A Crafter's Life

New Coffee (and Tea) Station and Some Big News

tierneycreates: a fusion of textiles and smiles

Taking a break from sharing the exhausting audit of my existing sewing projects (congratulations to those of you who stayed awake for it…and seriously – thanks for all your encouragement and thoughtful comments!) to share a follow up to the post From Junk Drawer to Charging Station and share some big news!

After John and I purged our “junk drawer” in the kitchen, turned it into a “charging station drawer”, and cleaned off the countertop above the junk drawer (which was becoming a “junk countertop”…), we decided we were going to explore our mutual dream of having one of those cool expresso machines.

John loves coffee in many forms including lattes. I’m not a coffee drinker (Tea Drinker for Life) but I do love a good green tea/matcha latte and the expresso makers come with that “milk frothing thingies” (you hopefully know what I mean, ha, don’t make me do a web search for the proper name…) which is perfect to make tea based lattes (like Chai lattes and Green Tea lattes). The expresso machine would also be nice when entertaining – we can make overnight guests lattes in the morning with their breakfast! And as a bonus, I think they are so aesthetically pleasing and add a touch of elegance to a counter.

So we researched and priced out expresso machines and decided to go with the Breville Barista Express:

Here is our new coffee (and tea) station on the countertop above the former “junk drawer” now charging station drawer:

And here is the BIG ANNOUNCEMENT: John and decided to buy the expresso machine as our mutual gift to celebrate our ONE YEAR MARRIAGE ANNIVERSARY!

In early 2020 John and I got engaged (see the Postscript section of the post Guest Blog Post: Mail Order Groom ) with plans to have a wedding in late 2020 or mid 2021…but a little thing called the COVID pandemic happened shortly after.

By the time January 2022 rolled around (two years since we got engaged), we decided – let’s just go ahead and get married on paper to make everything official – so we scheduled an appointment at the County Clerk’s Office which is located in the same location as a Colorado DMV (Department of Motor Vehicles).

Colorado is pretty informal when it comes to marriage certificates – a Justice of the Peace is not required, you just sign papers and have them notarized by a County Clerk’s Office staff member.

So on February 11, 2022 we had the romantic experience of waiting next to people awaiting their driving license learner permits appointments, and kept giggling over how laid back and informal everything is in Colorado.

We did go out to lunch afterwards to celebrate our paper wedding!

We kept our marriage quiet except for immediate family members and a few long time friends. We figured we would have a wedding in the future.

Then we changed our minds.

We decided instead to use the money we would have spent on a wedding to take our immediate family (his sons and their partners/kids; and my brother and sisters and their partners/kids) on a nice vacation together, most likely Cabo San Lucas, to celebrate our love and give our families time to get to know each other better.

We’ll still plan, while we are in Cabo with our families, to have a little ceremony with one of his sons performing the ceremony and the other as his best man. I’ll have my sister as my maid of honor and have my brother walk me down the aisle.

No more keeping it secret, now we are telling everyone and I thought I would now share with my blogging buddies!

No decision yet on whether I will change my last name. I was married 29 years before my husband suddenly passed and I’ve lived with my current last name a long time.

I am so lucky to have met John, who is a widower and understands and respects the grief journey of losing your lifetime partner. We feel like our prior lifetime partners somehow plotted in the after life to bring us together and give us another chance at another lifetime of love and kindness!

I’ll close with a wonderful quote from Megan Devine who wrote the amazing book It’s OK That You’re Not OK: Meeting Grief and Loss in a Culture That Doesn’t Understand, that I discussed in the post On Grief.

Published by tierneycreates: a fusion of textiles and smiles

Quilter, crafter, obsessive tea drinker and lover of all furry creatures (especially dogs and cats) - join me on my tierneycreates blog as I share stories from "A Crafter's Life".

58 thoughts on “New Coffee (and Tea) Station and Some Big News”

  9. Yay!!! I think you got it right, being married and taking good care of each other is much more important than a wedding. The family trip sounds like a splendid idea.
    I think it’s getting much more common not to change your name after getting married (at least it is here). I didn’t, and neither did most of my friends. It felt odd to change it after 30 years of being known by a certain name, also because it is a name that I use professionally in publications.

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  12. What a fabulous anniversary gift to each other! It does look like an elegant sexy sculpture!! And what a wonderful plan to take your families to Cabo to merge and mingle and celebrate the two amazing humans who bring it all together. So special. Wishing you both a lifetime of friendship, happiness and crazy love! mj❤️

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  17. Double congratulations or that triple congratualations – the triple being the new gadget that will make you both happy with your beverage likes – it’s apparently called a “steam wand” – 🙂

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  19. I saw your announcement on IG before seeing this blog post… boy was I surprised!!!!! You did a good job of keeping it a secret 😂 I’m so happy for both of you, finding a second partner is such a blessing ❤ The trip to Cabo sounds like it will be amazing and your anniversay gift to each other is pretty darn cool too!!

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  20. I am so very happy for you! I have been married for almost 28 years and can not imagine life without my husband. He is my rock and my best friend. So glad you have found a second miracle of love. Best wishes!

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  27. When you gave the blurb about having BIG NEWS in an earlier post, I wondered if you were going to say that you and John were engaged — I would have never guessed you already got married! Congratulations to both of you, and I hope you all have a wonderful time in Cabo when you get to go!

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