Wendy & Chuck's PJ and TR Merged 2/4/08 Escape SBP/JIKO: Updated 9/19-Pleasure Island

[PrincessBride010103]

It's an Italian, Greek and Middle Eastern (pre-christian aka originally pagan) wedding tradition and each of the five almonds is supposed to imbue the marriage with one of each of the following.. health, wealth, longevity, fertility and happiness. Since five, an odd number, is not divisible, it is supposed to make the marriage indivisible. In some traditions three are used just to enhance fertility.

I'm not Italian, Greek or Middle Eastern and I actually love them and their pre-christian origins and the real reason the tradition exists. But under the same circumstances, I would veto them too.

i dont need to be any more fertile so no jordan almonds for me!!!!

and wendy...congratulations!!!

 

[helloirishkitty]

I would just like to announce that I met my weight loss goal!! I wanted to lose 20lbs total and today I weighed in at 20.5lbs lighter than when I started!!!!

Congratulations!!



That's awesome!!

 

[thatdisneygirl]

Congratulations!!! That's fantastic (and inspirational)!

 

[Lizby]

Woohoo! You should be so proud! I can't wait to see your wedding pics...you will be so beautiful

 

[caryndisneydiva]

wendy, i hope i get to see you next week, hopefully i can convince mark that staying in fl a few extra days is a good thing!!! if not though...HAPPY WEDDING! i can't wait to read your tr and see all of your pics! i'm so excited for the 4 of us!!! our tr's will keep us out of the post wedding slump! don't forget to keep your on and don't stress!!!!!!

 

[Lisella]

Congrats on meeting your goal!

 

[figmentfan814]

Congratulations on meeting your goal, that must be a great feeling

 

[MistressOfAllEvil]

HOOOOORAY!!!!

yaaay for you! congrats!!!!!!!!!!!!

Congrats!! That is great!

You didn't just meet your target you bashed right past it!

Wooooooooooohoooooooooooooooo!

Wowee wow wow! Way to go!

Congratulations, that's AMAZING!

Congratulations, Wendy!! That is awesome!!

Way to go Wendy! Nice job on the weight loss!

i dont need to be any more fertile so no jordan almonds for me!!!!

and wendy...congratulations!!!

Congratulations!!



That's awesome!!

Congratulations!!! That's fantastic (and inspirational)!

Woohoo! You should be so proud! I can't wait to see your wedding pics...you will be so beautiful

Congrats on meeting your goal!

Congratulations on meeting your goal, that must be a great feeling

Thank You Everyone!!

I've been MIA b/c I've been busy and sick. I've got updates coming up shortly here... promise!

 

[MistressOfAllEvil]

wendy, i hope i get to see you next week, hopefully i can convince mark that staying in fl a few extra days is a good thing!!! if not though...HAPPY WEDDING! i can't wait to read your tr and see all of your pics! i'm so excited for the 4 of us!!! our tr's will keep us out of the post wedding slump! don't forget to keep your on and don't stress!!!!!!

Oh Caryn... you're gone. You won't see this until you're back... I'm going to miss you for the last week and a half here before I leave. All I can say is that I HOPE HOPE HOPE that you can get Mark to stay in FL for a few extra days. And I hope you know that you're more than welcome to come lurk outside my wedding!! I'm sure you do!

I hope that Carrie and Patrick are come along on the water and blow the horn!!! Eeeeeee!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[MistressOfAllEvil]

Where are we at with everything???

Hmmmm... let's see. Thursday evening I got home from school and both Chuck and Christie (FSIL/MOH) were there. I started talking to her about wedding stuff and then asked if Chuck told her about the whole jordan almonds situation. To which he looked up with a "caught" look on his face. He of course had not done the one thing I asked him to. So, with my stomach churning, I explained why it was a bad idea and what Kathleen said, etc... So, Christie says... well, what if we just put them in tins instead. I told her I didn't know and I would have to ask Kathleen. So, I emailed Kathleen Friday to have her call me and got an auto reply stating she would be out until today. So hopefull her and I will be able to pow-wow on the phone to craft the perfect email response that I can use to discourage the stupid Jordan Almonds.

