Wedding Day - Part Two

PHD's 93-year old Mom accompanied him to the chuppah. I loved the look on her face all day as she was simply kvelling the entire time.

My Dad and LO escorted me to the chuppah while our Cantor sang (so beautifully). When we reached the chuppah, LO and I started to circle PHD. I don't know what goes on with other brides when they are doing this, but from fasting - I got dizzy! (Plus - how come no one told me how hard it is to navigate with a veil on?) So...I am guessing I looked a little drunk on the last few circles (the videotape will soon tell). PHD didn't help - he keep giggling and saying silly things. Best of all...on the 5th circle, LO said loud enough for all to hear, "How much longer do we have to do this?" Everyone (including myself) couldn't help but laugh. It was so sweet to have LO circle with me and so perfect that her little personality came right out during it all.

Rabbi D started the service. He is our Rabbi and the more traditional of the two and did most of the Hebrew. Rabbi M's job was to explain what was going on in English to those not familiar with a Jewish wedding (and that would be my Chinese gentile family members!).

Rabbi D did the kiddushin and PHD must have been nervous because he almost drank all the wine in the cup! Next we exchanged rings. (At this point LO looked perplexed as I put up my right index finger for the ring. She said, "Wrong finger!" I shush'd her. So when PHD placed it on my finger, LO exclaimed, "See - it doesn't fit on that finger!") From that point on, knowing that by Jewish law we were fully married, I could not stop smiling.

Next Rabbi D talked about the ketubah and it's significance. As he spoke about how the ketubah protects the woman, LO kept giving PHD looks like she was saying, "You got that - you better take care of my Ima!" It made me giggle. Rabbi M read the ketubah and he also talked a little bit about us. He explained that we had met at Shul on Shabbat (which is why the kippot that we gave out at the wedding say "Shabbat Shalom" inside in Hebrew). He explained how much we love Judaism and how important having a Jewish home is. I had no idea what he was going to say, but his speech was so lovely.

Next Rabbi D handed me and PHD each a candle. The Cantor sang as he lit each candle. When the Cantor finished singing, together we used our candles to light another candle joined as one. Rabbi D then spoke of the Baal Shem Tov's beautiful metaphor of souls as flames of light as he lit each candle.

The Cantor sang the sheva brachot, stopping after each bracha to allow Rabbi M to give the English translation. I had originally asked that only the Hebrew be read but in hindsight, the way they did it was really beautiful and more meaningful for my family since they could understand what was going on!

We drank the second cup of wine and Rabbi M said to PHD, "There are only two things left to do. One is to break the glass and the other is to kiss your bride." Thanks to the horrible colds we both had, we had not kissed or even held hands in over a week, so after he said "kiss your bride", PHD and I both did a little happy dance and had everyone in the sanctuary laughing. Rabbi M explained the symbolism of the glass and then PHD broke the glass (we saved the glass for this mezuzah) and then we kissed. We hugged as many well-wishers as we could before heading off for a few moments alone and a little snack!

I couldn't have asked for a more beautiful day. For all of you who assured me that all the pre-planning stress would be worth it and that everything would be just fine - you were right - THANK YOU!

And now, all we have to figure out is are we now Dr. and Mrs. Orieyenta or Dr. and Mrs. PHD? :)

We had a professional photographer so more photos are sure to come. We leave for our honeymoon around 5:00 am tomorrow - won't be back until Erev Rosh Hashanah!

(For those are you who are wondering...I did end up inviting my mother. On Shabbat morning, I had what I call a "Yom Kippur" moment and I really felt like it was the right thing to do. And it was fine as she was on her best behavior.)

Wedding Day - Part One

Filled with excitement, I hardly slept. I kept waking up just about every hour. At around 6 am, I gave up and decided to take advantage of the fact that the sun had not risen yet and have a nice BIG pre-fast cup of COFFEE. This would help me avoid that caffeine-withdrawal headache that accompanies so many of my fasts.

LO woke up a bit later and then we were off to run errands. Once those were all done, I dropped LO off at Hebrew school and headed to pick up my Dad and his wife. (I had completely forgot about fasting when I invited them to breakfast!) I made a bagel for post-fast while they were eating hoping this would help them not feel uncomfortable that we were not eating. We spent a little time visiting and then I dropped them back at their hotel, went to pick LO up from Hebrew school and then headed back home. It was at that moment when I panicked and realized that the flowers had not yet been delivered. My panicked state was all for naught because when I walked in the house, there they were. (This is my bouquet. LO's was a miniature version of this one.)

