One to Nothin'

My Wedding Dress

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When Jason and I decided to push our big wedding for the second time (13 months past our original date), the thing that upset us most was that this pandemic was getting to decide when we would start our family. We started talking about having babies very early on (like, weirdly early), and there’s never been a doubt in our minds that we wanted to be parents.

So when we first set our date for 10/16/2020, we assumed we’d start trying shortly after the party that I’ve always dreamed of—the one where I’m surrounded by all our closest friends and family, reading vows foreshadowing a baby-filled future, crying into my champagne during speeches, wearing the beautiful, expensive dress (and, of course, showing off the hot bod I’d worked so hard for leading up to it), and partying hard into the night. These things were always so important to me until they weren’t anymore.

We decided that starting a family would be more wonderful than a party going how we originally envisioned it could ever be, and while covid has taken so much away from all of us this year, we decided we were done letting it keep us from our growing family.

We (and of course some divine intervention) timed it so that Baby Rainbow will be here one month before the wedding in November—I’ll tell that story soon.

As silly as it sounds, one of my biggest hang ups was not getting to wear THE dress on the big day. Very soon after arriving in Florida, I made an appointment at The Bridal Finery in Winter Park, mainly because they had such thorough COVID precautions (and back then I thought my wedding was right around the corner). My mom and sisters came with me and after trying on just four dresses, we all knew this was the one (see one of the close seconds here). Everyone cried, we popped champagne, it was exactly the finding-the-dress moment I’d always dreamt of. So this dress meant a lot to me.

So when we decided starting a family was our number one priority, I booked the amazing photographer Michael McDaniel (with very short notice 🙏🏻) for a professional photoshoot in Jacksonville early in the first trimester, and he exceeded my expectations in every way. I’m so grateful to have these beautiful memories to add to our unconventional wedding album (and to be able to wear a much more comfortable dress one month postpartum 🤣).

Huge shoutout to Jason for taking this wild ride with me and for posing for these photos (doesn’t he look amazing? He used to practice smiling in selfies with me because he was so uncomfortable in front of the camera, and now look at him!). I cannot wait to celebrate our marriage with all our people AND our daughter in November.

I love you, and I love our story.

KENSCHELLA Bachelorette Part II

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If you thought the fact that I’m going to be a mom in several months was going to stop me from posting millions of bachelorette photos (and my pre-pregnancy bod 😉), then think again. We’re back for part two of the KENSCHELLA Hen Party where we went hard on the festival vibes (see part I here). Each of my girls had their assigned rainbow color (because I am Mrs. Rainbow, after all), and Liz (the cutest little preggo orange one below) made us all color-coordinated flower crowns.

I couldn’t choose between white and rainbow, so I went with both. You might notice I had about three costume changes. Zero regrets (except I excluded a couple due to being too lazy to edit out camel toe—the joys of being a woman, amiright?).

My sister/Maid of Honor made us all custom temporary tattoos, amazing VIP backstage passes, and this epic KENSCHELLA playlist.

Why yes, I did finish this whole bottle of champagne myself. Thanks for asking! Also, pretty sure it cost me less than a water bottle at real Coachella would.

It was pretty chilly out—I guess we could’ve expected that since it was New Year’s and all—so we spent most of our time in the hot tub despite the amazing collection of pool floaties.

Rainbows all DAY.
There was a bloody mary bar, but I mostly stuck with champs.
I’ll have to show this to Baby Rainbow one day and say, “this is what mommy’s belly used to look like!” 😂

That concludes KENSCHELLA Part II, but we’re just getting started. Stay tuned for the rest of the party (seriously, each day had at least two themes complete with coordinated outfits and amazing decor).

We’re Having A Baby!

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We interrupt your regularly scheduled wild Rainbow bachelorette content for a very important announcement…

Baby Rainbow is coming October 2021! We are SO excited to grow our family, and yes, this means there will be a teeny tiny Rainbow at our wedding in October (we did that on purpose 😉). Watch the video below to see our Easter-themed gender reveal, featuring colorful eggs and lots of candy.