On Thrusday I also made appointments for Christie and I at the MAC counter for Sunday. Well it costs $50 for a half hour session, but the $50 goes towards your purchase. The more I thought about it though, the more I realized I was going to end up spending way more than $50 to get everything I would need to do my own make-up for the wedding. I started to panic, because this is what you do when you're two weeks away from leaving and you feel like everything you've decided to do sucks and nothing is confirmed or finished or planned! So I sent a couple of emails out and I was able to book Beaute Speciale for make-up only from 10:30am-12:30pm. It's cheaper for me to pay to have our (mine, christie's and my other bm Jenna) make-up done. So, I am. I hope that it turns out okay. I did learn however that they have 20 artists, not just Ana. So did everyone who use Beaute Speciale have Ana?? Or did you request her specifically? Or did you end up having someone else? And if so, how were they??? tia.

ALSO on Thrusday, I had Christie call the Lenox outlet at Birch Run to see if they had any of the mickey and minnie ear ornaments and sure enough they did. So, I had her have them put 20 of each on hold for us to go pick up on Saturday. Turns out they weren't supposed to hold them, but they did because they said they would. Not that we were in danger of not getting them. They had nearly 40 of each in the store anyhow and as far as I know I'm currently the only crazed disney bride in MI. So saturday we drove up there and I ended up buying enough mickeys for the guys, minnies for the girls, one extra of each. I also bought the groom and bride ear ornaments for Chuck and I. And! I found a very cute silver jewelry box to give to my niece as her flower girl gift. Now I need to just find a pair of little girl pearl earings for her, which should be super easy. It's just having the time to do it! I also bought, at the lenox outlet (we're still there, lol) picture frames for both Chuck's parents and mine. They're completely different b/c our parents are completely different. They're both 8x10 and I think they're both beautiful. So, now I'm thinking that I need to type something sweet up to put in the frames until we ended up getting the wedding picutres to put in them.

Chuck also ordered his attendant gift for Anthony. It's a USB storage drive that looks like a ducati tail. This is huge b/c Chuck and Anthonly are in a bike club together and loooooove riding and Anthony has a Ducati. So, it's perfect. I decided that I'm getting Jenna a gift certificate to the spa at Coronado Springs for a massage the day after the wedding (I know she wants this.) and after a lot of struggling I finally decided to blow the extra cash and get Cirque tickets for Christie and I as her gift.

So, Friday night my sister dropped my niece off and I took her to dinner and then to the book store to use her gift card she got for Christimas from my parents. Her's was for $25 and mine was for $40 from my parents for xmas as well. Somehow she left with 7 (chapter!) books and I only got 2. She stayed the night and then Saturday morning we met my girlfriend Wendy and her two daughters and her Mother at the theater and we all finally saw Enchanted. It was very, very, very, very cute. And I have to say, I had quite an appreciation for Giselle since I was in entertainment and Disney and so I like to pretend that I'm more aware of certain things. She was spot on taking the animated character to real life. The only thing I could have done with out was the rats and roaches... ewwwwwwwwww!!!!

After the movie, my sister picked my niece up and that's when Christie and I hightailed it to the gym, tanning salon, dinner and then up to Birch Run for the Lenox run (see above, lol.)

