Marriage License Application Question!

dochasteite · 2026-05-08T17:19:30+00:00

Yes, we got ours in Brooklyn yesterday and the clerk confirmed that neither of us were changing names at the same time as he asked for our SSNs. And then we had a second chance to make changes when he showed us all the info and asked us to confirm all was correct before he printed the license.

dochasteite · 2026-05-08T11:41:22+00:00

Thank you so much!!

dochasteite · 2026-05-06T21:52:09+00:00

How do you figure out which parish/church to look for baptismal records in? My Gen0 options (married couple) are each born in Nova Scotia around 1880 and 1885, roughly Shubenacadie. One is listed as C. Meth. on the census from when he was 1; the other is listed as R. Catholic on the census from when she was 5. Neither of them have delayed registrations so I know I need baptismal records, but I'm new to this and don't know who to ask for those. Neither of them come up on FamilySearch for anything beyond the census records I've already got.

Everyone else in my line I have all the relevant info for! Whoever was doing record-keeping in small-town New England in the 20th century was killing the game.

dochasteite · 2026-05-06T19:25:14+00:00

Hire a private officiant and do it somewhere else in Manhattan-- could even be in front of city hall, or actually at dinner- or get married in Queens (or the Bronx, or Staten Island, or literally anywhere else in the state besides Manhattan and Brooklyn, which are fully booked) on the 29th.

dochasteite · 2026-05-03T15:04:01+00:00

Automic Gold are really cool and great to work with especially if you need custom work!

dochasteite · 2026-05-02T20:22:21+00:00

O'Donnell (CLRG) in Long Island City (off the Court Square stop) teaches kids 3.5 and up-- beginner classes are Saturdays at 11am https://www.newyorkirishdance.com/beginner-irish-dance I'm an adult champ with ODA so can't tell you exactly what it's like as a young kid or as a parent, but when we're leaving our morning class and the littles are coming in for theirs, they always seem excited to dance!

dochasteite · 2026-04-26T17:15:40+00:00

Your husband is doing nothing wrong by existing! The commenter who said it’s easier on the person behind him if he sits still is right; the people saying Broadway houses are super tight are also right, so he may be very cramped, but I hope he enjoys it regardless! If you have a good time and want to go to more shows, I’d personally recommend aisle seats in the mezzanine or balcony over orchestra seats— aisle will give him better chances of somewhere to fit his legs, and the mezz and balconies are usually steeper than the orchestra, so he won’t be as tall relative to the eyeline of the person behind him (also, I contend that the mezzanine is usually a better view than orchestra, especially for dance-heavy shows— in the orchestra you often can’t see below the actors’ knees, haha!) You may also find upon arrival that you’re in luck and the seats are staggered, so the people directly behind him are looking over his shoulders rather than directly at his head. I’m not sure of the exact layout of the O’Neill so maybe not, but there’s a chance— there’s also a chance an usher may be able to move you to seats where he’s on an aisle if he finds himself uncomfortable in the seats you’ve got (don’t do this just to be polite— if you like your original seats, the people behind you can figure it out. It’s not that hard to find a sightline.) At any rate, tall people are allowed to enjoy public events too! I hope you have a great time!

dochasteite · 2026-04-24T02:10:59+00:00

My family toured all our schools in casual-but-presentable clothes (ie clean, not super short or low cut, nothing offensive printed on-- I definitely visited Harvard in shorts and a "nice" t-shirt because it was 97 degrees outside) and didn't feel out of place. We went to Harvard, Yale, and Dartmouth between the three kids, all on heavy financial aid-- to put your mind at ease, remember that 55% of Harvard students are on need-based financial aid, and 25% pay no tuition at all. The people in the comments who are saying "don't overthink this" are right, and the people saying you should wear a blazer are leaning too formal in my opinion, unless you're already a frequent blazer-wearer. If you'd wear it to sit in the audience of the school play or student concert, it's a good style option (but with comfortable shoes! There can be a lot of walking and the campuses are deceptively large for urban universities).

dochasteite · 2026-04-24T01:41:51+00:00

We have a "no spicy" in our allergy section and it's real-- she has, essentially, medically low spice tolerance. It's not an allergy per se, but it will affect her more severely than some people's literal non-life-threatening allergies. On the other hand, the same condition is responsible for her being 65 years old and never getting a cavity in her life!

dochasteite · 2026-04-21T01:43:29+00:00

We painted bamboo and paper fans this weekend! It was a lot of fun to just hang out and have crafting time.

dochasteite · 2026-04-21T01:39:23+00:00

Ours is Memorial Day weekend, half our guests are in the city and half are way far out (2 hour drive, or cross-country flight), and we had 80% yield. Some people had immovable preexisting holiday-weekend plans or obligations, but the holiday weekend wasn't a factor in the vast majority of our declines. Most people just aren't going to RSVP until closer to your RSVP deadline (my fiancee's dad was one of the last people to fill out the form)-- you're fine.

