Weddingbee

Last night Mr. Kiwi and I were moving our stuff from the old apartment to the new apartment. After picking up a pizza as a reward for our hard work, we sat down and turned on the Fox Movie Channel, because “Say Anything” was playing! Man, I love that movie.

As the movie played, I kept saying how much I love Lloyd Dobler, and how I bet every woman wants a Lloyd Dobler of her own. Then I mused that it wasn’t John Cusack’s magnetism that did it. To be honest, he’s quite unremarkable in his own right, but cast him as the loveable romantic character of Lloyd Dobler, and all of a sudden he’s a dream. When the no-smoking sign dinged and the credits rolled, I told Mr. Kiwi that I thought they stayed together for a bit, but separated in college, because they each had to “find themselves” solo, but then they got back together after a few years. When I said that, I kind of shocked myself—I was describing our relationship! Talk about putting yourself into the movie, right?

Well, that got me to thinking, what do people really think happened between Lloyd Dobler and Diane Court after the credits rolled? With this thought in mind, I set off to Google, where I searched, “What really happened to Lloyd Dobler?”
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I’m going waaaay back here, to November of 2008 - The Secret Life of Bees, Weddingbee edition, version Kiwi.

Here are some things you don’t know about me:

1. I still count on my fingers. Sure, most of the time I can figure it out without it, but then I count on my fingers to make sure my guess was correct. And yes, I AM a bookkeeper, and work with numbers all day.

2. The other night I tried on my old Jamba Juice hat and tried to seduce Mr. Kiwi. He was not biting. I don’t know why I thought it’d be sexy to wear the hat we met in. Especially when it was covered in old fruit crap.

3. I admit it. I love Twilight. No, it’s not because I love Edward. I love Jacob. So perhaps that’s confession appendix A) I AM TEAM JACOB. That’s right, I said it. Mr. Kiwi tries to bite me on the neck and goes, “I’m a Vampire… Raawwwwr.” To which I reply, “Uh, he’s a teenager.” To which he replies, “I’m a werewolf… Rawwwwr…” To which I again reply, “And he’s an even younger teenager—ergo NOT SEXY.”

(source)

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I’m an old married lady. No longer watching for the new issue of Martha Stewart Weddings, now I’m reading Real Simple, and religiously checking Apartment Therapy Los Angeles for tips on furnishing our new pad. Still, not much else has changed.

Here are some things I think would be good to know about being married, stuff I learned post-ceremony.

1.) The wedding is not the most stressful experience you’ll ever go through together. Right now we’re packing for a move to a new two bedroom apartment (with two differing opinions on how to pack), as well as continuing what has become a full year of trying to conceive, along with familial strife and the usual drama that comes from trying to make time for all members of our families. It can get insane, the ups and downs of living life, when things aren’t quite turning out how you had planned, but I’m a believer of things working out sooner or later. I’m usually just hoping it’s sooner!

2.) Sometimes you may not like your husband very much. Despite what it sounds like, it’s not the end of the world, nor is it the kiss of death for your marriage. It is normal and heck, even healthy to let out your feelings. Then again, if you don’t like your husband every day something is not right. No, I may not always like my husband, but I always LOVE him. Does that make sense? When he puts his dishes in the sink, and just piles them one on top of another like the leaning tower of crusty dishes, I want to bite my hand- how many times do we have to talk about this? Then I realize he’s just as scattered as I am, and like I leave my shoes in the bathroom (right behind the door so it smacks him in the face when he tries to push it open- SO not on purpose) every day like he asks me not to, I take a deep breath, remove my shoes and ask him to please move his dishes. It’s part of life; sometimes you may get a little frustrated, but it just means you’re human. Hey, he doesn’t ALWAYS leave his dishes in the sink; sometimes he’ll do the dishes in the morning while I’m sleeping in, and that’s when I am so happy I have him.
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Mr. Kiwi and I had been married a year and a month when one of his best buddies offered us a super cool Christmas present: she would take portraits of us! I’m not exaggerating when I say that Mr. K and I have probably about 5 pictures of us from the day we got engaged to the wedding- that’s a whole 19 months there, people. Not counting the wedding pictures, or the one picture of us we took in Hawaii last July, there are no pictures of us. We have three 8″x10″ pictures from the wedding we’re going to frame, as well as one 11″x14″ canvas I had made of us.

We’ve just signed a lease on a new, bigger place, and are adamant about framing these pictures and hanging them as soon as possible because that’s one thing we never did in our current place- it still looks as barren as the day we moved in, sadly. So, when Mr. K’s friend Tina Dela Rosa offered us this opportunity, I was more than thrilled- finally we’ll have pictures of us!

Since Tina is currently living and going to school on the East Coast (Law School!), she would only be back in town visiting family for a few weeks this past holiday season. We were able to hang out with her for an afternoon, and she got some fabulous pics of us.

Mr. Kiwi saw this one and said, “Wow, I have a LOT of grey hair. DAMNIT.”

 
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Breaking News!!

