Don't Mess With a Stubborn Redhead

In 2007, Sister Lioness was scheduled to have her high school senior prom at a South Florida hotel called the Marriott Marina. When the hotel was bought out and rebranded as the Harbor Beach Resort, the contract was honored. It was just the right thing to do. Our wedding venue, Anthony's Fine Dining, did not think this was entirely necessary. Apparently, they just weren't as concerned with respect for a bride's big day, a commitment to doing the right thing, or general public image.

Our wedding venue went out of business just a couple of weeks after our wedding day. They sold to a new owner and became the semi-private Yacht and Polo Club, which I found interesting because there are neither yacht docks nor polo fields on their property. The classic antebellum home was once decorated with vintage furniture, antique art, and Southern charm. Just imagine the retching in brides' stomachs when they arrived to this venue for their rehearsal to unexpectedly find riding chaps and oars lining the walls. Surprise! You're having a gentleman-themed wedding!

In addition to a significant change in decor, the venue has also lost their liquor license. Another surprise! You get to buy your own alcohol and find people to serve it...at the last minute! These disasters seem like tiny inconveniences compared to the thousands of dollars lost on deposits. Oh yes, the previous owner allegedly took the money and ran.

This story has been all over the boards over here...in fact, it's been all over most wedding sites' boards. It was also discussed on The Bert Show, one of Atlanta's most beloved morning radio shows, and it was covered on Atlanta's Channel 2 News.

I was lucky. The Lioness wedding was one of the last weddings held prior to this disastrous transition.

Our wedding day was wonderful, and everything went smoothly despite encountering some horrible customer service from Anthony's just two weeks earlier. However, I was disappointed with how everything was executed post-wedding.

First of all, we were promised doggie bags and never received them. Sure, it sounds petty, but when you spend that much money on food, you expect to take some with you. Fortunately, I made it a point to eat during the reception, so I was able to fully enjoy my entree. However, we never received hors d'oeuvres from cocktail hour, as we were taking pictures during that time. Our guests rave to this day about these fried cheese grits dumplings that were served; we will never have the privilege of trying them. I will concede the fact that Anthony's boxed up our leftover cake.

Our contract also listed that final payment would be based on consumption. Of course, our balance was due prior to the wedding, so I asked for clarification during these negotiations. Both Anthony's business manager (at the time) and their day-of coordinator responded that they "almost always give money back, because no one drinks as much as you think they will." I know we had some pretty tipsy guests, but I highly doubt they consumed as much as we paid for. Nonetheless, we did not see a dime post-wedding.

What got to me most of all was the fact that we left some items at the venue: our ladder, our chuppah, my vintage chair, and a hammer. Our day-of coordinator assured us that we could pick them up whenever it was convenient for us. I trusted her, so I didn't worry about it. When we returned from our honeymoon, I emailed Anthony's to arrange for pick up. No response. I gave it another week before I sent another email. Again, no response. When I didn't hear back from my third email, I decided to call. A recording stated that Anthony's was no longer in business. I decided that the only way to get my stuff back was to speak to them in person.

The banquet office door was locked, so I decided to let myself in through a different door. I tracked down the day-of coordinator, who seemed less than thrilled to see me. (Oh heyyyy, I was totally going to email you back?) I told her that I just wanted my stuff back, and she responded by saying, "I think we might have thrown it out."

Ladders and hammers are replaceable, so I wasn't worried about those. Our chuppah, however, had received a few offers from potential buyers. More importantly, I wanted the lace from the top of the chuppah. We got married underneath that lace, and I wanted to use it as matting in a framed letterpress print of our vows. And the chair! Oh, I wanted the chair.

I informed her that I was going to look around until I found at least the chair and the lace. She walked away to "help me look," saying that she was pretty sure I wouldn't find much. I shouted after her, "Oh yes I will! I want my blue chair back! I WANT MY BLUE CHAIR BACK!" a la Damien from Mean Girls, requesting a certain pink shirt.

