Let them eat Cake!

We have been having such great luck with our wedding planning and I am super excited about all of our vendors so far. My latest amazement was induced by our baker.

Now, we have been 'shopping around' for the cake for some time. I was having a very hard time wrapping my mind around spending hundreds of dollars for a cake. Costco sells them for like, fifteen bucks! But, you only get one wedding so I figured we give it a go at finding something that tasted as good as the price felt. We went to multiple grocery stores talking to their bakeries and bridal shows with "real" bakeries. I was quoted as high as $6 a SLICE! After our fifth failed attempt at a grocery store, we decided we might as well go with a standalone bakery.

We had talked to a bakery that seemed like they were reasonable and they said to come in any time to taste the cake. When they set the plate in front of us, let me tell you, I have NEVER tasted cake until this day. The cake literally melted in my mouth and I took the next bite so quickly I barely had time to swallow. At this point, I didn't care what the price was, I was ready to buy the bakery just to keep on eating this cake. Then my sugar high wore off, my vision began to clear, and we started talking dough.

 I started tallying in my head as the cashier tried to answer my questions as best she could. It was looking like we would be over the budget by at least $100 and still have to compromise on what we had wanted. We pulled out the calendar to schedule the appointment with the consultant, she would be able to anwser all our questions. And yet another blow, the consultant doesn't take appointments on Saturdays which would be the only day we could come. It was starting to look like we couldn't have our cake and eat it too after all. Just then, a small older women covered in flour came out to see how we were doing. I explained how much we loved the cake but we were not sure when we could come back without a Saturday appointment. She sat with us and chatted about how we were both working to pay for the wedding and trying so hard to stay within budget. When she heard Andrew was in the Navy, she mentioned her husband, now decorator extraordinare is retired Navy. She told us to come back next Saturday and she would help us out.

She was fantastic! I was sitting there trying to take things out to compromise and get the price down and she kept adding them back in at no cost. We got exactly what we wanted and she even helped brainstorm on the best way to make my custom cake topper. And when all was said and done, she brought out two big plates of cake to take home with us. Even though they were big plates, the cake didn't last long! Now, there will be plenty of tasty cake for everyone at the wedding. Let them eat cake!!!

Happy Friday!

I have officially completed my first week at my new job. I've been out of the office atmosphere for a couple years now and I forget how coveted Fridays are. Friday is a day to be celebrated. Every email includes "Happy Friday", every phone call ends with "Have a great weekend".  It is acceptable to be chatty for a good part of the day and even proclaim "I'm ready to go home" at 11am. I forgot how glorious a Friday afternoon can feel when you climb into your car and and say out loud, "It's the weekend Woohoo!"

Don't get me wrong, the new job is great. It was a very busy week in the office so my training was delayed a bit while business was taken care of. There is still much to learn, but the people all seem very friendly and with time I know that I will have no problem navigating the system. I am excited to dive right in and am looking forward to being challenged again.

I was slightly nervous last weekend, being the new kid all over again. Adapting to a new environment and becoming part of an already existing group doesn't happen over night. Anyways, time to enjoy my first official weekend in a long time. Happy Friday!!!

Big Changes

So.... I sort of got over the whole "blogging" thing for a while. It's been some time since I have even thought about it to be honest. Big changes have gone down for this Planner without a Plan. There will be tons of planning in my near future, I am getting married in August. Not only that, but I have accepted a Marketing Events Coordinator position and will be planning marketing events for a company in Hampton, Virginia. That's another change, I live in Virginia now.... has to do with the whole getting married thing. It's looking like I will be a very busy girl over the next 7 months or so...

Keep an eye out for outbursts about wedding drama, planning a wedding where ALL of the guests need to travel will be slightly challenging, especially since I know nothing about the area. Be ready for new job growing pains, and me learning to live with a spouse instead of a roommate.

And no worries, Clayton made the trip to Virginia with us... so he will be along for the whole adventure!

Spring is in the air...

There are these vines that grow up and over the entryways to the swimming pool at my complex. I never really noticed them before. I always walk under or run past them without a second thought. Yesterday, while making laps around the complex there was this amazing fragrance that I had never noticed before, a fragrance that had not existed before. On the next lap around I noticed tiny white flowers growing on the vines. I was so surprised that such small flowers could have such a strong scent. I noticed the same vines and flowers when I was walking around at the mall later that same day, but I noticed the scent before even seeing the vines. I found myself aiming to walk past them whenever I could.

People say that Florida does not have seasons. I have to scuff at that because those tiny white flowers definitely prove that Florida has a “spring”. These little fragrant flowers really got me thinking about it. The defense people seem to always use is that they “will miss the seasons”. I guess what they really mean is SNOW, because there are seasons here too. You know it is summer when it rains every afternoon, but only for 15 minutes. You know it is winter when the ocean water is cold and you find yourself gravitating towards long sleeves and pants. Who took it upon themselves to claim the word season and put the definition of “all the leaves have to die and fall to the ground to count as a season, and we have to be freezing cold and buried in snow for 5 months to count another”? There are plenty of places in the world that do not experience that, does that mean that none of those places can proudly say “this is my favorite season”?

