Lazy

It's been a while. I wish I could say it's just because I've been busy, but lately I've gotten to the point where updating feels like a chore. Perhaps because wedding planning has begun to feel like a chore. I'm at that point where the initial buzz has worn off and now I'm staring at a to-do list of phone calls I have to make and contracts to sign and cake tastings to set up and people I have to strike from my guest list...

I've been making headway on my 101 Things list, however. The Year of Buying Nothing is going famously. I survived Black Friday, Cyber Monday, pre-Christmas, after-Christmas, the Victoria's Secret clearance sale and a $15 off coupon from DSW shoes, so the rest of the year should be a piece of cake. Speaking of cake... I've lost six pounds, but have lost my taste for food journals and fanatical exercising ever since I went in for a checkup last week; the PA told me my BMI is "perfect" and if I lose any more weight, I'll be underweight. (Never mind that I think BMI is bullshit, and if my weight is perfect then where did this spare tire come from? At least this means I can drink beer again.) J. and I did #22 (Take a sushi-making class) on Feb. 12, thanks to a Living Social coupon. We learned how to make the rice (the hardest part), practiced proper rolling technique and then got to eat the fruits of our labors. It was also a sake-tasting; I lucked out, as the woman sitting across from me didn't drink, so she graciously and discreetly passed me her sake cups across the table. 

I also went to a Bikram yoga class in Greensboro one recent night with my yoga friends - this is the kind of yoga you practice in a room with the temperature turned up to 105 degrees. Yes, you read that right. I hate sweating in an air-conditioned gym, so why, you ask, would I do such a masochistic thing to myself? Well, I survived Bikram despite its best efforts to kill me, and then we all went out for Thai food and more sake. (Making progress towards #64 - Make a new friend.) I had a funny post in my head all planned out about Bikram and the yoga Nazis who kicked our friend Caitlin out of the building and the man in front of me who sweated so much it looked like he was peeing, and how I thought I was going to die but didn't, but the laziness has taken over. Sorry.

In other news, J. got a new job (good!), I got a new boss (argh!). I went to a concert and got a free snow day. It has been an eventful few weeks of not-writing.

Karma

One wedding task that has been a lot more difficult than I imagined is, weirdly enough, adding stuff to our registry. (I say "our," but this isn't entirely accurate... Last night I thought to ask J. what he wanted to add. He said, "I don't know. Maybe a grill?" And that's as far as we've gotten.)

So, last night I get inspired and set about gleefully adding kitchen gadgets. Stainless steel saucepans! Grapefruit spoons! Ramekins! Oh the joy! (But I can't find a simple freakin' bagel slicer to save my life...) 

Then it occurs to me that the time is ripe for karma to bite me on the ass. I have been, I am sad to say, an inconsistent wedding-gifter over the past few years. Some weddings, I was super-organized: I shopped from their registry long before the wedding. Got a wedding gift, shower gift, and even some boudoir gifts. But other times (usually when it's HIS friends), I lose their wedding website address with the link to their registry. Or I forget about the gift until we're sitting there in the pews. Or I spend so much cash just GETTING to the wedding (airfare, hotel, meals) that I can barely pay my rent when I get back, let alone buy them dish towels. (One time, even, we got a wedding announcement from some people we don't even hang out with and who we're pretty sure don't like us. That was so blatantly a gift grab that we didn't grace it with a response.)

So, here's hoping Lady Karma grants me some mercy this once. I really want that decanter...

Taking the ax to the guest list

Well, it was bound to happen sooner or later. I had my first bride-to-be budget freakout last night at 1 in the morning.

See, the budget was going so swimmingly... We don't have to pay an officiant (going to the courthouse the day before) or pay for our venue (because we're having it at our friends' farm). We found a BBQ dinner caterer for $10 a head. For alcohol, we're saving by not serving champagne or liquor; the wine is $2.67 a bottle at Aldi, and a friend is hooking us up with a FREE refrigerated truck for our kegs. For cake, we're going to cut a small circle cake from my favorite bakery, then use big sheet cakes to serve everyone. We have minimal decorations planned (candles in Mason jars, fall leaves). No favors. No floral centerpieces. No extraneous stuff like aisle runners or chair covers. No DJ, just a computer playlist hooked up to some speakers (borrowed). Invitations are coming from Vistaprint, where I'm saving even more money by using a LivingSocial coupon. 

