January 3rd, 2011
Book Title: Freedom
Author: Jonathan Franzen
Thumbs: Way, way up
Summary: Freedom follows the lives of Patty and Walter Berglund and their two kids, Joey and Jessica. It’s a lot of back-stories, but primarily set during the time right after 9/11, ultimately dealing with many societal issues during that time. You experience Patty and Walter’s childhoods, how they meet and fall in love in college, and the highs and lows of their marriage. It’s a story of how everything in your life shapes who you are – good and bad.
**SPOILER ALERT**
For me, the best parts of the book were Patty’s journals. It really let me as the reader understand where she was coming from. Personally, I could never once blame Patty for her actions…not saying I would have made the same decision, but when presented all the information, I can’t fault her either. The only decision I thought that *may* have been wrong was not staying/sleeping with Richard that night in Chicago. BUT ONLY because I know how things turned out since she hadn’t. The not knowing what could have been stayed with her and almost completely ruined her marriage.
I found her relationship with her children quite…umm…interesting. She was clearly trying to be the parent she felt she never had, yet only to Joey. She over shared, which eventually resulted in him isolating himself from the family for a time. Yet, Jessica, the one she seemed to neglect (and oddly, I felt the book neglected as well), was the one who is with her in the end.
Talking with a few friends about the book, we all had varying opinions on the ending. Personally, I liked it. I liked that they ended up back together after everything. Maybe that’s me wanting to believe in fairy tales (although I feel this is VERY far from a fairy tale). I always thought Walter was who she was supposed to be with. I never once questioned that decision…I just thought maybe they weren’t given enough time to grow up and experience life before they were married. I think both just needed to find out who they were before they could be themselves with another person?
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS:
I know this was one of Oprah’s book club selections, so there may be more in depth discussion questions there (I haven’t looked). These were just the ones that popped into my head.
If you read Freedom, what did you think? Did Patty’s actions make you angry? Could you sympathize with her? Do you think she should have married Walter? Any other decisions she made that you questioned or thought she should have done differently? What about her relationship with Joey – did you find it inappropriate? Did you see any parallels to Patty’s relationship to her parents and how Joey ultimately responds to his? What were your thoughts on the ending?
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Laura Schulte, a native of Little Rock, loves baseball (Rangers, Cardinals. Andrus, Pujols). And books. And movies. And did I mention baseball? |
January 3rd, 2011
I first saw a brooch bouquet while perusing one of the million and fifty wedding blogs I was addicted to casually browsing in search of inspiration. It took me a .02 seconds to realize I had to have one and immediately popped on over to Etsy to begin my search. I found several beautiful brooch bouquets… with big UGLY price tags. Determined to have one, I set out on a mission to make the bouquet.
I wanted my bouquet to have a lot of sentimental value, so I started gathering brooches from family members. I let my family and my future in-laws know what I was doing, sent them pictures of bouquets I found online and asked them if they could contribute to the effort. Everyone was excited to help and made it their mission to each give me a meaningful brooch. I loved every one of them but when I realized my bouquet would require more (mine totaled 80 brooches), I headed out to flee markets.
**Special Wedding Tip: Exploit the fact that you are getting married. Every time I purchased a brooch, I let the person know it was for my wedding. This ALWAYS scored me a better deal. Also, buy as many from each vendors as possible; the more you buy, the more likely they are to make a deal.
Things You Will Need:
- Brooches (like I said before, mine took 80 to cover a 6” diameter sphere)
- Floral Wire—20lb—about $3 for 80ct. at Hobby Lobby (you will need as many wires as you have brooches)
- 6” Styrofoam Ball—$6 at Hobby Lobby
- 1” Dowel Rod—$.69 at Hobby Lobby
- 1” Satin Ribbon in whatever color ribbon you wish
- Hot Glue Gun and Glue
- Small Needle Nose Pliers
**Tip: You can print off 40% off coupons to most major craft stores online!
To Assemble:
Step One: Clean the brooches! If you’re like me and found most of your brooches as flea markets, chances are good they have several years worth of dust and dirt on them. To clean mine, I filled a big bowel with warm soapy water, brushed them with an old, soft bristle toothbrush, and then rinsed them in a colander. Very professional, I know, but it worked!