I guess this is sort of a silly thing to rant about; I just really liked the flowers. So I am going to wrap this up with Happy Spring all!

Things I wanna do...

I really want to learn to play the ukulele! I think it would be neat. I’d like to learn Spanish too. I’d like to actually be fluent, not just master sophomore level vocab. I also want to live on a houseboat, or would that be IN a houseboat. Would you live on it or in it? Anyways, not something long term or anything, but for maybe a year. Something different, something new, something not everyone does.

So, one of the things that have been on my “things I wanna do” list for a long time is learn to surf. Ever since middle school I have wanted to be a ‘surfer’ but I had never even touched a surfboard. A couple years ago I went to Hawaii to visit a friend who moved there. Besides the fact that it was the most FANTASTIC vacation I had ever been on, I got my very first chance to try out surfing. More on Hawaii later… fast-forward a couple years, now I live in Florida. I’ve driven to the coast a couple of times and had the opportunity to rent a board to try out my skills.

Like anything, the more you do it the better you get. Using my logic meant that I needed to own a surfboard so I could go more often. I happened upon a surfboard without even looking for it. I found it in Costco of all places. An 8-foot foam board. Foam boards are a better beginner board for a couple of reasons: reason one and most important to me, they are cheaper! They are also softer when you land on them, you know if you happen to fall trying to learn to surf, that probably happens... Less upkeep as well, no waxing, no worrying about cracked fiberglass.

I looked at it a couple times before I actually bought it. I actually ran into a surfer in the store and told him about my background and how I wanted to learn. He told me “you need this board” and proceeded to put in into my shopping cart. Convinced by the “pro” surfer I clearly met at Costco, I took it to the beach the next day. I’ve got a long way to go, but I am on the right track now. At least I have actually touched and even SURFED on a board (I caught a couple of decent waves when I was in Hawaii). This will be ongoing and wish I were closer to the coast so I could go more often. Luckily summer is coming and the board fits into the back of my car with ease. Now, I just need Costco to sell a houseboat and I will be all set!

I'm an AUNT

Ella Grace Wynveen was born on March 14^th around 4am. Seven pounds seven ounces and 21 inches long; I am officially an aunt. If I see cute baby stuff, I will no longer be a crazy lady when I stop and linger or even buy things. Her picture is my background on my cell phone and if anyone seems even slightly interested I scroll through the dozen or so pictures I have of this seven-day-old baby. Everyone keeps saying what a beautiful baby she is. And I don’t think it is one of those times when people say she is a cute baby when really they are just afraid to say it like it really is… PEOPLE, there are ugly babies our there and we should just own up! BUT, this is not one of those times. She is really cute, just can’t wait to meet her in person. That’s only negative. She lives in Chicago. I can’t even argue that she should move here due to cold weather because it was 80 degrees the day she came home from the hospital.

In just 16 days I hop on a plane back to Chicago to meet my niece. I’m thinking I will spend the weekend sleeping on my sister’s couch just to savor every minute I can. I know those five days will fly by, then I will be back in Sunny Florida. I’m not worried about it though. Over the past year or so I have gotten used to cramming in my social visits and really cherishing the time we have. Of course I would always love to have more time, but I will definitely take what I can get. Because at the end of the day, I am still an aunt!

I am going to be an aunt?

As weird as it is, my sister is going to have a baby. I say it's weird because I just don't feel like we are old enough for all of that. Time has just flown by so much I sometimes forget that we are really adults. Don't get me wrong... I am SUPER excited. In every store I HAVE to walk through the baby section to look at all the cute stuff (although I'm slightly disappointed that I have found way cuter boy clothes than girls clothes but we will go with it). 

The baby is coming towards the end of March, so I just booked my flight to go home in April to meet her. Here is my concern... I will only be home for 5 days. How I am going to meet this new little person who is going to be fabulously amazing and then just say, 'gotta catch a flight, peace!'? The shower was a couple weeks ago, as you might have guessed it, I couldn't attend. It got me to thinking about the other events I won't be able to be there for. When she is actually born for one thing. But not just baby stuff that I am missing. There are birthdays, minor holidays and parties (Fourth of July for instance and the Superbowl), even when my mom and siblings just go out to impromptu dinner. 

This is why I have decided that EVERYONE should just move here too. I don't want to move back to Chicago, that actually isn't even a consideration at this point. I just want them all to come here. My new niece, siblings, mom, grandma, cousins, friends, everyone. I'll even help everyone unpack when you get here. Better get the show on the road though, because in March I am going to be an aunt and I don't want to miss that!