katie, lately

Life has been such a circus lately! There has been so much going on that I just don't have the time to sit down long enough to write up an entire blog posts! That being said -- am I mis-using this Sunday afternoon while Devin plays video games? I'm gonna say no for now. Here's what I've been up to lately...

 

kade loves dogs. he just doesn't know it yet.

  

the whole family waiting for the show to start at the new pavilion by the senior center in orem

 

so devin's grandpa is in a band. he plays the trumpet and they are really incredible!

 

cooper sat with devin like this for at least 15 minutes

 

addi's signature pose - showing me her cute shoes

 

the most perfect batch of macarons i've made to date! these were for my cousin's fiance's bridal shower!

 

my sister and her husband are in a band called The Zero Summers - and they are becoming a pretty big deal! when they played a show at university mall in orem, we knew we had to make it! they did so great, and i thought they were even better than the headliner!

 

< sometimes when i'm having a bad day, i go home on my lunch break and snuggle with cooper. and then i'm alright.

> we went to our favorite, Gourmandise, for dinner last week with our dear friend Skyler and I couldn't pass up their macarons, of course. this place is an authentic french bakery, so their macarons are basically perfect! i ordered a pistachio and chocolate macaron and the server brought me a lemon one to try for free! the pistachio is my favorite so far!

 

< car rides with this dog 

> i just can't. he's the cutest thing.

< we went to the bee's game with sean and chloe one night! they were celebrating the 20th anniversary of the movie "The Sandlot" - so the cast was there! Ham looks exactly the same. It was pretty awesome!

> yesterday morning, Devin grabbed the mail on his way home from work. He walked in carrying a package and I asked him what it was. He looked at me confused and said it was for me, asking if I had ordered anything. I hadn't. When I opened the package, I found this amazing french macaron cookbook and a note from my sweet friend Amy, saying she works for a company that just published this book and when she saw it, she knew I'd love it! I'm still not over how sweet it was of her! I am so excited to try making some more! thanks a million, Ames!

weekend update

oh my goodness, this weekend was incredible! okay that's not completely true because i spent friday night at home by myself alphabetizing our dvd's out of boredom while devin worked BUT. saturday, man. saturday was the best. Oh, but we did go to lunch on Friday! You see, every Friday at work for me is basically Armageddon. It's super stressful and I was having a pretty bad day (ranged from beetles to angry people, so...), so Devin met me for lunch and we ate huge, messy burgers and I felt much better.

burger wasted.

devin had to teach a class at the gym saturday morning so he got up and went to work. i woke up a little later and got together my climbing gear and some lunch, and then met him at the gym and we went up Big Cottonwood Canyon to the Reservoir Wall (side note: i sometimes wonder if people who aren't familiar with climbing know that each different wall or climbing area has it's own name. usually, the person who bolts the routes, which could be anyone who knows how, names it. I've talked a lot about climbing at The Wild and The Zoo that's near, but there are a lot of places. Devin and his Brother just climbed 7 pitches of one called "Cosmic Space Dust Lasers", so there really isn't any rhyme or reason to the names of these places we climb)

i sort of love the empty gym in the morning as they are opening. 

I would love to climb with that place to myself!

I had never climbed up Big Cottonwood, and I had never climbed on quartzite rock, either. We were in the sun and it was pretty hot, but we had a nice breeze! I was getting pretty excited and proud of myself for putting a lot of the techniques and movements I had been learning to good use, but on the first route, the mental game won and I came off the wall from about half way up really upset and disappointed. I hate that! I don't understand how/why my mind can control my climbing. That should just be left up to my strength and my body, right?! It can be so frustrating when you let it! I was mad. But I'm also going to blame the heat, because hot climbing shoes hurt and my toes were in a lot of pain!

big cottonwood canyon is absolutely beautiful!

loving my new and much needed chalk bag!

>imagine a picture of a moose right here, because there's supposed to be one, it's just on my other camera and i'm hugely lazy about uploading photos. the point is, this awesome moose grazed by us for awhile and it was pretty cool. moving on...<

After I rested for awhile and got my head cleared, I tried a second route, and it was the same thing. I was so proud of myself for trying things I had been afraid of before. I was using those tiny, tiny footholds (howintheworld do those microscopic lips on the rock hold me up?!) and I was going for moves, even if I wasn't confident I would stick them - except this time, I finished! When I came back down I told Devin that I couldn't even remember the last time I saw the anchors of a long route like that. I was so happy and in the best mood after that! I wanted to end on a good note, so we stopped there, plus it was getting way too hot.

