Archive for 2012
Just say “No” to DIY! {The Proposed Abode}
Ryan and I have a busy weekend of wedding errands and tasks. We’ve got only 4 weeks standing between us and the biggest mistake of our lives . . .
. . . wait, what?
Whoops, that was a typo! :) We’ve got four weeks standing between us and our wonderful celebration of commitment, and I now know why brides freak out in the home stretch. So many little tasks to make sure nothing falls through the cracks.
Maybe this is why I’ve started making things easier by eliminating some tasks/items that I previously planned to DIY.
First item of business: My Gown.
My gown fit pretty well when it arrived. But the shoulder strap needs to be shortened just a bit and I’d like the sides to be taken in so that it fits like a glove. Also it needs a bustle.
Now I’d planned to do these alterations myself. I cringe at the cost of bridal gown alterations – some brides can pay almost $1000 for them. But since I’m not used to altering clothes that a) have boning and b) are ruched I’d better have the sides taken in by a professional. And if I am going to do that, I might as well have them do the strap and the bustle too. I found a small alterations shop right down the street from me that has glowing reviews on Wedding Wire, so here’s hoping it goes well. And that it doesn’t cost an arm and a leg. If the quotes make me gasp, I’ll do the bustle myself.
Second item: The Wedding Cake.
After making my best friend’s wedding cake two summers ago, I knew the amount of work required for a DIY task such as that. Initially we tasted some cakes and didn’t love them, and the cost – again – made me gasp. So I decided to make our wedding cake.
But last weekend, and again this week, I started testing cakes and flavor combinations. Crysty’s cake had been easy – she was vegan, so I did vanilla and chocolate vegan cake tiers. Pretty straightforward. But for my cake I wanted to have all sorts of flavors – passion fruit fillings and lemon curd fillings and stuff like that. Wednesday night I made a ton of cakes and icings. Some worked out, some didn’t. That didn’t bother me.
But later that night, when I was cleaning up the disaster I left in my cake-baking wake, I realized that I did not want to make my own wedding cake.
What? I had to stop for a minute and think about it. But it was true – I didn’t want to be dealing with it three days before the wedding. It’s a big task that would create a HUGE mess and take a good 6 hours of my time.
It was easy to do that for my best friend, because I didn’t have any other wedding stress. But for our wedding I realized that I’d have so many other things to worry about in the days leading up to the event, I didn’t need to add this massive task to the list.
It’s a little late in the game to learn this lesson, but better late than never. Or in this case – better 4 weeks out than the day before.
Where does this leave us?
Today I’ve got my first gown fitting, then Ryan and I head down to the Chesapeake Bay to taste wedding cakes, and then visit two rental houses / places that could potentially accommodate my wedding party and also provide a space for our rehearsal dinner. This is necessary after yesterday’s notice informing us that the bay front house we’d rented for both of those things is no longer available to us.
Tomorrow I hope to finish sewing up the wedding decor that I did DIY. . . which means I’ll finally have a project to show you next week! There’s a lot of wedding stuff to share – I just haven’t had time to put it into a blog post.
Posted in 
A serious bump in the wedding road.
Our wedding is in four weeks.
Because there is very limited hotel space in the area, and because we are hosting a rehearsal dinner AND a morning after brunch, my mom rented a house on the bay for me, my bridesmaids, and their significant others.
Today we got this email:
“I am very sorry to inform you that I will not be able to go through with the house rental in June. I have been transferred to New York and have had to remove the furnishings from the home. I have sent your deposit back in the mail to you. I have a friend in town who does real estate and I have asked him to find you a nice place to stay for your daughter’s wedding. I am very sorry about this! He will take care of you and make sure it is a nice place and reasonable if you are interested in working with him. I have included him on this email.”
It was frustrating me that the woman had never sent us an official contract, but we have a long email trail about the house and I wrote that off to it being in a small town.
But now we’ve got 4 weeks until the wedding, and we have to find a new place to stay for 8 people. . . that can accommodate a rehearsal dinner as well. I’m not even hoping that it will be waterfront anymore. . . surely all the good houses are rented already.
You’ve got to be kidding me. As if we don’t have enough to worry about already.
