My own life lacks excitement.

Therefore, I better write about the fact that my sister got engaged last weekend. I can't tell you how it happened because I don't know that she told me that. I did get to see the pictures of how his place looked when she went over to his place for their anniversary dinner. She hadn't even been gone an hour when the two of them came home to show Sonny and I. I think she was happy. She had been pretty nervous about going over to his house because she didn't know if he was going to or not. I knew, because my mom told me in the morning that he had come to ask for Dad's permission to marry her. But now she is engaged and is supposed to start planning a wedding.

I have volunteered to be her wedding planner, or at least help her out somewhat. It seems like she wants all the whistles and bells and I am not really like that. Maybe it would be fun, but all those bells and whistles cost money.

We were trying to think about what the most useless part of wedding planning is so that we could tell her and that she could consider skipping that part. For example, my husband and I skipped the unity candle. When we met with the pastor, I told him how that was the part that annoyed me at any wedding I had ever gone to. To me, it takes 30 seconds to light the thing and then we have to sit for another 4 minutes while some dolt in the family sings. Every family has someone who can sing. Do you really need to use your wedding to broadcast their ability. I hate that. The pastor totally agreed with me. He said that the lighting isn't even really part of the ceremony. It's just for show. I wasn't there to impress anyone. I was there to marry the man that I loved. I think that people planning a wedding forget that part. It's not supposed to be about all the frills. It's supposed to be about marrying the person you have chosen to marry in God's house and with the blessings that go along with that.

I really hope that she figures it out that you don't need to spend so much money that you need to take out a loan. Your wedding doesn't need to cost over $10,000. Of course, I told her the approximate amount we spent, so she would have an idea how much it costs to have a nice wedding. (I thought it was a nice wedding. I may be biased.) Of course, we didn't have a DJ or dance, we didn't have a professional photographer (well, not one we had to pay), and we didn't have to buy a dress. Those three things probably saved us quite a bit of money. I don't know what her plans are, she is probably waiting for me to help her. But that's my thoughts on the whole thing so far.

I guess if she really wants to spend a gazillion dollars on the wedding, she could have the wedding during a more 'off season' time of year. And she could wait to get married so she could make money for the wedding. Of course, I will just let her read this and not tell her to get her all mad. I mean, things like weddings cost money. And my husband and I were talking about it and we both feel that there are more important things to spend money on than to spend a lot of money on your wedding. I mean you want to spend enough to have a beautiful day, but there will be more important things in your marriage that you will want to spend money on. If you are married, you totally know what I mean.

P.S. If you want to let me know a part of a wedding you were at, or part of your own wedding that you wish you would have done differently or didn't feel it was necessary, let me know so I can pass that knowledge on to my sister.