kicking off the love stories...

just in time for the overturn of prop 8, and leading up to valentines day,  our little love story kicks off a series over at sometimes sweet! check it out...

{photo credit: brett gurewitz}

still on european vacation...

sorry for the abrupt lack of posts...organizing for the trip got a bit crazy. we're still away and having an amazing time {despite the fact that patty got a cold in scotland & london!}. here's a sneak peak of our travels and i promise to post photos and a full report when i'm back!

missing you all out there in the blogosphere! xox

other folks weddings: {p. david & todd}

p. david and todd are two of my best friends in the world and they were the officiants at our wedding, so it's appropriate that i feature them as my first {male} same-sex wedding! they are a true inspiration, they have been together for eighteen years and they have the most beautiful, loving marriage i have ever had the privilege to witness. they have actually been married three times {!!}: once in 1999 at the beautiful union station in los angeles, which todd is writing about; again in san francisco at city hall when it became legal {i was their witness}; and for a third time this past june before prop 8 was overturned. the third time they were also married at union station, but it was a very quick ceremony outside, with drinks at the bar after! {third time a charm?!} i asked todd to write about their first {main} wedding ceremony at union station, so take it away, todd:

{a first date}

{first wedding: december 1999, union station, los angeles}

{second wedding: february 2004, city hall, san francisco}

{third wedding: june 2008, union station, los angeles}

We got married on the 8th anniversary of our first date on 12/21/99 which makes 2009 the year of our 10th wedding anniversary and 18th year together.

A lot like your wedding, we didn't have a big budget so all of our best people and a few other amazing friends worked with us transforming the Fred Harvey Room at Union Station into a winter wonderland. We worked all day, all get gussied up, got married and then we were all stuffing trash bags in our formal wear at midnight. A true community effort!

P. David is a producer so he approached it like a one day shoot which was very effective. We also learned half way through to stop using the word "wedding" to vendors. When we were just having a big party the prices dropped drastically every time. Especially where the cake was concerned.

Important was to have best friends near. Only regret was that we were missing a few key friends (wink). {note from christina: i was unable to make their first wedding in 1999, but i went to the other two!}

My favorite part of the day (night, actually) was right after we were pronounced husbands for life. Everything looked a little sharper and warmer. Things have never looked the same since.

We DIYed pretty much everything. We rented tables, piano, plates, glasses. We did all the decorations, music, food, drink and had Ebersole-Hughes mugs made from an office supply place online as the momento. We had lots of help from friends.

One piece of advice: Stay in the moment. Stay focused on your spouse so you remember everything.

tamra davis cooking show

i met tamra davis many years ago when i was involved with the silver lake film festival.  she spoke on a panel about women filmmakers i curated.  

she has a sweet cooking show that i've been obsessed with lately.  patty and i are trying to cook more at home, and neither of us are very experienced cooks!  tamra's simple, straightforward style is perfect for us.  she's a mom, so her recipes are not only directed to towards her kids, but involve them most of the time.  i love this recipe for vegan red velvet cupcakes.  i think i'm going to make these for the everyone at the hospital who has been taking care of oona.

video and recipe here.

married life: {budgeting}

historically, i haven't been very good about budgeting.  in my professional life, no problem.  but when it comes to my personal finances, i've really just hoped for the best, then worried.  i worried a lot.  well, i don't really have any resolutions per se this year, i don't want to set up too many expectations and i really just want to live one day at a time.  we also really want to seriously start saving to buy a house.  it's not easy to save in los angeles for me and it's not easy to find an affordable house.  but i really want to start managing my finances better, one day at a time.  i also really wanted to let go of all my worrying about money.  and i felt like if i knew how much i spent, i can make a better budget and be more aware of how much money we have. and if i have a better handle on it, i don't worry so much.  the "what if's" aren't as powerful.

so, although i'm unemployed, i signed up to meet with a financial planner.  i met with her last week and she sent me home with lots of homework.  figure out my expenses, my assets, etc.  rather than dwell and get depressed, i started right away.  earlier in the year, i had signed up for mint.com, then forgot all about it.  i never checked anything on it.  but in order to do my homework from the planner (and to start thinking about taxes!), i logged back on to mint.  

i have to say, it's been great.  yes, you do have to give your bank passwords, so i was a bit hesitant, but i've read a lot of reviews about it and it seems secure.  frankly, so much of our lives are online now, that a breach could really come from anywhere, so i decided to trust and use the program and it's been really helpful.

each transaction is automatically assigned to a category, which i can easily track. since january, i've been going on everyday as part of my daily online presence.  check email, check blogs, update mint. it just knows that target is "shopping," but if i want to add a label, a tag, or get more specific, i can.  

once i labeled my transactions, i can see my spending patterns.  they have great color coded graphs, which i love.  it's so much easier for me to get an idea of what i'm spending if it's

 in a nice visual picture!  i can click on the "food" portion of the pie and it will break it down in smaller increments:  "groceries" vs. "restaurants" for example.  and once in "groceries," i can click on a specific vendor.  that's where i really learned a lot and started to think about our spending patterns.  i was shocked--really shocked--at how much we spent at whole foods.  we had gotten lazy and did a lot of our shopping at whole foods and it really adds up!  it's made me so much more aware of where we are spending.  i try to eat well, as organically and locally as possible, and if i want to eat locally, i can go to the farmers markets.  much more local and

 WAY cheaper than whole foods!  plus, i really don't want to support whole foods management, as the owner is very republican and a big pal of george w. bush.  so analyzing our spending patterns has really helped me get back in touch with my values.  put my money where my mouth is.

lastly, i've created a budget that i'm working from.  they created one for me based on our monthly spending patterns, but i adjusted their "suggested" budget.  and the tracking is very simple and visual, which i love.

so, today i managed my money.  tomorrow isn't here yet, so i'm not going to worry about it. steady happy, one day at a time.