small steps

Last night, we knocked out the selection of tuxes. Yesss! It was a joke, albeit an expected one, how easy it is to say, "Yeah -- we'll take that combo of jacket style/shirt style/tie style/color palette/shoe selection. Fine." If only the wedding gown were that easy.

Lizzy even behaved herself like a princess the whole time. The shop -- same one where I got my dress, conveniently enough in Manassas -- is across the parking lot from McDonald's, so we went and got a Happy Meal with a promise of return to play on the McPlayPlace when we were done with tux selection. She daintily dipped her McChicken McNuggets in the McKetchup, and likewise her McApple McDippers in the McCaramel McGoo. (she used to list French fries as one of her favorite foods, but somewhere along the line recently, they have fallen out of favor. I'm not shedding a tear over it.)
She told me this morning that ketchup was on her favorite food list. I said, Lizzy, that's a condiment! She looked momentarily taken aback, then digested the information, and said, "Mom, you know what one of my favorite cond'ments is? Cinnamon rolls." Seemed unrelated to me, but maybe ketchup and cinnamon rolls are closely aligned in the 3-year-old mind.

For reasons I cannot fathom, Matt brought up an 'unresolved point' for us to argue about, all over again, on the way home/and to the tux shop. I don't know why we seem to get in arguments right before wedding-planning outings. I mean, I'd understand it if the arguments were about wedding-related items. But this seemed merely picking nits for zero reason. I truly don't know what was going on. I guess something just reminded him of it, so he wanted to get it 'resolved.'

There's probably a logic-related term for this -- an all-or-nothing? Something that's either a, or b? In which compromise isn't really possible? It's the old, tired newlywed discussion over whether his friends can 'crash in the basement' or not. Sheesh. You'd think we'd have hashed this one out by now. I think the root of it is that Matt doesn't want to feel that I'm making "house rules" -- that makes him feel like he has no power, or say, in what occurs. And yet, to have his friends come over, smoke a lot and then wallow on our couch, on which I sometimes like to, you know, sit, makes me feel gross. And I want order, darnit! I want pre-planning! I, well, I want them to go home to their own beds like civilized people! They live 10 or 20 minutes away, for pete's sake!

So we managed not to get into shouts over it or periods of silence that lasted for days (this time). We managed to get to the tux place and have a civilized discussion and make a civilized decision. It was, in short, miraculous. It was weird, because we walked in there and met with the lady who convinced me that the dress I got was just right for me, yadda yadda. When I took Lizzy to McDonald's, Matt still seemed rather uptight and frosty. By the time we got back, five minutes or less later, he was loose, relaxed and laughing with the lady. She is AMAZING! I need to tell her at some point how amazing she is sometime.

If I had a photo of the tux combo, I'd post it, but then again, a tux is a tux is a tux, right? They're black, and the groomsmen will wear champagne (light brown, really)-colored vest and tie. The ties are 'hand-knotted,' which to me means they look like regular ties. Not cravats, not bow ties. The shirts are off-white. The groom, the father of the bride and the ringbearer will be in black tux and black vest and tie. I think they'll look sharp.

I'll have another chance to practice my nearly nonexistent sense of hospitality this weekend when Matt's first cousin once removed -- his first cousin's child, who is Lizzy's second cousin (trust me) -- comes to stay with us. We've met him on two Thanksgivings. Don't really know him at all. He's about exactly Lizzy's age. I'm not that excited about it, I'll be honest -- he'll be at our place from 5 p.m. Friday to 6 or 7 p.m. Saturday. I think it's the fact that we don't really know him (if it were, say, Sophie, or Levi, or Ethan, or Elizabeth, I'd feel totally differently), but c'mon! How cold-hearted can I be? I'm just a selfish, selfish person, and I'm coming to realize that. So I am looking at it as a chance to loosen up a bit. Learn how to share -- a bit. You'd think I was actually putting myself out here in some way, the way I'm reacting to it.

I just won't let him sleep on our couch. :)