After The Wedding: Growing Together

Hi, Hive. Mrs. Palm Tree excited to be back in action as a participant of the After The Wedding series. This part's prompt focuses on what we've learned and how we're different as a couple as well as individuals since being married.

Mr. Palm Tree and I are almost at exactly a year and a half of marriage - my most recent post was our anniversary post from May. If you're familiar with us, you know that Mr. Palm Tree and I were together for nine years before we were married. It's safe to say that going into marriage, we knew each other for better or worse. 

personal photo | Mr. Palm Tree and I, Halloween '06

One Year as Mr. and Mrs.

Hi, Hive! It's been six months (WHAT?!) since I wrote my farewell post  and I wanted to pop back in among the Farm generation (as well as Miss Parisian and the newly Mrs. Pyramid, still reppin' the Honeymoon gen!) to touch base with you all. 

For those of you who may not remember/know us, the Palm Trees are sort of in the "high school sweethearts" category, with a twist: we grew up across the street from one another. Mr. Palm Tree hated me, I desperately wanted to be liked and accepted by the boys in the neighborhood. We reconnected in high school and with the exception of one strange year, we've been together ever since. 

all photography by Limelight-Images, the best wedding photographers EVER, unless otherwise noted

We were married last May by my awesome ciffer (cousin + best friend), who became ordained solely to marry us. We had amazing weather, a great day with our kickass wedding party, a short-but-super-sweet and personal ceremony followed by a pretty rockin' party, if I do say so myself, that lasted until the wee hours of the morning.

You could also catch up using my Recap before the Recaps post for all things pre-wedding and our actual recaps start with our rehearsal the day before our wedding. 

I've missed the Hive so, so much - interacting with readers and fellow blogger Bees put a truly special touch on my entire wedding experience. I'm so grateful for the community as a whole and for the ability to be able to pop back in and say hi! 

Not much has changed in the past year, truthfully. I'm still working as a Wedding and Event Specialist at a local university and Mr. PT is still getting his computer engineer on for our local hospital system's cancer center. My schedule is really hectic (lots of late nights and weekends) so it can get tough and annoying for the two of us in terms of trying to get in some quality QT, but we make it work. I truly think that being together for nine years prior to being married has helped us avoid many of the more common and dreaded First Year Problems. We're big communicators and know so much about each other - and, perhaps most importantly, we're always open to learning more and we understand that we, as people, are always changing. We are more in love and ooey-gooey than ever before, he still gives me butterflies and we still love to go grocery shopping and laugh until we cry (or sometimes just cry) together. 

We had originally planned to repeat our honeymoon (Couples Negril in Jamaica, for the record: cannot recommend enough) but decided to hold off due to finances and other events going on this year (including being a co-matron of honor in Miss Parisian's wedding this fall!). We were able to take a trip to NYC in early March, during the university's spring break, to visit friends, though, and considered that our early anniversary trip. It was Mr. PT's first time to NYC and we had an absolute blast.

personal photo | tons of cats in the East Village - Mr. PT was in heaven!

personal photo | at a Tiki Lounge in the East Village, again with a cat. 

Last Sunday was our actual anniversary and we decided to make a day of it. We went grocery shopping (natural for us) to prepare for a hangout we were hosting on Memorial Day and then we fancied up and had a great day out in the city.

personal photo | we had amazing weather

We went to Ruth's Chris Steakhouse for an early dinner. We were given a gift card by Mr. Palm Tree's colleagues last year as a wedding gift and we're not really fancy people, so we hadn't had an opportunity to use it. We both agreed that our anniversary was a perfect occasion for it and we had an absolutely amazing time and left so full and content.

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Our awesome waiter, Marcus, was so fantastic. He knew it was our first anniversary and gifted us both a complimentary champagne toast (which made me cry) as well as a complimentary dessert to share. We were both so touched and awed by the service as well as the amazing food. 

Our day didn't end there, though. We exchanged gifts at home before we had left. In keeping with the 'paper' theme of the first anniversary, I gifted Mr. PT a personal drawing:

personal photo of the drawing in a frame | the one and only kickass Mrs. Roadtrip  put this together. It's a drawing of our first dance photo, with our four kitties and the background has the lyrics to our first dance song.

I wanted to give him something cute and whimsical, but something he could also take to to work with him and want displayed. He was super touched and loved it. 

Then, for his gift, he presented me with a pack of Chinese wish lanterns and said, "I figured we could write 'Mr. and Mrs. Palm Tree' and the date and then maybe 'first anniversary' on it before we set it off with a wish. . .this way when it lands, maybe someone will see it and think, 'oh, good for them. I hope they had a good day.'" Cue the freakin' waterworks, Hive. 

So, after dinner we headed up to Mount Washington (an area of the city with great overlooks/killer views) with our year-old slice of cake and our lantern.

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We were getting ready to set it off when a family next to us expressed excitement and congratulations for us. They offered to take a picture of us with it.

