I can’t believe how quickly time flew the past month and a half! Now the holidays are over and I have to go back to the usual schedule of working on websites and blogs, cleaning the house and my craft business. I must say I am relieved the holidays are over because they are so hectic..but I also hate returning to the day to day life afterwards. I get spoiled by having Ry around more since he gets vacation days for the holidays..and I also have to force myself to go back to being more strict with my diet and exercise. It’s way too easy to splurge and pretend the diet doesn’t exist when everyones eating cookies and turkey dinners. I’m forcing myself to be good now though because yesterday was the 6 month mark to the wedding and I want to be in shape for the  big day! Ugh..I’m gonna miss all the goodies though. Poo!

Well I have 2 blogs to get out today and a cardio workout..and I’d love to get them all done before lunch..so here we go!

I finished the second book in the Twilight series today, New Moon. They conveniently place a chapter or two of the next book at the end of each book so I’ve read the first chapter of Eclipse and ant to keep reading!! I placed a hold on the book at my local library..but I don’t know if I can stand the wait. It’s  so dorky…but I’m obsessed. I can’t wait till the movie of the first book comes to dvd so I can watch it. (I’m not one to go to the theatres for a movie if I know it will probably make me cry. I hate crying in public, especially over a movie :/)

Annnnyways..I hope everyone had a fantastic New Years! I spent the eve with my fiance drinking margaritas and watching the ball drop. I made little personal pan pizzas and we snacked on rye dip and a bread bowl. Yum, yum!

Now I can officially say I get married this year…Scary!

….. <3

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uxjNDE2fMjI[/youtube]

I can’t believe it’s about to be 2009..how insane is that? As usual my being busy with everything has forced me to neglect the blog, but honestly you didn’t miss anything interesting. I have been running around like a psycho for the past month or two with the holidays and am just now starting to settle back down into the normal schedule.

I hosted Thanksgiving here this year and it turned out really well! My dad, brother, mother and her husband ,  Ry and I were all there for dinner. I did it all by myself too, so I was proud 😀 I made a garlic herb butter roasted turkey with stuffing, mashed potatoes, cranberries, green bean casserole and corn bread. I also baked 3 pies from scratch – pumpkin, chocolate peanut butter and banana cream. I was so nervous I was gonna screw up the turkey but it turned out really great! A lot of work but so worth it to have family time and make memories in our house. Ry even complimented me the other day after going to a holiday party at his work where his co-workers brought in dishes to share. He called me afterwards saying it was alright but that he was spoiled by my cooking and baking – that theirs just wasn’t the same. Awww 😀 I love that he loves what I make for him 🙂 🙂

After turkey day comes Christmas which is always hectic. Especially when you have to make sure you visit both families (my family on the 22nd since there was a huge storm on the 21st and then 23rd through 27th in Binghamton). I made my mom, Ry, Ry’s mom and Ry’s dad one of my wool needle felts as gifts, baked my infamous sugar cookies (x10000), sent out xmas cards (all of which got completely lost or damaged, grr), decorated, made taco salad, recorded home videos from vhs to dvd for my dad..oi! It was just insanity. All that on top of my usual work of crafting and website/blog maintenance (8 websites to maintain total! Working from home is great..but the downside is there is no start and finish to the work day – I basically work all day whenever I can squeeze in more maintenance/updates), and wedding planning.

Speaking of wedding planning tomorrow I’ll have been engaged for a year already. Time is flying so fast! I am coming up on the 6 months to the wedding mark and I just know I’m going to start freaking out soon. I have SO much planned that I want to do beforehand. I’m making the invites, programs, menus and favors by hand…I am just this week finalizing our limo for the day. I need to help pick tuxes and find someone for dress alterations. It’s crazy how much is involved in a wedding. You don’t have any idea until you start planning your own and it just blows your mind. We booked our honeymoon probably about a month and a half ago too! We rented a private house right on a private beach in outerbanks North Carolina. I am sooo excited. I’ve never even seen the ocean before! My honeymoon will be my first ocean experience and I get to live right on top of it for a whole week. I’m so going seashell collecting 🙂 I know, dork.