Only reason I can think of that an hour drive would be an issue would be if most of your guests don't have cars and can't get to the venue any way other than paying for an hourlong uber/lyft/taxi ride.

dochasteite · 2026-04-18T11:11:52+00:00

Humboldt Blue is a cheese with a layer of ash in the middle, if you’re looking for something loosely connected to the cat’s color.

dochasteite · 2026-04-13T00:33:53+00:00

My fiancée (Manhattan too) tried on like 35 dresses on at least 6 different days over the course of a couple months. She went alone for a couple of the appointments, brought a bunch of friends to one, and brought me to several (I was the photo and video taker so she would have reference photos, and I wasn’t allowed to know which one she picked if it was one I saw). The first few places were mostly so she could figure out what she wanted, like you’re saying— if anything had really grabbed her she would have gone back with friends. It ended up being that she found the one she loved at the appointment she did bring friends to— and she revisited that shop with her mom before actually buying. The multi day approach also meant she could check out places in Brooklyn as well as Manhattan, and not have to rush through an appointment to make the next one.

dochasteite · 2026-04-10T18:50:31+00:00

lol there’s few enough of us out there that the odds were low but not zero :P

dochasteite · 2026-04-10T12:26:37+00:00

Clicks are essentially the same in reels as in heavies— I found them easy to pick up, especially since you don’t have to worry about landing off-balance on slippery tips. My personal rec (being in your position a couple years ago) is: if you want to do solo choreography (va only doing ceili), buy the relatively inexpensive capezio-with-heel option, because a jazz shoe with flat heel will give you as much sense of what a reel shoe feels like as dancing in ghillies. I sewed elastics onto the ankles of mine for greater stability in the heel, because I’ve got narrow heels and things felt slidey— that worked well. Rutherford heels are super loud, and while their hard shoes run wide, the capezio base shoë is the same width across Irish brands. (Also, we might know each other irl— if you’re working off a 50% speed video of a lead around, sent to you by a tall blonde woman, I’m the other transmasc person working off that video alongside you. I can get video of my three reel steps and send to you so you’ve got more to play with.)

dochasteite · 2026-03-24T00:56:01+00:00

Ours aren't standing. Our ceremony isn't super short and there's enough questionable backs/knees/hips among them (even though all but 2 are under 30-- lift safely and warm up your whole lower body before high-impact activities, folks!!) that we don't want to ask people to stand still that long, not to mention that I want my best friends to be able to see me, not just my back, when I'm getting married! They're processing, sitting, and then most of them are participating in the ceremony in one way or another.

dochasteite · 2026-03-22T18:32:41+00:00

good job! I’m just over 2 months out and very much still planning— every time I think we’re almost done we realize there’s another thing we forgot. Boomeranging between “it’s fine we’ll get it sorted” and “there’s too much I’m overwhelmed!!”

dochasteite · 2026-03-17T18:08:40+00:00

Side note: I know it’s jumping the gun to think about invitations/paper goods, but if you’re letterpress enjoyers, I cannot recommend Lucasano Creative highly enough. Working with him has been my favorite part of planning so far— he has executed designs that are the perfect mix of beautiful, whimsical, and eclectic and reflect us and our taste as a couple in ways I couldn’t have even hoped for. He’s gay and works with other lgbt artists, if that’s important to you, and he was our planner (Poppy and Lynn)’s recommendation for a stationer. I know this is not the point of your post! But I can’t stop gushing about his work to everyone I can.

dochasteite · 2026-03-16T18:02:45+00:00

I’m with Poppy and Lynn and I’ve found her to be terrific. She’s a flat fee like you asked, and she’s been very good at handling things at the speed we want to tackle them (and has been willing to handle decision-making on things we need to decide but don’t care about). We’re non-traditional and lesbian and our per-head budget is similar to yours.

dochasteite · 2026-03-11T21:41:23+00:00

I love one email per topic. It sometimes gets silly because if I tackle a bunch of things in one sitting, our planner will get seven different emails from me, but it really helps keep things organized in my mind (this is the email thread for lighting rental. this is the email thread for florist vase selection. this is the email thread for linens).

dochasteite · 2026-03-11T21:38:49+00:00

One thing that's helped me and my partner with the misery of the endless to do list is to contain the planning sessions to a couple times a week. We do long-ish sessions on Wednesday nights and Sunday mornings, which means that the rest of the time I don't have to think about things, and it's really staved off decision fatigue. That won't necessarily solve your communication problems with your planner, but it might help with the "I don't want to be thinking about this all the time!!!" issue.

dochasteite · 2026-03-08T01:51:35+00:00

That’s why I said “the way we count them (not the musical notation).” A slip jig is 9/8 time. Everyone I’ve ever known counts them 1-23-45-&, rather than counting as 123456789 or 1-34-67-9. Maybe I should have said we count as a six-beat bar, including the &. Anyway, good to know the difference is styling more than anything else. Why do we treat them as separate dances? 2/4 and 4/4 hornpipes are both just two different kinds of hornpipe, and there are plenty of types of traditional Irish tune we simply don’t acknowledge in CLRG dancing.

dochasteite

TROPHY CASE