Day: February 15, 2010

Valentine’s Day Inspiration

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Yesterday it was finally time to say good-bye to Christmas. A last look at this years’ Swarovski before it got packed away (Feb 14th pic).

Some may think it strange that we keep the tree and decorations up this long afterwards, but one year they stayed up till Easter. Which was just a bit too long, even for me. It felt like the Christmas decor was preventing Spring from coming!
JD’s mom (who passed away shortly after we started dating in 2002) used to keep a little tiny tree up all year long, as a reminder for her family to keep the Christmas spirit in their hearts every day of the year. I wouldn’t mind doing something similar after the move to our new place. JD’s dad still keeps her tree up, as well as buying her a single rose every week and placing it next to her urn on the mantel. Very sweet.

As I was dismantling the tree and packing the ornaments carefully away, I was inspired by the colours in one box of ornaments:

These are the colours I would love to have incorporated into the wedding decorations, flowers and invitations. Soft pinks, creams, gold, silver…even some lavender. Now I have a definitive colour scheme and my artistic and crafty friend Mizzus K and I can go shopping for invitation-making supplies!

It’s Time to Get Serious…

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Feb 11th POD

About fitness and the wedding, that is.

Purchased a few cheap exercise DVDs to spur me on. Two for kicking my butt, and one for STRESS RELIEF! With a bonus talk by the Dalai Lama on meditation….how could I pass that one up? Plus, did I mention it was cheap?

Feb 12 POD – Catching Olympic Fever – Go Canada!!!!!

Since paying attention to my eating and trying to ramp up the activity (thank you Pedometer!), I have been feeling so much better and I have lost 2 pounds to boot! My body really does want to heal itself, I just have to give it a chance.

I started off slowly, by just increasing the amount of time and intensity of walking Mizz Lucy. Now I am adding workouts in the pool (sprinting laps), elliptical trainer, and DVD workouts.

Feb 13th – Date with Jackie Warner for a 15 minute total body circuit training session. Oh my goddess….I have no core strength. Sad. But I certainly have progress to make in that area, and that will be rewarding to note of as I get stronger. No wonder I have been struggling so much with most belly dance moves!
Who knew you could get so much done in 15 minutes? I am impressed. And pleasantly sore 2 days later. Not crazy-Frankenstein-walk soreness, but just enough that you remember you worked your body good.
Wedding planning got kicked off into a higher gear this week. We met with (and booked) our photographer, the lovely Jillian. Who was a fountain of wedding advice, due to her experiences at weddings of all sorts. And we also met with Tracey, at the Village Hotel, who was/continues to be also most helpful! Things are starting to come together, that’s for sure. And about time.
And, in talking things through with these two, we are slowly developing the picture of what we want our guests to experience. We’ve nixed the DJ/Dance idea in favour of live music and hope we can find someone to fit that bill. Guitar, piano…someone who sings too would be wonderful.
Otherwise we just may be recording hours of our favourite tunes and investing in an iPod and some speakers. We’ve also decided against a receiving line. The guest list is small enough that we won’t have any problem mixing and mingling with everybody immediately afterwards and during the rest of the night. Wedding dress shopping starts tomorrow. Things are starting to come together, all right!

Edward Gets Confused

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Feb 9th Pic of the Day – Our newish car (bought Nov 09)
JD and I are fans and consumers of Toyota products. We recently traded in our beloved 2006 Matrix and bought our second Toyota, a 2010 Prius. I secretly (well, guess the cat is out of the bag now) refer to the car as Edward….because the Blizzard White paint job is pearlescent and sparkles in the light. Thanks to Mizz J for introducing me to the Twilight series et al, and that reference!
And now Edward is going to be recalled because of a braking problem. We hadn’t experienced it until just this weekend, when JD was braking and went over a bump. Ooops, Edward got confused apparently and the braking just cut out. Thankfully we were going quite slow anyways and there was no one ahead of us.
I do hope Toyota learns from this experience and comes back stronger and more quality-focused than ever. We do think they make excellent cars (well, excellent for our needs…reasonably priced, durable, reliable) and I personally love our dealership – which has besides exemplary customer service, a cafe and quiet room with internet….you really don’t mind waiting for the car to be worked on. Oh yeah, and let’s not forget the complimentary car wash, so Edward can continue to be sparkly!

Feb 10 POD – Maple Quinoa Cereal
I recently made this recipe, from OhSheGlows, a wonderful website with many great recipes. Vegan baker Angela comes up with cool ways to eat healthy.
I’ve gotten a lot of great ideas from her site, including the whole Green Monster smoothie crush I’m currently experiencing!
The cereal was easy to make, quite crunchy and nicely sweetened with maple syrup and spiced with cinnamon.
It did keep me full longer than a regular bowl of flakes, no doubt due to the high protein content of the quinoa.