The first of our wedding pictures!

I think they just look amazing.  I can't wait for the rest!  Our photographer was also super friendly and fun to work with.

Go check them out: http://www.melissarobotti.com/blog/?p=6415

We got married!

We're married!!!

I don't really even know what to say.  I can gush and get all gooey, but really, this blog isn't hard core MY PERSONAL LIFE AND FEELINGS, but I am so super happy.

JD was so handsome.  I looked like a pretty pretty princess.  Everyone thought our priest was pretty much the best ever, and that he gave the best homily ever.  A lot of people liked the excerpt from Goodridge.  People loved the party and the food (I think), and the first dance was just fantastic.  For me at least.  Everyone else just got to stare at us stare at each other :-)

I know I wanted a smaller wedding, but actually, I did have a lot of fun.  and while people do say something goes wrong at every wedding, the only things that went "wrong" at ours were very small-- the flowers were lovely but not at all what I ordered, and the bar at the venue decided that cherry heering and maraschino liquor would work totally the same in a cocktail, which... they are both cherry, sure, but have VERY different flavor profiles, and different colors, which meant that their attempt at our cocktail was too sweet and not green.  But as things go?  No big deal!  No one noticed, and no one cared!  (well, JD and I cared about the cocktail.  But whatever, people seemed to enjoy chartreuse and tonics instead)

And the ceremony itself was so, so, so perfect.  So perfect.  I cried, but I was able to stop and keep it under control and say my vows without desperate sobbing.  

So yeah.  I'm married!!!  Which is awesome!  And tonight, we're back at home, both still exhausted from our whirlwind of days and love and excitement and friends (seeing everyone from so many stages of life together was... intense.  So, so, cool).

I've got nothing political or ideological here to say, just-- I'm in love, and I'm thrilled, and I have the best husband in the world :-)

On changing my name when I get married.

Say my name, say my name...

Or don't.

Because what is is now, is not what it'll be in two weeks.

I wasn't planning to change my name when JD and i went to the town hall to file for our marriage license, but I wasn't planning to keep it, either.  I'd thought a medium amount about the concept of changing my name, and had started multiple blog posts dissecting the many good and bad reasons to change my name, and the many good and bad reasons to keep my name-- because there are a lot of both, for each-- but I hadn't actually come to a decision yet,  I wanted my decision to be well thought out, in line with all my beliefs and desires, and consistent with all my other political and personal opinions.

In the end?  It turns out in my town, when you register for marriage, each spouse has to put down what hir post-marriage name will be on the form.

And I did not know that until I was there, filling out the form.

And I didn't have time to think.

And I ended up putting down JD's last name.

Would I have done so if I had thought about it?  I don't know.  Would I have done it if we hadn't argued about something small the night before?  Would I have done so if it had been a different time of day, and I was more awake?  Again, I really don't know.

So I made the decision, and I made it on the moment instead of in a reasoned manner.

Honestly?  I think it's good that I didn't consider it too much.  Whatever I had decided, I'd have questioned it-- because there are good and bad points to both decisions, and I could see them both, and i find it a very close decision.  I know Jessica Valenti, in her (not very well done) book about double binds goes off on women who change their name... but why is it so much worse than heels or makeup or short skits, all of which I (and Valenti!) do too?  I am a feminist, my politics are feminist, but I live in a world that is not fully feminist, and I want to have the same last name as my husband-- and JD, I knew,was and  is not about to change his name.

So, as it turns out, having the same last name is more important to me than keeping my name.

So, in two weeks time I'll be Amanda Y instead of Amanda X.  And you know what?  I'll still be me.

Our invitations are here!

Guess who's going to be doing a lot of envelope addressing in the next few days....

It's getting more and more real :-) :-)

I can't wait to be married to JD!

I said "Yes" to a dress

JD and I spent the past ten days visiting his family in Oklahoma, and as part of our trip, his mother took the two of us to Dallas so that she and I could look at wedding dresses there.  I had already looked some in Ohio, and had found one I liked... then looked a bit more in Oklahoma and found a few other good ones.  But in Dallas...

Well, I found the perfect dress, and surprisingly enough, it doesn't have a lot of what I initially wanted.  It doesn't have straps, it isn't a v-neck, it has a high waist instead of a drop waist, and it isn't the material I had in mind, or even quite as creamy colored as I wanted, being much closer to a true white.

But when I tried it on... people, I can TWIRL in this dress.  I look like I stepped out of Swan Lake or something.  I AM AN ETHEREAL FAIRY PRINCESS!  Which is, you know, hard when you're taller than the height of the average American man.  The hilarious part is that one of the dresses I tried on was everything I said I wanted coming in.  It was the perfect dress that I'd built up in my head.  But... it just wasn't perfect.
And the dress I'm going to wear... oh, it is.

We've now accomplished a total of one step on our giant wedding checklist, but hey!  They say starting is the hardest part.  And now I just have to momentum it all forward!

Skirt Challenge!

