Wednesday Confessional

I'm making this fast because I did not have something scheduled for today...

... and I confess that even though I was not up on blogging, I did go ahead and prep a meal last nigh for tonight's dinner. Tonight will be pasta. How do I prep pasta you ask? Well by sautéing the onions with mushrooms last night and then this morning sticking them with with the pasta sauce and other things into a slow cooker. 

... I confess that the weight loss thing lost steam when I saw Costco had pumpkin pies in! Those are delicious. I may or may not have eaten an entire pie myself. 

Except that I put on a LOT more whipped cream than that.

... I confess that I had a tough night on Monday. Nothing went my way (minor compared to others) and I became over whelmed and began crying. 

... I confess that I had some vivid dreams last night. I couldn't explain them all, but as I type this I can remember thinking things were real and now realizing that they couldn't have happened. 

... I confess that I went to the back to school night for my niece and nephew's school last night. They both have amazing teachers! I think they will both have a great year (5th grade and 1st grade). 

... I confess that Thomas and I tried a restaurant that was new to us for lunch yesterday (awesome part of working down the block from each other) and it was great. Plus Tuesday's are their special offer days so we lucked out. 

... I confess that my intent is to use the 2 weeks that Thomas is out of town to clean up the office and get it organized. I might make a trip to IKEA and buy a bookcase that I really feel like we need at this point. 

And that will be it for this week! 

I confess that...

… I have a new car that I didn’t really need right now. It’s gorgeous:

Thanks to Thomas' cousin (posing with me) who got us a great deal!

… Thomas has a new car that he really did need:

… I was feeling anxious about getting the car since I didn’t need it. Thomas and I have had many expenses this year (after all buying a home and having a wedding aren’t cheap!) and we didn’t necessarily need to add to it. However we were able to pay for my car in cash and, after doing some budgeting – something we haven’t done yet -, we realized that it would take us 10 months to save up the cost of the car. 

This made us keep looking into how long it will take for us to save up enough for a down payment on a house. Not going into details, it will take us about 5 years, possibly a bit longer with the costs of having kids added (however we should both have some bumps in our salary in that period of time as well). 

… I still cry about my sisters’ passing. One of my co-worker’s mom passed away last week, another’s father passed away this week… and it just gets to me. Also when I have to let people know she has passed. 

… I’ve been in training this week and I’m tired of it. I want to go back to my work. 

… Okay I can’t stop talking about my car. It’s so pretty and shiny and has cute inside toys! But it doesn’t have navigation which is sad, but I guess it is okay. My phone works and Thomas’ car does have it. I’m pretty good with directions anyway

... I confess that I really wanted to train someone but after 2 weeks I am ready to go back to just taking my own calls.  

... I almost forgot this one... I'm donating blood to the Red Cross at work today! I help to organize and put it together (okay, I get most (if not all) of the sign ups, put up signs, and got people to help clear out the room so that the Red Cross can come and set up for the donations. And I donate blood. *wipes brow* Okay, it's not hard and I like doing it. Last year our office earned a plaque from the Red Cross for increasing our donations 233% (what a coincidence that it was my first year at the office ;) - can I toot my own horn anymore? This year we will have a total of 3 donations (we had one in March, the one today, and again in November) so I'm hoping we get some sort of recognition. 

Wednesday Confessional

I’ve had a busy few weeks and I’ve definitely been out of the blog world as well. I had pre-written posts for while I was in Argentina for my honeymoon, but when I got back…  I had no interest in sitting down on the couch (or anywhere) to blog.

So I confess…

• I thought I would be inspired to blog while on my trip, but it was the last thing on my mind.

• However, I did read most of the entries on my Bloglovin’ feed. I did not want to come home to 1000+ posts to catch up on.

• I was upset with my family because of something that occurred regarding my sisters’ death. I’m not going to go into detail here, but it caused me pain.