We had been in the sun for awhile and were pretty hot, and neither of us wanted to get back into climbing shoes so we went home and headed straight for the pool! I love that our development has a neighborhood pool! It's not super nice and it's pretty small, but we have been at the pool so much since it opened on Memorial Day, and we will spend pretty much all summer there, I'm sure. We swam and laid in the sun for awhile and then started feeling guilty that we had left cooper at home all day (i'm a little opposed to climbing in big and little cottonwood canyons just because they won't let my dog come along), so when we got home, we took him to the dog park and let him run around for awhile. He is the funniest dog and every time we go, people comment on how much personality he has. I love that! He was even chasing butterflies around just like Riley does.

one abandoned coke can

On our way home, we stopped at the grocery store to grab a few things and then made some dinner and dessert and ended the night a little early because we were so tired! We ended the day with some of the funniest tanlines ever. I had put sunscreen on a few places that I knew I didn't want to get burned, including the tops of my shoulders, that were just recovering from a really bad burn while we were hiking Calf Creek, so I have a ring of sunburn around my shoulder where the sunscreen wasn't all down my arms, dang it! I didn't get any sun on my legs of course. My shoulders look so, so funny though. Devin got a pretty major chaco tanline and some funny lines on his chest and sides from climbing and belaying without a shirt. We are quite the pair!

chicken and pasta with fresh basil and spinach salad with strawberries and feta cheese

this dog makes our lives so. much. fun.

Whoopie Pies

So Devin served in the New Hampshire Manchester Mission which basically covers most of New England (he served in 5 different states!), and apparently, these treats are an East Coast thing. I had never heard of them until I met Devin, and he has always raved about them. He's tried the "moon pies" that are sold out here and says they aren't the same. He even looked into the cost of getting a dozen whoopie pies shipped out to us, but it was crazy expensive.

So I have to give him all the credit for this one. He found a recipe and was determined to make them, so last night, we finally did! He said they were perfect! These were a lot of fun to make and really simple. I don't think anyone could mess them up! I do have a few tips that I think would help at the end, though!

Ingredients: (cakes)

2 cups flour

1/2 cup cocoa

1 1/4 tsp baking soda

1 tsp salt

1 cup buttermilk

1 tsp vanilla

1 stick butter, softened

1 cup packed brown sugar

1 egg

Directions: (cakes)

1. Whisk together four, cocoa, baking soda and salt in a medium bowl, set aside. In a smaller, separate bowl, stir together buttermilk and vanilla, set aside.

2. Beat brown sugar and butter until light brown and fluffy (it's about 3 minutes. longer than you think, but don't over-do it either!). Add the egg and beat until well combined.

3. Reduce the speed on the mixer and begin adding the flour mixture and buttermilk in batches into the mixer until everything is well combined. Make sure to scrape the sides!

4. Spoon 1/4 cup mounds of batter onto a prepared baking sheet (we just used parchment paper). You should have about 8! Bake them in the over at 350 for 11-14 minutes, or until the cakes are cooked all the way through (we had to go all the way to 14 minutes to make sure the middles were cooked!) Let them cool on the cookie sheet completely, and then transfer to wire rack.

Ingredients: (filling)

1 stick butter, softened

1 1/4 cups powdered sugar

2 cups marshmallow creme

1 tsp vanilla

Directions: (filling)

1. Beat all ingredients until well combined (we just used a hand mixer.)

2. Spread about 1-2 tbsp of filling on one cake and sandwich with another cake to assemble the pie.

Tips:

- these are cakes, but they are also cookies, so the batter will be a weird consistency. Almost like brownie batter, but thicker, like a dough. That's how it's supposed to be!

- to get the batter onto the cookie sheets, I just used two spoons. They didn't come out perfect, but they weren't too bad!

- make sure the cookies are completely cooled before you frost them, or the filling will melt and get all over the place and make a huge mess (this happened to us on the first 3 we made!)

