Purp’s 2014 review

This has been quite possibly the busiest year of my life. Seriously, I can’t imagine having a year more full of stuff than this past one was. I went to so many weddings, traveled more and farther than I have ever traveled before, graduated college, moved out of my parents house and, oh yeah, I GOT MARRIED! I had to fill out like a thousand and one forms to change my name. It’s been a crazy long year. It had to be to fit everything in. So, as I have done for the past two years at least, and for the first time here: here is my 2014 in a nutshell.

January: So to start these things off I always have to go back through my Facebook to see what I actually did each month. They all kind of blur together after a while. Anyway, it took some searching but aside from starting my last semester at Geneva, I had pneumonia. Yeah, that was fun. I’ve been half way through Mass Effect 2 for a year now because I was trying to play with pneumonia and was so exhausted and frustrated with my tiredness that I couldn’t enjoy it. I went back to school with pneumonia, which thankfully cleared up a week in. I still had to run around in the bitter bitter cold, though. Other highlights include a visit from the elusive Brelyn, sending out my save-the-dates, running around weirdly to rehearsals and getting my very first ever college package, complete with owl.

This is Herbert, my first owl.

In January I had Cats on my Feet

February: February brought more bitter cold, several frustrations in writing, lots of studying for poli sci and the Odyssey. I am not going to rant about the Odyssey because this is a thing I do far too much. Just know that it was the hardest show I have ever had to do. I wanted to throttle my main director on more than one occasion, was sooo thankful for the co-director and her awesomeness and somehow got through the whole thing with my sanity mostly intact. I also found the most adorable pictures of my grandparents and got to try on my grandmother’s wedding dress. It is beautiful, by the way, and if it weren’t paper thing and likely to rip if I were to lift my arms too high, I would have loved to put it on for a proper shoot. I had to settle for the few pictures taken in my aunt’s house. Ah well.

The Odyssey went like this.

So yeah, Grandma and Pap-pap Farkas were pretty much the cutest things ever.

I’m wearing jeans and kinda look like a zombie, but the dress is really pretty.

In February things got Real.

March: March brought spring break which brought all the wedding planning, because planning a wedding while in college is stupid. Don’t do it guys, just don’t. Anyway, I got to snuggle cats all the time, so that was nice. Then I had to go back and finish the Odyssey. At least the people in it were awesome. Logan and I found our first home. It’s a really nice home, I must say. Sure, only one place got back to us and they don’t allow cats, but we are blessed to have it nonetheless. Also, cutest brick wall ever, just saying. I also joined Manchester RP Church, which is pretty awesome. Manchester is the first church that I actually belong to. I’d never been a member anywhere else. It’s nice to belong somewhere. Other highlights include lots of Kingdom Hearts, an impromptu cast picnic, getting my wedding dress and outings with some lovely people.

The day we got a home!

In March I said So Long to the Theater, which you totally don’t have to read, cause it’s kind of embarrassing.

April: In April I pretty much finished up college. I also got to see my first One Act staged. Okay, so it wasn’t the first that I had written ever, and it wasn’t even necessarily the first to reach the stage in some form, but it was the first fully produced production of a one act that I wrote all by myself. Anyway, it was beautiful and my director is beautiful and the cast was amazing and I love them all. I also went on a lovely adventure to a park with the Scavos. Other highlights include Easter, an epic search for flower girl dresses and defeating Sephiroth at level 80 in Kingdom Hearts 2.

Most of the cast – Minus Jacob, because he’s a butt – and my lovely director for “While Feeding the Birds”

Adventuring in the park with these cool kids.

In April I highlighted my college experience.

May: May brought Graduation. I officially finished my life as a student forever. I loved college, but I never want to go back. That being said, the beginning of May was filled with saying goodbye to my campus, my work, my friends and my life as I knew it. It also brought my first sort of bridal shower and, for all intents and purposes, my bachelorette party. It was a lovely gathering of some very lovely people. Also, I passed poli sci with a B… minus, but still a B. After the rush of graduation I was given a week to sleep before my totally awesome surprise Alice in Wonderland themed bridal shower. My mom had been planning it for months and it was indeed totally awesome. My flower girls were Alice and the White Rabbit and the food said “eat me” and the drinks said “Drink me” and there were posters everywhere with quotes and everyone was asked to wear a hat and it was so much fun! Other highlights include holding a very chubby baby and hanging out with some special family friends.

Me and my besty all graduated!

My Alice themed surprise shower was a success!

In May I didn’t write anything.

