August 14, 2008

No Bed of Roses...

Yesterday I met with the florist.  

I don't know if you've ever tried to say the word 'florist' over the phone, but it's a tricky word to communicate.  As I was talking to Tanner I tried to tell him that I was being a good Fiance and planning wedding things.  

"I'm going to meet with the florist this evening"

"The flourish?"

"What?  No, flourist."

"Floorist?  What floor needs to be done?"

"Flourist... I'm meeting with the florist!"

"You have a meeting in the forest?! Why?"

"Tanner, flowers.  The lady who works with flowers.  She arranges flowers: she puts together bouquets and makes boutonnieres... The Florist."

"OH...!  you're going to meet with the florist!  I get it..."

*  *  *

flo·rist (flôrist): A person who sells and arranges plants and cut flowers.

I didn't go into the woods, flourish, or get new carpet... I met with the flower lady yesterday.  All things considered it went quite well.  The lady doing them is really fun--a good friend of my mom's.  I'm not having any flowers in my centerpieces, so really all she's doing is making my bouquet and about 25 boutonnieres and corsages. 

My colors are fall colors: shades of reds and oranges, a little golden yellow, brown.  Here's how my bouquet is going to look.*



*Picture found by Tanner Layton.  {That's right everyone, he found this amazing creation for me!}

August 1, 2008

What I DON'T want to be when I grow up...

The other night I asked three 12 year-old girls what they wanted to be when they grew up. Their answers were all quite surprising and excessively ambitious:

"An architect." The first girl answered so matter-of-factly, it was as if she was created for that profession.

The second girl replied, "A vetrinarian is my first choice. If not that, then... No, just a vet, I don't have a second choice."

"I'm going to be a Marine Biologist." The third girl stated. {I wonder if I even knew what that was when I was her age...}

By the time I was five I knew that I wanted to go to Beauty School and ''be a bootishan'' {as the 5 year-old Lindsey would freely tell anybody}. But I knew that I would accomplish that by the time I was 18, and that following high school I needed to go to college. What kind of college degree I would pursue, however, was an absolute mystery to me. I was nothing like these three 12 year-olds...

After graduation, I spent a semester in China, teaching small Chinese children. Luckily, I fell in love with teaching, and decided that was my calling in life--now that's what my college degree will be {elementary education, not Chinese children...}



So, for the last several years, I've known just what I have wanted to do vocationally. And that's been nice. Real nice.

* * *

I would consider myself a fairly well rounded person {as far as likes and desires are concerned, not body size!} I have thought that if I hadn't harkened to the call of teaching, then there are other things I might have enjoyed. Well, recently I discovered what I would not want to do.

I would never want to be a wedding planner.

No, I don't hate weddings. No, I don't hate that I'm getting married {Don't worry Tanner! I'm SUPER EXCITED actually. Don't misunderstand this}. No, I don't hate planning--in fact, I quite like organizing things and making everything fit and work nicely. Sure, I would love to spend other peoples' money. Yes, I like beautiful things; more than I ought to probably.

At one point I even thought that my best friend and I should start an Amazing Event Planning Buisness. We both like all those things I said: beautiful things, spending other's money, making things come together, and success.  But alas, that never happened.

I guess that I'm just not loving planning my wedding.  It's a LOT of work, takes a LOT of time, requires a person to make a LOT of decisions {and we all know that I'm a bad decision maker}, occupies a LOT of mental energy, and yields a LOT of stress.  Don't get me wrong, I know that in the end it's going to be amazing {hopefully...} and my reception will be beautiful {hopefully...}, there's just a lot of 'to dos' between now and then.  

It's kind of like this:

Have you even had a paper, or a huge project due in a class.  And you know it's coming up, and you know you need to do it, and you know that when you get it done it's going to feel SO GOOD?  Yet, despite all this you don't want to do it.  More than anything you just want it to be the minute, or hour, of day after the project is due...  You would give anything for that time to be past, because you know that then you would have already done all that work and you would be free.  You know that feeling?  You know what I'm talking about?  

That's how I feel a little bit.  I know that every one always says "Enjoy being engaged!  You only get that once..."  Well, to all those people I say, "Thank you for that advice, but I've already enjoyed over three months of it."  Part of me wishes that today were October 23rd, because then everything would be done...