May 2010 – Learning Machine

Ikea – How Swedish Simplicity Might Simplify Your Wedding

So just a quick(ish) entry about a place you should check out if you planning a wedding. Especially if you are planning on building your own centerpieces. So if you have one near you, try Ikea.

I know Ikea is not a new phenomenon but you might not look there first to “furnish” your wedding. I actually got this idea a while ago from Ruffled. After visiting the store I realized how many other potential wedding applications there were. Too bad I already decided on my centerpieces!

Pros

Maybe not sturdy but cheap. And for one night of use that’s fine.
You can peruse their selection online and search to see if your local Ikea has that item. Perhaps even hundreds of them… You most likely won’t have to worry about not having enough if you find what you want in the store nearby. They have bins I tells ya! Bins!
Simple in style so you could always go crazy and still “customize” it/stencil it. Also often the selection comes in the latest “hip” colors.
Many of these purchases you could just use in your house afterwards!

Cons

Navigating the store. It’s best to just following the long long long winding path until you get to your “section”. Do not freak out there will be an end to the path and if you haven’t noticed related items and have been walking for a while, its okay, just keep on walking. Nina had to tell me to do this several times… its overwhelming.
Might not have one near you. Can’t order online for many of the items but you can call in and order. If you call in though they charge a pretty hefty phone order fee ($20!) and expensive shipping.

A Smattering of Ideas

Here are a few options I found:

I actually bought this $.99 option for my table menus. Double sided, cheap and simple. Holds a 4″x6″ and has Plexiglas to protect the photo or menu.

$.99 cent easel that holds a 4″x6″ picture frame (you can get a pack of three for $1.99) or perhaps your menu on card stock? My friend is using these for her Van Gogh inspired wedding.

Reception seats a bit stiff? Rather then decorate with sashes and a back cover, what about a utilitarian but summery cushion? At $2.99 it’s pretty affordable! You could then encourage people to take them home with them. Or have a cushion room in your future love nest… for frolicking like Scrouge Mc Duck.

Same idea as above but white and only $1.49. This could easily be dyed or stenciled with your logo.

Okay, this is straight up awesome for your own house… A pack of 10 honeycomb interlocking mirrors for $14.99 or $1.50ish each. But imagine keeping them separate or only bunching a few together and using them as mirrors underneath your centerpieces. Ah Haaa….

This is a little more expensive but for $9.99 you can buy this seven picture movie themed picture frame. It hangs and could either “frame” your bridal table or hang over each of your guests tables with pictures of you guys. Especially great for a movie/hollywood/picture themed wedding.

Science themed? Spice it up some flowers you could get at the local farmers market and colored water for your centerpieces. Or fill several with jelly beans (once color per carafe). $7.99.

$2.99 – Fill it with sand and put it on its side, fill it with candy, put tiny flowers inside. Swig beer in it. Send a message of love to commemorate the day to a far off land after saying your vows on the beach (or a pirate ship).

$24.99 including pot. $14.99 without. And you could instead go for a cheaper pot option. Like this. Or this. Sure these plants look like butts! But they are unique… and you could have a whole butt army of them after the wedding. Plus its green to buy reusable flowers/plants. I’m not sure if all Ikeas have these but they had them in Orlando.

For $6.99 a cheaper option and less buttish.

Simplistic and pretty unique! Only $1.99! Put punch in here or an orchid. Ikea sells orchids for $12.99. Perfect for an outside/classic white wedding.

Interlocking vases for $1.99 each. Not sure if it comes in a three pack for that… if not then its $6 for the set. Still affordable and pretty. Get six and they form a nifty circle. Or if you and your hubby have curvy initials (C, S, J…) you could spell them out in vases. Fill it with candy or flowers or sand. Comes in pink shades! I could probably show a million cute vases by Ikea… but I instead encourage you to look around their site.

Colored sand/rocks for $1.99. I suspect you can do this cheaper, if not with white sand and dye. But if you aren’t so DIY this means in one trip you could get the vase, sand and candles all in one fell swoop.

Alternatives

No Ikea near you? These options can be awesome… Just go to their home decor section. Probably won’t be as “one stop shop”ish though.

