The Journal Times Online - Racine, Wisconsin

Walking into work last week, I honestly looked like I had sprained my ankle or severely hurt my feet.

That was not the case. I was actually trying out the high-heeled shoes that I’m wearing for my friend’s wedding this weekend, which I am a bridesmaid in.

Normally in the summer my shoe of choice is a flip flop and I do have a few cute heeled sandals. But they don’t have any backs on them.

These shoes do have backs. So when my heel popped out of the shoe as I walked I had to quickly fit my foot back into the shoe. A lot of times, however, my heel didn't slip back in. It was all over the place and I looked like I was drunkenly stumbling.

After that experience last week, I was a bit scared of putting the shoes back on. But today, I faced my fear and did it. To my surprise no one stared at me when I walked into work and crossed the street. I walked one foot then the other and carefully applied pressure to my toes.

I still can’t walk as fast as I normally do, but I’m slowly learning. I think by Friday I should be OK.  Besides I know my flip flops will be safely waiting for me at the reception.

Wish me luck and let me know if you have any advice for walking in heels.

-Stephanie

I found the house I want! It’s great, I love it, I’m already decorating it in my mind.

But.

We put in our offer over a month ago. It’s a foreclosure, so we’re dealing with a bank. And it is taking forever.

I understand that there are a lot of things that have to happen in order to get the process rolling. Our agent has been great on trying to keep us updated. I know we’re in good shape when it comes to credit and everything. So it’s just turned into a waiting game.

It’s like when you have a great first date with someone. Afterward, you are inseparable from your phone. You can’t wait to hear from them again, every time it rings you grab it right away, sure it’s the person of your dreams.

Except now it’s turned into that more anxious kind of waiting, after some time has gone by. They haven’t called, it’s been so long, did they not like you? Did you say something wrong? What’s the matter? Why do they hate you???

Phew. Excuse my paranoia. But I really, really want that second date. I hope they call.

~ Bridget
 

This weekend I had my wedding shower and bachelorette party, which were both a lot of fun. But then it was done, just like that.

One minute everyone gets there and then the next day you wake up and go home.

For the first time I understand why people go on the honeymoon right after the wedding. After all that work getting ready, who wants it just to end?

Both my fiancé and I are excited about our entire lives together, those moments like today when I was in a waiting room and I overheard a couple saying “I can’t believe our baby turns 60 today.” I want to have moments like that.

So I know it doesn’t just end. But at the same time the honeymoon seems like an awesome chance to just relax after all the stress of a wedding and do something once in a lifetime right away.

At this point we were planning on waiting to go on our honeymoon until early winter. Then it would be an escape from the cold and give us some thing to look forward to a few months after the wedding.  But I am seeing the perks of an immediate honeymoon.

Whether we go on our honeymoon right away in October or we wait until February, I know it will be a blast. – at this point we are thinking a Mediterranean Cruise or the Caribbean.

Maybe we’ll just have to do a long weekend right away and then save the honeymoon. That would be the best of both worlds!

-Stephanie

Here it is my second annual reading list. Enjoy my recommendations and let me know what books I should check out next from the library.

1. The Next Thing on My List

By: Jill Smolinski

It is about a woman who drives another stanger home and ends up accidentally killing her in a car accident. Then she finds a list of 20 things the deceased woman wanted to do before she turns 25 and works to complete it. It’s a perfect beach read.

2. My Sister’s Keeper

By: Jodi Picoult

This book is about a young girl who is dying of cancer and a family that creates a test tube baby to help her with medical treatment. Everyone has already heard about this book I’m sure. But I’m going to give it another plug because it deserves it.

3. Nanny Diaries

By Emma McLaughlin and Nicola Kraus

Anyone who works with kids will enjoy this book. I used to baby sit a lot so I enjoyed reading about the fictional adventures of a New York nanny.

4. The Glass Castle

By Jeannette Walls

This is a crazy true story about a dysfunctional family that will make you wonder how it could possibly be true. This is a book that the bloggers actually recommended to me last year. Now I recommend as well.

5. Memory Keeper’s Daughter

By Kim Edwards

This book shows what happens when a doctor gives away his baby with down syndromes and tells his wife the baby actually died. It shows the value of truth in relationships and what can happen with hidden lies. It’s a great read.

