Joy and Austin: Pikes Peak or Bust?

[ItsMeY'all]

12 hours ago, Iokaste said:

Sorry, but no. Not okay to joke about having a serious mental illness that is very misunderstood, because you "like symmetry". 

Didn't mean to offend anyone and I love your respect for mental illenss. I have been in extensive treatment for OCD (including inpatient tx) for 19 years and had to drop out of college at one point because of it. Sadly things being symmetrical is part of my illness. I didn't mean for it to sound flippant in my post. When my parents were building a new home when I was a teenager they actually ended up moving my bedroom window so it would be centered in the room because I was having so many issues with it being off center. I was fortunate to marry a man with similar issues (that have actually led to him not being able to drive for over six years now) and life is so much easier with someone who gets it. Just have to make sure we aren't feeding off of eachother.  

[CreationMuseumSeasonPass]

When my family traveled to Germany in 2001, two German teenage girls approached my dad in the train station because they were lost. I don't think it's because we looked native to the area, I think it mostly had to do with the fact that my dad had a wife and kids by him and appeared "safe" to approach. However, the first time I went to Europe as a teenager (during that trip) I remember thinking I stuck out like a touristy sore thumb. 

[TeamDefraudinSquad]

2 hours ago, bal maiden said:

Frankly, you don't need to be wearing an American shirt to be easily identifiable as an American in Europe. You all just tend to stand out regardless.

I went to Italy when I was 14, and I found this to be true the entire time my family was there. We're a petite bunch by all American standards, but in Italy, I wore a large or extra large everywhere I went shopping for clothes. I remember a few of the shop keepers I met over there said Americans are usually identifiable because they're heavier, and in cases where they're not on the heavy side, they're taller than the average Italian citizens. 

On the topic of Joy and Austin, I saw they revealed they're in Switzerland for their honeymoon! Speaking as someone who's parents were also controlling growing up, it really is one of the best feelings in the world to be able to finally keep secrets from your parents without being afraid that you'll have to answer to them for your choices. Good for them. 

[RhythmicSkater]

Forgive me for not knowing how to add links or pictures, but we finally have full pics of Joy's wedding party! Pics

 

[ihaveanexamintwodays]

5 hours ago, nickelodeon said:

Evidently the "come and take it" thing is a reference to the Texas revolution against Mexico, but naturally it's become a slogan for gun rights etc. However, given that Austin is weirdly obsessed with the state of Texas (has he ever lived there???) he's probably wearing it as a reference to the former.

He was born there, and based off the timelines we've gotten from CO he probably lived there until he was 8 or so? which is plentttty of time to be indoctrinated with Texan  (speaking as a proud native who couldn't imagine living anywhere without cheap gas and texmex lol). I immediately recognized the flag on his shirt, it's a significant part of our state's mythology, and i am totally kind of miffed that gun rights activists have evidently "borrowed" it. 

is it obnoxious of me that any time i travel anywhere (out of town, state, or country) that i take my boots with me? i'm sure cowboy boots stand out as much as any other "american"-wear, but they are good for walking and match everything! haha

[FundieCentral]

THEY ARE IN SWITZERLAND!

So happy that they went abroad, see something, experience something, away from the overreach of extended friends & family. 

[Alachantal]

On 2017-6-8 at 5:39 AM, JesSky03 said:

I had only had 5 bridesmaids but if I could do it over I would just have 1. The whole bridal party thing does seem a little silly to me now.

I didn't have any bridesmaids. We were going to have my brother as the grooms man and his sister as the bridesmaid, but since my brother walked me down the aisle that was a no-go. I'd have loved to have my two best friends and sister-in-law as bridesmaids, but cost wise and (mostly) stress-wise, we didn't see the point. They're still in all the photos and we hung out and did shots together all night, so really what was the difference?

If I could do my wedding over again the only thing I'd really change was the dress. I wanted sleeves but DH said if I had sleeves I'd look like a Duggar, and that was a no-go for me unfortunately  lol.

[zygote373]

I have a theory that the east/west jetlag problem depends on whether you're a morning person or a night owl.

