Our Blended Family Travel Life

When My brother and I were little, my mom would sing this song when one of us would cry

The things you think about when you are stressed the heck out.😩 Less than 20 days till our wedding and so much to do but we are in a good place. We’ve been practicing our first dance and there aren’t too many big things left to do, so why am I stressed the F out?!?

I’ve had a few total meltdown sessions while planning this wedding. The first one I can remember is when my original photographer flaked on us. She started off really nice and said she would do it for one price, gave a deposit, we signed a contract. Then she wanted me to meet to give her cash to discuss locations for the engagement photos. Didn’t feel comfortable with giving a stranger cash so said we could Zelle it to her. Then all of a sudden the time wasn’t convenient. Rescheduled for another week, then when I reached out to confirm, she first said yes…then said she couldn’t meet cause everyone had covid (which could be true) but still wanted me to send her money?

So I said I’d send her money after we had the meet to go over the logistics for the engagement photos. So canceled again.

I heard from her maybe a week later and she’s asking for more money cause the plans for my wedding changed. I looked at the contract and no where in the contract did she mention that if the plans were altered it would require a renegotiation of the contract. The only thing that changed was that instead of having the ceremony one day and the reception on another day, we were going to have the ceremony and reception on the same day at the same location. At this point, there were too many red flags and she came off very unprofessional, so I had to drop her because I had no desire to pay her more.

Losing the photographer was annoying but luckily the videographer who I hired put me in contact with a photographer he worked with in the past. We had a zoom meeting after I checked out his website and it was the perfect fit! So yeah things happen for a reason and when one door closes, a better one, can open.

That was my first experience with wedding frustrations. The second involved a makeup artist that was the daughter of a family friend. She said she would go to the airbb we are renting at the shore to do my makeup. The next day she asked if there were other faces she could do…there weren’t cause none of us really wear makeup. After I got back to her, she then said she couldn’t do it.

I was in tears, cause I don’t wear makeup, don’t know how to do makeup and was totally frustrated with having to try to do it on my own. She offered to do a consultation to show me how to do my makeup. It looked ok but I just don’t necessarily like the way makeup feels…especially long lashes. I tried to make the best of it and bought a ton of makeup. I tried different things…watched YT videos and even booked a full glam makeup thingy at Sephora. It looked great inside but once I got outside I hated it…but loved the lashes.

Every time I would show my daughter, Najja my face, she would grimace. She didn’t like anything. She said she would just do it for me the day of the wedding. But maybe two weeks ago a friend offered to do my makeup…still waiting on a consultation and we are 19 days before wedding. At this point I’m like “Would be great if she can but I’m at peace with whatever happens “.

80% of the things I bought, including my dress were from Etsy! Etsy has been my bff this whole journey. I’ve never really used it before but man…the things I’ve been missing! I’m literally addicted to Etsy now 😂😅🫣 This brings up the next cause of tears and a meltdown. There are so many great artists and business owners on that platform but make sure to check their location and shipping details. My cake topper was customized and coming from the Ukrainian. I didn’t think too much of it, I knew the shipping would be close but we definitely had a decent amount of wiggle room. Well when I got the details that it shipped weeks early I was so excited! Then the day they said it arrived…I panicked. Why? Because the time they said it was delivered no one was home and it said an individual signed for it. I ran downstairs to go outside to see if it was on our porch…nope. Looked on the ring to see if anyone dropped off a package…nope. So my custom cake topper was delivered somewhere but not to my house. I tried to contact the seller and checked tracking for the delivery method, it was a Ukrainian delivery service and their website and help center was not in English. Feeling totally frustrated, I start crying again. Mark reassures me that it will be ok, worse case we just get a generic topper.