- devin says they are supposed to be better on day 2!

the one wear i actually make chocolate chip cookeis

Devin and I had been avoiding grocery shopping for a solid 2 weeks. The lack of food in our house was almost comical, but we did finally go a few nights ago. It wasn't really a pain to have no food in the house, because we had some staples like chicken and rice, but finding snacks to take to work got annoying, and it got really bad when we ran out of Rice Chex: the main ingredient for muddy buddies. We both have a pretty huge sweet tooth and have dessert after almost every meal we make at home, and that's usually muddy buddies. Okay, it's always muddy buddies. So when we finished off that box of cereal, we went 2 or 3 nights with no dessert. It was a travesty, I tell you.

The thought crossed my mind that we had pantry staples, and I could probably very easily bake something, but... meh. My real craving was for a big, perfect chocolate chip cookie. And this makes me laugh. Because I could be the freaking covergirl for how NOT to make chocolate chip cookies. I can make every kind of cookie. Chocolate Peanut Butter Surprise? Easy. Snickerdoodle? No problem. French Macaron? I'm your girl. But Chocolate Chip and I have just never seen eye to eye. I fail so miserably. Every. Single. Time. Recipes? I've tried the lot of them. I can barely manage to make edible chocolate chip cookies from store bought dough! It's very ridiculous, and i'm sure, entertaining.

But then, there was a miracle. One afternoon last week, while I was waiting for my lunch break, feeling really hungry, still craving that chocolate chip cookie (almost subconsciously, though, really). I found it. I happened upon a recipe for them by accident and read through the entire post. They're the "Chewy Chocolate Chunk Cookies" from Sally's Baking Addiction (amazing, amazing blog) and she lists every step in detail, and explains why each step is important and how it works. I think that's what made the difference for me! She had so many awesome tips, so feel free to click on the link, otherwise, I will just list the recipe below with my own photos, proof that they worked!

My problem with chocolate chip cookies was the spreading. The dough was always a great consistency and tasted good, but once those babies came out of the oven, they were spread paper thin, really greasy-looking, and a horrible shade of brown. The always always always looked this way. Every recipe. Every time. No matter what.

What I love about this recipe are all of her tips to counter the spreading. Extra ingredients like the cornstarch and extra egg yolk make the dough a little thicker, and techniques like making the dough balls taller than they are wide help the cookies bake thick and tall, instead of thin and flat. All of those things made a world of difference! I think making sure to pull them out of the oven just slightly underbaked was key, too. Mine did end up a little doughy in the middle, but I think I made my dough balls too big, because some of mine came out like 2 inches thick! Delicious, though. The melted butter trick is still a mystery to me. I don't know why or how it works, but it does, and I'm sure it made a difference, too.

Anyway, the point is that I tried them (which was a pretty big leap of faith!), and it worked! I've broken the curse!

Ingredients:

2 and 1/4 cup all-purpose flour, spoon and leveled

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 and 1/2 teaspoons cornstarch

1/2 teaspoon salt

3/4 cup (1.5 sticks) unsalted butter, melted

3/4 cup light brown sugar, loosely packed

1/2 cup granulated sugar

1 large egg + 1 egg yolk*

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

1 cup chocolate chips or chocolate chunks

Directions:

1. Combine flour, baking soda, cornstarch and salt in a large bowl. Set aside.

2. In a medium size bowl, whisk the melted butter, brown sugar, and white sugar together until smooth. Whisk in the egg, then the egg yolk. Whisk in the vanilla.

3. Combine wet and dry ingredients together and mix with a large spoon or rubber spatula (no mixer needed! boo-ya!). The dough will be really soft because of the butter. Add the chocolate chips. They may not stick to the dough and mix well, but just try to spread them out evenly.

4. Cover the dough and chill for 2 hours, or up to 3 days. Chilling the dough is a must!

5. Take the dough out of the refrigerator and let it sit for 10 minutes to thaw a little bit.

6. Preheat the over to 325F degrees. Line two large baking sheets.

7. Roll the dough into balls, about 2 Tablespoons of dough each. The dough will be crumbly, using your hands to roll the dough will warm it up and allow it to stick a little better.. Roll the cookie dough balls to be taller than they are wide (make them oblong shaped, almost like an egg), to make sure the cookies will be thick. Put 8 balls of dough onto each cookie sheet.

