According to Kasi: September 2012

Being THAT bride.

Well the GRE is over.

I did well enough that I refuse to take the GRE again.

So that's over...

Now what?

Well considering I'm taking part 1 (of potentially 3) of my engagement portraits today what better to obsess over the multitude of wedding details still to be decided upon.

One of these decision was wether or not to have a wedding party.

We decided we would definitely have one person to be our maid of honor and best man.

My wonderful roomie from the past two years, Jennifer, agreed to be my MOH

and Robert's childhood ~~lover~~ friend Roger agreed to be his best man.

Then something happened...

I found these dresses that I love on J Crew's website.

In this color that really worked with my already ~~sort of~~ decided color scheme:

Just look at those dresses. Image stolen from pinterest.

The problem: The dresses are $250.

But then I had that moment that every bride has and I thought out loud

"You could wear that again"

But couldn't you?

Or am I being THAT bride that has horrible dresses but assume everyone loves them.

I'm going to just assume since they are from J Crew they can only be but so horrible.

So anyway, I thought, "If they're popular enough they have to be somewhere for sale where other bridesmaids are selling them after one wear... That's right ladies and gents I found a ton of these dresses on EBAY!

It might seem a little ~~tacky~~ innovative to buy used bridesmaids dresses, but honestly I love these dresses and I know my friends love me and want to wear dresses I like but at $250 I felt like I was encroaching on bridezilla territory and that I want to avoid at all costs.

So tacky or not, my lovely ladies can get my dream dresses for them for at least $100 off.

So after emailing two of these potential brides and getting the consensus that they would wear them again and don't hate the price tag I asked Robert what he thought of us having a legit wedding party (see as said before we had already decided not to...).

Then something strange happened...

The KING of never making decisions said

"You need to make a decision" Followed shortly thereafter with "okay we're just going to do this".

Not only did he make a decision, he made one quickly.

Side note: I don't know how other grooms to be are during wedding planning but my man is really hard to drag an opinion out of. Its not that he's so picky its that he claims he "doesn't care what I do" and then the next thing I know "There should only be two types of wine, not three" or even worse I need him to decide and he just won't.

So now you understand that this quick decision was pretty amazing.

And thus I decided it must be divine.

So naturally, I immediately ran to Michaels to buy crafts to ask my future maids.

Yes I finished them all in a day.

Including my precious little future cousins turned flower girls.

And while I was there something else wonderful happened...

THAT is my centerpiece that I created with Roberts cousin/ wedding planner/ helping me on my wedding over the summer.

THOSE beads in that vase are impossible to find. Several Michaels have been sold out or just didn't even cary them. Well this time Michaels had a billion of the ones I needed so of course I bought 6 bags.

THEN I found that I had a 20% off the entire purchase coupon.

So as you can see things just worked out in my favor all day.

It's so amazing when things just work out.

Thank you God for helping me out of the last week of hell

(Biochemistry exam, Immunology exam, Biotechnology quiz, and the GRE)

Then Robert and I spent the remainder of the night trying on outfits for our engagement photos today. My wonderful future mother in law is taking them so they should be spectacular.

Note an example of one of our conversations

(that totally relates because it's about the wedding)

And no, its not a joke.

There is a pork shortage supposedly going to hit NC next year.

AKA the year of my wedding.

It's okay, theres no shortage of meat at the Batten house

(that's what she said)

Alright back to being an adult.

And I think that's going to involve me making myself breakfast.

But first, date night picture from this weekend:

Okay bye Ya'll!

Sunday, September 30, 2012
0 Comments

Living with a man

I never really had a strong opinion on living together before marriage.

I thought it might be nice to be engaged first but it wasn't a solid requirement or anything.

So when Robert and I both found out we were going to graduate in December and that we both needed a short term lease we decided "why not?"

And now my room mate is a man.

We opted for a 2 bedroom/2 bath since we both are still in school and need quiet study areas.

Like in similar new room mate situations we laid down some requests (a.k.a ground rules) so that we could live together more harmoniously.

Rule 1: I hate taking out the trash and I'm not doing it unless I have to.

Rule 2: Split the groceries, but I'm not paying for your beer.

Rule 3: Clean up after yourself

Rule 4: Keep the "shared" spaces tidy. (Do whatever you want in your own room).

Mostly these rules are followed and that's fantastic.

In return for him taking the trash (and also recycles) out I do the laundry. We take turns cooking and cleaning dishes but I usually end up doing that when I'm procrastinating homework.

In the process of all of this I have discovered a few things about men.

The countertop may also double as a trashcan/ recycling bin.

There are always dishes in the sink. Even if the dishwasher is empty/dirty.

There is ALWAYS, and I mean it, a sock (or 2 or 3) without a match.

It is impossible to keep the pillows where they should be on the couch.

And I do not have a picture for this one but men do not see dirt. I have WHITE countertops and there are always crumbs everywhere that "aren't Robert's crumbs" even if they look suspiciously like the bread he JUST used to make a sandwich.

But all in all I think its easier to live with a man. Robert has his MAN CAVE. I am such a fan of the man cave. His lovely iron sculpted bull can live there with his wood scented candle and plaid comforter and I get my frilly ridiculous room and he can't complain that it's too girly.

We aren't on our periods at the same time (although I swear men have them- at least emotionally - and usually near the full moon. you've been warned).

We communicate better because we aren't worried about that awkward situation where you tell some one whats been bothering you and you never speak again.

And even though he's a bit messier than my female room mates - I still get to live with my best friend. We get to make pizza together in our underwear and have sleepovers in the living room.

I'm a pretty lucky girl and I love living with MY man!

Okay Bye Ya'll

Sunday, September 23, 2012
0 Comments

The 9th Semester

It's not a well known fact but I do research for a professor

It sound like I'm going above and beyond but really I just didn't want to take analytical chemistry and research will take the place of it.

While waiting for a gel to run, my research partner and I were discussing life.

We were both talking about how tired we were and I made the comment "I've been getting enough sleep and I haven't been doing THAT much work"

Then she called it

"This is our fifth year, we've been doing this too long and we are tired"

Its true. This is my 9th semester and I'm really really tired.

And worse than that there's a big part of me that doesn't care about school anymore.

But then that little voice in my head pops up and reminds me that I want to go to grad school and it's too early in the game to give up. But I really want to nap. For a week.

This leads me to my next discussion.

Because I want to go to grad school I have to take the dreaded GRE.

I bought one of these books for studying for it and almost cried. Apparently I'm supposed to know what erudite, prodigal, improvident, fervid, vehement, assuage, etc mean.

And their synonyms.

When was I supposed to hear this in classes full of biological terms, named arbitrarily by some researcher in a lab somewhere sometimes based on latin words (that no one understands anymore)?

The practice tests aren't that bad.

Everyone tells me that it's super easy.

But it can greatly change what my LIFE looks like this time next year.

On both hands I will be married (yay) this time next year.

On one hand I will be entering my second semester of grad school

or I could be finding my first job!

Back to full circle. I am tired. I'm kind of over school. But I was NOT ready to be making these tough life decisions and working on myself this time last year or even last semester.

I think I would be lost if I had graduated in May.

I would have never found out about this awesome program (that I'm afraid to really talk about because I'm afraid to jinx myself if I get too excited).

So for now I'm going to assume it was all fate.

I'm going to BEAST the GRE.

Then turn in my applications.

And go get my masters!

and if not I will be okay. I'll still marry my best friend.

and God willing still end up exactly where I'm supposed to be.