• I cried quite a bit the night I found out my sister passed. I was able to pull myself together to go to dinner, but I was unable to stop tears from coming. People probably thought Thomas and I were fighting.

• Leaving Argentina was bitter sweet. I missed home, but I enjoyed being with my extended family very much. It feels like a second home, and not like I’m just a visitor.

• I am not looking forward to going through all our pictures, deciding which ones to print, and then putting them into albums. My brother is good at captioning pictures, but I’m not. I get bored easily with that kind of stuff. I have to do it – for both the honeymoon and the wedding.

• Part of the reason I don’t want to go through the pictures is that the wedding pictures are pretty bad and it makes me very sad.

• I confess that I feel bad taking things from my sisters’ room. My mom is emptying it out and she offered me one of her computers. I took her Mac. I still haven’t set it up… and I think that’s why.

I think that’s enough confessions for one week, right? Next week my Wednesday post SHOULD be about my wedding day!

Wedding Wednesday Confessional

I’m keeping this post as a confessions because a) I’m still recuperating b) I have a lot to catch up and organize to post and c) I have a paper cut on my right index finger which makes typing painful!

ONE / /  I was not one bit nervous the entire day. After all the worrying and freaking out over the past few months, during the actual wedding day I was as calm as a cucumber (that’s a thing, right?)

TWO / / I danced! I HATE dancing, but my anxieties went out the window on Saturday and I danced the evening way.

THREE / / I also drank too much, probably by 2 drinks. I ended up bawling at the end of the night after throwing up in my in-laws bathroom. I was a mess.

FOUR / / I don’t remember too much of that evening after, like, 9pm. BUT my husband (!!!) still enjoyed himself that night *wink*

FIVE / / I was worried about the decorations on Friday, but they ended up being really nice and I let my aunt-in-law know my appreciation.

SIX / / At breakfast on Sunday morning the waitress called me “Mrs. Mahoney” and I did a double take looking for my mother-in-law. I played it cool, though.

SEVEN / / I forgot to bring my petticoat and bra so I was nude under the dress… which no one could notice but I could definitely feel. Lame. Also lame because my mom spent A LOT of money on those things! HOWEVER! I didn’t take the tags off so I can either get store credit OR try to sell them on CL!

EIGHT / / The taco guy I was worried about? Really F-ed us over. A whole post-section about that will be done. Made me soooo mad!

NINE / / Taco guy was the only bad vendor. Stone Fire Grill was amazing as expected, the cake was delicious (actually…. I’m going to eat some of that tonight!) and gorgeous! The DJ, although he tried to cut out early, was great and kept the party going and the photographers were with me from 9am until 9pm!

TEN / / I’ve NEVER EVER felt more beautiful in my life. It wasn’t even the dress, it was the hair and make-up. The make-up was amazing! I was worried that they would overdo it, but it was perfect. I felt like a princess. Even Thomas commented on it. I wish I knew how to do it like that.

Our entrance at the reception!

ELEVEN / / Thomas teared up. No tears actually fell, and he composed himself quickly, but I could see his lip quivering. My maid of honor also commented on it. So sweet!

TWELVE / / My nephew was great as ring bearer and declared the party the ”most awesome party ever”. On Monday when his teacher asked him if he danced at the wedding, he said “No! I danced at the party!!”.

THIRTEEN / / I would not have been able to get through the wedding without the help of several people…. A few include my maid of honor Lauren, my co-worker and friend Dante (who decorated the chapel), and my sister and brother in law who went above and beyond to make sure everything was ready for the reception.

My maid of honor, Lauren, and me!

Clockwise starting on the left - Lauren, Mike (bro-in-law), Mika, and Nikki (nieces).

FOURTEEN / / Because I can’t leave the list at 13… I broke down the next day. Since I drank so much I spent most of Sunday alternating between shivering and being sweaty. I didn’t sleep well the night before and I couldn’t rest. I finally cried and slept at around 3pm which was what I needed. I woke up refreshed and Thomas and I were able to finish out furniture shopping.

