Dizzy Dee

When we think of weddings, we all have the most idyllic pictures in our minds. The beautiful bride. Lovely scenery. A cozy atmosphere for the tables that are all neatly set. Flowers. Flower girls. Happiness and laughter. Family photo’s. There’s generally a good vibe going around there do’s - lol.

I guess I’ve been pretty blind about it too, so I won’t blame anyone who takes it all for granted.

You have absolutely no clue what its like if you haven’t been through a wedding yet. And if you used a wedding planner, sorry, you’re disqualified.

Weddings take planning. Immense loads of planning. From the word go. I never thought that deciding on a date could be such a big issue. But I promise you that you will know exactly when I mean when you get there.

You have to keep in mind all your family who lives far away - will they be able to make it to your wedding? Then the season. What type of wedding do you want? Spring, fall? This will determine what flowers are available, and also what type of dress the bride will be wearing.

Once the date is set, after both parties have listed all the pro’s and con’s of WHEN the wedding will be held, you have to start thinking of invites. Invites will be determined by your colour scheme, or theme. Now, you also have to think about WHO you’re going to invite. This is bound to cause some strife between the couple, and between the couple’s families. Families always want to invite loads of people that the couple doesn’t really know, and doesn’t really care to have at the wedding.

The people who are invited will most probably be determined by the people who pay for the wedding. For instance, if the couple pays for the wedding themselves, they won’t easily let their minds be changed by parents who want to invite long lost aunts. But now the tricky thing is, if the parents pay for the wedding, they have a huge say in who’s being invited.

Traditionally the bride’s father pays for the wedding, but I guess these days people are ignoring almost all traditions, so this one went along with the rest. Honestly, its easier if the couple pays for the wedding themselves.

Once you’ve come to an agreement with each other, as well as made peace with the families, the guest list can be finalized. Remember, this is NEVER cast in stone. Never ever assume that your guest list is FINAL. A finalized guest list just doesn’t exist. Ever.

We’ve had some pretty interesting happenings around our guest list. First of all we drew it up with about 60 guests. Perfect. I always wanted a small wedding! Problem #1? I didn’t invite half my family. LOL. I guess we’re not very close with a lot of people in my family, and I really didn’t want people there who just want to comment on the whole “do”.

My folks weren’t very happy about this, which I could understand, so we adjusted the list a little, and added some more family from my side. Great. My fiancé’s family are all pretty close, so we couldn’t get away with leaving people out really. Asif that wasn’t enough, some of the people who were invited, invited their OWN guests along with them. I guess it wasn’t done on purpose, or to be strange or anything, but they just assumed that we had invited their kids and their whole entourage. Great. We have some extra faces. People we haven’t even ever MET!? Arrrrgh! Fine, we get ourselves together again, we make peace, and practice our smiles for the uninvited guests.

Once your guest list is setup, and you have chosen the colour scheme or theme for your wedding, you’re ready to start with the invites. You might make these yourselves, or perhaps you’d prefer having these made. If you have the spare cash to have them made, good for you, but note, you might not realize how much the whole wedding is going to cost. Don’t be too stingy, but also don’t throw around your money like you have found a pot of gold.

Personalizing invitation can be very costly if you’re not doing this yourself, but it adds a nice touch to the invite. We did ours this way, but we also made them ourselves. When you make personalized invites, make sure to make a couple extra “general” invites - just in case you forget someone, and also to keep in your wedding album.

Finally the RSVP date comes, and though a lot of people don’t RSVP on time, we eventually get everyone’s replies. We realize that we’re going to have some empty seats, and make use of this opportunity to invite friends who we would love to have there, but who weren’t on the initial list either because we forgot about them (sorry ), or because we didn’t think we had the space. Now this is where the “general” invites come in handy. My sister and her family RSVP’d, saying they won’t be able to come since they live in the US. I was very sad, but made peace with it. 12 days before the wedding they get told that they now have the opportunity to come. I’m absolutely ecstatic that they’re coming, but realistically speaking, we have to make some adjustments. Extra seating, gifts, place names etc, etc, etc. Its all good though - I would change it all over twice if it meant they could be here.