June: June was preparation month. It contained all the stressful, trying to cram everything in and make it perfect kind of things that one does the month before ones wedding. I had two fittings, one during which I almost passed out, you know, nbd, and made jars with sand and candles and lace and ribbon and tied ribbons to keys and somehow missed our violinist but you know, it happens. We went to soccer games and watched Muppets and went swing dancing and I spent a lot of time sleeping with cats, which is a wonderful thing. I also went to my first arts festival, which was pretty cool. It was very hot, but I had a parasol, so it wasn’t so bad. We also got to celebrate the adoption of a very special friend.

We’re super cool even in the heat.

In June I wrote two things! You should read them both.

July: Absolutely nothing happened in July. I mean, if you don’t count all the stress, getting married, driving 14 hours one way to Maine, moving into my first permanent apartment and, you  know, all that. So my July started with a preminition from a fortune cookie.

Even fortune cookies are right sometimes.

After that nothing matters until July 12. Why? because everything else was stress and leading up to July 12 and there for is unimportant in the wake of July 12. In case you didn’t know, that’s the day I got married. I married the sweetest, most amazing, Godly man I know and now he’s stuck with me forever. Ha! We drove forever to get to Maine while listening to the Fellowship of the Rings… both ways. Someone should have told me Lord of the Rings was not a great choice for driving entertainment. But, Maine was beautiful and we had an awesome time in Acadia National Park and Bar Harbor, so it was totally worth it. After we got back I adventured with my sister and started the name changing process. Fun stuff. And that was July.

Seriously, my favorite pictures.

Maine is a magical place.

Lenny the chocolate moose is the only moose we saw.

In July I wrote nothing, because July.

August: So after getting married and name changing and everything you’d think things would slow down, right? Lol, nope. Weddings, weddings, weddings, is the word of 2014. We also saw Guardians of the Galaxy… a couple times. So yeah, most of August went wedding, vow renewal, wedding with “must write the best speech ever!” mixed in there… like all month. And I totally did. I also started a new blog. 🙂 And here we are! On my new blog! Which has been going really well thus far. But, of course, the big thing that happened was MY TWIRLY GOT MARRIED! Logan and I drove ten hours so I could be in her wedding. Also, morning weddings, totally the way to go.

Me and my beautiful Twirly~

In August I explained my love of purple.

September: In September I turned 23 and got my very first smart phone because my husband loves me very much. I named him Martin after Martin the warrior to keep with the Redwall theme I have going for phones. But first, more weddings! My cousin Rachel got married the first week of September making our weddingy record of four weeks, four weddings. And our little breather began. I then chopped all my hair off. And by all I mean like to my shoulders. Which is still shorter than it’s been since I started college. We then went to all the 2-year-old birthday parties in one day. We spent the rest of the month doing birthday stuff for me because we have three families to celebrate with now, including us.

Dancing with the Farki

In September I have my Three Wedding Perspectives.

October: October brought ANOTHER WEDDING! The last of the year! or so we thought. >.> Mr. and Mrs. Panda were announced on October 5, my sister’s birthday and I got my Twirly for a whole weekend. Following that was homecoming, my first as an alumni, and MORE Twirly! My favorite. 🙂 It also brought a large gathering of my husbands friends and my first hike up to the G. It was a good time. In other news, Logan and I made pancakes, went to the park near our house and put furniture together. It was quite the exciting month. I also got to see Peter Pan at Geneva and miss theater tremendously.

Me and my lovely husband at the G.

In October I pondered Naming Your In-Laws.

November: I spent an excessive amount of time away from my husband for the first time since we got married. I saw Peter Pan again with all the friends who came in from out of town. I then proceeded to agree, most foolishly, to 24 hour theater again. I thought, Oh, I’ll just write and get some sleep this year… and then we needed a second girl… and that was me. Because I don’t know when to quite. Seriously, though, we had an awesome time. I then went and saw Anne of Green Gables with my mom and spent the whole day doing fun with mom things. Next came Thanksgiving. The great thing about having two families is that you get to celebrate twice. Thursday was spent with my in-laws and some family friends who have been such a blessing to us. Saturday was then spent with my family, getting coffee with mom and Erin and playing Sega with Eric. And, of course, eating dad’s pumpkin pie, which may be my absolute favorite, closely followed by the pecan pie from the Scavos. The Friday between was spent Black Friday shopping, my first ever endeavor at the usual time. Many things were bought, including a very nice comforter to keep us warm in the winter, in the exact color I wanted: pale green, shockingly enough. All through November I did NaNoWriMo, as I’m sure you remember. I succeeded in reaching 30,000 words and was very proud of myself.

