Wedding Dress News tomorrow

I promise, a big post tomorrow about the wedding dress. No final decisions have been made, but more than a vague idea is in place. Until then.

P.S. If you find yourself looking at any other posts and want to go back to the front page, just click the big title Zee Wedding - Zee Story at the top of any page to bring you back to the most recent one. Took me a little while to figure that one out. Until then.


"Do It Yourself" Wedding Tips - Save!

You know you are engaged when...

You know you are engaged when:

- You find yourself constantly thinking about next year, going so far as to mistake 2005 for 2006.

- You want to tell the WORLD you are getting married but you find saying "my fiance" somehow strange.

- Every dress that is white gets a second look.

More to come

Okay, this website is driving me slowly nuts. I have been trying for the last half hour to make a small edit in a previous post and to get the changed version of the post to load up. It is not working! Publishing normally only takes a few seconds, so I know if it's taking 5 minutes, something is afoot. I've tried a couple of times and it still is being ornery. If any of you other bloggers out there have some advice, I'd be happy to read it.

Thank you to all who have made comments, it's great to get feedback from everyone. And thanks to all who have popped in to take a look around, from Australia, to Sweden, to Canada, to all across the States. Keep looking! I tell you, I'm in love with my Stat program. To quote Ferris Bueller, it is so Choice. It's cool to be able to see where everyone is from and what brought them to the site.

I hope others will find my site entertaining or informative. I'd like to read some other wedding blogs as well, to see how different people are doing different things, but nearly all that I find are for weddings that took place in 2003 or so. Not really as exciting as reading new and fresh posts, filled with drama and intrigue.
Will she get the ring she wants? Stay tuned to this blog!
Will his friends really duct tape him to a lamp post for his stag party? Find out this week!

Zee Snow!

Munich is covered in snow! About 30cm (a foot) of snow has fallen in the last 24 hours. For all my northern readers, this might not be so impressive, but it's a lot for Munich. I'm impressed with how the city hasn't shut down; the sidewalks are being plowed, along with the major roads, as many people as usual are out and about on the streets.

Now, if we could get married next January with this kind of snow all around, it would be fantastic! I'd love it. I hope it won't simply be a miserable cold and rainy day. Not that it matters in the end, I am aware that marrying G is the aim of the day, but it would make for good pictures.

For those of you who may have tried this link yesterday, I'm sorry, I messed up. It should be working now. Let me know if it doesn't.

"Do It Yourself" Wedding Tips - Save!

Developing the Blog

I was quite excited to find a few new tools for some of the behind-the-scenes work of this blog. I have just added a stats counter to the template, so I know if anyone other than myself actually reads this thing. I will have to look at every visitor as a success, rather than being despondent that millions aren't reading my words of wisdom.

Plus, I found a new resource for saving money on your wedding. Check out the link below. It's for an e-book by Stephi Stewart. I listened to a radio interview with her and she sounded pretty on the ball. Plus, she personally responded to an email I sent her within the day! I was very impressed.

"Do It Yourself" Wedding Tips

Engagement Party?

Now that people are starting to find out that we are engaged, there have been a few questions of "So when is the engagement party?" Some a bit teasing, some very serious in their need for a reason to party.

An engagement party could be fun, but I do wonder what to do. Perhaps a house party like we did last year over Easter. We provided the alcohol, everyone else brought food. It was a great time, (other than the red wine stains on the wall which did eventually come out) and I wouldn't mind doing something like that again. Someone suggested something a little more dress-up than just a get-together in the bar, but that starts to sound like planning and coordination of a level I’m not prepared to do. It’s not that I don’t want to do any planning because I’m scared of it. I’ve planned lots of events, from 4 person casual lunches, to 150 people weekend extravaganzas. The reason I don’t want to get too involved in planning anything is because it’s easy to get wrapped up in planning, worrying about are the guests enjoying themselves, is there enough ice, etc etc, and forget to enjoy the party yourself. If it’s something simple that I feel comfortable with, I know I will have a lot more fun.

