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Weddingbee Blog
“Tell me about yourself.” “Share one fun fact.” “What makes you YOU?”
For some reason, these sorts of inquiries make me nervous. But I figure you all might want a little bit more info about the Turkeys than what you have now…so, to save myself the sweaty palms, I’m going to keep it simple.
Well, a picture’s worth a thousand words*, so here are some photos to tell you our story.
This is one of my all-time favorite photos—believe it or not, it was not at all posed.
A (formerly) nerdy runner…
Choosing to live together before marriage or waiting until after you’re married is a personal decision. I’ll never forget a conversation I had with a friend’s acquaintance after a few months of living with Mr. P. My friend explained that I lived nearby (we were out at a nearby bar) with my boyfriend, and this acquaintance, who had just met me mind you, immediately responded, “Oh, I’m so glad I waited to move in with my husband. It takes all the fun away from marriage if you live with someone first.” I just stared at her blankly. My first reaction was to say, “Who the BLEEP asked you?” I relented.
It may not be the “traditional” route, but one of the benefits of living with someone before marriage is ironing out each person’s role. Mr. P and I have pretty traditional roles in our home. Since we’ve lived together for over three years we’ve had some time to master who does what. I’m glad we have this all ironed out pre-marriage. Things have shifted over time due to changes in work and life, but for the most part I do a lot more work around the house and Mr. P does a lot more work out of the home.
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Mr. Unicycle lives in Milwaukee. I live in the northwest suburbs of Chicago, which is about a two-hour drive, one and a half if I’m coming from work—which I usually am. Most people in LDRs would kill for this kind of proximity. I even know people who live this far apart and don’t consider their relationship to be an LDR (granted, they are middle aged divorcees who don’t feel the need to see their SO every day, but still). Even though two hours isn’t that bad in the scheme of relationship commutes, it still feels pretty bad.
Image via Google Maps. MS Paint job by me.
I only see Mr. Unicycle on the weekends, because it doesn’t really make sense logistically or economically to drive to Wisconsin for an evening or an afternoon. And I don’t even see him every weekend. Sometimes he has to spend the entire weekend studying and I have to stay home and entertain myself. It’s not hard to entertain myself, but it doesn’t stop me from missing him. Being in an SDR has it’s perks, I suppose, but it also has its cons.
Mr. Hawk works in retail. More specifically, he is a district supervisor for a chain of retail stores. If any of y’all have ever worked in retail or have been in a relationship with someone who worked in retail full time, I’m sure you have an idea of what his job entails: long hours, working holidays, and (my least favorite) travel. (Lots.Of.Travel.) He is gone so often that sometimes it feels like we are in long-distance relationship even though we share the same address. On the off chance that he can actually make it home, it still feels like we’re just crossing paths. He walks in the door around nine and, being an early riser myself, I head to bed around 10 or 10:30. Come morning, I wake up earlier than him to head to work. When it comes down to it, we’re lucky if we’ve actually spent over an hour of (conscious) time together!
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Recently, I got to meet a very special newborn old baby girl, the daughter of BM K and her hubby Groomsman R. Over the past couple months, after finding out about BM K’s pregnancy (and maybe even before then?), I’ve been thinking about how BM K and GM R are one of my “inspirational couples.” When I look at them and see how much love and mutual respect they have for each other, I can’t help but hope that one day Mr. Hawk and I can be as great a team as they are. (Not to say that Mr. Hawk and I are a crappy team! But we’re still learning and establishing ourselves as a unit.) BM K and GM R are always affectionate and kind toward each other. I have never seen them publicly argue, and they really have a true partnership.
In the day and age where divorce seems to have run rampant and people can’t WAIT to spit out divorce statistics, it is so fantastic to see couples who are making it work and are blissfully happy. Take Momma and Daddy Hawk for another example (my other inspirational couple!). They have been married almost 35 years. They have survived raising 1.5 children (they’ve still got a few more years to go on the short stack), four cross-country moves, numerous careers, unemployment, all amongst other typical family struggles and life in general. Somehow after all that, they seem as close and as in love as ever! (Take that, Mr. Statistician!)
