Crab legs by Chef H

I rarely cook. And so I feel like H & I were meant to be because he loves to cook and I love his cooking. 

Went to Costco yesterday and picked up some amazing crab legs. Chef H did a quick boil with Bay seasonings, lemons, and corn. So delicious! Since it was a tad on the salty side I broke down and ate some carby bread with butter. I definitely controlled myself on the bread though. I could easily eat a whole loaf, but this time I just had about a palm-sized piece (x2).

We didn't have any newspaper, so Chef H cut up a Whole Foods paper bag and we put that down on the table for our mini crab boil.

Louboutin Strassed Shoe-gasm

Photo Courtesy: Official Louboutin Instagram feed

I'm thinking of strassing the soles of my wedding shoes and I came across this photo of Louboutins. Jaw dropped, heart skipped a beat, and had a major shoe-gasm. This is the ultimate ruby shoe for Dorothy and the ultimate Power Shoe for this gal.

Random Definitions

• Strassing - The act of blinging out or bedazzling an object.
• Power Shoe - A pair of shoes that make you feel sexy and powerful. The redder the better; the higher the heel the closer to God.

Shedding for the Wedding...22.5 pounds!

Photo Courtesy: CW

I've been trying to lose weight for the past 2 years - year 1 was in preparation of getting engaged (why he took so long I have no idea), and year 2 is in preparation for my wedding.

I'm now officially 22.5 pounds lighter! 

This may not seem like much weight for 2 years, but before this point I was frustrated with my weight constantly going up & down that I wanted to try something new. I'm a normal thick girl with a mixture of toned & jiggly parts. I'm not by any means obese (just a lil' chunky), so losing 5-15 pounds a week Biggest Loser style and working out 8 hours a day wasn't going to work for me. 

My goal was to lose about 1-3 pounds a month so that it would completely stay off. And it's working! Even after having 3 Thanksgiving dinners and gorging myself at Christmas dinner with prime rib and multiple portions of red velvet cake, the weight still stayed off. Slow & steady wins the race!

So how did I do it? You already know the answer from the millions of articles already out there. But here is what worked for me.

I always ate what I wanted and thought I could just work it off. Wrong. You can't eat a burrito every day, and work out for 1 hour and expect to lose weight. 90% of weight loss is all about what you put in your mouth. 

Cutting out Processed Sugar - I try to use honey, agave nectar, maple syrup, and stevia over sugar if possible. I use honey instead of sugar when making Korean BBQ, nectar in my plain yogurt. Maple syrup in my oatmeal, stevia in my coffee. Of course I still use sugar & heavy cream when I make salted caramel ice cream, but that's only for special occasions.

Vending Machine Junkie - I didn't realize this, but I'm a vending machine junkie. Every day at work around 3:30pm I would go to the vending machine to get a snack. That's a 500 calorie mistake Mon-Fri. I started bringing oatmeal, yogurt, and hummus to replace my ending machine habit, but still feeding my afternoon snack craving.

Portion Control - I have no concept of portion control. Just because I was eating a salad doesn't mean it's healthy if it's 3x the size of a normal salad. So forced portion control works great for me. Here are some examples.

     - Subway sandwiches with no mayo actually really does work. 

     - A can of Progresso soup has 2 servings, but each serving is only 100-150 calories. Add 1/2 a can of water to the soup and you could eat the whole thing guilt free. Watch out for the sodium, that will make you retain water and the scale will show that you've gained weight. 

     - Trader Joe's salads are a goldmine. They really pack a lot into 1 small container and you know exactly how much you're consuming.

Drink (Party) Water - I don't like water and I get annoyed when stupid health articles tell you to drink more water. I want to tell the author to go eff themselves. If you don't like water like me, get a Soda Stream. I love it! It turns regular tap water into bubbly party water and it's so much more palatable for me. 

Weights  - Lifting weights BEFORE cardio will help your body burn fat more efficiently and faster.

Morning.
Boxing & TRX - I discovered boxing and TRX about a year ago and I love it. TRX works out my legs and gives me tons of cardio. Boxing gives me upper body strength and nice arms for my strapless wedding dress. Also, working out with hot muscled men is total motivation to step up my game during class rather than lurk around in the back and half-assing it.

Got our San Francisco marriage certificate today. Almost married!

It was exactly 1 year ago today that H proposed to me and today was the day we went to city hall to get our marriage certificate. (insert cheesy grin here)

Not only that, we were the first ones in line and so our ticket # was A001. Loving it.

Per usual, our morning started out with us bickering and me running behind but then giving H shit for it. He's really so sweet that he puts up with my craziness and blaming him for all things tardy when I'm the one who's ready last.

