I'm OFFICIALLY Married now!

Another Repost from "Rene's Revolution"








This time, we signed the papers and everything. ;-)

There was a lot of hecticness with this wedding as I've discussed. Three days before the wedding we realized that we didn't have the photogs for 6 hours, we had them for 5. Oops. We had intended to have them for 6 but somewhere in our meetings with them that got lost in translation and we had only paid for 5 hours not 6 and the extra hour would be another $500. Soooooooo.... we had to change the schedule of events for that day which meant a lot of scrambling up until the night before the wedding.

We had our show the night before the wedding too! So, it was definitely a hectic time.

However, on the day of my wedding I had my beautiful bridesmaids and flower girl, the handsome groomsmen, my brother to marry us, our familes around us and my lovely and wonderful groom.

It is a bit of a blur of a day actually. Curtis and I forgot to bring our license to the venue, and we both forgot to bring our vows to the altar and had to improv our vows. :) But it turned out soooo well! Our improved vows were sweet and heartfelt and not the planned out words we wanted to say. Despite all the last minute changes and craziness there was no drama that day and everyone had a great time!





My brother had become licesensed as a Minister to marry us. He did SUCH a great job. Everyone kept talking about it afterward. My other brother was in the wedding party, as were both sisters in law and my nieces. My Matron of Honor Karen saved our butts and thrilled me when two days before the wedding she got my garter, and made a sign in sheet and a made me the MOST adorable little people cake topper for the cake! Our other friend Liz stepped in to take some getting ready photos since we didn't have the photographers for that and to videotape for us since our other friend who was supposed to be our videographer couldn't make it.


I am so lucky to have had two lovely wedding ceremonies! A big thank you to all our friends who pitched in to help us have this and to our families who made it all possible!

Not a Typical Bride Part 2

Another repost from "Rene's Revolution"


There are still quite a few details to be worked out before the wedding. Today I went out into the world and got started on a couple of those things. While out at a wedding store I looked at some floral hair pins. They were little fake flowers with a couple of fake crystals on a bobby pin. They were $99 for TWO of them! Are you kidding me? If I still want them in a week I will make them myself for about a buck each!

Weddings are, quite frankly, a racket. EVERYTHING costs more than normal when it's for a wedding. I think we need to start forcing a change here. Let this be part of the revolution. No more price gouging for what should be a happy, spiritual, day celebrating love and commitment with family and friends. If brides stopped paying through the nose for things, maybe they'd stop ratcheting up the prices so high? Let's all stop buying into the hype!

Part of this is, I think, because so many brides have that "This is THE MOST IMPORTANT DAY OF MY LIFE!" attitude and are willing to pay through the nose for their big day. I am not one of those brides. Sure, having an over the top luxury wedding is great if you have the millions in the bank. But if you have to go into debt for it, is it really worth it for what amounts to less than 24 hours? My wedding will end up being about 6 hours when all is said and done and it kills me that we are spending $12 grand on 6 hours when I could have gone around the world with that money. The average wedding in America these days is $25,000! Do you know what I could do with that?!!!! And that is usually for no more than 8 hours of actual ceremony and reception time! It's insane! No, I don't begrudge people their fancy weddings.I worked for an absolutely amazing event and wedding planner for a while. I worked some weddings that were so expensive, yet so beautiful you wouldn't believe it. Seriously, it is amazing what some of these weddings looked like! One in particular was everything I could have wanted and more. If I had millions, I would have a very similar, yet personalized to us kind of wedding. But I don't. So I'm not. I also saw a wedding where the couple saved up for FIVE years to have an amazing wedding in Malibu. It was truly breathtaking and awesome but you know what? They saved for FIVE years! That's such a long engagement! I don't have that kind of patience!

As a child it was never my dream to be a bride or to have children. In fact I have two very clear memories of playing make believe as a kid that I think really tell who I ended up being:

1. I was playing "princess". I was, you guessed it, a princess of not just one, but SEVERAL European countries. (I've always dreamed big-heehee!) I was also a world famous actress and singer and had been an Olympic gymnast and equestrian before that. I didn't have a husband but was being wooed by several boyfriends. Some were also royalty, some were rock stars or actors and one was a horse trainer for all my many horses. (I was a bit of a boy crazy vixen from a very young age apparently)In this make believe world that I liked to inhabit at the age of about oh, 8 or 9, I also had many dogs of many different breeds and a few cats, dolphins and of course, the horses. I went to awards shows, and I filmed movies on exotic locations and travelled. This was my version of the "ideal life". Oh I always figured I'd get married some day because most people do. It just wasn't a big focus to me.

