We're baaack..

I don't really remember what i wrote about last since it's been over a week.. oops! But i have an excuse, okay? I was on my honeymoon in Hawaii with my new husband. It's still kind of weird to say Husband, however I enjoy it way more than fiance.

I'd really love to go into huge detail about they honeymoon and everything we did, however that would take FOREVER because we did so much. So feel free to view our pictures at http://picasaweb.google.com/maelsche to see our Wedding and Honeymoon pictures. Be aware.. there's a lot!

I'll let the pictures tell the story so that i don't have to type it all out. I will say, everything wedding and honeymoon wise basically went off without a hitch!

Now it's back to reality.. I need to grocery shop, clean the house, write thank you notes and in between all of that try to relax and get my brain back on the east coast time schedule. I also need to start the changing my name process.. hopefully it's not too difficult!

2 days!

Two Days.. wow! I'm pretty excited!

Last night I was supposed to work on my place cards. But instead, Alex and I took a mini road trip to Stateline and to see Nick & Laurel and go to dinner with them. We wouldn't have been late if Alex trusted me and we road around Elkton/Newark completely lost for a good half hour. But we made it eventually! Stateline was Stateline.. we got Champagne for the Limo and Alex got some beers and some glasses. Then we headed to Nick & Laurel's apartment! We decided to go to Ali Babba's for dinner. I think it was Lebanese, Israeli, and something else cuisine. They must've had some greek mixed in too because Nick got a Spanakopita appetizer and it was delish! I'm pretty sure that's kind of greek. Anyway, for dinner we all got kabobs.. they got lamb and I got shrimp. Of course this came with pita bread, hummus, tabouli salad and an awesome garlic dipping sauce! After finishing my whole meal, I wasn't even full! It was great! I did eat pita bread though, a no no.. but we were celebrating! Celebrating Laurel's Grant Acceptance! I would go into detail on that but it's pretty complicated. Let's just say, it was hard to get, a lot of people applied and Laurel got it!!

So today, it's kind of hard to focus at work and I was pretty tired this morning from being up late last night. But I keep thinking.. stay busy.. it'll go faster! And it is already 9:45, so that's good I guess? Today I need to hit the mall on the way home for Makayla's Flower Girl gift and get another pair of shorts from AE. They're on sale right now. Then I need to stop at Old Navy (which isn't in the mall, booo) to exchange the flip flops Alex got me yesterday because they were irreversibly twisted. I should've known better then to trust him.. just kidding, he tried!

Then I really want to go to Hoss's for dinner. Alex doesn't want to, but when does he?? I need to label my place cards tonight as well. I was supposed to do that yesterday but the DE trip cancelled that. It won't be too hard though. I have the labels set up already, just print and stick! Therefore I won't be going to Alex's basketball game at 9.. unless I finish my stuff before then.

Friday's going to be busy. Laurel's coming to meet me around 9 am and we're heading up to get our nails done at 10 am. Then we're going to Lunch and at 2 I have a meeting at the Navy Club to drop off all of my favors/overlays/etc so that they can be set up the next day by the staff. I will be working on directions for that tonight as well (or maybe at lunch today). Then of course we have the rehearsal at 5 and the dinner at 6:30.. that's probably when the nervousness will set in! But i'll just breathe and everything will go fine.

We were originally going to Fort Hunter for pictures before the wedding, however they have a music festival this weekend, so that's out. So now we're going to the Italian Lake in Harrisburg which i've heard is also very nice for pictures. I got parasol's for the bridesmaids to take pictures with.. and one for me, and for the flower girl! Picture props!! I really hope it doesn't rain.. Paper parasols would not hold up well! All week it said that the rain would be gone by Saturday and now it says Isolated Thunderstorms! What? Not even scattered?? Isolated! Damn!

All i've ever wanted was no rain on my wedding day! It can rain maybe while we're in the reception! But not when we want to take outdoor pictures!!! And it will probably be overcast even if it's not raining. :( Maybe I can photoshop some blue skies into those pictures!

I should get off of this because the rain is making me sad. Happy Thursday!

All I Want..

