Joe and Kendra 3: Running Toward Marriage

[MissKnowItAll]

Surely they'll have one saying "Bless This Mess". 

[Bugaboo]

8 hours ago, MissKnowItAll said:

Surely they'll have one saying "Bless This Mess". 

Aka their marriage?

[neurogirl]

I've had so much FJ to catch up on...because I got engaged!!!! Reading FJ has definitely made me notice things I otherwise wouldn't. For example, my aunt started crying at the news and said, "I'm so proud of you," which is not something that she said when I graduated hs/college/started my PhD program. So I said "I haven't done anything!" All I did was say yes! My other life accomplishments took more concentrated effort. But I understood the sentiment. And I believe this was discussed on some thread drift somewhere.

Also I can't snark too much on Joe and Kendra for looking alike because my bf and I are both a bit shorter than average, super pale, with dark blonde hair and blue eyes. So I guess very similar to JoKen. No-one has ever mistaken us for siblings though, fortunately! 

[WiseGirl]

5 minutes ago, neurogirl said:

I've had so much FJ to catch up on...because I got engaged!!!! 

Congratulations! 

[MadeItOut]

13 hours ago, neurogirl said:

I've had so much FJ to catch up on...because I got engaged!!!! 

Congratulations on your engagement, but fwiw I'm more impressed at you having a bash at a PhD - I'm too scared to.

[Percy]

Congrats on all you have achieved.

[Lillybee]

Best Wishes for your marriage.

[scoutsadie]

20 hours ago, neurogirl said:

I've had so much FJ to catch up on...because I got engaged!!!! Reading FJ has definitely made me notice things I otherwise wouldn't. For example, my aunt started crying at the news and said, "I'm so proud of you," which is not something that she said when I graduated hs/college/started my PhD program. 

1. Good on you for your hard work!

2. Congrats on your engagement!

3. WTF re: your aunt's comment?! Such a weird thing to say. Do you think she was just overwhelmed, or actually sees that as more of an accomplishment on your part than your academic achievement?

[neurogirl]

Thank you so much everyone!!! 

@scoutsadie My family, particular my extended family, is from North Dakota and traditional. I think my aunt was mostly proud of the "woman I'm growing up to be" or something like that, but given the jinder roles taken on in the marriages of my family, some of that statement was definitely happy that I will be successfully married off. 

For example, the aunt that said this is a nurse in a NICU who also is a flight nurse on helicopters taking tiny sick babies to larger hospitals for treatment. She's a badass. And yet she does all the cooking/cleaning/plan-making/organizing/pet care in her family. Both my parents work, and my mom (and I) also did all the cooking/cleaning/calling people/buying gifts/etc. Granted, the men in my family do help in traditionally masculine ways (grilling, mowing, fixing things around the house), but it never works out in equal measure. So I had to have long talks with my now fiancé about how even though i was going to make less money than he will (academia does not pay well for a while), we have to have equal division of labor. Fortunately he knows I'm very sensitive to perceived imbalances and tries his best to help (though he was raised by a stay-at-home mother and doesn't see the mess I do...there's a lot to unpack there and it's one of the things we have to be careful of the most)!

Sorry for all the parentheses and thank you again, kind FJ-ers!

[feministxtian]

congrats on your engagement @neurogirl 

[purplepeony]

Congrats @neurogirl, I also got engaged recently and I have have received loads of cards congratulating me, loads more than I did for my degree or first job. I even got them from distant relatives who I wasn't even sure who they were untill asking my mum! I wasn't sure if it was because people wanted a wedding invite or if it is actually seen as a bigger accomplishment. Obviously, it is lovely that people are happy for me but it did make me think!

[Daisy0322]

6 hours ago, purplepeony said:

I wasn't sure if it was because people wanted a wedding invite or if it is actually seen as a bigger accomplishment. Obviously, it is lovely that people are happy for me but it did make me think!

I kind of think that it's just because it's a common unifying milestone. I didn't get much congratulations when I graduated, but I was the first in my family to graduate. I know they were proud of me but I doubt they understood the time, dedication, and energy that goes into it. Compared to say when I got married everyone was very excited for me and I think some of that has to do with them reminiscing about thier own wedding days and such.

[allthegoodnamesrgone]

@Daisy0322I think you are right in a way.  When I finished college, at 36. my dad made a HUGE deal out of it, he made me go to my college graduation (that I didn't want to go to) and my brother even commented on it, which for him is a big deal.  Now I realize in my family we were, at the time the only 3 who had graduated from college.  I've since had 2 cousins complete school, they are brother & sister.  No one else in either side of my extended family graduated from college or even attempted to attend.   I have 18 cousins on my mom's side and the youngest is almost or may already be 30, and more 2nd cousins than I can care to count right now, but so far of the 2nd cousins who are old enough which I think is about 13 only 3 have graduated and 3 have attended but dropped out (my son is one of these).  And there are at least 13  more that are still in K-12 and 2 that are preschool aged. My dad's family is just him and 1 cousin, that cousin never went to college and never had kids he was a military man until he retired after 30 yrs.  