I found the chair and the lace, and headed for my car. But not before the day-of coordinator could reunite with me and confront me about a less than stellar review I had given them on Wedding Wire...something about a cupcake incident. The last thing I wanted to do at this point was discuss The Cupcake Incident (which has now earned capitalization) again, so I simply said, "You should be grateful for the feedback." And I got the capital F out of there.

Venues, schedule an appointment with your brides about a month or two after the wedding to tie up loose ends. Your referrals are so crucial to your business; it is absolutely crucial to provide the best possible customer service from the very beginning to even after the wedding. Brides, when you negotiate your contract with any vendor, inquire about a back-up plan. I don't mean to scare anyone, but it's rough out there. It can never hurt to ask about something like a "recession clause." You never know what may be going on behind the scenes. For example, this photo was taken at our photo booth. Since those polo props weren't mine, I can only assume the transition had already begun.

{by Shipliketheboat Photography}

The Important Thing

I should begin by saying that I'm writing this post several months before our wedding, but I'm scheduling it to post just before the big day.  I'm doing so to remind myself to keep things in perspective as inevitable chaos ensues in the final days of preparation.

Wedding planning is a very involved process.  No matter how big or how small your wedding is, there's a lot to think about.  It's so easy to get caught up in the details, to the point where sometimes you get lost in them.  Something will inevitably deviate away from your original plans.  Something will inevitably go wrong, usually more than once.  With one element out of place, stress and frustration replace the joy and bliss that you should feel during this hectic time.  You try to cover all of your bases and plan for every possible inconvenience that could occur, but it's never enough.  You put forth tireless effort to plan out every detail, to create every piece of decor, and to coordinate with every guest.  But those things aren't important.

The important thing is love.

{photo by Pink Sherbet Photography / via Flickr}

I work as a physical therapist for a large trauma hospital.  Usually, I treat patients with broken bones that they've acquired from car accidents or gunshot wounds, but trauma can produce neurological injuries too.  I recently had a patient who had sustained a traumatic brain injury.  He was an engineer, and he was visiting a construction site when he was sandwiched between two large cement pipes.  It didn't look good.  I saw his MRIs, and the bleeding was extensive.  All of the physician notes in his chart predicted a bleak prognosis...and trust me, the Neurosurgeons in Atlanta know what they're doing.

No, I haven't met Dr. Gupta...yet.
{photo by Jeff Hutchens / via Scholastic}

This patient spent months in the ICU, completely unconscious.  His wife, who became pregnant with their first child just weeks before the accident, visited daily.  She brought pictures of family and friends, even though he couldn't see them.  She held his favorite foods up to his nose, even though he couldn't eat them.  She played his favorite music and read him his favorite books, even though he couldn't hear them.  She tried anything and everything with the hope that one of these stimuli would evoke some sort of response.

The thing about brain injuries is that they heal in stages.  Patients can stay in any of these stages for any period of time, sometimes even plateauing at that stage permanently.  This patient stayed at the first stage for a long time, unresponsive and in a coma.  He eventually opened his eyes and was able to respond to light.  Then, he started to respond to voices.  When he started to follow commands and make eye contact, his physicians determined he was stable enough to transfer out of the ICU and onto my floor.  We started to work on some brain injury rehab basics, like sitting up and reaching for objects.  Eventually, we started to practice standing and even marching in place.  His wife was his biggest fan and his loudest cheerleader.  She never left his side.

After weeks of therapy, he wrote on his dry erase board that he wanted to try to walk.  It took three of us to assist him, but he was able to take a few steps with a walker.  He stared at his feet as he concentrated on sending the message "walk" from his brain to the muscles in his legs.  Then, something interesting happened.  His wife walked over to the other side of the room and said, "Honey, walk over here to me."  He looked up, and started to walk towards her.  He was slow and still needed a lot of assistance, but he had a smile on his face the whole time.  When he reached her, she gently placed her arms around him.  He whispered in her ear, "I love you," the first words he had spoken in months.

