the puuurrrfect way to end a week.

the hipster in me screams

Are these really the candidates for Favorite Male Artist in the Peoples Choice Awards?

Is this why i feel disconnected to America?

I'm a snob.

boom!

I love that Jeremy photobombs.

The chick taking the photo was sooooo not into Jeremy jumping into this photo OR the fake moustaches we drew on ourselves.

Jonathan and Brett being silly

In this photo: Jonathan and Brett

Added 2 hours ago

shameful.

So Jeremy tells me that Con Air was apparently a huge movie when it came out in theaters. Yeah... I don't remember it. It could be that I blocked it out considering the SHAMEFUL SOUTHERN ACCENT that comes out of Nick Cage's mouth for two painful hours.

I don't know if it's because I'm from Tennessee and I take my accent very seriously, or if it was just irritating that they didn't cast a southern actor for the role... but damn, it really bothered me!

I tried to find the opening scene where you can really hear the absurdity that is his fake accent, but all I could really find worth sharing was this scene... this one was worth staying up past 10:30 for:

the internet is funny.

So yeah... the internet. how weird is it?!

so on friday when our little video was posted on design*sponge, i was fairly freaked out. it wasn't so much about a lot of people seeing it, but the fear of strangers saying mean things about us.

ridiculous, right? or not really? i mean, who wants people they don't know talking shit about them? no one! but at the same time, i'm not so sure why i assumed there would be haters. after all, it wasn't a video of us tazering epileptic kittens. it was a video of love! the happiest day ever!

maybe my fear was just a natural feeling of protection. i hold my relationship with Jeremy so dear, that sometimes I feel too protective over it. regardless, all of a sudden we were out there in the weird internet world, in our most personal and venerable moment for the world to view and comment on. and get this- the internet stranger world was NICE! Really super nice!

"To April & Jeremy: Thank you for sharing this with everyone, and thanks to D*S for bringing it to me. As a woman who has had her fill of big fancy weddings, I know that I want something smaller and more intimate. My friends disagree that anything that involves City Hall could be beautiful or romantic. Thank you for restoring my faith that every person knows what is right for themselves, and that City Hall can be beautiful when the two people involved really want to get married."

(that comment was the one that made it all worth it, by the way)

And then something I didn't expect happened... people started sharing it on their blogs... and then I REALLY freaked out. I mean I had some control knowing that design*sponge would not publish mean comments, but ohhhh shit- now the internet had free reign! so there i was on friday night, outside of a soup and salad restaurant in the suburbs of Denver, having trouble breathing and asking Jeremy why the hell we agreed to post it. Thankfully, sweet Jeremy just took me into the restaurant and calmed me down with a build your own sundae station. Yesssss.

But you know what? Not one of those 160 other blogs that shared it had one negative thing to say. Not one! Perhaps I need to give the internet more credit.


And then there's this: Kazakhstan! Which is my favorite part of it all.

money.

I just wasn't raised to be money-minded. Love the parents, but man saving and managing money just wasn't on the top of their priority list. It probably didn't help that they were trying to raise 5 girls on middle-class income in a fairly pricey community. So you know, no fault to them, but I guess I'm just trying to say that I didn't know how to handle a checkbook till like... now. And I sure as hell didn't know what "good credit" meant until I had bad credit.

I've definitely learned my hard lessons with money and so has Jeremy. My credit is still recovering and thankfully Jeremy has a damn near perfect score. But still, here we are in our early 30's and still feeling mildly out of control when it comes to our finances. Things are always paid. And I'm not addicted to designer handbags. But we really need to learn some hard rules about paying off debt and saving money.

So we're caving in. To the obnoxious entity that is Dave Ramsey. That's right, 14 weeks to financial peace, baby! One of our couple friends have been on his program for a little over 9 months, and to date they have paid off over $10,000 on just a $50K combined income. Yes- I don't know how it's possible either (especially in Denver), besides they live within their means and they don't stray from their budget.

I'll have to report back after tonights first class, but I'm really trying to stay positive that the class will be fun and really make a difference. Thankfully, my best Denver pal will be with us to keep us laughing.

my darling geek husband

... is co-writing a new website for the TV Series "The Walking Dead".

http://walkingdeadtheatre.com/

Jeremy's post are by the name "Carl".

we said vows.

we said vows. from Jeremy on Vimeo.

We were married at the historic San Francisco City Hall on Monday morning. It was the easiest and yet most romantic day ever.

Eloping gets a bad rap, but for us, we wouldn't change a thing.

