NavBar2013



WEDDING PART 2




WEDDING INTRO

      Photos by Zoe Arniotis (zoe-arniotis.com)

SO.  I have been meaning to put together a series of blog posts about our epic DIY wedding, but I have SUCH a hard time getting my ass in gear. So here it is-at least the start of it.

Like every other awesome and original couple out there, Dave and I wanted a small, simple wedding that completely reflected our personalities and would be totally unique to us... and to everyone else on Pinterest. :)

While we do live in the big (ish) and awesome city of Montreal, QC, we are actually country bumpkins at heart (from the far away Laurentians).  Therefore we wanted a beautiful, sweet wedding ceremony outdoors and near a lake somewhere up north, followed by a super fun dance party style reception.
      Photos by Zoe Arniotis (zoe-arniotis.com)
Of course, being that I am obsessed with all things design/ DIY and with my Interior Design education and a job in construction project management, I was pretty confident that I could handle one teeny wedding. It almost broke my spirit, actually-but we will get back to that.

Before I start this whole series of wedding posts, I will tell you a little something about Dave and I’s story.  Basically, we met in high school at the tender age of 15. My Dave is a little unique...meaning he is hilarious, sarcastic, annoying and has an uncanny resemblance to Tom Green (check out Dave’s old blog-you’ll see just what I’m talking about.) So who could blame me when I didn’t immediately fall in love with this guy? But we did become friends. And over the course of the ten years to follow, Dave and I became closer-he was my most trusted (male) confidant, my Go-To-guy and the all around constant in my life as I went through high school, college, new boyfriends, breakups, old boyfriends, breakups, job layoffs and much more.  Throughout all of this, Dave was obviously in love with me (Duh-who could resist all this?) and though he was always hanging around me, I far too dense to realize it or to see him for who he really was to me.
 
So it was a revelation to me when after all this time-and finally single- I started to develop feelings for Dave in more than a platonic way. WAYYY more.  It totally freaked me out. And it really freaked out my girlfriends as well.  We shared the same group of extremely close friends, so for me to take a leap of faith and see how things went with Dave was monumental. Seriously HUGE.
 
    Photos by Zoe Arniotis (zoe-arniotis.com)

But it actually went well. Really well, seeing as I went into our first date already loving the person I was about to date. There’s a lot that you learn about someone in 10 years that you can’t unlearn when you start dating them. [Sidebar]-I highly suggest marrying someone you have known for 10 years. It’s pretty awesome. Also, NO SURPRISES. [End Sidebar] I had been dating Dave for about 2 weeks before I knew that I wanted to marry him. I was totally, down for the count, in LOVE with this guy who had been among my best friends for 10 years. Who knew?

We adapted to this big change quite quickly, our friends adapted quickly and I moved in with Dave and his roommates almost immediately.  After talking about marriage for a long time (about 2 years), we got engaged on Thanksgiving of 2011 (Canadian Thanksgiving, eh?) and got married in July of 2012. Whoohoo! WIN.

So that’s our little story, and that’s about it for this post.

If you would like to check out our love story from both of our perspectives, we each wrote our “side” of it on our wedding website:


In the next wedding post, I will get more into the details of the actual day. EXCITING!

      Photos by Zoe Arniotis (zoe-arniotis.com)
Thanks for checkin’ this out!

 

DEEP DOWN, CANADIAN COLD

This week is by far the coldest, COLDEST, most freezing week of the winter thus far.  Being a Canadian, I take pride in the fact that I can survive -35 degree weather and look cute doing it.

BUT DAMN!

This morning my hair was frozen into little pieces after a short 5 minute walk to work and my thighs were burning with numbness. 

Oh well winterz...I'll just have to go skiing.

 
 
Good luck surviving everyone!
 


WHY I WON’T SUCK SO BAD IN 2013

 


Every year I tell myself I am not going to make New Year’s resolutions because I’m a shitty person that just breaks them anyways.  And low and behold, every year my hubby Dave sucks me into a conversation about his goals, than I get all excitable and by the end of the hour I have set like 14 totally unachievable resolutions for myself.  Working out, doing daily crunches, eat less chocolate, yadda, yadda, yadda.