First we collected a dozen eggs from our hens, then I cracked a hole in the bottoms, cleaned them out, and let them dry. Then my sister helped me paint them muted rainbow colors, and I went wild at Walgreens buying candy of all colors of the rainbow. Once we received the results (I let my sister check my chart for me since I wanted to be surprised), I brought her the eggs and candy and asked her to fill only one of them with all pink or blue candy without telling me which egg it would be in. She sealed the holes in the bottoms with tissue paper and glue, like you do with confetti eggs. Somehow we still managed to get down to the last two eggs without finding pink or blue—I swear we didn’t cheat. Here are some of the fun Easter-y details from the day

The old wives and I both knew it was a girl. I had a feeling from the very beginning! I just wore blue because the pink dress I ordered was too big. Woops!
Bunny veggie plate! I spent way too much time assembling two of them, but no regrets.
The vegan cupcakes from Butter Sweet Bakery also had colored icing inside so I had to make sure no one snuck one before the egg cracking began.
I was pretty proud of my pink and blue deviled eggs. I boiled them, took out the yolks, then dyed them with water and food coloring! I also made hot chocolate bombs—see the video here.
If you didn’t figure it out from the first pic, we’re holding the pink confetti (which I ordered here) because it’s a GIRL!
All the lovely women in my family pointing at our newest addition!
Huge shout out to my parents for letting us throw all our parties in the past year at their house (within our bubble, of course) and for already being the best, most supportive grandparents ever.
The candy/egg shell aftermath.

I’m so happy the secret is finally out! I’ve been privately documenting my belly growth and logging all my weird symptoms for the past three months, but now it’s time to overshare with the world. Get ready to hear about my newfound love for French toast and my inexplicable DAIRY TOLERANCE (!!!) in my first trimester recap coming soon.

XOXO

KENSCHELLA Bachelorette Part I

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The rainbow-themed bachelorette party to top ALL bachelorette parties happened over New Year’s Eve weekend in St. Augustine, FL, and let me tell you: we captured CONTENT. There were literally thousands of photos, so to narrow them down for these posts truly is a feat. But I’ll see what I can do.

My sister/maid of honor organized, planned, DIY’d, decorated, and completely crushed each day’s theme (actually there were at least two a day) and created a color-coded spreadsheet so everyone could come full prepared in their assigned color of the rainbow. I highly recommended getting you a highly creative virgo for a MOH.

And just as a PSA, all of my ladies and I were incredibly careful leading up to the shenanigans and once we arrived, we did not leave the Airbnb because we all take COVID-19 precautions very seriously and figured if any of us got sick (which we did not), we would at least not expose anyone else.

First, let us take a tour of the hen house. This incredible mansion had its own pool (complete with sunbathing mermaid statues), hot tub, private dock, a fountain, and themed bedrooms. This place used to be a hotel that boasted literary guests like Ernest Hemingway, Marjorie Kennan-Rawlings, and Robert Frost as well Hollywood elite like Cary Grant, Gary Cooper, and even Eleanor Roosevelt was a guest at one point.

Next up: the party favors. Everyone got their own backpack, rainbow slides, customized fannypack (full of supplies for each day’s theme), and branded cups with obligatory penis straws.

Wendy even made us all the cutest-ever hand-stitched, branded face masks—lest we forget I tried to plan a wedding in 2020.

The first night’s theme was Diddy’s White Party, so everyone wore white and I wore rainbow sequins, which you’ll soon see was a theme for the entire trip.

Stay tuned for part II.

Fun Things

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It’s been a while since we talked entertainment, and while we’re coming up on an entire year of quarantine, it feels more important than ever. Let’s go.

