Non Sequitur Chica

The BIG meal

noreply@blogger.com (Non Sequitur Chica) — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 13:40:00 +0000

Last week I received an email from CP regarding Thanksgiving- he wanted me to pick out our dishes (my picks in bold).

-Turkey: smoked or roasted
-Potatoes: mashed, roasted or potato au gratin? Or cheesy grits? and or Sweet Potatoes?
-Soup: cream of asparagus, Pureed Soup (squash, potato, or carrot), creamy mushroom,
-Cranberry Sauce
-Green Side- green beans, asparagus, spinach/chard/kale, broccoli, sprouts? Peas?
-Gravy
-Corn? Of course
-Bread- You make the call. You have the pizza stone to work with. Dinner rolls
-Stuffing- your moms or alternative? (we tried making my mom’s DELICIOUS stuffing last year and didn’t quite get the recipe)
-Cheese plate appetizer. Nuts
-Dessert : You make the call. Pumpkin pie with homemade vanilla ice cream.

We are making ALL of this food for a grand total of FOUR people. Let me repeat, FOUR people. Boy he makes me laugh sometimes, but he wants to make it like any other Thanksgiving. We weren’t going to do soup, but one of our wedding gifts was a soup tureen, so we figured that we would put it to good use!

So far CP has already made the turkey stock for the carrot soup and the cranberry sauce. I made the vanilla ice cream (using a Madagascar vanilla bean- YUM!) last weekend. Being the engineer that he is, CP will put together a Excel spreadsheet of all of the ingredients still needed and oven times. I seriously hope that CP’s dad and girlfriend bring Tupperware for leftovers!!!

Needless to say, it's really important that I get to the gym today AND Friday as I don't think that I am going to have time tomorrow....but boy am I going to need to work off some of these calories!!

A new addition?

noreply@blogger.com (Non Sequitur Chica) — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 13:40:00 +0000

Yesterday I opened up my email to find these two pictures waiting for me:

My aunt’s black lab had puppies this past weekend and she offered us a puppy!!

When I got back from work, I immediately started talking to CP about the offer. Just a few weeks ago, CP and I discussed getting another dog; the conversation included what breeds would we consider. I had a black lab growing up as a kid and my sister and I ADORED Toby. He was a fantastic family dog.

However, CP and I are really happy with the Bernese Mountain Dog breed. Fuzzy Britches had the right amount of energy for us, she has a great demeanor, she doesn’t bark, and she also doubles as a foot warmer in the winter! :-)

We also don’t think that it is fair to get a puppy when our plans for the future are up the air. What if we move in a few months? We have no idea what kind of place we would be moving into. Fuzzy Britches is kind of used to moving and is old enough that she doesn’t particularly care….a puppy might not take to the move as well. Not to mention that money is still tight and with Christmas coming up, we don’t particularly have the money right now for a puppy.

So sadly enough, I think that CP and I are going to have to decline my aunt’s puppy offer. I may have to drive down to her house to see the puppies before they are given away though…..

Inspiration

noreply@blogger.com (Non Sequitur Chica) — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 17:18:00 +0000

About two weeks ago I made a snap decision to run in a Thanksgiving-themed 5K. The race was yesterday and I am really glad that I did it. Not only did I burn some calories by running a hilly course for 3.2 miles, but I supported a local charity in the process.

Little did I know that there would be a “celebrity” also running the race! A couple of years ago I remember sitting down to read one of Rick Reilly’s back-page Sports Illustrated columns. The article about Dick and Rick Hoyt made me tear up because it was just such an amazing story!

Picture from Team Hoyt website

Yesterday, Team Hoyt kicked my butt. Dick ran the 5K in 26 minutes and 30 seconds, averaging an 8 ½ minute mile pace. It was not even close to his best time of 17 minutes and 40 seconds (which is RIDONKULOUS because that means that he was running at a sub-6 mile pace!!), but then again he just had HERNIA surgery this summer….and he is 68! I was fully inspired yesterday after the race. I mean here is this 68 year old man who is pushing his son in a wheelchair up the same hills that I was dragging my fat a** up…..and his pace was a whole 2 minutes faster than me!* Dick has push Rick through marathons, 5Ks, 10Ks, Ironmans and even triathalons!! Amazing.

*My time was 32:54 which I was pretty happy with considering that I didn't run for the entire month of October! It was a 10:36 pace.

Surprised

noreply@blogger.com (Non Sequitur Chica) — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 14:16:00 +0000

I had a great time checking people in and serving lunch at the soup kitchen yesterday. All of the other volunteers were really nice, along with the two AmeriCorps employees that help run the program. This particular soup kitchen serves lunch every weekday and recently added dinner three nights a week.

I remember being surprised as a kid when someone would come in dressed in a suit or looking particularly clean. Yesterday no one came in dressed to the nines, but I was surprised to see the janitor from my office building. I hope that he wasn’t embarrassed to have me see him eating there….I can’t imagine that he gets paid very much although he does work really hard.

Seeing him reminded me of the book “Nickel and Dimed.” Have you guys read that book? It’s by a journalist (Barbara Ehrenreich) that decides to go undercover and work minimum wage jobs in different parts of the country to see if people can really survive. It’s a fascinating book and not surprisingly, she finds it very difficult to eek out a living on minimum wage. I would bet that the janitor in my office building gets paid more than minimum wage, but most of the northeast is crazy-expensive to live in. I don’t know if he has a wife or kids, but I truly shouldn’t have been as surprised as I was to see him eat the free lunch.

I look forward to going back next week!

Volunteering

noreply@blogger.com (Non Sequitur Chica) — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 15:26:00 +0000

The last post of honeymoon pictures will be up either tomorrow or Friday—this time photos of our week in Mozambique! I hope that you guys have enjoyed the pictures….

