Monday, October 25, 2010

Halloween Dilemma


It's our first Halloween in our new-ish home and the last thing we want is to be the lame neighbors on the block. I'm not really a fan of Halloween myself, but I like the idea of having a bunch of trick or treaters coming to the house. My dilemma comes when trying to decide what to hand out. I had this discussion with JB last week and our consensus was the same.

With everything I have learned about processed food and sugars over the past year, it seems wrong to me to hand out candy to little kids. Then again, we all know how much we hated the houses that gave us apples and raisins as children. So if I don't want to hand out candy, and I don't want to be lame, do I just leave my porch light off and turn the children away?

Does anyone have any suggestions?

Sunday, October 17, 2010

RIP Sentra

JB's 1995 Nissan Sentra, which he's had since 1997, finally kicked the bucket last weekend and we have been a single car household for a week. Not really feasible for our schedules. We decided the best and most affordable option for us at this time was to lease something. We decided on a 2011 Hyundai Sonata. It's pretty pimp, not gonna lie. In excited for JB because this is his first new car ever! Here is a pic in his new ride:







- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Thursday, October 14, 2010

Happy Belated Birthday Jen!!

In the craziness of last weekend I didn't get a chance to post this for my late cousin's birthday on Oct 9th. She would have been 28.



I love you Jen, miss you every day!

Wednesday, October 13, 2010

Weekend Wrap Up (With Pics!!!)

Before I get lost in the craziness that is the Anub Wedding Weekend, I need to blog about last weekend, as it was very eventful. I will try to use more pics and less words.

Friday Night - Jewelry Party

A while back my mom basically twisted my arm off to have this jewelry party at my house. I am not a fan of home shows and inviting people over to make them buy stuff they don't need/want so I can get free stuff. Not really my scene. But, I went with it and used it as an excuse to entertain in our almost 1 year old home (!!!). I got some wine and made some apps, and mom brought some too. My SIL couldn't make it, but she contributed to the cause with cuppy cakes. I had a pink party and 10% of the sales went to the Susan G. Komen Foundation.


Saturday - Soccer/Dress Shopping/Ashlee's Bache
lorette

My BFF (and now MOH)'s daughter will be 5 next month and started playing soccer this year. I went to see her play in a game on Saturday before me and the MOH went to order my dress. Adorable, no?

(Mom! Meatloaf!!)

(swagger)

(MOH and would-be FG if I were allowing children at the wedding)

(Calm down, this is not the dress)

Bachelorette:

The theme? Ugly Dress Party. The plan? Dave & Busters. We had a quick change of plans when we found out the wait at D&B was 1.5 hours for food. We moved on to our next viable option, Strikes. We figured we could get some food and then bowl or hang out in the arcade or plan our next step. Turns out we didn't need to plan anything. The Spazzmatics, an 80's cover band, just happened to be playing at Strike's that evening, so we decided since we were dressed for the occasion, we would stick around. So glad we did, had an awesome night.

(self-portrait of ugly dress)

(group shot)

(first shot sent over, right as we were seated)

(traditional bj shot)

(Ash with a couple of the Spazz's)

Their wedding is this Friday, so stay tuned for more fabulous pics!!

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

Who Needs Tradition? (The Reason Behind The Plan)

As some (okay, most) of you know, JB and I have actually been planning this wedding since July. The following paragraphs will explain why.

Earlier this year we started talking about getting married next year. Me, knowing how long it takes to plan a wedding and wanting to have a date with some kind of significance, suggested we look at dates and start figuring out a budget. I mean, we bought a house together and had already talked about marriage, so why not start planning? Who needs a ring?

We decided on July 23rd. It happened to be a Saturday (bonus!!) and since July was the month of our first kiss (awwww) and 23 has been a highly significant number in our lives, it was a great choice. We started looking at venues and figured with the bit of help we would get from my parents, and our tax return, we could make something happen.

Anyone who knows us knows that I am the planner in this relationship. JB is just along for the ride and doesn't make a big deal out of a whole lot. He will definitely say something if he is not on board, which is great, but luckily my ideas aren't that crazy and we have similar tastes. Needless to say I was not surprised at his response when after a day of me watching Platinum Weddings I suggested we do a destination wedding instead. He was totally on board. We figured that since we couldn't afford a wedding and a honeymoon, we would just throw it all together and invite those that wanted to join us, provided they paid for their stay. Not only were we having a wedding, but we were giving our guests (who most likely wouldn't take one otherwise) an opportunity for a couples vacation.

