Love Doctors

Oh hello, yes, I know, it's been a while. Truth is, I've been refraining from blogging for the past few months, while I was funemployed because I knew it would just be too mean. You didn't really want to hear about my life of midday outdoor yoga classes in bryant park, leisurely afternoons reading on the highline, evenings cruising with a cocktail on my way to the Yankees game now did you? See, it was generous of me, I knew the jealousy would be too much. So you're welcome.

But now I'm back, a month into my new job at Etsy, which I understand may make some of you jealous (who could blame you, I get to craft AT work), but I think it's an appropriate enough time to start blogging again. Some notable things have happened since I last updated the Internat, and I'll fill you in little by little. At the moment I'd like to dedicated this post to several very special doctors in my life. These three docs are all very important in the well-being of one my vital organs: my heart!

First up: The Drs. O'Malley, finally got married this month (see this post on their engagement a mere 28 months ago!), and it was a blissfully wonderful weekend in Sonoma. We stayed at the beautiful H2 Hotel, and I felt like a VIP getting to spend some great quality time with the future Mrs.O'Malley on her big day. The whole bridal party took off for a group run and bike on the morning of the wedding, borrowing perfectly picturesque white beach cruisers from the hotel. Later when we were dressed up, the bikes came in handy for ridiculously adorable pics! (See many more here thanks to the Paul-parazzi)


It was a tearful day as I watched my mom preform Kit and Ryan's thoughtful and personal ceremony and pronounce them husband and wife. Hey, it's not every bridesmaid that gets to kiss the officiant in the recessional.

I must say after a weekend full of such love, I've been suffering from a little PWSD! The only cure will be seeing them soon, so I'll have to make a trip to Boston.

The third Doctor is actually a Dr-to-be (can we call her a DTR?), one Rebecca Sista-girl Schwartz, is officially white-coated and ready to take on the world of medicine at UPenn armed with endless textbooks, a stethoscope and a banana. Clearly.

I think that during this glamorous white-coat photo shoot (talk about Dr. McDreamy) my mom said something like "Paging Dr.Schwwwaaaartz!" and Bec whipped that out of her pocket. Not sure though. I, sadly, could not make it to the white coat ceremony, but I came in for the celebration dinner (and fro yo).

Can you tell we are very proud?

I love you Drs!

Dressing Up

As I mentioned in my last post, Lily and Matt's fabulous nuptials kicked off my wedding season this year. It was a flawless event at the Boston Seaport Hotel, and the bride left no detail behind. If I had to pick one favorite detail of this spectacular event is was Lily's absolutely swoon-worthy dress.

There hasn't been a wedding so far where I haven't loved the bride's dress pick-- it always seems to fit the bride's and setting's personality. I have loved some of the simpler dresses, like that worn by Alex last summer; but at the same time, I always adore the big fabulous dresses with trains and the whole nine-yards, which I call "the cupcake dress" (that is not a technical term). It doesn't fit every bride, but for those who can handle it, I say embrace it. It's your day and it's probably the only day you will be able to wear a dress that you could hide people under (unless you're into victorian reenactments or something).

Clearly it was the perfect choice for Lil. So perfect in fact that even Vera Wang decided it should be on her blog :)

What do you like better, Christmas or Wedding Season?!

Wedding season!!

On my way to the official kick off of this years wedding season, and I feel like a kid on Christmas eve! Lily and Matt are first up this summer so I'm headed to beantown to celebrate with some high school friends and the parents. I know these Colby kids like to party (nothing better to do when go to college in Maine) so it promises to be a great time...stay tuned for pictures post weekend!

Ok off to keep playing on my new iPad...which I'm blogging from right now. Woot! I heart technology. And weddings!

SoCal Sweethearts: A&P say "We Do!"