I hope Mr. Hawk and I are still having this much fun in 35 years!! (personal photo)
In celebration of Gobble Gobble Day, Mr. Warbs and I drove up to Las Vegas to eat turkey and break in my sister’s new house. Oh yeah, and to gamble. It’s Vegas. The day before we set out, I found Mr. Warbs packing some clothes in my suitcase. His clothes in my suitcase. Now, we share a lot of things, but for some reason, I was really bothered by this. Our conversation went like this:
Me: Um, that’s my suitcase.
Mr. Warbs: Yeah, I’m just packing some stuff.
Me: So, I don’t get to use my suitcase?
Mr. Warbs: Yes, there’s plenty of room in here for your stuff too.
Me: What?
Mr. Warbs: We can share.
Me: …
I consider myself to be a logical person. I can see the logic behind only taking one suitcase for the both of us.
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Create the honeymoon of your dreams.
Welcome to another edition of Miss Unicycle Getting Real. (I’ll get back to the engagement pics soon!) I’ve gone on a few business trips this year, and Mr. Unicycle and I usually spend the whole weekend texting variations of “I miss you” to each other when I’m away. (I’m not sure why I miss him more when I’m in Utah than when I’m in Illinois, because either way we’re not in the same state. But it happened.) This got me thinking about attachment and what’s “normal” in a relationship.
The other day I made the mistake of musing to Mr. Unicycle that I wished I could be more independent and not miss him so much when we’re apart. This hurt his feelings, because he thought I was implying that the only reason I stay with him is because I can’t be without him (“I wish I knew how to quit you!”). I didn’t mean it this way at all—though if you really think deeply about love, isn’t that essentially what it is?—and I had to sit and think about what it was that I actually did mean. I had ample time to think about it while on the plane coming home from my bidniz trip, and I came up with three main points. Yes, this is a five-paragraph essay. I miss English class. 
Age is always a hot topic on the Weddingbee Boards. A short time ago, I read a thread where members were discussing how age affects the speed at which you progress from dating to engaged. My relationship with Mr. Mink probably doesn’t fall in line with what most people were thinking.
Mr. Mink and I met when I was 28 and he was 34. Though he proposed twice in the first few months we were dating (including on our second date…do you want to hear that story?), I was in no hurry to get married. I was always a career-obsessed mink and did not envision myself settling anywhere for too, too long. By not letting my roots get too deep anywhere, I figured I’d be ready to accept the next great job opportunity when it came my way.
Within two years, I bought my home and was starting to think I was staying in Charlottesville long term. Of course, Mr. Mink had a lot to do with that.
When we started (seriously) talking about marriage, we were probably four years into our relationship. When Mr. Mink took me to his jeweler (he never imagined he’d have a jeweler), it was clear that he had already been there to look at rings. I picked out a setting I loved, the jeweler winked and made a note in her little book, and the waiting began. For the next month, I got more giddy as different occasions approached.
Mr. Mink and I never actually had our first date. We stood each other up. When we tell people that, they usually demand to hear the full story…
Have you ever moved not knowing many people at your destination? I saw taking a job in Virginia as an adventure. My work was fulfilling, but I was lonely. I didn’t know anyone here and, while people were friendly enough, it was hard to move to being friends. I’m not sure if this is common, but I often wondered if I had made a mistake. I wondered if along with taking my first big risk I was experiencing my first big failure. I felt like Charlottesville was a club into which I hadn’t yet gained entry. Everyone was so happy here that I started to wonder if I needed to change to find happiness. Thankfully, that was when I met Mr. Mink.
Soon after I arrived in Charlottesville, an acquaintance promised me that I’d meet “everyone” if I went with his friends to the opening of the new concert pavilion in town. He was right. I met hundreds of people that evening, including a popular duo who hosted a morning radio show. When one of them called to ask me out, I wasn’t quite sure I knew which he was. I was on a trip for work at the time and told him to email me the time and location of our date and that I’d check my email when I got home that Friday. (This was before everyone had a smart phone.) When I got home, there was no email. I was so sad. I felt sorry for myself the rest of the weekend.
Ah, Facebook. We have a love/hate relationship.
