Ask me Anything

iamjoesgurl

It seems like the ladies who post here are mostly in the wedding planning process.  I've been married since 10/2009.  I thought I'd make this post to invite you to ask me anything about my wedding planning, our wedding day, our honeymoon or anything since our wedding day.  And go...

wheatney22

Excellent post...

Did you and your husband live together before marriage? If not, how was the adjustment?

- Have you had to change anything about your life since getting married?

- What has been your biggest challenge since getting married?

- How has your Christian life changed since getting married?

- Are household chores divided equally between both of you? If so, who does more? How do you feel about it?

FI and I don't live together and don't plan to until after we are married but I am already panicking about what comes after so your responses to the above will help. Thanks :-)

iamjoesgurl

DH and I did not live together before marriage.  He actually lived in New York and I live in Maryland so we were long distance.  I suggested that he move down during our engagement and I would move from the house to my parents’ house, but he felt that I should be able to live in my house (now OUR house). The adjustment to him moving in has been great.  The biggest thing for us is to be sensitive to each other’s preferences and communicate about everything (communication is so important).  I also think that we pick our battles and unless something REALLY bothers us, we work through it.  For example, he has a man cave and keeps it like a pig sty.  It would normally really bother me, but it is his space and I feel like he should be able to keep it that way.  On the other hand, I expect that the bed is made every day by whoever gets out of it last (he wouldn’t normally make the bed but he knows that I want it to be made).  So it is a compromise that works for both of us.  I had lived alone for 16 years so almost everything in my life has changed.  But many of the changes are great!  I love having him there when I come home at the end of the day.  I love snuggling with him in bed.  It is fun to have someone to go grocery shopping with.  A lot of little stuff.   I have changed the way I handle money and am more careful not to spend a lot.  That has been hard, but good for me! I think one of the biggest challenge for us has been finding a church that we both love.  Before we got married we talked about how important we felt it was to worship together (his parents go to different churches).  So we are still trying to find a church that we both feel that we should be part of.  Also, we have different theological backgrounds so sometimes I don’t understand why he does or doesn’t do some of the things I feel are important (like tithing, adult baptism, church membership, etc.).  Don’t get me wrong – he loves God with all of his heart but he was never taught that these things are important.  I don’t read the Bible as much as I used to.  When we first got married, I would read a devotion to him each night.  But for some reason that has stopped.  I would like for us to become involved together in a small group Bible study.  So this aspect of our marriage is something that we need to work on. Household chores – he mows the lawn/shovels the snow and puts out the trash.  I do the dishes and do most of the cleaning.  We share the cooking, grocery shopping, laundry and some of the cleaning.  He is willing to do anything I ask.  He just says he doesn’t think about it unless I ask.   

Don’t worry about how life is going to be after the wedding.  Like I said, communication is key.  Our mentors told us not to let things get bottled up and if we feel that we are not communicating, to take the time to think about what needs to be said and approach our spouse saying, “I need to empty my jar.”  If you think about the conversation and how you want it to go, you will not put your spouse on the defensive and won’t utter any hurtful words that you might regret.  I have had to empty my jar a few times and I’ve always prayed a lot about it before approaching him.  And it has been accepted well and things changed for the better. 

Hopefully you are being mentored by someone (I hate the word "counseling" because it sounds like you are in a troubled relationship and need help so I use the word mentor).  During your sessions, I hope you can role play some conversations to get accustomed to talking about the things that may be uncomfortable.

I wish you all the best!

wheatney22

Thank you. That was very helpful. We are going through pre-marital classes now and we all get paired with christian couples at the church who have been married a while after the classes so I am looking forward to that.

Thanks again for the advise and I hope you and hubby are able to find a Church soon. What denomination are you? You could attend the church we attend if you want to try out a new place. How far are you from Upper Marlboro in MD? Let me know if you're interested.

iamjoesgurl

We live in Westminster so it would be a hike to go to Upper Marlboro but thanks for the suggestion.  DH is Baptist and I am Wesleyan.  We have been attending non-denominational churches.  The one that we have been attending recently is my favorite but I think that DH likes the one we attended before (a few months ago).  I just need to pray about it.

kkidd28

Hey Lisa!

Great Post!  I think its awesome!  I noticed you were our married bride and I appreciated it!  I saw on one board a post like this so I was thinking of making a sticky like this!  We have a few that have gotten married since they have been on the board just not sure if they will be back! 

CHarley2B

iamjoesgurl - What was your favorite part of the wedding? What do you think was a waste of time and money? What are your top 3 tips for the wedding day?

How was your first married fight? (I'm not looking forward to this)

iamjoesgurl

What was your favorite part of the wedding? My favorite part was right before the reception started (while guests were having appetizers) we went for a walk with our photographer and he got some great shots.  I loved this because we got some alone time to reflect on being husband and wife. 

What do you think was a waste of time and money?  I am pretty practical so I don't really have anything that I think was a waste of money but if I had it to do over again, I wouldn't have wasted time putting stuff in OOT bags other than food and water.  I spent a lot of time researching and printing stuff out that probably went directly into the trash!

What are your top 3 tips for the wedding day? 
1.  If you plan to skip the receiving line, make sure that your priority at the reception is stopping at tables to talk to your guests.  We did the receiving line but we also tried to go around at the reception and kept getting interrupted so there are some guests that we didn't really get to talk to.
2.  For pictures, make a list of all of the pictures you must have and make sure someone is keeping track.  I missed a few and I'm pretty sad about that.  Also, you are paying a photographer for their time so get the most out of it.  In retrospect I wish I had asked our guests if they were willing to be photographed with me and DH at the reception.  A lot of our guests did not make it into the photos.
3.  The biggest tip is to consciously pause during the day to take it all in.  I had just watched The Office where Jim and Pam get married and they took mental pictures throughout the day.  I did that too and have some special memories that I wouldn't have if I had just let the day go by.

How was your first married fight?  Our marriage mentors taught us to not let our jars get filled and let small situations turn into a larger fight.  A few months after we were married I was stressing about bills (DH was unemployed) and other small stuff and realized one day that I needed to "empty my jar".  I prayed a lot about what to say and rehearsed it in my head.  I was very calm and just told DH when I got home, "I need to empty my jar."  Then I told him about some of my concerns and asked him if he would be willing to do some things that I felt were reasonable and would help me not to stress.  He is a very calm person and it would take a lot to make him angry.   He took it all so well and it all worked out.  The tip I would have is to pray before you approach the situation and make sure that you are being reasonable and not attacking.  And don't let the small stuff add up.

CHarley2B

Thanks! That's lots of great advice. I actually was planning on skipping the receiving line because I didn't want to do both the line and going around to the tables. How many guests did you have? Maybe it would be better to do the line and not go around to the tables?

iamjoesgurl

We had about 120 guests.  We purposely made the receiving line so that people could bypass it if they didn't want to wait.  But it actually went pretty quickly - about 15 minutes max.