.. is a slice of pizza
.. is one peanut butter cup (who am i kidding that would turn into at least 5 more)
..is to make a fulfilling lunch (lunch is so hard for me, i would eat a sandwich everyday if it was considered healthy.. in weight loss cases anyway)
..is a job that i enjoy and look forward to
..is the world to be a little less judgmental
..is to eat and not worry about it
..is to look hot in hawaii

Being on a diet isn't easy. I'm aware that it's not supposed to be easy, and that the results drive you forward.. which, they are. 8 lbs! But when you don't see physical results.. it's a little disheartening. I've noticed that my legs have gotten a bit smaller, my arms, a tad smaller, and my face.. a teeny bit smaller. I guess maybe if i exercised more, it would accelerate things, however.. i don't currently have time to do that. This week is busy with the wedding on Saturday.

Tuesday: Dinner at my parents and to work on the programs/place cards.
Wednesday: Shopping for our Trip
Thursday: Tuxes, Champagne for the Limo, Hoss's!, Alex's Basketball Game
Friday: Nails, Lunch, going to the Base to drop off the goods, Rehearsal Dinner
Saturday: Get Married!

I can't say it's really stressful, it just keeps me really busy! And tired because I'm not fueling my body with as much food as normal. I'm still around 800 calories a day though which is good. At least I get to have a piece of cake at the wedding!

Seven Pounds

No, not the movie.. it's the weight i lost since last monday on the South Beach Diet. The weekend wasn't easy. My cousin Ashley had a graduation party with tons of goodies I could've eaten. However I stuck with meatballs and bbq pulled pork. No veggies.. but then for dinner i had a salad and some spicy chili at Conestoga. Then yesterday at Charmayne & Omer's they had strawberry shortcake. Darn diet! But it's working so i'm not complaining.

Weekend recap:
Friday: Worked a half day (love half days) then had to be home because our desk was arriving. After that had a carpet quote and headed to my parents house. In the evening I attended Ashley's Cumberland Valley graduation at the Giant Center. From 7:45 to 10:30.. crazy! Plus traffic! It was a nice graduation though. Makes me feel old.

Saturday: Ashley's graduation party. Alex was in Atlantic City for his bachelor party friday night so he did not attend the party with me on Saturday.. instead he took a 4 hour nap! He needed it though.. Atlantic City can be rough! But he had a great time, so i'm happy for that! After Ashley's party.. filled with Volleyball, Lifesize Jenga and Ladder ball, I headed back to my house in Lancaster. Alex and I eventually went out to dinner, Conestoga and then watched Saving Silvermen and went to sleep.

Sunday: I was late meeting Jen for breakfast (with Erik & Alex of course) and I felt terrible! But breakfast was good and it was nice getting to know Erik a little (soberly) before the wedding saturday. We then went to the Farm to help Alex's parents with the camera we gave them since we got a new one. Well, the camera isn't working.. what a great gift! I didn't expect to spend the whole day there, but we did. We went to the outlets to exchange Alex's swim trunks at Nike and then went over to Bass because they always have good sales and Omer needed some tan pants for the rehearsal dinner. Then we had hot dogs for dinner. I'm assuming their carb free?
All day I spent searching for kittens or waiting for kittens to come out of hiding. We got some good looks at them, they're super cute. There are 4, 2 orange ones, a cream one and a black and white one. Two are still up in the loft and two are in the lower part of the barn. Butterscotch (their mom) can't seem to get the two to come down from the loft. They sure know how to hide though. I have a picture of the two in the loft that i'll put on here then. I don't have a card reader here.

Overall it was a good weekend. I finished thank you notes last night so they'll go out today. Next weekend is of course, the wedding. It's going to be crazy! I have a pretty strict timeline to follow but once we get to the reception, everything should be fine. I get my programs and place cards today, so I'll be working on that tonight.

I'm so excited to be getting married in 5 days! I love Alex so much and can't wait to spend the rest of my life with him! :)

You are what you eat..

For some reason I really enjoy reading health blogs. It's fun to see how people go from overweight to healthy weight. Tipping the scale is very beneficial for your life.