I've never cried in front of a patient, but I almost broke that streak at that moment!  Sure, time is the best thing for neurological injury, and medicine and aggressive therapy can help.  And maybe it's just the Disney freak in me, but I really think love had something to do with his progress, too.  This patient's wife's relentless dedication to him very well could have sped up his healing.  The early stimulation in the ICU, motivating him during therapy sessions...all of this, because of love.  (By the way, this patient is now in a rehab facility where he continues to improve.  His wife is due to deliver their baby any day now.)

So when wedding planning gets frustrating, don't let yourself get caught up in it.  Keep yourself focused on the real reason for this event.  That reason is more powerful than anything else in the world.

They Were Right

You know how people say that things can and will go wrong at your wedding?  The unexpected happens, and there's absolutely nothing you can do to make it better?  Well, we've had our fair share of that lately.

First of all, we met with our venue the other day to discuss final numbers.  Guess what?  They brought up the how-do-we-serve-cake debate, or "Cupcake Wars" as I have now nicknamed it, again.  I thought we had come to the compromise of serving the cupcakes and groom's cake family style so that our guests could choose, but we wouldn't end up paying for too much cake.  Well, they brought it up again because they thought I had made the "wrong" decision.  Yep.  That's the word they used.  Wrong.  I won the argument again, but I have a feeling I won't be so nice about it if it's brought up a third time.

Secondly, I'm down a bridesmaid.  Mr. Lion's sister has decided not to attend our wedding.  My FMIL is still very upset about it, so I don't want to go into it out of respect for her.  I'm actually okay with it.  I figure, if someone doesn't want to be there, I don't want them to be either.  Besides, being a bridesmaid is an honor.  If she doesn't want that honor, I don't want to give it to her.  It feels like I'd be taking something away from the other five girls who have truly been there for me.

Then yesterday, my FMIL sent me this text: "I can't get a hold of Coco Loco [the rehearsal dinner venue].  The phone just rings and rings, and the email says it's no longer in service.  I don't mean to scare you, but I have a bad feeling about this."  Shit.

Then, on a hunch, FMIL Lion googled "Coco Loco" and "closed."  She found an article that said that the restaurant, which has been open for 20 years, closed permanently last week.  Last week, as in three weeks before our wedding.  Like Miss Sloth, we no longer had a rehearsal dinner venue.  Unlike Miss Sloth, these guys didn't have the courtesy to tell us.  We found out from a newspaper article, and only because FMIL Lion's intuition is that awesome.  Can you imagine if she had ignored that hunch?!  We might have showed up after rehearsal waiting to eat food!

As you can imagine, I hyperventilated.  But only for about 30 seconds.  I thought to myself, "You don't have time to panic anymore.  That's a luxury you can't squeeze in anymore.  You need to be efficient right now."  And I moved on.  Mr. Lion and I tried a new Cuban restaurant last night, and made up a list of questions for FMIL Lion to ask today.  If it doesn't work out at this new place, we'll keep looking.

Yeah, this kind of stuff happens.  When you're planning something as detailed and as involved as a wedding, it's more likely than not that something bad will happen.  It's out of your control, but your reaction to it is within your control.  And your reaction is what matters.  I just wanted to let y'all know that I think a big reason why I didn't completely freek out is because of you, Hive.  I've read about your drama.  I've commented on how strong you are, and how much I admire your ability to push through it.  When I got that text from FMIL Lion, all I thought about were people like Mrs. Trail Mix and Mrs. Socks, who didn't let wedding-related disasters get to them, no matter how big or how small.  They focused on the marriage, and knew it would work out eventually.  I just wanted to thank all of you for being such positive role models.  You have no idea how much you inspire me.

