Not Much To Report

Happy Birthday Mom! I love you! I hope you had a fantastic day!

It's been a slow week in the wedding planning department, mainly due to an extremely busy week in the work department, but month end is now done and my brain is slowly starting to feel less like Jello. In this slow/busy week, my parents were at the oil show in Weyburn and ran into my to be brother-in-law/generous wedding host. I hear reports back that he is extremely happy to be having our wedding at his acreage and has plenty of ideas that he would like to run by us. It's a pretty good feeling knowing how much he cares.

On a side note, I would like to say how proud I am of Dan. He started a new workout program not too long ago, P90X. He wanted to get a little more active, get into better shape, build some more muscle, and just feel better about himself all around. Well I am very happy to shamelessly sing his praises, as we have to go shopping for new jeans for him. He is so happy about it, and I'm proud of him because he's so happy.

Picking a Date... Again

Ok, so I have two potential dates picked, June 12th, 2010 or September 11th, 2010. Just have to run it by a few key people. I'm leaning towards June 12th, hopefully it works with our wedding host and the V.I.P.s. We're going to have the entire wedding out at Dan's brother's acreage, so either month should bring us decent weather (typically). Plus those dates will definitely not interfere with football season. I have my parents' guest list, waiting on the list from Dan's family, and we're still plugging through the friends lists. Everything is starting to come together again, much more quickly and a lot easier than the first attempts. I guess we just have a better idea now of what we want and need to do.

Welcome Back

After over a year hiatus, I am back. Some very busy and stressful times lead us to thinking we were going to run away to get married, but after some long discussions, a few small arguments, and a lot of thought, we're back to having a wedding at home with the ones we love. I couldn't be happier. So along with that, here goes the blog again. A place where I can collaborate my thoughts, ideas, and things that interest me along the way, and maybe help out some fellow brides in the meantime.

Life: Has It Been a Scary Ride

Well, I hate to tell you all this, but here it goes. Not long ago we had the house broken into. So after a lot of lock changing, dead bolt installation, and a home security system, we are feeling safe enough to sleep again. Shortly after that whole ordeal, the computer decided to crash and off to the doctor it went. Now we are getting ready to have our front lawn torn up to replace a collapsed water/sewer line. We are really batting 1000 lately. I haven't had time to decide for sure where to have the wedding let alone figure anything else out or look for ideas. I am so sorry for the lack of posts lately. Please bear with me.

Why should the wedding ring be worn on the fourth finger?

Why should the wedding ring be worn on the fourth finger?
There is a beautiful and convincing explanation given by the Chinese.....

Thumb represents your Parents.
Second (Index) finger represents your Siblings.
Middle finger represents Yourself.
Fourth (Ring) finger represents your Life Partner.
& the Last (Little) finger represents your Children.

Firstly, open your palms (face to face), bend the middle fingers and hold them together - back to back
Secondly, open and hold the remaining three fingers and the thumb - tip to tip (As shown in the figure below):

Now, try to separate your thumbs (representing the parents)..., they will open, because your parents are not destined to live with you lifelong, and have to leave you sooner or later.
Please join your thumbs as before and separate your Index fingers (representing siblings)....they will also open, because your brothers and sisters will have their own families and will have to lead their own separate lives.
Now join the Index fingers and separate your Little fingers (representing your children)....they will open too, because the children also will get married and settle down on their own some day.
Finally, join your Little fingers, and try to separate your Ring fingers (representing your spouse).
You will be surprised to see that you just CANNOT... because Husband & Wife are to remain together all their lives.

Please try this out... It's a beautiful theory.

