Nicole's New Schedule / Weddings Postponed?
Been a quiet few weeks. Nicole and I are still adjusting to her new full-time schedule. Combined with her commute, she's typically away from the apartment upwards of ten hours a day. That has meant that it's fallen to me to prepare most meals as well as clean and maintain the apartment, which I'm okay with. One of the big reasons we'll be looking at getting a new apartment in a few months once our lease is up is that I'd like Nicole to be living somewhere much closer to her current workplace, so her commute isn't so spendy both in gas and time. During February, we'll really be looking at new complexes so that by March, we'll be ready to apply for places.
The real big event of the moment is that my brother, Ryan, and his fiancé, Kim, have decided on what they wanted their wedding to be like, and so a week and a half ago they mailed out their Save-The-Date cards to all their guests. These aren't exactly wedding invitations, but each card had the date and event itinerary. Their plan is to get married in Key West, Florida, on December 1st later this year. It's not that simple, however, as apparently an eight-day cruise is a required part of being at the ceremony. This ruffled a lot of feathers and made last week somewhat awkward within the family.
The background story goes like this: Ryan and Kim have been engaged for longer than a year now, and they've been hinting that they wanted to do a cruise wedding, so this isn't exactly news. It sounds great on paper: They'll pay one low rate ($3,000) and the cruise line takes care of everything for you plus the cruise doubles as a honeymoon. Much cheaper than a traditional wedding and yet lavish. It also solved the problem of where to have the wedding itself. My family is all over the country and Kim's family is in Ohio, so they figured the only fair place to have the wedding would be somewhere totally neutral: On a boat at sea. While everyone knew this was a possibility, I guess some people didn't believe it was actually gonna happen like this until they started receiving the Save-The-Date last week.
That's when the drama began. Apparently, there was a great deal of negative pushback on the wedding plans once they were made real with the cards. My mother has a severe anxiety condition and there's no way you'd get her on a boat for eight days let alone the plane flight to even get her to the ship. She really took it personally that they chose a cruise wedding knowing she couldn't make it. We also heard that Kim's parents have an issue with a cruise too and wouldn't go. Other people were taken aback with what it would cost guests to be on the cruise ($2,000/head including air-fare and excursions) and others didn't like having to use up eight vacation days which is all the vacation they get in an entire year. However, this is Ryan and Kim's wedding, and they picked something fun and unique for themselves. In the end, the decision is ultimately theirs and the rest of us shouldn't have a say this point except to either accept or decline the invitation.
After several days of soul searching, the wedding couple has decided to cancel their wedding plans outright. The new plan is to have a land-locked traditional ceremony possibly in Ohio sometime in the spring of 2015. They didn't sound too happy about how much more expensive a normal wedding will be, but at least more people will be able to attend and it is possible to have a ceremony on the cheap. Whenever my college friends had their weddings, they'd "hire" their friends to handle major roles for free. It worked and it was surely memorable so it can be done. All in all, though, it's a very rough situation and for a moment there, my immediate family wasn't talking to each other. In fact, it's still quiet. I guess we'll just have to wait and see what's decided next...
The real big event of the moment is that my brother, Ryan, and his fiancé, Kim, have decided on what they wanted their wedding to be like, and so a week and a half ago they mailed out their Save-The-Date cards to all their guests. These aren't exactly wedding invitations, but each card had the date and event itinerary. Their plan is to get married in Key West, Florida, on December 1st later this year. It's not that simple, however, as apparently an eight-day cruise is a required part of being at the ceremony. This ruffled a lot of feathers and made last week somewhat awkward within the family.
The background story goes like this: Ryan and Kim have been engaged for longer than a year now, and they've been hinting that they wanted to do a cruise wedding, so this isn't exactly news. It sounds great on paper: They'll pay one low rate ($3,000) and the cruise line takes care of everything for you plus the cruise doubles as a honeymoon. Much cheaper than a traditional wedding and yet lavish. It also solved the problem of where to have the wedding itself. My family is all over the country and Kim's family is in Ohio, so they figured the only fair place to have the wedding would be somewhere totally neutral: On a boat at sea. While everyone knew this was a possibility, I guess some people didn't believe it was actually gonna happen like this until they started receiving the Save-The-Date last week.
That's when the drama began. Apparently, there was a great deal of negative pushback on the wedding plans once they were made real with the cards. My mother has a severe anxiety condition and there's no way you'd get her on a boat for eight days let alone the plane flight to even get her to the ship. She really took it personally that they chose a cruise wedding knowing she couldn't make it. We also heard that Kim's parents have an issue with a cruise too and wouldn't go. Other people were taken aback with what it would cost guests to be on the cruise ($2,000/head including air-fare and excursions) and others didn't like having to use up eight vacation days which is all the vacation they get in an entire year. However, this is Ryan and Kim's wedding, and they picked something fun and unique for themselves. In the end, the decision is ultimately theirs and the rest of us shouldn't have a say this point except to either accept or decline the invitation.
After several days of soul searching, the wedding couple has decided to cancel their wedding plans outright. The new plan is to have a land-locked traditional ceremony possibly in Ohio sometime in the spring of 2015. They didn't sound too happy about how much more expensive a normal wedding will be, but at least more people will be able to attend and it is possible to have a ceremony on the cheap. Whenever my college friends had their weddings, they'd "hire" their friends to handle major roles for free. It worked and it was surely memorable so it can be done. All in all, though, it's a very rough situation and for a moment there, my immediate family wasn't talking to each other. In fact, it's still quiet. I guess we'll just have to wait and see what's decided next...