Now you have your guest list filled up to the max, and you’re ready to have a the wedding?! You think you’re ready to book all the equipment you’re going to hire, i.e. chairs & crockery etc. BIG MISTAKE. If you want your max to be 90 guests, allow for about 5 people to still pitch up that you haven’t invited. Sometimes you forget about someone until the last minute, and other times people are just really rude and pitch without being invited. Its always safer to have a buffer. Also remember to hire some extra chairs etc. in case something breaks. You don’t want your guests to be without a main meal just because their plate broke.

Now we have to start thinking of table gifts, place names, a table planner, and decor. Decor can be pretty easy, but also tricky. You don’t want to crowd the table with lots of little fairies and stuff (I’m not having any fairies on my wedding, but some people actually like this), but at the same time, you don’t want the tables to look too bare. You have to think about vases, and flowers, and which flowers are in season, and who’s going to arrange them, and who’s going to pick them up, and when you need to get the vases to the people who are arranging the flowers. All of this has to be done in time, but not too long before, else the flowers will wilt. Same with the table gifts - ours specifically. We have chocolates, and these need to be set on the tables, before the guests arrive, but not too long before so that they melt. *sigh*

While all of these arrangements are happening the wedding dress is the bride’s top priority. Whether you’re hiring, having your dress made, or making it yourself, its stressful. I was fortunate enough to have my fiance’s Mom offer to make my dress, and she finished this week - she did such an incredible job, and I’m really excited about it!!

The groom’s clothes might be a bit of a fuss as well, that’s if you want him to wear a waist coat. This will have to be made to match the colour scheme of the wedding. Personally I don’t like waist coats at all, so my groom won’t be wearing one. (I keep wanting to call a waist coast a petty coat instead… I guess its cause English isn’t my first language, but come to think of it, the groom wood look equally weird wearing either one of those. To me that is )

Once the bride and groom’s outfits are decided on, you need think of your entourage… First you have to choose these! It might sound easy, but I can assure you its not even close to that. You’ll always have people who feel they should rather have been chosen. Either that, or the people who you have chosen will want to take over the whole show. They might try to design their own clothes, changing colours to something that doesn’t vaguely match the colours you’ve chosen for the wedding. The worst I’ve heard of recently, is that the maid of honour wanted her dress made exactly like the bride’s, just in a different colour. What the heck is up with that? I would slap that maid of honour and tell her to wake up, and see that its not her wedding. Yeah, I know, I won’t do that, but the little person inside me feels like doing that.

I’ve been very fortunate to have an excellent, supportive, and very cool bridesmaid. I’m not going to have a maid of honour and bridesmaids and all that. Just one bridesmaid is fine. Really. Her dress is nearly finished, and though I gave the main idea for the dress she chose her own fabric and some extra trimmings. I was at first a bit upset that I didn’t see the fabric before she bought it, but in the end, she has good taste, and it will look good. No use fussing about the small things. At least her dress won’t look anything like mine!!

The flower girls are a total different issue. I was going to use my two nieces, but since they live in the US and wasn’t coming to the wedding, I asked my fiancé’s cousin. Needless to say she is ecstatic. Now, after hearing that my nieces will in fact be here, we had to do some chopping and changing. We’re having three flower girls now, but the two nieces are not here long enough in advance to make the dresses. I’ve decided not to let this bother me, and my sister will just have to get the dresses in the US. Its one of those things that cannot be changed by worrying.

Apart from those three, we’re inviting a family which has five kiddies; four of which are girls. All four are dressing up really nicely. They would also love having something to do. Shame, I feel so sorry for them, cause I really don’t have something for them to do!? They even worked out a dance!! LOL. This is just too funny. So many people are planning things for MY wedding without me knowing it. Mmm… And I thought just the honeymoon was supposed to be a surprise? :O

Oh well, I can imagine if I was little, I would’ve loved to dance at a wedding too? So they can do their little routine while we’re busy taking family photo’s - its bound to entertain the guests who are waiting in one way or another

Now, I have 10 days left, and I honestly don’t know what to stress about anymore. I’ve worried, and wondered, and imagined everything over and over and over. I’ve spent my nights rolling around trying to think of things I might have forgotten.

My head is too full. But it feels like its stuffed with cotton candy… Sticky, and like a I can’t get anything out of it which makes much sense. I don’t know if that was a good comparison. Or maybe I didn’t explain the comparison well… Like I said. I cannot think straight anymore.

The most important things to organizing a wedding? I guess… To NEVER under estimate the cost. NEVER under estimate the work & planning. And once everything is done, try to relax, and just sit back and enjoy.