I was pretty proud of myself that I'd gotten the per person costs down to $26 apiece - not bad for dinner, appetizers, drinks, chair and table rental and invitations. A lot of wedding receptions cost two or three times that just for the dinner! However, even $26 a person really adds up when you have a 200+ guest list.... added to the fixed costs like the photography ($2,000), renting a tent, nice port-a-johns, patio heaters (because it'll be October), paying a bartender, etc. I started freaking out last night as I did my budget and saw that, even with my mom's generous help, my personal share of the wedding costs was creeping northwards of $7,000(!!!) - not including the dress alterations, the RINGS, the marriage license, or the honeymoon! That means I have to save at least $1,000 a month between now and then if I want to avoid dipping into credit card debt. This, when I am about to start grad school, and when J. is about to start a lower-paying job so he won't have to work second shift anymore. A grand a month is not happening. Hence my freak-out.

Thankfully, J. came right home after work to calm me down and look at our budget together. There were little tweaks made - saving $156 by not using the nice compostable plates and cutlery (I was trying to have a green wedding, oh well...), saving $250 by not having DIY veggie and cheese trays out before dinner (because really, people won't be starving at 4:30 p.m.). But it was clear that the only way we could save serious money is by cutting the guest list. If we can get it down to 150 from 223, we save $2,000, plus an extra $400 from not having to rent two tents!

THIS is painful. I have a lot of old friends I'm still close with, plus a lot of new friends I've made in this town. Lots of people on my original list have done me favors I want to repay - welcoming me into their group of friends when I was new and didn't know anybody here; inviting me to join boards and civic groups I'm still part of today; mentoring me and helping me get into grad school; supporting my and J's various nonprofit causes. Countless people who have had us at (or in) their weddings, and had us to their homes for dinner. The kind friend who was the only one to send us a hand-written note of congratulations on our engagement. The friend who, even though she's only in town a few times a year, offered to help with "anything" I need for the wedding. I hate to cut anyone. What if they're offended? What if they take it as a slap in the face, a declaration that we are not friends?

Yeah, it sucks, but I did it. Our combined families are 60 people. I got my friend list down to 50. He'll make his cuts today. Now I only have to save $450 a month until the wedding, and hopefully I can go back to being my laid-back self.

Ye gods! An update!

I haven't been doing so hot with my New Year's Resolution to waste less. Just tonight I threw away a bunch of cilantro that I let go bad, and the hour and a half I spent on Facebook today can hardly be called time well spent...


BUT, I'm pleased to report I'm already off to a running start on my 101 Things. I've already done #17 for January (Make at least 4 new recipes every month from my Martha Stewart Living and Everyday cooking magazines). I made a Mexican chicken soup, spaghetti squash with meat sauce, apple-oatmeal scones (food porn picture by me), and caramel-coconut thumbprints (picture not by me). (Here's the recipe. You're welcome.)

I can cross #25 - Go to a yoga class off my list. I did that Monday, and I'm hooked - it's a relaxing way to start the week (and hopefully will help me with #64 - Make a new friend). Likewise, I'm working on #18 - Lose 10 pounds, despite all the Martha Stewart cookies, by upping my cardio at the Y and writing down everything I consume this week. Which, unfortunately, has lead me to realize that I need to quit drinking beer. Not for any moral reasons, mind you, but because it has so many damn calories. I had two Imperial Stouts while watching the playoffs Sunday and then found out they had 300(!!!!) calories apiece! Only bourbon from now on (ha ha).


I'm almost 3/50 on #28 - Read 50 new books. I just finished The Tiger's Wife, which was a gift from my future sister-in-law. Most of it is magical realism in the former Yugoslavia, though it switches to a modern day story in an unnamed Balkan country. I found it fascinating because the culture is both familiar and exotic, Western and Eastern, Christian and Muslim people living side by side in tension long before the war erupted. I also recently finished listening to The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest on CD (yes, I'm still counting it), and now I feel unbelievably sad that there are no more Stieg Larsson sequels to read. And because I'm a history geek... I am almost done with The Buddha in the Attic, which I asked for at Christmas after hearing about it on NPR. It's the story of Japanese "picture brides" who crossed the Pacific in the early part of the 20th century to marry men they had never met, only to scratch out a meager living doing menial jobs and then get sent to internment camps after Pearl Harbor. I have no idea what I'll read next. Ideas?

In which the Laid-Back Bride jumps on the blog bandwagon

I made exactly one New Year's Resolution for 2012: Waste Less. Save more. (This applies to money, food and time.)

