The summer of 40 and 100.

This was the summer of my 40th birthday and my great-aunt's 100th. Her birthday was July 2, which was a great way to reclaim that date. There was a big family reunion the week before her birthday, so I went down to where she and her children live, and my parents came up. More family met up there, then we all drove out to the middle-of-no-where West Virginia, to a camp resort where even more family people I'd never met before converged. Most were from the side of my great-aunt's late husband's family, and I didn't know them since I am from my great-aunt's side. (My grandfather was her brother.) It was great to meet and get to know the extended family.

While I was down there, before we went to the camp in no-cell-phone-reception-West-Virginia, I introduced them to my boyfriend via the magic of the Internet. We had hoped he would be able to come on the trip, but he had to work, so we did the next best thing. My second cousins were eager to meet him, and I wanted him to meet them all. As I sat down with my great-aunt and was in the process of connecting to my boyfriend using Google Chat video, I glanced over to my right and saw a stereoscope casually sitting on the table beside me. I thought about how much change my almost-centenarian great-aunt has seen in her lifetime as I watched her video chat with my boyfriend.

Because sometimes you have to throw your own parties.

I threw myself a birthday party. I knew the first part of this month might not be easy for me, so I planned ways to intentionally take care of myself. I wanted to feel surrounded by loved ones and welcome in a new year, and a birthday is a perfectly normal reason to have a party. (Unfortunately a I-survived-the-depths-of-hell party is a little less socially acceptable.) And since I didn't have someone to throw me a party, I decided to throw one for myself. This probably broke some etiquette rules, especially because I made it a potluck party, but I don't even care. Sometimes you just gotta do what you gotta do.

My possessions are staging a rebellion.

So. My laptop broke on Monday night late, and I had to buy a new one on Tuesday because I have a freelance translation contract to finish for Friday. It was supposed to be delivered Wednesday, but it was not.

On Tuesday I came home and walked in the door and the lights wouldn't work. I thought it was the light bulb. I tried two and determined that it wasn't. Then I thought it might be the fuse. (The fuse box is a mystery to me because it is the old kind of fuses because the apartment is 100 years old.) After someone else checked for me (and I made notes of which fuses do what!), I know that all the fuses are fine.

The process of elimination revealed it is a problem with the contact in the lamp itself (for one of the non-working lamps) and a timer explained the other non-working lamp. The timer is now adjusted and that lamp works now.

Wednesday night I tried to go to meet someone to borrow a laptop to use until the new one arrives and to see if there was anything to be done for the broken one. I got in my car and turned on my windshield wipers. They started up then stopped in the middle of the windshield on the first swipe. So I couldn't drive anywhere because driving any significant distance without windshield wipers in winter in Québec is just not wise.

Choosing thanks.

As I sit at home with Booboo in my lap, I look at the snow outside and think of life and it's unexpected turns. Sometimes life's surprises are exhilarating, sometimes they're excruciating, and sometimes they're just...different.

It's American Thanksgiving, but since that's not a holiday here, it feels like a normal day. Thursday. Except it's not just Thursday, so I am choosing to focus on what I am thankful for today. I have a purring Booboo in my lap, I have a home to live in that is within walking distance of most of what I need, I have a job I enjoy (and freelance opportunities I love), and family and friends that love me and support me. I am lucky...blessed...and thankful. I'm also thankful for hope that everything will be alright in the end and that life has good things in store for me in the future, despite the hell of these past months. It may not always feel that way, but I will choose to believe it anyways. Life does have a way of surprising us, after all.

Comfy shoes.

Credit: Adventures Along the Way

Booboo is the best. I just love him. Who could resist that little face? He's been so affectionate with me these last months...more than normal. I guess he's taking care of me.

Thankful.

I have an amazing group of friends, and I am thankful beyond words for them. Friends from long ago and from recent years; those that are here and those that are far away. Even friends I have not yet met in person, and the new friend I made as I got off the plane at Midway airport in Chicago last week.

I am thankful for them all.

Broken.

It's been 4 weeks and two days since my world fell apart.

But I am still here.

Surrounded by the devastation of broken dreams, I know I have no choice but to try to figure out how to get the hell back up.

They say the grief process is not linear, and now I can say I agree with that. There are just so many triggers. I never know when I'll encounter one, but I am trying to just let myself experience the pain as the waves hit.

And hit they do. While at work, walking down the street, climbing the steep stairway to my apartment, or hanging out at a BBQ. I am getting used to crying in all sorts of places. Thankfully I am surrounded by a supportive community.

They say the only way out is through. So I am trying to make my way through.

I find solace in the river and water. Usually I walk to the water on my lunch break because it helps somehow. I am thankful for working near the water, loving friends and family, Booboo, daisies, waterproof mascara, sunglasses and my favorite dresses.