Team Photo w/Bride #2

So I am still reeling from the excitement of Alex and Pat's wedding weekend extravaganza 2 weeks ago. It seems to me that every wedding has some element of Fairy Tale-- for Dyani and Brice the french chateau setting said it all, for Leslie and Ben it was the reading of their beautiful love letters, and for Alex and Pat-- it was a Fairy Tale 14 years in the making. Though it was indeed aboutfingtime.com, I think the couple and their every guest would agree, it was worth the wait for this special day.

The wedding was held in the picturesque beach town of La Jolla, and the ceremony and reception were held at the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, where Alex's dad is director; and which is only several miles from Muirlands Middle School where Alex and Pat met 14 years ago. I arrived on Wednesday night, not to miss out on any of the action, and to help the bride prepare and ward off any nervs. Lucky for me, Alex (surprise surprise) was the chillest bride ever.

Festivities began Friday afternoon with a day at the beach of meeting and greeting, followed by a rehersal filled with sunshine and a "Rehersal Fiesta," complete with many margs, and toasts. Since A & P are always the last ones to leave the party, the only struggle of the weekend was actually getting them to leave the bar Friday night so that they could get their beauty rest before the big day!

The wedding day was so happy it is impossible to capture. Jessica "The Party Pope" Goldman officiating the ceremony was brilliant. I don't remember ever crying, laughing and cheering so hard within the span of 5 minutes. There was cheering, hooting and even noisemakers when they kissed- the energy of the event rivaled a graduation-- nothing but celebration. And the celebration continued all evening....
Dancing started early and went late-- we were twisting and turning and even danced the hora (why not?).
I don't know who brought the glow sticks but as I recall around 1am it turned rave wedding...
Shoes were taken off, cigars smoked, glasses toasted and school cheers chanted. The last song was dedicated to the couple, though somehow they had sneaked out the door without the rest of us noticing. Nevertheless, we circled up and "pretended" they were in the middle toasting to them and swaying.....
Many more pics here courtesy of Paparazzi Paul.

Oh la la...(and yes, guilty as charged)

Congratulations Dyani and Brice!
This makes me happy.

I know, I know, I have not updated the Internat for over a week. Here's the thing: whenever something monumental happens, I feel extreme pressure write the most wicked-killer post ever, and consequently get very nervous, push it off another day, and wake up in the early morning thinking about how I'm letting you, my loyal readers, down.

I know this doesn't help the fact that you have been hitting refresh constantly for the past week and have taken to perusing Facebook instead for your midday mindless-pleasure/voyeurism fix, but I want you to know I feel guilty and I'm sorry. That said, let's dive into the french fairy-tale that was my 3 night whirlwind trip to la France. May I suggest you grab un boisson first, since this is going to be a long one.... (if you just want the pictures check out these, or these)

As I last reported from l'aeroport, Jessica's tummy (damn you Lupus poopus) prevented her from coming to Paris at the last minute. As consolation (I hope) I decided to bring her along in paper form and utlized the excellent Google printers yet again. Here's Jess enjoying breakfast a lovely cafe in Paris:
I arrived Thursday morning, and after spending Thursday afternoon taking in the Parisian sites (and pastries), Erin and I reunited with Megan, Sally and Jeff for dinner. Tim, who coincidentally (?) was in town for work, also joined us.

Most of us dined on escargot and steak frites, accompanied by plenty of red wine and pain. There was much chatter about the wedding weekend ahead-- we had heard rumors of the groom wearing a sword and the celebration featuring a harpsicord concert...oh la la, we were excited to see what was in store. Tim was jealous, clearly. And after several glasses of wine he agreed to come with us as Erin's +1/Jess' body double, assuming this was fine with the bride. Lucky for all, she said Mais oui!

So Friday morning, the 6 of us headed off for Chateau de Chailly, where Dyani and Bryce would wed, in the largest car available in France (a modest 5 seater van with 2 miniseats in the back). The aventure was lead by Jeff, who I quickly renamed 'dad', for his excellent skill in car packing, navigating french roadways, and carrying his large camera with that cross-shoulder strap only dads purchase. Here's a pic from the backseat of the Eurovan...luckily Jess took up very little room and we both slept a fair amount:

When not sleeping we did a dramatic reading of the new Universal movie script, codename "Hopper," that Sally is working on. When hunger struck, Dad happily ablidged and we exited for lunch at a random spot which turned out to be "the most typical french town" according to Wikipedia:
Typical french town meant plenty of choices for anything but typical snacks, and after wine, sandwiches and mini macaroons, we were on our way to Chailly.