Before we have an engagement party, we should have some sort of physical token to show to people that we are actually engaged. A ring, a locket, something. So that will be the first step, before any party/engagement announcements are made.

The Knot - Update

The Knot sent me an email today. It said "Where are you getting married? We've pulled together everything you need to plan a wedding in your area: Hundreds of vendor profiles -- sites, photographers, florists, bands, and more" blah blah blah. Which would make you assume that from the oodles of information they collected from me when I registered for the site, they had some about things near me in Munich. Nah-uh. Just a link to their over-filled front page, with the list of everything for the U.S. C'est la vie.

But while we are on the topic, random impersonal emails from companies aren't the only ones I can get. You too can write to me: zeebride@gmail.com. Or if you prefer to deal with the male half, zeegroom@gmail.com. I'm going to make him able to post on the blog, so if you are very lucky, you might see a post from him one of these days...

Rings and things

I've been thinking about wedding rings and wedding dresses the last few days. I'll share my thoughts on rings for this post.

As I mentioned before, at the moment, I don't have an engagement ring. I can live with this, but I do want a ring. I've never really thought about it much before. I don't wear rings normally, so a ring would become extra symbolic, as no matter what it is, it's a ring I'm going to always wear. Within reason though, I might take it off when mixing up hamburger meat with my hands. But always in the sense it's not going to be taken off just because it doesn't match my shoes.

I'm not so crazy about a big diamond solitaire for a lot of reasons.


1. Diamonds are overpriced. Diamonds aren't rare, they are extremely common. A market was artificially created for them by keeping tight control of how many got out to the public. This has eased in the last few years, but the grip of good marketing is still in effect.

2. There are too many blood diamonds out there. Countries like Sierre Leon, Liberia and Angola fund their civil wars by selling diamonds they mine in their countries. Lots of times the people that these rebel groups use to mine the diamonds are kept like slaves. Do I want to wear a stone that went to buy guns that went to kill innocent human beings? If I do get a diamond, we'll make sure it's a Canadian diamond or another diamond with a certificate of origin from somewhere peaceful.

3. Solitaires stick out. Occasionally I am not the most graceful of humans. With a big rock on my finger, I am likely to rip up sweaters, scratch glasses and leave injuries on my or G's head during what was supposed to be a tender moment.

So what would I like? Well, both G and I were talking about something with rubies, since Ruby is my middle name. Pearls possibly, since it's our birthstone too (and I can't scratch anyone's eyes out with a pearl). But basically, we're going to just go out shopping and see what we like. Don't know if we'll get something matching to work as wedding rings together, or two individual rings. If anyone has any suggestions, whether of what to buy or where to look or a style they think we should check out, I'd love to read your comments.

Website review - The Knot

Really, this place should be called Zee Knot, in deference to me, but I guess I will just have to live with the snub.
theknot.com
Nice clean front page, with lots of information listed. The unfortunate thing is, you have to register to use any of this information. Registration is of course free, but I was forced to give a lot of personal information before registration was complete. It also forced me to pick a state/province, which is silly, as "Bavaria" wasn't listed as an option. Okay, now having gone back to see the page, I see they have an option of "Not applicable", but tucked down within the other Ns, rather than somewhere easy to spot.

Because there is so much information, it would be good if they had an obvious newbie's guide to take you on a tour of the webpage, to see what's available.

On my own, exploring leads me to the link for local resources. Hmmm. No Germany (no suprise), so let's see what they have for Canada. Canadian resources are limited the Toronto area. Is this because they have only started the Canadian section, or is because they really think that people will go to Toronto for their reception from Vancouver or St. John? Either way, it hardly encourages more Canadian viewers to check it out. A whole potential market and new advertisers basically left out in the cold.

But the site is not completely useless if you are not from the States. Some of the good things they have are some very nifty looking and useful tools. Included in this are a checklist for the wedding, a tool for planning your budget, a guest list which also then corresponds to the invitation list and to the gift list. At first glance, what I like most is the budget planner because it includes so much which you might otherwise forget and helps to distribute everything appropriately. You can take out things that aren't applicable and include other things that they don't. Very practical and useful.

