weekend update

you know, like snl? haha. maybe that's what i'll start calling all my weekend posts because that's when we have the most fun!

friday / /

pretty much right when we got home, we headed up little cottonwood canyon to the storm mountain amphitheater and saw our dear friend cory mon perform! (i call all our friends our dear friends. i'm just noticing.) have i ever told you about how devin and cory met? they used to climb together all the time, and then one day while they were climbing, cory suggested that devin come see one of his shows some time. and devin was all you play music?! haha he had no idea the entire time! so he started going to his shows and they climb together much less now, but cory has remained a close friend, and has proven to be a very, very talented musician. the first time i met cory was at starbucks, which is much less exciting, but he's such a good person. we love cory and we're so excited about his upcoming marriage! he did so well and the opener from denver, her name was Megan Burtt and she was incredible! i can't wait to buy some of her music. the point of the show was sort of to announce the release of cory's good friend, wes kirkpatrick's album, and we saw wes play with cory about a year ago and have loved his music ever since so it was a trifecta of awesome music that night! dustin christensen was there too, on the keys and the now-famous-because-he-was-on-the-voice, ryan innes made an appearance, although he didn't perform, but sat in the audience in front of us on his phone the whole time. (famous people. psshaw.) haha anyway. great show! remember how we came to the same place last year to see cory but it was pouring rain so we all went and stood under a big overhanging cliff in the back of the amphitheater and cory played a few songs? haha it was so great! much better without the rain this time though, i'd say. i was especially excited that cory performed my favorite song, Minnesota this time, so we recorded it! my phone ran out of memory (because i have such a hard time deleting old photos, even though they're already saved to my computer), so it stops in the middle, but it was still amazing!

(I can't get the video to upload to my blog, but you can find it on my facebook page!)

saturday / /

devin had to work saturday morning, so after i slept in a little bit, i went straight to the gym to test out my new nike free's! i love them. i just focused on cardio since we were going to be climbing later that night, and i noticed that i burn more than twice as many calories on the elliptical machine than i do on the bike, which is just my luck because i sort of hate the elliptical and the bike is my favorite! oh well. i stopped at the grocery store on my way home since we hadn't gotten groceries since before our trip, and then i cleaned the house and played outside with cooper for a few hours (still no sign of sun on my legs, though, of course!) after a few episodes of parenthood, devin texted me and said he was off work early so i packed up my climbing bag and headed to the gym! do remember the last time i posted about climbing in the gym? no? exactly. because it's been forever. we brought cooper and tied him up on the grass outside which he loves but also hates, and we climbed with some friends for a few hours. i got really pumped right away and called it quits after about 4 routes, and i was so mad! devin said it's just because i haven't climbed in so long, and i'll agree with that. i'm still sore though! we had a lot of fun and i'm starting to really understand the technique and movement that make such a big difference to your climbing. devin's a pretty great coach, and it's nice that he sets a lot of the routes at the gym because he can have my climb specific examples of things i'm trying to learn. it's so helpful! after that, we headed to zupa's for dinner with a few friends and pretty much went straight home and went to bed!

sunday / /

after church on sunday we had some lunch and spent the entire afternoon catching up on The Voice while devin looked up tons of routes on mountain project (it's a rock climbing guide, basically) and i edited that video from out trip! for dinner, we went down to orem to see amanda and jason's gorgeous new house and have dinner with the family to celebrate devin's birthday (a little late, since he had to work during the last party). i had so much fun playing with my nieces and nephews. i never get tired of those kids, holy cow. they are all so, so smart and so funny and i love them all so much! even baby ben was in a good mood and let me play with him for a little bit! i feel like i've gotten pretty attached to that addison, though. she and i are buddies and i love it! man. all those 4 kids that have made me an aunt are pretty special, but there's just something about that addison! when we got home, i showed devin several example pictures of the kind of coffee table i want, because now that he's got that miter saw, he's really anxious to build something, so hopefully next weekend we'll get it done! i'm really excited and now i want to redecorate the entire house! we'll see... haha i can't believe it's already monday. the weekend went by way too fast!