Adding Handmade Touches to Wedding Invitations
If you have the time and the determination, it’s easy to take a standard wedding invitation suite and kick it up a notch with some handmade touches.
These two examples of wedding invitations stood out to me as examples of inspiration. Ironically, the final style of invites we chose is nothing like either of these. I want to wait just a bit longer before I share the final photos of our wedding invitations with you, because a few final invites only made their way into the mail last week.
Photo by OurDayinApril.blogspot.com
Above, a standard letterpress invitation is sewn onto a colorful piece of card stock, to take it from standard to special. These I loved this hand-sewn look, but my zeal for handcrafting all the wedding invites waned rather quickly. Considering that most will go in the recycling bin after the wedding, I didn’t want to spend the time sewing up a bunch of invites.
I did take a note of inspiration from the small punched tags and the lace liner, however, which you’ll see in our invites later this week.
Photo by Abby Jiu Photography
I also loved these teal cutout wedding invites that I found on Style Me Pretty, and I thought maybe I’d make an invitation wrap in a similar style. (By the way, this whole wedding is gorgeous and amazing, probably my dream wedding if we were having one in the countryside.)
This paper design is surely laser-cut, but a similar look could be achieved using one of the Martha Stewart “edge punchers” sold at the craft store.
In the end, however, I decided not to do a punched-paper wrap for the invites. Maybe I should have, because the wraps I chose to make caused several difficulties which delayed the timely sending of the invites.
Friday {Week in the Life}
Friday morning, I awake yet again to my alarm buzzing on my phone that rests in the hallway.
I fire off my Thursday {Week in the Life} post, realizing yet again that my weekdays don’t really make for good blog fodder. Realizing it’s time to head to work, I pull on my favorite spring work dress, a colorful vintage pieces that was my mom’s back in the 1960s. It’s almost on the side of “too-wacky-and-vintage” for my rather straitlaced office environment, but not quite, especially not on a Friday.
There’s craiglist furniture-to-sell and bags of wedding stuff cluttering the living room, but that’s life. I snap a photo anyway.
~insert tiring workday here~
At 5:30 pm I realize that my eyeballs just can’t stare at numbers and dollar signs any longer, and I head home.
We’re joining friends for dinner tonight, so I detour by my local wine shop, the Vienna Vintner, to grab a bottle or two of wine. I’m a huge fan of this wine shop – Victor, the owner, is always willing to help me choose just the right wines at whatever price point I need, even though I most likely am one of his cheapest customers. I also can’t resist some getting some chocolates for Ryan. Sadly, only 60% of the chocolates make it home alive. . . as the others are already consumed by yours truly. Well, at least it’s a 60% gift for him. ;)
I have just enough time to change clothes before we head out the door to Falls Church. We make a pit stop at another wine shop, Red White and Bleu, to pick up some yummy cheeses and charcuterie.
Our friends live in a tidy, modern little condo in downtown Falls Church. I was stoked to see that CC, who also did the bulk of the planning for my (not-yet-blogged-about) bridal shower, has reused some of her DIY decor for dinner that night.
I’m also thrilled to see that she’s reused some of the copper vases she used in her wedding. They had the most gorgeous wedding flowers ever, using upcycled copper vessels collected from thrift stores, etc.
We have a delicious dinner. We visit with our friends. We come home well-fed, well talked-out, and ready to sleep in the next morning. Because Ryan keeps telling me, after all, that that’s what Saturday mornings are for.
Thursday {Week in the Life}
Thursday morning: Another successful attempt of waking up to my alarm that’s placed in the hallway. I really swear by this method for lazy waker-uppers.
My otherwise lovely and quiet morning is rudely interrupted when my cat is not content to just sit and purr in my lap. This morning he’s purring and walking in place. . . and suddenly I realize he’s basically dry humping in my lap. GROSS. I can’t believe I’m even sharing this. . . but seriously. . . what a rude awakening it is. I toss him off my lap, saying “come back when you’ve learned your manners, dude.”
This literally happens as I am typing the part of my Wednesday Week in the Life} post that describes my cat curling up all cute in my lap. WTF, cat?