That’s not a very easy task though. I will let you know how it went, and if I was able to do just that.

In the end its about spending the most amazing day of your life with the people who you love. The people who care for you, and the people who you want to share in this very special event.

I noticed now that I haven’t posted anything with a decent image recently. I would love to spend time on the net looking for something, but as you know, my time is limited. If you need some cool wallpapers, have a look at DeviantArt and Social Wallpaper

One of the biggest “no-no” on a wedding invitation is asking for gifts - the only worse thing you can do, is to ask for money. These days this etiquette seem to have been discarded completely. I’ve received quite a few wedding invites lately, and all of them asked for money, instead of gifts.

Personally it would make me extremely uncomfortable asking for anything whatsoever on my wedding invitation, which is why we didn’t do it. It feels asif you’re inviting the guests, but with a hidden agenda?

Surely everyone knows that they’re welcome to give a gift if they want, but putting that smack in the middle of your wedding invite is just a bit too forward for me. Its like asking your guests an entrance fee?

We’ve only invited people who we really WANT to attend our wedding, and we didn’t invite them because we thought they’d give us nice prezzies! Instead we look forward to spending this incredibly special day with the people who we love. Our friends, and our family. Because we really want them there for their company.

Here are some folks who agree with me: Lifestyle @ iAfrica

1. I can see your point, but I still think you’re full of shit.
2. I have plenty of talent and vision. I just don’t give a damn.
3. How about “never”? Is “never” good for you?
4. It sounds like English, but I can’t understand a word you’re saying.
5. I see you’ve set aside this special time to humiliate yourself in public.
6. Ah, I see the f***-up fairy has visited us again.
7. You are validating my inherent mistrust of strangers.
8. I’m already visualizing the duct tape over your mouth.
9. The fact that no one understands you doesn’t mean you’re an artist.
10. Someday, we’ll look back on this, laugh nervously and change the subject.
11. I will always cherish the initial misconceptions I had about you.
12. I don’t know what your problem is, but I’ll bet it’s hard to pronounce.
13. Any connection between your reality and mine is purely coincidental.
14. I like you. You remind me of when I was young and stupid.
15. What am I? Flypaper for freaks!?
16. I’m not being rude. You’re just insignificant.
17. Thank you. We’re all refreshed and challenged by your unique point of view.
18. It’s a thankless job, but I’ve got a lot of Karma to burn off.
19. Yes, I am an agent of Satan, but my duties are largely ceremonial.
20. No, my powers can only be used for good.
21. I’m really easy to get along with once people learn to worship me.
22. You sound reasonable…time to up my medication.
23. I’ll try being nicer if you’ll try being smarter.
24. I’m out of my mind, but feel free to leave a message.
25. I don’t work here. I’m a consultant.
26. Who me? I just wander from room to room.
27. My toys! My toys! I can’t do this job without my toys!

Pity its almost bed time!!! I wanted to tell you - specially the international readers…

I still get shocked by things that happen in South Africa - even though I live here.

Someone told me today, (and you might scold me for being so naive) , but there are really people in South Africa who sell their babies. Even sell them in pieces. Why you might ask? Selling organs on the black market? Nope. They sell them to the sangoma’s (traditional healers), who use them in the muti (medicine type potions).

This is absolutely horrifying, and not something that I deal with in my culture, but this is something that is relatively common in black cultures in South Africa. Its not like all black people do this, but they at least know about it.

As for myself, I knew that the sangoma’s brew muti with body parts, but never thought that it went as far as this. Its cannibalism and just sheer insanity.

I find it revolting.

If I think of twisting balloons, I think of it as entertainment for little kids, but these photos taken at a “Balloon Fashion Show” in China illustrate how far it has come as an art form.
Some are amazingly imaginative and detailed!

All people probably go through strange phases when they’re at school. Specially just before, and during high school. I can remember when late in primary school / early high school I went a bit ‘coo-coo’. I suppose it wasn’t that bad, but if I think back, I feel sorry for my poor parents.

I had art classes at that stage, and mixed with a lot of arty weirdo’s - no offense, but if you know the town that I grew up in, you might know that there are a whole load of funny arty people there. My art teacher wasn’t so weird, around where my art classes were, there were really interesting shops, with really interesting people working there.