Your turn!  Let's hear your most recent wedding vents :)

It's Complicated

We booked our venue over a year ago.  We knew early on that it was exactly what we wanted, and we eagerly signed up to have both our ceremony and our reception there.  The venue was then crossed off the to-do list and promptly placed on the back burner.  Our Day-Of Coordinator over there checked in with us from time to time, but other than that, it was out of sight and out of mind.  Now that our wedding is about two months away, I decided to schedule a meeting with our DOC to start ironing out the details.  What time does this vendor arrive?  What does the pattern of traffic flow look like from ceremony to cocktail hour?  Where is my candy buffet going to be?

What followed were a series of epiphanies.  Not the good kind, either.  The kind where innocence is lost and you're left thinking, "Crap!  What do I do now?"  I believe there's a Disney princess out there somewhere whose face can convey this emotion...

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I'm glad I have an experienced venue and an awesome DOC to help me figure things out.  Nonetheless, my meeting resulted in adding some new items to my to-do list, some new problems that I now needed to solve:

1.  Our tables seat 8, and I initially thought they seated 10.
My bad.  I shouldn't have assumed, and I don't really know why I did in the first place.  So, now we need an additional 5 tables to accommodate our guests, which means 5 additional centerpieces.  Groan.  It's only money, and we over-budgeted for the sole purpose of covering our booties in the event of mistakes like this.  Problem solved.

2.  Table linens bring up the white vs. ivory debate that I so despise.
My dress is ivory.  Mr. Lion and the Lion Gmen are wearing gray tuxes with ivory shirts.  The Lioness Bmaids are wearing multicolored shoes with a white background, but they are wearing ivory fascinators (I figure they're far enough apart and there's a lot going on elsewhere in the ensemble, no one will notice).  When my DOC and I began to discuss table cloths and chair covers, we instantly decided on ivory.  Then, we had to decide on sashes for the chair covers.  I could choose between black, burgundy, olive, white, silver, or gold.  They all looked great with the white, but the gold was pretty much the only option for the ivory.

Gold kinda clashed with the rest of our color scheme, so that left me back at indecisive.  I really liked the silver, since we're using mint julep cups for our centerpieces.  Could I pull off the silver with the ivory?  Or should I just switch to white and forget the fact that it didn't match my dress?  For that matter, could I do white linens and white sashes?  What do you think?

3. My cake plan was turned upside down.
We had planned on having approximately 100 cupcakes, in three different flavors.  We were also planning on having a groom's cake, which would serve 50-75 people.  We planned to cut a small cake on top of a cupcake tree, which our baker had agreed to make for us.  Then, guests would be able approach the cake table and choose between our three cupcake flavors or a slice of groom's cake.  This concerned my DOC, as she believed that it would result in chaos and (dare I say) it might look tacky.  She thought it would be better if the cakes were served.

She also added that it would be better if all of the guests received one cupcake and all of the guests received one small slice of groom's cake.  I suppose that would appear more hospitable, but it seemed like a lot of food for our daytime wedding.  Additionally, that would cause us to buy twice as much cake as we had initially anticipated!  Could we get away with serving 100 of our guests cupcakes and the rest groom's cake?  Or would it be so bad if we stuck with the self-serve route?  Or should we just bite the bullet and buy cake for (gasp) 300 servings for a 150-person guest list?  What do you think?

Y'all, wedding planning is getting stressful as we're reaching the home stretch!  I just wanna go back into DIY mode and play with fun projects and not deal with logistics!  Thanks for reading such a whiny post, and thanks in advance for your advice.  I hope I didn't stress you out vicariously!  I'm going to go have a glass of wine now...

What kinds of roadblocks have you run into with your nitty gritty details?