Thanksgiving coffee with my girls. (And Alan creeping) (and Logan… not seen.)

24-hour theater cast

In November I wrote a lot of things. Like Being Thankful.

December: In December we had yet another wedding! We got the invitation sometime in November and happily RSVPed to see Joe and Liz tie the knot. After that, we were finally done for weddings… or were we? The Christmas season proceeded as it often does, and we finished our shopping, received packages, wrapped things, got our first three and decorated it, all the while our apartment going in and out of a state of chaos and something vaguely resembling order. We went up and made candy cane cookies with dad, we went shopping and watched movies We went to Pittsburgh with Logan’s family. And then I woke up on December 19th and learned that my 2-year-old cousin had died that morning of SIDS. And suddenly it didn’t seem right to be cheery or post rambles about Christmas cookies and how to make the perfect candy cane twist. The days leading up to Christmas Eve were rough. I am so blessed to have my husband here to support me, to have Twirls visiting, to have my family and in-laws close by when I needed them. Christmas was a little sadder this year with bad news coming from all sides. But, you can’t stop living. Christmas Eve was with Logan’s side this year, opening presents and eating cheese ball with the church family. Christmas was spent hanging out with my family and the Farkas clan. A little rest on Friday and out shopping on Saturday when we learned our weddings weren’t over just yet. How very fitting that we should end the year with just one more. Our cousin Sarah got married yesterday to her fiance Andrew and sealed our year with a smile and lots of love.

So that was my year. Tonight we unexpectedly find ourselves the hosts of a New Years Eve party and our living room, for once, is truly clean. We will drink and eat and probably play games of some kind with Logan’s group of friends and see if maybe this is a thing we want to do every year. For now, I want to wish you all a very Happy New Year, thank you for your support over this past year, for listening to my rambles and rants and sticking with me through the rough stuff. I pray that all of you will be as blessed as I have been this year in 2015. Happy New Year everyone.

Purp’s Three Wedding Perspectives

Growing up on the younger end of twenty-seven cousins, I am no stranger to weddings. When half of your cousins are roughly four to twenty years older than you and all of them live in the same county as you, weddings tend to happen fairly frequently and unless they decided to run of to Florida or Hawaii or something, you end up attending.Thus I am well acquainted with the audience side of weddings.

Then I went to college and I made friends and friends get married and ask you to be in their weddings. Weddings are a bit different when you’re standing up front looking around three to six other people at some of your best friends promising their lives to each other.

Also while I was in college I met this super awesome guy I might have told you about.This super awesome guy gave me a super shiny ring and asked me to marry him and I said yes. So this past summer I have got to be the one front and center repeating vows and exchanging rings with the man from beyond my dreams.

These are the three perspectives of weddings, the Bride, the Attendant and the Guest. This summer I have been all three.

The guest is the easiest role to play. You show up, sit in a pew for half an hour then throw something at the happy couple and go to the reception for cake and dancing. It’s a good time. Mostly. Occasionally you get the really long wedding where they have like seven readers and/or musical pieces, the preacher goes on forever and you start glancing at your phone to see how long you’ve been sitting there. These are very rare. You also get the awkward wedding where a speaker says something that probably sounded good in his head and might sound sweet to someone but in reality makes everyone cringe. These are also, thankfully, rare. Most of the time the wedding is short, you give your happy congratulations to the bride and groom and move on to the dancy bits.

Honor level: 5. You survived probably three guest list trimmings to receive your invitation.

The attendant is a slightly harder role, but a more memorable one. All of the wedding’s I’ve been at kind of blur together. All the weddings I’ve been in, however, are rather distinct. Especially since the number is now four. Three excluding my own. Thus far I have played a flower girl, a bridesmaid and a self-proclaimed super bridesmaid. Being a flower girl is probably the easiest. Someone gives you a pretty dress, you walk down the aisle with your brother and then you take some pictures and get cake and everyone says how absolutely adorable you are. It’s a good time.

Bridesmaids have a bit more to do. First is the dress. This can go one of two ways. Either the bride has a dress she likes, you try it on and agree with her emphatically because it’s her day and she should get what she wants, or she tells you to wear what you want as long as it’s (insert criteria here) and away you go to find your own dress. I’ve done it both ways. Okay, the first is a bit exaggerated. Girls, if you don’t like the dress say so. It really can’t hurt to make your opinion known. The bride most likely wants you to be comfortable and confident in your dress, she won’t make you wear something you absolutely hate.