  • Fruit Pizza – I made a version of this heart-shaped fruit pizza for a virtual Galentine’s Day celebration last month and it was dangerously good. I used premade sugar cookie dough, topped it with CocoWhip (it tastes just like whipped cream but dairy-free), and decorated with red/pink fruit. J and I ate it all in two days. Woops!
  • Insecure – If you don’t have HBO Go/Max/whatever they’re calling it these days, I highly recommend. Issa Rae created and stars in this hilarious, raunchy comedy that’s like a funnier, less whiny version of Girls. It takes place in LA and addresses the real stuff, like friendship breakups, off-and-on relationships, trying to figure out career stuff, racism, and life in your late 20s/early 30s. Plus, it all started with Issa Rae’s “Awkward Black Girl” sketch on YouTube, and I love a self-made badass.
  • Severance by Ling Ma – This apocalyptic novel was eerily relevant in 2020 as it chronicles a global pandemic and follows Candace Chen, a first-generation American woman’s experience being one of the very few people left unaffected by Shen Fever in NYC. She joins a group of survivors and things get weird. Would *love* to discuss the ending if anyone else reads it!
  • TikTok food trends – Just like everyone else, I’m constantly scrolling and laugh-crying at TikTok these days. At this point, I find it far superior to Instagram. But lately I’ve decided I want to try allll the food/cooking/beverage hacks I can find. So far I’ve tried the Baked Feta Pasta (phenomenal), the Tortilla Wrap Hack (I’ll prob never try to wrap a burrito again), and the Whipped Iced Coffee (meh). I ordered this water-flavoring bottle, so TBD on that, and let’s be real, I’ll prob order the famous TikTok leggings in my sleep here pretty soon.
  • Coffee Shop Ambience – Does anyone else miss working from coffee shops? I used to work from home on Fridays, so I’d go to cute coffee shops around my neighborhood to get work done. Lately I’ve been streaming coffee shop ambience YouTube videos in my living room to fill the void. It sounds sad, but it’s actually pretty relaxing and the plus side is I don’t have to ask anyone to watch my laptop when I get up to pee.
  • New gratitude journal – I’ve been pretty inconsistent lately, but when I take the time to write down the things I’m grateful for in the morning, it tends to make a pretty big difference in my mood throughout the day. This new one from Ban.do takes it a step further and prompts you to write down your goals, people you admire, why you’re proud of yourself, etc. It’s pretty great.
  • Starbucks Impossible Breakfast Sandwich – I know this has been around for a minute, but we haven’t discussed and it is WORTH discussing. It is the best vegetarian breakfast sandwich I have ever had. I haven’t eaten cow or pig products in quite some time now, so I may be a little removed from the full carnivores out there, but even without cheese this sammie is delectable. The Dunkin Donuts one uses Beyond meat and while I appreciate the effort (and still order it fairly often) it just can’t compare. I’m Team Impossible all the way. I heard McDonald’s is going to serve Beyond Meat soon. They really shouldn’t have let BK beat them with the Impossible Whopper. I’m not usually a fast food gal, but with limited veg options on the go, I gotta say BK has been a lifesaver on the road this year. Never thought I’d say that.
  • Ben & Jerry’s Vegan Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Chunks – Speaking of vegan alternatives, these things are DANGEROUS. They do not taste dairy free and they are not easy to stop eating once you start. You have been warned.

There you have it, now you know that my quarantine consists of a lot of TikTok, HBO, and taste-testing vegan foods. Oh, and one epic bachelorette party, but we’ll get to that later 😉

What’s been keeping you sane in 2020: The Sequel?

Introducing Mr. & Mrs. Rainbow

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We had no idea the entire world was about to go into lockdown as we prepared to move from California to Florida back in the beginning of 2020.
But as the months went by and rumblings of the Coronavirus got louder, we stocked up on hand sanitizer and grew more and more tense with every sneeze and sniffle we came across. We noticed less foot traffic and more masks, but we were still clueless enough to love the open seats on the train (and let’s be real, we were living for the immediate service at bars).


One night in March, we stopped off at our local Oakland Bierhaus on our way home from work and, after a few tipples, we had an idea. Although our wedding date was set and our venue was booked, we had a hunch things were about to get weird. While navigating uncertainty in our jobs and soon-to-be home, the one thing we knew for sure was that we wanted to be married. 


Since we were about to join the Gibson family in Florida and the “real” wedding was still seven months away, we thought the best way to say goodbye to the place we fell in love in was to make a day of getting dressed up, getting married at the beautiful San Francisco courthouse, and celebrating with champagne and oysters overlooking the Bay.


So we made an appointment for Thursday, March 5, 2020, asked our close friend Dana to be our only witness, and had the most magical day. 


A global pandemic, a ginormous puppy, four chickens, and two wedding postponements later, we are so incredibly grateful we made this spontaneous decision. 

We cannot wait to celebrate in November once everyone is vaccinated.

10.16.2020

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October 16, 2020 was supposed to be our wedding day. After looking at dozens of venues in many different areas of the U.S., we finally booked our Orlando venue for a Friday in fall and imagined our guests drinking around the world with us at Epcot the following Saturday. We knew we’d be moving to Florida soon for a (so we thought) short stay, and the cheaper rent + close proximity to our venue was supposed to make wedding planning a breeze. HILARIOUS, right?