I, a night owl who sucks at both falling asleep and waking up, have no problem going west. I just stay up later, sleep until whenever I need to get up, and I'm set. However, when I came back to the east coast from Hawaii, I couldn't fall asleep before 4 AM for a week despite waking up at 8 for work every morning. I was crying I was so tired, and yet.

[HideousGreenShirt]

I'm a blender. Regardless of where I am travelling, people always assume I'm from there and will frequently speak to me in whichever language, tourists/locals will ask me questions. It's fun but makes me sad that I'm not better at languages. 

 

Hopefully Joy and Austin continue this extended honeymoon for as long as TLC will pay or any money they have accrued themselves lasts. I want them backpacking/interrailing through Europe for at least the next year. Occasional "thanks for your well-wishes" videos but nothing much else would be ideal. They are kids; they should be out exploring the world and not tied down with a million babies. 

Wishful thinking.

[Jingeyk]

23 minutes ago, Alachantal said:

If I could do my wedding over again the only thing I'd really change was the dress. I wanted sleeves but DH said if I had sleeves I'd look like a Duggar, and that was a no-go for me unfortunately  lol.

I had sleeves! They were supposed to be wrist length but my seamstress ruined my dress during steaming and I didn't find out until I put it on an hour before the ceremony, I'm still disappointed because sleeves were the ONLY thing I didn't change my mind on when trying to choose a dress. 

[bjr70]

I plan on wearing Toms down the aisle. 

A friend of mine wore white doc martens under her ball gown wedding dress. She said it was the best decision she ever made, except marrying her husband of course.

[snarkysuki1724]

8 minutes ago, bjr70 said:

A friend of mine wore white doc martens under her ball gown wedding dress. She said it was the best decision she ever made, except marrying her husband of course.

My daughter wore rose-gold Vans under her wedding gown, and the flower girl had a matching pair.  

[VBOY9977]

So I noticed that people credited Lissa Chandler for wedding pictures, but the duggar family thanked Jon Courville for the pictures on their website... I wonder if people sent Lissa or if they had 2 photographers

Also, I went on Jennifer courville's (photographer's wife) instagram and she apparently got a minor concussion playing volleyball at the duggar house lol

[Alachantal]

5 minutes ago, Jingeyk said:

I had sleeves! They were supposed to be wrist length but my seamstress ruined my dress during steaming and I didn't find out until I put it on an hour before the ceremony, I'm still disappointed because sleeves were the ONLY thing I didn't change my mind on when trying to choose a dress. 

I'm majorly jealous of your sleeves! I'm sorry the seamstress ruined them! That must've been a horrible horrible surprise to find out the day of, I can't even imagine!

I think if I'd had sleeves I would have been a lot more comfortable in my dress. I don't wear dresses or skirts and I don't even go without sleeves around men who aren't family/in-laws... I loved my dress when I tried it on, but a couple days after I'd bought it I started hating it. Ended up nicknaming it "the world's ugliest dress". I wish I never compromised on sleeves. I compromised on the reception, flowers, food and getting married in an outdoor chapel instead of the church, but shouldn't have compromised on the thing I was wearing. Learn from my mistake y'all - always pick something you feel like yourself in!

/end rant

4 hours ago, SapphireSlytherin said:

I've found jet lag isn't a "thing" heading east. Heading west is a whole 'nother story... It always takes me a good week to get back to "normal" when we come back to the States from Europe.

This! We went to Europe on our honeymoon. Going there was perfectly fine, but coming home was a nightmare. We were idiots and figured since we arrived home the Victoria Day weekend work wouldn't need us so soon and we could recuperate. I ended up having to beg off work because I couldn't sleep and would not be safe to drive a loaded b-train of hydrochloric acid from BC to ID!

[veron1que]

7 hours ago, Lulu22du said:

Is it just me or does something seem off about Joy in that video? She just doesn't seem happy or madly in love. It looks like Austin adores her, but I don't get the same vibe from her. Anyone else thinking the same?

How funny, I thought she looked really happy and relaxed.

Ive always identified with Joy, I'm a cryer but I'm not super expressive when it comes to happiness. 

