Please Sir...Can I have Christmas?

In planning the wedding I told F that he's in charge of our Honeymoon. I gave him 3 criteria: Somewhere warm, Somewhere neither of us has been before, and dang if I didn't forget what the 3rd one was! Oh well. Anyway, he suggested that even though it goes against the main criteria, that we go back to The Homeland. This is an opportunity that would be stupid of me to pass up. So I said yes, as long as we DO NOT stay with relatives while there. He agreed.
He just called to tell me that he was looking at prices online for us to go over Christmas break. He gets very few vacation days, and we both get that time off between Christmas and New Years, so this is our best bet for an extended Honeymoon.

F: "I just checked tix to The Homeland. They're $1,500 before Christmas and $1,100 on Christmas day or there after."
ME: "I'd prefer to go the day after(Christmas.) Especially if it saves us almost a grand."
F: "Why the day after? Why not on Christmas?"
ME: "Um, because it's CHRISTMAS DAY."
F: "And what are you going to do on Christmas day anyway?"
ME: "Spend my first Christmas with my new husband." (this of course was a blatant gab at boasting his ego, you'll see how well that worked....)
F: "Look at it this way. You know I don't get much time off and this is a free day. So we'll have one more day to spend doing stuff."
Me: " So, what you're telling me is that I get to spend my FIRST Christmas with my HUSBAND on an airplane????"
F: " *sigh* Yes. We'll have more time to do stuff with that extra day."
ME: "hmph."

So yes, lucky me, I get to spend my Christmas not in comfy clothes snuggled in front of our fireplace in our newly remodeled family room, with my HUSBAND. But cramped on an airplane for god only knows how long with the unwashed masses.
Yeah. Oliver Twist gots nothin' on me.

Make Me Thin: Parts 2 & 3

Remember the Make You Thin Guy and his 4 Golden Rules? I missed the second installment about emotional eating, but happened upon it later during the week. The emotional eating deterrent? Tapping. Lots of annoying, self inflected tapping. Tap under your eye, followed by your collar bone, then the pinky side of your hand, then the top of your hand while looking down and to the right, then down and to left, then in a circle, then hum, then count to 5, then hum again, all while tapping the hell out of the top of your hand. Honestly, I don’t know if it change how my brain processed things like he claimed or I was just so focused on how my hand and collar bone were being to bruise from all the tapping that killed the emotional eating. I haven’t had to put it in actual practice yet since my emotions have been whipped by pure exhaustion. Too tired to even care to eat. Working on the family room is really putting the screws to me, but it’s all coming together, and the paint color I picked looks lovely against the orange and red brick fireplace. Last night however, I managed to remember to watch Part 3, Killing the Cravings. Praise the gods, I need that! And how, pray tell, do you manage that? Well folks, you gross yourself the hell out. Yes, that’s right, GROSS YOURSELF OUT. Apparently, the human’s imagination is greater than the human’s will power. So imagine the food that absolutely turns your stomach and makes you want to gag. Then imagine yourself eating said food, eh, not tooooo bad, until he tells you to add gross things on top of it. Like hair. Off an un-swept barbershop floor. Not gagging yet? Add the contents of a spittoon. (For you young ones Merriam Webster has this to say about a spittoon: a receptacle for spit. Think what people who chew spit into.) This is all heaped on top of/mixed in with, the food you are craving. Eyes watering yet? Covering your mouth and heading for the bathroom? That’s how I felt when I thought of a fish, with its scales still on it, it’s bulging cold dead eye staring at me. Covered in hair off a barbershop floor. With tobacco spit on it.
Makes me gag just writing it.
While imagining all these gross things you are suppose to press your thumb and middle fingers together on your left hand.
After completely gagging yourself, you are suppose to think happy-happy-joy-joy thoughts while pressing your thumb and middle finger together on your right hand. (I used the memories of when F proposed and when my little nephew, just over 1yrs old, kept acting the fool just in order to make me laugh. )
And that, my friends, is how you kill a craving.
So of course, me and my endlessly wandering brain decided that wasn’t gross enough. That in order to get the full effect, I needed to think of even more disgusting things to heap on my fish, with its scales still on and it’s bulging cold dead eye staring at me. And this of course could only be accomplished whilst in bed, trying to sleep.
Want to know what I came up with? If you have a weak stomach, stop here.