I want to add a very BIG THANKS to all of you who reached out and sent me messages and well wishes on my wedding day! You don’t know how much it means to me! I’m going to attempt to reply to you all this week (paper cut healing soon, I hope!) but just know that you are amazing!

Wednesday Confessional

So it’s a hectic week. I’m getting married in just 3 days! Can you believe it? Well, I can’t… and it’s brought on these confessions:

// ONE Maybe I was a bit of a bridezilla. I was accused of it by my sister and my fiancée. I guess it depends on your definition of the term? If it means that I wanted my wedding to be the way I envisioned it and not the way my cousin or his sister or the neighbors aunt did, then I’m a bridezilla. If it means that I got upset when things got changed on me after they had been planned for a while, then yes, I am a bridezilla. However, I think that for the one day that is mine and his (and when he has no opinion) I should be able to have it the way I want it and not someone else’s vision. Bridezilla or not.

// TWO That said, I probably should have been more patient with the people I was dealing with. I lost my tempter often over the past few months, and if I could do it over again I would probably nod, smile, and then just do it my way.

// THREE I’m going slightly crazy these days. I know that I have just about everything under control. There are so many details that I have to remember. So many small things that have to be done in order for the whole thing to come together… and they are all freaking me out. My MOH asked me if I was nervous yet, I told her that I’m too busy to be nervous.

// FOUR I’m REALLY looking forward to my honeymoon and am so relieved to have the tickets purchased, even If we paid a lot more than I ever wanted to pay. I CANNOT wait to see my family – that I haven’t see in over 6 years. There will be a party/reception for them. We’ll see how comfortable Thomas feels at the party and around my family. He says I should be comfortable around his since we are now one family, so he better be comfortable around mine J.

// FIVE I probably spent too much money on getting my car washed, but now it is sparkly inside and out AND it all happened while I was at work and in the work parking lot. Time saver!

// SIX I’m going to have some drinks. I’m picking up my MOH at the airport tomorrow night and I cannot wait to go sit at a bar, have some appetizers and drink a couple of martini’s. As each day goes by I feel a bit more stressed out, so that will be a welcomed girl night.

// SEVEN I am bringing on more work on myself by deciding to make jello shots tomorrow night. I’m crazy, I know. The inspiration were the ones a friend made for my bridal shower at work (although those were non-alcoholic). So cute!

Wedding Wednesday - Vendors Edition

With everything going on last week I wasn’t able to get a wedding Wednesday post up. Let’s get to it this week, though!

// Photographer – Photobooth

I love love love Aladdin and this is how I felt at the prices!

When I started looking for a photographer I didn’t really know what to expect. I knew they were expensive and I knew I would spend a large part of my budget on it because you simply cannot skimp on pictures. However I kept running into photographers that charged $1500 or more and it was only for 3 or 4 hours of your wedding day. My wedding will start at 2 in the afternoon and then the reception will probably run well into the night. I began to get discouraged because I wanted to have pictures of both the ceremony and the reception, not to mention the time before the ceremony of both Thomas and I getting married. It started to look like I was going to have to pick which part of my wedding day I was going to have photographed professionally.

Just like with the invitations I kept on googling and searching all the wedding websites until I finally found Altar Photography. I browsed their photos like I had done on countless other websites and found them creative and in some cases different from what I had seen from other photographers. When I checked the prices I grew excited! This photographer was only charging $995 for a WHOLE day of photography. Not only was that a lot less than others but it also was for the entire day. With them I could have pictures of myself getting ready, Thomas getting ready, the reception area BEFORE everyone comes over and it gets messy and the whole ceremony and reception. Plus all the posed pictures. THIS was amazing. I sent a quick e-mail out to them and was happy to get a quick reply.