The worst month of my life (thus far, and I surely hope, ever) is over. Here's to a less bad August.

An update of sorts.

• Earlier this summer I was fired up to write a post about how I was seeing a lot of rudeness in society these days. But....eh. I decided not to.
• This is partially because we escaped away from it all and spent a month in Australia. A month in Australia can do remarkable things, including reducing levels of annoyance.

Photo credit: S

Photo credit: S

• See? It does wonders.
• The jet lag I had after coming back was the worst I've ever had. It took me ten days to get back on our Canadian time zone. But hey, it was fun staying up to dawn again; it had been an unbelievably long time since I'd done that.

Living Abroad (and Reflecting on Home)

I just read Chelsea Fagan's What Happens When You Live Abroad. Feeling inspired to write, I opened up a new post and quickly started to entitle it "Leaving Home." But then I stopped. What do I mean when I say "leaving home"? It surely isn't as simple as that for me. "Leaving One Physical Place for Another and Discovering Something New About Home" might be closer.

The other day my dad sent me a few emails with charts of our genealogical history going WAY back. Back to the "Old World." When I looked at the branches going back over several hundred years, it's clear that our roots are mostly in the general region of my home of origin. Basically my ancestors established themselves in one state and made their way to the neighboring state and stayed there. This is the state where I grew up, as did my parents and grandparents and others before them. Our family history is definitively there. But when I go back far enough, there is that one very distant ancestor who was born in England then died in the "New World." He is the one that changed the path of our family tree by leaving everything that was familiar to make a life in a new place.

And here I am, an immigrant in another country, with the realization that I have made a similar jump that impacts our family history. I feel a little like I betrayed my roots and The Sense of Place of my family.

Ice Ice Baby.

Photo credit: Adventures Along the Way

I have a confession: our cat is an ice cube addict.

It started last year on one particularly toasty summer afternoon in our 100 year-old, unairconditioned apartment. Booboo had been lying around in that stretched out, tummy-up, lethargic position of a cat enduring a heat wave. So I thought I would add an ice cube to his water bowl so that the cool water might provide a little relief from the sweltering temperatures.

Booboo was hooked from the very first cube. Later, when we went in the kitchen, he followed us and meowed by the fridge. We indulged him every now and then because it was funny and cute—and it was hot, after all. The addiction let up a bit after it got cool and winter kicked in, but recently he has begun frequently meowing by the fridge again. And when we give him an ice cube, he rubs his cheeks against the cube, first one side then the other. Again and again. And yet again.

Today, after several (assumed) requests for an ice cube, I got him one, and he rubbed his cheeks against it repeatedly while purring loudly in sheer enjoyment of this small frozen-yet-melting miracle. After a couple minutes of happy cube–cheek rubbing, I made a move to rinse it off so I could drop it in his water bowl, and he complained with a loud meow. So I grabbed a towel to give my cold fingers a break and gave him some more time with his happiness-in-a-cube before dropping it in his bowl. After he realized the cube was in his water bowl, he had some water. Which is a relief because I have recently noticed him standing around by his water bowl, staring at it and not drinking, only to meow at me when I walk in the kitchen. Perhaps he has decided that he only likes iced water now.

I guess we could have worse problems than a cat who has become a water snob. Besides, having that much fun with every ice cube that life has to offer sounds like a pretty good idea.

Well, I'm still here.

Hello! It's been a while. Nothing dramatic has been going on here; it's just been cold and wintry and I guess I have been hibernating a bit. Or maybe it's that I blog so much for work? Who knows. Or quite possibly, it could be the impending deadline of a big project I'm working on. Which reminds me...I should probably be working on that now.

Anyhow, before I go back to that project, I wanted to share some links of a number of interesting articles I've recently read that address societal changes in regards to marriage, singlehood, and concepts of community. Enjoy!

• The Atlantic's All The Single Ladies
• The New York Times' The M.R.S. And the Ph.D.
• The New York Times' One's A Crowd
• The New York Times' Alone Again, Naturally
• The New York Times' Room for Debate: Being Alone Together
  

Hello.

Thia is what Booboo has been up to recently.

If you are still checking this every now and then, you know that I haven't been writing much these last months. I was going to say that I don't really know why, but really it's just that I just haven't felt like it. So I haven't.

I wasn't feeling inspired because it seemed like my life was in a holding pattern of uncertainty, which it was, really, because I spent seven months waiting. Waiting for a decision to be made by somebody whom I have never met that would determine my (and S's) future. For such a stagnant action, it is surprising how emotionally draining waiting can be. And I didn't want to talk about any of it publicly until it was all over.

But now I can say it: After seven months of waiting, I am now a permanent resident of Canada. And it feels absolutely freeing to know with certainty that I am allowed to live here in Canada with my husband forever.

