Wedding Thank You Cards

After a fun laid back wedding and reception, I finally completed some lovely thank you cards for all the well wishers and guest! With how simple the design for both were, I'm surprised it took me well over a month to get these all done. I suppose it has something to do with having to adjust to things. I mean, I did get married and a couple months later it still feels surreal! Me? Married?!? Nope, that was not on my life agenda and you can ask anyone in my family or any of my close friends (including my husband). But I got pretty damn lucky and I can't imagine spending the rest of my life with anyone better!

So, for well wishers that we unable to attend the wedding or reception, I bought a love note heart template from Homemade Gifts Made Easy. Both the heart template and the envelope were less than $10! I originally had the idea to make these the wedding invitations. Since my husband (still weird!) and I thought a full on traditional wedding wasn't really our style, I just converted the heart template to a cute thank you note.  

These were super fun to make. It gave me the perfect excuse to practice my origami skills.The template allowed the message, font and color scheme to be customized. I left it at the default red so it would pop from the white paper.

I did update the message. I don't know, something told me saying super mushy to some co-workers would lead to confusion and possibly a talk with HR. I went so far as to personalize each envelope and put a heart felt (hee hee!) thank you message on the front and inside of the heart. The hearts and envelopes came with complete cut guidelines. If you cut everything right, you can get the message to line up and everything comes together really nice. Oh, and thank goodness there was a tutorial. They used their own template in their step-by-step video to fold the perfectly heart every time! That baby got watched over a billion times while I was working on these with plenty of pausing to catch up on steps. Thank Bob for YouTube!

I had lots of fun designing the cards for those who could attend the wedding reception. I was really trying to go for a low-key elegance -- which means keep it simple. I'm not sure if I captured it, but I really liked how the embossed card stock gave the card some texture and the shimmery card stock added a splash of color. Maybe it is just me, but the embossed background with the shimmery paper reminds me of The Great Gatsby, making it classy and fun. It feels like you were just invited to a New Year's Eve party and are going to meet up with Leo DiCaprio for drinks on the balcony during the fireworks, don't you think? *cough* Maybe that's just my fantasy.  

I still sit back and go "Aww" when I open the card to those wedding birds kissing. They are just super cute. I wanted to put them on the front of the card, but I figured a nice thank you to be more appropriate. Now to find other cards to put those love birds on. Anyone else having a wedding?

I really feel so lucky and appreciative of everyone's support in this new part of my life and I hope it reflects in my thank you cards. I also had a lot of fun with this project. It has given me lots of ideas for for the future. I'm so looking forward to getting started on something new!

Logically Sound Love

In a previous posting, logically sound love was found to be the truest love available to a person. This is because both people feel a mutual loving affection towards each other and are together. By this, one can possibly derive the conclusion their love is true.

Then there is a question of time/lasting. The lustful loves are shortly lived, as it is only the body which is in love. Then there is the love of the mind, which becomes friendship love, and can last forever but lacks the physical bond of lovers. Although love, and possibly passion, is present in both, it is the union of the body and mind being in love when one is really in love.

From a personal experience, such a love feels natural. It is the kind where one can act like themselves. One can behave how they ideally want to behave with another and will receive in return the affection they have sought. It becomes a sharing of two worlds and those worlds compliment each other. Neither are being forced to change to maintain a level of interaction. Neither has to sacrifice a fundamental part of themselves to stay with the other. The compliment of the other's affection enhances natural strengths, inspires growth, and neutralizes shortcomings.

As cliche as it will sound, it feels natural and comfortable. There is no speed in the equation. Passions are there, but they are at a level which can be maintained for years to come. It is also the kind, that should it leave, would leave a sense of gratefulness in its passing. That realization of gratefulness allows love to replace where fear was and allows one to fully appreciate the little things in the relationship. And when that fear is gone, speed is not an issue. For it is when we fear for something (loss, heartache, etc.) we will run and jump into the abyss straight into a free fall, or run to safer ground. The safety of those affections allows one to slow down and encourages appreciation for the present moment and concedes those moments to be cherished. It becomes a beautiful experience that can last through time and creates beauty in all it touches.

The Edge

Some days we find ourselves gauging over the precipice of our fears. There are three options to such a situation: 1) leap into the bluff and feel the exhilaration of the free fall, 2) return to safe ground away from the image of the edge, or 3) take a seat at the edge.

