The Wedding Planner

This day was nearly three years in the making. Here's how we pulled it off.

***

When I describe our first wedding, I never refer to it as an elopement, despite that being the very definition of what it was. That word always had such a shady connotation, as if you were somehow cheating yourself and others of the grand celebration that is required for such a momentous occasion. Firstly, getting married is not an accomplishment so everyone just needs to calm down about this being the most important day of your life, and secondly, the whole wedding industry is a giant racket. You want me to spend how much for five short hours of my life?? You're joking. How do I reconcile my frugal feminist spirit with my deep-seated compulsion to adhere to antiquated social norms? We eloped and caved in for a big party, mostly due to pressure from our parents, anyway.

But Nicole! It's your wedding day!
Nope. We already got married. This is their day. And I'm okay with that.

***

I am fairly organized so the idea of planning a wedding was not intimidating, especially since we had so long to do it. Every now and then, it was actually kind of nice to think about what a fun day we were going to have with all the people that we like the most. Guess who was NOT thrilled about planning our wedding. Hint: It's Jason.

They say, "If you can make it through the wedding planning process, then you can make it through anything." I used to scoff at this, imagining ourselves to be above such pettiness. We have planned week-long holidays for our friends and families on multiple occasions so we know that we make a good team. We have traveled the world together without much issue at all. Why would a wedding be any different?

It would probably be easier to list things that we didn't fight about in the process but I am going to spare you all the gory details and say that it was a challenge. I never realized how much I hated the phrase "I don't care" until recently. I understand if you don't have particular feelings one way or the other about seemingly insignificant details but if you say you don't care and then turn around and have something nasty to say about a decision I made, I am going to hurt you.

ProTip 1: Assign roles at the beginning and then trust that your partner will do a good job with whatever that task is. Only ask for their opinion if you really want it, not when you have already made a choice and you're expecting them to confirm it. If you really do want them to help you make up your mind on a particular issue and you are leaning one way or another, establish that you will listen to their feedback but that doesn't necessarily mean you're going to take their advice in the end.

I relied pretty heavily on Offbeat Bride and The Knot to help me stay on track. The Knot is basically everything I hate about weddings (making you feel shitty about your DIY decorations, convincing you that it's totally normal to spend $30K on one day, making everything an advertisement) but they had some really great organizational tools. The website builder is free and easy to use. The budget tracker gave you suggestions but allowed you to adjust them according to your needs. The planning checklist had great tips and reminders about things I totally would have forgotten about. And by far the most useful tool was the guest list feature. You have names, addresses, RSVP/ gift/thank you note status, meal preference all in one place AND a really nice seating chart application that allowed you to recreate your venue space and drag and drop your guests at tables, no complicated Post-it Notes madness needed.

*UPDATE: The Knot has since changed a lot of these tools and they are way less user friendly now. No more seating chart (but the guest list is still there), the budgeter is worthless and I don't love what they have done with the checklist. Sorry, guys.

ProTip 2: Technology is your friend. We saved a bunch of money by doing e-mail save the dates. No one needs another magnet with your face on it. Create a cloud-based shared folder for all things wedding and invite all the necessary parties (spouse to be, parents, wedding planner, etc.) We used Dropbox and it was a real life saver. Google Drive works great, too. Since we didn't want to have a bunch of physical stuff to take back to France with us, we registered at Zola. Our guests were able to contribute to different "wishes," like plane tickets home for Christmas and new home furnishings that we could then go and buy ourselves in Bordeaux. It seemed a lot nicer than just saying, "cash gifts only."

All of our big decisions had been made a long time again so in the last two months, all we had were little details to worry about. Once you have the RSVPs in hand, everything happens very quickly. You know how many tables you need so you can start doing the seating chart and getting centerpieces. The food, booze and dessert are all determined by the number of people that end up attending, as are favors, place cards and programs (if necessary).