So going with the hair theme, since we are all raised to be grossed out by hair in our food, I thought of the grossest hair area I could.
Guesses?
How about the strip of tape covered with hair after a lovely day of bikini waxing? Brazilian anyone?
Toe Hair.
Toe Jam.
Used…….well, now I’m grossing myself out too much here. Needless to say I didn’t get much sleep last night.

What would your gross out items be? You know, in case mine stop working some day.

Say that Again?!

What follows is a conversation I had with Second-Eldest Sister concerning her upcoming wedding. She got engaged several months after F and I and our family couldn't be happier with our soon-to-be BIL.


*SES: "We've decided on a month to get married."
ME: "That's great! When?"
SES: "May."
ME: "May??!"
SES: "Yes, May."
ME: MAY?!?! As in May in two months MAY?!?!?!!?!?!?"
SES: "Yes, that's right."
ME: "Well, um, Wow. That's great!"
SES: *sigh* NO! You goof ball, NEXT May!"
ME:"OH! I was gonna say!"
SES: "Yes, May, 2009."
ME: "Thank goodness, I don't need someone else stealing my bridal thunder!"(the 2 girls I work with who both got engaged after me, but are getting married before me. Plus, they're younger than me! jerks.)
SES: "Exactly."
ME: "Have you picked an actual day?"
SES: "Not yet."

*Please note, this is the same Sister who when I was very little would tell me the mannequins in the store were my parents. And then, lead me around said store while covering my eyes and running me into things.
Shopping with her was great fun.

Not So Happy Easter

I hope everyone had an excellent Easter Holiday! Stuffed yourself silly with chocolate and what-not.
I however, can not say my Easter weekend was a banner one.
It all started to go down hill on Thursday, I should have known then. Normally we are let out of work early, several hours. Not so this time around.
1st Warning.

I’d been compiling a list in my head for several days for things to do on my day off, Good Friday, and finally decided to write it all down throughout the day on Thursday. Needless to say, I forgot what half the things were that I wanted to do. Thursday night I hardly slept. Which means that after F left to go to work (poor sucker) I rolled over and fell back to sleep, until 10 am. I proceeded to lie in bed until 11ish, knowing full well I had to donate blood at Church at 3pm. I didn’t feel well, but dragged myself up, and started to cross things off my list. NOT. First I went to the store that purportedly carried the shoes I want to wear for my wedding. They do not stock all the shoes (so much for trying them on), and specifically do not CARRY the shoes I want because they do not carry that supplier.
2nd Warning.

Then I headed to the grocery store. I had a list and a flyer full of fabulous coupons. The first place I went? Literally had isles TAPED OFF. The shelves that were accessible were half empty. I turned heel and ran back to my car. I was close to the Church and decided to donate early. After waiting AN HOUR, I was told my iron was too low and I couldn’t donate that day.
3rd Warning.

I decided to finish (start) my grocery shopping and headed several miles away to a store I knew would be stocked and clean. Nice store, about 20mins out of my way though. Apparently that extra mileage equates into extra high prices! Crazy! And once I started trying to get the items that I had coupons for, I discovered they were those misleading kind: SAVE $2 on any 3 frozen dinners! SAVE $1 on any 2 EXTRA LARGE SIZE items! Huh? That’s not a deal! So I put back the 10 items I had in my cart and head those extra 20 minutes back home to another grocery store.
4th Warning.

After 4 warning signs you’d think I’d figure it out. Not so much.

It started snowing while in the grocery store, and the wind was whipping. As I stomped in the house, cold and wet and extremely hungry loaded down with groceries, F was no where to be found. Oh, wait, that’s right he was in the shower! “Warming up.” GRRRRR. He helped put away the groceries while I collapsed on the couch with a hunger induced headache.
“Fffffffff” I whimpered, “Will you please make dinner? I’m done, I’m just DONE! And I have a headache from hunger.”
“I’m not hungry right now.”
Pardon? I just told you I was in pain from not eating and you tell me you’re not hungry? How many times have I stopped what I was doing to make you dinner because you “are so hungry I’m really shaking!”
Make the damned spaghetti already!
“Please, seriously, I NEED to eat.”
“Ok.”