PS. And I plan to post more regularly about all that has been happening recently.

PPS. Isn't Booboo the cutest (and most flexible!) cat ever? But, of course, I am quite biased...

I made a dress. It was not a hit.

Right after New Year's, with a friend's encouragement, I decided to attempt to sew something with a pattern for the very first time. I decided to make a little dress for S's niece for her birthday. The friend helped me choose a pattern and all the necessary items and showed me how to cut out the fabric pieces with the pattern. We put the interfacing on the top and sewed two pieces together that first day. Then I procrastinated for about a month and before I knew it, it was just two days before the birthday party and I had not done anything else to the dress. What can I say? Zippers and piping are just scary-sounding. Anyhow, the friend came over to help me those two days and guided me through the process, zipper and all. When I finally finished at midnight on the night before the party, I was excited that I actually succeeded in making a real-looking dress! Something that was actually wearable in public!

We wrapped it in a cute color-coordinated pink pastel striped bag with pink tissue paper for S's adorable pink-princess-loving niece. She opened it and was underwhelmed.* Maybe I should have stitched a Disney princess appliqué on it? Sigh.**

*As in, she covered her face with her hands, about to cry, when we helped her try it on over what she was wearing for me to measure where the straps needed to be stitched into place to properly fit her.
**At least I accomplished my goal of learning how to sew with a pattern and to make inverted box pleats, put in zippers, do top-stitching, etc. The next project will be something for myself. Less stressful since it won't be a gift for somebody, and I already have some fabric S's aunt gave me that I think will make a cute dress.

Tutu

The tulle Booboo was attacking in the previous post was tulle I bought to make a no-sew tutu for S's niece for Christmas. I had found a video guide on YouTube that I liked and went to Fabricville to get the supplies (I used pink grosgrain ribbon and pink tulle).

Basically, you roll the tulle up, cut it in 3 inch strips, and tie it to the grosgrain ribbon. Super easy and it didn't take very long to put together.

And that is the finished result. (And his niece seems to really like wearing it!)

First Thanksgiving Dinner in Canada.

I forgot today is Thanksgiving until I got an e-card that reminded me that (American) Thanksgiving is, in fact, today. Here in Québec, they obviously don't celebrate American Thanksgiving, but neither do they celebrate Canadian Thanksgiving (which comes earlier anyways). Last year, I did not celebrate either Thanksgiving and I missed it, so this year I decided to host dinner this coming weekend for some of S's family. I will be the only American at our Thanksgiving celebration, and most of the conversation will be in French, which I find pretty great and also kinda funny. I am looking forward to sharing this part of my culture with S's family.

In Chicago, I used to host an annual Day-After-Thanksgiving Thanksgiving Potluck and I miss that. Since I am an only child and our celebrations eventually became just me and my parents, one year I decided it would be fun to invite a bunch of Chicago friends, and we celebrated the day after so that more people could come. We once had 16 people there, and we often had to eat on chairs in a big circle in the living room, with our plates in our laps. I have great memories of those celebrations with my family and friends and am so glad to have had those years of potluck Thanksgivings.

However, having only been in our new apartment since July, I still don't quite feel established enough to host a big shindig. Plus, it would probably be weird to have a potluck for Thanksgiving here, since it isn't celebrated here and the guests are not people who celebrate Thanksgiving. But I think I can handle a sit-down dinner for five adults and two kids. I have cooked before for seven adults, so I have experience with this size of group. But I have never cooked a whole Thanksgiving dinner without my parents' help, so I am a little nervous about the timing of it all and have created a spreadsheet schedule to organize every dish and every task that needs to be done. I hope this level of organization will help it come together and that I can pull off making all the dishes I want to do, some of which are new dishes. (Yeah, I like to live on the edge like that and often try new dishes for company.) And I still have to figure out what to do about the turkey. As a mostly vegetarian, I am not going to cook one. So...I guess I will look at the grocery store to see if there is an already cooked turkey or chicken I could purchase from the deli, and then do the rest of the dishes myself. Or maybe skip the meat part altogether, like I usually do when I cook? I like dressing with gravy (and no turkey), but I don't know if it would be weird for others. Though since they don't do Thanksgiving here, maybe they wouldn't miss it? I enjoy hosting and I am looking forward to it. The only thing is that I often (almost always?) run late in life and when I host people for dinner, I often get stressed in "crunch time" when trying to pull it all together. Hence, my work to prevent this by creating the extensive schedule that begins with tasks today. I will not be trying to iron tablecloths right before guests arrive this year. :) And I am excited to try this new recipe for delicious-looking yeast dinner rolls.