T.J. Maxx – got me some awesome beachy reeds here on the cheap.
Bed, Bath & Beyond – They always have coupons and they always honor them even if they are expired.
Bealls – Florida only.
Goodwill – Help out a charity and if you are lucky find a good selection. This takes more scrounging but especially if you are looking for a mismatched bohemian style this might be the perfect option for you.
Target – I’ll refrain from suggesting Walmart as well… But there are some fun cheap options at both of these places.

So happy shopping!

Breathe Deep Seek Deals – S

P.S. While you are at it buy a box to organize/hold your wedding DIY stuff. Stress Level–. Get a set of two and use it as well to separate what you need for the ceremony and what you need for the reception.

May Status Update – Haven't Seen Any Flowers

But life is good!

So lots going on in the life of Sheila Suarez. Nothing note worthy educational enough to “blog” about that isn’t just personal funness/work. But I felt bad about not posting and rather then resisting here we go… a status update.

Listy List of Stuffs

Launched a departmental application on 4/30 so that’s been consuming my life. LEARNED a lot about how to successfully launch an application, especially when its in house. Lots of consultation and baby kissing. In the end, things are sorting themselves out and despite the little resources we had, it was successful. Thank god for my development team… I know eventually I’ll relate what I learned… when the wounds aren’t so fresh. Still a long way to go with this puppy.

Made this.
Start of the semester at work as well… busy busy busy times.
Got a stomach flu from drinking a free sprite margarita while in Mexico… Yea, probably shouldn’t have done that. It was not fun and hit me 5 days after the cruise. Austin’s mom got it too and was diagnosed so by her doctor. Which is good to know because I was highly suspicious of all food until then as I had no clue what got me sick. But it helped me lose the 4 lbs I put on during the cruise!
Went to Charleston Lindy Exchange in Charleston (CHEX 4). Really loved the city though we only really got to peruse it for two hours or so. Maybe loved it because I was able to locate awesome beer within 20 minutes. Reminded me of a southern Boston. Love beer? Go here if you visit Charleston.
- Won first place in a solo Charleston Contest at CHEX! Super awesome fun and feeling pretty good despite needing to get back in shape. Last round was battle style which was interesting. Austin got to the finals in the Jack N Jill.
- Orlando brought like 30 million people to the exchange. Bonded more with my fellow Floridians then Charleston peeps! It was a surprisingly fun/relaxing event despite lack of sleep & having to go straight from and to work. Best part was the beach… because lord knows I don’t take the time to do that while in FL.
Djaustin debuted tonight at UCF. So proud… 🙂 Though he did play a 300 bpm song during the finals of a Jack N’ Jill I was in… Got 2nd!
Wedding planning is slow but steady… been helping out my Maid of Honor a lot since she just got engaged. Made her a site. Starting/planned out my invitations, bought boutonniere, veil & center piece supplies & finalized our rings. I’m gonna hate myself for doing so many DYI projects. But it saves money and I like being creative! This weekend I get to see one of my brides maids and make centerpieces with her! Next weekend while in St. Pete for Swing Dance USA we’ll be doing location visiting. So that shall be nice.
Dieting is a uphill battle. Must. Concentrate.

So that’s basically it. The summer proves to get even crazier…

Flllooowerrrsss – S

Life is a Carnival… when on a cruise.

Ready to embrace deadly sin #3 and #7? Take a cruise! Food, food, food, food, food, food, laying around, lots of fatness, red neon burns and food. People say they want to lose weight for a cruise but honestly as long as you take neck up pictures, cruises are the safest fat zones ever. Because there will always be someone fatter than you, redder than you & wearing less clothes than you.

But enough of the pithiness. I enjoy cruises. Though they make me feel slightly guilty in their extravagance. They are pound for pound (literally) the best value you can get from a vacation and a nice departure from the usual hectic, you have to remember to do stuff vacations. Because the beauty about the cruise is, other than liquor, souvenirs and some tipping, everything is paid for up front. So all you have to do is show up. Then you can meander the ship, either taking advantage of the onslaught of onboard activities (karaoke, mini golf, wall climbing, etc) or just catch some sun with a drink. And I don’t even like sun. Then all of a sudden you arrive in an exciting location for 8 hours but even then you could stay on the boat. If you do get off the boat, you can meander around that exciting location and then meander back on boat. I say this with great love for my fiance but our first cruise we fought for exactly zero percent of the time. And that’s not to say we fight a lot but usually with vacations/site seeing there’s bound to be at least a small tiff. With cruises they take out the messy part of “having to be responsible for yourself” in order to enjoy yourself or get somewhere. That leads to a very stress free vacation. Especially if you don’t have the internet so can’t check work email. I’m sure there were ways to get to it but I did not look…