2. When I was about 12 I was playing and I was thinking about what a great mom I'd be. Then it hit me like a ton of bricks: babies don't stay babies when they're real. They grow up. They become kids. Smart ass kids who talk back. Then teenagers. TEENAGERS! And by then, you're like, getting OLD! (I don't think that anymore, but hey, I was a kid!) And then EVERYONE knows you're getting old because you have TEENAGERS. Then THEY grow up and have babies! And you never stop worrying about or taking care of your kids. THEY ARE YOUR RESPONSIBILITY FOREVER. And right about then, the idea of having my own kids was tarnished forever.

So, as you can see, I wasn't your typical little girl putting a sheet on her head and pretending it was a wedding veil. I didn't dream of fancy weddings and meeting Mr. Right and having the picket fence and little family. I dreamt of being a star! With lots of boyfriends and who travelled a lot.

Then I grew up. I didn't become a star but I tried... I did travel. A lot. I did have lots of boyfriends. Some were rock stars and actors, some were not royalty but thought that they were. ;-) Unfortunately none were horse trainers. ;-)

Then I rekindled with one actor ex boyfriend. We tried just being friends. We ended up dating and falling in love all over again. 3 years later he proposed on bended knee in a theater in front of an audience. A theater where, 6 months earlier, because of his influence in my life, I had done my first show after a miserable 13 year absence from the stage I loved. He has helped to give life to my dreams better than even I have. He supports me and loves me even when I am being a crazy temperamental nutjob. He loves to travel. He loves luxury, but in a somewhat simple way like me. He is, in short, my ideal partner in life. And just like that, I was a girl dreaming of getting married to this man that I love. I may not be a princess, but he often makes me feel like one. He may not be rich, but he is famous and we're working on getting to a better place financially. We don't have lots of dogs, but we have one that we both love more than anything. i may not be a star but I have my first lead role in a musical right now, because he is in my life. That's pretty awesome.

So I began trying to plan a wedding having no real clear idea of what I wanted.

It's been a weird ride for me. On the one hand I realize that this is a big important day and there are definitely things I would have liked to have been able to do. But on the other hand, no matter how you break it down, travelling the world, doing what I love and being recognized for it, is still more important than this one day in the end.

At times I've been caught up in the wedding "must haves" that I read about or was told about. That caused me to get upset because, due to our budget, there is a lot we can't do that I would like to do in an ideal world. But really, when I calm down and think about it, I only get upset because I know what everyone else's expectations are and I don't want to be judged. My own expectations are pretty simple. I'm marrying the man I love. We are going to be surrounded by family and friends. We are going to eat good food, have some wine, do some dancing and celebrate our love and commitment. I'll be in a pretty dress. (Maybe even two or three, but shhh! That's a secret.) In the end, that's all any wedding needs. I know because, I already did this once on a smaller scale at our semi elopement. All you need for a wedding is love, family and friends, and someone to marry you. :)

I don't look down upon women who dream of their big day since infancy. To each their own. Several of my closest friends have always been super excited to be a bride and had life timelines about it and had things all planned out since childhood. I'm cool with that. I'm just not like that myself. I don't think one is necessarily better than the other, it's just two different trains of thought on the matter. While they were playing house and dreaming of their wedding day, I was dreaming about walking down the red carpet...swimming with whales and dolphins, riding race horses and singing on Broadway. I may have gotten off track on many of those dreams, but part of why I love and am marrying Curtis is because he has helped me to get back on track with them.

I'm not a typical bride. But I'm the bride I guess I was always destined to be.

Curtis would like me to talk more about the show we're doing together in this blog. I will in time, but I think starting tomorrow night I'll be blogging about it as we go into "tech week" and through the run on my other blog "Lil Vixen Stirs Things Up". That's my more "day to day" blog.