If this goes well, I'd like to host a drop-in Christmas gathering in December for a larger group? Maybe one weekend afternoon with appetizers and desserts? Or an evening, but make it potluck? Our apartment is not quite ready for that level of event right now though since we still are getting settled. Last night we completely re-arranged the living room and now have a configuration of furniture that is infinitely more pleasing. Before it looked like we had thrown everything in the living room with the couch in a bad orientation and had not unpacked much; now our living room looks like a living room. We are slowly making progress in finding the places where things truly belong in this apartment. We lost a room before moving into our apartment, so we have too much stuff for the size apartment we have (and almost no closets), so it has been quite a task to get organized. Plus we are combining all our stuff (since this apartment was the first time we lived with all our stuff together). I used floorplanner.com to create a floorplan for our living room and the furniture, and then could virtually experiment with various arrangements. It is an amazing (free!) tool, and I highly recommend it! Plus you can even look at your design 3-D to see how it "feels." The square shape of our living room was weird to work with, and I had to think outside of the box to fit everything in. Anyhow, now our couch floats in the middle of the room and half the room is the TV and couch area and the other half is my desk, one of our sewing machines, and a reading area. It feels pretty good so far.

Getting settled.

Moving is hard work. Physically, of course, especially if it is a DIY/DIT move, but I find moves are also emotionally exhausting. It hate that feeling of displacement while you are between places without a home base anywhere. Traveling is different because you have a home out there somewhere, even if it is far away. But moving means being in-between homes and living in that liminal space when you have to say things like "our new apartment" and "your old place in Québec" and "my apartment in Montréal" because there are just too many home-like places floating around out there making things a little confusing.

We accomplished our bizarre (and, we hope, worst-ever) move between June 21st and July 11th.* We used the help of professional movers in Montréal to move out of the apartment there (3rd floor apartment with a couch that had to be sent over the balcony to get it out!), and we were so thankful for the help of many friends and family in Québec in moving and getting settled here. S's mom graciously welcomed us to her home so we would have a place to stay while we waited 11 extra days beyond our lease start date for our bathroom to be renovated, S's friend let us store our massive amount of stuff in his warehouse for those weeks when we were apartment-less, and friends and family helped with the prep and the actual move into our new apartment. It was hot on our Québec move-in day, and everyone worked so hard helping us.** Everyone was drenched in sweat after the REMARKABLE feat of moving all our stuff into the apartment (which is one flight up) in only an hour and a half. I have absolutely no idea how that happened so quickly. S and I had for real thought it might take all day. And I had worried I might end up in tears multiple times that day from the stress of it all, but it was all exceedingly better than expected. It went really, really well and I was especially moved by the generous community that helped us.(Haha, pun not intended but I am keeping it cause it makes me laugh!)

In the week or so since move-in day, we have been unpacking and cleaning and trying to figure out where things go and maneuvering around an overwhelming amount of boxes. And trying to buy the things we need to get settled, like curtains and curtain rods and other needed apartment-y things.*** We have been trying to buy stuff second hand, for the eco-friendly aspects, and also for the thrill of discovering something we can re-purpose to fit a need.**** It is going well and over the weekend we even found an unconventional solution to a coat closet. (Our almost 100 year-old apartment doesn't have an entry coat closet, and has very pitiful closets in general. Sadly.) And we found a vintage table we love.***** More to come on that later, after we get more unpacked and take some pictures.

Settling in to a new home is a slow process, at least for us. But thankfully, Booboo seems to be handling it quite well.

*Well, really like four separate moving days: 1) My Montréal stuff to warehouse in Québec; 2) S's Québec stuff to warehouse in Québec; 3) Loading almost all our joint stuff from the warehouse into the moving truck; 4) Moving all the stuff from the truck to the apartment; 4) Some upcoming day where we will get the last of the stuff from S's dad's. Maybe in a week or two?

**That was the week of the "canicule," or heat wave, here in Québec (and elsewhere). And some of our boxes were HEAVY, as many of my Chicago friends certainly know. I am still SUPER thankful for all that help with last year's move. Boy, we have amazing friends. And we should really try to stay put for a while. :)

***This is the first time I have been in an apartment that didn't have blinds left by the previous tenant. Now I am entering a new era of being a curtain-and-curtain-rod owner.

****And we love that it is WAY less expensive too.

****Not that we needed a table at all. But we were surprised by discovering it at the flea market while looking for other things on our list. And we couldn't leave it there. Some things are like that.

The (discouraging) search for an apartment without a bathroom in the kitchen: Part 1

We have spent the last few weeks looking for apartments and houses online. We were considering buying, but recently we decided to focus on renting and postpone buying. We will both be homeless as of June 30th and we don't want to buy out of desperation. The last few days we have been visiting apartments that sounded promising, based on hours and hours of scouring listings to find anything in our price range.