 

this dog has become so obsessed with people watching. he goes nuts any time he sees someone outside the house, and even watched people really intently when we're in the car. it's so funny!

 

these girls are so, so cute with their baby cousin, Ben! they are so sweet. i'm so glad we will all have makayla to babysit our kids! she'll be so awesome!

love this photos i snapped of mom and baby! chloe's such a good mom. i'm glad i have her and amanda as examples for when i become a mama!

And a few other photos from our weekend / so far  this week...

 

when it's not muddy buddies, it's chocolate chip cookies. too bad i took the rest of this batch to the boys at work, because they were delicious!

 

just started this book. i'm having a little bit of a hard time understanding it because it's written from the view of a 5 year old boy who has never left this one room his entire life, so he talks about objects in the room as if they are people and friends, but it's so good and so interesting! i would recommend it to anyone.

oooh boy, did this guy give us a scare this week! i came home for my lunch break, like i do sometimes, and found that he had eaten an entire prescription! only 2 of the 28 pills had been taken and he had eaten all of them, plastic included! i was so angry, because the prescription was expensive, and so, so worried about what might be wrong with him! we were so relieve to find out that he should be fine, but we are keeping a very close eye on him for the next few days to make sure he's not acting funny, but man! it was a pretty awful afternoon. 

a day in the life

for today's blog every day in may challenge topic, we're sharing a day in the life! i fully intended on making this like a photo every hour kind of thing when i read about this topic at the beginning of the month, but naturally, didn't even know what the topic for today was until about 9:00 this morning when i looked it up. oops! but, to be fair, everything that goes on before 9am really isn't very pretty, so you aren't missing too much. at least i have a knack for remembering exact times.

6:00am: alarm goes off. wake up very grumpy and immediately turn it off

6:30am: alarm goes off. wake up a little less grumpy, but more tired than before. lay in bed and browse social media for a few minutes. cooper jumps on the bed and lays between devin and i. devin gets up.

6:43am: get up and get ready. let cooper outside. stand in front of the closet with a very blank look on my face trying to decide what to wear. throw on a dress because it takes the least amount of effort.

7:02am: get all my stuff together for work. grab some snacks, grab keys, grab phone

7:12am: ready early, so i head to work anyway. put coop in his pen. kiss devin goodbye.

7:39am: arrive at starbucks. i earned it since i got to lehi so early. order a grande vanilla bean frappucino and asiago cheddar pretzl.

7:47am: pull up at the shop, clock in, start computer, open blinds, fill water bottle...

8:00am: turn on the phones and turn on the "open sign", check in customers

8:30am: morning rush has died down, computer isn't working. call provo. they're having the same problem. sit around while we wait for tech support to fix it. read ksl articles. fall into every trap the guys make for dirty jokes.

>spent the entire afternoon doing basically nothing other than the very small amount of work that i could, with a lot of false hope that our system would be working again shortly, just to find out that it in fact wouldn't be<

1:38pm: got word that we would probably be down for the rest of the day. can you think of a worse combination than horribly bored and stressed, but not being able to do anything about it?

3:29pm: by this point, we had all basically given up and stopped caring. we sent the parts manager to sonic for some happy hour drinks and calmed down.

4:36pm: every single customer decided to pick up their car at the same time and we get a huge rush.

4:57pm: run parts and my car keys back to one of our techs, Evan, who agreed to do me a huge favor and stay a little late today to replace the wheel bearings on our mazda (note to self: get Evan a giftcard)

5:03pm: head home (finally!) - my boss let me borrow the company car for the night to get home and back to work in the morning - that was a fun change of pace!

5:23pm: come home to find my husband and dog hanging out in the backyard, and join them. (do you spot cooper in these photos??) devin also let me know that he won a big gift basket at a company event today and we got a free hotel stay that I can't wait to find time to use!

6:14pm: decide we are hungry and have a few errands to run, so we went to taco time and got some crisp juan burritos.

6:42pm: sit back and watch a zillion episodes of The Voice to catch up to the live performances, while it rained outside.