I'm glad I'm blogging again. I really missed it more than I realized. I hope that your enjoying these. I feel like I am writing pointless streams of consciousness at times. And lest you think I am some bitter betty bride who is ungrateful and awful let me say this:

I am beyond thrilled that I got to have both the elopement I had wanted as well as an actual "real" wedding. I cannot wait to see my beautiful bridesmaids, my beautiful niece as my junior bridesmaid and my other beautiful niece as a flower girl. My mom will look beautiful in her fancy dress, Curtis, my dad and brothers and all the boys will be handsome in their suits and tuxes. And it's going to be a wonderful celebration of love, life and music! Everything in this wedding is from the heart of both Curtis and I. I am sad that we had to cut the guest list, I am sad that I won't have a couple fun "props" that I wanted. But in the end, I am so happy to get the chance to marry the man I love twice, and to get to share it with family and friends. I am blown away by the generosity of funds, talent and time given by our amazing family and friends! I am so lucky to be marrying into a family I get along with and love! I am lucky that Curtis gets along with and loves my family. In the end, there are many, many more good things than bad.

I wanted to blog about the challenges though, because like pregnancy and childbirth, I think a lot of the hard parts of getting married and planning a wedding get glossed over and I thought talking about how hellish it can be at times was just being honest. Planning a wedding is a lot of work, costs a lot of money (even if you do it "cheap") and makes a lot of emotions run high. There is usually at least some stupid drama, and in some cases, like mine, a LOT of stupid drama. I also think the challenges I faced, just show that when we try to hard to do things as society says we should and not how we think we should ourselves, we end up disappointed. Also, I wanted to because, I am just not a typical girl in many ways and I think that my wedding planning experience shows that. But in some ways I guess I am. I loved trying on the pretty wedding dresses (even if I couldn't afford most of them). I loved looking at venues and tasting cake with my fiance. I love looking at pretty flowers. And if I AM having a wedding then damn it all to hell I will have the perfect wedding shoes! ;-)

Not a Typical Bride

This is a repost from my other blog "Rene's Revolution". I'm still trying to figure out which blog to use for which subjects. Sometimes, since I have more followers on Rene's Revolution, I just post everything there. But initially, that was my blog for body image, pit bulls and breed specific legislation and things that may get ranty. I started this blog to chronicle more day to day things in the life of an actress. So, there will be a few reposts from that blog to catch anyone up who may have missed it if they only follow this blog. But I really want to get back to posting more of the fun stuff here and the more call to arms stuff on Rene's Revolution. We'll see how that goes. ;-) Anyway, here's the blog about the wedding and wedding planning. :)










(photos out of order.... sorry!)

I'm alive!

This summer has been crazy.

I'm also married! Kind of. Long story.

We cancelled the wedding we were planning. The one that had a 150 person guest list,a photobooth, and an awesome photography package. We cancelled it because, in the end, we just couldn't afford it, so it seemed the responsible thing to do.

So, we started looking into plan Bs. After all, we still wanted to get married. So we started planning elopement options where we would kind of semi elope with our immediate families and the bridal party in attendance, and then have a small, simple party later for friends.

At first, cancelling the wedding really, really depressed me. But then I REALLY started to like our elopement options!

Then, out of the blue one day, Curtis called me and said that he and my mom had worked out a way for use to still have a version of the wedding, we'd just have to cut back on things like some of the extras and the guest list. My parents were also putting in more money and so were his parents. While extremely touched at every one's generosity, I wasn't exactly gung ho about it because I loved my elopement idea...

Plus when we had been planning the wedding before it was SOOOOO stressful. It had been so nice to not deal with any of the drama anymore. I had tried very hard to avoid typical wedding drama, but, well, it seems that weddings have a life of their own, much like other expensive rights of passage in life, like children for example, and well, you have absolutely no idea what kind of wedding you're gonna have until you're smack in the middle of it crying in a ball on the floor and saying over and over "Why does everyone HATE me?" or "Why did I ever think I could do this?"

THIS is why wedding planners were invented. We should have had a wedding planner. But everything was so easy when it was just Curtis and I making decisions in the beginning..... oh well. You live, you learn.

In any case, yeah, I was not at all gung ho about having to deal with wedding planning again. I just wanted to get on with my elopement ideas which were SO awesome. We had a plan for Vegas and for Napa Valley that we were trying to decide between and both were seriously awesome! And both were all about what he and I wanted and nothing about what anyone else wanted yet still including our families and closest friends. It was perfect.

That being said.... people were telling me I may regret not doing it up "bigger". There was still a part of me who wanted to see some portion of my wedding visions come to fruition after all the hell of planning that we'd already gone through. Also, a lot of the planning was already done so, we assumed all the drama would be behind us. So, I was left to make the decision on my own. I had a week to decide. To wedding or to elope?