Next is the shower. I didn’t get to do the shower bit for my Twirly because Boston is unfortunately far away. But for Danielle I collaborated with two other bridesmaids to put together a super surprise shower for her. It’s a lot of work, but a lot of fun. You pick out games and make snacks and eat first because if you don’t no one will. Showers are pretty great if you don’t get too stressed out about them.

Then comes the big weekend: the rehearsal and the wedding day. You show up at the church, or the dinner, whichever comes first and follow whatever instructions are given to you. Piece of cake, sometimes literally. Cake is often involved, for some reason. You’ll probably then spend the night somewhere unfamiliar because weddings tend to be in weird places. And by weird I mean your college friends’ hometowns. Then you’ll get up early because who can sleep anyway? And do all the fancy things to your face and hair and get into your dress and grab your flowers and it’s go time.

The Ceremony is actually the easiest part. You’ve given all the love and support you can to get the couple to their places, you walk down the aisle slowly, with a big smile on your face and take your place in front to stand for half an hour or so while you watch your friends get hitched. This is also where people tend to cry. Apparently. This is a thing. I never cried at weddings before I was in them. But something about the way he smiles when he sees her for the first time, how beautiful she is in that big dress, the way happiness radiates from them as they hold hands and say their vows. That sweet relief when all is said and done and they’ve finally made it, regardless of what struggles might have come or who might have tried to stand in their way. They made it. And I cried.

Last is the reception. You’re done! You finally get to relax. Unless you’re giving a speech. Then you sit at your table playing with your note cards, afraid to go to the bathroom because they’re running behind schedule and if you get up things will start moving again immediately. Then you get up in front of a room full of people you don’t know (and your husband) and give your speech. You look at you best friend because the speech is for her and she’s probably the only one who will get it anyway. You shake and you cry but you can’t wipe your face because your tissues are in your pocket and your hands are full. Should have thought of that before writing out the note cards. And then it’s over and you get to hug her and cry because it’s finally over and she’s moving to Virginia, which is closer, but not close enough.

Honor level: 10. You were chosen especially out of all his/her friends to stand up there in front with them. You are being singled out as on of their closest and dearest friends. You should feel super honored.

The Bride, oh the bride. The bride is the most intense perspective. You plan the wedding, with help, or without, and are the focus, or should be, the entire day. I was lucky. I had some really awesome people to help me pull my wedding together. My mother complained we didn’t have enough time, my husband complained we had too much, but it all worked out in the end. So for the bride, first comes the months of planning, picking colors, dresses, THE dress, places, decorations, themes, guest books, escort cards, gifts and food. And, if you’re in Western Pennsylvania, cookies. The cookies are always the easy part for my family. Just put out the call and it’ll be answered with at least seven different kinds, in bulk. We’re a very cookie oriented family.

Once all the planning is done, you have your dress and have had your meltdown, probably more than once, it’s time for the rehearsal and the night before. All your friends come in, you get to talk to every one for about five minutes and then it’s down to business in which you have to make even more decisions about where people are standing and how they’re walking and what they’re saying and then you get food. You think you’ll get to talk to people then, but nope, you sit in the middle-ish close enough to hear people’s conversations, but not close enough to actually talk to anyone. Then you grab as many bridesmaids as you can and some wine (and juice for the underage ones) and find someplace to drink and finally chat, a little bit. It’s not enough. You then go somewhere for the night where you lay in bed, mostly awake, waiting for morning.

Morning comes. You get dressed, or in my case, feel sick all morning and make your friends drag you around to grab stuff people (mostly you) forgot and finally plop down in a chair to get your hair done. Curls take forever. People buzz around you until it’s finally time to put on the dress, go out and do pictures. Pictures take much longer than you expected and you run out of time before the ceremony to take all the pictures you wanted. No one wants to take pictures after.

You finally make it to the line-up. You stand beside your dad who’s squeezing your arm as your seven bridesmaids and two flower girls make their way down the aisle. There he is, waiting. You make it down, somehow, your hand is in his. Words come out of your mouth that you hope people can hear. A ring is slid on your finger. Then it’s over. You’re down stairs hugging and smiling all over the place. It’s finally done. And then it keeps going. You’re dragged back up for the receiving line, hugging and thanking people for coming. You love most of them, but you won’t get to talk to half of them in any depth. More pictures which no one wants to take because it’s hot and you’re tired and cranky and haven’t eaten properly. More people want you to make more decisions and your maid of honor is probably tempted to beat them all with a bat.

