The hall and the dress

After Pickering City Hall, we headed into Toronto on the train. We arrived at Union Station and found that we could get to Toronto City Hall by walking underground for ten minutes through the city's extensive network of shop-lined tunnels. We went to the wedding chambers to have a look at the layout and find out more information about the service. It will be a very quick ceremony (about 15 minutes) in really simple surroundings, but I think it'll be nice. Afterwards, Heather took a picture of me outside City Hall.

We walked along Queen St and headed to Kensington Markets in search of my wedding dress. We found a shop with the most beautiful dresses in the world, but they cost about $300, so we can't really afford one. I am tempted to put it on the credit card, but we'll have to see how desperate and covetous I get in the next two days.

Marriage licence

We are staying with Heather's relatives in Pickering, which is a half-hour train trip from Toronto. We went to Pickering City Hall yesterday to get a marriage licence.

East heaven

Our road trip is complete. We are in Canada, and it is nowhere near as cold as I'd been led to believe.

We left Newburyport on Sunday morning and drove to Northampton, Massachusetts, where Heather once lived for a short time. Heather's friend Carey showed us around the town, which is really quaint and lovely. That night Carey took us to East Heaven Hot Tubs, where we sat in a private outdoor hot tub. Snow had fallen and was piled up in the corners of our courtyard and the air temperature was about three degrees. According to Heather and Carey, the tubs are best of all when it's snowing outside. Then you sit in freezing temperatures, warm as can be in the tub, and watch the snow melt as it hits the water. Snowing or not, though, I thought it was fantastic.

Style

Lately, most of our time has been spent shopping for wedding clothes. And it has been difficult. A few days ago, Heather and I discovered that we had really differing ideas about the style of our wedding attire. I was leaning towards the more traditional, formal style. I wanted to wear a long skirt or dress--not in white, but still fairly traditional in some respects. But Heather never wears skirts or dresses, ever. If I dressed formally, she would also need to dress formally, but she would need to wear a women's suit of some sort. She didn't want to do this because she would end up looking kind of butch while I would look very girly indeed. She didn't want us to look like women dressed up as a bride and groom, because we aren't. And I can fully understand her point. So we're going for a different style altogether, a more informal look. That way, we can both wear something that expresses who we are, without looking like a strange copy of heterosexual bridal parties.

Heather has bought her wedding clothes now. She even bought new bras from Victoria's Secret -- you can see her wielding her purchase with great pride in the image above. This was a photo-worthy moment because Heather has not bought anything other than sports bras for at least seven years. I still can't quite believe that she did it.

I still haven't found what I'll be wearing. I have a skirt, and that's it. We're shopping today, so hopefully I will find something suitable. Tomorrow we leave for Toronto. Over two days, we'll be driving up there. I'm really excited. Road trip! Wedding! Completely unprepared! Aarghh . . .