So.  There you go.  Six more days of me wearing skirts.  I did it!  I wore skirts or dresses for a total of seven days straight!  I couldn't manage to gt blogger to put them in the proper order, but you can get an idea of the shifts in weather by the shifts in clothing-- from stifling heat the day I wore the mini skirt, to fifty degree weather the days I wore the sweaters.  I do like wearing skirts and dresses.  I used to wear them more often than pants, but jeans are more durable, and I somehow have just ended up with less skirts, and less shirts that go with my skirts.  Wearing skirts doesn't really impact my day to day life-- I spend most of my time sitting down, studying.  It does make me automatically feel more "put together", though I do think that some outfits with jeans are more flattering than some of my outfits with skirts.  It also sort of helps trick me into studying more when I'm in the more "professional" looking clothing.  Skirts definately aren't appropriate for everything though-- hiking or the gym?  I'd get all tangled up, and be uncomfortable.  But for everyday life, well... I'm going to make a conscious effort to wear them more often.  I might wait until it gets warmer again though, because right now?  it is COLD and I hate stockings.  They just aren't comfortable, and comfort is a high priority to me during exams.

Amusingly, the days it was warm it seemed like nearly everyone else was wearing skirts too.  But it's been a ridiculously cold spring.  I'm also likely to keep taking pictures of my outfits, and posting them at my flickr account.  So.... outfits behind the jump!

Challenge: skirts and dresses!

I love a good challenge.  And so when I saw a challenge to wear skirts or dresses for a week, and post the pictures as proof... well, I couldn't pass it up.  Spring has finally, finally come to Boston!  Unfortunately, today has not been amazing for me... what you see to the right is me, in glasses, a shapeless dress, having showered with Boston's aquapocalyse dirty water and gone back to bed, ill, till after 1:00.  So, not really at my best.  Plus, it's an iPhone pic.  But still.

The challenge for this came from a site I don't actually frequent, from a blog I do read-- if you follow the links, you'll notice I'm pretty far, politically, from them.  So... why am I (sort of, ok, my skirts are probably not quite as long as they'd like) taking part in their challenge?  Well, it seems like a fun idea.  It isn't intending to prove any point.  And I like fun ideas, regardless of who comes up with them-- we should judge all ideas on their merits, instead of based on whether or not we agree with the speaker.

Also, I think it's really interesting to read about people who aren't like me-- who have different values, different beliefs, and different lives.  It's one of the things that makes blogs and the interent kind of awesome, really-- especially when people who disagree can actually talk civilly about things.

Plus?  I just love streotypicaly "girly" and "feminine" stuff.  I'm a feminist, but I understand that that has nothing to do with whether I enjoy wearing skirts and cooking.  I remember in college, one of my sorority sisters asked me one day if I ever wore anything but skirts.  But here in Boston... well, it's just so much easier to wear jeans every day!  But I'm not going to.  One week.  We'll see if it sticks.

Also?  The shoes aren't pictured because I've been barefoot most of the day.  Being sick will do that!
The beer is Abita Turbodog.  I figure, if I'm showing off my wardrobe, I might as well show off what I drink, too.

Why I blog

So, this is my 100th post! Yay! And in honor of it being my 100th post... I want to talk about why I blog.

First, I need an outlet for all my crazy besides JD. He's long-suffering and awesome, but writing things down and making them concrete has a different kind of satisfaction to it. I've always found that speaking and writing really help me to solidify my views-- being challenged, being forced to put it into words.

So why the internet? Why blog instead of just use a paper diary? Well, for one, I enjoy typing and the ability to view my words and do some editing. I do keep a paper journal, but that has details of my actual life-- I don't discuss friendships or my relationship here, as much as I get tempted to. I try to keep away from whining or being passive aggressive and stick to discussing ideas, news, trends-- things I notice in the world, or that friends point out to me, instead of things that are truly personal.

So, why feministy topics? Well, for one, I'm a woman. That means things that affect women end up being of particular importance to me. I'm also very interested in civil rights that don't affect me-- gay rights and prison reform being some of the big things that get my mind. I've also become more aware of the ways that society is biased against women. I have some wonderful parents who were extremely egalitarian growing up, so I didn't really have anything to chafe against there-- and when I was in school, well, I was an awkward nerd who hung out mostly with other girls, so I didn't really see a lot of sexist sentiments. And honestly, my friends and I were weird enough that dating topics weren't even some of our concerns. But in recent years, I've seen more and more sexism, both on the internet and in real life-- and while I do see some misandry, I see far, far more misogyny in real life, and I see it in such a casual context that it seems like people have internalized it.

So I want to get thinking more about feminist topics and the way society depicts gender roles-- even in TV, where men are often depicted as idiots and women as shrews. I have a huge problem with that sort of thing, and I'm totally willing to share that annoyance.

Plus, even though this blog is essentially aimed at friends, it gives me kind of a "whoa" shock when other people find my blog, and when I see a day where someone has linked to it and I get a ton of hits in a day. So I guess vanity comes into it a bit too.

But overall-- it's really just the enjoyment of writing and crystallizing thought and the idea of a huge worldwide conversation where someone from anywhere might see my blog-- and maybe even comment on it.