September 30, 2011

Lately I’ve seen a few people talk about how they met their boyfriends/husbands and I thought I’d get in the game. Most recently I read Two Martini's post about meeting her husband on OkCupid so I wanted to share my story – although it’s not as hilarious as hers (so go read hers!)

All my dates came from meeting someone online. Okay, no, that’s a lie. I once dated a waiter but that was short lived – maybe 2 dates. I used all the dating sites, including OkCupid (actually, I think that was my second favorite of the dating sites).

I met my husband on Craigslist. Yes, you read that right. Craigslist. The site that people are afraid of, that is thought of as a place that people meet murderers or rapists. The place people joke about when they buy something off of it. But it worked for me and I was never afraid.

I know many people don’t know that you could even meet people off of CL (that’s the short version) but you can. There is a personals area where you can either post an ad looking for a date or you can reply to others ads. There is plenty of spam posts and you will surely receive a lot if you post, but they are pretty obvious so it isn’t a big deal.

I had done the replying to posts however I found that for me it was easier to post and have people reply to me. Sometime in the summer of 2010 I posted and got a reply from a guy who seemed pretty neat. I replied to him inquiring about where he lived and a picture. He replied that he lived in Compton and with his picture. I didn’t reply back to him.

Apparently this guy turns out to be my husband. I don’t remember this and I don’t have any of the e-mails saved and he hasn’t shown me proof, but I suppose I’ll believe him. He says that I didn’t reply because of the picture he posted, I tell him that I’m sure that it was because of him living in Compton. Not only a bad neighborhood, but probably 40 minutes away from where I lived.

That's Thomas in the background. This was our first date. 

Fast forward a year and I get another reply to another post. We start talking. He seems familiar and I ask him if we had met before (sometimes that happens in the online dating world) and he tells me no. LIAR! He replies with a picture and that he lives in a neighborhood only a few minutes (7 to be exact) from me. I reply back proving that it wasn’t his picture but where he lived that turned me off the first time.

Our first Christmas (a few days before) together. 

Our first 4th of July together (2012)

Our first camping trip 8/2012.

Thomas accompanied me to my 10 year HS reunion.

I'm sure you can figure this one out.

We texted back and for the for a few weeks before we had our first date, which was 3 years ago today – the day before my birthday!

The Mahoney Wedding – Reception (2of 2)

Finally I have arrived at my last re-cap post for my wedding. It’s only been a few days over 3 months, that’s not bad, right? 

When I last left you I finished telling you about the ceremony. 

Our reception was after the ceremony (as soon as people could make the about 20 minute drive) at Thomas’ parents’ home. They have a very nice house with a pretty decent back yard (and by that I’m referring to Los Angeles, not in comparison to some of the backyards I’ve seen on other blogs). Since they knew we were trying to save money on the wedding so that we could buy a home they very graciously allowed us to use their home for free. 

In order to have the reception here we had to rent chairs, tables, linens, and tents. Although we got married in spring we live in an area that does not tend to have cool weather. While a lot of the country was under snow we were having 85+ days. That said - it actually rained the day before the wedding for an hour or two. 

My sister, brother-in-law, and (mostly) my MOH set up the tables early on Saturday morning and made them look gorgeous. I made the center pieces myself and my supervisor’s son made the table numbers – all items were from the Dollar Tree! I didn’t want any flowers on the table because one of the things that bother me at big parties like these is that there are so many decorations on the table you don’t have space for anything else. However my mother-in-law got some flowers donated and those were placed on the tables (I didn’t find out until the reception time).

As I mentioned in the previous post Thomas and I took some time to get to the reception site because the ceremony was shorter than we expected. When we arrived we had the bridal party come out to the front lawn of the house so that we could be organized to be announced into the party. 

While people were clapping for Thomas and I and we were doing a little dance when we walked in someone told us to re-do the cake topper, so we had to oblige! 

As you can imagine the night was a long of mingling and a lot of drinking. For me. The one regret I have from the wedding is that I drank way too much. The cucumber mint martini that I requested we have was SOO good that I couldn’t get enough of it! (My mouth is watering at the thought of it now!). 