Over a year ago.. I think it was February 2008. Alex started the South Beach Diet because his mom had recently tried it as she is pre-diabetic. Alex started at about 265. We don't know the exact weight, but we're guessing it's around there. His current weight is about 203. That's about 60 lbs.. it's crazy! Crazy good of course, but nuts to know that he dropped 60 lbs.. and about 20 of it was in the first month! I now call him my skinny minnie because i've never seen him this small since i've been dating him (2 years and 9 months). This is apparently where he was at weight wise in high school. I'm pretty proud of him.. plus not that he wasn't hot before.. but this makes him even hotter!

Moving on.. i'm currently on the SB to shape up a bit before the wedding/honeymoon. I started on Monday. I've been doing really well. One thing i'd like to mention though is scales are finicky.. it says i lost 4 lbs in 3 days. I'm not sure if this is accurate or not. I was thinking that my first weigh in was inaccurate, but hey, maybe it wasn't? 4 lbs in 3 days just seems crazy. I've been tracking my food intake.. calories, carbs and sugars and then how many calories I think i'm burning.. which really, might balance out because I'm eating an average of 750 calories a day. That doesn't seem like much compared to the 'recommended' amount that the gov't says you need, however i eat breakfast, snack, lunch, snack (sometimes), dinner. It's the south beach.. actually you're supposed to snack more on the south beach! I'm thinking that 4 lbs was water weight, and I know there's more water weight to come off (since i've done this a few times). Easter really threw me off last time with it's peanut butter cups! I just need to keep being strict with it. It's going to be hard to do that this weekend at my cousin's graduation party, but i'll do my best!!

Here's a fun website, 100+ Nutrition Facts about Well-Known Foods. It's very interesting. Count how many of those foods you eat on a regular basis. I'm 11 out of 25. I think that's pretty good?? it's only 44% but still!

I know it's hard not to eat processed foods, but you really are what you eat. If you eat a lot of junk, you're body will fill up with junk (fat) and if you eat foods that your body actually uses, then you're on the right track! So many of the foods on that list are anti-carcinogenic and can help cancer patients greatly by removing toxins from their body that they get during radiation and chemo.

Alex has a dream (yes another one) to one day be self sufficient on the farm and not need to go to the grocery store for anything (of course, somethings.. like toilet paper will need to be purchased) but you have a large garden in the summer where you grow all the veggies you'll need for a year. Obviously you'll have to freeze some or can some to make it the whole year but there are a lot of seasonal veggies. And he wants to have a couple chickens for egg production, a steer or two for beef production, sheep for lamb production, and of course a large garden. I agree with this dream, and though it will be a lot of work, we may live 10+ years longer because of it.

Sometimes I wish I lived in simpler times, like little house on the prairie. They didn't worry about much. Sure, Nelly was a biotch but other then her and her mother, everyone was super nice (from what I can remember). It just seemed like such a carefree life.. little to no bills to pay, no tv (which i couldn't live without but hey this is hypothetical).. no drugs (in your face, of course there were drugs).. no rehab though. It will never go back to that unless the earth becomes extinct and we start all over.. that's another topic tho!

Happy Thursday, Tomorrow is Friday!

Just another wednesday..

What a boring post title.. but i'm cool with it. I don't have too much to write about today but I think I can find a decent topic: Babies.

Everyone assumes that when you get married you should automatically start poppin' out babies. I myself have been guilty of asking people how long they plan on waiting to start a family (with children since technically you're starting a family when you say 'i do'). I just tried to google to find out how long couples wait on average.. but google these days is hard to comb through, so i'm not going to waste my time. I'm hoping the average is 2 years.. that should pan out since some couples jump right in and some wait longer.

