ruled that out.  I didn’t love the barware or stemware we found.  BUT, it was basically done.

We popped into Crate and Barrel to see what they had on the after-Christmas sale and I found the stemware and the glasses and the silverware I want.  It was an agonizing moment.

We couldn’t possibly go from zero to four registries.  No way.

But Don, who is never one to play by the rules and occasionally manages to surprise even me, said, “Why not?”.  In the age of online shopping, directing people to one more Web site is not really that big of a deal, he argued.  Even if people go into the store to make their purchase, they’re likely to investigate online first anyway, right? 

So, there you have it.  We created four gift registries.  I’m relieved it’s done and I’m very happy with our selections, but I still feel a little sick about it so we also decided to list a few charities we care a lot about on our Web site registry page.

Our registries:

Bed, Bath and Beyond
Crate and Barrel
Macy’s
Pottery Barn (this one will not take you directly to our registry for some reason)

Or make a donation to a charity of your choice, or to one of the three charities listed below that mean something special to us:

• Habitat for Humanity
• Gilchrist Hospice Care (Formerly Hospice of Baltimore)
• A charity to support marriage equality

  (We did not send up charitable registries with these organizations, so be sure to let us know if you make a donation so that we can make sure you get thanks where thanks is deserved!)

As I mentioned back in October, I have a pretty extensive list of DIY projects for the wedding.

Among the most important of these projects is the invitations.

As you know, I’m trying to stay way ahead of schedule since I have very busy spring. Thankfully, several of my friends offered to help with some of the DIY projects. My awesome wedding elves started helping me assemble the wedding invitations last week and we’re moving much faster than I ever imagined. Last week, Don cut all the invitation pieces, Katy hole punched them, and I tied them together. This week, Jaimie started adhering the starfish while Katy and I started (and finished!) the response cards. I am very pleased with the results.

The response cards were printed four per page and trimmed to be the size of postcards. Onto the front of the postcard we adhered a reproduction of a vintage postcard from Ocean City. It originally said “Greetings from Ocean City,” but Jaimie had the great idea to change it to “A Wedding in Ocean City” and I think it turned out great! I even had to time to stamp them tonight (after triple checking the USPS Web site to make sure postcards rates are not increasing in 2009). The only thing left to do on the response cards is to write a very small number on each one so that I can figure out who sent it in the event someone forgets to write their name on the response (which, I understand, happens more frequently than you might imagine).

Now I just have to print out and trim the information card (hotel and travel information, etc.), finish adhering the starfish and stuff the invitations. Oh, and address them.

Don’t worry little wedding elves, there are a lot more DIY projects ahead. We have to make the program fans, and the favors, the escort cards and the menu cards. Plus, I’m sure I’ll come up with a few more projects for us in the next 130 days!

Over at a Practical Wedding, the wise and wonderful Meg just hit the nail on the head as she so often does. Meg and her boy have been struggling with the wedding registry and this week she figured it why it matters. She said so perfectly herself that I can only quote her.

And then I got it. The registry has nothing to do with the wedding. Our great-aunts and grandmothers are on to something when they insist that you register so they know what pots you want. The registry is not about the wedding, the registry is about the marriage. For us, we hope that means a long life with a passel of kids, a ton of family gatherings, and lots of cooking. So for us, that’s what a registry is about - letting our friends and loved ones build that home for us. The registry is like a barn raising.

Don and I have been struggling with the whole registry thing, too. I’ve attended dozens of weddings so I understand why you need them. I get that even if you make a real effort to try to encourage people not to give you gifts or make donations, people WANT to give you an item to have in your new life as husband and wife and that it’s a lot easier for the couple AND the gift giver if you provide suggestions. Quite honestly, I prefer to buy a gift than to make a donation when it comes to weddings (I’m all about supporting charities - I just like the idea of helping people I love create a home they will love).

Don has struggled with it even more than me … and I had to start our registries on my own while trying to coax him in.

For awhile I was making the joke that our wedding Web site would have to say:

But then one day a few weeks ago, I met him at a store. When I walked in he said, “Does this place have a wedding registry?” I told him it did and he said, “OK. We can register here.” So we did. He liked that the store in question had a lot of low priced items (they have a lot of high priced items, too - but a huge variety) and that they have a coupon every week.