Before I describe our experiences, let me first explain the system here. People describe apartments as the number of rooms, plus the bathroom (which is designated as "and a half"). So, the normal "one bedroom" in U.S. terms is a "three and a half" here in Québec. Meaning there are 3.5 rooms: kitchen, living area, bedroom, plus the bathroom. We are looking for a five and a half or bigger.

Let me also explain that almost every apartment in Québec puts the bathroom in the kitchen. I am strongly against this, despite whatever practicalities might exist for whoever builds the building having to only run water pipes to one place. I think there should be a separation of more than three steps between the toilet seat and a seat at the kitchen table. (This is the awkward reality in my current apartment.) I prefer bathrooms that are in a hall or something so they are not immediately off of a living room area or a kitchen area, providing more privacy both for the people that live in the apartment and any guests that might come over for dinner and have an upset tummy.

Let me describe where we have visited so far, using X (what I paid in Chicago for a one bedroom in a good, but certainly not "most cool" neighborhood) as a cost comparison. We do not want to go over this price, which is more than we ideally want to spend but evidently is way less than most apartments rent for these days in Québec City. Which is not much less expensive than Montréal, shockingly. And also surprising is that most of the available apartments are three and half's or four and a half's. Right now Québec has very few larger apartments on the rental market. Maybe if people luck out and get a bigger one, they stay forever?

Apartment 1: Pretty good 5 and a half in a boring area that is close to our ideal neighborhood area. Nice space, but the rooms are not huge. There is a lot of storage though and this is a big plus. Bathroom is in the kitchen and small/cramped. Landlord is nice. I think there was a weird (smoke?) smell in the apartment, though it didn't bother S and he thinks we could get rid of it. He is probably right. Good parking. Price:  X (including heat)

Apartment 2: Loft downtown. AWESOME in theory; disappointing in reality. Much smaller than anticipated, which is probably too small for us. Run-down look, but they would repaint the scary walls that had weird and obscene paintings of women on them. Suspended ceiling. S could walk to work. Like in 2 minutes. Shower in the bathroom is literally just barely bigger than my body, height and circumference. And I am a petite 5 foot tall woman. I think I could not handle being in such a small space. S is convinced he would be fine with it, though he is taller than me. He did not see this apartment in person though. Difficult or no parking. Price: $125 less than X (including heat). Unheard of price for the location.

Apartment 3: Another loft downtown. Same building as the first one. This loft feels slightly larger (though still smaller than expected) and is pretty and well maintained. Does not have scary murals. High ceiling. The bathroom- get this-- there is NO DOOR and NO CEILING around the bathroom. Basically, in this nice looking apartment, there is only a partial wall as a (non) barrier between the apartment and the bathroom. I doubt I would like this if it were always only just S and I in the apartment. But I know I would not feel comfortable using the bathroom if we had company. I mean, there is no barrier. You might as well be going in the middle of the room. 'Cause you ARE. So...this one was out for me too, though S was pretty okay with the concept. Difficult or no parking. After this visit, our envisioning of our future urban loft life in the old historical, downtown part of town disintegrated. Price: $125 less than X (including heat).

Apartment 4: The most amazing perfect apartment for us ever. It is a 7 and a half. This is the one that I felt was right from the moment I saw the ad. I saw the ad and emailed immediately, I think only minutes after it was posted. I got an appointment to see it and we had the second appointment. It is HUGE. There is enough room that we could live there with a kid or two, if we wanted to. The kitchen is amazing and has an island. Tons of storage. Separate dining area. Large, pretty deck in back. Cool bathroom- in the hallway not near the living area or kitchen!- with 1920s era black and white tiling. Perfect spot in the bathroom for BooBoo's litter box. Double living room.  Good parking. Reminds me of my beloved former Chicago apartment in "feel" and era, only double the size, with washer and dryer hook-ups and a fabulous deck. Our ideal neighborhood. I could go on and on about the various wonderful qualities. Price: X (including heat). We said we were interested, filled out the credit check stuff and were second on the list. We left, giddy with the idea of living here.

Apartment 5: Five and a half in a okay part of town. Hundred year old building, newly renovated to the point of being boring. More-spacious-than-average bathroom...in the kitchen. Small, run down balcony in back. Two rooms are quite small, and the others aren't overwhelming either. Front door opens directly into the living room. This made me realize I definitely prefer a little entry area. The building is for sale, so our landlord would change when somebody bought it and we would possibly have to move next June when our lease would be up. Difficult parking. We were not excited about this place, but filled out the credit check anyways. Because, you know, we need some back up options. Price: X (heat included).

