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Budgeting and Meal Planning

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Occasionally I go through this phase of WE MUST BUDGET! I then set a budget, we stick to it for a while but then stray off because life is good and I know we aren’t breaking the bank. It’s not like we are missing payments, heck I just paid off my student loans, the beau just got rid of his cc debt annnnnnnd we bought a house. Not too shabby. I still have cc debt from that time I was making minimum wage during graduate school and decided living on the edge was the only way to live (totally was at the time) and the beau still has student loans and now we’d like to do some house upgrades, sooooo I’m back into the WE MUST BUDGET phase. Ha! Here’s my process :

Step one: create a budget. So many resources out there online and the nerd in me loves excel spreadsheets. A little modification now that we are married – what’s yours is mine now happening – and we’re all set. I think the word budget scares a lot of people into thinking that they have to be extremely frugal and sit home and do nothing. No. You figure out how much you make, subtract out savings and non-negotiable payments and split up the rest for food, beer and baseball games. Baseball games include both beer and food FYI.

Step two: figure out what you are currently spending on all the categories in your budget. This my friends is the best part (also the scariest). I did this for the month of March and we spent, no judging here, over $500 on alcohol that month. This included our weekly Friday beer and pretzels, a Green Day show (2 beers were $25!), and random ass trips to the liquor store. Insert jaw drop! Groceries came in just over $530 for the month and dining out, which there’s bound to be a drink mixed in there somewhere, $390. That’s $1422 in food aka fuel for a MONTH! I’m sharing these numbers for accountability; I’m determined to get those numbers down and have more spending cash (and savings too!). We had other categories that were out of whack but I’m in a wedding this summer and the beau bought a car, so I see those evening out.

Step three: figure out a game plan. I instantly turned to meal planning. If we have a plan, we tend to stick to it. Our refrigerator isn’t magnetic = we had to ditch the dry erase board, so I’m back to good old pen and paper with washi tape. Did you know that each month the USDA releases a chart with the average cost of food plans? You can check out February’s here. I’m using this as an inspiration: I’d love to spend $760 or less – that’s more than half than our current spending and a ton of money that could be invested.

Even though I’m starting this mid-April, I’m determined to drastically reduce our mindless spending. First up: the alcohol. Instead of drinking at the bar every Friday, we are going to fill up our growler. Instead of making random trips to the liquor store, we are going to take advantage of a wine club and have a certain amount shipped to us each month. It’s discounted and if we drink it, we drink it. If we don’t, it’ll help fill out our wine rack in the basement. It’s not a fixed expense, so we can stop it at any point. I’m aiming to cut our previous spending in half and spend no more than $250 on alcohol from here on out.

Food. We sure do love to eat and when we don’t feel like cooking (or don’t know what to cook), we tend to order Chinese takeout. And I can state with confidence that my hips don’t need anymore dumplings! I came up with a meal plan for the remainder of the month, starting today. Only Fridays are “locked in” with meals, as I plan to use the crockpot. I chose to do this for the simple fact that on Fridays I don’t feel like cooking – as my mother would say on Friday nights when asked what was for dinner, SKIP. A great way to enjoy a cheap, healthy meal with little to no work. And for clarification, I’ve only planned out our dinners. Both of us are really good about packing a lunch / the beau eats at home and both of us eat prior to leaving the house in the morning.

We have all but two ingredients (crispy onions + pizza dough) on hand to make the following meals:

Friday crockpot meals for the remainder of the month:
– tonight: veggie chili
– black bean soup
– BBQ tempeh with green bean casserole

To prep to keep on hand / freeze for quick meals: southwest quinoa burgers (makes ten)

Anytime meals in no particular order:
– taco salad with soy chorizo
– one pan Spanish rice
– portobello tacos!
– one pan Indian dish
– nachos!
– Shepard’s pie
– pizza or calzones
– frozen burritos
– breakfast for dinner! (pancakes, soy sausage, hash browns)
– the beau’s empty-the-fridge peanut wok meal

Note: there are only 13 meals planned with 17 days remaining this month. I tried to be realistic with how much we’ll want to eat out – like our friend is celebrating one year as a #girlboss so we may go out while downtown. Maybe we’ll skip a drink to save cash, maybe we won’t. We also grabbed some pasta and frozen meals at Trader Joe’s to help us avoid Lee Lin. As we cook our way throughout the month, I’ll try to share more recipes, like the one pot Spanish rice, and post photographs a la IG. Oh! And in case you were wondering, since I’m being open and accountable, our total spending last night on groceries was: $180.16 which did include a six-pack. I’m sure we’ll be back at the market for more fresh veggies and last minute items, but so far, we’re well below our numbers last month. Phew!

