More Secrets from Your Wedding Planner

It’s easy to think of Jennifer Lopez’s role in The Wedding Planner when hearing about people who plan weddings. Here, planners and pros from across the country pull back the curtain on what it takes to make dreams come true on a couple’s big day.

The second the ring goes on the finger, commonsense goes out the door.

This is a full time job, but on the big day we are steaming the bridal gown, pinning boutonnieres, making sure that the timelines are being met, making sure there are no spots on the glasses or silverware, allowing gum to be spit out in our hands before the ceremony, dealing with any situations that arise, and the list goes on!

I feel like a therapist when I am forced to step in to help with family drama. My insight is to be polite and respectful. Often, meddlesome people just want to be heard out. Since I’m an independent third party, I’m able to bring neutrality to emotionally charged situations.

Sisters are tough to work with. Often the Maid of Honor takes her role very seriously and doesn’t trust my capabilities. I take it in stride but have sometimes been forced to take sisters aside. By the end of the night, we’re friends!

On a Strawberry Swing

Is it normal to get excited for my husband to try new things I bake/cook/whip up for him? I mean, without sitting down to eat it too? This morning I ingeniously stirred our remaining strawberries into a bowl of whole grain pancake batter and threw in a pinch of cinnamon (his favorite).

As soon as the batter was ready for the pan it dawned on me: we’re out of syrup. For my husband, this was almost a deal breaker. I had to remind him, sweetly, that strawberries would make the pancakes sweet enough. He conceded and said he’d have them without the syrup, as long as I really buttered them up (no problem!). Piled on a plate, I proudly presented my creation and laughed when he got up to look in the cupboard one more time for hidden syrup. (Below, my Whole Grain Strawberry Pancakes!)

The verdict? Seems like he ate 75% of what I gave him, so I call that a breakfast victory — especially given he never lets me add fruit to my recipes. Let’s just say he’s not a fan of me modifying recipes… Maybe it’s a police thing, following the rules and all? I love theorizing.

Anyway long story short: Strawberries truly do make breakfast sweeter. I had a bite, they were delicious.

My Hundreth Post is Heart-Shaped

Check it out here: heartsfromabove.wordpress.com

What We Talk About When…

I unearthed a few highlighted literature texts the other day and decided I could read through just the highlighted sections, attempting to figure out what compelled me to color, circle and underline. It made me think of the funny things people have concluded about gender and language, that men have limited vocabularies, won’t use as many adjectives as women, etc. etc.

Which brings me to the image here.

via imgfave.com

You can imagine my hesitation in finding this photographic gem the other day, which by no means would satisfy my heart’s desire for a wedding guest book, but yet totally indulges my curiosity about how we choose to describe abstract things, like love.

Where would we choose to leave a mark had we just one choice to make in a dictionary of hundreds of thousands of words? It’s pretty limitless, being that Oxford admits we have no way of figuring out how many words are in the English language, mainly because you don’t always know what counts as a word and also because of usage. Love is a noun, a verb, you get the idea.

I know I wouldn’t be able to choose just one, but off the top of my head I cannot silence this: remarkable.