Life: Feeling Relaxed (For Once)

Dan and I were off to Saskatoon this weekend for 2 nights just to get a little R&R. We had a fantastic time, got some relaxation, and a chance to get out of Dodge for a while. We had a leisurely trip up, stopping in Regina to visit with my parents for a bit, a couple quick shopping stops, and carried on to Saskatoon. We checked into our hotel and wandered around downtown, stopping for supper in a small restaurant we had tried and really enjoyed during our trip up in April. We went to see Rob Zombie's Halloween on Saturday night, and it was phenomenal! By far his best film yet. But of course, we are fans of all his work. Sunday was relaxing, a nice breakfast, shopping and browsing around town, and supper with a friend of mine who is never available, so it was fantastic to see him again. We attended the movies again, this time to see the new Bourne movie, which Dan enjoyed more than I did, but I got a Yogen-Fruz, so I was happy. Monday we were up early, had a nice breakfast at the hotel restaurant, made a quick stop, and left Saskatoon fairly early. We stopped in Regina for lunch and a couple shopping stops, and hit the road for home. It all ended all too soon, but at the same time it was nice to get back home. Jessie, our puppy, was thrilled to see us when we picked her up from "grandma's", especially when she saw that we bought her new toys and a fleece blanket of her very own. Thank goodness for Dollar Stores lol.
Sorry to everyone about August's limited posts, we have been so busy with work and life, and trying to decide where to have the wedding, that I have been too busy to find a lot of new stuff for you all. I promise, once we finally nail down a location, that I will be all over the wedding finds again!

Party: Items I Loved

I had so much fun last night. I just had to show some of my favorite items! I loved these three items.
The first one is the body shimmer, it was a gorgeous lotion that didn't feel grainy like some other sparkly lotions do, it's a very subtle shimmer though, a little too subtle for my liking.
The second picture is the Jewels body glitter lotion. I liked it and it was subtle enough, but not too much so. I only found that it seemed to leave more sparkles in my palms than it did on my arms, but we were doing it all in a hurry trying to pass items around the room.
The third seemed to be the best. It's a gold dust, and it had smaller glitter than the jewels lotion, but it sparkled beautifully in the light. It seemed to stay on very well too, which the jewels lotion seemed to fall off on everything you brushed against.

The candle was amazing. We smelled and tried the Blissful Breeze and it was fantastic. What it is was a massage oil candle. You lit the wick, let it melt a bit, then poured the melted wax on your skin, it never got too hot, and massaged away. The scent was amazing, it lasted all night.

These two are a little more naughty. The Nipple Nibblers was really good. I've seen it in stores, but never had a chance to try it before. One of the girls there said she had it and she uses it as a lip balm. The consultant gave us all a bit on coffee stir sticks and told us to try it as a lip balm and it was fantastic. It tingled just a bit and it tasted great.
The Fireworks spray lotion was sticky, but it tasted fantastic. We were able to try both the passion fruit and the hot fudge. There are 10 different flavors that it comes in though. It warmed to the touch and was hot when licked off. It's definately one I'll be picking up when I host my party. I wanted to pick it up right away, but she only had the mint, hot fudge, and raspberry in stock with her. I'm looking to get the cherry and the passion fruit.

Life: It's Starting to Balance Out

So, the new bosses are here to stay and the old bosses are enjoying retirement. It's been busy and stressful, but things are seeming to begin to balance out. I am still losing my current position at work, but I will be heading into sales to give that a try. I'm a little worried, but being the only one in sales from the original ownership it seems that people are coming to me as a familiar face, so I could do alright. Once the mass confusion of the ownership change settles down a bit, it should be a lot easier.

The family issues that I briefly mentioned earlier have found their way to an end. My parents were possibly going to be splitting up, but they found a new love for each other in the midst of their crisis and have decided to give it another go. It seems that their love has grown due to this and we hope for (more) wonderful memories in their new/continuing relationship with each other.

I attended a "Passion Party" last night held by one of my girlfriends. We had about 10 women there and we had a fantastic time. I found some items I really loved, and I have decided that I'd like to host one myself. It was soo much fun. I found some awesome items for the wedding, from beauty products for myself to gifts for my bridesmaids. If you want to find out more about it, check them out at PassionParties.com.