Somewhere Between Greedy and Guilty

Disclaimer: This is a money-related post.  I will try my best not to offend, but I'd also like to be honest.  Bear with me :)

Lately, I've been experiencing a good bit of guilt about our wedding.  Not only are we spending a lot of money on things I would usually find frivolous, we're also asking our guests to spend money on presents, on top of all of their travel expenses.  This makes me feel as though I come across like this:

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I wouldn't go as far as to say that I had a humble upbringing.  Especially when I compare my parents' background to that of Mr. Lion's parents, who came to this country with very little, I feel incredibly fortunate.  My parents were comfortable, but not nearly wealthy.  Even if my parents had been well-off, I think Sister Lioness and I would still be raised with the same morals and values when it came to money.  My parents prioritized travel and education, but they were pretty thrifty with everything else.  As soon as I was old enough to work, I did.  My parents were more than happy to give me everything I needed, but if I wanted something, I worked for it and bought it myself.  This taught me to spend conservatively and carefully consider every purchase.

I now have an internal conflict brewing between the usual scrutiny that takes place over purchases and the more liberal spending I've been doing with our wedding.  This makes me feel guilty/sad/awkward/bad.  Like this:

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We're spending $20,000 on our wedding, which, according to Cost of Wedding, is below the average cost of an Atlanta wedding.  But to me, it seems like a fortune.  My car was $8,600 when I bought it at age 16.  Mr. Lion and I do not own our home.  I've just never spent that much money on one thing!  So when I look at all those zeros in our budget, I feel a little overwhelmed.

I know what you're thinking: "Sooo don't spend that much money.  Tah dah!  Problem solved!"  Well, the issue is that I want certain things for our wedding...certain things that end up adding up to about $20,000.

When we first got engaged, my parents offered to contribute $8,000.  Anything beyond that was up to us.  Could we have a wedding for $8,000?  Of course!  I've seen some beautiful weddings that end up costing even less than that!  But, it's not what we wanted.  We made a list of everything we wanted, we researched to determine approximately what those things would cost, and the figure we ended up with was $20,000.  After the $8,000 contribution from my parents, we were left with a $12,000 contribution from our own savings.  Given our 20-month engagement, we decided that saving this amount was doable.  Doable, but still not necessary ethical in my mind.

After over a year of wedding planning (and wedding purchasing), I still have moments where I feel incredibly guilty for the amount of money I'm spending.  For example, when we decided to have cupcakes at our wedding, we decided to top those cupcakes with little pinwheels.

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Cute, right?  And they match our whimsical theme, yes?  The only problem was that there was no way I was DIY-ing hundreds of these.  I don't have the patience of Mrs. Guinea Pig :) I found an Etsy seller who made pinwheels like these at a price that fit within our budget.  Still, I debated about buying them for an embarrassing amount of time.  It just seemed so silly to spend money on paper that would attach to a toothpick, stick into a cupcake for a couple of hours, then get thrown away.  After a ridiculous amount of discussion with many people, I finally sucked it up and bought them.

I feel the same way about wedding gifts.  Mr. Lion and I were thrilled to create gift registries.  We greedily ran through Bed Bath & Beyond with our registry gun, zapping everything in sight that we even slightly liked.  Then, our friends (who are also engaged) told us that they are not registering for their wedding.  "We've lived together for a few years already," they said.  "We've already built our home.  We already have everything we need."  Well, when you look at it that way, I suppose we have everything we need, too.  Sure, our kitchen is full of hand-me-downs from the 1970s (and not in the cool, retro kind of way), but everything works.  I was instantly transformed from greedy to guilty.

The guilt is something I'm continuing to work on.  The good news is that the people who will be attending our wedding would never even think about passing judgment on us or on our spending.  They love us, and they support us.  I take solace in the fact that this is only an internal conflict, not an external one.  I've been feeling better about my spending lately, but the idea of so many people spending money on us still makes me slightly uncomfortable.  It's new and foreign to me, but I'm sure that when the time comes, I'll just be happy to have received so much love from our guests!

Has anyone else felt this way about their wedding spending or their wedding gifting?