On Sunday, Chuck, Christie and I ended up at the mall. I bought the most adorable dress for our welcome dinner at Ohana, but not without a complete bridal breakdown. Christie was poo-pooing my choices and I had a coniption fit. She's trying to get decked out like she's going to the club on new year's eve, Christie style for our 5pm-in-Florida, Ohana, poly-theamed dinner. I finally freaked out and said that I was sick and frustrated and that it was annoying to have to try to get her family to dress down and my family to dress up enough for everyone to A. meet in the middle and 2. fufill my vision for what the dinner should look like. She said that it was just a miscommunication and that she didn't realize. That's a bunch of malarky b/c she showed me a dress she had purchased earlier in the week and I told her it was too dressy. I reiterated that it was 5pm in Florida at Ohana and that she should be dress casual. She claims that casual makes her think jeans and a t-shirt!! ***... I told her that the problem was that her and I have different definitions for words like dressy and casual and that the other problem is that she doesn't recognize that there's anything in between. I'm going to take a picture of the dress I bought and post it so you guys can see how absolutely cute and perfect it is. And if everyone else aside from Chuck and I looks dumb, I DON'T CARE. My mom actually called me on Sunday as we were parking to go into the mall all panicked about what she was going to wear for the wedding. First of all, shame on her for waiting so long. Second of all she's worried that the outfit she found is going to be too dressy?!?! She described it. It doesn't sound too dressy. I told her so. Really, too dressy for your oldest daughters wedding??? Damn, what does she want to wear?? Track pants?? This is from the mother who asked me point blank if she could wear jeans to the shower with a sweater. I told her no. She never even heard or retained my answer and showed up in jeans. Along with my sister in jeans. ***. I told them NO JEANS for the welcome dinner. Put on a cute pair of khaki capris or a skirt or something. jeeze. And she's apprently concerened that the outfit my sister is wearing to the wedding makes her look fat. Makes her look fat??? She is fat? Sorry, I'm not being rude about it. I can say overweight if that makes people feel better. But it's a fact, not a name calling session. So, if her outfit accentuates her heavieness, so be it. What am I supposed to do? Worry about how big my sisters butt looks on my wedding day????? Okay, mini-rant over. Also on Sunday, Chuck dropped over $300 on an outfit for the welcome dinner. LOLOL. That would be over 3x what my dress cost. But it was all from Tommy Bahama. And I guess I should mention that we will also be wearing these clothes for our honeymoon portait session at MK that day too.. and I explained to Captain Undershirt that it would also make a nice outfit for while we're on the cruise. He's cool with it. He just doesn't understand paying extra for nice, quality clothes. So finally after I harangued anyone with-in a 15 foot listening radius about the dress code for the welcome dinner, Chrisite ended up buying yet another dress. Bright Yellow. It's cute. I'm just not sure she understands that it's my wedding and that she should NOT be showing me up. Sunday night she made me choose which ankle bracelet she should wear for the wedding. When I told her none, she said that wasn't possible. So she's going to have on more jewelry than a freakin' gypsy!!!! And for sure more than me. When I first told her about us getting our make-up done, I told her I was getting lashes put on. She said she didn't want any (good!) and then changed her mind and told me yesterday that she does. Tough. She's not getting them. I told her sunday night that I get to dictate what her hair and make-up look like. The closer we get the more I'm being forceful about this stuff. She should not look more done up than me on my wedding day. I told her this point blank. She said, don't worry, everyone will know you're the bride.


So, what's my plan?? Work today. I'm going to try to leave early so that I can find a gold pen to use on the ornaments to have my friend's friend personalize them for me for all our guests. Then it's off to the gym and tanning salon. I hope to get to school by 5pm to work in the computer lab. I'm trying to "get ahead" in both of my classes and take the first test in both classes before I leave. It's probably one of the least stressful things I need to do b/c it's just working through the tutorials and flipping though the lab manual and then completing the assingments. It's very methodical and doesn't require too much brain power from me! Kinda funny that school is the least mentally challanging thing on my to-do list.

Things I still need to do:
-Adjust reservations (yet again) after the whole best man fiasco of earlier this month.
-find a purse to use on my wedding day
-confirm with Randy
-confirm with Ron
-pre-pay Beaute Special (by wed the 30th)
-talk to Kathleen re: jordan almonds, placing ornaments out as place cards, dropping number from 20 to 17 for the recption dinner, possible shipping stuff to her for the wedding?!?
-get ahead in both classes for school
-buy gold pen and coordinate personalization of ornaments
-creat list of things to buy for welcome bags to send with MOH (who's leaving two days before us) to buy when she gets to FL.
-work out two days on/one day off
-tan every other day
-figure out how to pack veil
-clean house and get all laundry done
-pack (and try not to forget anything)
-post on Dis about daily happenings and back track to cover shower and bachlorette party

I'm sure there's more, this is just off the cuff. We leave in 9 days. I'm kinda freaked out!