[CreationMuseumSeasonPass]

My brother finished his master's degree at Iowa State last summer and walked during their winter commencement @allthegoodnamesrgone. He didn't really want to, but my dad told him he would regret it one day. That was three summers of intense classes! This was also the same commencement where our now Gov. Kim Reynolds received her bachelor's degree and walked across the stage. I don't agree with Reynolds politically, but I admire her for finishing her college degree in her 50s and walking proudly across that stage. It's never to late to educate!

[allthegoodnamesrgone]

I remember that.  I too attended ISU my 1st go round in the colligate world, I failed miserably.  I'm the child that was raised what I'm finding out to be a fundy light family, never thought of it before but looking back yeah I think we were, with VERY strict parents. I was never allowed any freedom to set boundaries, and then suddenly I was sent off to college an hour from home with only myself to report to, at 17 (3 weeks shy of turning 18).  Lets just say, I was the beer pong, beer bong champ of the off campus party set after my 2 1/2 years there.  My GPA was a whopping 1.9 when I was finally kicked out. But I had raised to from a 1.2, I thought that was good enough but nope I had to have at least a 2.0 and I didn't make it. Anyway I finally did graduate from Upper Iowa in 2007 almost 20 years after I left ISU, with a 3.6, since they took none of my D's and F's from ISU, I still had to take 2 more years of classes, but I did much better.  I've also since discovered that I have ADHD and have had my whole life, back in the 70's & 80's I was just a willful child who refused to follow the rules, no matter how much you punished me, and boy did I ever get punished.  My mother of all people get it now, but my dad still thinks I'm just being a brat.  Turns out an illness that almost killed me as an infant had more lasting affects on me than anyone realized I read an article about children who had had meningitis before the age of 5, and what their lives were like now as adults (I had it at 7 months old) almost all of us have ADHD, almost all of had had trouble in school, the few of us who did graduate from college did so in later life, we tend to be job hoppers, I'm, we tend to be over weight I am, and we tend to have depression and anxiety, mostly related to undiagnosed ADD/ADHD which I have. How much better things could have been for me if I had known 40 years ago that I wasn't just a brat, there was something physically wrong with my brain. 

As you can see from my ramblings, I get off track A LOT. 

[HereticHick]

On 8/5/2017 at 4:05 AM, MissKnowItAll said:

Surely they'll have one saying "Bless This Mess". 

Do Gothard ladies get a wooden sign painted "Keep Sweet"?

[allthegoodnamesrgone]

31 minutes ago, HereticHick said:

Do Gothard ladies get a wooden sign painted "Keep Sweet"?

To masculine, I'm sure they might have a nice needle point, or something like that crazy strawberry lady with the blonde hair whose name is escaping me at the moment did with bible versus.

[Carm_88]

8 minutes ago, allthegoodnamesrgone said:

To masculine, I'm sure they might have a nice needle point, or something like that crazy strawberry lady with the blonde hair whose name is escaping me at the moment did with bible versus.

Hahah Sierra! Who did hand lettering like Josiah's ex Marjorie. 

[IReallyAmHopewell]

2 minutes ago, Carm_88 said:

Hahah Sierra! Who did hand lettering like Josiah's ex Marjorie. 

"Hand Lettering" (how is it not calligraphy?) is an industry now. All those chalkboards, all those precious, sweet messages. 

[Iamtheway]

There is a really scary photo of me and my first boyfriend where we look like twins. A lot more like twins then Jana and JD look and they actually are twins. We both have curly hair in the exact same tone, we both wear glasses that are quite similar in style, we have tops in the exact same blue and the light make our eyes look the exact same colour too.

Luckily this was taken pre digital cameras and only exsists in one paper copy somewhere in a box in my parents house. 

[shiverful]

Are we on wedding day watch yet? They've had their joint bachelor and bachelorette's party, and the new season starts in september (right after the wedding??). Any guesses?

I an going with August 26th, but as I don't know anything about the US calendar, it's an uneducated guess (when is and what is labor day anyway?? You can't were white after it? I don't know, lol).

[LacyMay]

On the wedding congratulations vs other achievements. I realized the exact same thing and found it especially pronounced at church. What struck me as really interesting there was the reactions when I graduated and got my first job (congratulatory but not a big thing, few people went out of there way to say something) to when Mr. May graduated  (It was a big thing) to when we got engaged (People fell over themselves to congratulate me but very few people said anything to him) 

In general though I wonder if in addition to being a unifying experience some of it is the logistics/timing? I feel like there's a really big period of time to congratulate someone on an engagement/marriage  (pretty much anytime from the yes to the I do) which also means that there's more time for the news to spread. Whereas with a degree or job people might not know when it happens and feel weird saying something months later? 

[albanuadh_1]

I think It will be a Labour Day weekend wedding.

 

[Fundie Bunny]

5 hours ago, shiverful said:

(when is and what is labor day anyway?? You can't were white after it? I don't know, lol).

i believe it is what most countries celebrate on may 1st. But you know, america and its fear of association with communism

[faraway]

Was this posted somewhere before?

They gathered everyone to talk about absolutely nothing at all... Poor Jana though.