In Chailly we were united with the rest of the Stanny crew: Kat, Chels and Kbo, Nikki and Gab. Dream dream dream (or shall I say: rêve, rêve, rêve). We all headed into town to the only open restaurant for dinner. There was of course much more Pain, Vin and escargot. And many toasts to our lovely Bride. Since there were no bars open in town, Tim talked the restaurant owner into letting us purchase a half case of wine to bring back to l'hotel. Clearly the french ablidged as they shared deep concern for letting any hours pass without wine.

Saturday morning we were up early to head over to the Chateau where we would all stay for the night. That was of course not before a stop in town-- apparently there is no such thing as brunch in France, so full service breakfast was unavailable at 10:30am. Instead we hit up the boulangerie for some goodies and brought them into the bar, which was I might add, bumping. Here we have le wedding crasherre enjoying the finest of le petite village:
The chateau was exactly as you would imagine: completely magnifique! We stayed just across the lawn at an adorable little apartment, which was perfect for le preparty: we popped some bubbly and got ready, then met up with all guests outside of the chateau entrace. The bride processed down this fabulous stone staircase and out the door of 16th century Chateau to meet her dad. It was nothing short of fairy tale:
French tradition has the entire wedding process through town to the church, so off we went behind the bride. The gentlemen layed down their swords (yes, multiple men were in french naval costume including swords) before entering the church, and we sat in pews older than the USA for the french-english ceremony. We all walked out and the newlywed couple led us back to the Chateau for celebration:
Following that there was a harpsicord concert, and champagne hour. And then came the food. And then came more food. And then came toasts. And then came more food. Several hours and several dozen decedent courses later, dancing began. Brice and Dyani's coregraphed 1st (salsa) dance, kicked off the party...which was fueled by plenty of bub and featured everything from the electric slide, to line dancing, to Lady Gaga.
Oh la la what a wedding.... (and Internat debut for Tim!)

Spring Training 2K10

So yes, as you may have heard Erin mention on National TV, we headed to Scottsdale for a 5 way bachelorette weekend directly following our big Martha win. It was a repeat trip-- after the best weekend of our lives last year, we just had to return to the Valley Ho for some spring training fun.This time we had more to celebrate than just ourselves, as 5 of the 12 team members have been rocked up since last year's training.

Unfortunately us NYC girls had a bit of trouble getting there-- it started with the worlds most anxious cab driver, we then missed our flight and were faced with frustrated and rude US airways employee and 3 screaming crying fellow passengers. We kept our cool, found out Jet Blue had a flight out, and sprinted to their terminal. We got lucky with a gem of a gate agent who processed our tickets, checked our bags, ran us to the gate, AND wore a birthday hat (which clearly I offered her) in less than 35 minutes, to get us on our flight.
The crazy departure made our late arrival at the Ho even more exciting, there was screaming hugging and laughing that sent security to our room shortly thereafter....

In true Team and Pi Phi fashion, all the single ladies (*queue Beyonce song) acted as though the 5 ladies: Dyani, Ashlee, Jess, Alex and Megan ("DA JAM" for short) were our pledges.
Here they are, aren't they just the cutest?! (we totally won rush)
Here goes the recap:

Friday night: We lock DA JAM in one room to make up a dance to be performed on Saturday night, while the single ladies got to work decking out the room with banners, pictures, posters and assembling gift bags of tshirts, cups, rings and all sorts of goodies:

The single ladies then preformed a rhyming roast/toast, complete with a drink to honor each bachelorette:
We then continued to have our cake (and champagne) and eat it too.... lots of catching up.