I am no longer a newlywed! Okay, I haven’t called myself a newlywed since after say… the third month of being married, but Monday was our one year anniversary. Mr. Kiwi and I have made it through the so-called “toughest year of your marriage”, and are stronger than ever.

Sure, I don’t wear makeup that much anymore, and he’s lucky if I remember to put underwear on most of the time, much less sexy underwear. Now we write bills, go grocery shopping, and coddle Woofie. We nag our single friends to hurry up and meet someone so we can then nag them to get engaged, and we have begun to start looking alike—much like owners and their pets. Juuuust kidding.

We still go to Disneyland and act like children, taking pictures with the characters and having candy for breakfast. We got our new mattress and now delight in buying sheets at a sale price. Despite how dreary and boring it sounds, I love married life. It’s just not that different from living-in-sin life, ya know? So don’t feel bad if your life hasn’t changed other than a single piece of paper and insurance and tax benefits.
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A New Beginning?

At that point in my life, I was riding high. I was a manager at Jamba Juice, I was free-wheelin’ and single, and had some great friends. All of whom would constantly badger me about my stupidity when dealing with Mr. Kiwi- making him leave his job and all that. To celebrate my new freedom, I decided to get a tattoo. Here we go with that stupid young person thing again, right? Well, I had a deep adoration for ladybugs (still do), and had one tattooed on my back right side. This was about three weeks after we broke up, and I hadn’t seen him for awhile, had almost put him out of my mind. Until…

My friends and I were out celebrating the event right after it took place, and we decided to go to Islands for dinner. Since it was the Saturday evening rush, we had to wait outside for a table, my friends armed with their video camera to document the first tattoo amongst us. As we were sitting there, my attention was focused on my back, when I heard, “Welllllll, look who’s here! Miss Kiwi, it’s MR. KIWI!” Yep. He had headed to Islands with his sister and brother in law. And there I was. And there he was. All on tape. Could you say awkward? We traded a few words, some of which were “So you got that tattoo you wanted?”, “yep”. “Awesome.”. “Yep”.
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The End of the Beginning

(The Beginning, Pt. 1)

Do you remember dating that one boy or girl who made you dumber, do dumb things? Stephen was that boy. After awhile, I couldn’t take it anymore, and decided to end that confusion. At that point I’d been working for a few months, mixing up the smoothies and helping myself to frozen strawberries, and noticed there was a certain someone who paid me a lot of attention. It was Mr. Kiwi! He was always supportive, always listening, always asking to give me rides home. Can’t look a gift ride in the mouth, right? So I got to know him better, and I admit it, I liked him because he liked me - yes, it’s wrong.
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Now that the wedding has passed, and we are starting to get into planning for a family (not family planning!), I thought I’d start talking about how we met, and how things ended up the way they are. So, here goes, the story of us.

The Beginning

When you’re just coming out of high school you have a sense of freedom. Finally, you are done with the mandatory 12 years of education, and you can proceed to learn as you wish. I was already enrolled in the local community college (although that sounds very crappy, it’s not; Santa Monica College is one of the best community college in the country!), and I needed to get a job to fund my college life. I know most people have their parents paying for college, but mine just couldn’t. So, I would do it myself.
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I hate to interrupt your posts from the regularly scheduled Bees, but I have something semi-wedding related I’m dealing with! When Mr. Kiwi and I first started planning our wedding, we wanted to go to Hawaii (Kauai, to be exact) for our honeymoon. The closer the honeymoon got, the less we could afford, which is why we ended up taking a three day trip to Las Vegas, instead. We assumed we’d save up a bit and take that Hawaii trip in the future, and as things started settling down after the wedding, the Hawaii trip wasn’t looking good.

Until a parent at Mr. Kiwi’s school emailed him with a list of locations and dates we could use this summer for a trip. The choices were: Acapulco, Cancun, Dominican Republic, Mazatlan, Puerto Vallarta, and Kauai, HI. The dates ranged from mid-June to August, and we had a choice for a week-long trip to any of those places - everything but the flight would be free.
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Hello hive, long time no blog! It’s been six and a half months since our wedding, and as the various bits and pieces of the “party” are given away or boxed up, one thing remains (other than a happy marriage): my dress. As some of you may remember, I was not too fond of my dress. Looking back, I do see myself in pictures a little differently, and I’m wondering if I should take the monster out of its plasticy coffin (aka, the garment bag that is taking up 1/4 of our closet space), and send it away to be laundered and boxed up.

A lot of the bees have sent their dress to be cleaned and packed, but these bees also loved their dresses beyond belief, and I am totally envious. Mrs. Bluebell advised me that it would be good to have it taken care of, should I grow to love it, and want to pass it down to my children. I had always assumed I’d just sell it, since I really didn’t want to see it again, but I’m thinking it’d be a hard sell. Still, sell it or keep it, it would have to be cleaned, so perhaps I should just take the leap and send it out.

Are you planning on having your dress cleaned and boxed? If not, what are you planning to do with your dress after your wedding?