One Last Plea.... for your photos!

Hola Friends! 

As some of you know, I just recently put together a wedding photo album with all of our professional photos (see the previous post).

I’ll be honest, I’m pretty excited, and I can’t wait for it to arrive. I think I may spend the first three days of possession just going through it again and again.

We also want to make a photobook of the candid photos taken on the wedding day (and including some of the other events, like karaoke, rehearsal and engagement party). But to do that, we need your help!

If you were at the wedding and you took photos, could you please contribute them to our online wedding album?

You can do this a couple different ways:

1    1)    You can email photos to us at: tiffandcurby DOT lovebirds AT picasaweb DOT com.. No subject line necessary, just email them to us as attachments and they will automatically go into our photo album drop box.

2      

              2) You can upload photos directly if you would like – to do that, please email us: tiffandcurby AT gmail DOT com and let us know you’d like to do this option and I’ll send you a link to an album. (this way you can upload a bunch of pics at once)

You can VIEW some of the candid pictures that have been uploaded already at this link: The Story of Tiff and Curby 

Dear friends - seriously, help us out here, and get YOUR photos featured in our memories forever.

(and in return, I promise to blog about Tiff's life very soon!)

Our Awesome Wedding Album!

This weekend I had some free time, and I decided that one thing that would bring me great joy was to work on our wedding photo album. Shutterfly had a 20% off deal on photobooks, and Curby said it was OK if I had a million pages... So I did it!! I actually think we'll end up with a three book series - 1) the wedding album, 2) engagement photo album, and 3) prewedding and reception posed and candid photos.

I love this album. It's 12x12 and has a hard cover and so that feels really fancy, and I can't wait to see how it turns out in real life.  (I know I could have done an actual "scrapbooked" album, and I like doing that kind of thing sometimes, but I was so excited to make it look as professional as our photos look!"
*(removed - link broken)

Settling In... or "Boy, We sure do have a lot of laundry! (wedding series post #4)"

OK, first, I know that when I outlined this wedding series it went like "leading up to wedding events #1, wedding #2, honeymoon #3, married life #4" and if you are a faithful reader of this blog (and I'm pretty sure that if you are one of the few readers of this blog, you are) - you'll notice that I posted three "pre-wedding events" posts and then skipped right to this "married life" one.

I promised its not because I don't want to regale you with the funness of the wedding or the sheer joy that I had in spending three days poolside in Playa Del Carmen. Its mostly because it has officially been over 4 months since I got married, and the sum total of our thank you cards sent out remains at 2, I figure I'd better do something wedding related to get myself moving! This "settling in" post is mostly about: Laundry.

Here is the naked truth.... There is more than double the laundry to do now in this house. It boggled my mind the first few weeks, and I almost couldn't handle it. I have decided that men wear more clothes than women (undershirts, shirts, jeans, undies, socks - every day! I don't have to wear undershirts or socks every day, and I often can re-wear a shirt or jeans a few times), and that double the towels is a lot of towels. I really struggled at first, because I work from home most days and that big bin of laundry, and the (massive amount of) dishes in the sink, and the state of the house in general wore on me like water torture.

See, there is a difference between working from home and homemaking as work. I appreciate the latter, and even might take it up someday, but the former means that I have to pretend that I am not at home, but rather that I am in a professional office somewhere. But the laundry, and the dishes, etc, called out to be addressed.  And part of me said, "Tiff, just do it! It would bless Curby to do the laundry today rather than over the weekend, and you're at home already, why not just do it?" ... the other part said, "Tiff! Get to work! You and Curby can do the laundry together! Your job is not to do the laundry, its to write this giant paper."  And so I struggled.

Then, when Curby and I were together, we just wanted to hang out and not "work" - so the laundry pile got bigger and bigger. We actually have two laundry bins and they were both full to overflowing. It was driving me bananas. So on one Saturday, we tackled it and after 6 loads, we were awash in clean, unfolded clothes - huge piles. Those eventually were folded, and even put away. VICTORY!