So, let’s recap Good Friday: Wedding shoes? Nope.
Donate life saving blood? Nope.
Use somewhat fabulous coupons to get discounted yummy food? Nope.
Wasted several hours? Yep.
Wasted way too much gas? Oh yeah.
Saturday? Not much better.
F had to get some blood work done, so he dragged me out of bed with him at 8 am with the promise of a fabulous breakfast. I hadn’t even showered.
We drive FOREVER to this place that takes 2 seconds to draw his blood.
The fabulous breakfast? Eh. Cracker Barrel has some awesome bacon, let me tell you, the biscuits were pretty good too, and that was the highlight of my breakfast.
We drove home and I collapsed back into bed for the next few hours while F painted the ceiling in the family room.
I didn’t really sleep, a trend I’ve been experiencing lately and am not too thrilled about.
Got up, showered and started getting ready. We were going to meet my friends and F wanted to stop at the Outlet mall to get new tennis shoes. As always 2 mins after he gets out of the shower he announces that he’s ready to go! That I need to hurry up! So I rush. I am seconds from walking out the door to leave to find F, in the basement, on the computer, still only half dressed. The directions to the restaurant? Not written down. The cars not moved around, he was too busy to do his stuff because he was chatting with a cousin! Grrrrrrrr We fought about it in the car, he couldn’t see that my point was not whether or not we would be late, but that EVERY TIME we have somewhere to go he says he’s ready then as I’m at the door he can’t find his shoes, or his wallet, or his cell or his glasses or needs to write this or that, or stop at the hardware store, or the post office, or the bank, or SOMETHING that puts us 10 minutes behind schedule that he could have been doing while I was getting ready.
“You’re blowing it out of proportion.” he stated.
WRONG THING TO SAY buddy boy.
5th Warning.

Dinner went well. F was kind of ignored by the other husbands, but boys don’t socialize as well as girls anyway.
We got home really late and when the morning came, I dreaded heading to Easter Sunday Services. I waited until the last possible service at noon.
Once we got home F painted the ceiling with a second coat while I cleaned the disaster of a kitchen. I even moved the stove to mop!
“DH, I’m so hunger, I’m shaking!”
really? cause I’m not. “I’ll make dinner, but I have to finish cleaning the stove first, do you want me to make you a sandwich to hold you until then?”
“Yes!”
And this is where all those warning sign were pointing, Easter Sunday Dinner. I’d had an idea in my head to use some salsa to spice up the baked chicken and I was going to season the whole grain brown rice so it won’t taste so nasty, and all would be lovely in the land.
The chicken smelled good, but still tasted extremely bland.
The rice wasn’t done.
I cried.
Like a damn hysterical woman.
“I can’t cook! I know how to cook, but every time I do, it comes out wrong! I feel like such a failure!”
“Oh, DH, I’ve never seen you this way! Wow, you are really having an emotional breakdown.” He consolingly wraps his arms around me.
“Your mother thinks I can’t do anything! And what happens when I have to cook for them? Especially T? She’s such a fabulous cook!”
“OMG, why are you worrying about that?”
“I’m a woman! I’ve been raised to believe that I should be able to cook for my husband! I never thought I’d feel this way. I want you to eat my food because you like, not because that’s all there is!!!” At this point I’m practically wailing.
“Oh, DH. I’m not marrying you because of that!”
It went on that way for a few more minutes, with F promising we would learn to cook together. Which really didn’t make me feel any better, but I know he was trying.
I felt completely defeated the rest of the day. I was still upset the next morning. I could feel the dark bony fingers of depression weaving their way into my psyche. So I stayed home, taking a vacation day from work.
I painted the family room. It looks good.
But I’m still skittish about making dinner.

Who is this emotional basket case I’ve become?????

Weird

Seen on the way home last night: A six foot cowboy wearing his hat and........ Birkenstocks
It was 35 degrees out.

This and That

F and I are trying this new way of eating. I happened to run across a show on Sunday night on TLC called, I Can Make You Thin. So I watched it. Apparently this guy is a huge hit in England. And following his rules seems fairly easy:

1) Eat when you are hungry(hmmm, often I feel I should be eating, especially when I'm bored)

2)Eat what you want (ice cream here I come!)

3) Eat consciously(this involves setting down your knife and fork in between bites, not eating in front of the tv or reading, not easy)

4)Stop eating when you are full(right now I am having a hard telling when I am full)

But I've really been trying to do this. The full part is especially hard since I'm used to eating til I'm stuffed. I can tell when I'm not hungry anymore, but full? Not so easy. He says if you get hungry again in 10 mins after having eaten, eat again, or drink a glass of water. Next show covers Overcoming Emotional Eating. Blessed be, I need THAT. What I really need is How to Overcome Boredom Eating. Now that is a topic I'm sure many of us have issues with.