And we stopped visiting here, holding our breath, both of us in love with apartment 4. Hoping that we would get this perfect-for-us, most amazing apartment either of us have ever seen, which was renting for at least a couple hundred less than what comparable apartments rent for. And there are almost no available apartments in Québec City that are larger than a 5 and a half. And now that we have seen The Perfect Apartment, we were having a hard time thinking of spending the same amount of money (or more!) on an apartment half the size and markedly less interesting.

And tonight S got the call. The I'm-sorry-you-didn't-get-the-apartment-because-the-first-people-on-the-list-got-it call. We are both deeply disappointed. I am so upset by not being able to make the home I had been imagining for us here in this apartment. It all is made worse by the fact that we now know this apartment exists, recognize that it is exceptional, and have to admit we will most likely never find another one that even comes close. I know because I have been reading the rental listings for weeks and know what is out there and what things cost. We have seen the best and almost had it, and now nothing else can compare. At least not anything in our price bracket.

I had been envisioning throwing large dinner parties (that apartment could easily comfortably host 15-20 people at a gathering) and thought about how we could set up rooms (we could each have an office and still have a guest room!), and loved the fact that we could even raise a couple kids there. I guess the lesson here is, "Don't count your chickens..."...well, no. The lesson learned here is that I deeply care about where I live. We do not want a luxury apartment, and don't care about living in the "nicest" areas. We like interesting places, which for us, usually means old apartments or houses that have some character (like 1920s or earlier, preferably). With this upcoming move, I was hoping to be able to settle in for more than a year and make a home together. I have been looking forward to idea of a joint home during this year of back and forth between two apartments in two cities. I want an apartment that truly feels like "home," especially living in a new city and new country. Apartment 4 was our dream version of our future apartment and we lost it. All because we were the second appointment and second on the list of people who wanted it. It all comes down to a matter of minutes. Now we are left apartment-less and disheartened by not getting this one. I hope something works out in the next seven days. After that, all sorts of complications ensue with S being out of the country for many weeks, and us only having a two week window to move after he gets back before he is off again for three more weeks for work.

And I guess I need deal and to think positively. After all, it is just an apartment. And wherever S is, home is. But still. This stinks.

Invitations in the approach of an Amish barn raising.

I realized that I never blogged about our DIY wedding invitation making experience last August, so I thought I would share in case somebody out there is considering DIY invitations.

When we started planning our wedding, one of the first things we started with was pricing how much having invitations printed would be. After realizing that they easily cost several dollars a piece, and even the very most basic (and often ugly) ones were about a dollar each, we decided maybe we should make our own. I enjoy making invitations and stationary, and we figured we could create something nicer than those cheap/ugly ones for slightly more than the least expensive cost we saw. So we priced out the supplies we would need. I think our estimate came down to $1.23 or so an invite. (This did not include the cost of a paper cutter, tape, and the punches we bought.)

Then we took a slight detour and decided to check out the kits you can buy at craft stores. We had seen some online that matched the look we were going for, and we thought this could be a low-maintenance solution. With half-off craft store coupons, it would have been cheaper too. So we bought the kit that matched our desired "look" from a craft store in the U.S., but after opening it, I was disappointed by the quality of the paper. Really disappointed. I love quality paper products and this kit was far from that. Parts of it looked like it needed ironing to be flat and some white paper had black random print smudges on the edges. After some evaluation of our situation and deciding that the invitations were very important to me, we decided to work hard and pay a little more to have invitations we would be proud of. And since we wanted to do bilingual invitations, we thought we could get what we wanted more easily if we had more control of the layout.

After deciding (for the second time) to embark on the full, "from scratch" DIY invite experience, S, my parents, and I came up with a design for the invitation. It was back in July and we were visiting my parents in the south. While we were there, and since my mom is an expert in craft-store shopping, we figured out what supplies we needed and bought it all with coupons at various craft stores. We bought a paper cutter too, since we were doing massive amounts of cutting and my dad said we needed something "professional" that could handle it. I don't know if our cutter is professional, but we did get one on the top of the spectrum available at normal craft stores. Thank goodness for all those 50% off coupons we used! We got most of the supplies we needed and took it back to Chicago.* We waited to get the black envelopes and the cards until we got back to Chicago, since I already knew where I wanted to purchase them.

Once back in Chicago, I started researching wedding invitation wording and creating drafts of the invitation, in French and in English. I started out trying to do this in Word, but then ended up teaching myself how to use Publisher because I realized I would not be able to do what I wanted in Word. Finally after many edits and the help of S's mom with the French grammar and etiquette of invitation wording, we got it down to the text wording we wanted.

Then there were some minor aesthetic disagreements about fonts. (I liked the two fonts look, but others thought that looked a little weird and wanted only one uniform font.) The initial two fonts I had thought of using were dramatically different, but I finally decided to compromise by finding two fonts that looked like close cousins of each other. A more elegant one just for our names (Freebooter) and a more standard pretty one for the other text (Monotype Corsiva, which comes normally with Microsoft Office). Because Freebooter looks like a dressed up Monotype Corsiva, I think everyone was pleased. I had the interest I wanted with two different fonts, but everything looked like it "belonged" together and did not have the jarring effect of my initial font combo proposal. I ended up really loving our font choices. Way more than my original idea...

