Photo booth turned stop motion film.

Annnnd...loved this so much I had to post it. Via A Practical Wedding, who writes:

4) Cara and I (and um, Alyssa) want to reassure you that this is not one more thing you have to live up to*. No, no, no. It's just a snippet of surprising wedding magic, shared with Team Practical, since you're part of the support that makes such magic happen. Happy Friday, kids, and kisses from Brooklyn.

*But if you're at that point of madness that comes at the end of wedding planning where you're slamming your head against the wall shrieking that you're pretty sure you have to have a videographer shooting on Super 8 even though you never wanted a videographer ever (Been there. Stupid blogging industrial complex) this one's for you. Read: you TOTALLY DON'T.

Our Wedding in 73 Seconds from Jeff Kirsch on Vimeo.

We moved!

Last week, I cooked a Thanksgiving dinner (started at 1pm, served at 7pm) at my mom's behest, she had college friends visiting the U.S. for the first time and we wanted to show them a big 'ole American tradition. It turned out pretty well, I think, I got a kosher turkey from Whole Foods and also made mashed potatoes, stuffing on the stove, cranberry sauce with fresh cranberries, and an apple pie. I think it turned out pretty well, my mom's got the pictures so I'll post them if she sends them to me.

me: What do you think? Compared to last year, when you bought everything and told me the night before you wanted me to make a turkey?

mom: Oh, we did a turkey last year? Yeah, this year's is definitely better. I'll remember this one, I don't even remember last year's.

I also made gravy, from the drippings and everything! And it wasn't lumpy, the texture looked great! Unfortunately I didn't make the connection that with a kosher turkey (brined) we could probably skip the 'rub turkey all over with salt' step and so the drippings, and thus the gravy, were unpalatably salty. Oh well, that gave our arteries something to be thankful for, right?

[edit 12/18/09: my mom sent me pictures! Here's the feast, with one of my mom's only-use-on-special-occasions dining sets purchased in Thailand]

We then spent the rest of the long weekend moving. Fun! Many thanks to my sister for her help with driving, I'm a total wimp about driving but she's the complete opposite. The van we'd booked for Saturday fell through, so there were many...many...trips.

On the plus side, the previous tenants did an immaculate job of cleaning and we're all set up with the basics now largely out of stuff scavenged from my parents' basement (homeowners! keeping entire apartments' worth of furniture in storage!) and a bed frame that we built! As in, it used to be pieces of wood and a pile of screws, none of it from Ikea, and now it looks just like it does in the picture and it's a piece of furniture we use daily and hasn't fallen down. I love having a cordless drill!

Anyway, the point of this whole ramble is that now I have the project of setting up the apartment beyond functional basics, I'll probably be pretty light on wedding planning related stuff until late January, I suspect. Keep the links and ideas coming though, loving the stuff that people have sent me but I haven't posted about yet. I might pontificate on the whole living together for the first time thing if I get in a self-important mood.