Wedding Planning: Expectation vs. Reality

I have a million other things I should be doing right now, but oh well. Inspiration struck, and, well, here we are...enjoy!

Ever since I was a little girl I have dreamed of getting married. I mean, I practically grew up around weddings. From the ages of 3 to 13 I was a consistent member of wedding parties as a flower girl, junior bridesmaid, and altar server among other roles for cousins, friends, and (of course) my sisters. Truth be told, I would always tend to get a little salty when I wasn't a part of a wedding as a child. I always went to weddings fully prepared to take over in the event that the flower girl couldn't uphold her duties! (I never went full Tonya Harding, but still...) Anymore, I'm a huge sap when it comes to weddings. I cry at almost every wedding, just because I can identify with the way the couples feel, especially now.

Like most girls, I had many aspects of my dream wedding mentally planned out, all I needed was to find someone willing to marry me! Any detail one could think of, I had it all planned out. I knew exactly what I wanted, even in my future husband. I had so many plans, and I never wanted to deviate from them. I wanted bridesmaids to wear all black, non-matching dresses with multi-colored flowers, I wanted the men to wear black tuxes, and I wanted everything to be Pinterest-perfect. I wanted to marry a man who was older than me and from somewhere near to me. I wanted to date so many guys who I was convinced would be perfect for me. I wanted so many things that I overlooked the most important thing--what God wanted for me.

God knew exactly what he was doing when he brought Thomas and I together. All of the details surrounding the beginning of our relationship couldn't be any better. Believe it or not, Thomas met (almost) every detail on my list of what I wanted in a man. (Yes, this is a real list that I wrote the day I decided to break up with Tevis. I still have it, and Thomas and I have read it together multiple times. It makes me happy!) Funny enough, I would dwell on this list every time I met someone new, but I put it away for a while, because I felt like it was holding me back in terms of who I wanted to date. About the time I quit focusing on it, Thomas came around and shocked me by asking me on a date. After dating him for a month or so, I came back to it and realized it described him almost to a tee. But by that point, I realized that I loved him immensely and the fact that he matched up with my "expectations" really didn't matter too much. That was one of the first times in our relationship I realized that it was better to set aside any unnecessary/unspoken expectations and fully experience the reality of our relationship, which was beyond amazing!

Immediately after we were engaged, we started making little decisions about the wedding. I told Thomas about my visions of all black, non-matching bridesmaid dresses and tuxes, and he looked at me, and said, "Black? In July? In Oklahoma? That sounds too hot." Then he proposed the idea of navy, perhaps with gray suits...I liked it a little more than I was willing to admit at the moment. The more we discussed together, the more I parted ways with my childhood visions. In fact, planning with Thomas was even better than my original plans, because we both had input on a day that was for both of us, not just me. As we've continued in the planning, I've tried to ensure that Thomas is an active part of planning our big day, unless he explicitly states that he is indifferent on the matter.

A few weeks ago I found my wedding dress, as I mentioned last time. Admittedly, I spent a ludicrous amount of time browsing Pinterest in search of a dress I thought would look perfect on me. I mean, it was helpful so I at least knew what styles appealed to me, but beyond that, it didn't do much besides setting up lots of expectations in my mind. Ultimately, I went to the dress shop, let the lady who helped me get dressed work her magic and bring me dresses I might like. My only stipulation was that I didn't wear white, because I thought with how pale I am that I would look even more pale. Yet, my dress is seriously white. And it looks perfect. And I love it! After finding my dress, I promptly deleted that particular Pinterest board, because I no longer needed it. It was freeing, honestly!

I'm always trying to work to not rely so much on my expectations and to keep an open mind. Some days that's more of a struggle than I'm willing to admit, but I like to think I'm getting better. Moreover, I've loved getting to make these choices with Thomas, not by myself. Granted, we definitely have our fair share of "creative differences", but we usually come back to a compromise/ agreement of some sort, and one of us always manages to put it all in perspective again...at the end of our wedding day, we'll be married, and we'll get to spend the rest of our lives together. No more long-distance, no more constant goodbyes. It'll all be worth it, and nothing else will matter. That sounds like a pretty amazing reality to me!