Saturday was a perfect Scottsdale day, high 70s and sunny, with 0% humidity and 100% awesomeness. We spent it by the pool, drinking Go Bananas and mimosas until early afternoon when we headed to the Giants/A's game. Unfortunately unlike last year we did not get kidnapped on a party bus, but we did get taken for a free ride on a pedicab....
We were careful to monitor our beer intake at the game, for fear of passing out by 9pm, and luckily we managed to keep it in check. We trapped DA JAM in the side room again and set up for Red Night (another pi phi tradition).

Rather than buy some standard pink bachelorette crowns/veils, I decided to make DIY headwear for the ladies....I found the stretchy sequinned trim, lace, letters and feathers all MJ Trimmings, and went to town fashioning these Red Night meets flapper accessories for our rocked up ladies:
We then played a "how well do you know DA JAM" game...we had asked them all for random facts ahead of time, and the single ladies had to guess. Following that there was a very odd Pi Phi tradition interlude....The Cookie Shine, where basically we lay out a sheet and ate cookies and read stories sent by the boys about their fiances. Cheesy? Yes. Necessary? Definitely. (and of course there were tears shed).

Next stop before dinner was getting a shot of the group in the tub, clearly. So we called the bellhop and about 50 flashes later we were ready to roll. Locked up Ladies:
And the whole group:

Last but not least, we made DA JAM preform their dance....which looked strikingly similar to the "Devil Dance" several of the ladies had performed at rush 5 years ago, with the brilliant addition of Dyani doing the worm as the finale (video coming soon).
If you've read this far, you probably want to check out the rest of the pics. Let's just say, this weekend sets a hiiiiigh bar for bachelorettes!

Jen and Hal's Cookie Press Package

Horray! Hal (finally) popped the question to my little, Jen over Christmas break (yes this is delayed, sorry). To celebrate their engagement, I created some cookies with this Message-in-a-cookie set that Jen gave me for Christmas. The set comes with individual letters, and you are supposed to slide them into the gingerbread man, snowflake and ordament cookie cutters. However, I just used the individual letters and pushed them by hand into heart cookies (purchased at my Michael's binge)
Pressing in each letter by hand was a labor of love...and it took me more than one "NEJ" and "LAH" to figure out how to make all the words and letters go in the correct direction. They did come out a little off center and imperfect, but the result was still pretty good for my first try, if I do say so myself ;)

I then packaged them up in a little cookie box which I had in my craft drawer, duh, and sent them off. I added the card below that I made with my new embossed diamond ring craft punch (Martha Stewart Crafts at Michaels, obvi), and it was quite a crafty little engagement surprise.

I'm definitely going to experiment some more with these imprinted cookies, since I really don't think I've seen them before. Perhaps there is a market for them? I could call it CookiePress Perhaps?

Technology is a Girl's Best Friend. (Congrats Megan!)

So today I got a very exciting email from Quinn: James rocked it up before 6am this morning! This definately takes the cake as the earliest morning engagement--talk about eager beaver (I would be too if I was dating Megan)! I was so excited, I immediately chatted her and jumped into the nearest video conference room for a virtual congratulations...
I waited anxiously with virtual flowers (from Leslie's birthday yesterday) and zoomed the screen in close for a big fat virtual hug and kiss. I screamed and she ran towards the screen beaming to show off the ring:
Then 3 engineers (who had actually reserved the room) walked in on Megan, and our fun was spoiled.... Awkward. Whatever, it still made my day!

Wedding season, completed.

This weekend I headed out to Tarrytown to watch my 3rd (yikes) Winsor friend of the summer lock it up. Despite mediocre weather, Erica and David's wedding was a huge success, thanks to many a DIY detail.

Highlights included the ceremony turned comedy hour with running commentary from the Rabbi: "Do you come here free of reservations?" without letting Erica answer she proceeded "Why that's a silly question isn't it!"

The choice of food was also incredible with mac and cheese balls (I'm going to try to replicate these at home) as apps, and I much prefered ice cream sundae and cupcake bar in place of traditional cake...especially because she gave everyone their own scoop! Erica was the most calm and happy bride, carefree as can be- which of course was the best part of all! And that's it-- no more wedding posts (at least til January).