I’m sure most of us have gone through some sort of Facebook drama, but what happens when your ex finds out you’re engaged? Well, if you have a crazy, stalker ex, he tries to contact you and win you back. This happened to me recently and it has all been so strange.
Let me start by saying I am not friends with my ex on Facebook—it’s just not something I want to do. He actually messaged me through a mutual friend of ours and wanted to talk to me. Our relationship ended badly, and there’s no way I would ever even consider going back to him. It’s funny, though, how it can stir up emotions inside you.
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Ah, the ol’ “how we met” story. I get asked this story a lot, along with the proposal story. Frankly, I’m sick of telling both of them. Every time I tell either of the epic sagas, my narration gets shorter and shorter. I kid you not, my answer to “How did he propose?!” has now become “He took me to watch the sunrise by the lake and then asked me to marry him.” The poor guy planned an elaborate proposal complete with soundtrack and mini muffins, and I reduce the event to a single sentence?? How rude!
Image via imeasy2love.blogspot.com
Now if someone asks how he proposed I can just say “Clearly you don’t read my posts on Weddingbee—check it out.” So now I’m writing a “how we met” post so I can nip that question in the bud as well. Because I would so much rather communicate through blogging than have actual human interaction, apparently. So here goes.
The first time I laid eyes on Mr. Unicycle was June 23, 2006. It’s strange that I remember the date, but it’s because it was the date of my university’s pre-orientation, and also because our wedding is on June 23, 2012. I love it.
In other words, the two biggest disagreement points between future Foxy and me. Keyword: future.
The topics of God and guns have come up several times, since the two of us don’t necessarily see eye to eye on either one. Where it gets tricky is when we talk about our future kiddos; sure, it’s a (long) ways away, but it’s something that we’re trying to decide on now. Duke it out ahead of time and such.
Here goes:
1. God
Image via Set A Mark
I’ve already mentioned several times that I grew up Lutheran and Foxy is atheist.
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I’m sure you can relate. There are just some days when I move a little slower and am feeling a little less “sunny.” Well, the other day was one of those days. Mr. Hawk was leaving to go out of town for work and I was feeling down in the dumps. The air had somehow turned cold, it was overcast and breezy, and the only things I could think about were my workload at the office, bootcamp at the park in the freezing cold, and having three super pent-up dogs that I’d have to deal with after everything else. Top it off with following up on some wedding emails? I was feeling like I’d be lucky to fall into bed before PM turned to AM again.
I ran off to work, barely having a moment to kiss Mr. Hawk goodbye before heading out to complete my multitude of tasks. I went about my day just hoping to get through. When I popped home to throw on my workout gear, I was still in blinders mode, looking for the light at the end of the tunnel. That’s when I happened across a sweet little note attached to my mirror. A huge smile immediately came across my face, but I didn’t have time to call Mr. Hawk before running out again for bootcamp.
When I made it back home for the second time, I was even more exhausted. I had my butt kicked in class and I was ready to make some dinner. I went to hang up my keys on our shelf and I came across another note. Heading to the kitchen to cook some dinner, I found still another note.
It’s 1:00 a.m. on the day of our wedding, and I’m writing this from my hotel room. Party Person N is asleep nearby and junior party person M is asleep in the living room (yes, my hotel room has a living room!), yet here I am so amped up that I can barely even fathom the thought of closing my eyes. I know I need to sleep, but I feel this intense need to keep my eyes open and take all of this in—like sleeping for even a second might mean missing out on part of this crazy-wonderful-magical time. I’ve been sensing the ’wedding bubble’ around me all day today, and I know that the feeling of this moment won’t last forever. I’m trying very hard to take the sage advice offered in my bee twin Miss Seal’s last post, and just breathe and stay in that moment for as long as I can.
Tomorrow morning I will wake up and do a little bit of a decoration set-up, then I will sit back and wait for all the rest of the meticulously planned pieces to fall into place. To say that I’m thrilled wouldn’t even begin to cover it. 
To the hive:
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It’s a banner day in the Mole household: Call of Duty Modern Warfare 3 was just released. Perhaps you have this box lying around your house as well? You very well might: analysts predict that this game might sell as many as 18 million copies by January 1st.
Image via Amazon / Cover of PS3 Call of Duty MW3
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