Life: It's All Falling Apart

So let's start with work. The new bosses came in yesterday. Our original owners and the new guys were running busy yesterday, and it was a very busy day trying to get everything done and taken care of, but we managed and today for me has been a bit slower. About like normal this afternoon anyway. Sounds alright doesn't it? Well, this morning, the new manager informed me that I am going to be replaced with some guy from one of their other dealerships. Then he tries to give me a "consolation" prize that I could be a service adviser (been there, done that, and would rather shoot myself point blank in the face with a shotgun rather than do that again), a parts person (um how about No), or a receptionist (woo hoo really? wow, now I can flush my life down the toilet like I really always wanted!). He's going on about "we'll find you a position that you'll enjoy" and "you can always be our backup when the idiot we are replacing you with is gone on vacation or something". Yeah, nice consolation prize. Why don't you come out and tell me that you don't think that a 24 year old woman should be doing the job that I have been doing for a year and a half now. You want to find me a job that I really enjoy? Wait, I know!! IT'S THE ONE I'VE BEEN DOING!! I can't believe that this is happening, and I tell you, when it rains, it pours... This came on top of some serious family issues that I prefer not to speak about quite yet.

Life: Busy Busy

I realize how long it's been since I posted and for that I am very very sorry. It's been stupid busy around our happy shack lately. My birthday was on the 14th, and for that Dan had a great weekend ready for me. We went to the city and shopped on the Saturday, he gave me a bunch of cash and said get whatever you like, so I stocked up my meager (then anyway) wardrobe with some tops, some dainty underthings, and some new jeans. Sunday we went out for breakfast, then off golfing, to our regular season scheduled slo-pitch game, and then out to Macoun for a relaxing drive and a coffee. It was a busy, but relaxing, weekend.
Then this past weekend we were roped into playing a ball tournament. Busy weekend, yes. Relaxing weekend... uh, a loud resounding No. 40 + Degree heat, 7 games in 2 days, and we won the B Side Finals. No air conditioning in the vehicle made it even worse with the hour drive to the park where we were playing, starting each day off with a 9 a.m. game and a temperature already into the 30s., with a humidity that felt like it was in the 50s.
In all that heat I even managed to catch a summer cold, which is still with me, although slowly getting better, and I feel like hell.
We each took the day off yesterday to head into the U.S.A. for the North Dakota State Fair. It was a slower day and a cooler one, which made it perfect in our books for fair going. We took in a beach party concert and a classic car show at the end of our evening to make for an excellent day. But the deer we almost hit on the way home was certainly a damper on our fun. We encountered 2 others on the rest of the drive home, but not nearly as close of a call as the first one who crossed our path... literally... about 10 yards up from us on the highway. Dan hit the brakes, HARD, and we managed to slow enough that he was more than halfway across the road, so Dan let off the brakes and went around him. Thank goodness for no oncoming traffic. But when we went around the deer, he was sooo close. I could have reached out the window (had it been open) and slapped it on the way by it was so close to us. It was certainly a very frightening experience.
But, I'll work on a few new posts over the next couple days and try to get something new wrote up here. Sorry for the lack of new reading material.

Life: Scary Big Changes

So I just had a meeting with my boss... or rather, the man who may not be my boss for too much longer. No, I didn't screw up big time and get canned or something. I just was informed by the big man that he and our co-owner (my other boss, they are also my 2 salesmen here) have sold their shares, and thusly the dealership to a larger dealership. This will be the new owner's 9th dealership. We aren't yet sure when they will take over, but we imagine that they will wait until after the insurance company is done with the rebuilding from the fire.
We get to meet them today, they will be down here this afternoon for a bit of a meet and greet sort of deal. It's going to be interesting for sure, the boys in the mechanics shop are worried that everyone may lose their jobs, but Garry (our boss) assures us that they intend to keep all our current staff, except our accountant/secretary. She had intended to retire in April, but stayed on longer due to the fire. She plans to retire when the new owners take over and she is greatly looking forward to that. So as far as we are informed, we are safe in our jobs unless they determine that we are unqualified/unsatisfactory down the road. We have all been here for a while, the least amount of time for one employee is just coming up to a year in August I believe, so we've all learned how to perform our jobs and have done well for Todd and Gary for long enough now that we shouldn't have to be worried.
I hope now that we get the perks that a larger dealership normally brings, such as a better health plan, employee incentives (bonuses), and - especially for myself being part of the sales department - sales department demonstration vehicles. That would be sweet. I hope that they also allow me to use some company vehicles for our wedding day transportation. Garry had already said that he would let me pick some vehicles off the lot for use on our wedding day, crossing one item (ie: expense) from my list. I hope that the new owners will be just as good and still allow me to do that.
So, I'm nervous but hopeful. I hope that the meeting this afternoon goes well, although they have already opened a new post office box under the dealership and have begun ordering new signs as we won't be Dinsmore Dodge anymore. I don't yet know the new name yet, they do not name all their dealerships the same, so we'll see what they pick and what kind of people they seem to be.