...i'm just gonna stop here. it's been a long day and i've got a headache. but you can expect us to be in bed before 10:00pm, watching Parenthood. well, devin will watch, and i will try for about 5 minutes, but fall asleep. 

this is a pretty standard day, really. weird things are always happening, like computer systems crashing and cars needing work.. it's constant, so none of this was out of the ordinary. i have a pretty great life, even though it seems a little sedentary, i really love it. i love my job. i love where i live and these crazy wonderful boys i get to spend my life with. just another day!

a moment in my day

we are not morning people. 

waking up at 6 or 6:30 is pretty hard in our house, so every morning is sort of a battle. but sometimes, like this morning, my alarm will come on, and greg laswell will start playing, and it's the best kind of cold because we slept with the window open, but we are so warm and comfortable under the covers, and we are happy. we have these sleepy morning smiles as we try to adjust to the light coming in from the window above our bed, and devin says "good morning, pretty lady" as he stretches and i roll over onto his chest and say good morning back and he pulls me closer. and we lay still. and then cooper jumps on the bed and squeezes his way in between us and starts doing something silly. and we're laughing quietly and talking about anything and everything. our dreams from the night before, our plans for the day, our plans for the weekend. 

and for a few minutes, we are morning people. 

wednesdays; if i close my eyes for too long, i'll surely fall asleep

by 10am today, my head was still droopy and my eyes were still heavy. i lay in bed with devin hours before, willing my body sick, so i wouldn't have to get out of bed. it's amazing how quickly i can come up with a list of excuses that would render me unable to go into the office when i want a few more hours of sleep. and oh, that snugly dog of mine, with his chin propped on my stomach, and his eyes half-open. he is expert with those big, long sighs. he looks just how i feel. so completely tired, and so very comfortable. isn't it funny how sick you start to feel once you've started wishing you were sick so you could stay in bed all day? because, bleh. i do. i had a small adrenaline rush as i started planning some details for devin's birthday next month, and now i am back to half-asleep at noon-thirty. and it's not even like i have any reason to be this tired. i'd just rather take today much slower. i told devin this morning as we laid there that i would rather fold laundry than go to work today. which is really saying something, because laundry is my very least favorite thing. and seeing as how there are literally FIVE loads of laundry sprawled across my living room floor, waiting to be folded, as we speak, I was really saying something there. i would have so happily stayed home and returned those clothes to their drawers and closets, folded and hung. but here i am, at my desk. on a slow wednesday afternoon, thinking things like wow, making it past hump day really IS a feat! because, really. it is. wednesdays are hard. wednesdays should be saturdays. i have had a recurring thought over the past few months that i truly believe the entire world should just all come together and start taking fridays off, too. because 2 days off out of 7 just never seems to be enough for us. i certainly wouldn't mind an extra sunday. even if businesses shut down for 1 extra day! we would all get by, wouldn't we? isn't that a good idea? tell me you agree. if we start a petition, i'll turn it in to Kid President. I'm almost positive he'd agree. and if anyone can inspire the world, it's him. 

our weekend {really long}

f r i d a y / /

I had been looking forward to Friday all week long! I mean, that's usually the case, but this week seemed longer and harder than usual, so the weekend was very welcome come 5:00 on friday! On my way home, Devin called and said he was just driving back from the dog park and wanted to meet me at Home Depot so we could pick out a pot and a plant to put on our front porch, which I had been wanting to do for a long time! Our front porch looks pretty bare, so I thought a big, pretty plant or a topiary would fix it up. We had also been playing around with the idea of building an herb garden, too. We couldn't find any large plants that we liked, or that would look normal on a front porch in a pot, haha, and we both started leaning more toward doing the herb garden instead. we saw a lot of planters that would have worked for what we wanted, but in the end, we decided to build one instead! we were running out of time to get all the supplies we needed, so we left with some garden soil, seeds for chives, rosemary and basil, and left with a long list of what we needed, so we could go back the next day to get it all!