I need Bridal Body 2008, is what I need. I'm so damned lazy.

On a completely different end of the spectrum, I was searching online for thigh high nylons to wear on my wedding day to go with my garter equipped bustier. Apparently, the only way you can advertise thigh-highs is if you show the thonged ass above the nylons and hooker heels below them. My friend walked by my office as I was scanning the page and exclaimed, "DH!!!"

To which I immediately responded, "It's Not what you think!!"

Really, why is it that thigh -highs with seams are considered hooker wear? Or Adult Entertainment wear if you need to be P.C. And the sidebar on the screen that has "Sponsored Links"? Stocking Fetish Video, and Penis Enlargement. Um, seriously, I just wanted some nice nylons for my wedding day.

I did find some, they are very cute and sexy and bridal, and from Taiwan. Great, won't be going there anytime soon.

If they had a seam up the back, I'd be flying to Taiwan.

I Need Your Help

I have always had somewhat of a contentious relationship with Second Eldest BIL. When he first showed up on the scene 20+ years ago, I didn’t like him because he was cutting into my time with Eldest Sister, we were very close, us two sisters. As time went on I found his humor to be relentless and often cruel, and as a young girl who was still coming into her own, I didn’t have the verbal skills to defend myself. I also felt that he, being an adult, should know when to quit(Eldest Sister is 11 yrs older than me and he’s, I believe, another 4 yrs older than her). Needless to say, I had to broach the subject with Eldest Sister, asking her to please intervene on my behalf. She did, and things improved, for years. As I got older, though, things began to revert back to what they were. I would defend myself as best I could, but he was often belittling and down right mean. I was at loss as to what to do, what to say that would finally put him in his place. Often his cruelty leaves me speechless with rage. He reprimands me as if I was a child instead of an adult. “Oh my GOSH DH.” “What the HECK, DH.” Most recently he has taken to calling me gullible. A trait that I think at one time he enjoyed, especially when he could exploit it. Now however, I think he finds it almost disgusting. When I relate a story that I read on the net he calls me gullible. When I relate something I hear on the radio, he rolls his eyes and tells me that it can’t be true. It really hurts my feelings because honestly, I’m not gullible. I feel I’m well informed and well educated. Things that we all pass along via e-mail because they are humorous, he criticizes, in a “Reply to All” scathing e-mail. My opinions are all but dismissed as ill-informed and uneducated. I feel he is mere moments from declaring me stupid. This is exactly how he makes me feel. I’m quite tired of it. I have relayed my anger and frustration to F. But neither of us knows how to confront him. I can’t hold my temper, which means my sword like tongue (my mother’s words, not mine) fails me and is as sharp as a wet noodle. It happened again this weekend. “Guuuullible.” Was his sing-songy comment regarding my presenting Second Eldest Sister with a St Joseph statue, which is suppose to help you sell your house. I looked at F and he shook his head. I don’t know if anyone else caught the look on my face of pure hatred, but it was there.
So anyone, please, how do I deal with this? Short of calling him a fucking ass, which wouldn’t do well for family relations. I’m at a total loss. I need some advice. Help me please!

Hair Raising Issues Part 2

Shortly after I posted yesterday about my hair, I got an e-mail from my cousin whom I’d asked to do my hair for the wedding. She did my hair for F’s office Christmas party that first year, and it looked FABU! Just after F and I got engaged (9 months now!) she started a new job. This is great for her, because now she makes more money and has health insurance for her and her family. But turns out, it sucks for me. Here’s what part of her e-mail imparted:

(….) “Unfortunately I will only be able to take a 1/2 day on that Friday. :-( I couldn't remember if I told you yet or not. So I will not be able to help out with your hair, I'm sorry. But I know you'll be Gorgeous! (just make sure that you have a trial run so you’re comfortable with the stylist & style)
So, there goes my mimosa drinking, hair styling, morning. *La Sigh*
Now I have to go to my stylist, who does a great job cutting my hair, I just don’t know how the up dos will go over. I saw up dos that they did, and seriously? A little too little girlie. Of course that could have been what bride wanted.
And what her brides’ maids wanted too.
Oh, god, I’m screwed.

This is the look I want:

Oh, and if I could have their size 00 bodies too? Yeah, that'd be great, thanks!