Thanks to our friend, Britt Simmons, for being an awesome witness and even more awesome videographer. (http://www.brittsimmons.com)

busy.

i'm thinking way too much right now about all of these things.

looking forward to a time where all of this crosses my mind as just good memories.

home sweet rental.

I miss owning a home. Well, I guess it's not so much the ownership as the making a house my own. I loved my house in Nashville. It had it's 1920's issues, but I loved it.

A big yard, a kitchen that was small but remodeled in a way I could easily bake in, a front porch for sunday paper reading.







Renting blows. I can't do anything significant without asking our landlord and there is a constant sense of "this isn't permanent".

To be fair, renting has served it's purpose since moving to Denver. I wasn't in a place to commit or sink money into something on my own. But now that life is moving along, I have house fever again. I want to make my own home. I want to do it with Jeremy. And this is where I become obsessed and impatient.

Thought I'd do a little search in my dream Colorado mountain town of Evergreen, and this popped up.





(built-in china cabinet, wha wha whaaaat?)




WHY DO I DO THIS TO MYSELF?

An affordable Mid-Century home in the WOODS where I can have my goats and chickens? Seriously?

With a google street view like this ?


View Larger Map







o.k. moving on.

missing a chromosome.

am i the only girl in the world that doesn't enjoy wedding dress shopping?

1. why are they all strapless?

2. why do they all take 3 months to get in?

3. why don't more bridal shops serve alcohol?

4. is it really all that inappropriate to wear a green or blue dress?

the dress is the last item stressing me out. after this, no more whining! promise!

rant.

Wedding blogs are pissing me off.

I understand the whole "DIY" concept to save money and make things personal. I love saving money! And making things personal!

But all this DIY CRAZE is killing me and the more they try to top each other, the more out-of-hand it all gets. I don't really see how they could be saving money. Craft materials cost too! It's like all these brides are trying to over diy the next bride, just to top the diy'yness of that one blog, just to totally trump the most diy wedding of them all.

If I see another hand sewn fabric boutonnière or "just married" pendant banner, i'm going to lose my shit.

Marry Him.

A few weeks ago I was getting my hair did, sitting in the chair, eavesdropping on the conversation happening between the stylist and the girl next to me. The girl in the chair was about 35, attractive but not a 10 (more like a 6), sounded moderately stupid, but not full blown idiot. Here is a snip-it of their conversation:

the 6: so i'm dating this great new guy!

stylist: OH! tell me more!!!

the six: well he's incredibly nice, handsome, has a great job. he doesn't play any games. he calls me back when he's supposed to and asks me out for another date while on the current one.

stylist: he sounds perfect! I'm so happy for you!

the six: well... there's this thing.

stylist: oh no, girl. what? alcohol issues? dating other girls? WHAT?

the six: he's about 2 inches shorter than me. maybe not a full two inches, definitely i can notice it. i know i shouldn't care, but it really bugs me.

stylist: so you don't think you can get past it? i mean, is he a keeper? the marrying type?

the six: yes. he is. BUT i just never imagined marrying a guy shorter than me. not sure if i can go there. shallow, i know, but it's a bit of a deal-breaker.

At this point, I almost leaned over and pulled a Miranda. You guys know what I'm talking about, right? To refresh your memory....

Except I would've leaned over and said: "MARRY HIM. Are you seriously saying that you're going to dismiss Mr. Perfect for TWO INCHES?"

But I guess I shouldn't be too hard on The 6. Before I was went through that awful break-up, I was the same way. I chose the wrong guy and I realized that the looks, the height, the money, the rock band (collective ughhhh), the life-of-the-party personality...

It means nothing if you don't have the patience, the care, the friendship, the honesty, the holding your hand at your worst moments, the ability to work through the issues, and the putting you as #1 on their team- above anyone else in their life. And when you find that, you care less about the curly hair and blue eyes, the two inch height difference, the whatever it is that just never seems to make it "perfect".

But I've found my realistic version of perfect...
and I'm going to marry him in October.

my first of three beautiful bands.

weekend.

Friday I cut out of work a couple of hours early to spend a ridiculously fun afternoon at Water World - the six flags of water parks here in Denver. Despite the fact that i LOVE amusement parks, including water parks, I haven't been too into the idea of tromping around anywhere in an ill-fitting tankini amongst a sea of teen girls in tiny bikinis. But my love for a waterslide trumped that and off we went. Afterwards, Dan, Alison, Jeremy and I stopped at some hole-in-the-wall mexican place that didn't serve booze (BOO!) and then home for the night.