I finish my Wednesday {Week in the Life} post, and then set out to answer some emails. Randomly, I decide to make some bacon for me and Ryan to munch on. Bacon Bacon Bacon Bacon! This makes my otherwise quiet and uninteresting morning much more lively. Bacon makes everything awesomer.
Shameless, Un-sponsored Bacon Plug!
I buy Niman Ranch bacon; if you’re trying to eat more ethically but don’t want to give up meat (bacon!) this is a good brand to go with. It costs a dollar or two more than the usual suspects, but Niman Ranch is an ethical company that treats their animals humanely and respects the land as well. I may not want to give up eating meat again, but I do want to know that the animals at least enjoyed a good lifestyle before they were slaughtered.
End shameless bacon plug.
Then the usual happens: Hi Ho, Hi Ho, it’s off to work I go. I try to avoid talking in detail about my day job on the blog – I think it can be dangerous to mix the two. What I will tell you is that I wish I had a more exciting work week. Many weeks I’m attending interesting small business conferences or attending meetings downtown – a few weeks ago I sat across the table from some members of congress and last week I worked a conference where I literally talked to small business owners all day, for 9 or so hours. I don’t get excited about those things, but either of those meetings would have spiced up a {Week in the Life} post.
I don’t leave the office until 6:30, but that’s ok because I know we’re going out to dinner and I have no tasks planned – other than cleaning my office – for the evening.
This is where all the excitement starts!
Ryan’s been on a “trying random restaurants” kick lately and it’s been a lot of fun. Last week we tried an Ethiopian sports bar one night, and a Vegetarian Indian restaurant another. Both were amazing. We are so going back to each of them. Even if we were the only white people there, and got some funny looks. :)
This week we weren’t so lucky. The Irish pub in downtown Fairfax, VA was surprisingly empty for a Thursday night in a college town.
When I ordered my Irish beer, I couldn’t remember which kind I liked. When I asked the waiter, he told me that he hated beer. Funny, but not a big deal.
But the weirdness started with the Guinness BBQ Wings, which actually tasted like they were basted with a really lame General Tso’s sauce. . . or with ketchup & orange juice. They were sweet and fruity and . . . gross. We told our waiter – not complaining, but just letting him know we didn’t need to keep them on the table. He responded by telling us that very matter of fact that he wasn’t surprised, since “none of the sauces made here really taste like they’re supposed to.”
What?
The waiter basically just dissed his restaurant’s products.
We raised an eyebrow but then let it go.
And then we heard our waiter taking an order from the ladies sitting behind us, who were asking for recommendations. Cue the waiter:
“I pretty much hate everything on the menu because I’ve eaten it too much.
But I can tell you what stuff isn’t too bad. I can also tell you which stuff is really bad.”
Ryan and I were frozen in place, listening to this guy “sell” these ladies on the food.
The woman orders the crab cake sandwich. The waiter asks:
“Are you sure you want that?“ (Like she’s making a huge mistake.)
The woman actually defended herself, saying “Yes, I’ve had it before.”
Wow. Just. . . . wow. There were more comments that we overheard in the evening, but this sums it up.
Sadly, our food wasn’t that good. Ryan was disappointed in his fish and chips (though the onion rings were awesome) and my corned beef was so dry and flavorless. I know how to make a mean corned beef at home, so this was doubly disappointing.
We paid the bill and rolled out as soon as we could. Granted, the waiter did tell us at the end that he took the wings off the bill since we didn’t like them and didn’t eat them, but after hearing his negative comments we had trouble taking him seriously.
Things looked up, though, when we popped into Woody’s Ice Cream for dessert. A true old-school hole-in-the-wall ice cream shop, this place had the cutest old man working behind the counter. I didn’t ask, but I’m 100% sure it was the owner – probably named “Woody.”
Big deal: Ryan actually let me take his photo to include in this post.
The sun was setting as we walked through old town Fairfax back to the car.
We made a quick stop at Goodwill – but didn’t find anything spectacular – before heading home.
I proceeded to watch Bewitched and 8 Simple Rules on Hulu while cleaning up my office and filing bills and paperwork. Fun stuff!