Life: A Side Finals

So, we played ball this weekend. 1 game on Saturday, 4 on Sunday. We played very well, and in the end we lost the A side final. But it was a good weekend and a lot of fun. It's a stat holiday here in Canada today, since Canada Day fell on sunday and is nice to have a day to recover from the weekend.

It's also my fiance's birthday today, and I have to get out and pick up a gift for him. I bought him the Tiger Woods Golf for the Wii, but I gave it to him early, mainly since we were in the store and he wanted it, so I said happy early birthday and bought it for him. But it doesn't seem like a birthday present to me, and I plan to head out and find him something else here today. He needs a new watch for at work, so I'll grab him one and find something else for him as well. I've finished cleaning up the house already this morning, and I'll have to call a few of his friends and see if they want to do supper with us tonight when he gets home from work.

What kind of bride are you?

Your Result:
Blushing bride You’ve secretly been collecting wedding magazine clippings and counting the days. You’re excited, but don’t want to subject every one around you to it. We say your friends and relatives will thank you for it later.

What a Week... Already

What a horrid week. Already. The weekend started it all off. Normally not so bad, visited with the parents for a lot of it... but Saturday we ended up with a pen in the laundry, which made it to the dryer... yup... ink alllllll over. But after some panic, a little crying (I was stressed already and that certainly didn't help, nor did the fight Dan and I had when I saw it and panicked), and a LOT of scrubbing with about a dozen different products, I had most of it out. Dan grabbed a can of "Erase" from his work and that took the rest right out. But before that, the only product that did anything for it was nail polish remover. Keep that in mind if you ever encounter this problem.

Sunday, more scrubbing - with the Erase stuff, a little house work, and another fight. It's been very stressful lately. Dan started a new job on the 18th, and he's working some pretty long hours right now, 10 hours a day, 7 days a week. So it's been interesting.

Monday!! I hate Monday!! I got in to work, to be reminded that our Service Manager and our Parts Manager are on vacation, and oh, Jen, would you go help in the shop by doing parts (which I know little about), Service (Which I've done before at my last dealership), and your own job? Yeah... Thanks a lot whoever approved those vacations. But I made it through, got done work at 6pm, instead of 4:30/5 ish like normal, and had to play ball at 6:30. Mad rush down there, starting to unwind. Mind you very slowly as the bottle of beer I'd snagged to take down with me, I dropped it as I just got into the dugout and it broke... in my ball bag. And around the 5th inning someone hit a ball majorly foul, and FAR. FAR FAR FAR. Way farther than a foul ball should travel. And it hit where? 3 guesses and the first 2 don't count. Yup. My Windshield. No bouncing off the hood even to slow it down, just smack in my windshield. I drive a Suzuki Vitara. You could not guess in this area of Saskatchewan how hard it is to find a windshield for one of those. But I found someplace in town that could get it, and it'll be here sometime next week. Mental Note: In the meantime, switch license plate over to the Mustang, it's summer and time to drive it again anyway.

Tues & Wednesday: Same thing, no ball Tuesday, but had to rush to Inlaw to be's place in Macoun (15 min drive) for haircut night. (We have a professional who is a family friend, she does it at the inlaw's place for cheaper than she has to charge in the salon she works out of. So no worrying about a family member who just thinks they can cut hair. $90, cut, color, and eyebrow wax in salon, $40 cut and color when she comes out to do it. Stop somewhere quick for a $10 eyebrow wax, no biggie and a lot cheaper.) Wednesday, ball again at 6:30, mad rush.