ProTip 3: Close friends and families like to feel like they're helping. Relinquish control and find them something to do. We made place cards with Jason's family and the favors with mine and everyone was so proud to see the fruits of their labor on the big day.

Stuff for the tables. Thanks, Mom and Dad!

Place cards. Thanks, Julie and Jackie!

I am an obsessive planner. I need a To-Do list with each item scheduled to the minute or I can't get anything done. If I get a little of schedule, it's okay, but having the structure is comforting to me. And I figured if I feel happy knowing exactly where I need to be and when, so will everyone else around me. Enter the wedding weekend itinerary. I had a detailed document with each event, times, the parties involved, contact information, what to bring, transportation suggestions, who was responsible for certain tasks... The whole works. It was immensely helpful. I printed copies and distributed them to all the necessary parties. I had scheduled salon appoints for my bridal party, our moms and Jason's sisters, and their stylists all had their pictures and beauty requests before they even met them so they could prepare as much as possible before the big day. Because that's how I roll.

ProTip 4: Don't feel locked in by a traditional wedding format. There are no rules to any of this. There are a lot of hot trends right now, many of which are huge money pits, but there is no reason you should feel obligated to do any of it if you don't want to. If your guests really are the most important people in your life, they are not going to give any shits if you don't have a program or giant floral centerpieces, or a signature cocktail. Welcome bags at the hotel seem like such a nice touch but when the hotel charges $12 a piece just to put them in the rooms, they start to look a lot less cute. Your guests are there to see you and to have a good time. All the rest is extra.

Since we're already married we asked my Uncle Craig to officiate the ceremony, no ordination necessary! I got a lot of inspiration here, here, and here but in the end, I trusted him to just say some nice things about us and share some personal anecdotes about the keys of a good marriage. We enlisted our siblings to do some readings that we both agreed on and we exchanged wedding bands. Doubly married!

ProTip 5: Do whatever you can to maximize time with your guests. Do pictures before the ceremony so you can get right to the party afterward. Doing rounds at tables was surprisingly difficult and time consuming. Everyone wants to see you and talk to you and ask you a million questions but you have to be diligent about moving on. We didn't get to every table because we spent too much time at some and I felt terrible about it.

ProTip 6: Have a designated drink runner. I don't think I made it back to the bar once the entire night and I would have died of thirst if Josh and Stefanie hadn't been keeping me well hydrated. Thanks, guys!

ProTip 7: Consider not just how you're getting everything to the wedding but also how you're taking it back at the end of the night. ArtisanWorks said they could keep things over the weekend but they weren't open on Sunday so if we wanted anything for the picnic the next day (leftover booze, for example) we needed to take it with us at the end of the night. This was a bit of a mess for us and we should have assigned spots in cars for things before we started drinking... Oops! I had to go back and grab a bunch of stuff on Monday when all I wanted to be doing was sleeping.

ProTip 8: If you've got a lot of dress, make sure at least a few people know how to bustle it or be able to explain it to someone. My mom was the only one who got the tutorial from the seamstress and I didn't even get to see it because I was busy wearing the dress. When it started to fall out, I was pretty useless to get it back in order. I didn't want to keep harassing her all night to come fix it and other friends offered but no one could really figure it out. I ended up carrying my train a lot. Also, think about peeing. Being a pretty pretty princess is all fun and games until you have to take a piss and half your dress ends up in the toilet and/or covered in urine.

ProTip 9: I had planned so aggressively leading up to the big day that I had nothing to worry about once it arrived. Less so for Jason, but that's okay. It all worked out in the end. Know that something will go wrong but don't let it get to you. We forgot to bring toys to give to the babysitter. I left my mini video camera batteries in the charger at the salon so we didn't have that to pass around all night. We had several no shows that we really thought were going to be there. It happens. Worry about you and your spouse having a good time and then, by default, everyone else will be happy, too.

ProTip 10: Look around you for a second. This is maybe the only time you will have all of these people in the same place at the same time. Enjoy it. They are the people you love the most in the whole world and they are all here for you and that's really awesome. Look at your spouse. Is he/she still breathing? Good. Are you? Great. Take it all in. Don't let the little moments slip away too fast.