Luckily since we were so preoccupied with moving our well-established California lives across the country, we halted all wedding plans until we were safely in Florida. We had an engagement party in Oakland shortly after New Years, and that would be the last time we’d get to celebrate IRL with friends for the rest of the year.

Fall in Florida is not cool and crisp, btw, but we sweated our asses off in jeans and sweaters anyway because #dedication.

As the COVID numbers got worse and worse (and Florida chose to deny its existence), we postponed for five months hoping a vaccine would be making the rounds by spring, and spent our original wedding date getting our engagement photos done and celebrating with just the two of us.

We don’t know if we postponed long enough. We don’t know if we’re lighting our bills on fire when we sign a new vendor contract. We have friends and family members who have to fly overseas, who have compromised immune systems, who lost their jobs, and who don’t want to miss the chance to celebrate our love.

Planning a wedding in 2020 is really just the pits.

I go from having butterflies in my stomach imagining myself walking down the aisle in the most beautiful dress I’ve ever worn and seeing this handsome guy waiting for me in a sea of lush green plants surrounded by all our best friends to ugly crying thinking about all the people who would have been there if this was any other year or imagining some super spreader scenario where we accidentally kill off our grandparents because we were selfish and impatient.

Then I remind myself that I’m lucky. I still have a job. I still have my health. I can pay rent. My family is safe. I have my person and two fluffy puppies. I’m a lot better off in this garbage fire year than a lot of people, and then I feel guilty for said ugly crying. After all it’s just a party, right?

But suffering is not a competition, and this year sucks for a lot of reasons. For me, one of those reasons is that I finally found the love of my life and I don’t know when or how we’ll get to celebrate that. But it WILL happen eventually. And when it does, no matter what it looks like, I’ll still be incredibly lucky to have found this guy and to have the supportive family and friend network that we have.

So here’s to 2021. May it be infinitely better than its predecessor.

Goldilocks & the Three Bears

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HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

We dressed up as Goldilocks and the three bears to check off my dress-up-the-pups requirement on my Fall Bucket List and it was mostly a success! Granted this is pretty much the only shot where both the dogs are in focus and sort of looking at the camera (props to my sister for capturing!).

We dressed up about a week before actual Halloween and brought our porridge bowls full of candy to my best friend’s daughter who was going to miss out on trick-or-treating due to COVID. Leon managed to wiggle out of his costume before we even finished chatting with them (from six feet away) and we accidentally left it on the ground. I truly don’t know how people get such great shots of their dogs.

I can’t handle Jason’s bear feet. They were SO good. The only way I managed to keep the dogs from completely decimating the teddy bear arms/ears/slippers was by spraying them all down with bitter apple spray. It really works and is necessary with a puppy this big and teeth that sharp (but can also be used to prevent them chewing on themselves).

As you can see, the bears’ costumes were more elaborate at the beginning. Leon had a baby dog toy sewn to his arm and Ziggy had an old lady scarf and rainbow necklace 😂I don’t think we got any photos of Jason’s bear tail, but he had one as well.

HER FACE! I die.

This one’s juuuust right!
I had way too much fun being a blonde.

We can also check “decorate pumpkins” off the list! The fam spent a whole Saturday painting pumpkins and we did not miss the gooey seeds/slime/manual labor that is usually required for pumpkin decorating one bit.

I hope you all had an amazing Halloween weekend! I spent the real deal in New Jersey, but that’ll have to be a post for a different day because I took a LOT of photos.

Don’t forget to vote tomorrow!!!

Fall Bucket List

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It’s fall! It’s fall! I’m so excited! 🍁

I’m not even sure why since Florida doesn’t really have seasons per se, but I think it’s a mindset and I am HERE. FOR. IT. Plus, we’re that much closer to Christmas (aka shitty-Netflix-Christmas-movie szn), which means we’re that much closer to 2021, and I am ready for this year to be over.

I know the world isn’t going to snap back into place once the clock strikes midnight, but I think we will all benefit from a healthy dose of new year’s optimism and maybe, god willing, there will be a break in bad news for a minute (and PLEASE REGISTER TO VOTE—my mental health, along with way more important things, will be greatly affected by this election).

