Bride Two

Last time I wrote, it the story of two brides.  I liked one; I was complaining about the other.

Yesterday was the wedding of bride number two, and I have to say, I actually had quite a bit of fun.  I don't have a clue what the girls had or hadn't been told, but every single one of them was a blast.  As the outsider looking into their ring of friendship, it was easy to see that not only had they been together for quite some time, but that they cared deeply about each other.  Everyone was relaxed and nobody was uptight about anything.

Actually, they were thrilled with the results we delivered for hair, and I had a couple of ladies ask for my card for future reference.  One of the ladies, we'll call her Shar, was so excited about her hair she almost started crying.  She's got unusually thin hair, and in the past, almost every hairstylist has made it look like she's balding.  I put my best efforts forth to make sure she looked like she had gobs of hair, and was rewarded with a big hug and a smiling, super-giddy, newly-pregnant woman for the rest of the morning.

Smiling Shar!

The back of her undo that she was SO excited about.

The whole while I was doing everyone's hair, I couldn't believe that I had been so stuck on the prices.  I mean, yes, I have skill, but is it worth getting upset over a difference of $100?  No.  At least, it shouldn't be.  I feel ashamed I reacted the way I did.  The more I digest it, I think I was more shocked and surprised because it came up last minute.... I'd already had my mind set that things were going to go a certain way, blah, blah blah.  Apparently I don't deal well with last second changes.

The upside is, now I know this about myself, and next time it happens, I can just have a little pep talk with myself before letting it rock my boat.  Plus, now I know what changes I need to make to my system to make sure things like this don't happen again.

Everything turned out beautifully and I'm really happy that it ended up working for me to do their hair for the wedding.  Here's a few pictures!

I was in love with this girl's hair color!!

The little girl was adorable, giving the bride kisses, telling her she looked like Cinderella.

The bride, taking a break before the ceremony started.

Three of the bridesmaids and the bride.

What I'm "Worth"

I've had the chance to work with the Detroit Glam Squad as a hairstylist now for a few months.  I love it!!  The girls I work with are amazing artists in their own right, and it's a lot of fun to share a creative vision with someone and then execute it.

This past week I've had the opportunity to work with two brides.  And WOW--I don't think they could be any more different!!

The first bride was a joy!  She was a little indecisive at times, but whenever dealing with a bride, you expect that.  They want their big day to be perfect.  We had the opportunity to do hair and makeup for her, her mother, and her entire bridal party.  They were a blast!  Everyone was upbeat, positive, trying to make sure that everything went perfect for the bride, and extremely appreciative of our skills so that they too, could look awesome on the bride's big day.  I'd do these ladies again in a heartbeat!

Bride number two has been a different story.  She's been all but non-responsive until the last minute for absolutely everything.  I'd sent an email three days prior to confirm the trial date and didn't get a response until FOUR HOURS before the trial was supposed to happen.  Then, after the trial, there was a dispute about prices.  Mind you, I sent the bride a copy of our contract about three weeks in advance.  Over a month before that, I gave it to one of her bridesmaids, who was the original contact.

Apparently nobody read it.

We charge $65 for bridesmaids, $75 for the bride.  I did research before setting these prices because I wanted to be competitive and fair.  These costs match what people in this area pay to get their hair done in a salon--except if you hire us, we travel to you.

Turns out the bride was given slightly lower prices originally.  She'd been told $50 for bridesmaids, $65 for the bride.  No big deal, I can work with it.  Because she'd had my contract for about three weeks and didn't bring the discrepancies to my attention until the day of the trial, I did feel she was trying to bully me into lower prices, but I wasn't going to abandon her because of it.

It gets better...  Alongside both sets of the prices, we offered a 15% discount due to her party size.  Somehow, the math was done wrong and she'd told her bridesmaids we were charging $33 post-discount.

Let me see.... $50 x .85 = $42.50.

Maybe it was $50 x .15?  Nope.  That's $7.50

Did she do $50 - $15?  Hmm... still comes to $35....

Uhhhh........  I have no idea how it got to $33.

So now I've got a non-appreciative, cheap bride who wants me to work for LITERALLY half price because of her mathematical error.  I explained that I'd have to have her sign the contract at full price, because that's what we charge, but I would talk to the girl who originally gave her those prices and if there was a reason behind it, we might honor them.  She signed, wrote a check for the deposit, and I headed home.

When I called back later that day to explain the pricing options that I could let her pick from (NOT $33), she told me that she's not sure everyone is still going to want their hair done and that the number of people in the party may shrink due to the price.

Excuse me?  You JUST signed a contract.  Did you not read ANY of it?  There's a number of things that you should have paid attention to, but the biggest would be this one:

1. You are liable for the full amount on the contract, once signed.  (The only time this would be swayed is if we feel we've messed something up and want to make amends by lowering prices.  I was clear in saying that we MIGHT lower them.  Not that we would.)