Lastly I guess and least important is I quit WoW about a month ago and have since signed back up with EQ2. I reached 60 on WoW with my druid and honestly was just disappointed with the content. A bit bored. I’m sure I’ll rejoin again in time when I’m not tired of it, but in the meantime I’m playing Everquest 2. My dad got me a laptop for xmas to help me out with working from home and it’s nice enough to also support eq2 for when I need a little break from the websites.

OH! I am also officially obsessed with the Stephenie Meyer Twilight series. Ry got me the first book “Twilight” for my birthday and I finished within a week or so..and he got me the second book “New Moon” for Christmas. I am almost finished with that one already! I am going to need the third book this weekend probably lol. Anyways, if you are looking for a new book to read and vampires intrigue you..you NEED to pick up this series. I’ve had a vampire love/fetish since high school after seeing Interview with a Vampire. Then there was Buffy and Angel…then the recent (but cancelled 🙁 ) Moonlight tv series. Now it’s Twilight..and I’m in love. Mmmn Vamps!

That’s about it for now.. 😡 😡

Uggh. I feel like asshole today. I went to bed with the slightest of headaches and woke up in the middle of the night with the most painful migraine I’ve had in a loooong time. It didn’t help that I was startled awake by my tank of a cat in Ryan’s room trying to open the closet by flailing is 14 pound orange and white body into the sliding doors. He does this until he knocks the door(s) off the track so he can get inside. It sounds like someone slamming a door over and over again. Why is he so intent on going in the closet you may ask? Oh, well that’s the strange thing..! He has become obsessed with a present my mom gave Ry as a joke a couple of Christmases ago – a plush rapping doll. Apparently he can’t get enough of kicking the crap out of a little plush eminem looking doll. He even broke the dolls sunglasses. Anyone want a Turkish Van cat?

As for life updates we’ve been trying to make some changes around here to deal with the shit state of the economy we are in to cut down monthly bill payments to allow us to afford the wedding. We are in a pretty decent amount of credit card debt from over the past few years, a huge chunk of it doing home repairs here like the 50 yr roof we put on last fall. We are trying to get a home equity loan to pay it off, but with the economy the way it is right now aren’t getting our hopes up too high. I know a lot of people would tell us not to go this direction to cut down credit cards, but we feel this is the smartest thing to do right now. We are currently handling our monthly bills just fine, as long as we stick to our budget. We are however sickened by the finance charges we see flying off into the abyss every month on these cards, so we figured this is our best option for several reasons. One, because the interest is tax deductible and let’s face it..the government seriously kills us with taxes. Ry doesn’t bring home nearly the amount he is salaried at..and they took 60% of his $3,200 bonus this year that was supposed to help pay for our wedding. Two, the interest rates (while still variable) are cut in half which means less of our hard earned dough flys into the abyss. Lastly if we get the loan we applied for we will be cutting our monthly payments down by $400 a month. That’s $400 we can put towards the principle of the loan instead of interest, so we can cut down our debt a million times faster than the rate we are at now (about $100 a week). We can even possible take $100 of that and put it into savings while the other $300 goes to principle to create an emergency fund and still make ground on debt much faster than we are right now. So we are basically crossing our fingers. The appraiser walked through our house yesterday and seemed upbeat about our request..so we are really crossing our fingers!

On another note, I know I’ve mentioned my mom’s wedding a few times and she recently got pictures back from the photographer. Here are a couple…. (the second one we were instructed to lean in and act like we were kissing the bride..some ppl don’t follow directions well, hehe!)

OH! Also, Halloween is Friday and I decided this year I’d make my own costume and it is about as dork as it gets! Guess what i’m going to be this year? A World of Warcraft Blood Elf Mage! HEHE! Pics to come 🙂

Oh, hello there! An update..yippee! Not really. I’m pretty boring! So what’s new on the lilly front? Not much..just having our engagement party get together this weekend..SOoo, I’m planning for that amid the normal muck of everyday life.