Soon after, my friend Em and I were having lunch and she said, "Before you guys used to do that stuff when you were apart, and then you could be together and just have fun. But now you need to do that stuff when you are together - you need to do this as a part of life."

She is a very wise young (single) woman. And her insight into this issue was a revelation.

Seriously.

And so one of my first lessons of marriage was that those things which were chores before have to be repurposed into fun times now.

One of the other lessons we learned early on is that it is OK ("nay, better!," says Pastor Adam) to not have defined roles (in terms of chores, duties, responsibilities - gendered or otherwise). For example, its better to not have it be Curby's "job" to take out the trash, or my "job" to do the laundry. Because once something becomes a job, it becomes an obligation - and then when someone doesn't do it, they fail at their obligation. Instead, we want to have a house where each of us serves the others, where people succeed at blessing each other. And so our philosophy is to do the things that need to be done. If the toilet paper runs out while I'm in the bathroom, then I change it, if the trash needs to go out and I have a chance to do it, then I do it. This means that our actions can serve as gifts to each other - when Curby notices the trash and takes it out, its a gift to me; when I offer to do the dishes, its a gift to him. We still have our "things" that we end up doing regularly, our routines - before bed, Curby usually makes the coffee and I take the dog out to the bathroom. But we usually discuss the tasks before starting them - if I'm wearing shorts or pjs and its cold out, I might say, "Can I make the coffee and you take the dog?" or I might say, "I can do both tonight - you go get ready or bed" - there is not an expectation that one of us will do a specific chore - just that it will get done.

This has really helped our marriage.  In particular, it has helped in the area of laundry. There may be a time when one of us is a stay at home parent, and that person may decide that laundry is something that he or she can handle during the daily routine. But for now, we do laundry together - it is not a man's or woman's task, not Curby's nor mine alone. I might take the laundry down and start it, and later Curby goes and switches it. I like folding and Curby hates it, so I often fold the main clothes and let him fold the socks.

And while the laundry runs, we watch episodes of "Chopped" or "Psych" or play "Lego Star Wars" on the Wii and make the whole laundry day fun.

So even though the pile of laundry sometimes still gets large (We had 5 loads again this weekend...), it is no longer stressing me out all day long. I know that its not my "job" to do it during the day, and I know that it will eventually get done, together.

Lesson #1 complete.

More lessons to come. :)





 

Friday Video Fun: When Curby Met Tiffani

I really do want to get back into more regular blogging. But having two blogs is difficult. For now I've decided to keep both blogs, but sometimes I'll either post the same thing on both - or more likely refer people from this blog to that one when I have posted something there I think you'll like. And then you can click and go there. (Alternatively, you could bookmark the tiff and curby blog or add it to your RSS reader)

This is one of those days.

Go to this link immediately: http://tiffandcurby.blogspot.com/2011/12/friday-video-fun-when-curby-met-tiffani.html to see the most awesome video, made by our friends Ryan and Bethany over at Effulgence Photo and Cinema, that we played at our wedding. The video was designed to be a documentary style video - and our inspiration was "When Harry Met Sally" - but I'll be honest.... the Speiers blew our idea out of the water. The video is really amazing and I cry every time I watch it. It will be a great memento for us and for our family over the years.

Enjoy!

The Wedding! Marriage! Life! (or rather a series about all of it)

Trying to get my head around the idea of blogging dissertation-writing, but although its been challenging to get my mind back into even the idea of writing, I know I need to start somewhere. So I've decided that in the next few evenings, when I'm sitting here with my glass of wine and my dog - most nights waiting for Curby to get home (he doesn't arrive until 7pm) - I can blog. Being forced to gather my thoughts will help me in my academic writing, right? Fingers crossed at least.

Here is the plan for the posts:
1) Stuff leading up to the wedding (or: my fun friends and family and how they bless me)
2) Wedding awesomeness! (or: the amazing story of how I got to marry my true love)
3) Honeymoon fun (or: why I want to be independently wealthy)
4) Settling in (or: boy, we sure have a lot of laundry)

While I'm at it, I'll also post some pictures. We don't have a lot of our wedding pics yet, but I'll post a few candids and a couple that I got from Bethany thus far.