 

[MistressOfAllEvil]

My planner Kathleen just called. She talked me down some (as far as anyone was going to be able to anyhow) from my Jordan Almond rage. I've agreed to let them be in tins. We're going to put them in a basket though, not at everyone's place settings. People can take them as they leave! Ugh. I'm trying really hard to not be petty and to be the bigger, better person here. I don't think I've succeeded yet. Hmpf.

As a bright spot, she did offer to be responsible for taking them to Jiko for set up and then "forgetting" them. Then we could blame her. I just didn't know if I could stoop that low. Because am I not then being as underhanded as the person who has decided to "surpise" me with the jordan almonds in the first place?

 

[mla1977]

Funny idea! I understand not wanting to stoop to that level though.

I just got an invite to a cousin's fiance's shower. I'm not sure if she is Italian (could be based on the last name, but could be Spanish or something too). I wonder if they will have Jordan almonds there? I'll let you know!

Here's my issue with this shower though:

I received the invite to the shower, but never received a save the date for the wedding. Those apparently went out a while ago. Hmmm... everyone says that maybe they didn't have the address. Well, the shower invite made it to me and it is addressed correctly. I guess the wedding is the Friday after Easter. I'm going to the shower anyways. I just better receive a wedding invite!

 

[lurkyloo]

Second of all she's worried that the outfit she found is going to be too dressy?!?! She described it. It doesn't sound too dressy. I told her so. Really, too dressy for your oldest daughters wedding??? Damn, what does she want to wear?? Track pants?? ... What am I supposed to do? Worry about how big my sisters butt looks on my wedding day????? ... Sunday night she made me choose which ankle bracelet she should wear for the wedding. When I told her none, she said that wasn't possible. So she's going to have on more jewelry than a freakin' gypsy!!!! And for sure more than me.

I think you should go into stand-up after this wedding - your angle can be wedding humor

Let me try to help with some of these things on your list...

Things I still need to do:
-Adjust reservations (yet again) after the whole best man fiasco of earlier this month.
-find a purse to use on my wedding day
-confirm with Randy
-confirm with Ron
-pre-pay Beaute Special (by wed the 30th)
-talk to Kathleen re: jordan almonds, placing ornaments out as place cards, dropping number from 20 to 17 for the recption dinner, possible shipping stuff to her for the wedding?!?
-get ahead in both classes for school
-buy gold pen and coordinate personalization of ornaments
-creat list of things to buy for welcome bags to send with MOH (who's leaving two days before us) to buy when she gets to FL.
-work out two days on/one day off
-tan every other day
-figure out how to pack veil
-clean house and get all laundry done
-pack (and try not to forget anything)
-post on Dis about daily happenings and back track to cover shower and bachlorette party

Pack a veil - I know how to do that! Wrap it in tissue paper and put it in a plastic bag. Then hang it up in the bathroom or have Carolyn Allen steam it.

I wish I could help with all those other things...

 

[MistressOfAllEvil]

Here's my issue with this shower though:

I received the invite to the shower, but never received a save the date for the wedding. Those apparently went out a while ago. Hmmm... everyone says that maybe they didn't have the address. Well, the shower invite made it to me and it is addressed correctly. I guess the wedding is the Friday after Easter. I'm going to the shower anyways. I just better receive a wedding invite!