Most of our friends loved the idea, but of course my step-dad thought it was selfish of us to make people pay to come to our wedding (we weren't requiring people to attend, what's the big deal?). After looking into it more and getting pretty set on the idea, a wrench was thrown into our plans. One of JB's good friends, Uwe (they met when he was a German exchange student at their HS), sent us an email on Father's Day. He had proposed to his girlfriend and they were planning to be married on July 16th, 2011.

In Germany.

Since this friend has been to the states for all of the other weddings, JB's friends decided that when the day came that Uwe finally tied the knot, they would all be traveling to Germany for it. Obviously we couldn't afford to go to Germany and have our wedding the next weekend in St. Lucia, nor could any of his other friends that had originally planned to go. We figured we had a couple of options. We could wait until 2012, which I don't think either of us wanted to do, or we could figure out a way to afford a wedding before we left for Germany and use that as our honeymoon.

We decided that the only way could even consider affording it, was to cut the guest list. Our initial guest list for the wedding was 160 people. Any bride knows that the most effective way to cut the cost of the wedding is to reduce the number of people you invite. The issue that caused me the most anxiety was upsetting the people we didn't invite. I have friends from all different areas of my life and most of them have significant others, not to mention a large family, so the numbers add up quickly. I wanted to have a guest list that anyone could look at and say "Okay, it makes sense why those people were there." and avoid the whole "I can't believe so and so got invited and I didn't." issue. Of course that will probably still happen, but now I am at a point where I just don't care. So, by inviting immediate family (parents, siblings, grandparents) and closest friends (aka those that know more about my life than what I post on Facebook) we were able to cut the list down to 65 people.

Am I sad that I won't have my aunts/uncles/cousins/other good friends there with me? Of course. But my financial sense takes a hold of me in this situation. Hopefully if they are as good of a friend as I think they are, they will completely understand. Especially if they have had a wedding themselves. And those that don't get it, will figure it out when they finally do get married. More power to you if money is no object, but that's not the case for us and we have to make sacrifices in order to keep ourselves out of debt and save our future marriage.

So, with our newly chopped guest list, we (read I) started researching venues around the Sacramento, Placer, and Tahoe areas back in June. It was pretty discouraging since the price triples for everything once you mention the word "wedding", but I was finally able to find a venue that fit our needs and our budget. Not to mention it's less than two miles from our house. JB and I went and met with the coordinator and we loved the space and the price, and over an early dinner in their restaurant we decided to go ahead and book it.

We need to leave for Germany on July 6-7, and the holiday weekend was already booked, so we went with June 26, 2011. So much for sentimental value, we need convenience (Although it turns out that June 26th is the day my mom and dad started "going steady". Not sure what to make of that since they have been divorced for 27 years). Since we have such a small number of people, we only need half of the ballroom, so she only charged us half the facility fee. The ceremony and reception will be just steps from one another, which is another bonus as we will avoid transportation costs. We have also booked the photographer, selected most of the other vendors, and I ordered my dress last weekend. It was actually the day before JB officially proposed. Nice timing :)

So, as you can see if you made it all the way through this post, we are saying to hell with tradition...for the most part. We signed the purchase agreement for our house before ever having lived together, let alone being engaged or married, and we planned the wedding before the proposal. Big deal. We are still going to end up in the same place, maybe better.

Sunday, October 10, 2010

Breezy is a Bride!!!

I got woken up with this little number this morning. No big deal.




I was still sleeping this morning at 8am (with my ear plugs still in) when I felt a tap on my shoulder. I removed my ear plug from one ear and said,

"Can I help you?"

Often times JB will wake me up early on Sunday morning to tell me he is going to the gym, but we had plans today so I was pretty sure that wasn't the case. He replied with

"Maybe...surprise!!!"

And put the ring over my shoulder in front of my face. He said a few other sentimental things and of course asked me to marry him.

What do you think I said?

He told me of all the ways he thought about popping the question, he knew this was the only way he could do it without me smelling it from a mile away. He's probably right. That's how well he knows me. That's why he's my boo.

Here is a pic from our first anniversary in Vegas which is also where our love story officially began:




- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Friday, October 8, 2010

Nice Marketing Plan


I received this little package from a staffing service earlier this week. Often times I receive things here or there from different companies trying to set themselves apart from all the other companies we won't be using either. Sometimes it works to my benefit. This time, notsomuch.