I have to say, I did experience a micro-second of panic when I clicked on one of these pages for the first time. Because you have to enter a date for the wedding, I picked a random date in January next year. So when I went onto the checklist, there it was in big letters, "Only 350 days left!" I think it was the exclamation point which scared me the most. But it's also the first time I started thinking about a wedding date being a deadline. Eeek.

There are other nice features of the webpage which I haven't had a chance to explore yet, so I'll review them more after I've had a chance to play with them.

Shameless publicity

In an attempt to become rich and famous, (hah!) I have submitted my blog to a few blog search engines. blogwise.com was good enough to include me in their list, so here is their reciprocal publicity. Thanks Blogwise! I won't forget you little people when I reach the top!

Getting married in Germany

Getting married in Germany may be a bit unlike what you are used to. In Germany, many couples have both a civil and a church ceremony. You can't just get married in a church, you must do a civil ceremony too. A friend of mine figures it's to restrict the power of the church versus the state, which is an interesting theory and very possibly true. You can also only have a church wedding if you pay church tax. This is an extra tax of around 9% that you "voluntarily" pay to the church that comes off your paycheck. I say voluntarily because you don't have to pay it, but a lot of expats don't realise this when they move to Germany. They put down their religion on their work forms, not realising that it means they will be paying an extra tax. If you want to give to the church, all fine and good, but a lot of people I know find it a bit bothersome that they are taxed 9% for their faith. Once you are on, you have to it's of course a big hoopla to get off. Not too big, but it might make you a bit uncomfortable if you are religious but want to tithe the money somewhere else. Don't worry, no one I know has been struck down by lightning for removing themselves from this tax.

ZeeGroom and I will be having only a civil ceremony.

I was looking through some of the online information about marriage in Munich from the Munich webpage, and as I don't have all the details, I won't write exactly what is needed. I have to go down in person to get all the goods. But I have to share with you this one tidbit. They have a list of songs that they can play for your wedding. Most are just your normal standard stuff, but some of the song they have go a ways in helping blowing away the stereotype of Germans as conformists. But perhaps go a ways to giving you the idea they have no taste.

How Deep is Your Love - BeeGees - To me, this song always had more to do with "getting it on" than getting the ring on, but perhaps that's just me.
My Way - Frank Sinatra - "And now, the end is near, And so I face the final curtain" What a nice sentiment to start your married life with. And does this mean that whoever chose the song is going to get his or her way for the rest of the marriage?
Que' sera' - "Hitchcock" Doris Day - Okay, this song isn't so bad really, but the fact that they list it as a song from Hitchcock is really a bit weird. It was in the movie The Man Who Knew Too Much but still, I think Doris Day would have been enough.

But saving the best for last:
Hells Bells - ACDC!!! I really really would like to see the couple who get married to this song. They must be extremely cool or extremely clueless. Hah! It made my afternoon.

Telling People

I'm enjoying telling people that I'm engaged. It's always nice to be able to tell people good news and everyone I know would think that this is good news. As G and I already live together, it hardly comes as a shock to anyone, so no good expressions of amazement on people's faces, simply a 'bing' type look, a smile and an immediate "Congratulations!" Makes me feel good, the exact opposite of shoot-the-messenger.

But one thing I'm not enjoying so much is not being able to give any details. Most people have not immediately followed their congratulations with "So when's the wedding", but it usually comes within the next few minutes of conversation. We are vague, thinking probably January next year for the actual paperwork, then a party in February or March in Australia, then another party in June or July in Canada. Everyone in Munich is now asking themselves "And what about us young lady?" Yes, definitely another party here in Munich at some as-yet undetermined time.

But know I'm thinking about it, and June/July next year is when the World Cup is taking place. Here in Germany. It would be really really inopportune to go away for all of that excitement, when it's happening right here. Hmm. More thinking required...

