Wedding Wednesday: Underneath the Tulle and Ribbon*

Could I talk about the wedding all the time? Maybe. In fact, my poor sister calls me about spinach and I manage to squeeze in a comment about the invitations. Bless her and the patience genes she got.

I read a pretty awesome blog called A Practical Wedding and it is a pretty awesome place where lots of ladies share stories about their planning woes, what it’s like to be ‘wife’ and other stories about weddings and marriage. The other day, a post included a great statement:

But what they don’t tell you is that when you’re engaged all that anyone ever wants to talk about are your wedding plans, so for me this was a version of Hell.

Don’t get me wrong– I love to talk about the wedding. Let’s face it, I love to talk about everything. But I think it sometimes overshadows some of the other super-awesome stuff Aaron and I are up to. Wedding planning is not really real life, it’s appointments and decisions we make in between the real stuff. And I would hate to look back at Summer 2013 and remember it only as “the summer we planned our wedding.”

Of course, due to Neverending Winter and Relentless Spring, it hasn’t yet felt much like summer in Minnesota. And it is early in the season, but here’s some of the stuff we’ve been up to:

We Bike. We have been machines on our machines this year. Aaron biked 100 miles at once and I have taken on a new commitment to bike to work more often. We love to bike around town to the store, restaurants, and other events. It’s peaceful not to drive, it’s good for the planet, and we generally enjoy biking places together– except once when I told Aaron I couldn’t keep up with him on hills and he responded, “Really? Because I am going pretty slow.” He’s soooo funny.

Biking the Gateway Trail from Saint Paul to Stillwater and back.

We Rocked the Garden. Hipsters. Yupsters. Democrats. Whatever you call the kind of people who have public radio memberships and go to outdoor music festivals–that’s us. We had a great time standing in the pouring rain, going to an impromptu concert in a parking ramp (Rock the Ramp), listening to a 27 minute instrumental drone, and hanging out with great friends and drinking Summit beer. And, in true Rock the Garden tradition, we took down a 5lb Bucket of Fries.

Bucket of Fries! (Always said with enthusiasm)

Aaron rocking the ramp in true Aaron style– somewhat reserved, very chill, with a barely perceptible head nod.

We Play Softball. Every Friday night we schlep ourselves, some used cleats, and our neon yellow jerseys to Apple Valley for some good ol’ beer league, slowpitch softball as 1st baseman and Shortstop/Leftfield for the Christus Victor God Squad. It is during these games I am perhaps best reminded that God is not always in the business of giving us what we want (like, a win?) and instead gives us what we need (good friends, a lot of laughs, and just enough big hits to keep our heads up). Though, I could have used a little more divine intervention when I got smoked in the back of the head with a ball– not even a gust of wind, God? Really? When players on the team make a big mistake or bonehead play, they have to pay a “kangaroo fine” of 50 cents which we are donating to the Twins Community Fund to build ball fields for kids and communities in need. I imagine we are on pace to build one lucky community this:

The road to community ball parks is paved in strikeouts.

We do lots of stuff.
We hang out in the yard– Aaron mows over everything with an indiscriminating eye and a reign of terror over the hostas and I decide that if something doesn’t look good in the garden it simply comes out of the garden. Efficiency. We hang out with our dog because he is funny and challenges us and is loving and hilarious. We walk to the ice cream shop, we bike to the bakery. Every few weeks we stare at the bikes at the Angry Catfish that we can’t afford. We listen to baseball games. We drink local beers on the local patios of local restaurants (again, because we are hipsters/yupsters/Democrats). We watch movies about adventurers and we curse the Miami Heat in the NBA Finals.

When I first decided I was going to not write about the wedding on Wedding Wednesday I thought it was because I was running out of wedding stuff to say, but as I have drafted this post I realize that it’s exactly this kind of stuff that the wedding is all about. It’s this kind of stuff that makes us want to do a wedding because it’s this kind of stuff that makes us want to be married. For the rest of my life I will get “Shhh!”ed when I am talking over the Twins game on the radio. A million times we are going to have to make decisions between doing something to ‘win’ or doing something for fun. There are many miles before us and whether we take them by bike or by foot, by car or by plane, by pogo stick or Segway… no, we are not going there via Segway… we have some journeying to do.

In fact, a post about real life might be the most true to Wedding Wednesday than anything else…

… but don’t worry, girl is totally coming back next week with how OMG delicious the cake tasting was and how I actioned the assembly, envelope stuffing, stamping and addressing of 122 invites in 36 hours.

14 Wedding Wednesdays to go!

*There actually isn’t any tulle or ribbon involved in the wedding, but the title “Underneath the Trombone Quartet and Recycled Glass” probably wouldn’t have made much sense.