I'll also continue to blog on the "transitioning out of singleness series" and at some point, I'll decide if I'm going to transition into using the tiffandcurby blog full-time, or if I'll keep both.

Thanks for reading!

p.s. here's a pic to whet your whistle!

Double-Duty

Since Curby and I got engaged, we have been working on establishing our "wedding website." We decided to create our own site on blogspot, so we had more control over the design of the site.

I've been blogging in both places - here on Tiff's Life, I'm blogging about, well, my life....  and on the other site, I'm blogging about various wedding-related events, experiences, thoughts.

My current debate is whether I should re-post my posts onto this blog, or just refer you to the other.

For today, I'm referring you over. :) If you're interested in reading thoughts specifically related to the wedding stuff, go to: www.tiffandcurby.blogspot.com, and enjoy. The most recent post was about our experience getting our engagement photography and videography done this last weekend. Enjoy.

Tiffani

Reading for the 21st Century Bride (and Groom)

I'm currently in the process, as you regular readers know, of a series about my transition out of singleness and into married-ness. Here is a review of some books I've been reading lately that are great reads for the modern bride - or the modern single women who wants to better understand men or herself!

I was blessed recently, when a friend of mine, who is also one of my bridesmaids, Sarah Martin-Werntz, along with her husband, sent Curby and I a few books as an engagement present.

The first two books were a companion series called "Couples Only." One is "For Women Only" and describes research on men and what men are thinking/feeling/wanting/needing. The other is "For Men Only" and does the same for women. From what I hear, there are a lot of books out there to help men and women understand each other "Love & Respect", "Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus" etc. The two books Myles and Sarah sent are similar but are smaller and maybe cover more topics (? I haven't read the others, so I don't really know).

This series has been a great read for Curby and me. We have both learned more about each other, and it has led to some great discussions surrounding our emotions and how we're feeling. It has also opened the door for us to say to each other "You do a great job of this!" or "Now I understand why when you do this, I feel this way," or "...when I do this you respond this way" and "OH! I could do more of THAT to bless you, right?"

The "For Women Only" book has also led to some great conversations with me and my friends! I'll say, "I learned this _________, and this is how it changed me....." and they'll say, "What?! I never knew that _________" or "Oh yeah, I learned that one the hard way by making this mistake __________". Even Curby's book "For Men Only" has helped me learn about myself and has led to some great conversations with my friends as I realize that I am always thinking about all different aspects of my life, and Curby may only be thinking about one thing at a time - as my friend Dave says, "Women are like dry erase boards, men are like file cabinets."

If you are dating, in the process of getting married, or married - or just interested in learning about the opposite sex, I HIGHLY recommend this series. I have been so blessed by Myles' and Sarah's thoughtfulness in giving it to us, and I plan to pass the books along to others on their relationship journeys, as well.

The third book I've been reading - and really, I JUST started it today, is called "The Conscious Bride: Women Unveil their True Feelings About Getting Hitched." Essentially, it is a book about the feelings and experiences that people (women primarily) go through in the marriage process, and how to go through them in a healthy and complete way. Sarah told me about it before even reading my blog post about grief and joy in the marriage process! I've only started it and I can tell that there are going to be major parts that I connect to. I know that for me, as I wrote in that earlier post, the feelings of grief were kind of a surprise to me - no one had mentioned it before - so I am really excited to read a book that talks about the transitions that women go through as they leave daughterhood/singlehood and move into wifehood/marriedhood/motherhood, etc. I think that this book will be a great companion on my journey toward marriage - which is happening just a short 3 months and 10 days from today (ahhhh!!!).

This book is for you if you: are thinking of getting married, are married and you feel like your experience differed from the modern "sunshine and roses" myth, or if you are just interested in being more conscious of your identity transitions in your life in general.

