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What’s Up Sunday – 9.12.10

This week’s “What’s Up Saturday” edition coming to you on Sunday.  Yesterday was a day for remembering, so the blog stayed silent. I was also away from the computer all day (!). I was helping out at meeting’s annual fall flea market and eating my mom’s amazing food. Driving back into the city late last night we saw this:

(Source.)

I do like that memorial. It is strange to be living in this city; 9 years ago I was in New Jersey in my third period math class (I was a sophomore in high school) when everything started. But on a happier note…

Salad News:

For some reason I don’t have as many starred articles this week. (I star my articles in Google Reader to save them for this post.)

Food & Blogs

  • Really want to make Erica’s Gluten-Free Challah (I am not Jewish nor am I allergic to gluten)
  • Coco had a great quote about LIFE
  • Katie had a really great post on being scared of hunger. Felt like the words could have come right out of my mouth!
  • And when I was having a rough day yesterday, I woke up to read this post and felt a little better.
  • Only one third of Americans consume 2+ servings of fruit a day… and juice counts as fruit. Only one fourth consume 3+ servings of veggies… and the most popular veggie is a potato (potato = GMO’d fries). Read more at Fooducate.

Music & Writing

  • Top 10 Alternative Albums You Should Own (from Listverse) – I already have Vampire Weekend, Mumford and Sons (who we are seeing in November), and Postal Service. I really like those 3 so I will have to check out the rest! (I do not like Passion Pit, but oh well.)
  • Even if you don’t want to do something, if you can make yourself do it for just 20 minutes, you will probably keep doing it. This is exactly why I’m doing the 30 Days of Yoga – I know I love yoga, and every time I do it for 20 minutes I am so happy afterwards. It just takes a little bit of oomph to get started.
  • The Arcade Fire teamed up with Google for this awesome reminiscing video. My coworkers and I enjoyed watching this this week! Put in the address where you grew up and enjoy. (P.S. It’s completely coded in HTML5. Who needs flash anyway?)

Dealy Deals

Enjoy, and as usual, let me know your favorites from the week. If you haven’t entered already, you have until Wednesday to enter the stevia giveaway. There will be 4 winners and there are 3 ways to enter so get all your entries in!

Also, if you want to update me about your yoga routines, please do so on the 30 Days of Yoga page. I am keeping up with it! (So is Gaby.) You do not have to do yoga every day to update! It’s a whenever-you-want kind of thing.

Have a lovely peaceful Sunday 🙂

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Best WordPress Commenting Plugins & Goal Updates

Note: This is replicating similar functionality that is built in with WordPress.COM blogs (but not .ORG). If you are self-hosting your blog using WordPress then you are .ORG (that is what I am). If you host your blog using WordPress.COM you don’t have to worry about all this because it’s built in. If you are not even using WordPress you can just skip down a few paragraphs to the updates below.

I don’t know about you, but when I comment on a blog with a question I very rarely go back to check for an answer. I like it when the blogger emails me back from the comment notification email they get in their inbox from WordPress. I also reply to nearly all my comments this way. I should really add the responses to my blog since sometimes people ask good questions that other people might want to see the answer to. So…

Best Blog Commenting Reply Plugins for WordPress

Reply to a comment on a post –> sends an email to the commenter.

First, if you don’t already have nested comments enabled, do so. It’s under Settings –> Discussion –> Enable threaded (nested) comments. This makes it so your comment replies are indented, like so:

Source.

Second, install Comment Reply Notification (search for it under Plugins –> Add New). This one sends an email to the commenter after you write a reply. You will need to go to Settings –> Comment Reply Notification and select the option that you want (I did “Anyone replies”). You can also change the format of the email that gets sent out with the reply.

Voila! Now you can have comment replies on your blog that also go to the original commenter’s email.

I will be replying a whole lot more now that I have this up and running. I’m very excited!

***

August Goal Setting Update

Last week I listed out some goals that I wanted to make progress on by my birthday in mid-September.

Sleep goal. I am happy to say that I went to bed early-ish every night this last week! The latest I stayed up was on Saturday night (til about 1am) but all the other nights I was in bed around 11:30pm. I am so happy.

Fitness goals. No yoga yet, unfortunately, but lots of walking. I don’t know why I haven’t been into yoga lately. This was me doing down-dog on the lanai (balcony) on the honeymoon. I did actually do a yoga class in Hawaii; it was yoga on the beach in the early morning. (We were both morning people on the honeymoon because we didn’t really do the time change. So 6am in Hawaii was like noon in NYC. It worked.)

Music fun. Here is a lovely song by a band called Mumford & Sons. We are seeing them later this year. They are fantastic. Just wait for the chorus!

***

I will be back tomorrow with a standard healthy post. I just wanted to offer up that comment info for anyone who might find it useful, and do the goal update.

Do you have any great plugins you want to share?