Step Two: Use the pliers to wire the back of each brooch with floral wire so that it looks like a flower with a stem.
Step Three: Cut down the wire from each brooch to about 3”
Step Four: Cut the dowel rod down to 9” long
Step Five: Cut a hole in the Styrofoam ball just a smidge smaller than the dowel rod’s diameter and about 2” deep. Fire up the glue gun, glue about the first inch of the dowel and push it into the Styrofoam. Make sure it’s good and sturdy because this bouquet weighs a ton.
Step Six: I organized my brooches into three categories: the sentimental brooches from family and friends, favorite brooches I had purchased, and my not so favorite “filler” brooches. Beginning with the not so favorites, push the wires into the Styrofoam until the brooch is firmly up against it. Continue to do this and evenly spread the not-so-favorites around. These act as “filler” so that you won’t see the Styrofoam once you get all your favorites in.
Step Seven: Repeat step five with all you favorites. Keep in mind the special brooches and their placement (i.e.: one from my fiancé I placed at the top so I could always see it, and ones from my family I placed on the sides so they would photograph well).
Hint! As you are placing brooches, turn the bouquet upside down and shake it gently, if any brooches come loose, grab the hot glue gun and glue the wire in.
Step Eight: Once all the brooches are in place, grab your ribbon. Cut it into 5” stands and begin to make loops at the base of the Styrofoam. To do this, glue about ½” of ribbon to the top of the dowel where it meets the Styrofoam, then double it over and glue the other end of the ribbon at the same point—continue this all the way around the base of the Styrofoam.
Step Nine: With the remaining ribbon, again glue ½” of ribbon to the dowel, this time starting at the bottom, and begin to spirally wrap the ribbon up the dowel, sporadically placing drops of glue on the dowel to hold the ribbon in place. Wrap the ribbon a few extra times at the top of the dowel to insure the ribbon loops are fully covered.
Step Ten: Find a vase tall enough to set you shiny bouquet in, step back and admire it. Then go do some push-ups because it probably weighs a ton!
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Amanda McCain Himes, a Colorado native, made her own DIY wedding look like… well, a piece of cake. |
January 3rd, 2011
Prep Time: A couple of hours
Cost: Under $20
Things You Need: Cake, Frosting, Almond Bark, toothpicks, cupcake liners, electric mixer, wax paper
Terms to Know: Double Boiler, Moderation
These totally divine cake balls can be made using your favorite from-scratch recipe or your favorite from-the-box cake mix. We (and by we, I mean my sister-in-law, Jessica) used sour cream chocolate cake and butter cream frosting recipes from cupcakes!, by Elinor Klivans. You can always take your favorite mix, substitute milk for the water and get a richer product.
Step One: Make your cake according to the directions. While it’s cooling, mix up the frosting. The cake will need to be completely cooled to get going, so you might want to chop it up (a la the photo below) to speed things up.
Step Two: Scoop the cut up cake into a bowl and begin adding the icing, about 1/4 of the recipe at a time to get the right consistency. Our recipe does best with about 3/4 of the icing. Mix together with the electric mixer.
Step Three: Either wearing latex gloves or with clean hands, roll the mixture into bite sized balls. The size really depends on you – I like a two-bite treat, personally and they fit nicely into the cupcake liners.
Step Four: Freeze cake/icing balls for about an hour. The firmer they are, the easier they are to dip!
Step Four: Make a double boiler. Simply, this is a shallow pot or skillet filled with water (as seen above) with a heat-safe dish inside.