We are having a small gathering at our house Saturday afternoon as sort of an engagement party. Basically, we are finally getting both of our parents (and step-parents) into one place, so they can finally meet each other. We figured this would be a nice beginning to a long list of wedding festivities and to-dos, and we also figured it would make things less awkward ont he big day if everyone had already met and talked previously. So long as everyone gets along I guess! We aren’t doing anything big – just a small barbeque of burgers and hot dogs, some homemade baked beans and baked desserts. If everyone feels up to it we may also head to the wedding venue to show them where we will be saying our I dos. Should be fun! The cleaning and prepping the house beforehand..eh..not so much.

I’m also back on a more strict diet on weekdays like I was doing a year ago when I lost the first 10-12 pounds. The wedding day is approaching a lot faster than we thought it would..so I know I need to get back in gear now to be the petite bride I am hoping to be. Don’t get me wrong, I’m pretty small and in shape now..but I like how my face looks better (more defined?) when I’m 135-140lbs..so I want to lose at last 5-10 pounds in the next 9 months. I’m starting now because I know the colder weather holidays are coming upon us now..so if I focus on losing now it won’t be a big deal if I gain a couple during the holiday parties. (Makes it easier to lose everything after January 1st rolls around if I lost some before I pigged out!) So far it has only been a week or so, so nothing really in regards to weight change yet..but it’s a slow process so I’ll be patient. Not eating whatever I want sucks though, and makes me cranky. If I was granted wishes one would definitely be to be able to eat whatever I want, whenever I want..and still be tiny and in shape. It takes qay to long to exercise off 100 calories..compared to the minute or so it takes to consume them!

*Rant* Lastly, my laptop is stupid. It always loses it’s wireless internet connection and sometimes won’t even open firefox. I broke down and reinstalled windows on it today thinking it would solve my problem, but it is not plug and play at all (or fast for that matter..256 mb ram?? UGH!)..so it still needs working internet drivers that don’t suck. The dell support site has about 102 different drivers for networking..Which one do I use turdnuts at dell? Could you be any less helpful? I finally found and installed one that will connect to internet..but it takes about 2 minutes to load each page, regardless of being on a cable connection. Fuck you laptop. I hate you. I have a million things to do on my blogs and web businesses, and I’m forced to sit on my desktop in the basement because despite spending 6 hours on the laptop, it still acts like a piece of splooge. WHen the wedding is over and we pay off our debt..I NEED an up to date laptop…and a couch. Our couch is also a bumpy lumpy turd. *huff*

And I’m off!

Well mom’s wedding is now over. I must say I’m relieved because there was a ton of stress leading up to it from drama. I was so happy to come back home when it was over, pull on some pjs and climb into bed. The day went well overall. My mom was happy and had the wedding she hoped for. My brother, Ry and I were in the bridal party…yadda yadda. It was nice to see all my family again too. After moving to Rochester I haven’t been out to Buffalo for many of the get-togethers since they end up being close to 2 hours away from where I am. All my cousins are so grown up now..and tall! I was amazed seeing some of them after not seeing them for a few years. It really is insane how time flies.

Other than that it is now full speed ahead on the planning of my own big day. I ordered a bunch of paper samples from different paper sites to start piecing together the invites, menus and programs. I have to start on our Save the Dates soon too since those should be going out within the next month or so. We’ve been engaged over 8 months now and that’s flown by! We are now under 10 months to the wedding so I know that will fly by too. That’s why I’m trying to get started on all things DIY now.

I kind of fell off the wagon the past month or so in terms of my workout and diet regime…So I’m now trying to get back into that to finish losing the weight and inches I had intended to lose the first time around. I’m now fluctuating between 147 and 148 so only 7-8 pounds or so to go. A big difference from the 20 pounds I was aiming for last year around this time when I was about 160. So I know I can definitely be in my best shape by wedding time if I just keep working out and eating right as much as possible.

That’s it or now.. 😡

It has been a busy few weeks! I know I’ve been lacking in the blog department since the video but I’ve been so busy…eep!