We spent the next hour packing stuff in the car and trying to be sure not to forget everything. Just as we were going to get in the car, LO asked me to print her homework for her! She was going to spend the night at a friend's house after the wedding and would need her homework! Umm...talk about bad timing. Despite her lack of a printer and our laziness to hook her up to our printer, we managed.

And finally we were off to the Shul!

Remember my chuppah nightmare? In the end we decided to go with the chuppah that belonged to our shul. (Remember that it was not in the best of repair, but I decided to have faith that it would all work out somehow.) I kept talking with out Temple Administrator and he told me several times that he was going to do a trial run and set the whole thing up but with the High Holidays just around the corner he just got too busy to ever do it. He asked that PHD arrive early to the Shul on the wedding day to help set it up. When we got to the Shul (late of course) I went into the sanctuary and the chuppah was all set up and way more beautiful than I could have ever expected. I was so excited that I was literally jumping up and down...and what else did I do? I of course took a picture with my phone and uploaded it to Facebook.

While PHD was working on getting everything set up, I went to the library which I planned to use as a dressing room. When I got there, I was greeted with a broken doorknob and so we were never able to get in there! I headed to the kitchen where my friend was baking challot for us. She also happened to be the person who was going to do LO's hair and who was going to help me with my veil. We decided it was apropos that she would help us get ready in the kitchen since she and I became friends when we were baking challot for the high holidays there years ago.

I searched for a quiet place to do some last minute davening and from that point on, things seemed to be happening at warp speed. LO and I headed off to get dressed. Then we ran back to the kitchen for hair and veil. (This is when we realized that we left all the hair stuff at home. Thankfully I had remembered the most important thing...the veil!) I had forgotten to do the corsages and boutonnieres for everyone so I had to run and quickly give those out and then run to the office to sign the ketubah. It was simply CRAZY! (Oh yeah and I decided I had to take a few pictures here and there in the middle of all of it!)

On to the bedeken. The Rabbis (Yes, plural. One who is our Rabbi and one who is PHD's very good friend) gathered my Dad and PHD's Mom. And along with LO, we all recited the blessing for the children. It was one of my favorite moments of the day to have my Dad blessing me, PHD's Mom blessing him and me and PHD blessing LO. PHD and I looked at each other as my veil was placed and I don't think I stopped smiling from that moment on.

And then it was time...

Wedding Day Tehillim

Photo by Hasan Sarbakhshian

With the frenzy that must always occur in the days leading up to a wedding, it completely slipped my mind to ask if anyone wanted me to daven for them. Thankfully someone reminded me! (Thanks Hadassah!)

If you would like me to include anyone in my tehillim on our wedding day, please leave me a comment or e-mail me at orieyenta@yahoo.com with names.

Chuppah here we come!

Baruch Hashem. Six days. It seems like a million years since the day this happened (the good friend in that post was none other than PHD).

I can't believe it. We didn't get a hurricane. My cold is almost gone. Hopefully the cold that I managed to give PHD will be gone before Shabbos. And even more so I am praying that LO won't get it as well. Everything on my gazillions of checklists is complete except for going to the mikvah and buying kiddush wine.

Life is good.

Here comes Bridezilla

I am thisclose to becoming Bridezilla with this whole wedding thing. Just when I think the whole wedding planning thing is under control, something comes flying out of nowhere and hits me in the face.

You may remember that we wanted a very small, very simple wedding. We would have been perfectly happy having nothing more than the required minyan to say the Sheva Brachot. And then we seemed to have gotten caught up in sharing our joy with our friends and family and very quickly, our nice little minyan blossomed in THREE minyans. And now with some guilt from assorted family members including this whole issue, we are on the verge of FORTY people.

Yes, I know that 40 people is not a lot for a wedding and I should be happy to be sharing our simcha with everyone...but I am not. This is not what we wanted.

In the end, I am sure everything will work out just wonderfully and the wedding will be beautiful. But I have to admit that now I understand why some people just run away and elope. (I'm just saying!)