Hair Today

I, like so many other Brides, am “growing out” my hair in preparation for my wedding. It’s been shoulder length for several years, anything past shoulder length and it gets mangy. Knowing this, I still feel the need to have long flowing locks upon my wedding day. Plus I’m too cheap to pay for a white girl’s weave, i.e. extensions. I have extremely fine hair. As a former stylist told me, “Your hair is very fine, but you have a lot of it.” That however doesn’t make it curl any easier. I am not the kind of female that gets up an hour early to make sure my hair is perfectly coifed. I used to. But then I got old and didn’t care anymore and discovered clip thingies. I try, I do, but proper hair maintenance takes time and frankly, I’d prefer to use it sleeping. Anyone with fine hair will tell you that getting it to hold a curl is near impossible. CBF has even finer hair and less then I do. She also is not a great maintainer of hair and whenever we go anywhere together she poaches my products. I remember her calling me about hair styling (she thinks I’m a great hair stylist, silly girl) for a big to-do she was attending. Knowing the state of fineness of her hair, my sage advice was, “Spray it before, during and after curling. That’s the best way to get to hold for most of the night.” Most of the things I know about styling has come from making mistakes. You should see my prom pictures. YIKES. And that was the product of like 3 hours of curling. It held all night though, I must say. When my hair is short I use the smallest curling iron possible. Last night I broke down and bought a new curling iron. My hair has gotten so long that the 2” barrel one I’ve been using for years now, doesn’t do enough. The 1” barrel one did too much (my bangs hated me that day.) So I searched and found 1 ¼” barrel, EUREKA! I used it this morning. It seems to be working. I was tempted, after having read (several times) Molly’s post about how she does her hair, to buy hot rollers. I would LOOOVE to have Molly Hair, but the $11.96 curling iron won out over the $39.95 hot rollers.(I'd also looooove to have those red shoes she's got posted today about her wedding shoes. Seriously, I'm not stalking her, I swear!) That plus the fact that hot rollers would take more time than a quick 8 (probably more like 5) curls with the curling iron.
It’s a good thing I’m having my hair done for the wedding. Or I’d probably show up with it pulled back in a clip thingy.

Ok, so I just reread this post and seriously, I’m kinda lame.

Can Somebody Get That?

Remember the lady with the Crocs and the inappropriate questions/comments and purple hair? Yes well, in a meeting with the entire office the other day her cell phone went off. In and of its self is no biggie; until she reached DOWN HER SHIRT to pull it OUT OF HER BRA.

Her BRA people, her BRA.


It’s probably better that she didn’t have it set to vibrate cause lord only knows where she would’ve pulled it out of then……………

Operator..Please Give Me #9......

And if you Disconnect me, I'll kick you right behind.....

Remember that childhood rhyme? Well this weekend, while F was making phone calls back to The Homeland about the wedding, as per FIL's demands, FIL kept beeping in. So F asked me to call FIL and tell him to stop calling.
So I did.
FIL: "F!?"
ME: "No, it's DH."
silence
ME: "F is on the phone and wants you to stop calling him." *nervous giggle* i knew this wasn't going over well
FIL: "OOOOH well EXCUSE ME! I gave him the wrong number and was going to give him the correct one."
ME: "Well you can *CLICK*

That's right folks. My 70 yr old future father-in-law hung up on me.
Like he was a 16 yr old girl.
So yeah, I'd like to kick him right behind the ...........

Overwhelmed

I cried in the shower this morning.

This wedding thing is really getting to me. REALLY getting to me. F still hasn't whipped up his side of the guest list and it was really upsetting me.
I know affording this wedding isn't going to be a simple, "Here Daddy! Pay for this!" Because I have no Daddy(literally) and even if I did, I doubt he could pay for it. God rest his soul.

That, and my house isn't selling and I am EXTREMELY BROKE because of it.

Also, I'm deathly afraid I'm not going to like my dress once my sister finishes it. Or my fat arms will still be fat, and goodness I am such a damn girl!

F turned off the water, wrapped me in towel and hugged me.

I wish I was still there in his warm arms instead of here, at work.

I'm really lucky to have him.

