Hoarder

While moving in and unpacking last week, I discovered that when you marry someone, you also marry their stuff. And by stuff, I mean alllllllllll of it. Our extra guest-room-turned-office ended up being affectionately called "the crap room", as all the boxes my fiance brought with him got placed there "until further notice".

"Until further notice" got addressed when I came down for spring break. One of my jobs was to go through his stuff and find a proper place for it. When I asked him before what kind of "stuff" I would be going through, he shrugged his shoulders and just said "Stuff." Reassuring.

I got to this said "stuff", and it was just an elaborate, highly chaotic, collection of crap. Like, old eye masks (fact #2457 about the fiance: he wears an eye mask to sleep every night), various rubbery ipod cases, nasty old woven friendship-type bracelets type of crap. I found myself moving boxes of junk from one corner of the room to the other, not really knowing what to do with any of it.

After dinner, the fiance and I sat down together to look through his stuff. Whenever I asked him why he chose to keep things, he said "You never know when you'll ever need it!" This was the reply for: empty containers, ear buds, a bajillion bandanas (you know your fiance is a youth director when...), etc.

When I commented about how surprised I was that my fiance has kept all these things, he replied: "You don't understand. This is the first time I've had to share my space with anyone. All my stuff came with me. I went from one extreme to the other. Before this past year, I didn't use to save anything. Now I save everything."

Couple things -- 1) Kind of concerned that in 1 year the fiance has accumulated a rather impressive collection of eye masks... 2) Kind of impressed he saved all the cards I wrote him (1 point for the fiance)

Then I came across this:

It was in a card box with a bunch of other cards just like it.

"Oh, that's nice! We have some extra 'thank you cards' to use!"

Then I touched it; thinner than the toilet paper you find at the airport bathrooms.

Then I opened it.

Liar liar pants on fire; "I hope you have a good 2006"?!?!?!?!?!?!?

That was the day we had our first big laugh (to the point of tears) at our new house. *memories*

Around the house

On March 1st, the fiance moved into our rental home. This little brick house has a lot of charm, and we love everything about her (I've decided it's a 'her')! The craziest thing? Everything we prayed for, this little lady's got it; a fenced in back yard, at least 1 guest room, hall bathroom, open kitchen.

I've been here for a week, unpacking and decorating. Finally all my daydreaming and wishing up and down the housewares aisles at TJ Maxx, Marshalls, and Home Goods have become a reality. Wonderful friends and family threw us a joint engagement shower earlier this week, and the fiance and I were able to use a their generous gifts to start making this house a home.

I've talked before about budgeting and how the fiance and I have been working on being smarter with our money, especially as we prepare for our life together. Thanks to the shower and some gift cards saved from past birthdays (what up $75 Bed Bath and Beyond gift card from 2009), we have been able to decorate and furnish our home without having to spend any of the money we have been saving for our life post-wedding. I spent a lot of time doing some price matching and research online, and woke up earlier than usual just so I could spend ample time shopping and comparing prices, even when it meant going back to a store more than once to snag a deal. But once I had a plan, it was so much fun shopping and not having to take out my credit/debit card to pay for anything out of my own pocket.

We still need some pieces of furniture, but for the most part, we have everything we need. The one thing I love about this house is that a lot of the pieces you will find are hand-me-downs, with a whole lotta character. So without further adieu, I introduce you to my future home:

Hand-me-down dining room chairs...would you LOOK at that fabric!

And yes, that is an old school high chair...

Gifted china my parents never used; hand-me-down arm chairs and an awesome produce box

My love for patterns and designs exploded too.

Clockwise from L: spoon rest, drapes, rug, measuring cups

Linen napkins (on sale!), mason jar mugs

...and that's just the beginning (!). Can't wait to show you the rest of the house!!

Mutemath

If there's one thing you need to know about the fiance, it's this: I am not his first love. Mutemath is.

Don't believe me? One time I tweeted about his love for them and how his love for Mutemath > his love for me, and they awarded me a signed poster. To give to him. And consequently increase his obsession to infinity. Wish I was kidding.

In 2009 the fiance (at the time just my co-worker) convinced me to see what this band was all about. We made a pilgrimage to The Tabernacle and I have to admit; Mutemath was everything my fiance raved about, and more. I was so enamored by them that I willingly stood outside of their tour bus for hours after the show to meet them and have my Converses signed. Still wish I was kidding.

Then in 2010 we saw Mutemath back-to-back in two evenings. I went from a girl who never knew who Mutemath was to a girl who screams with excitement when Darren King duct tapes his headphones to his head. Can't kid anymore, this is all true.

Then, yesterday, on our one-year anniversary of our engagement, I gifted the fiance with a belated birthday present -- to see his beloved band at The Tabernacle again for their last show of their tour. Our faces melted, I had confetti fly out of my clothes when I changed after the concert hours later, and my ears were still ringing this morning.

This is what a face of sheer amazement/confusion looks like

Mutemath, thanks for the memories.

Sneak Peek

This is what I did this afternoon:

My invitation was made up of two (free!) design templates (Tandem Bike Invitation Suite + Monogram Invitation Suite) thanks to Wedding Chicks! I purchased a little handy-dandy perforating tool from Michaels to split up my RSVP and information cards. I bought brown bag kraft envelopes and plain white mini envelopes from Envelope Mall online. Finally, I purchased 240 yards (!!) of Lemon Yellow Divine Twine Baker's Twine from BahanaSplitsBoutique on Etsy.

Whoever said that DIYing your own wedding isn't worth it was wrong. It's totally worth it, saves a lot of money and I had a lot of fun! They were right about one thing though: this insane crick in my neck from working so hard.

In other news, we get married in 83 days! Eek!