My History With Ships

Austin and I have taken two cruises in the last year:

Royal Caribbean – Monarch of the Seas – 3 days – Bahamas & Coco Cay – for our 4 year anniversary.
Carnival – Inspiration – 5 days – Grand Caymens & Couzumel – took our mom’s as their christmas present

We were frightened about trying Carnival after a SUPER awesome first cruise with Royal Caribbean. We heard that it just wouldn’t be up to snuff. To be honest we found ourselves constantly and sometimes obnoxiously comparing Carnival to Royal Caribbean (“Well you know on Royal Cariiibbeaaannn…”) BUT the difference was not that stark. And while we liked Royal Caribbean better, Carnival was still VERY good and we would take a cruise with them again, especially since they are cheaper. You get what you pay for but you still get a pretty good deal!

Royal Caribbean vs. Carnival: Sudden Death

Some key comparisons and tips (sorry for the table style… you’ll have to imagine the borders):

Criteria	Royal Caribbean	Carnival	Stuff To Know
Food	Pretty Impressed!	Wasn’t as impressed but still delectable.	Good selection on both. Pretty much unending food. Carnival might have had more nonstop food. Pace yourself… its not going anywhere.
Dining Methods	If you pay your tips when buying your tickets (there’s an obligatory $7-$10 per person per day tip) you can get “My Time Dining”. Which means you have to select a time block (early or late) but each day you can go to the Maitre De and select a specific time and server depending on your mood. We got to know our server (Tony!) so we always asked for him. You then can show up at that time and get sat straight away rather then waiting. It’s European style though, as in, you get sat possibly with other groups. But we enjoyed the chance to meet other people and on our anniversary celebration date they sat us alone on request. We really enjoyed this method of dining. They also have the option of sit down breakfast.	Carnival once again you choose Early or Late but there is only one seating time. Though they would still sit you if you come late. You also get an assigned table which is nice but we missed meeting random people at dinner. One thing nice which Royal Caribbean may have had but perhaps we didn’t take advantage of was you could have sit down dining for Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner. We preferred this rather than buffet style, very relaxing. For Breakfast and Lunch you get sat randomly sometimes with others groups. Tip per day is paid at the end.	Cruise sit down dining is certainly an experience… an extravagance. I just never truly was able to sit down and order five entrees if I wanted without one single care of the bill. Because there is no bill. In fact, on Royal Carribean since we were the last dining group they PUSHED us to order more, because it was going to go to waste anyway. Both also offer free room service. Which we never took advantage of. Bring extra cash if you want to reward your favorite servers. Which they will become your chums and you will want to.
Service	Amazing!!	Very good. Very close to Royal Caribbean. Maybe not as lavish though?	It’s AMAZING what good service you get even though your servers aren’t asking for a tip. I was expecting to have crappy service but cruise service is the best I’ve ever had. Both cruiselines employ people from allll over the world and they take their job seriously and with pride. It was very interesting and fun to meet such diverse and happy people. I still remember everyone who served us as they really become part of our vacation experience. Thanks Tony, Slavko, Rado & Aslam! But honestly I found overall that service is better over seas, so perhaps its the “take your time and dine” mentality of europe and aisa I like. I could sit for hours in a Parisian bistro/cafe with only a cup a coffee without any dirty looks from the server…. not so much in the US. But then again servers more have to rely on tips in the states it seems. Tipping is not obligatory overseas. Hence why foreigners get a bad rap when they come to the US, as they are not used to tipping.
Onboard Activities	Rock climbing, dance shows, trivia gameshows, gambling, gamboling, karoake, ping pong, live music, weird old people grinding night clubs, meetups & lots of sun.	Same stuff only not as good dance shows and minigolf and water slides instead of Rock Climbing. We did less on this cruise but the quality seemed fine and they were better about announcing things coming up.	Do as little or as much as you want. Most activities are free, some have fees like wine tastings. Both will have a daily newsletter keeping you up to date.
