A CARE-ing Registry

We did it. Finally. We registered. SO MANY PEOPLE have asked us Where!? When!? We want to buy you an engagement gift!!!! What? Not yet? Still? When??? So, we finally gave in. We're registered. We weren't initially going to do it so soon but we figured if people were wanting to buy us gifts so badly we may as well get things that we want/like/will use. Otherwise we'd probably end up with 12 bread boards, 8 fondue pots, and 27 crystal picture frames or something like that.

So we went last weekend and got it over with. We didn't put in everything we'll probably need because a lot of things such as bed/bath/table linens are seasonal. But we got dishes and silverware and some serving pieces and of course baking stuff. That's my FAVORITE part btw, I CAN'T WAIT until I get all the new baking stuff and the HUGE mixer that's under my parents dining room table and when I have the room and I can bake and bake and bake... TEE HEE!! I'm so excited!

I LOVE the dishes we picked out too. We got 2 sets, one each for meat and dairy. One set is glass because glass is amazingly versitile when it comes to kashrut because it's non-porous. So we can use it for pretty much almost anything and interchange it as needed. And that's one less set we need for Passover. I like that. Glass dishes are hard to come by and when you do, they're pretty plain. But we managed to find a set that's pretty basic, but at the same time interesting and fun. We had to get mismatched bowls because the set didn't have matching bowls, but what can ya do...

And I truly LOVE LOVE LOVE our dairy dishes. They are so beautiful and simple and timeless, I can't wait to start setting my table with them. The set is called "Flora." The dishes have flowers on them but not a pattern of small flowers. One big flower. Or two growing together. Or 1, 2, or 3 in various stages of opening. They are SO beautiful. There are different sets that all mix and match. There's a daisy and a rose and a poppy and a cornflower, and a sunflower. So we got 2 place settings of each flower, except for the poppy and the sunflower. The sunflower only came in the dinner plate, but we liked it so much that we susbstituted out the poppy dinner plate for the sunflower and got the rest of the poppy set by itself. I'm so excited to mix and match them and make a pretty floral and fun dairy dinner table. :)

So now we have most of our stuff set and it'll be nice when we eventually get a house to have nice new and matching things to put in it and use instead of the mish-mosh of hand-me-downs we're using now. I',m looking forward to having a matched set of plates, a matched set of silverware, nice serving pieces, matched bedding, etc, etc, etc. I'm excited about the prospect of one day setting up a home with beautiful things tht I'm going to enjoy using and sharing with others. When I have more space I can't wait to have more people over more often. I can live without it, but Rob is excited about having a dairy AND meat kitchen. Ours now is just too small to have 2 sets of everything.

SO... now that I've gone on and on about my excitement over home-making and dishware, you'll probably want to know where to look for these things if you were one of the many people who have previously asked aboot the registry. We are registered at Fortunoff, Crate and Barrell, and Williams-Sonoma. So you can go to those stores or to their websites to do your thing if you so desire.

IF however, you decide to order a gift online, Rob and I ask that you PLEASE do it through the registry search at weddingchannel.com. For every gift bought through this website, WeddingChannel.com will make a donation to the charity of our choice. Rob and I have decided on CARE-USA.

CARE is an organization that works with impoverished communities in more than 70 countries around the world to find lasting solutions to poverty. They not only aid the poverty but also look at the big picture and confront the underlying causes. They have a broad range of programs based on empowerment, equity and sustainability. They work in some of the poorest communities in the world aiding them in self help, economic, educational, and health care opportunities. They also provide emergency aid for those communites struck by disaster and help them to rebuild. It's a worthy organization with a 4 star rating from Charity Navigator, and they put over 90% of their monetary donations towards their relief projects.

And so that's that. Rob and I have tried to make the difficult task of registering a little easier by chosing to participate in helping a program that does so much good around the world. For me anyway, it makes me feel better that in the huge whirl of all the wedding extravaganza STUFF, that some semblance of deeper meaning and good can come out of it all. I am SO excited to know that Rob and I will be spending our lives together. And I'm SO excited to celebrate that with our families and community. But we also want to recognize our priviledge to live the lives we lead, and we want to incorporate a piece of Tikun Olam (Healing the World) and Tzedakah into the celebrations. This is one way we can start to do that even before the actual celebrations.

So for all of you who have been asking, there you go. And thank you so much for your generosity and thoughts at this special time in our lives. And thank you for helping us to extend that generosity further into the world.