Step Five: On medium-high heat, melt the Almond Bark in the double boiler. I chose Almond Bark because it gives such a nice finish and, well, it’s easier than messing with melted chocolate which must maintain an optimal temperature for dipping. Our cake balls are all about forgiveness.
Step Six: Grab your frozen balls from the freezer, poke ‘em with a toothpick and dip in the melted almond bark. Transfer to wax paper (a fork will be useful in this process) and remove the toothpick.
Step Seven: Add any pretties you want (we went with simple, pink pastel dots) and once dry, carefully set them in holiday-appropriate cupcake papers. Ta da!
Lessons Learned: When the instructions say to freeze the dough for an hour, it’s best to go along with it. Haste, in this case, made some really tasty waste. Which leads us to that thing about learning moderation. Wowsers.
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Jessica Jamison is from Dallas, Texas. She loves anything vintage, worships Martha Stewart, and would be considered a hoarder if not for her excellent taste. She is starting up her own event and design business – Everly Lane – and sells her wares at Etsy. |
January 2nd, 2011
Originally posted at thisfish.com on November 3rd, 2010. I know, the images are still missing. I’m hurrying!
From the comments:
I’ve been shopping for a car for a few months now and have been having horrible luck with salesmen. As a young-ish, single girl, they see me as an easy target. Can you offer any bargaining advice? I always feel like they back me into a corner and I’m never sure how to get out of it. Thanks! -Kristen
Kristen, I’m happy to help!
Disclaimer in the First: I am not an expert. I know, I know. You are shocked. To that end, I could be *gasp* wrong on some of the following, but it worked for me so now it is law. And anyway, a lot of this was garnered from conversations I had with my brother who is very practical and also tall. You know what they say about tall people.
Disclaimer in the Second: Technically, I am not single. Also technically, I did not go to the dealership by myself. I did, however, do all the talkin’. You wanna take a dude with you? Go right ahead!
1. Decide before you ever set foot in the dealership what you are going to pay. Write it down.
How do you know what to pay? I’m glad you asked. What you can pay will be dictated by your budget (for accurate planning, use an amortization calculator. I found this one useful). But to know what you should pay, go to a neutral source like Kelly Blue Book (kbb.com) or Edmunds (edmunds.com). Enter the year, make, model and trim of the car you’re looking to buy. Add the bells and whistles you expect – if you’re just gaga for a sunroof, add it to the package – we’re looking for a maximum range here. Now, check out the price. Notice there are three dollar numbers. In the example below, I priced out a 2010 Hyundai Santa Fe (they are rather nice to drive, in case you were wondering).
MSRP: Manufacturer’s Suggested Retail Price. Please make note of the word suggested. In reality, this number doesn’t mean jack squat.
Invoice: The price paid by the car dealership to have that shiny baby on their lot. But only *sort* of. The dealership didn’t actually pay the listed invoice price.
There car manufacturer offers incentives and discounts that aren’t
factored into that number. Do not be fooled by this number. Above all do not feel sorry for the car salesperson if they make any overtures about not making any money off the car.
Fair Purchase Price: The average price car buyers are paying for this car. On new models, like my 2011, the Fair Purchase Price will read the same as the MSRP due to the lack of data available. Do not be fooled by this number, either. If you’re tenacious and well informed, you can get a better deal.
Your price. The dealer is probably aiming to make a minimum of a thousand dollars (Your Price – Invoice Price = $1,000). Remember what you know about Invoice Price. It ain’t as advertised. But since you don’t know the actual dealer cost, the Invoice Price is a good place to start. The price you negotiate should be “up” from the invoice price of the car and not “down” from the MSRP.
For instance, our Santa Fe has an MSRP of $28,690 and a Invoice price of $27,267. In my case, I set my sights on paying no more than $100 over invoice (in Santa Fe terms, that’s $27,367) and got what I wanted.
(You may end up writing two numbers down – one for the ideal car and one for the scaled down version, if you can live without some of those bells and whistles.)