Cabin	Nice, clean, small, dark.	Bigger! I suppose this depends on the ship but we were very impressed on the size and cleanliness. People were constantly cleaning and tje rooms were immaculate. For a cheaper cruise we were impressed. They also had this feature which was a fake window (pictures to follow/really it was a curtain with a light behind it) which at first I laughed at but was pretty nice, made it feel less like a closet. The fake window did not follow daylight outside so you could keep it dark if you wanted. Surprisingly enough though Carnival’s rooms were not as dark as Royal Caribbean’s so it wasn’t as disorientatingly tomb like. I think the door wasn’t as tight? You can take that as a plus or minus. I like to be buried.	Bring a watch… your cellphone will not be reliable and while they have wake up calls you will want to not TOTALLY lose your sense of time. Our first cruise we forgot and ended up buying one on the boat. Water proof is best. This is also useful for when you are off the boat and need to know when to return.
Alcohol	We were to scared to sneak on alcohol though we heard of many people successful on the ship (disguising it as soda or just checking it). We ended up spending quite a bit on alcohol, but the drinks were priced at a reasonable bar price and well mixed and strong. Tipping was appreciated and you could choose the amount.	Mixed drinks sucked. And seemed more expensive. Also, the tip was included. BUT Carnival allows you to bring on a 750ml bottle of wine per person for the departure day. We filled the bottles with colored vodka and corked them. It was excellent. So we ended up saving money on that. Still spent a lot of money though…	Great thing about Cruises is that you can buy cheap alcohol to take home after the cruise. Sometimes buy one get one! We always stock up. They do not let you have it until you leave so that’s not an option for drinking on the boat. One thing to note is that if you want to buy alcohol off the ship, lets say Grand Caymans you have to do it as much as 2 hours before departure so they can deliver it to the ship. We got burned on this. But at Couzumel you could carry it on and check it! So you’ll want to check on this at each port of call, as ships don’t really advertise it as they want you to buy on board. Also, both cruiselines allow you to take on soda in your checked baggage. You can use this as a trojan horse just to ensure your alcohol doesn’t get confiscated. I heard some stories of that. Or you could use it to bring on soda/water/juice… Soda you have to pay for. But you can get a soda pass which makes it cheaper. Side note: on Royal Caribbean cappuccinos at dinner you had to pay for (Carnival it was free).
Decor	Very nice.	Very crazy disco casino (perhaps to encourage you to go to the casino). But it was an older ship. My mom was not drinking and claimed that looking at the main atrium lights for more then 15 minutes made her feel drunk. Also really dark in the main atrium… rather then light and airy. Just strange. But not tooo obnoxious. You’ll see in the pictures to follow… Also the main buffet room looked like the inside of an alien that swallowed you.
Off the Boat/Excursions	Did one snorkel trip in Bahamas. Was nice!	Did none. Found a local excursion to do.	Both cruiselines seem to offer a variety of excursions. But two things to note: 1. Will be more expensive then going on a tour given by the locals. 2. They will leave you if you get delayed by your tour if you are on a tour that is noncruiseline affiliated. So its up to you. Pay more but be secure? Or pay less and risk being left? But to be honest, if you just take tours with buffer time, you will most likely be fine. In Grand Caymans, we took a 3 hour Sting ray petting/snorkeling excursion and it ROCKED and was at least $60 cheaper per person then the boat one. Technically you don’t even have to plan that far ahead though we made reservations. Just walk off the boat, peruse the different signs for local tours bombarding you as you get off the boat and go! Don’t get robbed. ;p I would say, if you are interested in snorkeling, bring your own gear for islands you can snorkel right off the beach (Coco Cay, Couzumel). Otherwise you have to pay $40 to rent them. In Couzumel we just rented a jeep and drove around stopping and ruins and beach side bars. It was only $70 with insurance and a lot of fun! Though potentially nerve wracking of the place has bad traffic.

So overall both good.

Picture Recap

Just a few pictures from our last Carnival cruise. A few more here….

Austin with our corked vodka. You could probably get screw top and glue it to look like its sealed.

Carnival Room. It’s roomy! We have a window!

Or its a terrible lie…

Dress up night with our lovely mothers.

Tattoo’d and white.

Dancing with Aslam our Waiter

Man dance a little in the crazy disco atrium and you become a cruise star. Old people love to see swing dancing.

So I guess that’s it! Try a cruise even if you hate the sun like me! Because some sun is good. And relaxation is even better. Also check out: http://www.vacationstogo.com/. Never have done me wrong. Though a travel agent helped us find a single for cheaper on our last cruise.

Next I review Tom Cruise – S