Then I was off to bed, where I managed to squeeze in a few more pages of Stephanie Plum before passing out around midnight.
Wednesday {Week in the Life}
6:09 am – My very cozy slumber is ruined by the dinging of my alarm. I want so badly to head back to bed, but the little walk out into the hall to turn off my alarm gives me enough time to talk myself into staying awake. After stumbling into the kitchen and plugging in the percolator, I curl up on the sofa to “wake up” while the coffee brews.
Apparently I brewed disappointment this morning. When I pour my much-anticipated cup of joe, all that greets me is tan colored hot water. GROSS! I don’t know how I got the proportions so off. I’m extremely frustrated – it’s way too early to deal with bad coffee – but I make another pot, with much better results.
6:30 am – It feels like I’ve wasted precious moments of quiet morning blogging time, but now that I have my coffee I head to my office and finish up my Tuesday {Week in the Life} post. There’s photos to download and watermark, writing to be done, and then of course a final editing read-through. Even though many people say you don’t have to write perfectly when you blog, I try to ensure that I write well.
As I blog, the cat sits in my lap, purring up a storm. This is our little morning routine – he seems to get really excited about morning blogging time. I attempt to take a photo of this.
Cat thinks I”m crazy. “Seriously, lady? I haven’t woken up yet!”
He really gets excited, and will headbutt everything: The desk, my knees, my chin, my hands as they type . . Sometimes he likes to headbutt my cup of coffee *while* I’m sipping from it. That does not fare well; it usually ends in bad words coming out of my mouth as the cup is slammed against my jaw and coffee is sloshed everywhere. (He has a very strong headbutt.)
Here he is getting ready to headbutt. At least the coffee is safely out of the way.
7:24 am – Hit “publish” on my Tuesday {Week in the Life} post. Hooray – I’ve managed to stick with it for two whole days in a row. :)
Now it’s time for a coffee refill. I can not impress upon you how much I love my morning coffee.
7:33 am – This part of the morning always makes me a little sad. I know it’s time to shower and head into the office, but I really just want to sit at my computer and write. Once I get to work, though, it’s no problem diving into what my job requires . . . it’s just that little transition from doing what I really love to going to a cubicle for the day.
- – Insert busy workday here. – -
On the way home from work, the Container Store is calling to me. I have to make a return, but in the process I see a really cute build-your-own planner set by Russell+Hazel. It’s not cheap, but it appears to be just what I need, in the perfect purse-size binder. I decide to buy a few parts, and decide at home if I want to keep them. Later, when I see that they’re not any cheaper online, I rip open the packages excitedly. :) The three parts I got (for now) are the Mini Lime 9 x 7 Inch Binder
6:00 pm – Mr. Merlin and I gear up and head out for a walk. I’m not feelin’ it today, so we only do about .6 miles. But at least we did something.
Ryan and I have leftover BBQ pork tenderloin for dinner. Damn, it’s good. I microwave the entire dinner. . . frozen green beans, leftover pork, and sauerkraut. It seems to create very little mess in the kitchen. :)
Wednesday evening is spent working. It’s not fun, but it’s got to be done. We’re coming dangerously close to our April 30th deadline at the office, and when you’ve got deadlines for the government you don’t mess around.
11:18 pm – I head to bed. It actually feels luxurious, like I’m going to bed “early” tonight. Last night I only made it through one page of my book before nodding off. . . tonight I’d like to read just a bit more.
I didn’t have a lot to share on Wednesday. I think that’s because the day was so mundane – with the exception of that new planner :) - but some days are like that. Even in Australia.
Tuesday {Week in the Life}
6:00 am My alarm goes off, and I wake up. . . for a moment. I really want to get up and blog about a home project, but I lie there realizing that I don’t have any photos loaded. I quickly feel defeated and fall back asleep.
Later, when I wake up around 7, I realize that I could have started my {Week in the Life} post – so I start the coffee, then hurry up and dash off a bit of that post. The day always gets off to a better start when I’ve had a chance to sip my coffee and blog a bit before heading off to the cubicle for the day.
