Gettin' Crafty with Ribbon Wands

So today I delved into wedding DIY.  Crafting.  Makin' shit.  Going Martha Stewart on this wedding.
Ok, maybe not that far.  When I told Paul what I was making, he laughed at me.  Hard.  And I am slightly embarrassed about how excited I got about making these ribbon wands, but they turned out very pretty! 

Step One: All the crap

Dowels, ribbon, eyebolts, bells, scissors and pliers.

Step 2: Cut the ribbon.  I had 10-yd rolls of ribbon and cut them into six even lengths. 

Step 3: Screw eyebolts into dowels:

I had Paul do this part for me.  As long as he's dealing with hardware and wood, it's not "crafting"...right?

Step 4: Thread ribbon through eyebolt and tie a knot.

Step 5: Add bells.  I tried to do this with twine, and quickly realized that the twine untied in about six seconds.  So I'm going to have to get some wire or baby cable ties to put the bells on. 

We made twelve for a test drive, and between the two of us it took about 20 minutes.  Only about 130 more to go! 



The next phase is to decorate the dowel somehow.  Ideas include spray-painting them, or getting another type of ribbon to wrap around the middle.  This requires a glue-gun, which I own, but makes the entire project infinitely more complicated. 

What are these for, you might ask?  They're alternatives to rice and/or bubbles.  They are for waving in a celebratory manner.  This might happen as we exit the chapel, or as we enter the reception, or both! 

Wedding Weight Loss Update

So I joined a gym a few months ago.  And in mid-December, I started Nutrisystem. I love it for work; the program tells you exactly what to eat when.  Breakfast: packaged thing.  Snack: Diary.  Lunch: packaged thing and two veggies.  Snack: Fruit.  Dinner: packaged thing, two veggies, and a carb.  Dessert: packaged thing.  It's great, because I can pack my lunch in the tranquilized-grizzly-bear-haze that usually predominates my mornings.  If that's all the food I bring to work, that's all the food I have to eat. Easy.  The problem is when I get home.  There are infinitely more options, like the pizza or spaghetti that Paul is having for dinner.  Or the Mt. Dew I can pick up on the way home. A bottle of Mt. Dew is almost a quarter of my total daily calories.  ONE QUARTER!  No wonder I've found myself 50lbs overweight, drinking 2-4 of them a day.  I can manage now to have one every couple of days, but haven't gone more than a week without one.  *sigh*  So even though I'm paying more than $200 a month for this food (not including groceries), I'm still not sticking to it as closely as I should. 

Even so, to date I've lost a little over 20 lbs.

Paul says he can see it.  I can't.  He spends a lot more time looking at my ass, though, so I guess I'll trust him.  In looking at pictures of myself when I went dress-shopping over Thanksgiving, I can sorta see it around my jaw and neck.  I would love to be under 2001bs.  That means I've got about 25 to go. 

I'm not a fan of the general idea that a girl "should" loose weight for her wedding. But I wasn't happy with the way I looked and was always making excuses for postponing the diet and exercise I knew needed to happen.  This wedding is not the reason I'm losing weight, but it is the incentive to do it now rather than next week, or next month, or after some unimportant-and-arbitrary date in the future that is not now. 

I can't loose much more weight after April.  Paul's sister Erin is making my dress, and I don't want to burden her with a bunch of unnecessary alterations just because I've gone overboard on the weight loss. 

But I'm happy.  This is the most weight I've lost on purpose in a long long time.  Lets just hope that once it's gone, I can keep it gone...at least until I get myself knocked up. 

Honda CR-V commercial makes me grumpy

A wedding-related rant:

Has anyone seen the new Honda CR-V commercial?  A guy suggests to his girl, "Hey, you wanna get married?"  She goes off into a panic-spin about all the things she wants to accomplish before she gets married.  Supposedly, her car is going to help her do such life shattering things as learn to play the drums and hike the Appalachian trail.  She finally says "OK, but we have a lot to get done first." 

This commercial annoys the shit out of me.  It implies a whole host of things about marriage that make my blood boil.  Am I missing something?  Will I be under house arrest once I tie the knot?  If one of my life goals is to "see Mt. Rushmore", how will getting married inhibit my ability to do so?  Isn't the point of getting married that you've found someone to share your life and dreams with?  The commercial implies that all those silly goals I had when I was single better be accomplished before I get married.  I'm only allowed to want married-people things, presumably babies and antiques.  No film-making.  No flying lessons.  No band.  Those all have to get done before I get married, or be ever lost to the archives of "fun stuff you can't do anymore because you're supposed to stay home and watch the evening news while he snores in his armchair." 

There is nothing I want to do with my life that I can't do WITH Paul.  I want to learn to play guitar.  What's that?  He knows how, and can teach me?  I want to travel to Ireland.  So does he.  Not only will being married to him not stop me from going, but we'll get to experience it together.  He wants to write a fantasy novel.  I'll happily read his rough drafts and discuss character development.

I'm unreasonably annoyed by the implication that marriage all of a sudden changes your relationship.  The girl in the commercial says "WE have a lot to get done first." So she's planning on fulfilling all her life goals with her man.  Why does that have to get done before marriage?  Does marriage dissolve all sense of self, of personal goals?  What, exactly, are we supposed to be doing as husband and wife, if not the things we've dreamed together as an unmarried couple?  

For the record:  Neither of us will be forfeiting our personal goals and dreams after we sign that piece of paper.  If and when we decide to have kids, then that will realign our priorities.  But simply getting married is not the death of fun and personal growth, both together or independently. 

Wine Bottle Request

So, all you Wisconsin/Chicago-based winos:  I have a request.  If you ever drink wine out of a green or blue bottle, please to save the bottle for my wedding decor?  I'd like to use them for table numbers, ala Martha Stewart:

Yeah, I know...Martha.  But hell, the woman has some great ideas, and I'm not going to dismiss something I like just because she came up with it.