we wanted to try and take trax up to salt lake again, but with the places we wanted to go and the times we needed to be there, it would have made for way too much walking, so we drove instead. first stop: why, ekamai and bruges, of course! yellow curry from ekami with a vegetable spring roll is my favorite meal lately. i love that tiny little hole-in-the-wall place, and if you're ever in salt lake and feel like eating some good Thai food, ekamai is the place to go! the women who cook the food and everything are so cute and recognize us by now! ha! but we couldn't stop there, the belgian waffles next door our completely irresistible, so even if you've stuffed yourself with purple rice and curry, you find a way to make room for dessert. we usually share a waffle, because they are pretty expensive, but the last few times we've gone, we've both been a little selfish and wanted our own. we highly recommend you get the torpedo waffle, which is stuffed with belgian chocolate, and it would be a crime if you didn't get some creme fraiche on top! their other toppings include various fruits, some weird things i can't pronounce and don't know what they are, ice cream, and more belgian chocolate drizzled over top! it's heavenly. i talk about these places way too much!

we still had some time to kill before our next event, and we both needed to go to the bathroom. i asked devin, "where's the one place in salt lake city with bathrooms we can trust?" and we headed promptly to the temple square visitor's center! haha! the church always seems to have the cleanest, best smelling bathrooms. but it was nice to take the time while we were there to go ponder at the Christus and walk around that big, gorgeous temple, all lit up and shining as the sky went dark. it was such a nice spring evening, not even too cold, and it felt very romantic to stroll around the temle grounds while it snowed cherry blossoms.

after that, we found our way over to Urban Lounge, because doors were opening at 9:00 for a show by our dear friend, Joshua James! sort of funny confession: this was my first time in a bar, okay well second, but the real first time was in kamas and i just got a burger and diet coke and lady called me "sweetie" because i looked so young and i didn't have my ID so she was really worried about letting me order my diet coke (heaven forbid!).... remember that? yeah. i'm not gonna count it. but anyway, i was all sorts of nervous and kept asking devin the silliest questions. he thinks i'm very irrational sometimes, but that's okay. because i am. i felt pretty out of my element when the people in line behind us were discussing the "brownies" they had baked earlier that week, and once we got inside when the crowd got louder and louder as they finished their first drinks. nonetheless, i started feeling much more at home as gym members at momentum started coming up to say hi to devin (joshua is a member at the gym, so a lot of other members had come out to support him!) we waited (read: drained our phone batteries) for about an hour before the first musician came out, another one of our favorite locals, Isaac Russel! i had never seen isaac perform live, but he was absolutely amazing! like i said, the crowd was loud, and within the first few seconds, you could tell that isaac was really, really frustrated with all the noise. surely enough, after about 3 songs, he stopped playing and said "wow. you guys are awful." and went on to tell everyone to be quiet (but he didn't say it quite that nicely). the crowd listened, and he was able to play a few more, but during his last 2 or 3 songs they got loud again, and he looked so relieved to have finished his set, and got right off that stage! poor guy. i don't understand why people would pay $15 to come to a show, just to sit in the crowd and talk louder than the musician?! pretty rude, if you ask me. luckily, we had gotten there early enough to score a seat in the front near the stage and we could hear everything great.

we waited another half hour or so and joshua james finally came out with his band. by this time, it was 11:00 or 11:30 (which is about an hour past my usual bed time) and i was pretty exhausted. but when joshua started playing, i was completely blown away. he is one of the best live performers i have ever seen, and to know him outside of his music career, and just as a friend gives you a different perspective when you see someone on stage like that. i was completely beside myself. aside from his raw, natural talent (which, whoa.), it was so incredible to watch him just completely succumb to the music. he wasn't in that room. he was off somewhere else when he was playing and it was the coolest thing to witness. i had never seen a musician become so completely saturated in their music like that. he was so passionate about it. you could tell by the way he would close his eyes and move around the stage as he played his guitar and you could tell by the way he rarely even looked at the crowd. it was almost a spiritual experience, really. i feel like i can't even really describe what it was like to be in that room, so you'll just have to trust me. but really. i had never experienced anything like it. at about midnight, i was getting sick of the crowd, and the beat from the speakers replacing my own heart beat, but there was one song i was still really hoping to hear, and right then, he played it! and it was absolutely amazing! and i told devin that i could leave happily now. i so badly wanted to stay for the whole show, but i was so, so tired and that crowd... so we went home. but man. i will never forget that show! as we were walking to the car, i inducted the show into my own personal concert-hall-of-fame. now, he sits there, in my mind, next to tim mcgraw, journey and a few select others that left me speechless after their shows.