Congrats Jess and Jandro!

Jandro can quit his fishing cause he locked down quite a CATCH! (sorry, I couldn't help it). It appears to be raining diamond rings in California this summer...In a not-surprising but super-exciting turn of events, Jandro popped the question this weekend. I couldn't be happier for this little munchkin:
I can't wait to dance the Hora at their Mexican- Chinese- Jewish- Sodium-free wedding next summer!

AppleBOMB wedding

If last weekend was the perfect west coast wedding, this weekend was the perfect east coast wedding. Amanda, my high school bf, married Bryce Appelbaum in an oh so lovely Newport, R.I. She looked stunning (are you getting sick of me saying that about every bride?) and I can honestly say she was THE most smiley bride I ever did see-- her cheeks must still be burning.


I third wheeled it with Nev and Graham all weekend-- which was heavenly. I may be the only Schwartz I know that had never been to a Jewish wedding until this weekend. This was a great first-- loved the personal aspects of the ceremony, and focus on the couple rather than God. And of course, loved the crushing of the glass (video) and the hora. Crazy that the last person I saw up in a chair was probably Amanda on her Bat Mitzvah 13 years ago, and there she was in a wedding dress. Here's a video of her walking down the isle (and yes, you can hear me and Neva sobbing like babies in the background). Full photo library here.

Molly and Seton's Wedding in Sonoma

So my Google Storage finally has gone into effect and I can now upload photos again. Thank god. I am however, already at 40% capacity with my 88 albums. Yikes.

Anyway, a review of Molly and Seton's wedding is in order. The wedding was straight out of Martha Stewart or Real Simple Mag. No detail left out, all tastefully color coordinated and the perfect size (107 guests). My favorite touches included: the SF trolley cars driving us into the vineyard to the ceremony site, the candy bar featuring M&Ms of Molly and Seton's faces, flip flops which everyone used (even guys), the red sox hat grooms cake.

But of course, the most fabulous touch was Molly's stunning dress. I stalked the bride rather hardcore. Here's my fav photo, though my other 350 photos from the weekend are here.

The good news is, I won't be getting married any time soon, so it won't be weird when I replicate their wedding from start to finish....

Happy Birthday Alex, take 2

Previous post was my first attempt at updating the Internat from my iPhone. For some reason even though I was able to upload a video to YouTube (video of sick SF streetdancers), I was unable to edit a body of text. Weird.

In any case, it was indeed the birthday of Miss (soon to become Mrs!) AY Davies yesterday and that was cause for celebration. As it also fell on the day before Molly and Seton's wedding, it was spent touring Sonoma and wine tasting with 75 of their guests, our oldest/newest closest friends. Ideal. I took the spotlight from the bride for a moment to embarrass Alex with a mini cake which we promptly devoured in this wine cave.



The afternoon was pure bliss, and unfortunately we made the foolish decision to take a quick catnap at 7 (before our 7:30 dinner reservation)...I woke up at midnight to find the birthday girl had also slept through her birthday dinner and had ventured out for Thai food alone around 9pm. We ended up perving wedding blogs and dreaming up DIY projects for the Hodgins/Davies wedding while cuddling with Fateous, the enormous teddy bear that was part of the hotel's "celebration package." Oh and Alex asked me to be a bridesmaid- YAY!

They go Together like Cops and Donuts...

Since the day I met Alex 8 (yikes!) years ago, I have been waiting for the call I got on Friday night...There are no words to express my excitement about Alex and Pat's engagement. They are the golden standard in fabulous relationships and over the years have even worked their way into team vocabulary: "Well they're a great couple, but they're no Alex and Pat..." So after 12 years together, they're getting married.

Naturally I spent the weekend going through all 8 thousand digital photos on my computer (literally) to find the best picture of them to post. Winner:


Runner up was this shot taken 2 years ago celebrating their 10 year anniversary.