8. Bake the cookies for 11-12 minutes. The cookies will look very mushy and they won't look done. Don't bake longer than 12 minutes though. They will keep baking on the cookie sheet when you take them out of the oven.

9. Allow to cool on the cookie sheet for 10 minutes before moving to a wire rack to cool completely.

10. Giant glass of milk is absolutely necessary.

Notes:

*Room temperature egg + egg yolk is best. To bring eggs to room temperature fast, put the whole eggs into a glass of warm water for 10 minutes.

baked sweet potato fries

i know i'm not the only one who's completely obsessed with these. it's gotten to a point where devin will be all, "hey kate, where do you want to eat for dinner tonight?" and i will go through a list of restaurants in my head that i know serve sweet potato fries, and pick one of them. i'm a little ridiculous. but can you blame me? these things are like candy! one of our newest favorite restaurants, Cafe Bella Rue on Soda Row in the Daybreak area, serves baked sweet potato fries and they are my favorite fries to date. And obviously, much more healthy than anything fried. I knew making them at home was possible, so when we happened to have a few sweet potatoes around, I took a try at making them on my own!

This is one of the easiest things I've ever made, and now I know that I can satisfy my crazy obsession at home! Nothing better than that! I honestly think this recipe was a little overboard on flavors, so next time I'll use a little less salts and seasonings, but they are still to die for. I also thing I may nix the Italian Seasoning. It just wasn't the flavor I wanted. I wanted more BBQ style, so I'm sure just the garlic powder and sea salt would be enough! Would also be delicious with tons of other seasonings! The hardest part was cutting the potatoes into fry strips! Sweet potatoes are really hard!

Ingredients:

2 sweet potatoes (I used 1 large and 1 small, because that's what i had)

2 tbsp olive oil

1 tsp sea salt

1 tsp garlic powder

1 tsp italian seasoning (or other flavor you want)

Directions:

1. cut sweet potatoes into fry strips. try and keep them all the same size so they will cook evenly. you can skin them if you want to. i didn't.

2. in a large ziploc bag, combine all ingredients and SHAKE IT. shake it reallll good. coat everything evenly.

3. spread out coated fries on a cookie sheet covered with tinfoil. make sure none of them overlap! seriously. use 2 cookie sheets if you need to.

4. bake for 35-40 minutes at 425, flipping them twice. I let them bake for 10 minutes, flipped them, let them back for 20 minutes, flipped them, and baked them for 10 more minutes.

5. serve immediately with fry sauce, ketchup, or whatever sauce you want.

weekend

i've seriously got to be more creative with post titles around here, but now is not the time! because now is the time to talk about another glorious weekend we had. as usual, the weekend had been a long time coming. devin finished this semester of school last week and finals were killer, so we definitely needed to celebrate. but first, can i just say how stinking proud i am of that man, my husband? he kicked that semester's trash! school is getting progressively harder, the further he gets into the rec program, and it's become more demanding and time-consuming than ever before, but he was so diligent and so on top of everything. i am amazed! he worked so hard, got great grades, and never once neglected his wife :) that being said, though, i am so very happy this semester is over and we can have a little break! devin is taking a week day off this summer instead of saturdays so he can get in a lot of climbing with his co-workers and friends, and he so deserves it!

this weekend truly started on thursday night (after i bought those adorable shoes - thanks again, target. i can always count on you) when we went up to Squatters in Salt Lake for a big birthday dinner for devin's boss, our dear friend Jeff! it was so good to see all our climber friends. when you're in a room full of climbers like that, the atmosphere is so different from anything else. climbers are awesome. i love em! the highlight of my night was when Devin introduced me to CHRIS SHARMA. I was so start struck. Chris Sharma is the world's greatest sport climber. Like, the very best of the very best. He is incredible. I have watched so many Chris Sharma documentaries, it's ridiculous. This guy is a maniac, he is so talented. Chris has been a long time friend of Jeff and tends to frequent Momentum when he's in the area, since momentum is a world class gym. Chris is also helping design the walls for the new gym opening this fall. I felt like such an idiot when I met him, but I am so glad I got the chance! He is such a cool guy. So humble and laid back. I sometimes forget the celebrities are also people, too. They always seem like a different species or something, haha! It was so cool though. We had delicious food, great company, and laughed a lot at ourselves as we ordered sodas from the bar while everyone else had their beer.