The day in the office is just as busy as yesterday’s, only with fewer meetings. I leave a bit early so that I can get to the post office in time to buy some pretty stamps and mail the WEDDING INVITES! :)
4:55 pm Just in the nick of time, I pop into the post office. Cherry Blossom stamps are the only ones that are even remotely attractive, so they’re the ones that I stick on each and every wedding envelope.
Whoosh! Down the chute go the envelopes, and just like that I’m reminded that I’m *really* getting married. I feel really awkward as I snap a furtive photo of the act. :)
5:20 pm - Exercise has not played a big enough role in my life lately, so when I arrive home I immediately set off on a short walk. Charlie’s still recovering from her spine infection, so she can’t go on these walks with me and Merlin. I keep his leash in the car – that helps prevent the total freakout that occurs when the coat closet door opens and I jingle a leash onto his collar – but Charlie still knows she’s being left out and she doesn’t like it one bit.
Once outside, I set my Runkeeper app on my phone and take off. Runkeeper is great because it not only logs your activity, it also creates a map of where you went on your walk.
The walk is one of the best parts of the day, and now that it’s spring there are so many things to catch my eye. This yard, in particular, grabs my attention – because it’s the kind of yard I’d love to have someday. The way the bushes are grouped throughout the yard, creating so much visual interest – it beats a plain green grassy yard any day.
Near the end of the walk I get to a little stretch of woodsy trail. I love this part of the walk, because it momentarily feels like I’m miles away from everything. Merlin splashes in the creek before taking off up the trail.
5:45 pm – Sit down to catch my breath from my vigorous walk and do a little blog reading, and finish my Monday {Week in the Life} post.
6:00 pm - I’m in the mood to sip something tasty, so I pour a small glass of the Linden Vineyards Late Harvest Vidal wine. The 2003 vintage has aged amazingly well. If only I had some stinky blue cheese to pair with this sweet, honeysuckle and apple-y dessert wine, then I’d really be in heaven.
I have a little fun with the camera, taking photos of all the sediment (aka wine diamonds) on the cork.
Hm. . . now am I motivated to clean up my pigsty of an office / dressing room?
Oops. . .Ryan comes home from work and he throws off my attention span since we start talking about work drama. (We both work for the same company.) Guess I’ll have to clean up the office later.
7:13 pm – I finally finish the Monday {Week in the Life} blog post. Ryan is outside starting the grill, which means it’s time for me to clean up the kitchen (again) and make dinner. At least we have a yummy BBQ pork tenderloin to look forward to tonight!
8:00 pm – Woohoo! Dinner cooked, we sit down to dig in with the show Joe Schmoe on DVD. My BBQ pork tenderloin was seriously tasty – thank goodness there’s enough left for about 3 more meals!
8:30 pm – With the Joe Schmoe show still playing, I set about cleaning up the mess on my sewing table that was created by the previous night’s wedding-invite-assembly. I also start some laundry. Yeehaw, I have an exciting life. ;)
9:00 pm – Time to get sewing. I have just a few more custom pup pad and pillow orders left to fill before my shop is “closed” for the wedding countdown. I’m hoping to finish everything by Friday, so that the weekend can be totally wedding-focused.
11:30 pm – Finally, I’m finished sewing for the night. I package up the orders, set up my coffee so it’s ready for the morning. I’m proud of myself for managing to serve dinner without making a disaster in the kitchen this evening.
11:50 pm - My bed looks oh-so-cozy (to my cat too, apparently) and I’ve got a few minutes to curl up with Stephanie Plum (13th book in the series, I’m hooked) before falling asleep.
Knowing I really want to wake up early Wednesday morning, I set my alarm on my phone, then set my phone on the floor of the hallway. Having to haul my butt out of bed and into the hall to turn the alarm off forces me to really think about whether or not I want to go back to sleep. Here’s hoping it works like a charm in the morning.
Monday {Week in the Life}
I’ve been wanting to do a bit more writing and journaling lately. Concurrently, I’ve been wanting to share a “day in the life” – but realized that a week would provide a more accurate record of everything that I encounter on a regular basis. Fortunately for me, I saw that this week Ali Edwards is holding her Week in the Life event – perfect timing! Let’s see if I can keep up with this all week. 