Today I can relax a bit. The parts person is back and the service dept can be her problem too. Tomorrow is month end, so that'll be busy. But it's Canada and this weekend is a 3 day weekend... and a much needed one.

My mom, I have to write about this quick, My Mom is a godsend. She is so thoughtful and so helpful. I love her so much. She's a Teacher's Aid, and thusly as of Tuesday at 3:30 is now off for the summer. She went out on Tuesday and stopped at some of the venues I'd mentioned to her and picked up some information for me. She said she thought I'd never get the time, and she's done work for 2 months, and has the time to do some running for me. Thank you so much Mom, even though I don't think you even know my blog exists lol. I've thanked her in person already, so no worries. Because she's right, I wouldn't ever be able to find the time.

RE: Comment from Mike

Thanks Mike! I love to get comments, although you're only my second comment, and one was from one of my bored friends. lol It lets me know that someone out there has read my blog, and I'm very very happy to hear that one of my posts has helped someone out. I guess my blogging is not futile. To answer your question, my wedding will be (barring the unexpected that may bring a need to change) September 8th, 2008. We were engaged on December 22nd, 2006 and I wanted to have a good amount of time to plan everything, lots of time to DIY and try to save some money through careful planning. Congratulations to your daughter and your family(ies) on the upcoming wedding. I took a look at the website URL you left, and it is beautiful. I'm sure she will be thrilled with it.

We live in a smaller city, Estevan, approx 13000 people, in southeastern Saskatchewan. If we went to the capital city of Regina things would be even more expensive there, but being a smaller center, costs are smaller in reflection. But as far as the Plaza goes, it is very expensive for around this area. I have a couple other venues to interview yet, but their base pricing starts between $250-275, which is by far less than the Plaza.

Lol. Call me cheap, call me stingy, but I can't imagine starting a life together in debt. I want to remember the wedding day for all the glory and happy memories it brings, not the parts I'm still paying for down the road. But we're paying for our wedding all ourselves. I'm paying most of the wedding and my fiance is taking care of our honeymoon, which we'll take 6 months or so after the wedding. I'll be 25 when we marry and Dan will be 30. We've been together for a couple years already and have lived together for the last year and a bit. We have known each other for quite a while before we started dating.

We own a little house and thusly have a mortgage and a couple of car payments of course, so all and all, we can't afford, or in some cases, just don't want to afford to sink a lot of money into our wedding, but we don't want to sacrifice too much in getting a day that is uniquely us. Fortunately I have a very crafty mother and a Mother in Law and Grandmother in Law to be that are willing to help do anything they can. I'm sure we'll pull it all off somehow. :) Makes me very happy that things aren't too expensive here as in comparison to elsewhere.

Thank you very much again for your reply Mike. It was a highlight of my day. :) I look forward to possibly hearing from you again. If there's anything that you guys are researching, let me know. I have a lot of resources I haven't yet posted on. I was somewhat starting to give up a little until your comment let me know that I'm not the only one that reads this. lol.

My Mood: Enthralled

Quote the Walls, "Nevermore"

This could be used in a wedding setting, but likely is easier to do this at home where you are allowed to stick permanent things to your walls. But they sure are cute. These can be found at "Quote the Walls". See some samples below:

Big Changes

Well, we just discovered this past Friday that my Fiance has been picked to begin an industrial mechanics apprenticeship. This is great and horrible all at the same time. I am soo stressed out about it! The good thing is that he gets to acquire a skilled trade, the company he works for pays for all his schooling and tools, and that he will no longer have to be on shift work. Weekends are optional, except during "overhauls", and overtime is plenty. He'll be working once again with a few good work friends of his.

The horrible thing is that now he'll be gone for 2 months at a time, once a year, for the next four years. We don't know when these will occur, where he will be sent to school (2 or 5 hours away). The company does put him up while he's at school, whether in company owned condos or a hotel, but it doesn't ease anything in my head. He can get sent off to another town for a few weeks for an overhaul at the drop of a hat. So any plans that may have came up about kids or moving or buying/building a new home will have to be postponed for about 4 years. And to kick it all off it's about a $6 an hour pay drop. Yes, I said Drop.