It's your day, after all.

Cheers Bitches, Here Come the Stiches!

I flew home to Rochester on August 6th and that Saturday was Josh's bachelor party. As the (wo)Man of Honor, I was in charge of organizing it and although it was the first one of these things I had ever been to, I think I did a pretty damn good job. There were matching hats. Carpools were organized so no one had to drive drunk. A detailed itinerary was distributed to all members prior to the event, all of which was planned from another damn country. If you put me in charge of something, it's gonna get DONE.

The day started out at Lost Borough Brewing Co. where we had Wegman's subs for lunch and plenty of tasty craft beers. It just so happened that there was a bachelorette party that came in at about the same time and clearly we needed to challenge them to a drinking competition. You already know who won.

Next stop: The Genesee Brewhouse. I must admit, I was partially using this visit as recon for our own rehearsal dinner (!!) but also because it is so boss. Free tour of the brewery? Flight of four beers for $3? Roof deck with amazing view of High Falls? Yes, please.

Man down!!!

Roc Brewing was next on the list. It's in a random part of Rochester so I don't think I would have ever been there if it weren't for this event. Definitely a more upscale vibe than the other places we had been but that might be in part due to the fact that it seemed super new.

We were going to hit Swiftwater but we didn't have time or enough space left in our bellies for more beer. It was time for LASERTRON! As the website suggests, this is indeed a place where adults go to play. There is a giant arcade with all kinds of games, a full service bar and restaurant and, most importantly, several different styles of laser tag games. This is not your corny old school laser tag. You're not supposed to run but we were all sweating buckets after the games anyway. If you are looking for a fun time to feel like a kid again but this time with booze, I definitely recommend this place.

No event for Josh Stich would be complete without a meal at Stone's Countryside so that's where we decided to end our evening. We ate and drank to our hearts' content and it was glorious. It's really cool to get to know my cousins all over again, now that we're all grown-ups, and getting to hang out with my dad and my brother all day was spectacular. There's not much else I miss about living in Rochester, but I do miss that.

Not long after Josh's shindig, it was time for Stefanie's bachelorette party (oh yeah, I get to go to BOTH parties!) There was a lot of Fireball and an actual fire and I'm sure Stefanie felt like her throat was on fire after belting out show tunes at 2am but it was all worth it. Wooo! Penises everywhere!!

And suddenly, it was my little brother's wedding day. Like us, Josh and Stefanie were sick to death of wedding planning but really excited to get married so when the day finally arrived, I was hoping Josh would be relieved. More like "anxious/nervous/terrified" but hey, he's not the first and certainly won't be the last to have some pre-wedding jitters. Stefanie stayed at the hotel the night before and Jason and I stayed with Josh at his place. We tried to get him to eat some breakfast but his stomach would not allow it and we opted to just get ready and try to stay focused on getting through the day. Even if everything else was a giant disaster, at least we were going to look good.

I was wearing a dress that barely left me enough room to breathe let alone carry a camera so I didn't take many pictures for the rest of the day but all you need to know is that it was beautiful. The ceremony was super personal (officiated by a friend of theirs) and it was great to see so many people from so many parts of their lives together in the same room to watch them celebrate their love for one another. My toast was EPIC, the drinks were plentiful, and they added an extra hour of dancing to the end of the night. And just seeing how happy they are together... Ugh! Who is cutting onions in here??!?

Sibling selfie!! Why are we so beautiful??

Congratulations, Josh and Stefanie! I am so happy for you both and I can't wait to see what adventures life has in store for you!!!

My Best Friend's Wedding

"I'm getting married and obviously I want you to be a bridesmaid but you live in France so I totally understand if..."

"Say no more. I will be there. With bells on. Well, maybe not the bells part but I will be there."