as soon as we were both home on friday, we made a beeline for SodaRow. it's this shopping district in the middle of the daybreak community and they have the cutest restaurants and bakeries. we had eaten at Cafe Bella Rue once before and loved their sandwiches, and had long been fans of their Gelato. they've also got the greatest baked sweet potato fries, which puts them high up on my list. we love the daybreak community and have found ourselves spending a lot of time weaving through the neighborhoods picking out houses we'd love to have, and SodaRow is very dog friendly, so Coop can come along with us, too! it was a little chilly, but we ate outside anyway and then headed over to the pond. cooper was so intrigued by the dock and the water, and i hope this summer he tries to swim, but for now, we stood on the shore and watched the sun slip behind the mountains and turn the sky bright orange. we kept walking around the playgrounds and along the pathways as the neighborhoods grew quieter and the bugs got louder. we were having so much fun and cooper was in heaven! it was the perfect night. we came home and were in bed with our favorite tv shows by 9:00pm! on a friday! but that's just what we wanted.

for saturday, devin had to work and i had a whole lot of nothing to get done. cooper and i snuggled in bed all day long. i didn't even put real clothes on until 3:45! it was so great. i always feel so lazy and unproductive and like i'm wasting precious weekend time when i do that, but that rest was so needed! i finally got out of bed and headed down to provo because i did something for the very first time ever on saturday: i dyed my hair! guys, this is a big deal! i'm almost 22 and am just now dying my hair for the first time! i have always loved my hair color, and that's why i've never tried something different, plus the constant root touch-ups seemed way too high maintenance, i mean, it's a chore to have to wash my hair, so why would i want to pay tons of money every few weeks just to avoid color growing out?! enter the ombre trend. no upkeep. no maintenance. the messier, the better! i was sold! i didn't do a full ombre and just went a lot lighter, mostly toward the front, instead. the change is subtle, but different enough. just what i wanted! i had asked tons of people for their recommendations for stylists, i mean, this was my first time dying my hair and i wanted someone with a good reputation that i could trust! it's my head we're talkin about here! i asked my sister in law, Chloe, because she's always got the most gorgeous hair, and she referred me to her old friend, Natalie. and let me just say - WINNER. Natalie did exactly what i wanted. she was amazing! i had sent her a few pictures of what i liked and she got it dead on. she didn't bleach my hair (thank goodness!) and the color lifted to exactly what i was hoping for. she's a genius. she's the type of stylist who won't let you get out of that chair until you are completely happy. i think i've become her newest regular! another great thing about Natalie, that both chloe and I agreed on is that she has dark hair, too, so she gets it. She understands brunettes! seriously though. i love my hair. i was so anxious and nervous, because i couldn't picture what i would look like with a different hair color, but i love it and it's perfect for summer! maybe i'll try going a few shades darker in the fall? we'll see! it still surprises me to look in the mirror and see blonde in my hair! i'll have to post pictures later when i actually remember to... after my hair appointment, devin and i made tacos for dinner - we've been super into making mexican food lately - and then ran a few errands before heading to bed. it was such a good day!

when sunday came around, my 7:30 alarm for church didn't got off and we didn't wake up until about half hour after church had started! we took advantage of the day together and made a big breakfast and cleaned the house. we tried to go up yellow canyon, but it was so packed, there wasn't even a parking spot! i tried my hand at sweet potato fries for a snack (recipe coming soon - you'll want to try!) and then we went down to Orem for family dinner with his parents, sean and chloe. we got to play with baby ben and cooper got to play with him a little, too. coop was so confused and curious when ben would cry and was very concerned. it was the cutest thing! he kept getting right in the middle of chloe playing with ben and would lick ben's arms, legs and face. good thing chloe didn't mind! he wouldn't stay away! it was so cute though. i'm glad to know that cooper will be good with babies when we start having kids! after dinner and some cheesecake (devin's mom's cheesecake is legendary), we went over to devin's aunt and uncle's house to meet his cousin's fiance. she's so cute and sweet and we're so excited for matt! it was fun to see family and catch up with nana and grandpa, but by that time, we were ready to be home. we did a little party planning for devin's birthday and then called it a night, hardly believing it was already time for monday.

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!