Thirsty Dog and Pumpkin Pie Cheesecake Bet

I'm lucky I have a friend who's husband goes out of town probably the same amount of time that Danny works. Last night she promised her coworkers she would go to somebody's birthday party at the Thirsty Dog Brewery in Akron and she needed me to take her husband's spot who was in Chicago. I was by myself with no plans so I was excited to go. We pull up and wonder if we're in the right spot because it looks very industrial but then we realize that her coworker rented out a room in the brewery not open to the public. I just started to tolerate beer within the past few years so I was ok with trying some. I tried the Pumpkin Ale and the Raspberry Ale which were both very good. I'm lame and have no pictures.

This year we are hosting Thanksgiving at our house! Danny and I have a bet going on right now regarding dessert! I found a pumpkin pie cheesecake recipe with a pretzel crust on the Whole Foods website that I was going to make. My mom asked me what to bring and I forwarded the recipe to her and she said she would make it. Well Danny has never seen my mom make a home made dessert in the 8 years we've been together because she likes to buy stuff from the bakery. So we bet $5 - I win if she makes the pumpkin cheesecake recipe and he wins if she brings store bought bakery. I'm putting my faith in her, I hope she comes through and I can prove Danny wrong! Just for fun, even though my mom doesn't have a facebook, I posted this:

Get a Melissa & Doug 25% Off Coupon When You Take the North "Poll"

Melissa & Doug want you to tell them which of their educational toys you think is the best! Just click on the image below to place your vote in the North "Poll!" You'll Get a Melissa & Doug 25% Off Coupon** to use at MelissaAndDoug.com just for voting!

Editor's Note: I have a niece to buy for this Christmas and I've read so many good things about Melissa & Doug! I like so many toys that I can't make a decision!

Sweatin to the Homies

I like Zumba but latin music is not my favorite. I have the best time when the instructor plays Britney or another non-latin song. There's also a joke within my group of friends that I'm the only one out of the group that likes hip hop and I get made fun of constantly. When I found out there was a hip class near me, I was really interested in going, but scared at the same time. For two weeks I had something going on on Wednesday nights (see last post), but last night I finally trekked up there in the dark and went to see what this was all about. I felt bad that there were only two other people besides me. The instructor was really energetic and did the steps slow, which was great for me. At first I was thinking, this isn't doing anything...but by the time we were done, I was soaking in sweat! Even more than after Zumba! I'm going to try to get the word out and get some more people to go with me because I'm addicted now and I'll be sad if the class gets canceled due to no interest.

In other random news, I bought the dunkin donuts strawberry shortcake coffee that the Healthy Diva posted about:

Since I only have a Keurig and not a regular coffee maker, I had to bust out the Keurig reusable coffee filter that we got at our shower. Wow what a hassle! You have to take the little filter, scoop little teaspoons of coffee in it, and then wash the whole thing! I just started on the coffee train a year ago so I'm not used to cleaning grounds, but I felt like I was doing a lot of work for 8 oz of coffee, haha! No, I take that back, I was messing with coffee grounds at age 15 when I worked at McDonalds. The strawberry flavor was really good :)

Trying to be healthy

The wedding was wonderful but the stress surrounding it was overwhelming. I was really surprised how some family members acted. I guess a wedding brings people's true colors out. Everyone loved the carnival theme though and danced the night away. I'm so grateful to have been given a nice wedding by my in-laws, but I'm happy it's over and life is back to normal.

My new obsession is what I call "healthy living blogs". I've been introduced to the world of Whole Foods, protein powder, overnight oats, chia seeds, almond butter and a lot of other things that excite me. I've been trying to incorporate some of these ideas into my diet in these past few months. Another one of these cool blogger buzz words is kale. On hungry hungry hippie, I read how she tried this kale from the Pasadena Whole Foods made by a chef AJ. That rung a bell in my head and I searched my deleted emails from Whole Foods and saw that chef AJ was coming to my Whole Foods the following week for a demo and book signing. What are the odds that she would be in Cleveland?

The demo was very informative and explained why we shouldn't eat processed foods. Chef AJ used to be a comedienne and that really showed because she was very energetic. She said Cleveland is the farthest she's travelled so far. She also made fun of my Cleveland accent when I told her I visited Santa Monica and Hollywood on my honeymoon. I hate when I get nervous and that comes out!

Here she is in action:

Anyway she demoed a Nutrient Rich Chocolate Smoothie. The main ingredient is spinach but she used cacao powder and dates to sweeten it up.

Next was the famous Hail to the Kale salad that the hippie talked about. She used a whole jar of raw almond butter to make that dressing! So cool to actually be able to taste it!

