Day 292 ~ I Married My Best Friend ... Part Deux

As our BIG day approached, all I kept hearing from Dean was ... don't forget we need to keep it small.  For ten months I heard... don't forget we need to keep it small.

All the usual things for a wedding, but with a relaxed twist.  The venue was easy, we were getting married by a long time family friend in Malibu.  What a great place to get married, after all we met near the beach, most of our relationship was spent at the beach, and we grew up near the beach... why not get married near the beach.  We were married at the Malibu Phoenix.

As far as the preparations went...I put all my talents to work with this wedding.  I designed and made the invitations.  The party favors, shoes, and our Titanium wedding bands (the strongest metal to represent how strong our love is for one another)... all purchased on eBay.  Table arrangements, and other decorations including paper goods, glasses and utensils purchased downtown Los Angeles from wholesale merchants.  Then a little of this here and a little of that there... and VIOLA!  Oh, my dress, it was given to me.  Finally, all the delicious Persian food was provided by my father-in-law's Persian friends.  Nummy!!  

Our photographer was perfect, and the flowers just right (I just had to have gardenias! ~ my favorite!)

   

When it came to the guest list... this was funny.  Yes, I still kept hearing ... don't forget we need to keep it small ...  However, Dean's mom was somehow oblivious to this.  I will say this... even though Dean's mother Sally had been divorced from Dean's father for well over thirty years, she had all the family addresses correct.  More announcements went out than invitations, by far. 

As we got closer, and closer, every so often Sally would call me up with some little story of bumping into a friend who we must add to the guest list.  or Better yet... Dean would tell me that he had bumped into an old friend, and that we needed to send them invite.  Then ten minutes later.. yes you got it... don't forget we need to keep it small.  

This would happen up until days before the wedding.

Now, that I think about this.  I feel so blessed to have had Sally help Dean and I with our wedding.  She was a major help!  We feel so blessed that she was a big part of our day... thank God she handled the food... truth be told, it wasn't until Sally told me that her husband and his friends were bringing (scrumptious) Persian food as their gift to us that I realized that I had forgotten all about food!  Big smile!  That was a close one!!

When our BIG day finally arrived, Dean's mother and father, and their respective families, as well as my uncle Jose Luis, aunt Graciela and cousin Alejandra, and my brother all scurried and helped put together a fabulous day for us with all the last minute preparations!

My family?  My mother was late, as usual.  We even held the wedding for nearly an hour and a half.  Finally, the rest of our guests were getting restless, and I had to make the call to start the wedding,  Oh, and my father was far too busy with his wife's grand-daughter.  Boy was that a slap in the face.  He barely put her down long enough to walk me down the aisle!  I was so embarrassed by my family's actions.  Here, Dean's family barely sat down... and my family...             ...     ...  exactly... par for the course.  

Had to get that last paragraph out of my system... and now that it's out... YES!  You got it!  It's in a balloon, tied tight and off it went!  To know more about this awesome reference in my Day 7 post, click here.  A must read.  wink, wink.

As our day went on, Dean kept on wanting to get and do last minute festivities.  He even wanted to go get a keg!  I could have strangled him... after all, what happened with... "don't forget we need to keep it small" ?   

 “And they...LIVED!  Life isn't always ‘Happily Ever After’, rather, loving FOREVER, regardless.”   ― Carmen DeSousa, She Belongs To Me

Blessings to all!!

73 days to go...

PS... for a, l & c.  You are my sunshine(s).  

Images are property of Dean Karam, Carla Barila Karam and of this blog, Taking Back My Life ~ Making It My Own.  U.S Copyright laws apply.  ©

Day 291 ~ I Married My Best Friend

Nine years ago, on my 40th birthday, my best friend and I were married!

The more I analyze my life and the things I do, I have learned that I like to do things my way. It isn't that I go out of my way to be different than most, if it happens, it happens.  What I am saying is that I do things that I like, and not because others are doing so or to be like them.  

It isn't that I, or Dean for that matter, didn't want a traditional wedding.  Dean wanted a small, intimate wedding, HA [will explain later], and I had my traditional wedding with my sons' father.  So, as far as I was concerned, this was more for Dean since it was his one and only time down the aisle.

My 40th was about ten months away (which I had been planning a celebration for years,) when we decided to get married.  

Let me explain a little here.  chuckle, chuckle.  My wonderful husband, before I married him, and when I first started dating him. was a bachelor in every sense of the word.  

Sure Dean dated, but he wasn't a player and he didn't have a "need" to constantly have a girlfriend.  He was into playing ice hockey, league and pick up games, as well as his street hockey at Santa Monica beach every weekend; he was a man's man and hung out with his friends; friends of which he has had since childhood, junior high and high school combined; he spent most Christmases with his father and his family in El Paso, and other special holidays and family vacations with his mother and her family; at the age of thirty-seven, Dean brought his first girlfriend home for Christmas, to El Paso, to meet his family- that was me.

As we dated, and time went on, we were approaching my birthday.  Now, here are some reasons why Dean and I are good together.  I am a planner, for example I planned for years that when I turned forty I was going to have a party.  Dean on the other hand, God love him, doesn't think to think ahead on whether or not he should have a jacket for later in the day.  If that makes any sense to you.  So... since we started dating, it's become my job to remind him to take a jacket with him if he needs to.  

The subject of marriage came up soon there after... to this day Dean and I can't agree on how the subject came up... however as we got deeper and deeper into the subject... I proposed!  Well, I saw that Dean was going to take forever and ... well... my biological clock was ticking!!  

I did put a lot of thought into this beforehand.  I even asked for his mom's blessing, and went as far as getting my father's blessing as well (for whatever that's worth- okay, I'll be nice.)  I learned early on that if I wanted romance in mine and Dean's relationship... well I was going to have to be the one to orchestrate it.  That's okay.  Dean would not be my Dean, if he was a mushy romantic guy.

Soooooo... after a nice dinner one night, somehow "marriage" came up, I don't know how, but it did... wink, wink.  Then, my 40th birthday came up... and then before I knew it, forget all the laid out plans I had- they all went out the window when my nerves showed up!  Most importantly, when the thought of saving money and throwing "one" grand celebration came up, it was very appealing to the both of us... it was cool... it was different... plus Dean would only have ONE date to remember... so we decided to get married on my 40th!

1 Corinthians 13:4-13  (NIV)

⁴ Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. ⁵ It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. ⁶ Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. ⁷ It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

 ⁸ Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. ⁹ For we know in part and we prophesy in part, ¹⁰ but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. ¹¹ When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me. ¹² For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

 ¹³ And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

Blessings to all!!

74 days to go...

PS... for a, l & c.  You are my sunshine(s).  

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