I posted a pic of this on my facebook and joked that these people obviously don't follow my blog, otherwise they would know that this type of "gift" would definitely turn me away from their services. Included in the box is ramen, parmesan cheese, breadsticks, shortbread cookies, italian dressing, and fruit snacks. The card should read "Enjoy your ( insert any number of countless diseases/health conditions here) on us!"

Don't get me wrong, I love me some ramen. This soup with some tapatio and a grilled processed cheese food sandwich used to be an any time of the year staple at my place. Not anymore. I took the liberty of adding up the nutrtional value (or lack there of) of this little lunch box for everyone's information (the parmesan cheese and breadsticks did not have info included on the package and I almost ate the fruit snacks yesterday but they were gross so I threw them out, so keep in mind that these numbers are probably higher):

Calories - 600
Fat - 28g
Sat Fat - 10.5g
Carbs - 72g
Protein - 10g
Sodium - 2180mg

Not to mention each item that had nutrition facts had a laundry list of ingredients, most of which I couldn't pronounce. No.Thank.You. For 600 calories, 28g of fat and 72 carbs, I will be eating something much more delicious than your new take on a ramen salad. Like all of Bucca de Beppo or Olive Garden. If I am going to sabotage myself, I'm gonna make it worth the guilt.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Tuesday, October 5, 2010

Weekend Wrap Up

Friday was nothing to write home about. All we did was eat and catch up on DVR shows.

Saturday we were up and at 'em.

First we moved our starbuck's Sunday to Saturday so we could visit the local library and get our library cards:

Then we went and returned our Surewest boxes at the customer service center because we made the best move of our lifetime by switching to Dish. Say what you will about Dish, but it's not Surewest and we can get it in our area, so that's all that matters.

I found a dress for our friend's wedding:


I got it at Kohl's. Originally $60, I paid $17.20. You read that right, seventeen-twenty. It was on super clearance and I had a coupon for $10 off. Their wedding colors are black and dark purple, and JB is the best man, so I am sure there will be lots of photo ops.

Since we didn't get enough of a literary fix, we went to Barnes & Noble before heading to lunch at Blue NOMMY! And since we were right by the movie theater and happened to have a couple of free passes, we decided to go see Social Network.

Sunday started with a 9am workout, which is unusual for me because I am still in bed at 9:30 most Sundays. I decided it was more of a sure thing to get up and go with JB instead of trying to motivate myself to go later in the day when I had a bunch of other stuff I wanted to get done. After JB pointed out some weeds in the backyard, I spent the next hour gathering those up and getting them out of the yard. Then I paid some bills and balanced our accounts before heading to WalMart and spending all of our money on groceries and toiletries. For dinner, I made poppyseed chicken courtesy of our friend's recipe blog.

Another lovely domestic weekend under our belts. We both really love having the free time to get stuff done and spend time together.


Ballet Update - Week 7


So, we are almost halfway through the semester, which means it's time for an update. Plus, I had someone ask about it today, which means I need to get it together and get back on the blog-wagon.

Remember when I was worried that the class might move too slow and I would have to remind myself that I was there to learn and take it for what it's worth? Well, I never thought I would have the opposite problem. For some unknown reason, there is a small group in the class that are dance majors and have taken every single one of this teacher's classes multiple times. They.Are.Annoying. Look at me in my point shoes. Look at my perfect technique. Bleh. Way to make the rest of us fell self-conscious and inadequate.

Let's start with the important stuff; my leotard doesn't look any better in week 7 than it did in week 1, but I have learned to care a little less. We are all in the same boat here, but some people's boats are more streamlined than others. In regular clothes and gym clothes, I like my muscular legs and lifted, round glutes. In a leotard, I just look stocky and thick. Thank goodness most of the time I am too concerned with my turnout or my balance in relevee to care about what I look like.

Instead of taking the time to instill good technique in all of us, the instructor has decided that since more folks in the class have experience than not, she is going to introduce us to all kinds of stuff we would never be doing in beginning ballet. Luckily most of it I have learned before and have some sort of muscle memory and can manage just fine, but some of it, not so much. And since I have been working out so much and not focusing on my flexibility, my muscles are not wanting to stretch with me. Very frustrating.

Oh, and that routine I mentioned that will be happening at the end of the year...I don't think I will be performing after all. With the class size as big as it is, I have a hard time seeing what the instructor is doing half the time and that leads to confusion and missing counts and just faking it til I make it. Doing that in class is one thing, but doing that in front of an audience is an entirely different story.

I think all of this has led me to realize why I stuck with jazz and hip hop in the first place. Here's to the next 11 weeks!

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