Finally you escape, you spend a whole twenty minutes alone with your new husband breathing in the car. Then it’s back into the fray with the entrance at the reception. You get to eat a little, you cut the cake, you eat the only bite of cake you’ll probably get, you dance, people cheer and then tell you they’re leaving, but they had a lovely time. And then you’re wonderful matron of honor and best man grab the car, stuff you in it, and off you go to the wedding night. Mission accomplished.

Honor level: over 9000. This great guy just put up with you’re wedding madness for eleven months, stood in front of 250 people and swore his love for you before God, then danced with you all night. He’s awesome, and you’re extremely lucky to have him.

So there you have it. There are my three wedding perspectives. Wedding season is almost over for us and I am looking forward to the break. It’ll start up again next summer, of course. It always does. This is what comes of graduating from Geneva. But the good news is, I never have to be the bride again! I can sit back and enjoy weddings from now on.

Purps on Road Trips

When I was four we drove to New Jersey for a vacation on the beach. We drove through the night on our way there, us kids sleeping all six hours. On the way back we drove by day and my dad swore, never again. I often wondered why we didn’t do more things like that growing up. Now I understand why. 

Some people really enjoy road trips. I don’t understand. In college I always thought it would be a lot of fun, pack up a car, buy a bunch of snacks and drinks, fill the seats with all your best friends, head somewhere cool and enjoy the ride. Twirly, Dakota, and I even planned a spring break trip to Prince Edward Island my senior year. That was before two thirds of us were planning weddings and the other third got a job. So yeah, when Logan and I decided we could drive up to Maine for our honeymoon, a fourteen-hour trip, I thought it would be a great time. We’d have all that time to catch up after all the craziness of the wedding and planning and just enjoy each other’s company. I was wrong. 

Driving sucks. Spending seven to ten hours a day in the car is a pain. We split the Maine trip up into two days which should have been an even seven hour split. Then Jane happened. Jane is our GPS and she likes to take us places that we really don’t want to go. Like New York City. I’m sure it’s a lovely place, if that’s where you want to be. It was not where we wanted to be. NYC driving is scary, the tolls are ridiculous and the traffic is awful. We didn’t get to our hotel for the night until close to midnight when we should have been there at 9. It was not a fun time. 

Our second mistake was our choice of audio book. I love audio books, but this one was a bad decision on my part. I thought, oh, long trip, I’ve never actually made it through Lord of the Rings, let’s give that a shot! Silly Purps. LotR is really dry and kind of dull for the first half and super wordy and it takes forever. We reached Rivendell at the same time we reached our cabin and had just barely finished the Fellowship by the time we re-entered Western PA. It was not super great driving entertainment. 

Maine was only our first road trip of the summer, though. We had to return to New England for my favorite Twirly’s wedding near Boston. My husband decided flying would be best after the learning what a pain driving is. Then we let some time pass. We started looking at flights, how much they cost, thinking about the legalistic of getting to and from the airport, times, limitations on what we could take and where we could go while we were up there… and we decided to drive again. 

I chose Sabriel for this trip. Ten hours in one go, which turned into twelve with traffic and lunch stops and all. We almost actually finished Sabriel on the way up and got maybe half way through Lirael on our way back. It was a better choice, I thought, until it almost put Logan to sleep an hour and a half away from home. Our big mistake this time was driving all in one go home after church. We went to church with some friends and headed out around 1-ish. Again, twelve hour trip with stops and traffic. While the trip back was actually about an hour shorter than the trip up, it was still tedious and painful. 

So here’s my advice for road tripping, if you must do it.

1. Take people. Three or more, I think. Logan and I did okay on our own, but if I fell asleep he was on his own and road trips are less fun when half the party is asleep. 

2. Switch drivers. Seriously, driving the whole thing yourself sucks, just ask my husband. I offered to switch with him but he chose to take it all on himself. The thought of driving is super intimidating to me, but I’m sure I could do it. 

3. Comfy clothes and comfy things. I am a nester and I make nests wherever I can. The car is a great place to nest for a long ride. I wore sweat pants and a pajama shirt to Boston and it was glorious. 

4. Make absolutely sure you are not going through New York City. The end. 

There, I have imparted my minimal wisdom that I have gained in my two road trip summer experience. You’re welcome. This is probably not the last road trip we’ll be taking. There will be Grovers in Virginia soon and they must be visited. But that trip will have to wait. For this summer, we are done. No more long trips for us.