So... after a week of anguish over the two, I decided that what I REALLY wanted was both! But doing Napa or Vegas the way we had planned AND the big wedding was impossible. Originally, when we had started planning, we had wanted a big winery wedding, but we couldn't afford that, So, I called the winery we had liked in Temecula and arranged to have a small "open elopement" for just us and out families and whoever from the bridal party could make it, and then still do the bigger wedding.

It was perfect! The best of both worlds!

The elopement was beautiful. We did it in August so we'd have time between that one and the wedding. Ordinarily I would never think to have a wedding in August. But it had been such a mild summer. Seriously not that hot at all. And we had thought it might be fun to do it on 8-9-10! But that date didn't really work out for us, so we had to do it the next week. That was unfortunately the first REALLY hot day of the "most mild summer ever" (well, of course, why wouldn't it be?) and so it was 110 degrees during our outdoor, no shade ceremony. But it was sooooo pretty. And it was really a great day! After that we changed into more comfy (ie: much cooler and easier to move in)"wedding clothes" and then had lunch at the winery restaurant and then Curtis, me and our friend and photographer Greg went for some wine tasting at another winery and then Curtis and I retired to an awesome winery hotel and spa resort! We had a certified minister, however, we did not sign our license, as we want our official anniversary to be later. So, we're married in spirit, but not by law... yet. :)

Then it was back to finishing the planning for the wedding. Only, we had lost a little over a month in planning by then from when we had cancelled it. So now we were racing against a clock. Tensions and emotions were strained and well, remember how we thought we were done with drama? Yeah. Not so much. More tears. More hurt feelings. Seriously, I am not sure why people have weddings. They definitely bring out the best in people, but they also bring out the worst. I enjoyed the very beginning of our wedding planning back when Curtis and I thought that we could afford to pay for almost all of it and it was just us planning our nice, simple and unique day. And I enjoyed the elopement planning a whole lot! But then...for the wedding it was just a stressful, 7 month emotional roller coaster. Curtis and my Maid of Honor both agree that yes, most weddings have some drama at some point, but no, not all wedding planning goes as awry and as awful as mine has. I have been pretty unlucky in my planning. So much of it has been up in the air at times, and the plans have had to change for EVERYTHING from the engagement party, to the actual wedding plans, to my shower which was last week- things have been constantly up in the air or changed at the last minute. There were always valid reasons, but the reasons were always totally out of my hands. My Maid of Honor keeps saying "The theme for your wedding is 'Everything Is Gonna Change!'" She's right. That makes things quite stressful. So, you'll have to forgive me when I say yes, I am SO excited for my actual wedding! It's going to be an awesome day! But I also just really want it all to be over. I'm absolutely drained from planning this wedding.

Having been in my friend Karen's wedding as Maid of Honor and also a bride myself, here's what I can now officially say: I do not enjoy planning weddings. I enjoy going to weddings, I enjoy being in weddings, but I do not relish any position that involves planning the weddings. It's good to know these things about yourself. So, there will be no more wedding planning in my future after this wedding. :)

I also now know that the happy yet extremely awkward and uncomfortable feeling I have at showers does not change when it is my own shower. Did I mention that the second REALLY hot day of this "mildest summer ever in CA" was the day of my shower and it was technically FALL at that point? Yup. I hate you Mother Nature. And uh... it's now officially October so lets just dial down that thermostat ok?

Oh yes! We also moved and are rehearsing for a show together! So, yeah, lots of stuff going on! No wonder I am stressed. The show is actually REALLY fun. But the timing of it being right before the wedding could have been better, however, we are so happy to be a part of it!

We live in a cute little two bedroom bungalow now. It's super adorable and conveniently close to the theater and to many restaurants we like!

So... that's what's been going on in my neck of the woods. Thanks for reading! Now that we have internet again after months without really having it, I will try to post more often again! :)

They like us!