2. Negotiate to get that price you wrote down; do not budge until you’re comfortable.
If you make the first move, put your number on the table and then sit quietly. If the salesperson makes the first move, as he did in my case, look over the initial offer and never, ever be afraid to say, “This is not what I had in mind.” When asked what you do have in mind, SAY IT. You may not be used to haggling, but you can bet the person on the other side of the desk is. Do not worry about sounding cheap, aggressive or even delusional. They have heard it all. The worst they can say is no, but even that answer shouldn’t be taken too seriously.
During all this, your demeanor should be relaxed (so, so important) and friendly but never, ever forget that the salesperson is just that. A salesperson. This is business.
3. Be prepared to walk away.
You’re not desperate for a car. You don’t care what special deals are going on right now, nor that they expire in exactly six minutes. There will be other deals. Other cars. Other dealerships. If you’re truly getting no traction (and right now, that’s pretty unlikely what with the economy being as it is) ask the salesperson to call you when they’re better prepared to negotiate. They aren’t likely to let that happen. See, no matter how it pains them (uh huh) to give you your way, the bottom line is this: the sales manager wants to make money (and his monthly bonus) by selling you a car. They know that’s not going to happen if you leave the showroom.
4. Don’t talk trade-in until you’ve settled on a price for the new car. Period.
Your trade in should not be a factor in the negotiated price of the new car. The dealer will do a bunch of fuzzy math to show you a super swell, lower monthly payment. Ignore him. Negotiate a car price, not a monthly payment. It’s okay to say, “If you don’t mind, I’d like to discuss the trade in after we’ve settled on a price.” You pay less sales tax ({negotiated price – trade in vale} x .0825 = total tax) when you have a trade-in, and the lower, super swell monthly payment will most likely be a result of that, more than anything.
5. Know what your trade in is worth. Write it down.
Again, Kelly Blue Book and Edmunds are great resources. Fill in the year, make, mileage and select the condition your car is in. And once again, you’ll be presented with a few dollar values. I’ve used a 2007 Santa Fe in the following example (and added side-by-side comparison of values).
Trade In Value. What you can expect the dealership to pay, based on the car’s condition. This will be the lowball offer.
Private Party Value. What you can expect to get going the For Sale By Owner route. Or even CarMax. We’ve found them to be quite competitive.
Suggested Retail Value: What the dealership is going to sell your washed, waxed, reconditioned and warrantied baby for.
Drop by a CarMax to get their offer, too. Fix that number in your head. Write it down. And don’t agree to anything that doesn’t match up. If anything, you can always take your car to CarMax, complete that transaction and then come back to the dealership with the cash. Again, though, they won’t want you to walk away – you might not come back.
Keep in mind that you’ll have to be realistic about the condition your car is in. If you’re like me and love your steel baby with all your heart, you might be inclined to think it’s worth more than it is. For some perspective, check out what similar used vehicles (mileage, options, warranty) are going for at dealerships around your area. Obviously, there’s markup involved – used cars are where the money is made – so factor that into your expectations.
I opted to ask for the Private Sale Value (at Good Condition), understanding that even at this price, the dealership stood to make at least two thousand dollars from its resale. I had taken excellent care of my car and I did not budge on this.
6. Be prepared to discuss adding options.
The “closer” will try to talk you into added extras. Roadside assistance. Longer warranties. Tires for life. These are not necessarily without value. I opted to raise my monthly payment in order to have a seven year, bumper-to-bumper warranty. I opted out of the Lowjack. Do what feels right. Again, they want your money. But so long as what they’re selling is something you want, everyone’s happy.
Okay. That’s it. Any questions? I kinda hope not, because I’m pretty sure that’s the extent of my vast and amazing car buying knowledge. Best of luck!
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Heather Hunter, aka This Fish, is is from Dallas, Texas via Boston, New York and some other cold, snowy places. She spends a bunch of her time blogging, planning her May wedding and eating things made mostly of melted cheese. |
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