Getting married: it's tricky! (Part One)

We're going to start this story a few days ago. Travel back in time with me to one week ago, Monday, June 15th. I had one major task for this day: ship my wedding dress to Kyle's parents' house in Connecticut. We figured this would be simpler and safer than trying to get in on the plane with us. I mean, shipping a package is fairly straightforward, yes? Well. I left the house in Orem at 11:00 am, heading to U-Haul in Provo to buy a box. A big one! I waited in line for 20 minutes before even getting any help, but I bought my big box (the largest non-wardrobe box they had) and took it out to the car. Where it wouldn't fit. I will just preface this by saying that I hadn't been sleeping well, and I had a sore throat (which has turned out to just be the cold that Kyle had had, which is what I figured, but I'm still slightly paranoid about sore throats, so it raised my stress level a bit). And I could not get that box into my car. Not in the trunk, not into the back seat. I finally had to actually form it into a box and set it on the passenger's seat, where it blocked my view out the window and the edges rubbed my right arm raw every time I shifted gears.

I made it over to Kyle's lab on campus, though, where he was going to join me for the trip to the post office. Of course, when I got there, there was a minivan blocking the lane, just waiting to pick someone up and not about to move so as to not block traffic. The parking spots were all full anyway, and Kyle now had nowhere to sit in the car. I had started crying in sheer frustration by the time he came out. (Yes, I know it was pathetic. But like I said, I was tired and stressed.) But Kyle managed to get the box fenagled into the car trunk and we headed over to the post office.

When we arrived, we headed inside to actually package the thing. As it turns out, that big dress, even still in the garment bag, folds up into just a tiny bundle. (Okay, maybe not tiny, but waaaay smaller than I had anticipated.) My box was comparatively ginormous. But none of the boxes there at the post office looked big enough in the right directions, so we set about filling in the empty space. I ran over to Kyle's house for the packing supplies remaining from my move to Orem. There was a box of bubble wrap, along with two partial bags of peanuts. I took them back (almost getting killed on my way back into the parking lot), and we managed to fill the rest of the box. We go up to the counter to mail it, and the guy (who was very nice) informed us that there would be an additional charge for it being so large. Also, another additional charge for it being so large and so light at the same time. [sigh] He suggested we cut the box down by an inch to avoid the size charge. Well, I'm standing there and looking at the box that had contained the bubble wrap and wondering if the dress will fit in it. So we get out of line and return to the packing area, where we cut open the box we'd so carefully taped up. And yes, the dress fit basically perfectly into the bubble wrap box. So we packed that box up and returned to the counter.

The charge was now significantly less, and we got it mailed off alright this time. Of course, we now had a large box and a bunch of packing peanuts to stash somewhere...

I finally got back home at 1:30 pm. It took me 2.5 hours to mail that dress. What a nightmare!