The best pictures of the entire day were from the reception. I had a lot of fun and couldn’t stop smiling the entire time. 

My dad was too shy to do a whole speech but my brother-in-law went ahead and did it for him. The night before my nieces decided they wanted to give speeches as well so we let them. Thomas’ dad and best man (his cousin) both gave speeches along with my MOH. 

My brother-in-law (since I was 9).

My youngest niece, Camila.

After the speeches Thomas’ Uncle Greg gave a blessing and we said the Lord’s Prayer.

Thomas' Uncle Greg.

Then it was time for dinner! We chose to have it catered by Stone Fire Grill. If you haven’t heard of it, it’s a chain restaurant that is simply delicious and very affordable. We ended up paying about $13 per person! We also had tons of left overs. 

The cake was ordered from a high school friend and she did an amazing job. Not only was it delicious (chocolate, lemon chiffon, and carrot cake) but it looked beautiful! I will be ordering from her again soon! We also ended up having left overs of the chocolate portion of the cake. I think we forgot to tell the caterers that the cakes different flavors so they only passed out the top two layers. Oh well.  

I set up 3 different things for our guests to do during the reception. 

• Jenga Guestbook

I saw this on Pinterest and since Thomas and I like to play games I thought it would be pretty perfect. Instead of a regular guestbook I set out Sharpies and our guests signed on Jenga pieces. Since our guest list was under 70 we had more than enough pieces for everyone. 

• Plate

    I saw this plate on clearance at Jo-Ann’s and thought it would be cut to put up in our home. Of course not I haven’t done it, but it was a cute idea, right?

• Thumb Prints 

I also saw this at Michael's. Everyone left their thumbprints as leaves of a tree.

• The Shoe Game

I’m sure you’ve seen this either in a movie, at a wedding, or floating online. The idea is that guests write down questions that have either a GROOM or BRIDE answer and then the bride and groom have to answer the questions by sitting back to back and lifting up either the bride’s shoe or the grooms. I was nervous to do this because I didn’t want the attention on me, but it ended up being SO much fun! 

There was plenty of dancing, including my dance with my dad to Bob Carlisle’s Butterfly Kisses and my first dance with Thomas to I Still by the Backstreet Boys (yes, of course BSB was played at my wedding!). Thomas had his first dance with his mom as well. I did a lot more dancing than I ever would have though since I hate to dance. 

I imagine I am sitting on his lap here because he is over a foot taller than me!

We did do a Money/Cash dance. It was fun, but also a bit disappointing. We didn't get many people to come out and participate. I think part of this is because people tend to think we are much better off than the rest of the family and also because since it was held in the home people were wandering around the house and not just in the backyard. 

I had to do a lot of this pulling up. I mentioned previously that I forgot to put my bra/underskirt on under my wedding dress!

Because I did end up getting pretty drunk I don’t remember much of what happened in the evening. I remember my MOH taking my dress off of me before she left (she had an early flight back home). I remember throwing up on Thomas’ parents’ bathroom (in the toilet) and that I cried because I felt bad that I had ruined it. Thomas assured me that I hadn’t ruined it and that everyone had fun. 

We also took a lot of pictures with friends and family.

My brother, David.

My MOH.

My Mommy.

And of course I threw the bouquet and he threw the garter!

We finally left at some time around 8pm. My brother-in-law drove us to the hotel we were staying at and he picked us up the next morning. 

Getting Uncomfortable

Many things make me uncomfortable. Social situations in general make me cringe. I’m not good in social situations. I always tend to say the wrong things at the wrong time. But maybe that is just my social anxiety. 

This year I had to do several things that made me uncomfortable. Included, but not limited to:

• Getting married! Okay, I shouldn’t say this makes me uncomfortable, really, but it is something new. It’s the first time I’ve lived with someone other than my parents. 

• Walking down the aisle and standing in front of a room full of people. As I mentioned I have social anxiety so walking down the aisle with everyone staring at me was scary. At least the concept was. Once I actually did it – it wasn’t that bad. I only had eyes for my husband. 