Some general tips on navigating the San Francisco system for getting your marriage certificate:


1. Go to the SF gov website and read it (uh-duh). Click here.
2. You can get your certificate up to 90 days before you get married.
3. You can make an online appointment with the court and the calendar booking system is super easy.
4. Fill out the application BEFORE you go to your appt. It will save you a lot of time.
5. It costs $99 to get a marriage certificate (as of today). Other fees can be found here.
6. You don't need a blood test to get married. Growing up watching sitcoms about people getting married and you always had to get a blood test. So I was surprised that we didn't one. I still told H to get one anyway just to make sure that he was good & healthy.
7. The whole process takes about 30-45 minutes! Woohoo! We walked in at 8am, appt. was at 8:15am, took a few pictures, and walked out the door at 8:23am.
8. You can buy a souvenir marriage certificate for $5 that has a pretty pic of City Hall. It's free if you get married at City Hall. My advice, splurge the $5 to get something pretty. You're probably spending $3000 on your wedding dress, so just get the souvenir.

Preparing for the After Party

And so it begins, we are starting to prep for the after-party. We haven't finished planning the actual wedding, but we have already started planning the after-party. Went into Costco to get toilet paper and we left with this package instead. It's actually a pretty good deal. 5 bottles of liquor for $80. Just need a handle of whiskey, mixers, cups, & napkins and we're done.

Don't Skip the Day-Of Wedding Coordinator

From: 'The Wedding Planner' movie

We met with our day-of wedding coordinator today and I continue to be so excited to work with her. One of the event managers at the hotel where we are having our wedding event manager is also our day-of wedding coordinator. H & I are planners and so we don't feel like we need a general wedding planner, but the day-of coordinator is a total must-have.

Essentially, she is on top of her shit. Timeline, coordinating with all the vendors, bringing lunch to the bridal party, menu changes, hotel guest gift bags, all of it. There are so many behind the scenes things that go on during a wedding, I am really finding the value in having a day-of wedding coordinator.

The true value of a wedding coordinator can really be seen when you experience a horrible one. I was the MOH for a friend's wedding and the wedding coordinator was awful. She constantly looked like a doe caught in headlights, she didn't speak with confidence, and was constantly MIA. It got to a point where I took a walkie talkie from her and took charge for about an hour before the reception.

In experiencing first hand a good day-of coordinator vs a bad one, here are some things that I would look out for. There are tons of articles out there to help you figure out what questions to ask your coordinator, but I'm just coming from a personality perspective.

1. Confidence - If your wedding coordinator sounds confident and speaks with authority, then people will listen to him/her.

2. Organization - Things like having a portfolio to keep notes, a brochure, business cards, a website, etc. All these things point to a person being organized. Meeting with a potential client (you the bride & groom) is like a job interview and they should be prepared. I'm not saying they should be conservative or on guard. Just prepared.

3. Kindly Opinionated - This is your first time getting married, so you're going to ask questions like, "What do people typically do in X situation?" If their response is, "It's your day and up to you on how you would like to handle it," that's the wrong response. You have no idea what to do, but your coordinator has been through several weddings. So they should be able to provide a couple different options/opinions that will allow you to decide on what's best for your situation.

3. Appearances - You meet with your coordinator a few times, and so they should be presentable at all times in order to make a good impression on you. If they look like they have their shit together, more likely than not, they'll have their professional shit together.

4. Connection - You should feel like you have a good connection with your coordinator. If you like that person, and they like you, you'll be excited to work with them and they'll want to work harder for you.

Happy hunting!

Died and gone to craft heaven

All hale the craft goddess!

The last time I was in Michael's was when I was the MOH for my friend's wedding and I was there to get last minute double-sided boobie fabric tape. That was a year ago. Now I'm here to attempt my first DIY project.

I wandered the aisles for an hour before putting anything in my basket because I was so distracted by all the wonderful colors of yarn, sparkly knick-knacks, baskets galore, and every single type of glue under the sun.

Did you know that Tori spelling has a line of DIY jewelry at Michael's? And *gasp* it's actually a pretty good idea and the jewelry was kinda cute in that jersey-shore-i-like-claire's type of way. (And I do.)

The DIY project I want to do is create a special hanger for my wedding dress photo. I picked up 16 gauge wire but really needed 12 or 14 gauge wire. Total fail. I also picked up some stickers for my photobooth photo album, 15 rolls of discounted ribbon (70% off!!), and jewels & glue to bedazzle my wedding shoes.

I seriously stopped myself from going haywire and getting all the embroidery thread in there. I hope my DIY project goes well. Eek. This may be my 1 and only DIY project...so we'll see.