I met with Trista along with my mom and Nikki (my niece). She showed us her book of pictures which were great. It was a quick meeting but I knew I had to book her ASAP. On top of the great price for the photography she offers a photo booth for only $350. I had been thinking that having a photo booth would be fun but I knew that with my small budget it might not be feasible. Altar Photography is making it possible for me to have beautiful photographs from my whole wedding day as well as a photo booth for my guests to take pictures!

I talked to Thomas about it and then quickly let her know that we would be using her. After putting our 1^stand 2^nd deposits down I got a call saying that she had double booked! I started to panic! I was never going to find another photographer with the same prices and time. Luckily when I called her back she let me know that she had another photographer she worked with that was available. Thank goodness!

// Tacos & Tables

One thing I’ve been really lucky with in planning my wedding is being able to book people who were recommended to me as well as a couple whom I went to school with. Thomas and I needed an appetizer/hor dourves to serve while we are having our pictures taken at the chapel. Since I’m not hiring waiter’s and the dinner will be buffet style this wasn’t an easy thing to figure out at first. One day Thomas mentioned that he wanted a taco truck for the wedding. At first I just couldn’t’ handle it. My perfect formal wedding was going to have a taco truck? Ah well, it’s in a back yard so we might as well go all out for that theme, right? I started looking for taco truck company’s and started to ask around for them.

A co-worker mentioned to me that she knew a guy who had a taco truck who also did rentals. Perfect! I could take care of both the food and all the tables and chairs with one guy! Awesome! After a misunderstanding about when we were going to meet with him he came over to Thomas’ house, where the reception will be. He brought over the color he thought matched my wedding color – and it did, perfectly. We were able to work out a deal for (a gazillion) tacos/quesadillas as well as all the rentals I need: chairs, tables, linens, chair covers, and napkins. I am providing “looks real” silverware and plates.

// Cake

I had a lot of fun looking through cake pictures online to get an idea of what I wanted. I knew what I didn’t want: all white, classic, traditional. I knew I wanted something with color and modern, but I wasn’t sure exactly what. I also knew that I had a $300 budget for the cake and I wanted to stick as close to that as possible. On a whim I remembered that I had a classmate from high school who made cakes and I had looked through her blog a year or more before. I sent her a Facebook chat and we planned on meeting a month or so later, closer to the wedding date. Being the darling that she is she drove up (probably like 40 minutes!) to come to me so that we could decide on a cake and she could give me cake samples to try.

They were DELICIOUS! I’m not going to tell what kind of cake we’re having, but I will say that the cake will be 3 levels and each level will be a different kind of cake. The design will be colorful and yet still classy. I’m very excited for how it will turn out. As of right now I don’t have a topper for it, so I need to get on top of that (no pun intended!! Hehe) soon! Best of all she is giving me a great price and will deliver it the day of! So excited to see the finished product!

// DJ

Music. I didn’t want dancing at my wedding mostly because I am not a dancer at all so I didn’t want to be forced into dancing. This idea was vetoed. My fiancé very much wanted to have a money dance so that meant we had to have music. Since I had not budgeted for a DJ and had heard from others (included his twin sisters’ wedding last summer) that DJs cost nearly $1,000 I had planned on making my own wedding son dance mix on my iPod and asking my brother in law to act as the MC. This was the plan for most of the time, I began to get music from Spotify and to plan the timeline for my brother in law to follow. Then I remembered that I always see updates on Facebook from another high school classmate about his “shows”. A DJ! Out of curiosity I sent him a message and asked how much he would charge for a wedding. The answer completely surprised me: $300! When I saw that I knew we could make some room to have him take care of the music so that my brother in law could enjoy the night and I didn’t have to create a wedding playlist.  

// Alcohol

I also was not very excited about having alcohol at the wedding. I know people can get rowdy and make weddings difficult and I really did not want to deal with that. However I didn’t have a choice when it came to this. His parents took over the cost of the alcohol so I couldn’t say it was too expensive to include. We will be having a bartender friend of theirs take care of the drinks – which will be an option of a martini (most likely Cucumber Mint) or a pina colada/margarita (we have not decided yet). I think there will also be champagne but I am not positive.