Back with an update on numbers in May!

To love. To family. To surprises!

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I feel like many of you have been begging for this. Here you go: vendor picks and the big day.

And forewarning, this is going to be a very looooong one.

Where to start?

To answer the number one question: YES this was planned alllllll along. I have the emails to the dress shop to prove it ha ha!

I’ve never been one for big weddings. Not judging anyone and what they choose to do, similar to childbirth, it’s your life (and your money): do what makes you happy. My family has always known this about me and for years, my mom has always said to me, “I don’t care if you elope, just please have me be your witness.” When we got back from our trip to Mexico last February, both my sister and mom asked if we had eloped. Nope, wasn’t even engaged.

The idea of eloping and throwing a surprise wedding had come up in the past, with the beau and with girlfriends. Frankly, I’m shocked that none of them caught on sooner or questioned some of my quick planning, but then again, I really ghosted a lot of people the last month and a half in fear I’d slip. So when our engagement came last October, it was an easy decision for us to settle on a “wedding” date and count backwards, knowing we’d have to sneak in the surprise before then.

Only our vendors and officiant knew what was about to go down. We invited our closest family members – siblings, parents and grandparents – to our “engagement dinner” at Peck’s Arcade. There were 11 of us total in the room. I know for elopements the hot topic is not everyone being involved and here’s my response: that’s okay. If a family member is going to “punish you” for not including them, they aren’t being very supportive of your love and desire for intimacy. Do I wish my grandparents and Uncle were present? Yes. Was I going to sacrifice my surprise to get them there? Unfortunately not. If I wasn’t going to let my mom in on the secret, I wasn’t going to spill the beans. I knew we’d be throwing a party in May and am personally still looking forward to having every single person we invited there to celebrate.

We chose Peck’s Arcade because it was in downtown Troy and we heard they had really good food; neither one of us actually ate there prior to the big day nor could we choose the menu that evening. And oddly enough, we were both pretty okay with the unknown.

Back in October when we chose May to be our “wedding” month, I knew I had to move fast for a dress because they typically say it takes 6 months to have the dress made and finished with alterations. I needed it in 3 months. I wanted to support small business as much as possible, so I chose to visit True North Bridal in Chatham, NY. I remember having to call the owner, Katee, and explaining to her, okay, if my mom says May, just shake your head: I need February! She was a breeze to work with and was a huge help when it came to rushing the dress’ arrival. My mom and sister were there and I tried on probably 10 dresses but chose the first dress I picked up off the rack and tried on: a Daughters of Simone Lilah gown.

Flowers: there was only one person I wanted to design my wedding bouquet and that was Colie, the Flower Scout. We met with her a couple of times to discuss what we wanted but the beau and I were both pretty laid back: we wanted a garland on the table and a boutonniere and a bouquet all with whites and deep reds. That’s it. We didn’t have a choice of flowers or a specific look: I knew whatever she made would be fabulous and perfect. And they were. Last minute I had asked her to decorate our cake and she was on-board; that too came out better than I could have imagined.

Our cake was a vegan vanilla naked cake filled with vanilla frosting and fresh strawberries. Sarah, formally of Xs to Os, oh so kindly made it for us – thank you Sarah!

I’m trying to think of other details we needed to solidify for February 25th: my shoes! Sooooooo, they aren’t vegan. And I had a hard time making that decision but I’m human and make the best decisions I can on a daily basis. I searched and searched and searched for a long time for a vegan replacement but just didn’t love any as much as I did this pair of Swedish Hasbeens. I justified this purchase because I’ll forever get to wear them, paired with jeans, dresses… everything! And I already have worn them a number of times happily… and guilt free. I chose red for a pop of color – thank you Lauren for helping me with this!