In other news, today is my first day volunteering at a soup kitchen! Weekly I will be serving lunch in a church across the street from work. When I was a Brownie my troop volunteered at a nearby soup kitchen one day and I liked it so much that my mom, my sister and I would go monthly. With so many people out of work and hungry, I hope that I can help to make a small difference in the lives of others while I am still working for my company. :-)

Big cats of Kruger

noreply@blogger.com (Non Sequitur Chica) — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 13:47:00 +0000

Now to the animals that everyone has been waiting for- the big cats!

Check out those teeth!!!

This lion decided that he was tired after his big roaring session (to be posted later when CP finishes with the videos), so he decided to lay down on the pavement.

Two female lions walking in unison.

We came across this male lion and a female lion (not in this picture) together. Our guide told us that if a male and female are separated from the rest of the pride, it means that they are mating. They do this for 4 to 5 days EVERY 20 MINUTES. Wow.

CP takes good photographs.....

We came across this bunch of mothers and cubs laying down by the river. Adorable.

This adolescent male lion decided to play with a stick he found on the ground. He and Fuzzy Britches would be best friends! :-)

We came across this pride as they were trying to chase a giraffe. Sadly they lost....as that would have been really fun to see.

The cubs of the pride recovered well by playing with their mothers....as this one is doing.

We spotted this former impala hanging in a tree. When leopards kill something, they haul it up a tree so that lions and other animals are not able to steal it. There wasn't much of this kill left, but often a leopard won't eat the animal in one sitting.

Unfortunately we didn't get to see the leopard that killed this impala.

However, we did get to see this hyena at the bottom of the tree waiting for the former impala to drop so that he could eat the leftovers. He was a very patient animal....

We also came across this hyena a different day....he ran into a hole and let out his hyena cackle....which oddly enough DID sound like a crazy laugh.

Although we didn't get to see a leopard, we did spot two cheetahs. They weren't doing much because it was hot and the middle of the day, but cheetahs are usually harder to see than leopards, so we were pretty psyched to see them. I kept calling them "Chester" and asking if they had any Cheetos. Yes, I am 10 years old.

Heavy animals of Kruger

noreply@blogger.com (Non Sequitur Chica) — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 14:19:00 +0000

This is the last week of honeymoon pictures....then we will be back to our regular-scheduled programming. :-)

CP used his fish-eye lens for this picture. Gives you an idea of what we looked at while searching for animals. However, within a mile the terrain could turn into red soil with no grass on the ground.

This elephant was in the middle of shaking water off his head. To the left of him (not pictured) were hippos and he was having fun throwing water and mud on them. Why? Simply because he could.

This is a man-made watering hole and as you can see, elephants get pretty desperate when they need water. The two biggest killers of elephants? Humans and drought.

This herd of mothers and babies just crossed the river (which is why the lower half of them is darker in color). The babies had a bit of trouble getting up the slope in the middle.

Black and white close up. Check out those eyelashes!

A ridonkulously large elephant- with a broken tusk!

Baby elephant

We came across this white rhino just as he was finishing marking his territory. Basically, they take huge poops, then step in it and walk all over their territory. Lovely.

Rhino close up

Mother and baby rhinos running away from us.

It is VERY rare to see a black rhino- there are only 350 in the park. Unfortunately, we came across this dead one with a crocodile getting ready to eat it (a rhino's butt is the softest part of its body so the crocodile starts there). :-(

Larger animals of Kruger

noreply@blogger.com (Non Sequitur Chica) — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 13:05:00 +0000

On to some of the larger animals of Kruger....

Female Kudu.

Male Kudu- their horns are so cool!

Reedbuck- another rare sighting in Kruger.

Impala. They are ALL OVER Kruger. Our guide called them JAFIs (Just Another F*ing Impala). LOL.

Waterbuck.

Zebras.

Buffalo. I kept wanting to call them "water buffalo" for some odd reason. I really liked their ears.

Blue wildebeest. CP did not mess with the color of this photograph at all.

Baby hippos with birds on their back.

Hippos fighting in the water. Hippos are actually the number one killer of people in the park every year. People don't realize that they are fast (at least in covering short distances).... and then it's too late. They also have ridonkulously powerful jaws.

Giraffe just hanging out. Giraffes have horrible eyesight so they actually walk towards you to figure out whether they should be scared of you or not.

Giraffes are hilarious. Gotta love the black tongue!

Medium-sized animals of Kruger

noreply@blogger.com (Non Sequitur Chica) — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 13:58:00 +0000

Continuing with honeymoon pictures.....

A large lizard.

This is a community spider. Hundreds (or even thousands) of spiders work together to create this web. *shudder*

Warthogs. They were pretty funny creatures. When they were scared, they would run away with their tails straight up in the air. This is because they have poor eyesight and need to follow each other into the brush. They also were poorly designed in that they have to get on their knees in order to search for food.

Chacma baboon heading up a tree.

Baby chacma baboon

Baby chacma baboon being adorable.

Vervet monkey. These guys were hilarious- mainly because they have blue balls. This resulted in a large number of jokes at their expense. Oh, and they also liked to play with themselves.

A rare sighting of a female ostrich in Kruger. She was running away from the male ostrich playing hard to get.

This poor male ostrich (also a rare sighting in Kruger) ran after the female ostrich, trying to court her. We saw him do his preening/ mating dance for her (twice), but you will have to wait for the video for that as it is hard to tell what he is doing in the picture. There was a second female ostrich that CP didn't get a picture of, but she was basically chasing after the male ostrich. Poor female ostrich couldn't give herself away!

This crocodile caught a catfish in the water and then was promptly chased by an even bigger croc! Eventually, this guy had to release the fish...otherwise he risked getting eaten by the bigger croc.