We haven’t finished our registries yet, but we’re getting there and hope to be done before Christmas. And, as Meg said, we’re registering for things we’ll have and cherish as we grow old together - like the rest of our Fiesta Ware collection (which I already love and on which I want to serve Don dinner for the rest of our lives) and for a fancier place setting, too (which I will love and on which I want to serve holiday meals and other fancy dinners until I am too old to stand at the stove). We’re registering for some silly things that might not stand the test of time, too - but things that we will enjoy for right now anyway (like silpats for baking).

If our guests would prefer to make a donation to their favorite charities, I’ll be delighted. But I am going to be just as pleased to get a spoon that I will use to stir the creamer in my coffee and Don’s coffee when I am 34 and when I am 94.

Thanks, Meg, for helping me see the light.

Since getting engaged, the question of whether or not to change my name has been in the back of my mind. I’ve gone back and forth a few times, but I keep coming back to the decision to take Don’s last name.

On one hand, taking Don’s name is patriarchal tradition that I don’t necessarily want to take part in. On the other hand, keeping my current last name - my father’s family name - is equally patriarchal; it just happens to be the name I’ve always had.

We’re forming a new family and I like the idea that our family - even if it’s just the two of us - is identified to the world as a family unit by our shared last name. I’d be just as happy if we agreed to change our name to something else, as long as we both chose it. It could be a combination of our current names (Whitesell, Fusside?), or something we just like (maybe there’s a first name in both our family histories that would make a nice last name).

Don, however, likes his name and wants to keep it. Because he wouldn’t change his name, he doesn’t see why I would want to change mine. He’s being honest and completely fair. If I want to take his name, he won’t object (and he’ll probably even be happy in the long run); he just doesn’t see why I would change the only identity I have ever known.

So, if he doesn’t care, why DO I want to change my name?

I’m in media relations and a spokesperson for my industry, so my name is highly google-able right now and I’m sure our PR firm would be happier if I kept my name. I thought about changing my name officially, but using my maiden name for work … however that seems like it could turn into a real pain.

I own the URL for my current name, but the URL for my potential new name is already taken. I sent an e-mail to the person using it right now, but have not heard back from her.

Even though my current last name is kind-of hard to pronounce and hard to spell (I don’t know why either of those things are true since no one misspells or mispronounces Russell, but for some reason the “F” changes things), I do like the way it sounds and I like my initials. My potential new name is a lot easier to pronounce and spell, but I’ll probably use my maiden name as middle name making is less attractive to the ear and giving me odd initials (try writing out SLF and SFW and see what I mean).

Add up all of those things and it seems impractical to change my name, but I’m doing it anyway - because when it comes down to it, I want to share a name with Don. I just WANT to.

So, in just over five months I will begin the process of becoming Susan Whiteside. What do you think of my new name?

Once again, I’m going to take a minute to blog about something other than my own wedding. I’m sure I’ll be back later this week with something as self-centered as usual.

Don and I headed to Capitol Hill to participate in the Prop 8 Protest March on Saturday. Equality in every aspect of life - especially love and marriage - is something I feel strongly about every day. But since I’m planning my own wedding, I feel especially passionate about the civil laws surrounding marriage right now - way more so than I ever thought I would to be honest.

I’m so happy that I’m going to have a chance to be Don’s wife … but until we became engaged I thought it was far more important for me to be Don’s partner. I feel like we’ve enjoyed that status for a long time so there was never really any pressure on us or our relationship to get married (well, except for the fact that I like diamonds a lot!). I knew I would be his wife one day, and I didn’t spend a lot of time thinking about when that day would come.

Truthfully, I probably felt that way because I had the luxury of knowing that when and if we decided to change our status we could do so in just about any way we wanted - from a big black tie affair to the two of us at the Courthouse - and it would be legal in EVERY state in this country.