I've decided that Alex and I are going to wait 2 years as well. Why? Because i was planning to wait 4 and decided that i didn't want to be 28 i'd rather be 26 (or possibly 27 depending). Alex would have them now if he could however 1. i don't want to have children in the city.. not my idea of a good time worrying about my child at night. and 2. we're not financially ready for that. Of course people say, oh you'll never be ready. but really.... we're not ready and i want to at least feel like i'm sorta ready before we jump in to an 18+ year commitment. Some reasons I'd rather wait 2 than 4 also include weight.. when you're younger, you drop it faster and if i'm gonna do a back to back (2 kids in 3 years) i'm gonna do it, get it done, and get back in shape. bam! bam! Plus, we can barely have pets right now bc we're so self-centered.. or i am. And kids are a 24/7 gig. So now maybe some people won't have to ask.. we're waiting at least 2 years. In that time we need to save money for not only children, but buying a hunk of the farm and building a house on it. Still hammering those details out..

Here's the deal. There's a farm. It's split into 3 parts but it's all on one deed. Alex's parents have 2 parts and his uncle has 1. His parents would be selling us one of their parts. Where it gets confusing is.. we want to build a house on this property. Does this house then become "everyones" because everyone is on the deed? If so, Alex and I are the ones paying the mortgage for a house that up's the property's overall value. It seems really complicated.. I can't really figure it out actually. I get the land part.. but Alex and I are going to be paying for the knocking down of the current structure, any trees that need to be taken out, and then building. I'm estimating it costing us around 225k.. not to mention the cost of the land we're buying. It's craziness and sometimes I don't think it's going to work. It's Alex's dream to live on the farm, not mine, but sometimes I think maybe we should wait for that dream until 10-20 years down the line. He wants it like now.

I guess we'll just wait and see what happens. Peace and Love kiddos.

me and air conditioning aren't friends

Happy Monday??? Monday's are usually my fastest day of the week, so i'm not mad about it. The weekend was GREAT though.

My bridal shower was awesome.. my mother had a contest for the most uniquely wrapped gift and since it was hawaiian themed, people had some crazy/fun ideas. My Aunt Kim and cousins Jenny, Wendy and Sarah won this contest with a Treasure Hunt. I had to swim through the sea (jello in martini glasses) and dig around in the sand to find money. They also had some $ attached to a blow up crab.. which alex and I plan to take to Hawaii with us. It was so much fun! Everyone did such a great job! It's crazy thinking that it was a party just for me (and Alex) but it really helped get me used to the fact that people will be looking at me (us) all day. Of course it will be like 4 times the amount of people that were at the shower, but hey.. it's practice! And did i mention the cake? My mom hired the baker that's doing my wedding cake to create a cake with the word Aloha.. it was awesome! Like an Ace of Cakes cake awesome! She did such a great job. And my mom's the best for putting all of it together and setting up and everything!



My bachelorette party was after the shower, and we went to dinner at Cafe Fresco and then went to Scott's Grille and later Ceolta's. It was super fun. I totally love my friends and sisters.. so much!

Yesterday was supposed to be a date day, but when I got home, Alex and I just sat in the backyard for a while because it was so gorgeous outside! Then we went shopping at the outlets for a couple things and heading to Bube's Brewery since his coworkers got us a gift certificate to there. It was yummy! When I got home though, it's like the strep throat had returned, hardcore! I couldn't even talk and it hurt a lot to swallow. The doctor said that it takes 3 or 4 days to really work, and i'm sure drinking alcohol over the weekend didn't help the cause, but hopefully I start feeling normal soon.

This week isn't going to be too busy. I'm hoping to have the wedding programs in by friday and then i need to write names on placecards. Everything else seems to be in order. It's 2 weeks away but that's kind of a long time in terms of getting things done. What I really need to do this week is Thank You notes for the bridal shower. I'm going to start those tonight. Everyone is so generous.. I really am so lucky to have a family and friends like I do. They're super!

I just ordered some more clothes for the honeymoon! We also ordered a digital camera last night with a 12 gb memory card, is that big enough?? haha I think so! And I ordered some underwater disposible cameras as well, i'm sure that's cheaper then buying them there! Hawaii is going to be SO much fun! I can't wait!

Maybe you're wondering why the title of this blog?? Bc as I'm sitting here at work, in a sweater and covered in a blanket (also turning my heater on occasionally).. it just reminds me that i'm not really good friends with air conditioning, we don't get along. This is my life year round.. even in summer, I guess maybe we don't have a good heating system here bc I never feel the heat! But that's the reason!