After weeks of rehearsal, we opened last weekend to great acclaim! I have to admit I was a little scared of the audience reaction. It is a brand new show so I wasn't sure what to expect... but.... they LIKE us! They REALLY like us! That's always a nice feeling. Also the director from the show I did earlier this year, "Jake's Women" came to see the show and he offered me a part in a play we've been talking about. This is now TWO shows in a row that I didn't even have to really audition for. A girl could get used to that. :) The next play will rehearse in January and run through February JUST LIKE "Jake's Women". :)

So... that's all for now. I'm off to walk the dog. I promise to write more over the weekend and actually post photos. :)

Thoughts From a Rehearsal

I was never the best singer, dancer or actress. But in the past I was pretty damn good. Now.... Well, after years of being out of practice I had hoped that 3 weeks of rehearsal would whip my singing voice back into shape. However, like many other things in life, that's just not as easy to do now that I'm no longer 18. I was really, stressing out about it but, at this point, since we open in 2 days, I really can't do much about it and it's not helping to stress about it. So, for this musical, I'm essentially having to just roll with it. Funnily enough, I just described my upcoming wedding the same way. I told someone "Well, we're so close now that we can't sit around and cry because it's not what we had envisioned. At this point we just have to find a way to make it work and roll with it."

I guess that's a pretty good way to deal with a lot of things in life, right?

Ok... must get some sleep. This whole, moving, doing a show and planning a wedding thing is exhausting!

SHOWTIME!

So, Curtis and I just moved, had an elopement and are still planning a wedding that is taking place rather soon.... what better time to be in a musical?! :)

So, yes, we are in a show called Zombie Love. It's about a girl who falls in love with a zombie.

We are in rehearsals right now. It's been a lot of fun, but I discovered that back around the time when Curtis proposed and I was very sick with a terrible cough, I hurt my voice terribly. I don't know what I did, but it's not the same. I've been slightly hoarse ever since. I didn't think it affected my singing voice, but it did. That has shaken me up quite a bit.

Aside from that it's been a really good thing to be in a show with Curtis. I've missed being in a musical. I just wish my voice wasn't so shot. It's distracting me from other aspects of my performance so, that's something I need to work on.

We only have two rehearsals left.

Yikes.

Turns Out... Weddings and Jobs are WORK!

So, I am way, way, way behind on my uh... supposed daily blogs. Sorry. I'll make it a point to try and catch up sometime this week or weekend. The day to day things involved in wedding planning, my day job and frequent overtime at said day job have really kept me away from the computer. Also, for Curtis and I there are three times a year that birthdays/holidays completely overwhelm us. The actual holiday season, then from mid February to the end of March we have 8 birthdays between family and friends (including me, Curtis, our nephew and niece and several very close friends and my brother)! Then again from May through early June it's birthday madness in our circle of family and friends. This year was extra crazy because we threw in our engagement party as well in May. So it has been nonstop since then with birthdays and Mother's Day and things like that added to my already ridiculous schedule of my job and wedding planning stuff. It's always very fun to celebrate birthdays but when there are this many in a row it takes it's toll time-wise. :) Anyway, that's my excuse and I am sticking with it!

On a happy note I just picked up my wedding dress today! It's so very lovely and I am happy to say that it fits like a glove. I will have to have it hemmed but that's the only thing it really NEEDS done. I might do a few other alterations if the mood strikes. And today I won $33 on a lotto scratch off ticket and then Curtis got a gift card for Nordstrom's as an engagement gift from a student of his! He's giving it to me to put toward my wedding day shoe fund! :)I gotta love that man!

Planning the wedding is so much fun and yet so stressful at times. Weddings are SO expensive. We're probably still going to end up under the national average, but man... it just seems like SO much money to be spending!

So far I have loved registering for gifts with Curtis the most. Not because we're all greedy for gifts (we both agree that we don't expect to get most of the stuff we scan, since we never really expect people to get us gifts for any occasion-but you get a discount on that stuff after the wedding so, we're scanning like crazy!)but it's such a fun bonding experience. As you pick out the stuff you want together what you're really doing is imagining the life you want to have together. It's actually really romantic and fun! We have had a great time doing that. We pretty much already knew we had the same taste in things but it's nice to have that confirmed when you agree on a china pattern or on the colors you want the kitchen or bathroom to be, you know? :)

Anyway, aside from that I am obsessed with Sookie Stackhouse books. They are the series of books that "True Blood" is based on and they are SO GOOD. I'm addicted. I'm very close to finishing the series now (once I start one I usually finish it within 24-48 hours depending on what other responsibilities I have) so I am pacing myself because I am going to be so sad when I am done with them! I've never seen "True Blood" the tv show but now I want to!

So, that's what's been keeping me away from the computer for a while! I'll catch up soon! As always... Thanks for Reading! :)