Remote This

I was watching “Who’s Wedding is it Anyway?” the other night and the MOG (mother of the groom) went out and bought a red dress to wear to the wedding. We are talking bright cherry red. The Bride was understandably upset. Her mother was wearing dark silver and her grandmother was in lilac. The BM’s were in black. So the cherry red? Can we say, FOCAL POINT? The wedding planner tried to intervene by telling the MOG that the dress was amazing and she looked great in it, but maybe she should exchange it for one in a different color “gun metal gray perhaps?” MOG’s reasoning behind her choice was completely self serving. “It’s MY BABY’S Wedding! And it’s during the holidays (they were having a new year’s wedding), so why not RED? Plus it looks great on me! Hahahahaha!”
“What a bitch.” Was my response to the TV. I went to bed before I saw if she changed it or not. I have CFB checking her TiVo to see if she has it and can tell me what the out come was. I have to say one thing for MIL, she would never do that. She knows better. She has better manners than that. Thank You MIL.

Update: CBF says: "She did indeed where that red (or as she called it, burgundy) dress. And then at the reception, she got drunk and went around to all the tables exclaiming that she was the groom's mother. Apparently, she did not have a wedding, so she saw this as her chance. I think she might have bi-polar disorder. Crazy biznatch."


Last night we were watching Rich Bride_Poor Bride. The one couple that was on, the girl was a total blond. She kept going over budget and couldn’t understand why anyone was getting upset. Every time her planner said, “This is going over budget” she’d say, “it doesn’t matter, they’ll pay for it.” “They” being the parents. She kept signing for things without telling her future spouse. Like the harpist for $500 for the first hour. F’s response to it all? “I’d leave you if you were like that.” This is his answer every time we watch this show. I just looked at him. “I would! This should tell him how she’s going to be when they get married. Not telling him stuff! That’s ridiculous.”
“I’m thinking if I was like that, you’d know it by now. Plus, you are a hypocrite. I KNOW there are things you don’t tell me.” I said pointedly.
He smiled, he knew he’d been caught.
“Right.”
At one point the planner had an intervention to try and stop the spending. This was the one time I was on the girl’s side. Her future in-laws ripped into her. I think at one point they even told her she was stupid. Which ok, maybe she was, but they shouldn’t talk to her like that! Especially on TV!
I turned to F, “If your parents ever talked to me like that, oh, it’d be ON! You know I’d try to bite my tongue, but hell no!”
F rolled his eyes and sighed.

I love the conversations we have when we do things together.

School is OUT!

On Sunday we had our Premarital Prep Class. This was more than just meeting with our Priest. This was an all day event, 8:45AM to 4:45PM. There were 19 couples in all, and F and I were the 2nd oldest couple there.
Yeah, me and F, and a bunch of 20 somethings with their teeny tiny waists and glaringly huge solitaries. Opps, was that a tad bitter? Oh well.
The class? A complete waste of time. COMPLETE. They feed us bagels at 9. F and I spilt one. They didn’t feed us lunch until after 1pm, after we all attended mass together. Back in the class room, we all fell on the pizza and wings and stuffed ourselves. Yes, that’s right, pizza and wings. All that was missing was the beer bong. And that’s what we got for $60? Not pleased.
Other than that, nothing to write about. No crazy couple. Nothing outrageous. No one fighting over the stupid little exercises we had to do. Really, it was a Blogging Bust.

Except the stone chapel that everyone but us (not really, but it seemed like it) was getting married at. "Oh we're getting married in the little stone chapel." So we checked out this "little chapel". Totally JEALOUS because the "chapel" is a Gothic church that was built in the 1930's and seats 200 people. I wanted to stab myself in the eye so I could forget how cool it was and how horrid it was that I wasn't getting married there. I’d post pics, but the website won’t let me copy them. Jerks. And posting the website, well, not really all that anonymous for me then, is it? Anyway, we could have had the family room cleaned up within that day instead of me stabbing out my eyes from jealously.


However, I think I found my bridal shower theme. I doubt my friends would protest!

Fun bridal shower theme: Stock the bar

by Meg Massie on Feb 27th 2008 7:31PM

Now here's a shower I'd like someone to throw for me -- and I'm guessing most guys could have a good time with one of these, too. A stock the bar bridal shower is just what it sounds like. Instead of buying household supplies for the bride, you're literally stocking the couple's bar with gifts of liquor and drink recipes.

Bridesmaid Essentials has a great guide for how to throw such a party, including decorations, menu ideas (of course there's alcohol), games, and even wording for the invitation.

The guide suggests including a few blank recipe cards with the invitation so guests can write out the recipes for their own favorite cocktails to share with the couple.