I am so happy to be back on the fulltime bride. After the wedding I took a much needed break from everything because as you can imagine, life happened! I can’t even begin telling ya’ll, all the craziness that has happened in just 1 month into marriage! For starters we went on our AMAZING honeymoon where we really enjoyed just being newlyweds, exploring a new country and just living in the moment. To then coming back to our apartment and finding out that the 4th floor apartment had this huge leak that then caused water damage to our apartment. So we had to move out within 24 hours into a new unit. It is crazy how things happen because I know myself too well, and if this would have happened any other time, I know I would have not been calm. Not sure if it was these sense of calmness that I brought back from our honeymoon, but I didn’t freak out as bad as I thought I would have. I felt pretty calm throughout it all, well initially when we found out I imagined the worst so of course I freaked out a bit but then my husband reassured me we would get through it. So anyways throughout the move, it felt nice to 1) declutter and get rid of things we had not touched for months. 2) Start fresh! Moving into a clean new apt, and organizing wasn’t that bad. Maybe it was a blessing in disguise because we ultimately were able to shorten our lease by 2 months, and start planning what’s next.

My husband and I are the type to be one step ahead and thinking of what is our next goal. My one fear in life is hitting this stagnant point where I feel no movement. Whether it is a career move, a huge life decision or even picking up a new hobby, I like to feel like I am not doing the same thing I was doing last year. So anyways we knew that buying a home was our next goal post wedding. We had already started researching areas, and talking to builders, all within a couple of months before the wedding. So when this whole thing happened with our apartment, it gave us that push to start making decisions. We signed our building contract this past weekend and we are so excited!!

So that brings me to my next point, as wedding planning was coming to an end, I had this huge fear that I was going to feel sad that I wasn’t in wedding planning mode and that I would miss it so much due to how much fun I was having, but honestly, I have not felt any of that!! Not sure if this is because of all the craziness that has been going on and I haven’t had time to think about it. Either ways, I have actually been more excited about our “post wedding life”. Just thinking of our goals and what we want to do next. So now to the point of today’s post:

1. My biggest advice for any newlywed is to start planning what’s next before you even get married. I know that sounds crazy because the closer the wedding gets the more stress it can cause BUT, if you start thinking about your next goals some of that stress may not become as heavy. For instance we knew we wanted to build our house so it made me excited to think about the house especially during those moments where everything was going wrong with the wedding. It honestly helped me put things in perspective too!

2. Plan trips! Travel! Think about those trips that you had to pass on because you were saving/paying for your wedding. This past year I got to travel more than usual but it was fun (and expensive lol) to know that I already had my next trip booked. So I want to keep that same mindset as it helps me stay excited for the future.

3. SAVE!!!! Maybe not as exciting as the other options but now that you are married it is fun to start thinking, “what are WE saving for now”. You get out of this perspective of, “I need to save for a rainy day” to “WE…” The fun part of this is that now you get to see it happen more aggressively. Now that I look back at how capable we were to paying big payments towards our wedding, it proved to us that we can save for anything that we set our minds to!

4. Treat yo’ self. Lol I know this contradicts the point above but hear me out, splurge on one thing that you had to keep on passing on while you were wedding planning since obviously that was a bigger priority. During planning, I ended up buying so many gifts for this person and then this other person that I had to continue putting myself last. While of course I didn’t mind because I truly wanted to gift these items, it still felt amazing walking into ulta and sephora and just splurging on me.

5. Lastly, focus on your marriage. I know we hear this over and over, the wedding is one day but marriage is forever and of course I stand by this. Take the time now post-wedding to reflect at your marriage from this short time and soak it all in. Plan spontaneous date nights, stay up all night talking about your dreams and goals, call each other husband and wife every chance you get!

Thank you to everyone for being patient during my little break and I hope you are so excited for all the new content to come!! I know with the holidays around the corner, bride gift guides sound exciting, also talking about the actual details of my wedding and of course sharing all the things that I couldn’t share before, such as all the fun in dress shopping, picking invites and save the dates and etc. Stay tuned for all the fun!!