The first two options seem more preoccupied with looking down. By simply taking the leap you don't really take in the view from the precipice. You perhaps become more fixated on the bluff and the sensation of falling. In the second option, you just run away from the edge. You may have looked down briefly, but only enough to cause you to seek familiar ground. But neither provides a significant time to take in anything else but the fear.

Imagine sitting at the edge and looking over to see an endless fall into blackness. Then slowly start looking up. The different shades of black will become present as it moves closer to the brightest light source. Looking ahead you will see the vastness of the area surrounding you. Then looking straight up, you will see the endless depth of the sky that reflects the same depth, if not more, of the fall beneath your feet. You will see what inhabits that precipice and how they have adapted to the environment. You will look at the ground next to you and see the ant that effortlessly walks along the edge, neither falling over nor running from it.

In the seated position, you are in no hurry to jump or walk because it would take effort and calculation to do either. In the seated position, you are almost forced to observe. This observation does not have to be just external, it can also be internal. You can see the fear settle in as you ease into a seated position without falling down the cliff. Hearing your heart beat in your ears. Your breath short and heavy. But gradually your heart and breath ease as you gain comfort in the solid ground you inhabit at this edge and the fear dissipates. The realization of the other two options become visible and viable, but neither will be motivated by fear.

"What would life be like taking that plunge into the unknown? Do I really want to jump?"

"What will I be like returning to what I know? Do I really want to return?"

But only the absence of fear will allow those contemplations to exist. When you are ready, you will be able to once again move with confidence in your decision.

Logic? Love? Logical Love?

A friend presented me with a question: "Love? Or logic?" Funny she should ask me such a question, as I am taking a formal deductive logic course. I felt a certainly level of competence in logic to attempt answering that question.

Her real dilemma was asking, "Should I listen to my heart? Or should I listen to my mind?" As if the two were dichotomies to our being, especially when searching for love in this life. Do the two have to be so separate? My answer, to her question was "logical love." I would say logically sound love is true love. Without arguing what love is (because that is a task that could be endless) I decided to focus on logical soundness. From my course, logical soundness can be defined as follows:

1. The argument is valid
2. All the premises are proven to be true.

Now for an argument to be valid:

1. If the premises are true, then the conclusion must be true
2. There are no counterexamples, meaning there are no cases in which true premises would lead to a false conclusion.
   

Let us go beyond and start applying it to love. We have "Jack loves Jill. Jill loves Jack. Therefore, Jack and Jill are together." We would find instances where supposedly Jack loves Jill and Jill loves Jack, but they aren't together. Hmm... Interesting. Would this be a moment where we would classify this situation as a counterexample to our original example? Yes, because Jack and Jill still love each other, but it isn't true they are together. So, as long as Jack and Jill love each other and are together, we would say their love is valid.

So we have proven validity of their love, but is it sound. It may be the case that Jack and Jill are together, but Jill loves Jim, or Jack dreams of killing Jill in the middle of the night and making it look like an accident. In such a case, that would not be logically sound love. But as long as it has been proven through time and action that Jack and Jill love each other, we could say they have demonstrated logically sound love. This is because 1) their love for each other was stated and they are not going contrary to the original conclusion that they are together and 2) their love for each other has been proven true, perhaps through empirical evidence of some kind.

To address the implied question my friend asked, you may have found love, or "the right one," if your mind and heart can agree. I think Rene Descartes said people are divided into their mind and body. Our body can love independent of the mind and the mind can love independent of the body. But true love is when the mind and body both love the same thing.

So, what happens when the body or the mind love and the other does not? It guess it is like our Jack and Jill situation. The body is in love, but the mind is not. The relationship will be based on sex and no emotional or intellectual connection. Those relationships are usually called flings, or die once the couple gets old. Now what if the mind is in love, but the body is not? Great intellectual conversations and emotions, but nothing physical will happen. Although this relationship can last through decades, I would classify such a relationship as friendship. But to gain agreement from Descartes, both would need to love the same thing for it to be true. So friendship is love, physical lust is love, but both premises must be true at the same time for the conclusion (true love) to be true. And if you can demonstrate both premises to be true, then you would have logically sound love all over again. And logically sound love would demonstrate capable of being true love that would survive through time.