Weddingbee Blog

I seem to have hit a wedding wall. My fizz has lost its bubbles, my bounce has come back to earth—that sort of thing.

Don’t worry, it isn’t like I have lost my enthusiasm and excitement for marriage—that I am very much looking forward to with everything in me. It’s the wedding bits and bobs that are getting me down.

Mr E’s grandmother passed away early this week. She was an amazing, amazing woman who did all she could to make me feel welcomed into his family and she has supported us in so many ways. Mr E was very close to her; she is the reason he could even afford to make the move to NZ to be with me and study. She has been fighting cancer for the last year and a bit, but in the last couple of weeks she went downhill very suddenly.

When faced with something like that, making a decision about whether or not to have rose petals on our aisle doesn’t seem all that important. You get me?

A little more than a year ago (before we were engaged) we were thinking about doing this wedding thing differently. It would have taken place last December or June, and it would have been either in Bali or Yosemite National Park. Only family would have attended.

If we had gone with one of those plans, Mr E’s grandmother could have seen us get married.

I do know that she was excited for the wedding plans we have now and that she would never have asked for it to be earlier on account of her. But still. The world always seems to be filled with “what ifs?” and “maybes”. All I know is that part of me feels very, very guilty that she wont be there and wonders if we should have done something differently. Who knows.

But, of course we cant go back and change what has happened and the decisions we made, which means forging on. Like Miss Seashell though, after Mr Seashell’s mum passed away, it is hard to think/do/ask for anything to do with the wedding without an overwhelming feeling of selfishness. Right now I know I have to address a kazillion envelopes for the invitations and I have to fight the urge to whine, because what right do I have to whine about that when there are so much more bigger things going on? (Yes, yes I did say “more bigger” Sorry. Late night.)

At the same time, I know that Mr E’s grandma would be peeved if she thought we were dwelling too much on sadness. Over the last few days, Mr E has been telling me stories of her and snippets of funny things she did or said while he was growing up. FGIL was definitely not a party pooper and she wouldn’t want to start being one now. So what we are trying to take from this is the joy in knowing that she lived a full and happy life, with family and friends that adored her, and her passing has meant that we have taken the time to take a step back a bit from the wedding planning. She has given us the gift of refocusing on our relationship (which is the most important part of the wedding!) and remind me (because Mr E seems to know this truth already) that weddings aren’t just about flowers and lace and cryptic vendor emails and cupcake flavors—they are about the couple, their love, and family coming together in both the hard times and the good.

Mr E’s mum and grandma on New Year’s this year—they are two very fun ladies! (Photo taken by his mum)

I’ll be back feeling the “wedding buzz” soon enough, I’m sure. But I don’t want that buzz to keep me from remembering what is most important in this whole business. For now, Mr E and I are going to snuggle up and just enjoy being together while it pours with rain outside (it hasn’t stopped for two days straight) and watch endless episodes of Big Bang Theory and The Mentalist.