Since we got engaged, however, my opinion evolved. Being Don’s partner is still the most important aspect of our relationship for me, but I have a new appreciation for the act of making public the private commitment we already share, and for being his legally wedded wife - an institution that has a universal meaning and conveys a universal message of our bond (in a way that simply saying he is my partner never could). I find myself pouring word by word through countless wedding ceremonies, and considering what each and every one of those words really means.

I’m overly emotional even at the best of times, but since we got engaged it’s rare that two or three days pass that I don’t encounter some part of wedding planning that moves me to tears.

Nonetheless, I was completely unprepared for the reaction I had when we arrived at the protest. I started crying almost immediately. It is so unfair that Don and I can celebrate our love by participating in a government-sanctioned ceremony that affirms our commitment to each other for better or worse while some other people whose love is just as real and just as strong don’t have that option.

That sentimentality, of course, doesn’t even begin to address the fact that there are legal matters that are addressed by legal marriage. I’m not really planning to discuss them here because, quite honestly, when I started crying I wasn’t thinking about survivorship and wills and life insurance; I was thinking about love.

I was thinking about the man who held the sign reading, “Married August 30, 2008. Unmarried November 4, 2008″. I was thinking about the couple who lifted up the sign reading, “Our Gay Son’s Rights are Unalienable”.

And I cried. Several times.

What was strange was that I didn’t notice anyone else crying. For the most part, everyone else seemed really happy and excited. And I have to hope that it’s because the community sees the light at the end of tunnel and soon everyone in the country will have the right to be married to their partner in life.

Not long after the March started moving in the direction of the White House, the skies opened up and Don and I ducked into the metro to head home. Later, when I looked at Don’s pictures of the day, I felt some of that same hope.

This multi-city march was the largest LGBT protest ever organized in this country - and what brought it together was love. The signs below, with the Washington Monument in the background, sum it up for me.

Today my friend Erin and I took the afternoon off from work, had a leisurely lunch at the cafe at Nordstrom and then hit the Bobbi Brown counter where we had appointments for makeup application.

Skip this post if you don’t care a thing about makeup, because I’m going into some detail here. Do not skip this post if your name is Sofia.

I was curious about the long wearing cream eye shadows that Bobbi offers because my friend Kristen had just purchased some. The day I saw her, Kristen had taken a shower and her eye makeup still looked amazing.

Here’s the overall look the consultant put together for me. I’m not sure it’s what I expected, but it was pretty nice.

As you can see, it’s not too heavy (that’s kind of the signature of Bobbi Brown Cosmetics - natural, but taken up a notch or two).I was expecting an even more neutral eye pallet, though. The consultant instead used “sand dollar” (silver) eye shadow with “brown rock” in the crease (there’s also an all over shadow in “white” across the entire eyelid). The gel liner is called “espresso”. It does make my eyes look even bluer, I have to admit. You can see the shadow better in this picture. I didn’t buy anything because I want to see how it wears after a few hours and I want to see what Don thinks (since it would be very bad if on our wedding day Don doesn’t think I look like myself). I also think the eye liner might be a little dark ..,. her alternate suggestion was a lighter brown called chocolate shimmer.

In the event that you care about makeup stuff, I’m also wearing:

• Eye corrector and concealer (”bisque” and “sand”) to remove the darkness under my eye
• Foundation (”warm sand” in a stick tube)
• Bronzer (”light”)
• Mascara (”black” no smudge)]
• Blush (”pale pink”)
• Lipstick and liner (”pink mauve”)
• Lip Gloss (”rosy”)

Finally, here is a picture taken Saturday night where I’m looking down in a similar way to the picture above. This was not a long-wearing application, and I didn’t have any primer on so most of the shadow slipped right off my lid, but this is what I normally look like with eye makeup.

The colors here are a coppery brown, a light silvery blue near the brow, and deeper blue (denim) in the crease. Maybe it’s too muddy? Don doesn’t mind it so much when it’s freshly applied, but as the day wears on he finds it a little “raccoon-y”. So don’t suggest a smokey eye as I don’t think he’d find that nice on me at all.

Any opinions? I’m not a makeup girl … so, really, help me out here.
Oh - my dress is ivory and I will probably wear pearls if that make a difference at all (the consultant today did ask).