Next was a black bean based soup.

And for dessert an amazing raw chocolate truffle (and a nice shot of my black work pants!).

I'm going to try to attend more demos like this in the future to keep learning about "healthy living" topics!

The asking my maids fiasco

I went back and forth with Danny whether we wanted a bridal party or not. In the end, we decided that we would regret if we didn't ask our family and friends to be in a bridal party and to go all or nothing. So all or nothing meant I had 5 girls to ask (plus my sister who I had already asked). I wanted to do something special like a card and a gift but couldn't decide on anything. Then I went to the weddingbee boards and saw that a post on how a girl asked her maids by sending them all flowers to their jobs. I loved that idea, knew it would be expensive but figured this is the only time I would ever get to do this.

I decided to use teleflora because the website let me send the flowers to multiple addresses and put it on one invoice. It let me pick each local florist based on the location I was sending it to. So here's how it went:

Bridesmaid D: She's a stay-at-home mom so I had to send the flowers to her house. The florist sent them a day early!!!! Then she starts writing on facebook that she has a secret admirer! I had to email her and tell her to keep it on the down low because everyone else would be getting the flowers the next day.

Bridesmaid G: I'll just let her email tell this story: OMG! I just got a special delivery at work; Flowers : )

My answer is ABSOLUTELY YES!! I am sooo excited and nervous. I have never been an official bridesmaid.

I do have to tell you when I first opened the little card I had a mini panic attack because I thought is was someone sending cards to their wife or something and they gave them to the wrong person because the card is signed Deanne. Then when I calmed down and actually read it again, I figured it must really be Deanna, and then I was giggling with excitement.

So they spelled my flippin name wrong!

Bridesmaid A: I find out that her work sent her to Columbus at last minute and she would be out of her office for 3 days! In a panic, I called the florist who was no help. I ended up calling her work and asked if they could just put the flowers on her desk for her to get when she gets back. They ended up putting them in the fridge so they were perfect when Bridesmaid A got them.

Bridesmaids M and B got theirs at their respective places of employment no problem.

Whew, right? I have to say it was fun getting the emails and phone calls from everyone saying yes and telling me they were excited. Oh and I asked them to send me a picture of these flowers so I could at least see them! Here they are. I picked two different designs and alternated between the girls:

Photographs - Check!

Since I had such a problem booking halls, I realized that I had to get on the search for a photographer too. I emailed a bunch of local photographers and got a few emails that were set up like this:

Hello Deanna - thanks for contacting me. Unfortunately, I'm booked on xx. However, I would like to suggest the following photographers. They do amazing work.

The photographer suggested 7 photographers' names. What was really weird was that I emailed one of the suggestions and I got another booked letter with the original photographer on the list! They must have a little club or something.

One of my favorites, Hunter Photographic, emailed me back almost instantly and was open on my date! I loved that he had an updated blog and was so fast to respond. He even wanted to meet with Danny and I right away! We met at a Caribou Coffee at my suggestion and I was sold on the fact that he brought an ipad (I'm a mac nerd) a cool portfolio. Included in the package were the engagement photos and I said I wanted to wait until spring because I hate winter and snow and don't want to see it in my photos. So we're looking forward to that in a couple months!

Hotel vs. Banquet Hall

My next natural inclination was to get a guest list number to see what we were dealing with. I knew it would be a big number. After going back and forth between both sets of families, the estimate was 378! This new information knocked out about 70% of the venues that I had bookmarked or liked.

Since my future in laws were helping to pay for the reception, we devised a system of booking appointments to look at venues on Saturday mornings. The first venue we visited lied on their website on how many people it could hold. Or you could probably hold 400 with tables set up in a completely different room. Fail. After about 5 visits, we narrowed it down to two choices - the hotel vs. the banquet hall.

I honestly fell in love with the hotel. It was built in 2009. Everything was sparkling new. The bar had a flat screen tv. But it was at the tip top of our budget. Also, Danny loves Jim Beam and their house brand of bourbon was Jack Daniels. We would have to pay extra for a longer bar time. We knew we wanted our carnival theme for appetizers and it just seemed like we would have to work so hard to fit our theme in these food and drink packages.

Enter the banquet hall. I wanted so much to hate it but each feature was better than the next! We could bring in our own alcohol! The dance floor was huge! They were flexible with food options! What really sold me was that the dj that we had excitedly booked too early had played there before and was familiar with how to set up their equipment there. The one catch was that we had to change our date to the weekend before. At this point, I was fine with the date change. I had a heart to heart with my future FIL and decided on the banquet hall! Yay! Now we can move forward!