6. Pursuit of Happyness

By Chris Gardner

This is a truly inspirational story. If you have seen the Will Smith movie and liked it then you will love this book about a homeless father raising his son and becoming a success.

7. The Last Lecture

By Randy Pausch

What lessons would you share if you knew you were going to die? That is a question that Pausch answers beautifully in his best seller based on his life. Read it and then pass it on.

8. Pledged: The Secret Life of Sororities

By Alexandra Robbins

It’s an inside look into sorority life and certainly an interesting one.

This book is a great summer reads, but probably not good for any mom sending her sorority-bound daughter to college.

9. The Friday Night Knitting Club

By Kate Jacobs

This is the book that I am currently reading. I’m on page 70 now and I am definitely intrigued. I originally thought the title sounded like a book meant for women who are 70.

But I’m learning not to judge books by their title.

10. What should I read next? Let me know. I love hearing your recommendations. Then they can be added to my next recommended book list!

To read my last summer reading list click here. 

l

Thanks,

Stephanie

It’s crazy to think in one month I’m going to be living with the man I’m going to live with forever.

You know what that means….new furniture!

Last week the two of us met up at a furniture store and started shopping for our future.

The first stop in our furniture expedition was the couch. For the last five years the two of us have being living off of furniture that we found on the street.

I would like to say that I am joking, but I’m not. When we were in college our furniture shopping consisted of driving around the East Side of Milwaukee and looking at what college students left outside.

My fiancé used a steam cleaner to wash the couch that he found outside, but still we don’t really know where it has been.

Walking around the furniture store we dreamed. We found a perfect corner couch that fulfills my fiancé’s life-long dream of having a corner couch. And then we found a coffee table that has extenders that lets you lift the top to play games on or eat off of.

We also found a table that we both love and even started looking at bed room sets for our room. The salesmen kept trying to figure out what room we were looking to fill, and we had to admit we were just dreaming for the most part.

It was fun to dream, but right now we know we can’t afford everything we found. The sad truth is that when we move into our apartment together next month we are moving in with our old college furniture.

But we have already decided that we are saving most of our wedding money and putting it towards new furniture.

What did you do with your wedding money?

What were your first big purchases?

-Stephanie

I don’t know why it took me so long to dip into the pool at the Y. I’ve been working out there for over a year, and every time I emerged from the gym, all hot and sweaty, I’d look longingly at its cool blue waters. A little while ago I was chatting with another member about wanting to swim, and finally took a day to try it out.

Goggle-less, wearing a borrowed oversize swimsuit, I took my first breathless strokes, crashing into the lane dividers, petering out close to the end of each length and clinging to the wall to catch my breath.

But once I took the plunge, I was hooked.

I love the weightless feeling being in the water brings, the buoyancy that stays in my step even after I’m out of the pool. I love the meditative aspect of swimming, where concentrating on my breathing and my lap count leaves little mental room for anything else. I love skimming through the water, stretching my arm as far as possible and with the next stroke, stretching even farther.

While I’m swimming, there’s no cell phone clanging for my attention, no multitasking, no interruptions. I enjoy ticking off the progress I’ve made, too – in a few short weeks I’ve gone from breathless floundering to swimming several laps in a row without needing a break, and feeling ready for more each time I finish a workout.

I’m currently in week 3 of a 6-week, zero to one mile swimming regimen, and I’ve been pleasantly surprised at how my asthmatic lungs have adjusted to my demands. I swim three times a week now (with a new swimsuit that fits AND goggles, I’m very professional), often with my gym buddy.

Most of all, it’s nice to try something new and succeed at it. Eventually I may move on to something different, but for now I’ll just keep swimming.

~ Bridget

For about three years of dating I avoided using the names of my fiancé’s parents.

It wasn’t really that hard to just avoid the whole name thing. You can get people’s attention in other ways. You know, making eye contact and that kind of thing.

Then a couple weeks ago, and only a couple months until the wedding, I decided that it was probably about time that I actually address his parents by some name.

But what name? That was the question.

My parents used first names so that is what I grew up with, while his parents call their in-laws mom and dad for the most part.

It’s kind of a tricky thing. I certainly don’t want to call them the “in-laws” because that has a horrible connotation, and makes me think of scenarios like the mom from “Everybody Loves Raymond.”

But first names seem a little impersonal and calling someone mom and dad is really personal. So that was my dilemma.

What do you call your significant other’s parents? How did you decide?

-Stephanie