Did I mention that this is a party of 11, and that both myself and the assistant I've hired are taking a Saturday off at Nordstrom (which is frowned on because it's retail) to do this wedding?  Did I mention that I'm paying the assistant?  Did I mention it's 45 minutes away?  Did I mention the bride's disorganization/non-responsiveness has been a pain in the butt?  Did I mention she wants me to stay for an additional two hours so that I can give her a second undo before the reception? (Which I had agreed to do for free before the price conversation came about)

I'm frustrated and I feel bad that she's gotten herself in this predicament, but I'm pretty sure it's not my fault.

Night Drivers

Isaac and I spent the weekend on the road.  Almost literally.  We left Michigan around 8:30pm on Friday night and arrived in Iowa at 5:30 in the morning.  We went to bed and then I got up three hours later to do hair for Kendra and Beau's wedding and finished around 1:00pm.  I dropped three of the bridesmaids off at the church, then went home to do Ike, Mom, and Dad's hair before the wedding at 5:00p.

Immediately after the ceremony, Isaac, Ike, Court, Jess, and myself had to scoot on to the reception hall quickly.  Ike was in charge of setting up the projector and computer for the slideshow and I'd volunteered Isaac and myself to plate and refill the desserts.  The reception was a lot of fun!  I love being able to chat with people and socialize with family that I haven't seen in a while.  I even ventured out to the dance floor for a little bit.  I had a few heart palpitations or something while doing "The Twist," so my husband recommended I sit for a little bit but other than that my health seemed to be holding up!

By the time we hit 10:00 that night, I was just wasted tired so Ike, Court, Isaac, and I left the reception and ended up falling asleep in front of the fireplace at the farm.  Actually, Ike, Court, and I fell asleep in front of the fire and my husband went upstairs and studied for a little bit.

The next morning, we went to church, had lunch at the farm, and then hung out for a couple hours.  Around 3:00, Isaac and I jumped on the road again because we wanted to stop and have time to visit with Lynn and Howard on the way back to Michigan.

At some point while talking to the Hinton's, my job status came up and Isaac shared that I have been talking with Helen Paves, the manager of the salon that I think I want to work at.  It reminded me that I'd been meaning to ask Howard if he had a particular professional camera that he would recommend us investing in at some later date so I can digitally document my work with pictures of high enough quality to display on a website in the future.

You should have seen how excited he was.  His enthusiasm was probably equivalent to if someone had asked my dad about tractors or field work.  He ran downstairs and grabbed a camera and several lenses to let us borrow and then walked me through the basics of operating it.  In the end, I was sent home with two lenses to play with and a 250-page instruction booklet.  Needless to say, I have plenty of reading material.

After chatting with Howard and Lynn for a bit, we hopped back on the road and began the rest of the trip back home.  We talked for about four hours of the trip and then I fell asleep shortly after we switched drivers.  At 4:30 in the morning we finally arrived home.

Twenty hours of road time in a 48-hour period is just a little too much, I think.  But it was SO fun!

Here's a few pics from the wedding on Saturday!

Court and I

Isaac Jordan, practicing his smiles!! :)

Court and Mom

Jess and I.  Forgive her smile... her cheeks were really tired by this time...

Up-the-nose shot of Isaac Dean.

The lovely married folks!

Dry As A Desert

I found out yesterday that I am already about halfway through my radiation treatment!  Boo-ya!

Apparently I only have to have seventeen treatments.  There hadn't really been any side effects other than my skin being a little bit tender until yesterday--when the first manifestations of a dry-as-the-desert throat appeared.

Oh, it's dry...  Incredibly so.

For instance, yesterday it hurt to burp (unladylike, I know, but it comes with the cancer territory) because my throat was so dry that instead of just slipping out like usual, the air was getting trapped near my hyoid.  Man, was it uncomfortable!

This morning it's actually even worse.  I've spent the last hour and a half slowly but surely eating a ham and cheese sandwich.  It's not that this thing is the size of a table or anything either.  I just have to take a small bite and chew... and chew... and chew some more.  Then maybe add a little water to the mix, masticate (fancy word for chew) some more, and then swallow.  By that time, my jaw is a little tired and I feel the need to drink some more water in hopes that it will juice my throat up so the next bite doesn't take an hour too.  I've gone through three full glasses of water so far.

For a ham and cheese sandwich.  Good gravy.

The "glass half full" perspective on this is that I'll probably drop the weight I put on from chemo pretty quick!  That will make it easier for me to win the weight loss competition between my husband, father-in-law, sister-in-law, and dad... yet another positive of cancer.

On another note, we're heading back to Iowa again today for my cousin's wedding.  It's going to be a really fast trip.  Like, we'll maybe be there for twenty-four hours fast.  But it's totally worth it!  Weddings are a blast!!

Catch ya'll on the flip side!