At the time I was totally intrigued by their uniqueness. They were either the “earth-wind-&-fire” type, or they were obsessed with faeries. Some were goths, and most of them had studied psychology at some point or another. I started wearing tie-die T’s, and made my own fabric painted table cloths, or cushion covers - all with faeries or other weird characters… I decorated by room with fancy incense bowls, and burnt incense almost constantly, up to the point where I had developed a serious sinus problem - LOL.

It was the same time that I went through the alien phase. I bought magazines and books about aliens. I read up as much as I could. Back then we didn’t have internet at home (or even in my home town at all, for all I know), but anyway, there was nothing like google for me back then. Just the old fashioned library where I could read up on the paranormal. It intrigued me to the point where I was maybe even obsessed. I suppose the paranormal still intrigues me today, but I’ve learnt a lot, and I’m not as naive and gullible as I was back then.

I still enjoy movies like Sixth Sense, and I still get a thrill from it. Though I guess it wouldn’t have half the effect with the music.

If I were to see someone

or no hope for them. But luckily we grow out of those phases in our lives. Or most of us do in any case.

I’m slightly irritated today. Our office has been without water since yesterday, and if you think a power cut was bad, consider not being able to FLUSH your toilets! Even worse, try imagining a whole building full of women, sharing three toilets, and not being able to flush. Its a disaster.

Our company bought mineral water to drink and make coffee with, but still, there’s no way of washing the dishes, washing your hands (after going to the filthy bathrooms), and there’s no way to clean ANYTHING in the office if you spilt something!

I can’t imagine why its taking them so long to fix a burst water pipe. Surely for situations like this there are people who ought to work nightshift to try and fix it? I really don’t understand why it has to take them more than 24hours? I saw the hole they dug, to fix the pipe, but there isn’t even anyone there, working on it?!

On a more positive note, you might not have noticed my new header image, as Kirstyn pointed out, she only saw it this week, and its been up for about a month! Hehehe… If you still can’t see the bride & groom image on the header, try to refresh my blog with Ctrl+F5.

I was actually looking for a wedding Wordpress theme, but couldn’t find one that appealed to me. Most of them were very old fashioned, and reminded me a bit of a funeral - with the faded roses and all.

Just a reminder, I’ve only got 23 days left before I’m getting married - that just a bit more than 550 hours!

Even though we have Window Blinds in the new place, we still went to hang some curtains yesterday. It just looks so much more cozy with the curtains up!

Its slowly but surely starting to look more like a home, instead of just an empty building.

I still need some curtains for the bathroom, but who knows, maybe I’ll take mini blinds?

Whenever I can’t find something worthwhile to read on one of our local news websites, I go to the science section, and usually find something interesting there.

Here’s what I found in today’s science section on IOL…

• Global warming puts king penguins in danger - King penguins that feed on fish and squid at the northern edges of Antarctica are threatened by global warming, which is cutting down on their food supply.
• Bones of flying reptile found in China - Paleontologists have discovered the fossil of a new species of tiny prehistoric flying reptile in north-eastern China, a study released on Monday said. The miniature reptile lived about 120-million years ago and was about the size of a sparrow, with a wingspan less than a foot across.
• ‘Giant baby’ planet discovered - German astronomers have discovered a “giant baby” planet in deep space which they say has a mass 10 times as dense as Jupiter but is a scant 10 million years old - a newborn by cosmic standards.
• Ancient Indian city uncovered - Archaeologists have dug out the remains of a 2 500-year old city - believed to be bigger than classical Athens - from under the ruins of an ancient fort in India’s eastern state of Orissa, a newspaper reported on Monday. The findings of the team of archaeologists from India and the United States include the debris of household pottery and terracotta ornaments showing that the city’s inhabitants led an advanced lifestyle.

The ancient Indian city which was discovered particularly interests me. If I could’ve chosen another job, I would’ve loved to be an archaeologist. I guess its the adventurous side of the job that appeals to me so much. Just imagine finding a building which is centuries old, buried by sand, and completely forgotten. Yet still there were people who walked in those building, who LIVED there, and to whom it was as normal as our shopping malls are now. I find it intriguing, and would LOVE to discover something like that. One day.

The reason why I shared this today is because I sometimes forget what amazing people are out there, and the awesome things they’re doing. I forget that there are people out there STILL making discoveries, and that its not something that only happened in my history classes. Its just a reminder that we don’t know half the secrets that our Earth holds, and that there are still so many unknown things. Even though we live life “normally” each day, there’s a whole new ‘world’ out there. Somewhere.