Birds of Kruger

noreply@blogger.com (Non Sequitur Chica) — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 13:31:00 +0000

Our first day in Africa we were groggy and tired of plane flights. Our flight into Johannesburg (Joburg) from JFK was 14.5 hours, the headset wasn’t working very well and CP has a hard time sleeping on planes. I tried to pull the “we are on our honeymoon- are there better seats you could put us into?” ploy, but the South African airline employees weren’t having it.

After a three hour layover in Joburg, we hopped on a prop plane for the short flight to Nelspruit. Our lodge outside of Kruger National Park was beautiful. We stayed in one of the bush chalets- a two-story cottage with a queen bed on the bottom floor, two twin beds on the top floor and two bathrooms. The Lodge even left a bottle of champagne as a congratulations gift!

Kruger National Park is known for being the best place to see the “Big Five” animals: elephants, lions, rhinoceros, leopards, and buffalo. These animals were named the “Big Five” because they were the most dangerous animals for hunters and poachers to kill. The gates open at 5:30am in the Spring and it is best to get there early to try to catch some of the nocturnal animals before they head to bed under a tree for the day.

On to what you REALLY want to see- pictures!* Today's post will focus on the many birds we saw in Kruger- there are over 500 different species in the park!

Cape Glossy Starling

Cape Glossy Starling in flight

Weaver

Weaver in flight

Southern Yellow-billed Hornbill

This guy especially loved to mug for the camera....despite his old-looking face.

Pearl-spotted owl

The smallest owl in Kruger.

Lilac-breasted Roller

Lilac-breasted roller in flight (and food in his mouth)

Kingfisher

Guinea fowl

Grey go-away birds

Goliath Heron

Egyptian Geese (one in flight) with hippos in the water

Crowned Eagle

Crested Barbet

African Hawk Eagle

*All pictures were taken by CP. He has a natural eye for photography (I admit, I am a bit biased). The videos that I shot will be in a later post. :-)

Getting back into a workout routine

noreply@blogger.com (Non Sequitur Chica) — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 13:56:00 +0000

I thought that it was going to be hard to get back into a workout routine after the honeymoon, but so far it has been pretty easy. I took off the week we got back and figuring that I was a bit jetlagged anyway….. Since then, I have been working out almost every weekday either at lunch or after work. One of my friends here at work convinced her personal trainer to come into our work gym and hold group classes, so twice a week I have been doing that. His services also include eating plans and nutrition counseling so I am hoping to continue my weight loss. I did not gain ANY weight on the honeymoon, so at least I am starting at my wedding weight. :-)

I told the trainer about my running intervals (5 minutes running, 1 minute walking) in order to get my endurance back up to what it was before the wedding (one month off does a number on your endurance!), and he suggested that for weight loss, I should do quicker intervals. So last week I went on the elliptical and after a two minute warmup, I did a 24 minute workout of 60 seconds at a really hard resistance, 30 seconds at a moderately hard resistance (still trying to go as fast as possible), and then 30 seconds of “rest” at a slightly easier resistance. I did 12 intervals of this and it was a pretty good workout! I will still continue my running as I would like to do a Thanksgiving 5K if I can find one near my house, but I will definitely incorporate this interval workout into my routine.

My weight loss nemesis will be the Kitchen Aid ice cream maker attachment. I have already made this recipe for Mint Chocolate Chip Ice Cream (delicious! We were even able to use mint from our garden!) and then this past weekend, I made Pumpkin Spice Ice Cream from Our Best Bites website (also delicious! Note: I didn’t have time to make the cookies ). In addition, I tried the same website’s recipe for dinner rolls and they were a huge hit! Of course, having all of these things in the house is not part of the eating plan NOR super healthy, but I can’t let them go to waste, right? :-)

The start of the honeymoon posts to come tomorrow…..I PROMISE.

Quite the Quandary

noreply@blogger.com (Non Sequitur Chica) — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 14:16:00 +0000

Recently I have been put in a weird position. CP and I have a few events that we have to fly to in January and we have been purchasing airline tickets. My quandary was whether I should use my new last name (which isn’t official with any federal, state or local government agency) or my old last name. I would think that I wouldn’t hit any snags when changing my name, but I also am trying to just add CP’s last name onto my current name (for an annoying total of 4 names) instead of dropping my current last name.

I have heard that this can cause a nightmare, so I have to hope that the local Social Security office doesn’t have a problem with this…. Otherwise, I have heard that it sometimes takes a court order to change your name, and boy does that sound annoying!

Anyway, I ended up buying the plane tickets using my future last name. I sent off my request for our marriage certificate today and hope to make a trip down to the Social Security office during lunch one day in the near future. I hope that this is all figured out before mid-January, or else I see the airlines charging a bunch of fees to change the name on my ticket (grumble grumble).

In other news, CP has finally finished editing our pictures so expect to see a lot of animals on this blog in the coming days!!

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In a totally different topic, I recently came across a cooking blog called Our Best Bites. These people sure can make food look delicious! Despite the fact that CP and I want to continue losing weight, I am going to have to try to make their roll recipe this weekend to see if they are tasty and if I can make it without screwing it up. I’ll let you know if the results are good- and I will probably use the recipe for Thanksgiving dinner too!

I’m also thinking about making their pumpkin spice ice cream as CP and I received an ice cream maker attachment for the Kitchen Aid as a wedding gift….. :-)

Marriage shockers

noreply@blogger.com (Non Sequitur Chica) — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 14:04:00 +0000

Right before CP and I left for our honeymoon, we spent a quick weekend in NYC with friends. Our flight left from JFK Sunday morning anyway and we had a free hotel room for two nights, so why not get out of MA and start the honeymoon early?

After dinner on Saturday night, my friend CS met up with us at a bar that looks up at the Empire State Building.*

Anyway, we started drinking a bunch of wine and randomly, CS came out with two sad pieces of news about two of our friends.