Then I sent out an email to friends in the Chicago area asking (er, begging?) for help assembling our invites. (S was in Canada at this point.) To me, having friends help was necessary (I never-ever-ever could have finished in our short time frame otherwise), but also having those friends gather with me was unexpectedly calming. These friends kept me sane and kept the experience enjoyable. It felt like a communal effort, like what I imagine an Amish barn-raising to be, only not mandatory and with less physical labor and no expected gender roles. (Yes, two of my guy friends did help and put in HOURS of work, along with some female friends.) It did wonders to have those friends around me, successfully pushing back my feeling of being overwhelmed just by cutting, taping, sticking, and chatting.

The above pictures showed the part put together by my parents who, a week or so before, had spent a couple days cutting and assembling this external decorative strip that would eventually be wrapped around the invite. They cut the red strips and white strips; the red being slightly wider and longer than the white, so it would create a red border around the white piece. Then they attached the red and white strips together using double sided archival quality craft tape. After that, they punched out the two fleur-de-lys holes. Finally, they attached double sided tape to the ends of the strips so that they were ready to affix to the cards later in the process. As an added bonus, they divided the strips into groups of twenty-five so we could keep track of how many we had, and they wrapped up the little punched out fleur-de-lys holes in red and white for potential use in another project. Because of the massive amounts of punching they did, they went through two or three of the punches. Evidently those are made for more occasional punching and not repetitive and frequent use like this project.

I got the black envelopes and cards that would be the main "base" of the invite at Paper Source in the Chicago area. My friend L went with me on a lunch break one day, and we had a quick task of figuring out how many packages I needed and how many extra we would need to buy to get the bulk discount. Since our numbers were so close to the number needed for the discount, we bought a few extra to get the discount. (As a side note: weeks before my mom and I had briefly thought of making the cards ourselves by cutting them down from larger paper, but after one or two failed attempts to get a folded card with 90 degree corners and a clean fold and some frustrated, stressed tears by me, we all decided my sanity was worth the $20 or so difference in cost to buy the cards pre-made. And a huge plus was that the cards and envelopes matched exactly and looked great together.) These cards from Paper Source were great and I was very pleased with the quality and the customer service! I love that store.

At the first night where friends were coming to help for our invitation "barn-raising", I was having the font crisis mentioned above and had not yet printed the invites. So, just before they arrived, I finalized my font choice and started printing on my ink jet printer. As I printed and let the pages fully dry, my friends arrived and we established a kind of assembly line approach. I printed the white text pages for the inside, one friend cut the pages with the paper cutter to the proper size**, one friend attached the white invitation text parts (one French, one English) to the inside of the card, and the next friend attached the wrap-around strip. Broken down into parts like this, the process went pretty quickly, but if I had had to do this alone, it would have taken forever!

After they were all assembled, I had another friend who asked if she could take the invites and the envelopes home with her overnight and stuff them for me (while I was packing for my move and trying to get the addresses in the spreadsheet so we could print labels for the invites.)*** Meanwhile two other friends volunteered to help create a label design into which we could import the addresses and print. I had bought large labels already, with the thought that I wanted to use black envelopes and print the recipients' address, our return address, and some sort of wedding image/motif on the label we would attach. But I had no idea how to do that, and these friends stepped in to figure it out.****

On the way out of town, right before our vintage jewelry shopping adventure, we stopped at the post office to mail the invites. I was working myself up to the experience (because my then-neighborhood post office is notoriously mean and many people rant on Yelp about it) but it turned out to be a fine experience, other than a long time in line, and the clerks did not make me angry or cry out of frustration. (Which was often my experience there.) They were quite nice, actually, and went to the effort of finding enough pretty stamps for the envelopes, which ended up being the wedding ring ones. I didn't care what stamps went on there as long as they weren't ugly, so this was fine. We stamped them all then dropped our U.S. invites and some international ones in the mail, and saved all the Canadian ones to mail from Canada several days later.

All said and done, it was a LOT of work for me and a LOT of friends and family who donated hours and hours of time to help. It did end up being less expensive than ordering invites (well, invites that were anything more the very cheapest ones available), but what was most special to me was to be able to create an invite that was very "us", with the French and English, and with the colors and design we had chosen. It makes me smile to know that our invitation was truly was one of a kind, made just for us with people that love us. We got some good feedback on it, and I am kinda proud of the fact that our invitations looked a little unconventional as far as a normal wedding invite goes (at least where I come from), but still remained classy. I loved using our fun labels (S was great at applying the labels and stamps, and very precise at sticking them on straight, which was surprisingly difficult for me!) And I know it is standard to use calligraphy and black envelopes are probably a wedding "no-no" to some, but we didn't care and it felt just right for us!