• Dancing! Same as above, dancing means that people are probably seeing me dance. The energy of the day and also the liquid help that I had helped out in making dancing not a horrible experience. I did dread it until the moment the day 

• Bridal Shower. My in-law’s threw me a wonderful bridal shower a few weeks before the wedding. It was amazingly sweet of them but I had a panic attack over it. I survived with the help of Ativan, but the night before and the hours leading up to the event were horrible. I’m sensing a theme here. I dread things beforehand but feel fine during them… Hmm…

I’m sure there have been others, but these were the big ones that I dreaded for a while. 

Linking up with...

The Mahoney Wedding – April 26, 2014 (Part 2)

I understand people hate reading blogs in a million different posts, but I couldn’t really cut out just parts of my wedding days, and the posts were getting really long, so I figured this was the best way to go about it. Thank you to those who have been sticking around for it!

I was surprised that I wasn’t nervous to walk down the aisle. Well, until a minute before when I remembered I didn’t have my shoes on! We were standing in a room to the side of the chapel when I realized I was barefoot! I hadn’t put my heels on because they were way too painful for me to have on when I didn’t need to. My MOH rushed to put them on before they motioned for her to walk down the aisle. 

I stood there with my daddy, waiting for our turn. It was nice to have a moment alone with him. I felt so grateful that he was there. 

I had no worries at that moment. I thought I would be nervous. That I would be freaking out because there were so many people with their eyes on me. But I didn’t. I was calm and excited to walk down the aisle. I looked around at all the people around me as we reached the end of the aisle where the pastor asked my dad if he gave my hand in marriage to Thomas. We had practiced it differently, but my dad caught on and agreed. I think he told Thomas to treat me well and shook his hand before I took Thomas’ arm and walked up to the pastor. 

Although we had a rehearsal the night before, we hadn’t met with the pastor so it was all new and fresh at that moment. We didn’t know how long it would last or what he would say. We knew it would be religious in part, but what the vows would be? Not a clue. Actually I don’t even remember what they were. This part is really just a blur. 

What I remember clearly is that at one point the pastor stopped and so Thomas thought that was the time to give me our first kissed as a married couple. Everyone laughed at that. We had to take the candles our mom’s had lit before the ceremony and light the unity candle. I asked the pastor “do I turn the candle off, now?”, which caused quite the uproar from the guests. That was probably the most embarrassing moment of the ceremony. 

After the ceremony ended, Thomas and I walked out followed by our bridal party. The pastor, Thomas, I, and his best man along with my MOH went to the office so we could sign the marriage certificate. We posed for some pictures there and then returned to the chapel to take more pictures. 

We spent quite a while taking pictures in the chapel. Unfortunately they aren’t the best photos. Although we paid over $1k for pictures for the day, the photographer was not as professional as I would have hoped and it seemed as though she kept the camera on automatic. I could have paid someone a lot less to do the same. You live and learn. Luckily I had friends and family who took some nice shots. 

Trying to get the photos was interesting. Thomas has a huge family.

Initially the photographer told my family to get on my side and his on his, I told her that it wouldn’t work – his family couldn’t fit on just his side as you can see. My entire family numbered 13, including myself! 

After everyone left (and man, everyone was in a hurry to be done with pictures and leave) we took some more individual shots. Since the service took less time than we thought, Thomas, the photographer, and I waited around for the limo to arrive. We took some extra pictures during this time. 

The limo was very nice and included alcohol – unfortunately neither of us liked the alcohol they had. We enjoyed some time alone as husband and wife and took some silly pictures. 

When we arrived at Thomas’ parents’ home for the reception we had to pull to the side and wait because our entire bridal party and family weren’t there for us to make the entrance into the party. After a few minutes they finally arrived and we were able to come in. 

This is our immediate family - siblings, parents, and grandparents.

Here is our ENTIRE family - both sides. Okay. Not really, this is just HIS entire family and my immediate family.  

This is my entire immediate family - except for my sister who was in the hospital at this point.

The pastor had us take this picture. I thought it was amazing! The best picture ever! 

Thomas with our fathers.

Me with our moms.

Our siblings - my sister missing.

Next time I’ll talk about the reception. There will probably be a lot of pictures in the post and not a lot of words – I think.