The first? Our college friend, married two months after graduation to a guy that she dated throughout school, who became pregnant six months later. She and her husband have been together for 9 years and have three sons together. For me, they have been the "gold standard" for a marriage. Unfortunately, the news was that the husband cheated on my friend WITH A HOOKER. Not with a random woman at a bar, but a HOOKER. I can't decide which is worse. He could have developed feelings for the random woman, but the whole act of PAYING someone to have sex with them makes me feel ill too.

My friend is obviously devastated, but has decided to try to forgive her husband. I am not privy to her thoughts because this came out during my weekend wedding and we haven't had a chance to talk about it (I'm going to wait until she says something to me), but I can see why she is staying with him. They have three kids. She hasn't worked since taking maternity leave in 2001. She has become accustomed to the "lifestyle" that she leads as he has a good job. And according to CS, she still loves him.

I'm not sure that it would be my choice, but I also don't have kids with CP and I am in a different situation. However, how can you fully trust someone after that?

The other shocking news? Our other mutual friend's husband is gay. HUH???? According to CS, our friend knew about it BEFORE they got married. I'm not sure whether she thought that she could change him or what, but they have been married for probably 5 or 6 years now. They no longer have sex, but I guess that he does go outside their marriage at times. WHAT?!?

This news makes me sad as I don't understand why my friend would want to put herself in that position. She loves him dearly and I understand that....but then why not be best friends? Marriage is hard enough.....why add to the difficulty? Is she no longer interested in having kids?

Hearing these two pieces of news a week after my own marriage and as I was about to embark on my honeymoon was shocking. I had just been thinking about how lucky I was to not have any friends divorce when there is such a high divorce rate in this country. I still am trying to wrap my head around it.....

*By the way, if you live in New York City and haven't been to the La Quinta Inn rooftop bar (17 West 32nd Street)? It's got a great view and the drinks are cheap!

Halloween

noreply@blogger.com (Non Sequitur Chica) — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 13:52:00 +0000

How was everyone's Halloween? CP and I had an interesting day. Since we just got back from Africa we ran errands, edited pictures, and cleaned the house. Sounds like fun, huh? Around 4pm the trick-or-treaters started to ring the doorbell and I felt old. Why wasn't I wearing a fun costume and out drinking? I was home with all of the old people in my neighborhood, handing out candy. *sigh*

For the most part, the night went well. Most kids came up and said "trick-or-treat" and thanked us for the candy. Some tried to grab a whole bunch of candy and when I told them "just one," they audibly groaned. Brats! We are not here to solely fuel your sugar highs and stomach aches!*

Two teenage girls were dressed up in emo-like clothes, but I'm pretty sure that they were just their everyday clothes and didn't put forth an ounce of effort. The weirdest thing we saw? A man, probably about 45 years old or so, in a cat costume, that said "meow" as I opened the door. It was just.....odd. Turns out they have our wedding congratulations card from the Obamas too! I told them to just put it in our mailbox as we would really like it, but he seemed to want to drop it off himself. No need weirdo.

With 45 minutes left to go, CP and I were worried that we were going to run out of candy. We weren't around last year so we weren't sure how many kids to expect, but thankfully we had leftover candy from our out-of-town wedding bags! Red hots, Tootsie Pops and gum went into the candy bowl (remember CP was the one to buy everything for those oddly-packed bags). To our surprise, the kids were ecstatic to get GUM. Not Bubble Yum or something fun like that, but sugar free gum. Huh? Ummmm okay. We also stuck honey candy that we bought from a local store in the bowl just in case. I said that any kid that picked it up would probably end up egging our house- I mean ORGANIC candy on Halloween? Luckily, I think that only one or two kids picked them up. One kid's response? "What is this??" Exactly my little friend.

In the end, we had just enough candy.

It was a nice, relaxing weekend, coupled with an Eagles blowout against the Giants. Woo hoo!

What was your costume for Halloween?

*Writing this makes me feel old.

Day of questions

noreply@blogger.com (Non Sequitur Chica) — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 18:46:00 +0000

Today I am full of questions. I think that it is partly because I am still EXHAUSTED from a day of sheet rocking yesterday at a Habitat for Humanity home with coworkers. 8 hours of that can make a girl pretty tired! I think that it also because CP and I put off thinking about future stuff until after the hump of the wedding and honeymoon. Now that they are behind us, there is uncertainty in our lives once more. Or rather self-imposed uncertainty. We both have jobs that we could stay at and a landlord that loves us. However, I am unhappy with my job and we both are unhappy with where we live (me more so than CP).

I just don’t know where to even start. Do I look for jobs in CO? Boston? Abroad? Who wants someone like me with my experience? What am I qualified for? A JD is a general degree and I don’t know that the experiences that I am getting at my current job will be that marketable. What kind of job do I think will make me happy? Is CP going to take the GMATs? With CP thinking that his boss is going to pull him off his current job to have him work from home/ travel, is that going to make CP happy and thus ensure that he wants to stay in MA? Or will he still want to get his MBA? What do our future plans hold for having kids?

I was half expecting to have some of these conversations while on our honeymoon, but CP really didn’t want to talk about them. Which I understand (not wanting to think about real life while on our honeymoon), but it also would have been a nice time to flesh out some plans. Of which we have none.

I get excited for change, but only when I have concrete plans. Uncertainty (especially in a crappy job market) is not my cup of tea.

We are back!

noreply@blogger.com (Non Sequitur Chica) — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 19:45:00 +0000

Afternoon folks! CP and I are back from our African honeymoon with a crap load of pictures and videos. I am not allowed to release said pictures or videos until CP is done making them “perfect,” so you might have to wait a few more days. He’s so silly.