 

*A fun benefit of making the invites is that there was some leftover supplies and I have been using them for business cards and have enough cards and envelopes to make some cool stationary later. And the paper cutter has totally come in handy many times. Who knew how useful they were?


**For some reason, the act of cutting the paper down into the proper size while keeping it centered (there were two on each page that had to be cut out) almost sent me over the edge. Thankfully, I was rescued by my (male) friends, M and D who manned the paper cutter and did a FABULOUS job cutting them down exactly right. 

***We skipped calligraphy, handwriting, RSVP cards, and inner envelopes and I am still so thankful we made each of those choices! It saved trees, expense, effort, and reduced stress.

****How did we end up with such amazing and giving friends? I feel so thankful. All these wedding-helping friends saved me from countless tears and from losing the little sanity I was holding on to at that point, less than two weeks before an international move and about seven weeks before the wedding. As did the many friends who about a week or two later helped me pack and move. And then the friends who helped with even more wedding stuff before and at the wedding. I can not say enough how much all that amazing help those few weeks carried me through one of the most stressful times I have experienced.

Rushing pumpkin pie to decorate the tree.

"First comes love,
then comes marriage,
then comes baby in a baby carriage."

Saturday was our six month-versary, and on that very day I got not one, but two emails that suggested the idea of the impending "baby carriage." The first one I noticed was an email from The Knot entitled, "Pregnant? New Parent? Trying to Conceive?" I opened it and it told me: "Believe it or not, it's already been six months since we helped you plan your dream wedding!" Then it went on to tell me about their other baby and family websites. Now, I don't mind them letting me know about their other sites, but as they reminded me: We have only been married SIX months! Isn't it a little early for baby hints from anyone besides one's own mother?* Then I realized that I had also received a baby-centric email from Crate and Barrel advertising their child-focused company.

Exactly six months into a marriage seems a little quick to begin the bombardment of newlyweds with pressure to start a family. After all the excitement of the major mile marker of a wedding and the beginning of a marriage, does normal life just seem so boring that people decide to jump ahead to the talk of babies? Is it about needing something concrete to look forward to? Or maybe it's about wanting to celebrate something?

To me, it seems a bit like putting up Christmas decorations right after Halloween, and losing Thanksgiving  in the shuffle. Personally, I prefer to enjoy Thanksgiving for what it is before putting up Christmas decorations. I wait to put up our Christmas tree until after Thanksgiving, usually in early December. I love Advent, which is a whole liturgical season emphasizing the idea of preparing for (and waiting for) the celebration of the birth of Jesus at Christmas. In the liturgical calendar, Christmas Eve marks the beginning of the season of Christmas (Christmastide) which then lasts to January 5th. (You know, the idea behind "The Twelve Days of Christmas.") But, of course, by January, the stores have been flooded by a sea of hearts and chocolate.

I guess that's just how it is because our society, as a whole, seems to like to rush things. To speed through the present moment in favor of embracing the excitement of The Next Event.** And I admit I often find myself thinking to the future and missing some of the joy to be found in the present, but I am working to change that and be more intentionally awake in the Now. And for me, Now is being a newlywed. It's about learning more about each other and dreaming and thinking about how we want to live life together. A current (very recent) exploration we are having is related to the idea of buying a house. Or maybe not. Or maybe in a few years. But babies...? I think we are still enjoying the pumpkin pie for now. Though we do talk about potential future Christmas decorations.*** We are just not ready to buy the gingerbread house making kit yet. And I think businesses should not try to rush to sell them to us on our six-month-versaries.

*I don't mind the occasional hint from my mom. And I don't mind talking about this subject with friends of family. I do mind businesses trying to put their timing on me. 

**I do think that people are starting to make choices to live differently and not buy into the rush-rush model of how to live. Like the Slow Movement and the Slow Food movement.

***And I have also been thinking about the Slow Parenting idea and potential implications on our hypothetical future child's childhood and high school years, and the ramifications in the college admissions process and beyond.

Some Christmas and New Year's Photos...

An ornament from a trip to Budapest years ago.

A little ballerina ornament that I love even more because it is broken. One of her wings is broken too.

An attempt at some eco-friendly wrapping using advertisements from the recycling bin.

Booboo claiming a new surface.

It was fun to celebrate Christmas with both S's family and my family.

Our friends K and D came for New Year's. We talked and talked. And ate, including a fun fondue meal.

We made New Year's Eve cookies. And took some to S's extended family's Christmas celebration on January 1st.