However, being that I have an unhealthy obsession love of making lists, I can't resist the allure of creating my very own Day Zero Project. (If you live under a rock and haven't heard of this concept, it's a list of 101 concrete, quantifiable goals you hope to accomplish in the next 1,001 days.) Perhaps because the whole house smells like the cranberry bread I have baking in the oven right now, a lot of mine have to do with food... (Don't be impressed. It's from a box.)


MY 101 IN 1,001 DAYS LIST!

Start: January 5, 2012 
End: April 3, 2014

1. Get married. (...Okay, that's a freebie one.)
2. Get my engagement and wedding announcements published.
3. Send all my wedding thank-yous within two months.
4. Have my wedding dress preserved.
5. Make a fancy cheesecake from scratch.
6. Complete my Year of Buying Nothing successfully.
7. Go to Kathy's wedding in Boston.
8. Start listening to Rosetta Stone Spanish.
9. Go to Machu Picchu.
10. Go somewhere tropical for our honeymoon. 
11. Go back to visit family in New Mexico.
12. Go to a new national park I've never visited.
13. Take a Big Sur road trip and drive up the California coast.
14. Make an entire meal (appetizer, entree, side, dessert) from my new Thai cookbook. Ditto for my new Indian cookbook.
15. Make 10 new recipes from my Tupelo Honey cookbook.
16. Make 10 new recipes from my Vegan Slow Cooker cookbook.
17. Make at least 4 new recipes every month from my Martha Stewart Living and cooking magazines. (1/28 down...)
18. Lose 10 pounds (ha). (6 pounds down as of February)
19. Go one month making everything at home - no restaurant food or other premade food, or buying coffee in a coffeeshop or beer in a bar.
    
20. Follow the Prevention magazine "Eat to Beat Belly Fat" plan for 1 week.
21. Go one month without eating fast food.
22. Take a sushi-making class.(Feb. 12, 2012)
23. Do at least 20 cardio workouts of 30 minutes or more in one month.
24. Try a new machine at the gym.
25. Go to a yoga class.  January 23
26. Try salsa dancing.
27. Go roller skating at the rink.
28. Read 50 new books. (3/50)
29. Read 3 classic books in the original French.
30. Finish all the unread French-language books on my bookshelf.
31. Stay debt-free for a year.
32. Save $1,000 that is untouchable except in emergencies.
33. Build up $2,500 in savings.
34. Surpass $3,000 in my IRA.
35. Contribute $3,000 in just one year to my Roth IRA.
36. Go on 10 new hikes.
37. Go to a music festival I've never been to before.
38. Go back to Shakori Hills with J.
39. Make a framed collage of Rooster Walk 2 and 3.
40. Complete a scrapbook.
41. Write a (finished) short story.
42. Start my master's in communications. (I got in to Johns Hopkins this month!)
43. Either get a raise, or get a new job.
44. Hit the half-million dollar fundraising mark in my grant writing and fundraising job.
45. Learn to play "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down" and the Charlie Brown Christmas theme on piano.
46. Go shooting again.
47. Get Lindsey to teach me how to knit.
48. Knit something.
49. Make myself a new fabric wallet using my mad sewing skills.
50. Make myself a fabric coupon holder.
51. Whiten my teeth.
52. Sing karaoke at a bar.
53. Clean out my closet.
54. Take a load of clothes to Goodwill.
55. See a movie at a drive-in.
56. Get a good 1.8 camera lens.
57. Go berry-picking.
58. Go wine-tasting.
59. Go visit my old teachers at high school.
60. Make a donation to my college.
61. Buy a Groupon.
62. Host a theme party.
63. Put together a Halloween costume using only items in my closet.
64. Make a new friend.
65. Invite some friends over to dinner who have never been in my house before.
66. Go skiing.
67. Get a massage.
68. Go to a UNC football game.
69. See a meteor shower.
70. Go a whole week without cursing.
71. Get a dining room table and chairs.
72. Plant a garden in our yard.
73. Spray the poison ivy in our yard.
74. Make and use a batch of compost in the garden.
75. Organize my photos and post the best ones online.
76. Go zip-lining.
77. Go ice-skating. 
78. Go tubing down the river.
79. Go canoeing.
80. Catch and eat a fish.
81. Go visit Eliza in Richmond.
82. Go to a Unitarian church.
83. Floss every day for a month.
84. Go a week without spending any money.
85. Get my picture taken in front of the Big Chair.
86. Do all my Christmas shopping at local and small businesses one year.
87. See a live theater production. The Importance of Being Earnest, Feb. 2
88. Make annual donations to the Boys & Girls Clubs, St. Jude's, Heifer International, and the United Way.
89. Solicit a donation from someone else to the Boys & Girls Clubs.
90. Go to an SCA event.
91. Make a medieval dress.
92. Make a mix CD.
93. Get makeup done once by a professional.
94. Go to a barbeque festival.
95. Go to a beer festival.
96. Go through a corn maze.
97. Wake up early on a Saturday and go to one of those Ruritan country breakfast fundraisers.
98. Make a list of all the places I want to see before I die.
99. Call an old friend.
100. Organize a mini-reunion with high school friends I haven't seen in forever.
101. Keep volunteering for local organizations.