A couple weeks ago was my mom’s bridal shower, and since I’m her maid of honor I had to do a lot of the planning for the day. I hand made the invites, collected the RSVPs (the few that actually had the decency to call!), purchased a biiiig deli platter and made a cake. The cake turned out wonderfully! Everyone at the shower didn’t believe it was real, and when I told them it was..they couldn’t believe I had made it. I was flattered..I LOVE baking. It’s one of only a few things I feel I’m good at. The shower went extremely well -  my mom couldn’t have been happier about everything we did for the day. (Now if only the whole wedding thing was a happier situation, but I won’t elaborate on that one. >:( )

The following weekend (last weekend) we headed out to Toronto for the weekend. We had tickets to see Radiohead at the Molson Ampitheatre on Friday night, so we made a mini vacation out of it and stayed until Monday morning. Back in April or May I somehow managed to score the very first 4 tickets for the General Admission Pit for the show. Ryan, my brother and I all went up together Friday afternoon for the concert. The show ended up being amazing. We were right up front next to the speakers and it was a fantastic show! We took in our surroundings and danced and had the best time. 🙂 Afterwards we went back to the hotel by taxi, admiring the nightlife of the city. We stayed right in the heart of downtown at the Sheraton Centre, on the 18th floor. The view was soo cool! We had a view of the city and the CN tower right outside our window. We went to sleep every night with the drapes drawn open to fall asleep watching the lights of the city. We spent the rest of the weekend shopping and sight seeing – visiting Ikea, the Real Canadian Superstore, the Eaton Centre and wandering up and down Queen Street. I had the best time! I was so sad when the vacation was over. I’m absolutely in love with Toronto and hope someday to own some kind of property in or near the city so I can go whenever I want. Mmmn Poutine.

We then had our engagement pictures taken Monday night upon returning from Toronto..and head out to Binghamton tonight for the weekend. Always on the go..oi! Those will have to be another blog entry.. I want to try and get a workout in, shower and pack (again.) *waves*

[flv]http://www.enrapture.net/wp-content/uploads/2008/08/helloenrapture.flv[/flv]

Yep, I made a video blog. Well..it’s more of a hello than a blog, and I say “so long” WAY too often. But ya..I’ve had this site for 7 or 8 years now and figured it was about time I made a video saying hello 🙂 Pure dorkiness. Oh yes.

So I guess I should elaborate on the July 4th incident I touched on last entry. I love July 4th. Fireworks, Family, Barbeques..not to mention it was one of my late Grandpa Joe’s favorite holidays of the whole year. That’s one reason why we decided to hold our wedding on July 4th next year. It just seemed like the perfect choice. It’s on a Saturday next year, our venue is a tent downtown (free fireworks)..it all just fell into place. We wanted to do something special for July 4th since it was one year til the big day. Nothing big, just spend time together, dinner and fireworks.

We went to Binghamton for the weekend to get out of the normal day to day life and visit his parents and family too. We got to visit with all of Ry’s nieces, nephews and siblings at a family BBQ and at night we made plans to watch the fireworks at the Binghamton Mets game downtown. Everything was great until we made the mistake of assuming the area immediately around the outside of the Met’s stadium had to be safe enough to stand out and watch fireworks. We drove around the general vicinity, found an empty side street to park on and walked to a corner with a good view of the sky over the stadium. Little did we know the Met’s were in overtime..and were going to be awhile. Everything was fine, Ry, Zoe and I stood against a building and waited for the fireworks to begin. Then, the creepiness began! An older disheveled guy comes walking by..then stops and turns around to pet Zoe and start talking to us. Totally fine! The guy’s lonely, it’s a holiday..no problem. Well, maybe. The problem started when early in the conversation his topics were hateful and only progressed to be more and more violent. Not directed at us, but progessively more and more disturbing and uncomfortable. He started our convo talking about how the “indians” were screwing him, the working guy, with their lack of taxes and such. Just nod and smile, not going to argue with some stranger and start a fight. Eventually the convo turned into his father abusing him as a child, cutting him up and the like..and how he broke some guys legs and killed another guy. I just stood there nodding and trying to seem empathetic, meanwhile ry stood there fidgeting with keys in his pocket. I didn’t want to say anything that might set this guy off and turn his anger at us, so I just nodded and agreed..hoping..PRAYING..for the fireworks to start, in hopes the show would make this guy move on his way. No luck! Eventually his conversation had him right in my face slamming his fist into his hand, explaining what he did to a guy..and we had to make some kind of move to leave because it was getting worse and we had a feeling we may get jumped if we didn’t skidaddle. Ry made an excuse saying “oh my brother was supposed to meet us here, I should call him and see what’s up.” And off we went back down the side street to our car..Safety! It kind of ruined the whole tone to the night, adrenaline pumping from the whole situation, both uneasy and uncomfortable. We found a parking lot a few miles away to watch the show instead from the car. Not as nice of a view, but hey..not getting jumped and staying alive is nice!