So! To celebrate this season I hold so dearly in my heart, I made a fall bucket list. I love lists, especially fun ones, and what’s more fun than making it imperative that you bake cookies or make a costume for your dogs or watch spooky movies? Maybe it’s slightly less fun to run/walk 100 miles, but your girl’s got a wedding coming up (come onnn, 2021, don’t let me down!).

First up, the movie thing. Truth be told, my mom wouldn’t even let me watch Goosebumps or Are You Afraid of the Dark? as a kid, and as a teenager my friends forced me to watch Texas Chainsaw Massacre in the movie theater (I cried and closed my eyes almost the entire time) so needless to say I never got into it. But I think I would enjoy the old ones that don’t look even remotely real. Or the ones where the young A-list actresses are rocking killer (no pun intended) 80s/90s fashion. Or the super goofy ones where the blood shooting everywhere looks like Kool-aid? So yea, if you have any suggestions, holler. My main requirement is that it’s not *actually* scary.

The rest are pretty self-explanatory, but I’m very excited to have two blonde dogs. I feel like they would make perfect lions, but maybe I need to get more creative with it. Either way, a very difficult photo shoot will be involved (Ziggy hates wearing anything other than her collar, remember this?) Decorating a house will be new for me! My roommates were always really good about making our space feel festive, but now we have a whole house we can work with! I got really pumped because we even live in a neighborhood that kids probably trick-or-treat on (we had a fence at our old place so there was nowhere for them to knock) but then I remembered that COVID is ruining all things fun. So now we’re trying to think of how to build a sanitary candy shoot? TBD.

Then it all comes down to the fall treats. I have my first wedding dress try-on/alterations appointment right after Christmas (CRUEL, I was supposed to be done with all this *before* the holiday season), so if you know of any healthy apple crisp recipes or low-cal cookies that don’t taste like hot garbage, let me know. Either way we’ll make the real deal a few times because life is too short 🥧

What’s on your fall bucket list?

I’ll leave you with my fall 2020 playlist I’ve been working on. It’s only about 80 minutes long for now, but I’ll keep adding as I check things off the list.

HAPPY FALL 🎃

Fall Fitness Challenge

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Hi friends!

September has blessed us with its presence and I, for one, am very excited for fall. I recently created a @mackensierainbow account on Instagram where I’m allowing myself to be as obnoxious as I want to be when it comes to fitness, food, mental health, wellness, and, obviously, rainbows (if you look at the grid, eventually it’ll be ROYGBIV).

So I thought I’d start out strong with my first #RainbowFitnessChallenge. It was supposed to be for the month of September, but life is weird these days and California/Oregon folks can’t even go outside, so I’m unofficially expanding it for all of fall. Between now and December 21st, I hope to:

👟 Log 100 miles—whether it’s walking, running, or biking. There’s a handy-dandy chart template in my fitness IG stories highlight here for you to mark each day—trust, it is very motivating  and will make you excited to cross off numbers each day.

🧘🏻‍♀️ Move 30 minutes a day—yoga, daily mileage, dancing, weight lifting, anything counts! Just move that bod. I will be posting resources for free workouts and ideas for fitness at home for those of you who, like me, are not comfortable going back to the gym just yet. 

💧Drink 64 oz (about 8 cups) of water each day. Tailor this to you—if you already drink tons of water, don’t stress, but if you’re struggling to meet this number, work your way up and notice how you feel when you’re more hydrated. 

🍤 For the Month of September, avoid fried foods and observe four Meatless Mondays. I’ll post lots of meatless inspo throughout the month, and if you do it right, you won’t miss the meat at all. As for the fried stuff, if it’s a regular in your diet right now this might be a toughie, but you’re going to feel amazing once you’ve gone 30 days without it. I plan to do a different healthy eating challenge for each month of fall.

📝 Write down three things you’re grateful every morning or evening. Keep a notebook on your night stand or somewhere that fits into your routine and get into the habit of gratitude journaling. This is more for your mental fitness, but priming your brain in the morning to look out for things to be grateful for can really be a game-changer. 

📱Share updates on social with #RainbowFitnessChallenge so I can follow your progress! I would love to see sweaty selfies, water chugging videos, daily gratitude, and healthy meal ideas to keep me motivated as I work hard to complete this challenge myself. 

Any of you folks with me? Be sure to follow along on Instagram and maybe even here on this blog now that I’ve switched over from Blogger to WordPress.org 😉

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