Maggie will be marrying Danny on 6th June 2021 at Stone House of St. Charles in St. Charles, Missouri. Click here to read all Maggie’s planning posts to date.
THREE FACTS: (1) Danny proposed to Maggie on his birthday! (2) Maggie is in the process of converting to Judaism (3) Maggie is a member of STG Brides Club!
I found it more difficult to write this month’s post as I have not really checked off any boxes when it comes to planning my wedding. We looked back through some vendors we saved for things such as cake and photo booth, worried about how we were going to pay for our catering deposit and tried to figure out a kosher caterer. We did however have our first meeting with our friend Leah Sachs of Leah E Moss Designs to discuss our wedding paper goods.
She gave us some much good information, much of which I already knew from following her blog and Instagram, but she taught a lot to my fiancé who surprisingly agreed with what I wanted without any convincing. I wish I could have screenshot her face though when we told her that we wanted her to make our custom ketubah. She was so honored, and we are so excited to have a friend design this for us. It will make our ketubah even more special to us as we believe in supporting and helping our friends. Besides all this, life has just been too crazy to really focus on wedding planning when the big stuff is taken care of and the wedding is 8 months away.
As I may have failed to mention before in my posts, I have a lot on my plate. Not only do I work full time as a hotel manager, which anyone in the hospitality industry knows that means 50+ hour weeks. The past month alone I worked for three weeks straight because of an employee who abandoned their job, and call offs. I worked three doubles that included overnight so my sleep schedule was just all over the place or nonexistent. Besides this full-time job, I am also a part time student working on getting my master’s degree which should be completed 3 weeks before our wedding.
It was a goal of mine that when I became a manager in a hotel I would get my masters’. I also wanted to complete my masters before I was married. I will be able to accomplish both tasks, and not to brag but I am currently at a 3.8 GPA so I am managing quite well. In addition to all of this, we brought home a Golden Retriever puppy only 3 weeks ago. He is currently 10 weeks old and still not sleeping through the night. He is however 80% potty trained (this means that he knows when we take him outside it means it’s time to go potty0.
This however does not mean that he knows to not potty wherever as we have had a few accidents around the house and on our deck. This post will likely be filled with cute pictures of Boomerang, and his older sister Emily as that is currently all the pictures I have taken in the past few weeks.
Being crazy busy is nothing new to our wedding planning though. We got engaged in October 2019 and thankfully had already been scouting out a venue for months before. We booked our venue in December 2019 and our photographer in the beginning of the new year. We put a halt on planning between January and March of 2020 due to my opening of a hotel. For those of you who have not experienced this it is an exhausting few month.
I was on mandatory Monday-Friday 7am-6pm and Saturday 7am-3pm. This went on from January 6-Feburary 26 with my working 12 days straight through opening. Combine this with my only day off being filled with schoolwork, wedding planning was at the back of our list of things to do. During my time of unemployment (yes I spent 12 weeks of my life putting together the hotel, my staff, and the front desk only to get laid off 3 weeks after opening) I was able to start planning again and I was upset about losing at the time the best job I ever had (still my highest paid job ever).
Now, I have more responsibilities in an Assistant General Manager role especially since my General Manager is gone to help other hotels often – I did not see her for a month after my first week in the role. This however comes with a more consistent schedule, when we don’t have staffing issues. Thankfully, Danny is working from home, so we are better able to keep our new puppy Boomerang on a set schedule. When they say getting a puppy is preparing for a baby they are not kidding. I do not remember Emily being this difficult as a puppy expect for potty training (which took 2 years because she is part dachshund and super stubborn).
Boomerang wakes up 3 times in the middle of the night to go potty, so we must get up and take him outside similarly to waking up and feeding/changing a diaper for a baby. He also can not be in the house unsupervised, so he stays in his playpen most of the day. When he is running around its crazy hard to keep up with him because he runs from one room to another and then back before you can even get to the one room. He also cries over everything, he sees his sister, cry, he wants to play, cry, he needs to potty, cry, he does not want to be in his playpen or crate alone, cry.
Today he had an accident in his playpen in which he rolled around in it and then went crazy because his sleeping area had poop in it along with himself. Danny proceeded to give Boomerang a bath and clean out his playpen which is like a diaper explosion. Basically, if you want to see how your partner is with multiple children get a puppy because its like having a newborn and a 2-year-old at the same time.
Overall, what I am trying to explain is that no matter how crazy life is, planning a wedding is still able to fit in the open spots. For brides juggling so many things in their life, I’m right there with you, which is why we decided on a long engagement, so it was less pressure on planning and easier on our wallets.
Click here to read all Maggie’s planning posts to date
Maggie & Danny’s Wedding Vendors booked so far:
Photography – Abbie Takes Pictures
Wedding venue – Stone House of St. Charles
Videography – Sparked Media Collective
Florist – Roses and Mint
Paper goods, ketubah, kippot – Leah E Moss Designs
Bridal boutique – Mia Grace Bridal
‘If you’re a Jewish or Jew-ish bride-to-be, join Smashing The Glass’ Brides Club for step-by-step guides, handpicked wedding vendor discounts, Jewish wedding action plans, a free smash glass pouch, Jewish wedding checklists and templates, and SO much more!
Guided by the world’s number 1 Jewish wedding expert, Karen Cinnamon, Brides Club is the private community for brides that minimizes wedstress and overwhelm and maximises your budget. Join our Brides Club here.’