Ok - breathe in, breathe out - everything will be fine.

Wishing you all a beautiful and peaceful Shabbat.

I need chuppah help!

Want to help me with a decision? The chuppah (which I thought would be the least of my problems) is turning out to be a bigger issue than I expected. One Rabbi has the portable poles but no tallit for it. Our Shul has free standing poles - but two are in the Rabbi's office serving as flag poles and one is broke. I can rent one for $175 but again, no tallit. So...I am in the market for a tallit.

Yes, I am kicking myself for not buying one while we were in Israel. However, I found www.tallis-n-tefillin.com where I will be able to purchase one at a reasonable cost. The man who owns the site is in Ft. Lauderdale (so this is basically local) and he has been very kind in answering all my questions. Here's my problem...I'm at a loss of what to buy.

I know what you're thinking, I should ask PHD. Well, I did. He thought we should borrow one from a friend but I don't want to be responsible for someone's tallit. I am too worried about ruining it as we would use the tzitzit to tie the tallit to the poles. He also thought of using an Israeli flag. While I love Israel as much as he does, I think this is tacky. I could go to the fabric store, buy some fabric and make one (since I am crafty that way) but to be honest, I have too many other things to worry about without adding a sewing project in. So...I am going to buy one despite the fact that PHD thinks I shouldn't spend the money on something we will use only once. (I told him we should be glad we would use it only once and that I would save whatever we bought and give it to LO when she gets married so she doesn't have to go on this search.)

So...pretty please with sugar on top, help me choose...white with white stripes? white with blue stripes? white with black stripes? Want to pick for me? I'll be your best friend. Have a better idea? I'm all ears.

Yes, I'm frazzled with all this wedding planning. But I am thankful to G-d that my biggest problem of the moment is that I can't decide what color tallit our chuppah should be. We should all only know of such problems, right?

Hope this finds you all enjoying the meat-free, dirty laundry days. :)

Jewish Guilt

So the time has come for me to mail our wedding invitations. Like so many couples do, we have had an ever-changing list of who is invited and who is not invited. I would love to invite our entire Shul - of course I would have to win the lottery to afford that but it's still a nice genuine thought of mine.

Since we've both been married before we agreed that we wanted a small ceremony. Originally we had planned for a minyan. That minyan has blossomed into three minyans. And I'm ok with that. And I am ok with the Jewish guilt I feel about inviting some of our Shul friends and not others.

So the list is FINALLY finalized. The invitations have been beautifully addressed and now they are sitting on my desk waiting to be mailed.

And then my sister calls to lay on some guilt. You see, I am not inviting my mother. My mother and I do not have a wonderful relationship. Actually, we don't speak at all. My sister is sure that years from now I will feel guilty about not having invited my mother. And of course the guilt has already settled in and I am doubting my decision since she is my only mother no matter what our relationship is like. What do you all think? Invite her? Don't invite her? Oy.

Kids or no kids - the wedding dilemma

Ok, I have a dilemma and I need your help. Since the wedding is getting close (3-1/2 months!) we have really gone into planning mode. We have always talked about it being very very small and to not have much more than a minyan. This becomes complicated since my family (meaning my Dad, his wife, my sister, and her husband) are not Jewish. But we decided that the minyan plus my goyim family would be fine.

Enter my sister and her 3 year old daughter and her newborn little girl.

I love my nieces as though they are my own children. Apparently PHD does not share this love. He is adamant that the kids don't come to the wedding. I can understand not wanting the newborn there but my other niece? I just don't get it. He says they will disrupt the wedding and since it's so small it would be a huge deal. I say that they would be fine.

Obviously I love PHD enough to marry him but let's just say that he is a tad on the stubborn side (ok maybe more than a tad) and when he makes up his mind about something there is usually no swaying him. He says I haven't given him a good enough reason to include my niece. I say that it should be reason enough that it's important to me that she is there.

Help me! What else can I say? My sister says she won't come if she can't bring the kids. PHD (as usual) is showing no signs of budging on this issue (he's even threatened to cancel the whole affair and just have us married with the Rabbi in his study).

I'm the one who will always give in to everyone else before taking what I want but I can't see a way to make everyone happy. Help!