s a t u r d a y / /

after being out so late (to us, we're wimps!) we definitely slept even, even though we hadn't planned to. we took the morning pretty slow and cleaned the house, and then headed down to home depot again to finish our shopping for the herb garden. i drove separately from devin so i could leave as soon as i got a call from kayla telling me she was close. we were meeting up so we could drive together to Gardner Village. she let me know she was close in the middle of the trip, so i left devin to the list and the shopping cart, and headed to Ikea, our usual meeting place.

from there, we drove up to Gardner Village, where we were meeting my mom and kelli. my mom's birthday is this week on Thursday and for her birthday, all she wanted was to spend the day with us up there! i hadn't been to gardner village since I was really young, and it was a lot of fun to go back! they had so many cute boutiques, craft stores, consignment shops, and a gorgeous quilt shop. we had so much fun joking around, going to lunch, telling stories and shopping together. we were there for 5 hours and we didn't want it to end! we all left with some cute stuff, and tons of candy from the awesome candy shop! it will definitely become a tradition! my sisters and my mom are my best friends. i love spending time with them like that.

while i was out with my sisters and mom, devin was building the herb garden planter. he photographed it all for me because he says he knew i'd want to put pictures up on the blog. he knows me so well! ha! when i got home, it was the best surprise to see it completely built, sitting in the garage! i am so impressed with his talent. he has built us so much furniture for us, and he loves it! i definitely don't mind either. we were both very anxious at this point to get our garden planted!

after a trip to the grocery store, and some dinner, we laid on the couch and ended the night with pitch perfect. because that movie hasn't gotten old yet! we still love it! i was so tired from being out all day and devin was pretty worn out, too. my favorite part of the week day is lounging around on the couch with devin, catching up on shows and finally feeling relaxed, and it feels good to do the same on the weekends, too.

s u n d a y / /

we had been asked to substitute in primary on sunday, and we were pretty excited about it. we have never had a primary calling, just nursery and now young single adult representatives, so it was a good change. we had the valiant 10 class and we taught them about missionaries. they were awesome! so smart and so funny. i love 10 year olds! it was a blast. we had printed out some missionary badges and they all wore them into sharing time, it was the cutest thing. primary is really loud and a little frustrating, but i think i liked it better than relief society, haha! i'm glad we signed up to be subs for primary, and i hope we get another chance soon!

we've been slowly trying to get cooper used to being in the house by himself, instead of locked in his pen, so we will leave him out when we go to the grocery store or run quick errands, but on sunday, we left him alone in the house for the full 3 hours of church and he did awesome! it looks like he may have chewed up the cap for one of devin's cameras (not the ones he uses, just the ones he collects), but nothing else was ruined! i'm so impressed with him. such a good dog! sunday was such a gorgeous day so we spent most of the afternoon outside after lunch. we stained the planter (it's perfect!) and filled it with gravel and dirt and decided it would get better sunlight on the back patio than the front porch, so we're back to looking for a big plant for the front again! i think our best bet will be ikea, so we'll just have to try looking there. anyway, all of the herbs we got can't be planted until about June, so we are very impatiently waiting! the planter turned out exactly how we wanted though, and it will be fun to see if we can actually grow something in there!

later sunday night, we drove down to Orem and celebrated all the April birthdays with my mom's side of the family. we ate way too much food, and kayla, who works at sweet tooth fairy, baked an amazing cake for the party. she is so talented! she did an ombre rosette frosting pattern and told me she would make me a similar one for my birthday! we had a lot of fun with the family, and then headed to devin's parents to hear about their trip to Moab they took this week. i have never been to Moab and now i'm even more excited to get down there some time.

we got home a little late and i got some etsy stuff done and also made a first-time-ever appointment for friday (more on that later. you'll all be shocked and amazed!) and we called it a night. it was the best weekend! it felt like a really long weekend, but at the same time, i can't believe it's already monday. here's hoping the next weekend comes fast!