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A Wedding Post

Wedding Planning

I just got married and I have barely talked about wedding stuff! I compiled this list of tips a little while ago, and I hope this is helpful for someone.

Wedding checklist (in no particular order)

  • Photographer
  • Photobooth (optional – I did get one)
  • Videographer (optional – I did not get one)
  • Caterer (buffet versus sit down? I chose buffet – usually less expensive, and now I don’t have to worry about who is eating what!)
  • Rings (mine is an antique and Bobby chose to go modern at Tiffany)
  • Venue (I went the simple route and chose my parents’ backyard)
  • Tables/chairs/linens/dishes (usually will have to coordinate with either the caterer or the venue or both)
  • Tent for outdoor weddings
  • DJ (get a recommendation from someone – the best way to pick)
  • Candles
  • Flowers
  • Invitations

Best Wedding People Ever

  • DJ: Sound Choice DJ’s Inc (New Jersey and Eastern Pennsylvania, including the Philadelphia and New York areas)
  • Tent/tables/chairs/linens/dishes: Adam’s Party & Equipment Rental (Trenton, NJ)
  • Caterer: Emily’s Cafe (Pennington, NJ)
  • Photographer: Tarantino Photo (New Jersey, New York, and Pennsylvania) (go to Featured Events –> Maggie & Robert)
  • Invites: Parekh Cards (beautiful cards from India – they have so many gorgeous options, and they are fairly inexpensive for the quality – shipping was pricey though)
  • Candles: I got these votives. We made luminaria with paper bags, kitty litter, and decorative punches.

Budget Wedding Tips…

  • Refuse to buy into the idea that it’s okay for something to cost more just because it’s a wedding (!)
  • Go with a buffet instead of a sit down meal (I think people prefer this anyway)
  • Don’t get your dress at a bridal store – check out “used” dresses (Craigslist, etc… – if you Google you will find more wedding gown swaps) OR don’t buy a traditional dress (mine is a ball gown that happens to look like a wedding dress – it’s designer but wasn’t thousands of dollars)
  • Bridesmaid dresses – JCrew has a gorgeous wedding line
  • Know what you want (but don’t be afraid to change your mind)

And to plug my photographer one more time – Tarantino Photo –> Featured Events –> Maggie & Robert.

What are your wedding and/or big event tips?

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Goal Setting

I’m in an ambitious mood today, so here we go. My goals for the next few weeks (I want to see at least slight changes in all these areas by mid-September… my 24th birthday):

Going to Sleep Earlier

I am not really a night owl by choice, but night after night I fall into bed at 1:30am or later, only to roll out of bed at 7am bemoaning my existence. I took a class on sleep with my friend Mel down at Brooklyn Brainery a few months ago (BB is awesome, check it out if you are in NYC) so I do know that sleeping is incredibly important!

Goal: I’m going to follow the usual tricks – 1) get up at the same time every day, 2) set a routine for night (read for 20 minutes starting at 11 to get me sleepy), and 3) do this for at least 10 days in a row to get in the habit. I think ideally you’d do more than 10 days, but that is a start.

Food Less, Live More

I want to talk about some other stuff on the blog – I like food, but it’s not good to think about it too much. Maybe this is me being more intuitive.

Goal: Blog about other stuff every week!

More Fitness Fun

Been slacking a little on fitness, but I’ve been getting in some walks. I try to do 5,000 steps a day on a low day. 10,000 is better! I usually hit that. I’d like to do some more yoga, too. It keeps me sane, even if it’s just 20 minutes a day.

Goal: 20 minutes of yoga a day 5 days a week + at least 8,000 steps a day.

More Music Fun

Sometimes I listen to a song that just makes me happy. One of my (current; there are many more) favorites is:

  • Defying Gravity – this is off of the Glee Soundtrack. Actually the entire soundtrack is mood boosting. At least it is if you are like me, and you were a music nerd back in high school 😉

Goal: find a new song every week and play piano for 20 minutes a day, 5 days a week.

Were you a music nerd? Do ya miss it? I sure do. I have an audition for a choir tomorrow night, so I’m excited to (hopefully) have that back in my life. Favorite songs?

What are your goals for the next few months?

Are you good at following through on goals, or not so much? Why do you fail or succeed?

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What’s Up Saturday – 8.21.10

Time for another best of the week post:

Bloggieville

Food!

Media (this is usually books, but…)

  • I’ve been in a major funk all week and have not read. I have to snap out of it a bit.
  • So I give you Dishing Up Nutrition podcasts. These are super interesting. They are big fans of fats like butter, whole eggs, and veggies. The one thing I’m still on the fence about is their obsession with protein.  Has anyone listened to these or have any input? I’m really intrigued.
  • Great NYTimes article about why us 20-somethings are so lost. Long read, but worth it.

Useful Schtuff

That’s enough for now. Hope you are enjoying your Saturday.

What are your weekend plans?