Next day I’m on one mission and that’s to find out where my freaking topper is. I go to my neighbor next door and ask him, he didn’t get it but offers suggestions on where to look. I go up two blocks to the north side of my street where they have the same numbers as my street on the south side. Go up their stairs and onto their porch…I see a package. I pick up the package and read the label…it was IN FACT my package from the Ukraine. So did they lie about having someone sign?! I believe so! Whatever, I’m just so happy to have received it. I few days later I also received my custom wedding glasses from Bulgaria and the USPS person said any package from outside the US needs to be signed for. So I’m sure whomever lives on the north side didn’t sign for a package that had my name on it and the delivery guy just left it on their front porch

After I secured my precious topper, I said to my darling Markie “I guess if that’s the worst thing that happens planning our wedding, I shouldn’t be too upset”.

We are now less than 3 weeks away, we have one or two more dance practices left. I still haven’t mastered my twirls, they make me dizzy. I know I’ll be less dizzy if I practice but practicing makes me sick 😩

We have our date scheduled to get our marriage license, pay for our cake and drop off the velvet roses 🌹 that will go on our cake and visit the venue, all on the same day. We still need to make my bouquet, figure out decorating the arch, make streamers and decide on the last little decorations for the reception. But really, I’ve come to terms with if these little things don’t get done, no one will really know but me and my planner and it’s ok.

Not only have I been planning the wedding but also my bachelorette party!

Not sure if it’s because I don’t think anyone will do it like I’ll do it or I don’t believe anyone cares enough to do it for me. But I pretty much organized 80% of the weekend. I rented the lake house through my travel business. Created the event, made sure everyone who wanted to go paid, signed up for food. I asked my friend who has an adult party business to come Friday for our deviant bachelorette night. My maid of honor focused on the activities like booking the location for our spa day, paint and sip and axe throwing for Saturday. No matter how much you love your friends, organizing events are just “hair pulling” because you typically have to follow up with people multiple times. Of course people are busy and we forget things that aren’t in need of immediate attention, so I get it, just doesn’t make it easy to plan events.

I guess the bachelorette party doesn’t count as a trigger for a meltdown but did add to my overall frustration level. The final thing that caused me to totally lose it, I’m still not sure. I think it was a culmination of everything: Wedding planning, bachelorette planning, my daughter’s soccer practice and games, my son’s football practice and games, chronic back pain for months, full time job that has started to be stressful with little support, starting my own travel business, etc.

I woke up the other night and just started crying. I couldn’t stop crying. I was up hours, just thinking about how much my life sucks…it doesn’t though. Mark really tried to help and encourage me with love note on the mirror and the sweetest texts. They definitely helped a while but during my chiropractic appointment, I was on my belly and I started crying again. I couldn’t stop thinking about how much I hated my job. How I hate that I don’t feel successful and I’m not friends with anyone there. I snapped at my boss right before the appointment and then immediately told him I’m stressed and feel overwhelmed.

So when I got out of my appointment, my boss messaged me to ask if I had time to chat. Once I got home we talked (I work from home) and we had a nice conversation. He wanted to figure out how he can help me feel more supported, successful and not feel so isolated. Ultimately I realized that I would have to be the master of my own destiny and proactively ask for what I need and want. That people actually won’t know you need support and help if you don’t make it known. Communicating your needs before you burn out is necessary to keep you from burning out. Things I already know but not sure why I didn’t feel comfortable enough going to him and letting him know what I need to feel successful. Well actually, I did last year but I never took the initiative afterwards to setup meetings. Now I need to make sure once a month I setup a time to learn something new from him, this will help me to feel like I know the full picture of how my department runs and in turn that will help me to feel more successful.

What exactly have I learned from the last 6 months of crying over spilled milk? I need to ask for help sooner. I need to set realistic goals. I need to be ok saying No. I need to delegate tasks, instead of thinking I can do it all. I need to be present and grateful for all the amazing and beautiful things going on in my life right now, and not be hyper focused on the things going wrong.

You enjoy the sunshine more after the rain. The rain (like crying) is necessary to wash away the guck and nourish the roots (soul). My first 20+ years of life, I thought crying was a sign of weakness but have since realized crying releases the bad, strengthens the good and makes room for the beauty ❤️