Stuffing Wedding Invitations: Dante's Inferno with 2 extra levels of Hell
Sometimes I think Kenny does stuff just so I'll write about him on this blog. Wednesday night, we decided to tackle stuffing wedding envlopes. This is an AMAZINGLY TEDIOUS PROCESS!!! Considering the insanity of our wedding invitations, I knew this wouldn't be an easy task. We had 7, that's right- 7, components to our invitations: (1) invitation, (2) tissue to go over invitation, (3) reply card, (4) tissue to go over reply card, (5) reply card envelope, (6) direction card, (7) inner envelope for invitation, (8) outer envelope. Ok, that's 8. I tend to lose track after 2 items, which is the normal number of different pieces of paper involved in a typical letter. To add to this 8-fold nightmare, we had to number each RSVP envelope with a number that corresponded to each guest on the guest list in case they forgot to actually write their name on the reply card. (I thought, "Who forgets to write their name on the reply card? Who's such an idiot?" That would be me. Responding to a friend's wedding invite, I wrote this great little "well wish" for them, and am pretty sure I forgot to actually tell them I was coming, much less sign my name. These numbering rules are apparently created for people like me.) So this little numbering scheme adds the 9th component of our wedding invitations. This corresponds nicely with Dante's Nine Levels of Hell.
Kenny and I shared the responsibilites of Levels 1, 2 and 7, which involved folding the invite, laying the tissue paper over it, and stuffing it in the inner envelope. Piece of cake. Then I decided I would tackle assigning numbers to the RSVP cards (Level 9) , assembling Levels 3, 5 and 7 (the reply card and the tissue that goes over it, and the reply envelope), and neatly enclosing the direction card (Level 6 under the flap of the reply card envelope and stuffing these in the inner envelope as well (back to Level 7) then matching the inner envelope with its corresponding outer envelope (Level 8). It was during the process of stuffing the RSVP envelope in the inner envelope that I discovered a 10th level of Hell: trying to match the numbered reply envelope et al. with the right inner and outer envelopes. Remember, these little envelopes are numbered for each guest. Since I descended through the various levels of Hell in an assembly-line fashion, the reply cards and their respective envelopes were in a separate stack, and not exactly in the same order, as the inner and outer invitations. Let me just say that this sucked big time.
Once I finally got through this and matched up all of the invitations with their reply cards, I was introduced to Stamp Hell. Part of Stamp Hell involved my own creation- forgetting to put stamps on the RSVP cards. I would go through a few envelopes, then realize I forgot to stamp one before I stuffed it in the big envelope, and would then have to go back and check the five envelopes before that. This involved lots of unstuffing. Again, not fun.
Kenny created the second part of Stamp Hell. He is the most anal-retentive person when it comes to stamps, apparently. As I finished my trip through Hells 1-10, I looked over to see that Kenny, who did not participate in levels 4-10 or the first part of Stamp Hell, had a huge stack of envelopes before him that did not have stamps. This could only mean one thing: I stuffed, matched, and assembled the invitations faster than he could put stamps on the outer envelopes. I was truly baffled as to how this could be, so I watched him for a moment as he applied stamps to an envelope. He would take a stamp from the right-edge of a page of stamps so that it would have a straight right-side edge to match the straight right-side edge of the envelope. The next stamps were then lined up according to their little scalloped edges. The far-left stamp was taken from the far-left edge of the stamp page so that it would have a straight edge on the left side. Unbelievable. Meanwhile, I was haphazardly choosing stamps from anywhere on the stamp page for the RSVP envelope stamps. Kenny would occasionally yell at me for using one of the stamps from "his row." Again, unbelievable. So this is what took him 50 seconds per envelope. We still have 10 or so envelopes without stamps, but that will be done this weekend hopefully. And then we have the issue of hand cancellation of stamps, which will be a whole other adventure, and possibly an added level of Stamp Hell, or maybe a new level of Hell all on its own. That will be addressed in a later post that will undoubtedly involve one or more disgruntled postal workers and a $20 bill.
Kenny and I shared the responsibilites of Levels 1, 2 and 7, which involved folding the invite, laying the tissue paper over it, and stuffing it in the inner envelope. Piece of cake. Then I decided I would tackle assigning numbers to the RSVP cards (Level 9) , assembling Levels 3, 5 and 7 (the reply card and the tissue that goes over it, and the reply envelope), and neatly enclosing the direction card (Level 6 under the flap of the reply card envelope and stuffing these in the inner envelope as well (back to Level 7) then matching the inner envelope with its corresponding outer envelope (Level 8). It was during the process of stuffing the RSVP envelope in the inner envelope that I discovered a 10th level of Hell: trying to match the numbered reply envelope et al. with the right inner and outer envelopes. Remember, these little envelopes are numbered for each guest. Since I descended through the various levels of Hell in an assembly-line fashion, the reply cards and their respective envelopes were in a separate stack, and not exactly in the same order, as the inner and outer invitations. Let me just say that this sucked big time.
Once I finally got through this and matched up all of the invitations with their reply cards, I was introduced to Stamp Hell. Part of Stamp Hell involved my own creation- forgetting to put stamps on the RSVP cards. I would go through a few envelopes, then realize I forgot to stamp one before I stuffed it in the big envelope, and would then have to go back and check the five envelopes before that. This involved lots of unstuffing. Again, not fun.
Kenny created the second part of Stamp Hell. He is the most anal-retentive person when it comes to stamps, apparently. As I finished my trip through Hells 1-10, I looked over to see that Kenny, who did not participate in levels 4-10 or the first part of Stamp Hell, had a huge stack of envelopes before him that did not have stamps. This could only mean one thing: I stuffed, matched, and assembled the invitations faster than he could put stamps on the outer envelopes. I was truly baffled as to how this could be, so I watched him for a moment as he applied stamps to an envelope. He would take a stamp from the right-edge of a page of stamps so that it would have a straight right-side edge to match the straight right-side edge of the envelope. The next stamps were then lined up according to their little scalloped edges. The far-left stamp was taken from the far-left edge of the stamp page so that it would have a straight edge on the left side. Unbelievable. Meanwhile, I was haphazardly choosing stamps from anywhere on the stamp page for the RSVP envelope stamps. Kenny would occasionally yell at me for using one of the stamps from "his row." Again, unbelievable. So this is what took him 50 seconds per envelope. We still have 10 or so envelopes without stamps, but that will be done this weekend hopefully. And then we have the issue of hand cancellation of stamps, which will be a whole other adventure, and possibly an added level of Stamp Hell, or maybe a new level of Hell all on its own. That will be addressed in a later post that will undoubtedly involve one or more disgruntled postal workers and a $20 bill.
posted by Cindy at 3:06 PM
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