6:30 am My alarm goes off and I barely wake up enough to turn it off. A little while later I wake up and write a short blog post, but I’m all out of coffee. My morning is out of whack from that alone. I’ll have to stop by Caffè Amouri on the way to work, because I absolutely can’t start the day without a tasty caffeine jolt.
The weather sure is disappointing. It’s cold and rainy all of a sudden. I suppose it’s typical for April, but it’s tough when it’s following on the heels of balmy February and March weather.
The workday is typical for April – crazy busy. I sit in my cubicle working hard. . . attend a few meetings . . . dart to the craft store at lunch to grab a few fake flowers that I’ll experiment with later this week. I don’t have time to dawdle; there’s so much to be done at work and my blackberry doesn’t stop buzzing the whole 20 minutes I’m out of the office. I grab a ham and cheese croissant from the French bakery next door. The warm and flaky goodness is perfect for this cold and rainy day.
6:30 pm – Stop at the store on the way home from work. We’re desperately in need of groceries, and have a feeling Ryan would not consider frozen veggies and vegan “sausage” an acceptable dinner.
7:30 pm – Because my night won’t be busy enough, apparently, I decide I should clean out the fridge and make pizza for dinner. I take a shortcut by grabbing a thin-crust frozen pizza, then topping it with piles of fresh spinach, mushrooms, olives, cheese and pepperoni.
I pump up the volume on my latest British chick-lit audio book because Ryan has chosen this time to vacuum. And in true Jane fashion, as soon as the vacuum is away, I spill coffee grounds all over the kitchen floor. And drop a hunk of tofu, promptly stepping in it and mashing it into my slipper. Whoops.
Yes, this is a typical day in the life.
While the pizza is baking, I manage to clean the whole kitchen, clean out the fridge, and marinate two pork tenderloins for later in the week. I switch the pizza to “broil” to crisp up the pepperoni slices, but as I open the oven door to check the pizza, the smoke alarm goes off again and again. I put the dogs outside for the sake of their sanity.
After a few minutes it’s time to slip the pizza out of the oven and chow down! But suddenly my headphone cord catches on a drawer handle, ripping the headphones off my head and sending my phone crashing to the ground.
I scramble to put my phone back together, thinking “don’t let me have broken another phone. . . I really don’t want to replace it yet. . . ” just as I notice smoke coming from the oven. “Sh*t, the pizza is burning!”
Grabbing the pizza from the oven, I see that only the edges of the crust are burnt. But then the smoke alarms – all THREE of them – start wailing for the THIRD time. The poor dogs are cowering in the back of the yard, behind the shed.
Yes, this is a typical day in the life.
8:00 pm – Dinner. The pizza rocks. So do my pepperoni, spinach, olive, and cheese-stuffed mushroom caps, which I’m experimenting with as a low-carb pizza alternative for future dinners. Finish watching Back to School with Rodney Dangerfield as we eat.
I carry my dishes to the kitchen after dinner, and wonder to myself how on earth the kitchen could be such a mess again – already – when I completely cleaned it up before cooking dinner.
8:30 pm – Check on Janery, my Etsy shop and answer customer inquiries. Check regular emails, realize I have about 100 to respond to, and give up. I’ve got to finish assembling wedding invitations.
And then all evening I fight with the invites. They’re not turning out as I hoped, but maybe that’s because I’ve seen far too many picture-perfect invite packages featured on wedding blogs. I am pretty sure I should have coughed up the dough to just order everything from Minted, rather than just ordering the invite cards and attempting to DIY the rest.
Psst: Can you guess which invites we chose?
11:00 pm Ryan wanders down to see what all my whining is about. I put him to work licking envelopes and cutting strips of burlap ribbon. I usually like working alone, but at this point I’m grateful for the company. We watch Zoey Deschanel in New Girl while we work. . . and several times Ryan dies laughing, proclaiming again and again that she really is me. Oh dear.
12:30 am – Fall into bed. Damn. Hopefully I can get to sleep earlier tomorrow. And I guess I’ll straighten up my sewing table tomorrow, too.
Are you participating in Week in the Life 2012? If so please share a link in the comments section so I can visit! :)