If you read all or part of this... thank you!!! 

Wednesday Confessional... I needed it!

Wow. I have quite a bit to confess this week or at least they are heavy confessions, especially since some things have not been going the way I hoped. A few of these confessions will lead to posts in and of themselves. Let’s get straight to it:

I confess…. that I get angry very quickly and take a while to “move on”. Examples of this include the current situation with our realtor. She has not been very good at communicating with us and her way of expressing herself has been insulting. I’m still angry and I have to watch myself before replying to emails.

I confess… that work frustrates me sometimes, even though I love it. For some reason there are people in my office (of 300 people or so) that don’t like me and complain about me even though I have done nothing toward them.

(I feel like this way too often!)

I confess… that I have made a great friend at work and she is great at lifting my spirits and listening to me. I am so thankful for her and many other people who are great! I don’t make friends easily so it is great to work with people whom I can consider friends and not just co-workers.

I confess… that I am a cry baby. I hate confrontations and will usually get emotional about them. When I get bad news (like when I didn’t get the townhouse we wanted to buy a few weeks ago) I can become inconsolable. It’s pretty ridiculous sometimes.

I confess… that I’m doing well so far this week at sticking to my eating goals, although I am going to dinner tonight for Thomas’ parents wedding anniversary. It’s a seafood restaurant and I don’t eat seafood – however there will be chicken on the menu!

I confess… that I am getting excited about having our own home and how I will decorate/organize my home. It’s really a dream come true for me and I am SO looking forward to it. At the same time I am being very cautious because I’ve gotten excited about 3 other homes and I didn’t get any of them.

I confess... that I don't know where to get good gifs from, so if you have suggestions, please tell me!

To end on a happy note….

I confess… that I will be married in less than a month and a half! That is just mind-boggling!

Wednesday Confessional!

When I saw this Link Up from Kathy (what a great name!) at Vodka & Soda I knew I had to participate, after all it’s another chance for me to talk about myself. Also I get the feeling I have a lot of things I should be confessing! Here we go…

1. I confess that I am obsessed with Peeps. Mostly the bunnies but I’ll eat the chicks as well. I don’t know why. I’ve eaten enough of them that I can taste a difference between the yellow, pink, and blue peeps. Blue does not taste as good as pink. I think I have a problem. Every time I buy a package I tell myself that it’ll be my last one but it’s a lie, always a lie. I buy more and more. I need to stop. They stop selling them after Easter, right? And yes, I am eating a blue Peep Bunny as I type this.
2. I confess that I tend to eavesdrop and offer my opinion in things that are not involving me. I do this at work a lot. In my line of work there is always something that a person doesn’t know and has to ask for clarification. I sit next to my supervisor (and one of the best in the entire office so many people come to her) and I often interject myself into their conversation. I shouldn’t do this because I’ve been getting a feeling that people don’t like that.
3. I confess that even though I am trying to lose 5 pounds in order to fit into my wedding dress a bit better (it fits, just a tiny bit tight) I eat Peeps and am not counting calories like I should. I come up with excuse after excuse. I’ve been stressed out with trying to buy a home (as I’ve posted about) and so trying to diet and buy a house has obviously not worked well for me. But this is purely an excuse and I should be able to take care of my weight. Bright side I’m not gaining any weight!
4. I confess that I get tired of being the one that has to organize all the birthday celebrations at work. I want to make my co-workers feel nice, but I don’t like organizing events or decorating.
5. I confess that I'm afraid that my attempt at blogging and being social will fail even though I am trying my best to be a good blogger. 
6. I confess that I'm not good at having posts ready to post in the morning but I am creating a calendar to keep track of link-ups so that I can be better at posting these link-ups on time!

Those are it for today. I had a busy day at work, which is where I do most of my blog writing (I guess that is a confession as well, right?) so many of my confessions slipped out of my mind for the moment. Happy Hump Day!