We don't know when he's going to start in the new position. His hours are going to change, could be good, could be bad. We're used to 12 hour shift work. When he's working, he's working, but he gets some nice stretches of 5 - 6 days off at a time. Now he'll be back to a daily 8-4 job, so it'll take a bit of getting used to the new schedule.

I know we'll be alright, but it's a change I definitely was not prepared for. Horribly unexpected and we don't know all the finite little details, too many questions without answers as of yet. It makes me very nervous, worried, and certainly scared. But we'll make it, I know we will. We'll know more details on Tuesday when he's back to work. Or at least, so I hope.

My Mood: Stressed

It Definately Was a LONG Weekend

May Long weekend in Saskatchewan. It was a classic repeat of every year. Friday was gorgeous until about 4 pm, and then it was cold and rainy all weekend. That's just the way it always happens around here.

We kicked off our long weekend festivities Thursday night with a few drinks with one of our friends for his 30th birthday. We played a little virtual golf and later went to a bar which features karaoke on Thursday nights. It was pretty low key, but we had a great time.

Friday it was back to work for one last day, but I had a pretty laid back day, spending most of it delivering a sold vehicle to a customer who lives a couple hours away. Managed to get a chance to stop at the golf store before I came back home, so I picked up a new pair of golf sandals.

Friday night was pretty low key, we took the puppy out for a drive in the country. We stopped down at the dam and she loved that, although it was pretty windy (not in Saskatchewan right) and the water was coming in pretty hard on the beach. We'll take her out there sometime again when it's nicer and she might get closer to the water.

Saturday... What did happen Saturday during the day... Oh! We took the dog out for another drive. We headed out to take a look at a cabin that is for sale that my parents are looking into buying. On the way back we stopped at his parents' place for a visit. We came home around 4, made a quick supper, and waited for Tom to arrive so we could head out for the festivities of the evening. We had a pretty good time at the party. It was a 30th birthday party for another one of Dan's friends.

We started off the evening with a scavenger hunt, and while on the hunt for your objects there were also projects to be completed. Some projects were taking pictures of some things, ie: a house number with 30 in it, and whatnot. It was a great time until we got to the rendezvous point... ie: small town bar, and there we had to find numbers which would match an envelope telling us what we had to do. I'm not big into public humiliation, nor am I very comfortable around Dan's friends yet, so when I had to roll a ping pong ball up one of Dan's pant legs and down the other... in the inside of his pants... and then he had to roll it through my shirt... I wasn't too thrilled. But we got through it and headed back to the farm where we all drank the night away.

Sunday was VERY uneventful. We got up late, and headed out for a late breakfast at 11ish. Then we headed back home and Tom stayed to hang out for the day, so we watched some movies, played a bit of Nintendo Wii, and barbecued supper. Tom left around midnight and we headed to bed since we had an early tee off time.

Monday morning, golfing in the rain and the cold, I wasn't horribly impressed, but I did it for Dan and he was nice enough to accept it when I refused to do the back nine as well. We headed back and stopped again to visit with his parents, mainly because when we went through we saw his brother was there, and we had some things to return from our scavenger hunt. We headed home in the early afternoon to try to recoup from our weekend in peace.

My Mood: Tired

What Kind of Sexy Girl Are You?

You Are Bad Girl Sexy

Girl, you are nothing but trouble. And that's hot. You've got the classic bad girl sexiness mojo going on. And your badass attitude makes men fear you - and crave you. Don't give into people who say to tone it down. You're perfect as is.

What Kind of Sexy Girl Are You?

What Color is your Lucky Underwear?

Your Lucky Underwear Is Red

You're confident and bold, and your lucky red underwear will only make you more sure of yourself. You have a great zest for life, and you tend to take on impossible goals - and succeed. When it comes to love, it's hard for you to take the time to open up. You're too busy conquering the world. So if you're looking for a little more romance, put on your red underpants. And see where their passion takes you!

What Color Is Your Lucky Underwear?