And Austin seems to be the only duggar hubby that looks back at Joy with adoration. We are always criticizing how the ladies have mastered the worship look towards their hubbies, but He's clearly fond of Joy. 

[Alachantal]

4 hours ago, bal maiden said:

Frankly, you don't need to be wearing an American shirt to be easily identifiable as an American in Europe. You all just tend to stand out regardless. I used to play a 'spot the Americans' game with my colleagues when I lived in Amsterdam, I would say we hit the nail on the head about 90% of the time. And when we were wrong they were usually Canadian... 

So true. DH and I are both born & raised in Eastern Europe before moving to Canada (separately as children of course, he from Bulgaria and me from Ukraine). When we go back to Europe - even Western Europe - it's incredibly easy to spot the North Americans. It's just the way they act, the way they carry themselves, and the way they talk. You can just tell. Since we both moved from Europe to Canada, people were 50/50 guessing where we were from. In Greece for example, they tried to speak Greek to my husband, who would then go "English?" and they'd assume he was American.  

On 2017-6-8 at 10:16 AM, ladybug15 said:

In NY only 1 witness is required. 

We did both civil ceremony and a year later a church wedding. I wanted my brother as my witness, and we had my husband's sister in law as the second, as his sister did not want to be one in the church (she is anti church). I told my husband I wouldnt care if we had 2 males, so he could have his brother, but he went with everyone that we had to have one of each gender.

Two are required in BC, Canada. Can't even have a courthouse wedding here. Unfortunately. We had both of our mothers as the witnesses. His sister and my brother offered, but we both wanted the mothers, figured it would be something special for them.

[Cheetah]

*jet lag - is worse coming home than going on vacay, regardless of direction.  Use benadryl.  Take a nap, but set your alarm for no more than 2 hours.

*obnoxious Americans - some Americans... mostly younger ones from the midwest or smaller us cities... can be really LOUD on public transportation.  Like we think that people will overhear our conversation and be interested and charmed and want to then approach or something.  Lumping myself in there because I was like that on my first Europe trip at age 19, and I still see it (hear it) when I travel.   There can be this naivete (I'm sure I'm spelling that wrong) that Americans are both novel and fascinating to everyone else.  (And... okay... I did get recruited into several photos for what were likely rural or small-town Chinese people visiting Shanghai at the same time I was there... but really, there is nothing novel about US tourists in any major city anywhere). 

...heading off to Hong Kong next week... then Bali... :-)

[subsaharanafrica]

For the first time in the five years since we moved I find myself wishing I still lived in Geneva. It's gorgeous this time of year. 

Good thing TLC is paying though. There are only a handful of places you can eat for less than $100 USD a meal. 

[just_ordinary]

Being European myself- it is true that you often can pick out the American tourists. But I think that it goes both ways. Europeans are noticed in other countries too. Every culture has their own stereotypes (good/bad) that people will somewhat match. Right now the view of American tourists concentrates a bit on negative stereotypes like just talking louder, table manners (some are very different) and always comparing things to America (where everything is better of course). Normally people would just raise their eyebrow, shrug it off and laugh about it. These days those stereotypical actions really rub people of the wrong way. Hopefully this will change again. In my case people sometimes realise fast that I am German. Thank God not the accent but I find it hard to smalltalk with people (in the queue, on the train...) and I don't use words like awesome etc. a lot. In Britain many people tend to use thanks (+variations)/please/that would be lovely etc.  A LOT. I have to remind myself all the time not to stick out as impolite. We are using this in Germany too but it is still different. Can't really lay my finger on it.

All that said, it is always good to travel the world. It widens the horizon wether you really have intense contact with locals or not. And it is fun!

[MadeItOut]

9 hours ago, FundieCentral said:

THEY ARE IN SWITZERLAND!

So happy that they went abroad, see something, experience something, away from the overreach of extended friends & family. 

We have friends and family living in Switzerland, both native and not. I would really like for them to visit a Swiss church and see how outreach is done there.

