Thursday, March 20, 2008

Oh, how I have longed for this day

Today is officially the first day of spring. Unofficially, it's been spring for a couple of weeks here in Colorado; even the snow and snain (snow mixed with rain, it's my own creation!) we've gotten has been wet. The air has moisture in it for the first time in months, a bit of green is beginning to peek through the brown in people's lawns, and I've actually seen a couple of real, live flowers poking out of the ground. Part of why I'm so excited about spending a week in California (well, aside from the whole getting hitched thing) is how much I love Bay Area spring, how green and flowery and wonderful everything is. I missed out on it last year so I am going to revel in it, frolic as much as possible, and take lots and lots of photos with my new camera.

Speaking of my new camera, I'm unable to upload photos from it onto my computer because of some work security-type issues. My old camera was the same age as my operating system but the new one is obviously much younger and so my computer doesn't recognize it. I hope to have this issue worked out when we get back, but for now I'll be taking photos and uploading them to Dan's computer, then having him email them to me so I can post them. Or using his computer to write in my blog. This will be difficult, because he loves that computer almost as much as he loves Petra, so it will be hard to tear him away for a few minutes so I can do something with my photos. It will be a stopgap measure, as I've been assured by the IT guy here that with a few simple steps (and when he has time) I'll be able to get my camera and my computer to make sweet, sweet USB portage.

Can I just say how awesome it is that the person who teaches the Thursday pilates class I take will give us a free reformer class if there are four or fewer people who show up? It is fantastic, and these classes are usually really expensive. But she calls it a win-win - all she does is bark commands at us (rather than having to demonstrate everything as she would in a mat class) and we get an extra-good workout for free! Today she even complemented me on my form, saying I could be a pilates reformer teacher because it wouldn't be as difficult for me to pass the certification exam. I've only had three classes on the reformer so I don't know that I'd actually WANT to put myself through that but it was nice to hear anyhow.

I'm leaving work in a few minutes to go home and PACK. We have SOOOOO Much Stuff to bring with us to California. Leaving aside things like clothes, shoes, toiletries, makeup, and jewelry (for both of us! Dan's wearing his grandfather's cufflinks and studs!), we've got 4 cases of wine, many cases and flats of vitamin water and smart water, 50 umbrellas (luckily they're still packaged compactly), and a whole bunch of decorations. Including these:




Yep, it's the Huge Craft Project I've been talking about for months. I had been saving a whole bunch of old calendars for years, but never figured out what to do with them until I got it in my head to start folding cranes for the wedding. I folded and folded and folded for months, and then Dan's mom gave me a bunch of HER old calendars so I was able to fold some more. After I was finished folding (I folded until I had no more calendars to use and no more origami paper; my intent was to completely make it be a recycled paper project and only used what I had and didn't buy any more paper) I had a plethora of cranes (though, sadly, not a thousand as I didn't have enough old calendars for that). I bought some balsa wood dowels from the craft store back in February and used embroidery floss, a glue gun, and a teeny tiny saw from Dan's exacto knife set to create 12 different crane mobiles. Some are chandelier style, while others are more traditional mobiles. There are squares and triangles. I lurve them and plan to give them away to specific people after the wedding is over as a thank-you gift and reminder of a special day. And I'll reserve one to give away to the person who guesses closest to the number of cranes in attendance!

So I had to individually wrap these in tissue paper as I'd like the strings to remain as tangle-free as possible, and then I boxed 'em up.

We have to pack for being away from home for two weeks(ish), pack for possible rain and (hopefully) nice weather, and pack stuff that we can wear in Las Vegas, Yosemite, and some canyon area in Utah (places we plan to stop on the trip home). Plus food and music for the drive. Plus a whole bunch of stuff that I'm forgetting. Packing will pretty much be up to me (except Dan's clothes/shoes/etc.) because he's driving up to Casa DanRents this evening after class and trading cars with his mom. Thanks, Dan's Mom! It will be much easier for us to haul all this stuff out to California in a slightly larger vehicle than our Honda Civic. Hope Moxie treats you well!

Anyone who has opinions about cake or what I should wear to the afterparty, please continue to comment on the previous post!

3 comments:

Yank In Texas said...

Those look so cool! Man, I am so freakin' disappointed. It's a great decoration idea. I am sooo not crafty enough for that.

Anonymous said...

I am so excited about your wedding that I had a full-on nightmare about it this week. Everything about the celebration itself was spectacular, but my camera had a dead battery and I was completely freaking out--running all over looking for my charger and missing most of the party.

As for afterparty wear, I'd have another outfit at the ready but be prepared to just stay in the dress. It is, after all, the only time you get to be The Bride, so you might as well indulge. Then again, you'll have been in the dress for what, seven hours at that point?, so you might be desperate to get out of it at that point.

Sara said...

Those cranes are so cool!