Obviously, by Jan 2nd yearly I have broken 99% of my resolutions because 1) I’m too lazy to actually attempt any of them and 2) have decided that I made them in a moment of insanity / holiday sugar high when the pure quantity of chocolate I have consumed made me feel like I could attempt anything and succeed at ALL OF LIFE! But what was I thinking?!? Cold reality sets in as I come crashing down from that lovely high only to realize that I have nothing, want nothing, can’t achieve anything, that I have a headache and that my sweatpants actually DONT look as amazing on me as I thought. (They may have started out looking all cozy & sexy, however are now are covered in chocolate smears and have an obvious butt-sag.)

I digress.

SO THIS YEAR WILL BE DIFFERENT

(Yeah, right).

This year Dave and I calmly talked about out goals and I confessed that I had made some pretty big (secret) goals for myself this year. (Why secret? Because nobody judges you when you fail.)

Goal #1: Start a blog. CHECK.

I have been wanting to start a blog for more than 2 years, but as an avid blog reader/judger/all-around generally opinionated person, I don’t want to be on the judged-end of that stick. AND I was afraid that my starter blog might not be perfect right off the bat or measure up to the high standards I have set for the other blogs that I read. Also, I thought I might suck at writing the blog content in general. I tend to get bored with a project quickly, and often my thoughts and my writing don’t really follow each other, and I thought that readers may be left with a weird, chaotic impression of whatever point I was trying to make.  Thus, the hesitation.

However I must say that I’m pretty psyched (has anyone used this word since the 1990s?) that I jumped on the blog bandwagon, and that I am launching my “blog” for the world to see RIGHT THIS VERY MINUTE! Ready or not, nice design or not, pro photos or not, I’m starting it and I will just have to see how it goes. And to protect my ego, I’m not actually telling anyone I know about this blog. I figured that I can deal with strangers judging me, but not those that I love.

Goal #2: Don’t give up on goal #1. Seriously. I vow to put out more than an overall 2 blog posts. This is very important. Also, I will not set too high of a standard for myself in terms of quantity of posts per week. I’m not a damn super-hero!

Goal #3: Do SOMETHING excercise-y. Anything at all will do. Walk just a little bit further between the metro and bus during my commute. Go skating or something. Remember that I actually LIKE skiing and that convincing myself to go is the hardest part of going.  So, to recap: I am not going to join a gym and waste my precious money. I am not going to pop in my yoga DVD twice a week, every week and yogi it out. I’m just going to make an effort to be ever so slightly less lazy. Simple, right?  We will see.

Goal #4:  Ummmm.....Oh yeah. Spend less money on clothes and stuff.  But then again, I love clothes and stuff, and house stuff, and expensive stuff, and even the cheap stuff. But honestly, I really should spend less money on myself. Must stop buying gimmicky snakeskin Essie nail polish that costs a small fortune and instead save up to enjoy larger items with my husband.  (Or scratch this whole goal and enter an equally responsible budget-savvy goal similar to this.)

Goal #5: Wait before nesting!  I am moving in 6 months and still can’t stop myself from constantly decorating. I’m bad at this. I just want to paint, and paint, and craft and invest money in our current rental when I know that I’m going to be living in another apartment soon.  And no matter how nice the new place will be I am literally going to want to change EVERYTHING once I move in. So I need to learn to practice self-control. This is HORRIBLE, because I am the queen of instant-gratification. It’s awesome.

I’m winding this up now because to be honest, I just can’t remember what other SUPER IMPORTANT goals for 2013 that I made over dinner. I was super distracted by my delicious $85 sushi to actually take the time to write them all down. Oh-one last one-
Goal #6: Stop buying $85 sushi. Oh, and stop doing it twice a week.

(Sidenote: If you are from Montreal, you must go to Sushi 5 Saisons in NDG. Its ‘da bomb. I mean, I practically weep every time I walk into the resto and see the delicious food.)
 

And that’s it! Happy New Year to everyone and good luck in keeping your crazy resolutions! May at least one of us succeed!
 
(and it probably wont be these guys)