A note: Some of us are older brides (like me!). This means that we may have had a lot of other life transitions already that a younger bride might not have - for example, I feel like I transitioned out of being "Chris and Warren's daughter, Tiffani" to being "Tiffani, daughter of Chris and Warren" years ago. So my identity crisis may not come in that transition, but in the transition from a singleton to being part of a couple. But also, I have been dealing with how my relationship (friendship) with my mom will likely change as a result of living with someone else who has my first attention. My point is, the transitions may be slightly different for all of us, but are still valid and worth exploring. I'm excited to be on this journey with Curby, and excited to share it with you, my friends, as well.

Curby asked..... I said, "Yes!"

Background: Two years ago, Curby decided to buy two tickets to the upcoming U2 concert. He was planning to go with his best friend, Mark, and Mark's wife Mandy. He bought two tickets hoping that by the time the concert came around, he'd have someone to take with him. Mandy, hearing this, began to pray that the person he would take to the concert would be his future wife (she mentioned this to Curby, I think, but never mentioned it to me until the day of the concert). As the concert approached, Curby was single and Mandy was disappointed. Shortly after that, Bono broke his back and the concert was postponed for a year.

Flash forward to March 26th, 2011. Curby and I were on our first date, and we both knew that something special and different was happening than had happened to either of us before. As we were walking back to the car, Curby mentioned the concert and how he had an extra ticket and maybe I'd like to go with him. I sort of laughed to myself and thought, "Wow, that is three months from now - I mean this is going well, but I'm not getting my hopes up!" and so I said, "yeah, maybe, that would be fun." and left it at that.

Soon after that first date, we were virtually inseparable. We met each other's families, Curby met my best friend and her family in Texas and some of my local friends, and I started getting to know his friends and church community.

As the weeks moved on, Curby and I continued to find that we were like-minded in almost everything. Our relationship blossomed and moved quickly. Well, to us it seemed not so quick - each week we were together it seemed like we had been together for months. We began to talk about marriage, about what kind of marriage we wanted to have, about our family, and about when we would like to get married. We started to plan our wedding and I knew that Curby was saving up for a ring and planning to propose sometime in the summer.

The U2 concert loomed in the near future, and it was now a given that I was going to attend with Curby, Mark, and Mandy.

June 17th, 2011: The Friday of the concert arrived, and it happened to coincide with three months to the day of when I first emailed Curby from the OKCupid website. We all met at Mark and Mandy's house, with Curby arriving straight from work and in a rush to get there in time. We arrived at Angel's stadium after a brief drive and train ride, and walked around the stadium to find an entrance. Slowly we made our way up to the top level, where we were pleasantly surprised to find that the stadium was serving Irish beer (we presumed in honor of U2). This was especially sentimental to Curby and I, since I first emailed him on St. Patrick's day and had been drinking Smithwicks (an Irish beer made by Guinness) that evening. Curby bought us each a Smithwicks and we headed to our seats.

Lenny Kravitz was the opening act, and we enjoyed getting settled. The weather was great and the music was good. As it started to get dark, U2 took the stage. Most of the songs were familiar and we were enjoying standing up and singing along to the show.

Soon the song "All I want is You" came on. We sat down and were just singing along when Curby turned to me and whispered some sweet words above the din of the music, then said "All I want is you - and they are singing about diamonds on a ring of gold, and I have this ring right here..... will you marry me?"

I, of course, said "Yes" and we spent the rest of the concert in a haze of lovey-dovey-ness, listening to the concert, and texting our friends and family.

Meeting Curby

Here is the (long) story of how "Tiff met Curby"

My friend Jessica told me I needed more dates. And then she said, "Just sign up for this site - OKCupid.com."  We were gchatting on St. Patrick's day. I was disappointed because this guy I had gone out with a couple times had turned out to be a dud and I had no plans that night nor for the weekend ahead. I had also had two beers.

So I did it. While she and I gchatted, I filled out my profile, answered 200 questions and then let the math algorithm of the site do its work.

And it found me a few matches. There were a few highly matched men, many in the mid-to high 90's. Then there was this one guy who was a 99.4% match.

He looked pretty cute, and as I read his profile, I thought, "Hmmmm, he seems pretty cool and thoughtful. He seems to love Jesus and have a good sense of humor, and I think he's pretty smart." So I emailed him.

