today has been an incredibly unsuccessful day on the wedding front. finally, i decided it was time to go and get the invitations printed and to attempt to register for gifts. our lovely puppy (who finally slept through the night for the first time since we got her - yay!) woke us up at 7:00 am so we decided to take full advantage of one of my last mornings off before i start working 9-5, monday to friday. although i constantly complain about my procrastination with regards to the invitations i have actually purchased the them and chosen the wording; all we really have left to do is get them printed and assembled and then we can send them out. we probably could have printed them at home but since there are all sorts of different sized pieces that go along with them i figured it would be easier to take them to kinko's where they could make sure they were done perfectly. anyways, for as long as we could remember there had been a kinko's conveniently located on macleod trail, about 15 minutes from our house. since i am so neurotic, i actually googled the location and exact address just to make sure we knew exactly where we were going. turns out, google is not always up to date or accurate. an hour later, after circling the same strip mall about 100 times and attempting to ask 2 or 3 neighbouring business owners if they knew where the kinko's was, a lovely woman waiting to get her tires changed informed me that it had in fact closed over a year ago. get with it googles / yellow pages. anyways, needless to say that was an entire was of an hour and we still don't have our invitations printed.
at this point i was a little upset but refused to let myself get down since i was so excited about finishing our registration. we all know how much i love shopping, especially for housewares etc. honestly though, it was completely exhausting and frustrating. who knew registering was such a time consuming process? jesse sure didn't haha we went to the bay last night, since everyone says it has the biggest and best registry, and set up all our information the night before, and choose a few things here and there before the store closed, knowing we would be back this morning - key phrase "knowing" we would be back in the morning since the lady we dealt with suggested we register for at least 150 things between our wedding and shower. we registered for 5 things last night. we were ready to get the ball rolling this morning. anyways, we enthusiastically started scanning all the things we need and were actually getting excited and enjoying ourselves until some grumpy old man in electronics decided to poop our party. he kindly informed us that currently the bay is having some crazy renovation sale (i'm sure you have heard the ad on your local radio station, it goes something like this "here at the bay we have prided ourselves in our image as well as yours for the last century. for the first time in a century we have finally decided to renovate over 90 of our highest grossing locations across the country just in time to completely mess up brenna and jesse's gift registration. nothing will be in stock by the time your guests go to buy your gifts, don't worry though, everyone else will get it for at a ridiculously low price") and most of the products currently in the store will be gone in a matter of weeks. so essentially, the 3 hours we spent carefully registering for what we needed had been a complete waste of time. oh, and also, the bay is completely getting rid of its "decorative department" which means i wont be able to register for candle sticks, picture frames, vases or any sort of decorative pieces. grumpy electronics man obviously got me all frazzled, so i went to discuss this with betty, the lovely little asian lady that set up our registry for us last night. betty, bless her heart, completely forgot to tell us not to scan anything that is listed as "priced to go" or "clearance" or even "on sale" because chances are incredibly unlikely that they will still be in stock when people go to purchase our gifts (i know it probably sounds stupid that we scanned things listed as "on sale" and "clearance" but the ENTIRE STORE was on sale since they are attempting to clear all existing inventory). i honestly could have strangled her at this point but she was such a cute, frail asian woman that i obviously had to contain my inner bridezilla. long story short, we are going to have to start this whole experience all over again at sears this weekend.
i guess that the silver linging is that we did learn a lot about place settings. i never knew there were so many different types of plates: dinner plates, salad plates, serving platters, bread plates, saucers etc. oh, and there are equally as many different types of bowls, cups, mugs, platters and serving dishes. then, on top of this, every brand has been fired, once, twice, ... seven times. some can go in the freezer and the dishwasher but not the microwave. others can go in the microwave and the over but not in the freezer or on the stove top.
it.is.so.overwhelming.
anyways, after betty was done explaining all of this to us ignorant young'ins we finally decided that we should probably go with denby dishes since they are the best quality place settings you can get without buying china. i definitely did not want china; i think it is such a waste of money since it only makes an appearance on your dinner table maybe three times a year. denby makes sense since they are amazing quality dishes that can be used everyday. now we just have to choose a pattern... something we have decided is equally overwhelming. luckily, they have a greater selection at sears and i hadn't started scanning my place settings yet...
when we first started registering i was so excited. i had this "oh this is exactly like shopping only without having to pay for it yourself" mentality. as the day went on though i simply started to feel greedy. it was really weird. jesse and i are young and need things. we are not asking for anything we already have. we are literally only asking for things we need yet i still felt guilty. everyone keeps telling me to ignore the guilty feeling because this is what weddings are about: friends and family helping young couples prepare for their future together. still, i feel like a spoilt kid with a 25 ft long christmas list...
i know this entry sounds like an annoying rant (probably because it is) but i think that my shock and frustration comes from the fact that the bay advertises itself as the number one bridal registry in the country; the catalog they gave us while we were setting up our registration was even titled "the biggest and best bridal registration in canada", and ironically, our wedding has to coincide with the first time they are out of stock of all their stock in over a century! i am hoping that we have a bit better experience at sears...
