The History of Us

If I'm going to write about our wedding planning process, then it only seems right to start with a brief history of my not-so-brief relationship with my amazing fiance (a.k.a. "lovemuffin," "muffintop," just plain "muffin," or the least embarassing pet name - "love").

In the beginning, there was a cat...


{Halloween 2005}

On the night Mr. FW and I first got together (I believe we called it "hooking up" at the time.  Am I showing my age there?  Do the kids still use that term?)  this is what I looked like.  Unfortunately I don't have pictures of his Hugh Hefner costume, but suffice it to say that we were an interesting pair!  Our getting together came as a complete surprise to me because we'd been friends for several months at that point.  I thought we'd been on a few "real" dates, but apparently he was unaware of this.  (I mean, come on!  You picked me up and took me to dinner.  I asked you to take off your overshirt so I could see your tattoos.  I was all cuted-up in my favoritest clothes.  Ugh... Whatevs, I'm over it.)

After a few months, it was clear there was some staying power to the relationship.  Don't we look happy?

I was in grad school at the time and he was a senior in college.  Part of graduate training for a psychologist is to complete a year-long internship, and often you have to move to find a position that fits your needs.  So around the 1-year mark, we had to have some tough conversations about what would happen if our relationship became long-distance and whether our relationship was serious enough to move (and move-in) together.  



{SF Pride}

{at a friend's wedding}

Luckily I was placed with an internship that would allow us to move an hour outside of San Francisco, and I would commute to my internship while Mr. FW commuted to grad school (he ended up going to the same grad school as I did!). 



{Ferris Wheels on the far right, accompanied by wedding party members - yay!}



Pretty soon I had graduated,

{that's Doctor Ferris Wheel, to you}

we had purchased a little postage-stamp of a home (our first home!) in San Francisco,



{postage stamp located on the front half of the top floor}

and had settled down with our pack in the the city that we love!   

{Patches and Eli}

Clearly we were making significant commitments to each other even though the engagement wouldn't happen for another 2 years.  We don't consider ourselves traditional AT ALL, so this "out of order" relationship history of buying a home together long before we were engaged is perfectly, blissfully fitting for us.

Of course, like any story, there's always more to tell - and I will, don't worry!  But I'll leave it here for now. 

Did anyone else do things "out of order" like we did?

Ms. Ferris Wheel's Wild Ride Begins!

*deep breath*

...  and away we go! 

image by Idle Type via Wikipedia

So hellooooooooooooo hive!  Can I even tell you how surreal it is to be writing this post for you?!  I'm trying to find the words to describe the crazy shock and disbelief I feel right now, but to be honest I'm still a little bit worried that someone's gonna realize their mistake and yank my Bee card before I've even gotten started.  (That doesn't happen, right?  Right?!?)  Because I was just having this incredibly normal morning, waiting on hold with an incredibly normal telephone representative, when I decided to multitask (per uzsh) by checking my incredibly normal email.  I thoughtlessly clicked on the newest message in my inbox, but at the same moment I saw the words "think you'd be a great addition to the Weddingbee team" I was also hearing this representative woman insistently asking me for my employer identification number and password, so I didn't at all get to process what I was reading.  When I finally got off the phone and re-read the email (oh, only about a zillion times), that's when my morning became decidely not normal.  It all started to sink in.   

I... am... a... Bee!!!!!!!!  (Still shaking my head as I type that.  Wowza!)

And just who is this Bee, you're wondering?  Oh, I'm so very glad you asked.   

{the Ferris Wheels, on the Matterhorn at Disneyland}

By day (and some nights and about half the weekend {workaholics unite!}) I'm a psychologist working in a university counseling center with a part-time private practice.  By night I'm an absolute hobby fiend who always has my eye on the next craft/talent/skill/project du jour.  (Mr. Ferris Wheel would like to add that my hobbies include "planning the future" and "running the numbers" - not mutually exclusive.)  As you can probably already tell, I love ellipses, parentheses, hyphens, asterisks, brackets, and any other grammatical device or punctuation marks that will let me continue with ridiculously run-on sentences without the point being completely lost in all my wordiness.  To top it all off, I'm an optimist with a snappy sense of humor (if I do say so myself) and a meticulous eye for detail. 

Mr. Ferris Wheel is a psychologist as well (except kinda not quite because he doesn't graduate until May - small details), and by the time our wedding rolls around in November we will have been together for 6 amazing/stressful/formative/love-filled years (cue collective "aww...").  After slogging through 2 doctoral programs, 2 dissertations, 2 internships, 1 post-doc, 1 funemployment, 1 surgery, and 2 moves we decided we finally felt "ready" (whatever that means) to make our commitment all official and such.

For 11 months now we've been working to create a non-traditional, fun, chic, handmade wedding in a fairly typical hotel ballroom in downtown San Francisco.  (Don't worry - I'll explain all of that in more detail later.)  And I'm so glad to have y'all along for the ride!

{this time inside the Haunted Mansion}

Oh, and before I forget...  Why Ferris Wheel?  Well, the icon is adorable, I love carnival rides (Mr. FW could actually be convinced to ride a ferris wheel), it kinda fits with an unintentional circle-y wedding theme that's started to develop, and I happened to see a ferris wheel the day before getting my acceptance email (it's a sign!).  But Mr. FW had his reasons as well, and to prove it here is the verbatim list he sent me over Gchat:

[Mr. Ferris Wheel]:  i like ferris wheel for the follwoing reasons:
1. "Ms.Ferris Wheel" sounds better than all but a couple others
2. The picure is easily the coolest
3. The icon is representative of things in our wedding
4. It is something at the carnival that we could actually do together.  Because if you ever take me on one of those spinny things again i reserve the right to throw up on your shoes
5. i think ferris wheels are romantic-sounding
6.  I think Ferris Wheel IS actually something almost everyone would identify as being associated with a carnival.  Unlike, for example, bunting
7. Now I also know you're leaning towards it too
And 8. I think it lends itself more readily than some of the others to be incorporated into our wedding somehow
WHEW!
me:  Awesome
I'm gonna be Ms. Ferris Wheel
!!!!

Who could argue with such logic?!  So Ms. Ferris Wheel it was.

{celebrating at our favorite restaurant with a homemade ferris wheel card, given to me by Mr. FW}

Hang on tight, Hive, cuz I have a feeling this is going to be one wild, bumpy, and thrilling ride!  Whee!

P.S. Only after I sent many an excited message to other people did I realize that Ferris Wheel looks a lot like Ferris Whee! and that makes me infinitely happy.  Don't you agree?