Something old: our first toast was done using Taylor’s parents’ champagne glasses from their wedding thirty plus years ago.

Something new: the pair of quartz earrings I purchased from Annick’s.

Something borrowed: the pair of Spanx I wore under my dress (no, I’m not kidding – thank you Maryann!).

Something blue: I had my seamstress sew in the tail of a Smurf stuffed animal – it use to be my Nanny’s.

My engagement ring was made by an artist from Kingston: Rebecca Peacock. It’s absolutely me and I wanted to support her some more and asked her to design our wedding bands. It was wonderful meeting and chatting with her in her studio – there’s something special about knowing the person who physically makes something for you, something you’ll be wearing everyday from here on out. My mom was with me when we picked them up the first time (we had to have them sized again) and I was so nervous she’d catch on by how fast everything was coming together… she didn’t.

Our officiant was my close friend, Phil. We’ve only been friends for a short amount of time (well, 6 years) and he’s been supportive since day one. He was even on our first date! He was the BEST officiant friend a couple could ask for. Besides writing our vows, he made sure his car was fully stocked with water and mints – he was our driver for the day – and he even bought me a clear kitty umbrella so that I could venture out in the predicted rain. And he ran some pre-wedding miles with me the morning of. Kicked my butt!

Lastly, but surely not least, our photographer! DiAnna Marr of Our Two Hearts flew in from Denver, Colorado to be a part of this surprise. When I first reached out to her, I didn’t realize she was living in CO and felt silly that I had reached out to her without figuring out that little detail. Turns out, she grew up here and still has family local, so she was happy to travel east to visit. [She took all of the fabulous photographs in this post.]

Okay, now that you know all of the vendors / little details, on to the big day…

The week prior to our wedding, I realized our birth certificates had been thrown out during the move. Whoops! I was upset and freaking out a tiny bit, but the beau mailed in an application for a duplicate and I took off from work to visit the Town Hall. They both came with time to spare and the day before the wedding, I met the beau on lunch at the Troy City Hall to get our wedding license. The employees were shocked we were there so last minute – we had a good laugh telling them the story.

Leading up to the big day, I didn’t have any nerves. The night prior when I kissed the beau goodnight, I made the comment “when we wake up tomorrow, it’ll be our wedding day.” Instant nerves! I was mostly concerned over how everyone would react. I ran with Phil, took a quick shower and before I knew it, was headed to Jean Paul for hair and makeup. I was sweating so much I was so nervous! I must have calmed down toward the end because when someone asked me where my bridal party was again, I noticed I was back to sweating. Ha!

When I got home, Phil was drinking a beer in our living room and Taylor was upstairs showering. I immediately made myself a mimosa and hung around with the photographer until we heard the beau holler down… his shirt was wayyyyyyyy too big. I ran upstairs and there was the beau, looking like an episode of Seinfeld. We had a good laugh – there was nothing we could do – this was his only white shirt. Once he was dressed with his vest on and hair did, I decided to get into my gown. The beau was there to zip me in and I remember turning around and looking at him and he had this puzzling look on his face – “why were you so worried?” he asked? “You look perfect.”

Swoon. See – and I know this is a sensitive topic for all brides – I’m not in the best shape as of right now. When I got engaged, that was an instant thought I had – “if only I looked like I did a year ago (when training).” I kept thinking to myself, okay, I’ll start working out now and I’ll have X amount of days to be ready. Well, weeks kept ticking by and nothing had changed in my life. In January it kind of clicked: I’m getting married whether I’m 130 pounds or 150 pounds and guess what, I’m pretty happy right now at 150 pounds. I told myself that regardless of how my body looked on my wedding day, I wanted to FEEL happy. I can tell you that I couldn’t stop smiling that day and it shows in our photographs. Ladies who have yet to get married: I’m not telling you to be unhealthy, I’m telling you to be happy. And if your arms aren’t toned, guess what, no one cares.