Needless to say, we had an AMAZING TIME and I can’t wait to tell you guys all about it! Now do I start to write my recaps or go through the 400+ blog posts you all wrote while I was gone??? :-)

If I had a time machine.....

noreply@blogger.com (Non Sequitur Chica) — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 13:19:00 +0000

Although our wedding weekend went GREAT, there are a few things that I would change if I could go back in time:

*Although we got a lot of compliments on the Inn, the owners were crazy. They constantly talked about money and then pulled weird things like only putting 50 plates out for the rehearsal dinner. Or doing the champagne toast Friday night, having some glasses of champagne leftover and instead of handing them out to people, they brought them back into the kitchen. There was still some champagne left in the bottles, so why wouldn’t they pour it? It’s not like they could keep the bottle to use it for later guests…AND my in laws had already paid for it. WTF? In addition, two hours before my wedding, I guess some random people stopped by the Inn wanting a drink. Instead of telling them that we had a wedding and that the Inn was closed for other business (we took up the entire Inn, another nearby hotel AND part of another nearby Inn), the owner allowed them to have drinks and sat and talked to them instead of helping with the set up. ???? If CP and I had it to do again, I think that we would have looked at other places to take over for the weekend….

*If we could have afforded a wedding coordinator, that would have been a helpful person to have. Even if it was just a wedding coordinator that came with the property or one the day-of. My mom ran around like a maniac, and CP did too. It would have been nicer to have both of them able to relax the day of the wedding.

*I wouldn’t have done the out of town bags. Yes it’s nice to give guests Gatorade, gum, snacks, etc. but it wasn’t absolutely necessary.

These are fairly minor changes though….at least in my mind. Despite the fact that the Inn owners were crazy, the only people that really knew what was going on were CP’s parents and my parents. So to our guests, it was pretty much a seamless weekend….and that’s what you want!

Overall it was one of the best weekends of my life. I simply couldn’t stop smiling the entire weekend….and I have continued to have a perma-grin on my face since then.

If I am still alive and I haven’t been abducted in Mozambique or South Africa, then I will let you guys know on Monday how the honeymoon went (and I promise no more wedding recaps!!!).

noreply@blogger.com (Non Sequitur Chica) — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 13:29:00 +0000

Looking back on our wedding, here are some decisions that we made that I thought turned out great:

*Spending time with friends and family the two days before everyone else arrived. I think they helped to keep me calm and collected and not worrying that everything was going to get done.

*Inviting all of our friend to the Inn Friday night. It was great to see almost all of our guests the night before the wedding. If CP and I had headed to our room for the night, I think that we both would have gotten nervous about the next day. Instead we were able to talk to friends that either flew or drove long distances and have all of our friends and family meet the night before the wedding to get to know each other.

*I am happy that we did not print out a menu for every guest. We didn’t even print out one large menu to put near the place cards. It simply wasn’t necessary. It would have been a waste of paper. I AM happy that we ended up doing programs. We used the same leaf stamp (bought at Michaels) as we used for the save the date cards, bought plain program paper at Staples, and voila! Now we have a program of our wedding for the rest of our lives.

*Our unity ceremony was a not a typical candle or sand ceremony. CP put thought into our plant ceremony and we had our officiant say a few words about having to nurture the plant, just as we would our marriage. We then put some soil and water on the plant and that was it. The best part about it was that the plant was a clipping from my great-grandmother’s Christmas Cactus so the plant has meaning to us. Hopefully we keep it alive!! Here is what the plant will look like when it blooms around Thanksgiving (and Easter I guess? So who knows why it is called a Christmas cactus??!!):

*Inviting our guests to a brunch on Sunday morning. Amazingly enough, I was wide awake and not hungover by 7:30 so we were there to greet our guests before they had to catch flights. It was fun to recap the wedding and to spend a few extra minutes with friends or family that we didn’t see too much of the night before.

*I’m glad that I didn’t go crazy by micro-managing our vendors. For the flowers? We told her our colors, said what flowers we didn’t want and let her do what she thought would look great. And you know what? My flowers were beautiful! Same with the guitarist for the ceremony. Would anyone REALLY care what was playing when people were sitting down? No. The only thing that I cared about was that “Here Comes the Bride” was played as I walked towards CP with my dad.

*Despite the fact that I had made the table cards, put together the guest book, went to all of the vendor meetings, etc., it was great as the bride to come down to the ceremony and gaze in wonder (and surprise! I didn’t plan an ugly wedding like in my nightmare a few months ago!) at the beautiful job the vendors did. Or when I walked into the tent for the reception, it was nice to see all of my little touches. I’m glad that I didn’t do a lot of DIY projects for the wedding as the few ones that we did, people did end up noticing.

*Not caring what people thought of us playing Beirut and Stump after the reception (especially in our wedding attire). There was nothing to do in that area of NH anyway, so why not spend more time with your friends and family?

*The weather was nice enough on Friday and Sunday so that guests were able to see WHY we picked the location that was so far away from civilization. The foliage was in its peak, guests saw bears, moose, turkeys and other wild animals, and the air was fresh.

Come back on Thursday. I have a few things that I would have changed….

Non-professional wedding pictures

noreply@blogger.com (Non Sequitur Chica) — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 12:40:00 +0000

While we wait for the professional pictures to come back, here are some pictures from our wedding weekend (without heads/ faces of course)....

The pond across the street from our Inn

Amazing tree when you pulled into the Inn

Three red gerber daisies in my hair (the bridesmaids also got red gerber daisies)

Fuzzy Britches was a hit at the post-reception with her barrel full of rum

Our beautiful and tasty cake with fresh flowers

Yep, that's right. Me and CP playing Beirut after the reception in our wedding attire. Don't worry- I went undefeated! :-)

While I was busy kicking a** on the Beirut table, some of our other wedding guests were playing Stump, an old loggers game. It involves a big tree stump, a hammer, nails, and alcohol. CP used to tell me about it and I was horrified at the thought of a hammer mixed into a drinking game, but I have played and if I can't hurt myself, then it's safe. :-)

I'll be back next week with honeymoon pictures!!

Wedding recap- post reception and Sunday

noreply@blogger.com (Non Sequitur Chica) — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 12:50:00 +0000

Saturday post-reception
After the reception concluded at 10pm (due to the town noise ordinance), CP and I brought out the regulation-sized Beirut (aka Beer Pong) table for the after party.* We kept our wedding attire on and the first game was against my parents. My mom had quickly run back to her cottage to grab flats and proclaim them her “Beirut shoes.” Awesome. I then proceeded to win every single game. It must have been the luck of the bride, but I was on FIRE. After my parents went to bed, I played my drunk aunt (the loser of the chug-off) and my uncle from Canada, once again kicking butt.** CP was frustrated later on when I kicked his butt too. Hee hee.

While the Beirut table was going on, other friends had one of the pregnant wives drive to a nearby restaurant to pick up a huge tree stump. Someone had the forethought to bring a hammer and nails and thus, the game of Stump was ready to be played! Frankly the one and only time that I played was when CP and I were down in New Orleans for the Eagles/ Saints game and I don’t particularly remember the rules because I had been drinking so much, but needless to say, it’s a fun game.

The after party went on until 2am or so, which was perfect timing for CP and me to head off to bed. Thinking about it now, I am shocked that I was alert, not cranky, and up that entire day because I woke up so early and didn’t get a good night sleep.

Sunday
I was amazingly NOT hungover in the least bit, but just a bit tired. We invited all of our guests back to the Inn for brunch, and a good number of people came. After reuniting jackets and other items with their owners and cleaning up the tent, CP and I drove home in separate cars, but married. While we had dinner that night we watched our wedding video because it’s true what people say- the day goes by in a flash and we were both so nervous that we couldn’t remember most of the ceremony!!

*The table was a wedding present from one of my friends from college. We totally intend to bring it to the Patriots game we are going to in December!

**My aunt was the only embarrassing part of the wedding. First, she berated my dad and their sister about things that happened years ago, making my dad feel awful. At one point, I went up to them and said that it was not the place for this to try to save my dad. I really like this aunt too….so it was also embarrassing when in the middle of playing Beirut she was pulling her top down to expose her cleavage. She’s in her 50s so it was not appropriate and really weird of her to do so. That is something that I used to do in college and haven’t done in at least 10 years myself.

The funniest thing about it though? A family friend was playing on my team and decided that she had enough of the cleavage. So instead of aiming for the cups, she whipped the ball straight into the cleavage of my aunt. Best shot of the night!

Next week I have a few pre-written posts including one with PICTURES of the wedding. :-)

Wedding recap- Saturday part 2

noreply@blogger.com (Non Sequitur Chica) — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 12:35:00 +0000

After the ceremony, we spent an hour taking pictures with our family and the bridal party. It was off and on raining, so we will have umbrellas in some of our pictures, and in others they will be absent. Despite the fact it was in the 50s and rainy, my bridesmaids toughed it out and agreed to do outside pictures. By the end of the pictures, I was getting a bit cold…so I was happy to hear that CP and I had about 20 minutes to go into our cottage, eat some appetizers and relax before being introduced into the reception. During the introductions the DJ messed up my sister’s last name (she is not married so it was the same as mine before that day and it’s not hard to pronounce), but she took it in stride.

We elected to do our first dance right after our walk into the reception and because it was so rainy, the bottom of my dress was basically like a mop to the floor. LOL. CP and I also couldn’t stop talking through the song. We chose Etta James “At Last” even though lots of other people use it. We figured that it’s a classic for a reason. It was during our first dance that we made our two fathers cry. Score!

The three toasts went well. J was trying hard not to cry and CP’s best man went off his script a bit because as he was practicing it that afternoon, three bears came out of the woods and scared him. CP and I had a sweetheart table because we heard from married friends that it was the best way to get a few bites of food- and we did! We successfully ate the red pepper bisque, had to skip over the salad, but then ate our dinners (me- swordfish, CP- duck with cherry sauce). Between courses we were rushing around trying to greet people at all of the tables and I’m sorry to say that we didn’t get to everyone while they were sitting down.

Next up was the cutting of the cake. The DJ put on “Pour Some Sugar on Me” by Def Leppard and although I had warned CP that I didn’t want cake on my face, he did it anyway so I did it right back to him! We have some funny pictures of that moment, but needless to say before the father/daughter, mother/son dance we had to run inside to the Inn to wash up.

We had “What a Wonderful World” by Louis Armstrong play for the dance with our parents because we couldn’t think of anything better. After that, we had an anniversary dance- it’s where the DJ has all of the married couples slow dance and once the DJ calls out a year range all couples that have been married at some point in between that range leave the dance floor. CP’s great uncle and aunt have been married for 72 YEARS so we gave them some flowers when we were the last two couples on the floor.

From there, the DJ employed a great trick. He had all of the guests get together on the dance floor for a huge group picture. After the picture was taken, he then said, while you are on the dance floor….and played a song that old and young people would dance to. Good trick buddy!
The dance floor was pretty busy all night long. CP’s grandmother had some great moves, although her knees hurt her the next day because of it. CP and I were on and off the floor, talking to people, getting drinks, etc. Luckily, we handed off our new video camera to CP’s brother-in-law to tape the ceremony. Not only did he get the ceremony, but he got the reception entrances, the toasts AND then put the camera down and pointed it at the dance floor for a good 40 minutes. NICE. We definitely have blackmail video of some of our friends and family- hilarious!

At one point during the dancing, CP and I ran inside to get drinks. We just happened to come in on my aunt challenging my dad to a chugging contest. I totally jumped on this idea and ran to the bar to get the drinks. It was closer than I thought, but my dad pulled it out. Then CP’s dad decided to challenge my dad and it wasn’t even close (my dad was the chugging champion of 6 colleges). CP and I basically tied during our chug-off in our wedding attire. So klassy. :-)

But the night wasn’t over for us just yet…..

Wedding recap: Saturday part 1

noreply@blogger.com (Non Sequitur Chica) — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 12:44:00 +0000

Saturday morning, after a trying night of sleep due to CP’s snoring, I woke up, completely alert at 6:40am. This is despite the fact that I left the party the night before around 12:30 and was desperately trying to go to bed when CP came in at 1am. I knew that there was no way that I was getting back to sleep, so after a nervous bathroom break, I decided to get into the shower and start moving. CP on the other hand, was not ready to get up, as he had a nice headache.

I finally got him out of bed as my stomach was in knots. Turns out, it would be this way all day long. At breakfast, I sat with CP and three of my bridesmaids as I tried to shove food down my throat. Normally that is not difficult, but with my nervous/ anxious stomach? I thought that I was going to throw up. Not from being scared about getting married or scared that CP was the wrong guy, but nervous that the day was going to go okay and that everything was going to get done.

After breakfast I kissed CP goodbye and went upstairs with the girls. The hair stylist arrived and started to do our hair. I had my ipod on shuffle and the mood was fairly chill for most of the day. Once in a while, my mom would come in and ask a question, or update us with the status of things. I guess that she and CP ran around quite a bit that day making sure that everything was ready while I was sequestered with the girls. Although my stomach was in knots, it relieved me to know that the two of them were in control.

We ordered sandwiches so that we wouldn’t be drinking on empty stomachs later on and once again, the anxiety made it hard for me to eat. After lunch I kept looking outside the window to see what the weather was doing. At some points it was pouring rain, at others, it was just cloudy. Three hours before the 3pm ceremony CP made the decision that we were going to have the wedding outside. With 30 minutes to go, an employee came up to my room to ask what we wanted to do. It was currently raining at the time, so I made the decision to have the ceremony in the patio under the tent. I figured that I didn’t want the sky to open up during the ceremony.

About an hour before the ceremony, our photographer came in. My sister was nervous at this point, so she was fanning her armpits. Once my mom rushed in from getting ready, the girls helped me get into my dress. After a few pictures, my maid of honor J popped the champagne and we toasted to the wedding. And yes, my stomach was still in knots.

Right before my mom and the girls were going to head downstairs for the processional, I made a joke about my mom crying. She of course then started to cry, which made me cry and my sister cry. Damnit! Thankfully we had to get the show on the road so we cleaned up and they all headed downstairs.

As soon as the girls walked off though, I saw my dad waiting for me and I started to tear up again. Twice in the span of a couple of minutes? How unlike me! But I composed myself and headed down the stairs to meet my dad.

The processional went fine other than our ring bearer. He got a little nervous (he’s only 4) as everyone was watching him and walked most of the way down the aisle before darting into an empty seat. CP had to come over and take the ring bowl from him. LOL. How cute.

Our officiant, a mutual friend from our time out west did a fantastic job. He talked about our sense of adventure, the first time he met the two of us, and how everyone just knew that we would always be together. CP’s sister read the poem Love by Roy Croft- I simply love the first couple lines of the poem.

I love you
Not only for what you are,
But for what I am
When I am with you.

I love you
Not only for
What you have made of yourself,
But for what
You are making of me.

Our second reading was read by one of my best guy friends from college who just got married a few weeks before us.

Our unity ceremony was actually a plant ceremony. My mom gave us a clipping of a Christmas cactus that my great-grandmother started to grow. We poured some soil and water on it as our officiant spoke about needing to nurture the plant like we need to nurture our marriage. Semi-cheesy, but I think that the fact that it was a family plant saved it from being barf-worthy.

After CP joked about using these as our wedding vows, we ended up saying this:

I take you NSC/CP as my wife/husband
I promise to be your faithful best friend
I promise to communicate openly and truthfully with you
I promise to grow together with you
I give you my hand and my heart
As a sanctuary of warmth and peace
In times of sorrow and joy
In times of failure and triumph
I pledge my love, devotion and honor
As I join my life to yours.

My voice was at a good level when I first started the vows, but as I repeated after our friend, I was so worried about messing up that my voice got softer. Throughout the ceremony I smiled at CP as I couldn’t believe that our day was finally here! Every once in a while I did try to take a deep breath (it was hard to do in my corset dress!) to calm my nervous stomach and beating heart, but I’m not sure that it helped…

I had to help CP push my ring onto my finger, but his went on with no problems. We were announced as husband and wife and we had a nice kiss.

At this point we had successfully made both mothers cry. Score!

Wedding recap: Friday

noreply@blogger.com (Non Sequitur Chica) — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 12:26:00 +0000

Friday
People started to arrive throughout the day. I got a little annoyed at my sister as she and her boyfriend went off to gallivant in the foliage, promising to leave for only an hour or two, only to arrive back at the Inn in just enough time to shower and get ready for the rehearsal dinner. Meanwhile, CP and some of the groomsmen put together and hung lanterns in our tent and dropped off the out of town bags before going into one of the Inn rooms and drinking a bunch before the rehearsal dinner. My parents and I put together the favors, meanwhile greeting friends and family. Finally I was able to find CP and we were ready just in time for the rehearsal dinner.

The rehearsal dinner was an informal BBQ at the Inn where we were set to get married which was great. Everyone wore jeans and the only annoying thing was how much the Inn charged people for drinks. It’s not like we were in NYC! The other weird thing was the chef (one of the owners) only put out 50 plates. It was a buffet, so not like our guests were eating a ton of food, but it is not unheard of to take a little of each thing to make sure that everyone gets some and then go back again for seconds. Plus, a couple of people rolled in later than the 6:30 start time and it took 10 minutes for her to bring out more plates. Ridiculous.