This is what I said that evening (Thursday):
Hey there Cap, 
I enjoyed your profile for the following reasons: 
1) your overuse of the letter I to the point of your keyboard failing. 
2) your affection for HP7 - though I'll be honest that 5 was my favorite because I felt like the spiritual idea of fighting for something good was so clear. 
3) you made me smile while simultaneously made me think that my (newly created) profile was not nearly cool or thoughtful or funny enough. 
So check out my profile - and consider that in reality I am much more um, cool, thoughtful, and funny than that... Unlike most recent movies, I am much better in 3d than in 2. :) 
Lets talk. Tiffani


I emailed some other men, too. And then I waited.

I heard back from Curby early Saturday morning:

If you are more cool, thoughtful, and funny than your profile, I'm going to have to stockpile more electronics ... I almost launched coffee onto my keyboard when I read about your gchat studying! 
I like you, let's talk indeedy :) 
Curby

So I wrote him back a long email with some random conversation starters and stuff, later that day. And he wrote me back a long email on Sunday and totally "got" my sense of humor. He sent me his phone number in case I wanted to call him. I wrote him back that night and included my phone number, saying "I appreciate you giving me yours though, so now I'll know its you if you call/text."


He called me on Monday night. We talked for an hour and it was so fun and easy. Before the end of the conversation, he asked me out for the following Saturday. I had made tentative plans for that Saturday, though, so had to say "maybe." My friend, Jenn, and I had talked about going to this Salsa dancing thing some friends were putting on, but when I talked to her the next morning, she said she was unable to go.

Curby had asked me for a movie, but when I mentioned what Jenn and I had planned to do, he said, "That sounds fun, even though I'll be really bad at it, and would be a much better first-date story than a movie!" So we decided on dinner and salsa. Right then, I knew that he was going to be a pretty cool guy - how many guys WILLINGLY go dancing on a first date?

We texted some, and talked on the phone the next few days, and it was just fun and easy. Even talking to him on the phone was something I looked forward to and felt like we were really learning about each other, not just making conversation. His texts made me laugh and I learned he had a great, goofy sense of humor and was really thoughtful and intentional about his life.

Saturday arrived and I was nervous. I had woken up that morning and remembered the tail end of a dream I had where I was an old lady telling the story of my life and I said, "From then on we were Tiff and Curby." I scolded myself, "Tiffani, settle down! You are putting way too much pressure on this first date!"  The thing was, I liked him A LOT on "paper" - what if one of us didn't like the other when we met in person?!?! So I asked some of my friends to pray that our feelings - whether for or against - were mutual.

He arrived to pick me up, with flowers, and after about 15 seconds of akwardness, it was clear that he was great and that we were going to have a terrific time. It was like peas and carrots. Like we had known each other forever.

We had dinner and danced and we had a great time. Curby asked me out for a second date for the following weekend, while we were dancing, and I said, yes. Afterward, we walked all around Santa Monica and ended up down on the pier. It was beautiful and we talked about our lives and family until it was almost 1am. At that point we decided, "wouldn't it be fun if we just stayed up all night and kept talking? that would be a great story!" So we did. While we were hanging out at my apartment, Curby said, "Saturday is too long to wait to see you again, I would like to take you out sooner."  (I swooned and said, "Well, I'm only free on Monday." and so Monday it was.)

We had breakfast at Marie Callendars' (next to my apartment) and he left for his church, and I got ready for mine.

And that was that. From then on we've been together, like chocolate chips and cookies, like shoes and socks.

More to come on this, I'm sure. But now you know one of the reasons why I've been so absent on the blog lately!

In the meantime, please join me in my rejoicing and in praising the Lord for this good thing. We have both been so grateful and thankful for God's goodness in bringing us together. He has done more than either of us could ask or imagine. I am learning a lot about myself, about God, about my assumptions and my heart, and about what things I knew before this relationship and what things I realize now I didn't know. I'll have a post on my transition from adult-singleness to adult-coupleness soon. But other posts will likely come before that.

Thanks for reading, friends. :)

Curby and I on our first date.