End little rant. We were dressed, drinking mimosas / beer / wine (a whole slew of bevvies) and it came time for us to figure out a game plan. I knew I wanted photographs taken downtown prior to the surprise because it was suppose to rain. But first! I had to write a little note for my dad to read. See, everyone thought they were showing up for our engagement dinner and the plan was to show up a little late. This note would be read prior to us entering to give away the surprise and kind of let it sink in before I walked in in a wedding gown. We decided to have my dad read the card because he wasn’t going to have the opportunity to walk me down an aisle. It was short and something along the lines of “(Please read out loud) Sorry we’re running a little late, there’s been a slight change in plans. We’re getting married – tonight!”

As we were walking out of the house, I noticed that our neighbor’s daughter, Emily, had drawn a starting line on our sidewalk. I thought it was the PERFECT shot: we were at the starting line of our new adventure together. It’s one of my favorite shots of the day and I can’t wait to print it out to hang in the house.

We drove downtown and decided first to take photographs at Peck’s Arcade before everything went down. I feel like I saw every single person I’ve ever known during those twenty minutes; it was fun and exciting but we were TERRIFIED that a family member would walk around the corner. Phil had to break into our house because I had forgotten the beloved kitty umbrella and as we were standing there waiting for DiAnna, I felt like I was going to freak out. We finally hopped into her car and turned the corner… and there at the light passed the beau’s family and I could have SWORN his sister saw me! Instant panic.

We grabbed some shots under the Green Island Bridge near the TroyBot mural and then headed over to Second Street, where I was living when we first met. We shared our first kiss outside of that apartment, so it was only fitting that we return. Next up: the surprise!

We easily found a parking spot and I instantly had to pee. I thought I was going to pee my pants, frankly. We sent the photographer and Phil into the place to make sure everyone was there and little did we know, they had all been there just moments after we had left. Perfect timing. We walked over and the rest really is a blur. I know Phil walked in asking for my dad, my dad read the card and we walked in to some pretty shocked family members. The one person I remember the most was my sister in the corner, hands on her cheeks, mouth open, and tears running down; I ran over to give her a hug (she admits to not like surprises). I remember a TON of questions:

  • was this planned all along? YES!
  • are you pregnant? NO!
  • what about the dresses we bought? Well I’m wearing mine again so feel free to wear ’em.
  • was this planned? YES!
  • are you pregnant? Can I have another glass of wine?
  • what’s for dinner: We don’t know.
  • (me) can we get married?!
  • my mom to my sister: I can’t believe you wore pants to your sister’s wedding!

I don’t know if people thought we were already married because I walked into the room in my dress, and together, but we weren’t and we got married right then and there at the end of the table. After sealing it with a kiss and a toast of champagne, we all sat down for a delicious meal. Really, not stressing about every little detail including the menu was kind of perfect. Also to note: the weather was kind of perfect on this day (I know, I know, can’t control that detail). It was 65 and sunny and SO STORMY while we got married / ate… I heard rain on your wedding day is good luck <3

After our meal, we decided to head over to our favorite brewery, Rare Form, to have a beer. My parents joined us despite the rain and long ride home, and it was a wonderful time. A couple of beers, more champagne, shots of whiskey (my parents had left before that – ha!) and before I knew it, we were walking to The Ruck for one last beer and hot fries. Yes, I ate hot fries on my wedding night and it was phenomenal. Phil even got a shot of us sitting where we sat over five years ago on our first date – I don’t think those college kids liked the idea of moving, but they’ll do anything for a gal in a wedding dress.

I was so hungover the next day, I just about crawled into the bathroom to check my dress for hot sauce: alllllll good.

Hiking Wittenberg Mountain

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Trying to catch myself up with the hiking posts. I know I’ve missed many over the years but it is a great resource for myself to look back on now that I’m hiking more / completing them in the winter again. Here we go…

In early November Paula and I decided to hit the trails and hike Wittenberg Mountain in the Catskills. We had intended on hiking this mountain back in May 2013 when we hiked Slide and Cornell, but were turned around due to ice. Luckily, we had blue skies and just dry leaves covering the trail.