***

Jenna and I met at Frisbee back in college. I thought she was a year older because she seemed like she had her shit together so much more than the rest of our dazed and confused freshman bunch. Somehow she managed to avoid all the drama but was still there for all the cool stuff.

Kweezy Ultimate!

Sophomore year was tough, in part because I was a hot mess on all levels but also in part because my three best buddies all went abroad at the same time, leaving me with only myself to blame for my terrible decisions. When Jenna got back form Ireland, we decided to start living together and we have been pretty inseparable since.

With Danielle, another awesome girl from Frisbee.

With Jess, our housemate and partner in crime.

Celebrating Jenna's 22nd birthday in style

For some reason, they decided to give us diplomas.

When I got accepted to Teach For America and they asked me where I would like to be placed, my first choice was DC because that's where Jenna was going to be. Baltimore was my second choice only because of its proximity to DC (and that one time we visited with the band in 10th grade). Only a short train or car ride down the road and we could continue our college hijinks into adulthood!

So when Jenna asked if I could make it, there was only one option, other responsibilities be damned! I had to cancel two classes, miss the Gaelic Football finals in Paris and shell out a small fortune, but there was no way I was going to miss my best friend's wedding.

I was home in November for Steven and Ashley's blizzard wedding and was able to swing by David's Bridal to get my bridesmaid dress. Thank God Jenna is a reasonable person and just said "get any dress in mint" because otherwise, I may have been out of luck. I had 20 minutes to grab something off the rack and hope that it fit. Mission 1 accomplished.

I left Bordeaux on Thursday morning and landed in DC later that evening. Jenna was able to scoop me up from the airport, bring me back to her and Ben's newly purchased home in Arlington and then they took me out for barbecue. (If there's one thing they're really missing out on in France, it's good ol' American BBQ.)

On Friday, we had work to do, (after bagels, mimosas, and mani pedis of course). There were lights to be strung, decorations to assemble and display, Spotify DJ playlists to create. The wedding was being held at the Chesapeake Bay Environmental Center, and while it is beautiful and natural and all that good stuff, it's not necessarily set up for having a wedding. That's why we had a lot to do to get the place looking like a party hall.

After a long day of work, we were treated to an excellent rehearsal dinner, catered by the Baltimore-based restaurant Clementine (the same place where we asked Paul and Ama if they would be our witnesses in our little wedding). They were also doing the food for the reception and I can honestly say it was the best wedding food I have ever had. Hands down.

Sunset at the CBEC

After the dinner, we went back to the hotel and met up with a couple of old friends from DC. This is where the bad decisions began. We got beers and shots at the local VFW, where we were the youngest patrons by a good 50 years, climbed on the tank out front and then went back to the hotel for a parking lot party. We may have shotgunned beers in the trunk of Will's car. None of this was really planned but old habits with old friends die hard. And they worry about the groom getting ripped up the night before the wedding... At least we looked good doing it.

 

I'm not sure any of us were feeling 100% on the morning of the wedding but at least Jenna could blame it on nerves. Ashly and I were just hungover. But that's nothing a little make-up and some Excedrine can't fix!

Game face

The wedding was beautiful but I didn't take a single picture because I was too busy dancing like a fool and stuffing my face with delicious food. The weather cooperated for most of the day, only deciding to bring on a torrential downpour during dinner when we were all inside anyway. The catering team had to scramble and move everything inside but it ended up working out perfectly. There is something really magical about being a part of such a special day in the life of someone you love. Jenna and Ben seemed so happy. Just look at those faces!

We partied late into the night, eventually ending up back in the hotel to finish off a few beers but all of us were pretty much done at that point. Raging is hard when you're old!

Sunday was clean up day and everyone went home with a bunch of leftover booze. No one complained. It's insane to think of how much work goes into a wedding, only for it to be over in a couple of hours. Totally worth it, though.

We headed back to Arlington and decided to go see if our old Ithaca/Ultimate friend Jon was working at the local bar. Indeed he was and it was a glorious reunion!

Nawshus Ultimate! I love these people.