The rest of the review of InStyle Weddings Issue

Things I like.
I like the fact the articles finish in order in the magazine. I hate it when you have to go searching around the back of the magazine to find the last one and a half pages of an article.
I like that the articles are well-written and seem to respect the reader. It seems to be a style that says "We understand you are really happy, but we also know you have a lot of decisions to make." Nothing too frothy and lovey-dovey.
As you would expect from a bridal magazine, the photography is excellent and the clothes that are displayed are tasteful. Not necessarily my taste - there's a doozy on page 159 that you would have to pay me the 6,990 bucks it costs just to wear it - but no red latex jumpsuits for you to show off in in front of the vicar. Hey, maybe by the time things roll around to the day, I might be interested in that look. But that wasn't what I looking for when I bought the magazine and that's happily not what is in it.
Being from InStyle, there are some clever stylistic things to do with your hair and the location you choose. Other things too that are perhaps a bit more fashion than just bridal. But I might just being saying that because it's my first one. I guess I'll have to buy another and compare. :)

Things I don't like.
The pages and pages and pages of ads. I'm not surprised, but when I pay $6.50 Cdn for a magazine, I would hope to get a bit more meaty substance than was provided.
I'm sure many brides probably appreciate that there are so many ads for ideas they can see pasted in front of them. But I would appreciate if some of them listed the price of the outfit the model is wearing. You (you being the advertiser) may feel that's a bad idea, listing the price, as people will just flick through, either shocked at the prices or simply looking for the cheapest dress. Well, I have two things to say to this. One, they list the prices of the dresses used in the articles, so I think most women would have an idea of what to expect. Two, either they are going to fall in love with your dress and seeing the price doesn't matter or they are going to shop around anyways. Do all of us future brides a favour, start listing the price discreetly in the corner!!
Okay, if that is really too much to ask - although I feel is shouldn't be - can you at least then put the name or number of the style on the page so we know what to ask for when we go into the shop? That truly is the least you can do, rather than making us go online and find it on your website, which also doesn't have the price. Sigh.
The last thing I didn't like, which relates to the first thing I didn't like, was that there wasn't enough practical information in it. I suppose this is how they sell magazine after magazine, by only telling you a few tidbits at a time. Well, like I said, I'll buy another one in a few weeks and see how they compare...

Review of InStyle Weddings Issue

I can't remember exactly why I picked this magazine over the 9 or so others hovering in the same part of the magazine rack, each with a skinny beautiful girl with a white dress on the front cover. I guess it wasn't specific to any particular region; it didn't look over the top on ideas of how to waste-sorry, spend, your money; and I was under pressure from ZeeGroom to "just pick one so we can get out of here", so probably the words "Great choices for any budget" and "easy ideas" caught my eye.

The magazine is 376 pages long. The first page that isn't an ad is page 27, the start of the contents page. The next is page 32, the second page of the contents. That's right, they space two pages of contents over five pages. Next is the editor's note on page 50. The first actual article comes on page 89. I was going to put quotes around the word actual, because it's basically a promotion for an event designer. But it is in print and it isn't an advertisement and it does give at least one idea. $325 US for a bouquet? Ackkk!! Ack was my reaction to reading a lot of the things in the magazine; $5000 US and for a cinematographer to film your wedding (you get a 12-14 minute DVD, no sound). Ackkk!! The price of the first outfit I saw that I actually liked, $4030 US. Ackkk!! At least that included the Manolo Blahnik shoes.

Which leads me to an aside: Was I the only one who hadn't heard of Manolo Blahnik before I watched Sex and the City? Living in Europe puts you behind the curve on a lot of pop-culture things, but was a pair of shoes that cost on average over $400 a thing that your average North American knew about before? I so do wonder. Maybe it's just me who is behind the curve.

More later, and I promise, a true review, not just first impressions.

Breakdown

I started writing this last night, and "Breakdown" is a very apt title, as blogger.com did in fact seem to do that as I was trying to publish this. I hope it's not a regular feature of their service.