img_4351Side note: we drove down Woodland Valley Road to reach the campground and parking area for the trail head and there are the cutest, most desirable homes – to me at least. This house is for sale : can you imagine spending an entire summer there with friends and family? Or living there year-round? I’d need a stay at home kind of job because there’s no way I’d travel that road in the winter – but I guess if I had the money for this home, I’d also buy me a jeep, ha!

img_4297img_4299img_4337Back to reality: like many Catskill mountains, you get out of the car and go up! We climbed a short distance before signing into the register and then continued on. Wasn’t long before we each took off our fleece layer (while I was warm, I was thankful I hadn’t worn shorts). The trail eventually evens out – or at least it no longer felt super steep – and about 2.6 miles in, you come to a junction for Terrace & Wittenberg Mountains; follow the signage to the right.

img_4305img_4310img_4313img_4314img_4315During this last mile or so is when the scrambling happens. There were a couple of sections that I was thankful there wasn’t any ice and can only imagine going down it if there were – no thank you! We were moving at a steady pace and I never felt winded, despite being out of shape. It could have been that Paula and I had much to catch up on, but the miles ticked away for me. Before I knew it, the ground was evening out and up ahead I could see a clearing: we had reached the top! And the views were spectacular on that chilly morning!

img_4316img_4317img_4327img_4329We sat on the summit for a little while, enjoying a snack and soaking up the views.

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We didn’t sit for too long – the wind was blowing and we both started to get cold. I layered up before heading down and wore my gloves for almost the entire trip out – which I never have to do! I think because it was my first colder hike of the season, my body was adjusting. It sure did smell like winter was right around the corner.

img_4340fullsizerenderOh! We took a small detour over to Terrace Mountain to find a lookout – which bumped up our trip mileage to 8.4 miles for the day (for a total of 6 hours hiking).

Hiking Graham + Balsam Lake

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I feel like I’m so behind on sharing my hiking adventures. I’ve been hiking more frequently these days, especially now with the warmer weather… well, some days have been warmer than others. I’m hopping out of order to share with you an adventure I took this past weekend in the Catskills. Paula and I set out to hike Graham and Balsam Lake – both count toward the 35er list and Balsam Lake also counts toward the fire tower challenge. Win!

I don’t mind hiking in the cold and I’ve certainly hiked in colder conditions (higher wind temps, below zero starts) but golly, this hike had me freezing! My core was nice and toasty (as it should have been with a layer of tech-wick and two wool layers under a shell) but my legs were cold. I mean really cold. No matter how fast I hiked or how steep the trail got, I just couldn’t warm them up. And I was moving at a good clip despite having sore legs from a 10 mile run the previous morning. I knew I was short one base layer when I never took my gloves off… which I never wear on the trail. Paula knows I never complain about the cold and I just couldn’t shake the topic; later in the day she admitted to watching for signs of slurred words and slower movements – she was worried about me too!

Now before I get you all concerned, we weren’t ever more than four miles into the woods. I had my emergency shell with me and hand warmers and I never needed to break them out. We were both more than prepared. And I mentally kept telling myself: if you don’t warm up, get out.

We started on the trail right at 8AM (the car said it was 3 degrees outside) and got moving right along. We both kept a pretty consistent pace because of how cold it was and before I knew it, we were at the junction where a side trail heads to Graham. This is an unmarked trail and you’re required to call the owner of the property for confirmation of use; Paula did this for us. Being typical Jona, I hadn’t researched anything about this hike – I had no clue the total distance for the day, to the junction, etc. The trail to Graham was a pleasant surprise despite the cold and never really got steep. The last up got me warmed up a little and I hollered down to Paula as soon as I could see the summit structure, 10:16 AM.I snapped a couple of photographs – we could see the fire tower atop of Balsam Lake – and zipped back down onto the trail. I did grab the map to see how many miles we had traveled and was surprised to see it was almost 5. At this point my hands were coooooold from taking photographs and I decided I wasn’t going to eat until we reached the car. During this trip back to the junction I seriously thought about heading out of the woods. I didn’t feel like myself but kept quiet because I didn’t want to worry Paula; she had already hiked BL in the past so it wouldn’t have been a “loss” for her.