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We had lit it and were hesitating about releasing it and the family cheered us on with a hearty chorus of "let it go!" so we did and together - with our friendly family - watched it sail away in the sky.

personal photo | Can you see it? 

personal photo | Still there - what freakin' perfect weather we had, honestly.

We watched it until we couldn't see it anymore and got ready to leave. The mom of the family said that she loved the idea and planned to use it next year. She gave us each a large hug and expressed her best wishes, telling Mr. Palm Tree, "you better take good care of her - she's special." My eyes most certainly were not dry as we walked back to the car.

We had tossed around the idea of going to the Drive In that night but decided to just got home, get comfy, curl up and catch a movie on Netflix. It was the perfect day - as I said earlier, we definitely try to spend a lot of time together but it's so rare that we have an entire day that's just for us. It was so amazing and it was a great way to reminisce on the past year and look forward to the rest of forever.

I miss you all, Hive, and am so glad to share this small update on the Palm Trees. I'm still around now and again, binge-reading posts and keeping up on all things wedding. I love this community and don't think I'll ever fully separate myself from it. ;)

Until next time!

xo,

Mrs. Palm Tree

Six Months: It's Not Goodbye, It's See You Later

I can hardly believe that I'm writing this, but the time has come, Hive. 

I know that I alluded to posts including in-depth vendor reviews and a list of music for our wedding, but having recapped our day from beginning to end, I feel as though it is the right time. In addition, today is our six month anniversary - I can't ignore the nice-and-neat feel of that. ;)

Our wedding day was, without a doubt, my favorite day of my life. It was everything that I dreamed of, hoped and planned for over the course of seventeen months. It was full of love and laughter, friendship, dancing, drinking, music, memories. . . I sincerely don't know that I could ask for anything else.

I stumbled across Weddingbee prior to even being engaged, in about November of 2011. I became obsessed shortly after and dragged BM Y into my obsession as well. Mr. Palm Tree asked me to marry him on December 22nd, 2011 and as we shared the news over Christmas Break, one of my relatives asked if I was still writing and encouraged me to write about the experience. From that point on, I knew that I wanted to be a Weddingbee blogger.

personal photo | I really wanted this picture, haha.

Behind The Scenes: A Life of a Vendor

Quite a while ago, I wrote a post about what it's like to be on the vendor side of the fence when it comes to wedding planning and executing. Since that time, my career path has changed pretty drastically. I am now a full-time Wedding and Event Coordinator for a local catering company. The account that the company is contracted for is one of the larger colleges in the Pittsburgh area and the venue at the college holds between 50-70 weddings a year. If you're thinking, "but there are only fifty-two weeks in a year, you dope," I am here to tell you that Friday and Sunday weddings are definitely A Thing in this region. 

I love my job and it's kind of a dream come true for me. When my friends will ask me what all my job entails, my short, jokey answer is, "I plan shit and tell people what to do." The response is almost always, "that is perfect for you." It wasn't until fairly recently though, through communication with BM Y, that it hit me: I'm a vendor. 

Since that thought took place, I've been sort of writing this post in my head. I thought that it might be helpful for those in the planning stages to have a sort of behind-the-scenes glimpse into what a vendor does for your wedding. Mr. Palm Tree consistently comments that he would never think to inquire about so many of the things that I handle on a daily basis, but he would expect them to be done. 

Treely, Madly, Deeply: All The Things (The Details Post)

I know that the Wedding Industrial Complex is A Thing and it puts a lot of pressure on Brides to have the 'OMG MOST PERFECT DAY EVA' day - but Hive, all outside pressure aside, my wedding day really was one of the (if not the) best days of my life.

Looking through these detail pictures makes my OCD heart happy because I really do feel that my vision (even if it changed a bit) was brought to life. 

All photos via Limelight-Images unless otherwise noted.

Our centerpieces:

Our centerpieces started out as a grand idea that would be a semi-nod to the Zelda lanterns and fairies, combining two loves of both Mr. Palm Tree and myself, and resulted in what you see in the above pictures. Like quite a few of my ideas, this got pushed to the "if I have time list". I had purchased much of the items needed sporadically throughout the course of our engagement and the week prior to the wedding, I sat down with my cousins B and O and we threw them together. 'Aqua' colored marbles that I purchased from various craft stores, blue fairy berries hidden amongst them, this shredded filler that BM Y amazingly found and purchased for me that I still can't remember the name of, and they were topped with assorted yellow silk flowers purchased from JoAnn's. The lighting in the above pictures really doesn't do them justice, but then again, there isn't a lot of justice to be done: simple yet effective. Moving along.

Fun Stuff: 

Our Bride and Groom Mickey ears, purchased by BM Blackout as a surprise for us.

One of the best inventions ever, our tumbler cups that I originally gifted to my girls at my shower. These were purchased from Debi DelaCruz on Etsy (on Cyber Monday - hint to all Brides-to-be planning to shop: DON'T FORGET ABOUT CYBER MONDAY! I scored so.many.deals). 

Our favors, Bride and Groom cookies, homemade by a wonderful baker friend of mine. You can find her website here. She's pretty fabulous and one of the cakes. 