What you'll notice isn't on the list (yet): Buying a house. Having a baby. Moving to new town. Even though these are all things I want in my "five-year plan" (if I had one), my 101 in 1,001 list is more about getting ready for all those big scary life changes. By the end of this, hopefully I'll be in better financial shape to do all of those things. And I'll have gotten some bucket list items out of the way (like Machu Picchu) that Future Baby would make VERY difficult.

Resolutions

Today, Laid-Back Bride was anything but. (At least it wasn't wedding-related stress...)

It was my second day back at work after vacation, and oh, what a fabulously shit-tastic day it was. I could just about feel the bile churning around in my innards this afternoon, singeing my stomach. The kind of day that makes me want to curl up in the recliner after work with some liquid therapy and too many cookies and melt my brain staring at the frivolously large TV for a few hours.

But today, I am pleased to report, I did none of the above. I had my usual stockpile of excuses for not going to the gym: It's cold outside. I'm hungry. I'm sleep-deprived. My lungs hurt. It's after 6 p.m. - I won't be able to get my favorite elliptical machine at the Y. I made myself go anyway, and I stayed on the (not-favorite) elliptical for the whole damn hour, until all my anger had burned up and evaporated. 

Then, I came home and ate a late dinner of an orange, a big leafy green salad with homemade mustard vinaigrette, and beef stew I made in the crock pot yesterday with mixed vegetables. No cookies, no weeknight drinking, no TV. Instead, I sat down to devour a new book and float along on endorphins and the ethereal music of Broadcast in the background. It has been a glorious evening.

New book, you ask? Yes, on Day 37 of my Buy Nothing Year, I kind of maybe violated my resolution to not buy any nonconsumable material goods until after the wedding. My Sierra Club wall calendar ($6.94) and copy of Meg Keene's A Practical Wedding: Creative Ideas for Planning a Beautiful, Affordable and Meaningful Celebration ($11 with my discount card) arrived from Barnes & Noble today. But really, as splurges go, I think these are small and well-founded. I'm 94 pages into the book already, and reading Meg Keene is like seeing the voice in my head transcribed. I am SO GLAD to see this sane alternative to the Wedding Industrial Complex and hear real advice from other brides who share my wedding philosophy! So far, my favorite part is that she gives you permission to skip all those "Things that Must Be Done or everyone will be Horribly Offended" that I consider extraneous and unnecessary for our purposes - three-course meal service with waiters, aisle runners, favors, embossed invitations addressed with calligraphy ... 

How about I file this one under "Necessary Wedding Expense," so it's not technically breaking my resolution.

Beating the system...

This post is overdue, but you know how the Christmas season goes...

So, I came up with a brilliant plan to save on my Save the Dates. (On wedding chat boards, posters often abbreviate that to STDs, but I'm not going to go there because it makes me snicker like a seventh-grader.)

Instead of paying to have a bunch of postcards professionally printed, I thought, why not just make the Save the Date as a 4" x 6" photo in Photoshop? Then I waited for Snapfish.com to have a "100 prints for $1" sale and ordered a whole bunch. The plan was to send them out in my Christmas cards, thereby saving even MORE money in postage.

I did both a black-and-white and a color version, and they looked great (edited versions below). 

 EXCEPT... I got the date wrong to my own wedding. Yep, I did the template before we had officially set the date, and obviously I didn't proofread these before ordering. Le sigh... At least I'm only out a dollar.

What I ended up doing was running to Walgreen's and printing just a few to mail out to family. I may wait for another "100 for $1" sale to order the rest. Or, I may just send this out over email/Facebook to my online friends. Elderly relatives, traditionalists and Luddites on my list will still get printed copies. 

You don't even really HAVE to do Save the Dates, really, but I consider it a necessary courtesy to my faraway friends who will have to buy plane tickets or drive a long way. Considering that we've been to two very faraway weddings in the past two years that required us to buy plane tickets last minute and didn't even send out formal invitations, I'd say we're ahead of the game!