#TheBigKaput: My Hilarious, Haunted Bachelorette Party

I wasn't planning to have a bachelorette party. All my bridesmaids except for one live outside of Ohio, & I didn't want to make my friends travel twice for me. On top of that, none of my bridesmaids or close friends know one another very well; they all come from separate parts of my lives, so they've heard about one another, but it's not like they're a tight-knit group. And I'm not really a penis-straws-&-sparkly-tiaras kinda gal, anyway, so I figured it was no big deal.

When my friend/bridesmaid Sammi came home for a baby shower earlier this year, she told me definitively, "We've all emailed one another. We decided we want to do a bachelorette party." Well, OK. Who was I to argue with that?!

I invited a small group - man, there were so many others I would've invited if we weren't trying to keep it small & manageable - but in the end the guest list was just eight of us, myself included. We decided on Savannah, GA, because it was driveable for three of my out-of-state bridesmaids, & it's a cheap, easy flight from the CLE.

I flew out on Thursday with my friend Lilly, the only other Cleveland attendee, & we did a little bit of wandering that night before staying in a cheap but adorable AirBnB. On Friday morning, we checked into our weekend AirBnB, a beautiful, historic house in Savannah's Victorian district - & then other guests started to arrive!

Sammi, who lives in Atlanta & has spent a lot of time in Savannah, organized most of the weekend - & she did such an amazing job.

On Friday, we spent a lot of time exploring the downtown area, walking down beautiful, park-lined Bull Street & stopping into random bars & shops, including the shopSCAD boutique. We sampled cookies at the Byrd Cookie Co. (those cheddar pecan biscuits!) & drank boozy slushies from Wet Willie's & ate free samples of pralines at the various "candy kitchens" along the riverfront. We toured the Prohibition Museum (including its awesome speakeasy!), & we drank beers & ate nachos & petted dogs on the patio at Moon River Brewing.

Savannah is a hot spot for bachelorette parties, but I didn't want the standard matching-T-shirts-&-a-sash-in-public kind of event. In fact, I told Sammi that if I spotted anything penis-shaped, our friendship was over - so, of course, she found a loophole. When we arrived back at the house on Friday night, she'd hung this hilarious, glittery, vulgar-but-true banner (which I made Lilly pose under with me, as she's newly engaged, too).

My maid of honor, Christina, made the banner you see in the photo at the top of this post, a whole structure made out of PVC pipes, decorated with streamers & the weekend's hashtag. We'd compromised on #TheBigKaput because we all agreed that my original suggestion, the hilarious #KateGoesKaput, sounded a little too much like a celebration of my funeral. "It sounds like we're ritualistically partying before we murder you," Sammi said, so I relented. How cute is this photo backdrop?! (And have I mentioned here before that my new last name will be Kaput? Yes. Kaput. It means "dead" in Yiddish.)

On Saturday morning, we hung out on the patio of our AirBnB (it had a koi pond!) then wandered a farmer's market on our way to brunch at B. Matthew's. A few of the girls got fried green tomato benedict, which made me desperately wish I liked eggs! (My breakfast burrito was killer, though, so I can't complain.) We did more wandering, then a little napping, then dinner at Jazz'd Tapas Bar, where we split a bunch of dips (including a freaking melted cheese platter) & our lovely, gregarious server gave me a free blowjob shot (because bachelorette party). Sammi subsequently took the least flattering Boomerang of me that has ever existed.

Savannah is an open-container city, so we took our drinks in to-go cups for the weekend's main event, a haunted tour of downtown Savannah... in a vintage hearse-turned-convertible. Our driver was "Peg-Leg Ron" (yes, he told us to call him that) & he did, indeed, have a prosthetic leg. He also had a Southern accent so thick I could only understand every tenth word or so - which made for a lot of laughter from us as he shuttled us around town telling (what I think were) ghost stories. Look at this thing!

Peg-Leg Ron made a stop at an old butcher shop where some man (allegedly) killed his entire family. We were pretty sure Peg-Leg Ron was about to kill us there - the whole place was in the middle of nowhere & doused in red light - but as he reminded us, eight strong young women could certainly have taken on one middle-aged dude with a proclaimed peg-leg. Once we relaxed, it turned out to be a pretty hilarious part of the tour, complete with more of Ron's dramatic Southern storytelling & a creepy impromptu photo shoot.

Ron dropped us off at Jen's and Friends, a tiny bar that specializes in over-the-top martinis. After a stranger let me try her drink (she seemed trustworthy?), I went with the oatmeal cookie martini, which came with an actual oatmeal cream pie on the rim. All their drinks are dairy-based, & by the end, they started to taste like the leftover milk in a bowl of cereal - except boozy. We ended the night at Rocks on the Roof atop the Bohemian Hotel, which had a great view that I couldn't exactly appreciate because by that point, I was, uh, no longer seeing straight.

The best part of the weekend, in my opinion, wasn't the booze or the food or the city or the beautiful AirBnB or the warm weather. It was the fact that these incredible women - some of my favorite people in the world - came together for the weekend, all in one place. I thought it would be uncomfortable to bring together people who don't know one another & to have to try to connect them - but I suppose I underestimated how great they are. It was incredible, truly, to look around the brunch table & see all these friends from different parts of my life all in one place, together, chatting & laughing & genuinely befriending one another.

I felt so freaking lucky, & it was easily one of the most joyful weekends of my life. I feel so honored that they did this for me, & that they'll all be there to celebrate with Mike & me come November.

Truth be told, we didn't take a ton of photos during the weekend. Why? Well, look, you know me: I love social media... but I love real-life more, & frankly, we were too busy having fun & enjoying one another's company to snap many pics. The ones I do have are plenty - & the memories I have of the weekend are more than enough.