Our cake, by Brenda McGee, which was included in our package at The Fez. I did not care one iota about our cake so this was Mr. Palm Tree's baby. My wonderful DOC/Friend E decorated the cake table with the extra flowers and, even though you can't see them in this lighting, assorted fairy berries. 

Our place cards, another  'they'll be cool if I have time" thing. Bought the templates from Staples, I think, and printed these out the night before our rehearsal dinner. Boom.

These programs were nearly the death of MOH Mem, Mr. Palm Tree and myself. I painstakingly designed them and was super proud of them but Hive, please learn from our mistakes and unnecessary hard work (also mentioned in the post about our invitations): OUTSOURCE ALL OF YOUR PRINTING. Getting the right parts to print on the right sides and then figuring out how to turn them around and dealing with the ink running out and computers freezing and just. . .it was a mess. We were in tears of laughter over it the night before the rehearsal dinner because by the end of it all, some things that were supposed to be gray were pink and what else can you do at that point?

As you can see, DIY played a veeeeery tiiiiiiny role in our wedding. This is super representative of real life. I am far from DIY savvy, as I've stated many times. Our personal touches came more from the decisions we made and our actions: the music that we played, the reasons behind our wedding colors, our vows. 

I made a sort-of haphazard Inspiration Board way back when. Let's revisit and compare, shall we?

Once again, my MS Paint Skillz hard at work. From left to right: One via Bells and Whistles; Two via Style Me Pretty / by The Rhoads; Three via Sun Kissed Weddings; Four via Sakura Photography; Five via Wedding Channel; Six via Curbly; Seven via Wedding Wire; Eight via Etsy and Nine via Etsy

All photos courtesy of Limelight-Images except for the top left, which is courtesy of BM Y.

In this case, I'd say reality beats the inspiration by a landslide.

Treely, Madly, Deeply: My Somethings - including my bees and some familiar jewelry!

We all know the saying: Something Old, Something New, Something Borrowed and Something Blue. There's the line about the sixpence in a shoe but to be honest, I didn't know that existed until Weddingbee so it was not even remotely on my radar. I loved all of my somethings and am happy to be able to write about them.

All photos via Limelight-Images unless otherwise noted.

My Somethings: 

Don't hate on my hanger, guys. ;)

My beautiful dream dress was considered as my Something New. Is this considered cheating? I loved this dress and am truly sad that I will never wear it again because I felt like such a beautiful Bride in it. This comes from a place of complete honesty that is devoid of any sense of arrogance, I promise, but I felt like it was my wedding day and that I was stunning. I hope that every Bride feels this way on her wedding day. 

Once I get my dress cleaned and snip a piece of it from underneath for some future daughter/niece/cousin/someone of a future generation, I plan to donate it. I haven't decided where. . .maybe Goodwill, maybe Brides Against Breast Cancer. Regardless, it won't sit in my closet for the rest of my life, because it is truly too special to me to have that fate.

Treely, Madly, Deeply: After The Party There's The Hotel Lobby. . .

Our ride back to the hotel was a ride to remember. We were all so full of fun and love and. . .well, alcohol. I honestly would not have wanted ti any other way and could not imagine it being any other way. We put on BM Tiny Dancer's playlist and had a blast.

*photos courtesy of BM Y.

When we got back to the hotel and walked into the bar, I was so happy to find almost all of our guests. Seriously, we took up pretty much the entire space. And of course, we all mingled with one another and shared stories. GM Pythagoras' sister had made a Sheetz run and brought me Mac and Cheese bites (I am so loved, you guys) so I housed those in between drinks. I did so many shots with so many different people and loved every minute of the after party.

We closed the bar down and there were a handful of us left - Mr. Palm Tree and I, the Y's, GM J and his parents, GM L, Mr. Palm Tree's mom and stepdad, Best Man R and his date, our friend V and our friend J. Mr. Palm Tree's mom mentioned that we should keep the party going, to which I heartily agreed, so we made our way to her room.

On our way, though, we encountered some friends in the lobby.

GM Pythagoras' sister's husband and our friend D were playing the piano. You guys, I was so excited that we caught this - I was clapping my hands and encouraging it to continue.

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High-fiving my excitement with Sister Pythagoras.

A very accurate representation of my state of mind at this point.

We were up so late that night - seriously. We did a tour of rooms, first stopping in MIL Palm Tree's, then in GM J's parents, then we ended up in our room. We ended up with a bottle of champagne after BM Y and GM J's dad went on a hunt for one, during which he said that he was my stepfather and that I was crushed that I didn't have anything waiting for us upon our arrival (some might say shame on him for lying, but I say, GOOD THINKING). I know that slowly but surely, people started leaving us and that Friend J was the last one out of the door.

And thus, our wedding night officially ended. . .or started, depending on how you want to look at it. ;)

So ends the Palm Tree Wedding Recaps. Don't worry, Hive, I'm not going anywhere just yet! I have a few more posts and details I'd like to share with you before I say my official goodbyes.