The name the dorm where Jon and I lived freshman year is also the name of the bar where he now works.

Obligatory BFF selfie. Rocking our Kweezy hoodies.

On Monday, it was time to go back to France. We grabbed some tasty tacos on the way to the airport, completing my list of all the things I wanted to do in America: eat BBQ, eat bagels, eat tacos, drink good beers, and hang out with the people I love. Check and check. It was a whirlwind weekend but I wouldn't have traded it for anything in the world. Being able to see Jenna marry her best friend was absolutely priceless and if I was able to contribute to that moment in any small way, it was all worth it. Congratulations, Jenna and Ben! Here's to a lifetime of adventures and delicious craft beers. I love you guys!!

So Much to be Thankful For

With the sleep still in my eyes, I kissed Jason goodbye and staggered down the stairs. It's true what they say about the dark before the dawn, and in late November, chilly, misty mornings are the only type of mornings there are. My bag was heavy, filled with wine and chocolate and my good boots in anticipation of the wintery weather that was waiting for me.

Excitement and a cup of bitter coffee keep me from sleeping. It's been 10 months. How much longer until we're there? I just want to be there.

There is no greater sight on the face of the earth than my parents' smiles when I finally step off the escalator in baggage claim. My dad always waves one thick, rugged hand and my mom always looks as though someone has finally taken a heavy load off her shoulders. It bring tears to my eyes every time.

"Have you been watching the news? They finally lifted the state of emergency in Buffalo. Aunt Carol says the thruway is open again and they are working on clearing the snow at the church parking lot. It looked bad for a minute there but I think they're going to pull it off." While Rochester was completely unscathed, our neighbors to the west were buried by the worst snowstorm in recent history, with certain parts of city seeing up to 7 feet of accumulation over the course of a week. If rain on your wedding day is supposed to bring good luck, what does a record-setting blizzard bring?

Of the seven cousins on my dad's side, Steven has always been the witty, quietly silly one. He can give you a look and you're laughing immediately, not even necessarily knowing why. Ashley is just as sharp, just as quick with exactly the right thing to say. But they both have this earnest sincerity about them, as well. Watching them recite their vows to each other, you knew they meant it. I am excited for the rest of their life together.

Patrick and I don't talk much. He filled his quota of big brother duties when we were still in elementary school and we have been pretty absent from each others' lives for a good 15 years. I love him, but I don't know him anymore. Moving to Buffalo and starting a family of his own was certainly not the only cause of the growing divide between us but for the first time in a long time, I felt like that gap shrank a little bit. We sipped cocktails, and laughed and talked about being adults and how that changes everything. And we danced.

Some of my favorite people in the world

Consumerism has spoiled most holidays for me but Thanksgiving has remained pure and beautiful. It's hard to ruin a day that is exclusively dedicated to family, food, and feeling grateful. My time at home is always so limited and it has shown me how important it is to truly get the most out of every moment with the people I love. There were many wedding-related errands to run, but the giddy excitement in my mother's eyes as worth it. Even the simple act of sitting next to her in the car again is time well spent.

Just as suddenly as it began, the week was over. On the way to the airport, we stopped quickly at Grandma and Grandpa's house. At 96, his health was fading quickly and as Grandma put it in her blunt way, "God's calling him but he can't hear Him!" (The high-pitched squeal of his hearing aid is forever etched in my memories from childhood but he had given it up completely.) Knowing that he was due for a little fresh air, we managed to get him into the van so he could come along for the ride. Absent the dry erase boards that litter the house, I scrawled a simple note in the back of the book I was reading: "Taking Nicole to Airport. She's going back to France." It took him the entire ride to decipher it and I doubt he knew that I was Nicole but it didn't matter. As I gathered my bags, he waved one thick, rugged hand and it looked as though a heavy load had been lifted from his shoulders. I knew the sad, inevitable truth that lay ahead, but in that moment, he looked so genuinely happy and it brought tears to my eyes.