Otherwise, dinner was fine and it was time for the slideshow. My maid of honor put it together and there were a few snafus in getting it loaded, but it was about 30 pictures total of CP and I throughout the years (including one of CP in drag for Halloween- HILARIOUS). There was also a mystery video from my sister that they had problems playing because it was on her Mac. We finally got it played and it was DONOVAN MCNABB (QB of the Philadelphia Eagles) saying “Congratulations CP and NSC on your wedding. Congratulations.” OMG. I almost pooped a brick I was so excited. I guess my sister saw him at a Superbowl party LAST FEBRUARY and filmed him on her Blackberry. SO F*ING COOL. CP was a little miffed that she didn’t get Tom Brady (QB of his favorite team the New England Patriots) to say anything, but I told him he was pushing his luck.

CP’s stepfather has a license to blow up fireworks in the state of NH so he was going to have an awesome display, but it unfortunately started to rain. So no fireworks that night. :-( After the rehearsal dinner we invited ALL of our wedding guests to come to the Inn for a pre-wedding celebration- we figured that there was nothing else to do in that part of NH Friday night anyway! It was great to see friends and hang out with them after they had traveled such a far distance to be there.

That night CP and I both did a bunch of shots- to celebrate my friend passing the bar, to celebrate our wedding, etc. I wisely drank water periodically as I didn’t want to be hungover the next day. CP? Well, he did not. Finally at midnight I decided that it was time for me to go to bed. I could still hear friends drinking and laughing and texted my sister to make sure that CP drank water. She tried to have a chugging contest with him (with water), but he didn’t fall for it. LOL. I then complained a bit to my maid of honor that people were loud, and thankfully she went downstairs and told people that I was trying to sleep and to keep it down. And that is why she is so awesome.

CP finally came into our cottage around 1am and I spent most of the night listening to his snoring. I kept trying to roll him over onto his side and it wasn’t working. *sigh* I was annoyed with him, but figured that I wouldn’t let it ruin the wedding day.

To be continued….

Wedding recap: Wednesday and Thursday

noreply@blogger.com (Non Sequitur Chica) — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 12:18:00 +0000

Wednesday

CP and I had friends from our west coast city come in to stay the night before heading into Boston the next day. They were not able to make the festivities on Friday (they had another wedding), but it was great to hang out with them. We basically had everything done before they drove in so we were able to relax with them all night long. However, I didn’t drink that night so they automatically assumed that I was pregnant. WHAT?!!?

I still was feeling calm and collected at this point, which was quite weird.

Thursday

CP had to go into work for most of the day, so I slept in a little bit and then had a few errands to run. I had my last fake bake appointment and then went to the SKETCHIEST nail salon I have ever been to (it’s in my town). When I walked in the door, I had to ask if the equipment was clean. Seriously. But so far I haven’t died and I haven’t had any appendages amputated, so I guess I was lucky? :-) Fuzzy Britches and I then ended up making our way up to NH through Concord so that I could get my ring cleaned.

CP and I then met up with two of our other west coast friends, my parents, and my sister and her new boyfriend. Because we all arrived so late, we had time to do dinner and then sit around drinking a bit before my parents went to bed. All six of us youngins then ended up staying up until 1:30am playing Jenga and drinking. I would highly recommend it as it was fun and it kept my mind off wedding stuff.

At this point, I was still relaxed. Amazing.

To be continued tomorrow.....

Honeymoon worries

noreply@blogger.com (Non Sequitur Chica) — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 12:18:00 +0000

So, I lied. I started a post about the wedding and because I wanted to write everything down, the post became too long. So I decided to break them up into smaller posts for next week so that you guys will have something to read while I am gone. I planned on a quick recap of the whole weekend, but then decided that I want to make sure that I remember everything- thus the longer posts. Hopefully they don’t bore you. :-)

Hopefully we get out early today as CP and I have a date with Amtrak to head down to NYC. We plan on a short visit with friends that just had a baby about two weeks ago (10 lbs, 7 oz- the wife is my HERO) and therefore couldn’t make it to the wedding and then spending time with friends who made the trek to NH for our big weekend. Then Sunday morning, AFRICA.

That is, after the 15 HOUR flight down to Johannesburg. In COACH. I sincerely hope that CP and I don’t have middle seats AND that we don’t have seats in the way back that don’t recline. I might just cry if that happens. I also plan on playing up the fact that we are on our honeymoon. I know that it won’t get us first class seats, but maybe free drinks? Or a bit better seats? :-)

Overall, I am not worried about the trip, just excited. However, there are a few things that I am wary about.

1. Johnannesburg is a city where you are not supposed to walk around at night. We have one day and one night there at the end of our trip and transportation has been arranged for us to get to dinner and our tour (of the city and Soweto).

2. According to a number of articles, the water in South Africa is one of the best in the world. However, recent news articles have talked about the presence of cholera in the water near Kruger National Park, so I think that we are going to be sticking to bottled water. Even if we have to buy bottled water, I am SO excited to hopefully see lions, elephants, baboons, rhinos, cheetas, giraffes, hippos, etc. Supposedly October is a great month to go because it is fairly dry and with the lack of water, there isn’t as much vegetation for the animals to hide behind. :-)

3. Tofo, Mozambique is going to be…..interesting. I read stories about hotels being double booked and the country’s general lack of knowledge about how to function with tourists. Needless to say, we are going to need PATIENCE. I am a little worried about crime. CP has a huge backpack for his nice digital SLR camera with all of the different lenses and I’m not sure we are going to bring it out too much in this country. I am not bringing my engagement ring so that we don’t attract attention. Not that CP and I are going to spend a ton of time apart from each other, but supposedly I shouldn’t venture away from the crowded parts of the beach as I might get abducted or raped. Fun!

Anyway, I hope to come back with wonderful and amazing stories of all of the animals we will see on land and in the ocean (our first time in the Indian Ocean!). But for now I just worry (just a teensy bit) of the things that could go wrong. Don't worry....I did this before I went down to Buenos Aires and had absolutely no problem down there.