A friend of ours is a social worker out there. She's secular, but as a social worker, is attached to a church. They do so much on a practical basis - loads of what would count in UK as HCA/Living Asst. work. Our friend enjoys and thrives in the work vs the jaded, tired folks we see elsewhere. She credits a lot of that to how her state employers and the church employers work together on her professional maintenance and keeping her sane. Every few months they send her for 3-5 days doing what makes her feel good (in her case that's taking city kids for outward bounds activities) to top up her calm and sanity. In between she works some insane hours - especially if she's with someone in crisis, but it really suits her and she's good at it.

[MadeItOut]

Does anyone happen to know if there's any truth in the statistics that get trotted out relating Americans and travel? (Genuine interest - I've never made it to the States yet). What we get told is:

* Only about 10% of Americans have a passport

* About 5% of Americans ever travel abroad

* Roughly 3% of Americans never travel outside their home State.

I'd be willing to bet those figures are civilian only, but still, it seems odd. Though of course there's the question of scale, which living in a place you can cover tip to tail in 7.5hrs, or across in 4.5hrs, is really difficult to imagine. Someone did once tell me that there's a state that would comfortably fit 15 Irelands into it. - sadly it's a case of buggered if I can remember which one, though it may come back as it's gonna rattle round in the background now until it's resolved.

 

[Chewing Gum]

Oy, Joy looks so tired in that video. I really hope she's alright. Her brainwashed "I'm so excited" beginning of her sentence followed by a silence in which she was searching for her words, did not convince me she was excited at all. Not like someone who was having difficulty trying to choose between 10 exciting things. 

[nvmbr02]

6 minutes ago, MadeItOut said:

Does anyone happen to know if there's any truth in the statistics that get trotted out relating Americans and travel? (Genuine interest - I've never made it to the States yet). What we get told is:

* Only about 10% of Americans have a passport

* About 5% of Americans ever travel abroad

* Roughly 3% of Americans never travel outside their home State.

I'd be willing to bet those figures are civilian only, but still, it seems odd. Though of course there's the question of scale, which living in a place you can cover tip to tail in 7.5hrs, or across in 4.5hrs, is really difficult to imagine. Someone did once tell me that there's a state that would comfortably fit 15 Irelands into it. - sadly it's a case of buggered if I can remember which one, though it may come back as it's gonna rattle round in the background now until it's resolved.

 

I don't know how accurate those statistics are, I would imagine more people have passports now that they are needed for air travel to Canada and Mexico. But I do know plenty of Americans that have not traveled out of the country. When we first entertained the idea of moving overseas several years back most people thought we were crazy. Recently we met up with my mother in law in Hong Kong since it is close to where we are living and the airfare to Hong Kong from the US mainland was much cheaper than a plane ticket to where we currently live and when she checked in on Facebook in HK most of the people were asking her why she would want to go there. She is in her mid 60's and has lived her whole life in the midwest but she loves to travel. She visited us a few times while we were in Europe and now she visits us in Asia. 

But anyway. yeah, a lot of Americans don't travel or don't travel outside the U.S. It is sad really, they are missing so much. 

[adidas]

10 hours ago, FundieCentral said:

THEY ARE IN SWITZERLAND!

So happy that they went abroad, see something, experience something, away from the overreach of extended friends & family. 

I was going to guess New Zealand. I'm happy they went abroad too!

[bal maiden]

I think lots of Americans don't travel abroad, but when your country essentially covers an entire continent, how much need do you have to do so? You can't go skiing in the UK (well, barely), so British people travel to France, Switzerland, Germany, Austria etc. In the US you have lots of skiing options all within the borders. You want to see geysers and you like in the UK? You go to Iceland. Americans just need to go to Yellowstone. You want to visit a desert or swim in warm seas from the UK? You have to travel abroad; Americans can go to numerous deserts and numerous places with warm waters within their own borders. And so on. I'm not saying there's not value to travelling abroad and cultural tourism, etc., but I think it's often hard for Europeans to appreciate the scale and diversity of the USA in terms of climate, landscape etc. Plus, of course, you can in theory drive to most of the USA, whereas to go to Europe or Asia etc you have to fly.