Help.

At the beginning of the month, I (and Grant) went to Melbourne to celebrate Aunty's birthday. *No, she's not my only Aunty, but due to Maori linguistic conditioning and for the purposes of this post, she will heretofore be referred to as Aunty.
Anyway, at Aunty's birthday dinner, for reasons I don't quite understand, our wedding was a major topic of conversation. There were a few conversations that stand out in my mind, and they all centre on the idea of help.

Now, I'm a big believer in helping. If you're moving I'll offer my (and Grant's, and not always with his knowledge) assistance. At your house, I'll help clear the table or the dishes. At your party, I'll go find extra food or drinks, and if I’m still sober and able I'll help you clean up. My childhood memories consist of fetching Nanny's stool and smokes, or making cups of tea for various family members and visitors and basically being the person that does stuff for everyone else. Not that I'm a saint or anything, I know that I complained, but that's just how it was. You did stuff for other people.

But accepting offers of help from others? That's hard. Being the one to ask it? Even harder. I'm not sure why though. Is it because I'm a perfectionist and think that I can do a better job? Maybe. Well, is it because I'm proud and don't want to be seen as unable to do it all? There's definitely some of that. What about the fact that I'm lazy and a procrastinator, and crafting the perfect email/phone call script is bloody difficult? Sure. Mostly, I think, I don't want to seem demanding. After years of declaring that I'd be the Bridezilla when I got engaged, I'm now working really hard not to become a 'zilla. And part of me thinks that asking people for help could be unwelcome and deep-down I'm a people pleaser.

It probably doesn't help that I see all these weddings on wedding blogs where the bride "incorporated so many wonderful DIY touches" or they self-catered, made their own dress, decorated the entire place, wrote their vows and played their own music as they walked down the aisle. Or they had wonderful parties where all the family and friends drank and ate and made the decorations, or a family friend who's a florist just magically appeared with a beautiful arrangement, or this bride that knows someone in every single area of a Wedding Management... I know that I shouldn't compare our wedding to anyone else’s and that it should be a reflection of us and what we like and our story and the way we're going to build a family together.

So, I want to talk about help. Specifically, the different areas that I'm coming to realise we're going to need help with. And I'm going to start by talking about some of the conversations from Aunty's birthday party.

The first was with Cousin Courtz who mentioned her husband was looking forward to maybe doing a duet with me on the ukulele and he on one of his many instruments. He's a wonderfully talented musician, and I would be honoured to share the stage with him. It had never occurred to me to even ask him. Why? Granted, I hadn't thought about performing at either of our wedding celebrations, thinking it would be naff and attention-seeking on the day where I'm pretty much centre of attention anyway...

The second conversation was around my declaration of intention to make the cake and organise the flowers. Aunty's friend was scandalised to think that I'd do it myself. Yes, I understand the theory that I'll be incredibly busy in the lead up. But I just can't fathom the idea of paying hundreds of dollars when I'm a pretty decent baker/decorator, and I'm not hungup about having perfection for these two things. Later that evening, Aunty's partner handed out a cake she'd made for Aunty and it was, as usual, delicious! And I thought to myself, what if she or Aunty were to make a cake/our cakes as a present? Again, how do I start that conversation?

Thirdly, Cousin offered to help out on the day (albeit after many drinks, so we'll see if she remembers, hmmm?). I had actually been thinking of asking one of the cousins for their assistance - no one organises like a Wehipeihana female - but had yet to get past the mulling stage to the asking stage.

Other discussions have been had though, and with slightly more action by Yours Truly. There are the Save The Dates (and hopefully the invitations, maybe?) - as soon as we got engaged, I got in touch with Hannah and asked ever so nicely if she'd design them for me. Which she did, and she did a wonderful job. They'll hopefully be sent out soon... As soon as I figure out how to print them nicely... But that was still hard for me to ask.

There's also the dress. Originally, Honorary Whangai Mother Mary offered to make my dress for me, which was such a lovely offer. In the end, I bought a dress here on sale, after thinking that it might be difficult with me not being in Wellington to talk about patterns and fabrics and fittings. But Mary's going to help us find bridesmaid dresses soon - yay!

Neither of those conversations were easy for me. For some reason I am more than happy to help others, love to, but I find it really difficult to accept help from others. So in an attempt to overcome that, I am compiling a list of things that I think we could use help with:

• Cake – either one big one or a few little ones
• Flowers – to either find sources, collect or help arrange
• Music/DJ – we might use an iPod but we’ll need
• Music to play
• Speakers and technical equipment
• Someone to DJ or manage the iPod
• Co-ordinate on the day = be the contact person for vendors, keep an eye on the time, boss everyone around.
• Decorations – collect items like jars, wine bottles, candles; help arrange them/design plan for caterers to arrange them

What else is there? I know I’m missing heaps...  

*love love love love love*
Kiwa.