This is weird. And this has had me questioning weather I had posted my plan for the at home reception?!? Not that I think it is right in the least that you were invited to a shower but have not received a wedding invitation without some sort of reasoning as to why. For example, there were plenty of people who were invited to my shower knowing that they were not invited to the wedding, but would be invited to the at home reception a few months later. Most people didn't have a problem with this. However, i'm taking issue with the people who couldn't even be bothered to RSVP that they weren't coming. I think those people are off my list for the at home reception. I don't want to be bothered to track them down for and RSVP and they obviously can't be trusted to reply on their own. So... is it against wedding etiquette? YES. Do I care at this point?? NO. (this in no way has anything to do with the situation you're in, other than it reminded me to write about this. I find it very odd that you're received no word about the actual wedding!!!)

I think you should go into stand-up after this wedding - your angle can be wedding humor :

I'm always glad I can entertain!! They always say the true stuff is funny. It's too bad my life is this funny. I do hope you enjoy though!

Pack a veil - I know how to do that! Wrap it in tissue paper and put it in a plastic bag. Then hang it up in the bathroom or have Carolyn Allen steam it.

Do you think? Even with the birdcage? I do believe Carolyn Allen's is pressing my dress instead of steaming it. Do you think they can press the veil??? I have the foam ball it came on, I just don't know that I'll ever be able to wrap it back on there all neat and snug.

 

[mla1977]

This is weird. And this has had me questioning weather I had posted my plan for the at home reception?!? Not that I think it is right in the least that you were invited to a shower but have not received a wedding invitation without some sort of reasoning as to why. For example, there were plenty of people who were invited to my shower knowing that they were not invited to the wedding, but would be invited to the at home reception a few months later. Most people didn't have a problem with this. However, i'm taking issue with the people who couldn't even be bothered to RSVP that they weren't coming. I think those people are off my list for the at home reception. I don't want to be bothered to track them down for and RSVP and they obviously can't be trusted to reply on their own. So... is it against wedding etiquette? YES. Do I care at this point?? NO. (this in no way has anything to do with the situation you're in, other than it reminded me to write about this. I find it very odd that you're received no word about the actual wedding!!!)

It is ridiculous what you have gone through with your RSVPs, etc. Having to Escape with so few people, you would think that they realize that they are the only ones being invited.

As for the at home reception, I would be fine if I knew my cousin was doing something like that. His brother got married in Hawaii (wife was from there) and they had a second huge reception here (well, in CT). Anyone could have gone to the one in HI if they wanted to pay to travel though. I think his younger brother did something like that too. I couldn't go to his reception because it was two weeks before I took the bar exam though.

I hope that everything turns out okay with all of your guests though. I wish I could offer some advised on the almonds, but I'd probably give in at this point. I'll still pack my bags and head down there if you decide to dis-invite all the family and invite the DIS family!

 

[lurkyloo]

Do you think? Even with the birdcage? I do believe Carolyn Allen's is pressing my dress instead of steaming it. Do you think they can press the veil??? I have the foam ball it came on, I just don't know that I'll ever be able to wrap it back on there all neat and snug.

Oh crap - I forgot it was a birdcage. Well, I stuffed mine with tissue paper and stuck it in a box (I'm shipping it down to our hotel with all our mouse ear favors, fake bouquet, etc.), so maybe you could get it around the ball as best you can and wrap it up with packing material? I wish I had a ball...

 

[madfelice]

I'd be smacking those darn Jordan Almonds with a big mallet, and I'd be thinking about smacking FMIL with said mallet as well!!

 

[allie_to_you]

I hope everything works out with the jordan almond thing and that things start falling into place for you. We leave in 9 days for Disney also so you'll be there during our trip. I wish you the best!

 

[lurkyloo]

So.... would this be a bad time to ask why your screen name is "Mistress of All Evil"...?

 

[MistressOfAllEvil]

So.... would this be a bad time to ask why your screen name is "Mistress of All Evil"...?

Ummmm... While I was on my CP in 2006, I was checking in for my assigned position in Main Street Ops and ended up being recruited for entertainment. I got to be really good friends with the White Whitch of Narnia AND Maleficent. Maleficent IS the Mistress of All Evil.

Mmmmwaa ha ha ha ha!

I also got to be really good friends with Tigger, Geppetto, Tweedle Dee & Dum, and some others.