I hope our July 4th next year works out better. Hehe. 😀

I love my bed. So cozy! That’s where I’m writing this post from as I finish up another long day spent on the laptop marketing and building one of my many online business ideas. My right hand feels slightly carpal tunnelish..ouch! It’s been a few weeks and I have a bunch of minor things I’ve been meaning to blog about but probably won’t get to all of them this time around. My time has been consumed by so many things that just needed to be done above all other things, sadly including updating the site. (not that anyone missed me 😉 )

My mom’s getting married in the beginning of September (as I mentioned some post previously I’m sure), and I am her maid of honor. I have been working with my cousin and aunt to put together her bridal shower which is only weeks away now. I handmade all of her invites, am buying a huge deli meat and cheese platter for the shindig and am either baking or buying a cake. That has taken up a lot of my time lately! The invites are now in the mail and a marshmallow fondant cake test run was successful, so I’m all set for shower things for now! The bridesmaid dress I ordered from netbride arrived very promptly this week and fits wonderfully. It worked out very well because it arrived a month earlier than they quoted..fantastic!

My time was also consumed by one of my crafting projects, a needle felted dog. I had a woman contact me about making a mini wool replica of her and her husbands dog for their 7th wedding anniversary. He is currently serving in Afghanistan, and their anniversary is the beginning of next month. I was absolutely flattered by her request for such a special occasion, so of course I told her yes of course! I put a ton of time and heart into each craft I create, so between the invites and making this little dog I was so crunched for time! I needed both the invites and the dog out in the mail asap so everyone would get everything on time and be happy. I was so relieved when the mailman came n grabbed all that stuff from the mailbox..it meant it was all done! The little dog ended up adorable, and she was very happy…YaY!

Other than that it’s the usual time consuming stuff of my multiple entrepreneur type businesses all going on at once! Multiple websites to maintain and keep building on to, crafts business..etc etc. Usually I’d be happy to be kept so busy so I don’t have time to sit and think and just drive myself crazy…But, it’s summer! I want to be able to be a bum! I can’t allow myself to though. I know some people may think that since I’m working and freelancing from home I must be laying on the couch watchin soaps and eating chocolates all day. Not at all! Sometimes I wonder if I should drop all of it and find a normal 9-5 so that there was a clear cut start and end of the work day. When 5 o’clock rolls around I walk out the door and home to relax! I’m such a perfectionist that I get in these moods where I drive myself nuts with anxiety if I’m not sitting at the computer plugging away at one of my business attempts. “Omg, I shouldn’t be sitting relaxing right now..I could have added more content to one of my sites..which in the long run may contribute to it’s success!!” I’ve been sortof driving Ry nuts with it here and there. I’ll wake up some days and be on the computer from the time I climb out of bed to the time I climb back into bed. (And then some, if you count right now! 😀 ) I forced myself to set down the computer and just watch a show the one night and was just fidgeting, feeling the need to work on -something-…anything! I just want to be able to break out of debt and start paying more towards our July 2009 wedding..If I’m not working on something that may help finances, I’ve been getting anxious. UGH. I need a chill pill. I’ve been recommended St. Johns Wart to calm me some, which sounds pretty necessary..BUT I’m on Seasonal Birth Control pills, so I can’t. 🙁 The supplement apparently messes with the bc pills and makes them less effective.

I think that’s enough for now..I still have to update ya on my Doc appoint from last week (mostly healthy!), and my crazy 4th of July.. (it involved lots of kids, fireworks..and almost getting jumped by a plastered bum! Not-EVen-Joking. Omigee) I’ll try to do that this week!

BTW – Bob..you aren’t patronizing me. 😛