But I’m pretty stubborn and when I saw that junction, I got a jolt of energy and forgot about my hands and legs. THEN I saw the sign to Balsam Lake and it said .75! Holy smokes, I can do anything for that short period of time! This section of the trail seemed a little steeper, I was probably just a little more tired, but it did the trick and warmed me up! When we arrived at the summit at 11:49 AM, the sun was shining and we could barely feel the wind. Oh the sun never felt so good!

I had ZERO desire to hike up that fire tower and plopped down at a picnic table to jot down times and started hounding my lunch: chickpea and carrot salad with a bagel. Probably would have been nice to have a hot meal and I’m usually good about that but I was craving chickpea salad. Ha! Within ten minutes we were back on the trail and passing the Ranger’s cabin. Yup – it was 4 degrees.

The trip out was swift in microspikes and I did manage to stay fairly comfortable temperature wise. We were back and sitting in heated seats by 1:20 PM. I’m happy I made the decision to continue on but I did learn a valuable lesson: my legs get colder than I anticipate on shorter hikes! Wear a layer of tights – better to over dress than under dress.

(Sorry for the lack of photographs… you guessed it, too cold.)

Oh it is love: Save the Dates

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You guys. Planning a wedding and keeping yourself quiet aka not working it into every conversation is difficult. I feel like I’m officially that person at work. Ha! I didn’t think I’d one day be that person but it’s exciting and expensive and if I’m going to put all this effort into one day then gosh darn it I want to talk about it.

So here we are, at the beginning because I can’t give details away until it happens. But I can officially share details about our Save the Dates because those were mailed last week, holler!

Okay, we’ll have to back up one more step to address budgeting, which will be an entirely different post. I had budgeted $250 to spend on save the dates and that did not include the cost of postage. [THAT is how detailed my wedding spreadsheet / budget is.] For some, that number may be a little high but you have to remember, we’re paper / stationery people. We both had visioned setting up a new studio in our basement and printing like the wind to mail one of a kind pieces. In reality, with moving and trying to unpack and the holidays and LIFE, that wasn’t going to happen and I knew this months ago –

Then randomly one day while in a meeting at work it popped into my head: have another artist do the work and we’ll customize the rest. I texted the beau and he loved the idea.

That artist was Will of Thorneater Comics. We had met him two years ago at the Hudson Valley Hullabaloo where he did individual $1 portraits of us both in between sales (we were vending at the event). Those portraits hung in our apartment and will be taped up somewhere in this new house once we find a special spot / the walls are painted. I had seen a post on IG that he’d be back this year, so we made the plans to drive down to Kingston to have our portrait done together – and that’s just what we did. We had crazy warm weather that weekend and we spent the day wandering around on foot and window shopping after sitting down with Will. Check!

One lazy Sunday afternoon – I’m pretty sure it was the first day of January – we sat down for a good thirty minutes finishing up the design. We had worked with Moo in the past for our business cards and loved the quality and customer service. After doing a quick little search on their site, I was sold on the postcard idea because they use the Luxe line of paper from Mohawk Paper. If that sentence means nothing to you, know that Mohawk is located right in our backyard – Cohoes – and that it’s excellent quality paper. It’s 32pt (thick) and you can choose a seam color that runs in the middle of the paper; a fine little detail. We ended up choosing white – ha!

We sent off the design that Sunday afternoon and I danced a whole lot in the kitchen that following Thursday when they arrived. They were perfect! I took one into work with me the following day to confirm with my postmaster, Justin, that they wouldn’t cost more than 34 cents (thicker paper remember); all good! Friday evening I sat down before dinner to stamp and personally address each postcard. My sister got me the Rifle Paper Co. address book for Christmas – just what this girl needed!

About the vintage stamps: I started collecting them when we were at the shop. It was a personal project and I saved the ones that I liked, which included the Christmas designs. Despite them going out after Christmas, I wanted to put them to use because I hadn’t sent out Christmas cards from our new address… If only we had remembered to put a return address, our closest family and friends would have that new address.

Breakdown of costs:
Custom portrait: $10 donation
50 Moo custom postcards: $103.99 minus a $20 coupon I found online: $83.99
Expedited shipping: $19.75
Vintage postage: free!
Total spent: $113.74, saved $136.26