Anyhow, as I was saying. The breakdown title in fact refers to my lack of willpower. Less than a week after finally informing my parents, I broke down and bought a bridal magazine. (You can see the cover below, I'll give you my rating of it later). I really wanted to buy one, even though as I've stated before, I really don't want the hoopla of a big wedding. But it was like there was some power over me, drawing me to the section of magazines with white dresses on the covers, willing me to buy one. By the way, it's amazing how many bridal magazines are out there. How can they sell so many on a regular basis? Who buys these? I suppose a nervous bride (they are definitely targeted at the bride, not the groom!) would probably buy a stack. I bought one, and felt deliciously guilty buying just that. G just rolled his eyes at me and told me to get one, as I obviously looked like a kid locked out of the candy store, staring up at them.

The draw I felt to buy one reminded me of a similar feeling I used to get when I was dating. I would meet some guy, have a couple great dates with him and feel giddy about him. You know, that initial rush of attraction. If I had too much time on my hands after one of these dates, I found my mind wandering, thinking about our future life together, whether we'd have a boy or a girl first, how my first name would sound with his last name... and then I would pull myself back to reality, hating myself for getting carried away with things that I truly (I swear to you) did not want or expect. Honestly, I've never wanted to change my last name, it's so cool and most guy's last names don't measure up, but I still would daydream about it. It was like the hormones in my body were pressuring me to make whoever the poor guy was my mate, whether my conscious mind wanted to or not. I felt the same feeling when I went to buy the bridal magazine, something my conscious mind didn't want to do, but still wanting it. But at least buying a magazine is something considered fairly normal. I'm sure the boys and men I dated would have ran off in a panic if they had an idea of what coursed through my mind so early in the dating sometimes.

InStyle Weddings Issue 

Spice Girls time

I'll tell you what I want, what I really really want. (Sorry to those out there who missed/hated that bit of pop culture).

I want something simple. - This is the end result of all the following ideas.
I would like something small. - I don't want to spend my wedding day trying to make 3 minutes of conversation with every person there.
I would like to celebrate a special day with the people I care most about in this world. - That is what will make it special.
I would like no hassle. - Anything that I can do without, I want to do without.
I would like no pressure from others, making me cave in to ideas I don't really like. - This is another source of stress.
I want an unlimited budget to spend 400 Euros. - I want the freedom to spend money on what I want, but really, I don't want to spend a lot.

Then what I want is to have 3 big but low-key parties. One here in Munich, one in Sydney, one in Edmonton. Not necessarily in that order, but in those places (or close by). Doesn't that sound like fun?

Planning is a crazy thing to try and do when you live in one place and your families are from opposite sides of the world. And also when you sooooo do not want a traditional wedding with the dress and the flowers and the poufy bridesmaid dresses and the decorations and everything. My sister did it in 2003, and it was a very nice wedding (my bridesmaid dress wasn't in the least poufy) and they looked wonderful and have great pictures and memories from the day. But at points, the stress levels were really high. I would really like to try and avoid that as much as possible. I'm sure those of you out there who are already married are probably laughing, thinking "Yeah, right! Good luck!" Well, those naive dreams might fly out the window soon enough, but since it's early days, I'm going to hang onto the idea as long as possible. Hah!

I'll post later what I do want.

Zee Wedding Proposal and Telling of Rents

So, I suppose you want to know when it happened? Well, it was a Saturday in early November. We had just changed to the Czech train at the border with Germany and were on our way to Prague. We were alone in our carriage on this old clattery train. It was getting dark out, but you could just make out the snow that was falling. A very romantic setting. He asked in his G-like fashion, and I said yes. Happy beginnings.

We told G's parents while they were over here in Munich for a visit in November and we told mine while we were in Edmonton for a visit in January. Both sets of parents had an amusingly similar reaction. For both G's and my parents, it was a "Oh, well that's good. Congratulations" at first. Then when it had time to settle in, they started to act significantly more happy and enthusiastic. Not that either of us doubted it from their first reactions, but it was funny to see how having time to think about it increased their excitement. Similar to my own reaction I guess!

Now that both sets of parents know, we can tell the rest of you. We didn't really want to spread the word around before I had had a chance to tell my parents to their face, as word gets around the world pretty quick nowadays...

Getting the hang

Okay, so I think I've set things up correctly. Please comment or email me if things look wrong. Wrong as in "did she really mean for the text to be lime green on a lime green background?"