Saturday morning Jeremy and I went to pick out a couple of large purchases. $900 later, we are the new owners of a lovely Livestrong 9.9 Treadmill. Originally the plan was to find the best treadmill $500 could buy on craigslist, but the more we researched the more we leaned towards a new machine. The rationalization of spending this much comes from the fact that our gym memberships total $90 a month and when we go I walk and Jeremy runs, so why not just buy something for home. I'm BEYOND excited about it and think it's going to get tons of use. Hopefully getting me prepared for jean shopping this fall and Jeremy ready for his birthday marathon in October.

Saturday afternoon spent with Alison checking out some of her matches from eHarmony which was a total blast. Man, some dudes out there are such douches! Luckily, Alison is awesome and so some good guys see that too. (Alison- Team Pat!)

Saturday night watched some fireworks with JC, Alison, Matt, Dan and Bryan in the Glendale Whole Foods parking lot. Lots of fun made better by a fight that some old drunk dude tried to start with a neighboring car. Young guy was playing his music a bit too loud and old balls yells out "You're GAY. WE GET IT." I guess old balls wasn't sure that young guy heard him, so he just kept repeating it or similar "You like shitty music. WE GET IT." Finally some dad broke it up and old balls digressed. It was awesome. Also "WE GET IT" became the sub theme of the weekend.

Sunday the same group took off bright and early for Dan's condo in Breckenridge. Holy shit- so awesome. The day was beautiful- low 70's, sunny, and the mountains were so green with just a little snow-cap left. After a day of drinking too much for high altitude, we came back and watched the season premiere of The Real World. Ha.

Yesterday- just cleaning. ALL DAY. We might be having a few summer guests so it was time to tackle the office/guest bedroom closet which has basically been out place to stuff everything we don't know what to do with. Came out last night with two bags of trash, two goodwill bags and i recycling bin. I think I'm finally learning the "if you haven't used it in a year, throw it out or give it away" mentality.

Looking forward to a 4-day work week and getting my tready on Thursday!

the fat belly diet.

Jeremy and I walked over to the library on Saturday to check out a few cookbooks for my dad. He's not doing well (to say the least) and one of his trillion doctors suggested he just start 'eating clean'. You know- fruits, veggies, healthy organic meats... REAL food. Food that will rot, that doesn't come in a box.

Considering my dad has been eating downright terrible (but tasty!) food for the past 70 years, I was specifically looking for cookbooks with recipes that were 1) easy to make with less than 10 ingredients 2) affordable 3) healthy 4) tasty. Tasty being the most important, cause if it doesn't at least taste salty or fried, dad won't eat it.

The one I ended up really liking was the Fat Belly Diet by the editors of Prevention Magazine. Now, I'm not really a fan of any diet. I think every plan has its ups and downs, but this cookbook is really good, regardless of following the plan or not. I am a fan of order, so I love the way it's laid out (see photos below). However, as far as a diet goes, this one seems to be fairly smart. Allowing you four meals a day, all around 400 calories each, and adding things that we all like to eat such as nuts, olive oil, peanut butter, chocolate.

So far I made a few of the recipes to see if they're Sloan Powell friendly, and I've been really impressed! Here are a couple of the recipes I've made that I

recommend-

Greek Grilled Chicken Breast - This was SO GOOD! Some changes I made: added 2 Tbls of Olive Oil, 1 good squeeze of a lemon, and an extra clove of garlic. I also blended the yogurt sauce instead of just stirring. This is meeting my craving for Chicago Style Gyro in Inglewood, but not resolving it. I miss my old neighborhood sometimes. :(

Korean Beef in Lettuce Leaves - Also so good! A little on the spicy side for me, but only because I listened to a review that said to add a heaping tablespoon of Chili sauce. If you like a medium to hot dish, add it. If not, stay away. Or, just add to taste. I added a can of sliced water chestnuts (and sliced them even more), used a mango chutney instead of orange marmalade because I couldn't find a jar that didn't have high fructose corn syrup, but then again I was at Albertsons, not Whole Foods.

I would recommend checking this cookbook out at the library and copying a few recipes for your collection. Lots of good items. Speaking of- did everyone but me realize that libraries let you check out just about everything? Cookbooks, movies, new books, old books, magazines - I'm so ashamed for my lack of knowledge about this!

I love that it's easy to read and designed well (geeeek) - Title of the recipe, brief description, ingredient list, directions and then to the far right, all the nutritional information. At the bottom, it allows you to "add" items to make it a complete meal and a reference to another recipe in the book.

Here's the "make it a meal" section: