THURSDAYS ARE THE BEST!

Why are Thursdays the best? 
Because that's when new episodes of My Favorite Murder come out and I get to edit photos in my office and giggle to the funniest podcast!

Seriously, I look forward to Thursdays so much now just because I know I get to crack up alone in my office for a good hour and a half or so while I work. It's silly how something so small makes me so happy but it's become a little tradition of mine the past couple months now and it's perfect! 

Here's the thing, if you love true crime/ survivor stories/ or are just slightly fascinated by interesting weird things, you should give this podcast a try! The two hosts are so hilarious and clever, and even though I have never met them, I feel like the three of us are friends now haha. It's weird how that happens huh? Or maybe it's just me. 

Anyway, this podcast is so interesting with crazy stories, and funny, and I think you'll love it!

Podcast: www.feralaudio.com/myfavoritemurder

FAVORITE THINGS

A list to remember all my favorite things when I was 24.

FAVORITE:
Movie: La La Land.
Place: Yosemite National Park.
Food: Carne asada burritos, or just Mexican food in general.
TV Show: The Office. 
Favorite [currently watching] TV Show: SNL, Orange is the New Black (season 5) Breaking Bad (again), Modern Family.
Color: Mustard Yellow.
Candy: See's chocolates. Specifically Cashew Brittle, Coconut Special, Key Lime + Lemon Truffles, Scotchmallows, California Brittle (dark).
Little Treat to Get: A Dizzle from Swig.
Place around SLC: Little Cottonwood Canyon.
Band: The National or Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros.
Thing about this Summer: Season Passes to Lagoon + Seven Peaks!
Thing about work: Having the freedom to come and go as I please. And eating lunch with Jeremy everyday. 
Flower: Gerber Daisies 
Scent: Pine trees, and the smell of rain on dirt.
Thing About Living in Utah: Having so many friends here!
Time of Day: Morning time when I get to drink my morning chai and listen to music or the podcast "My Favorite Murder". And evening time when Jeremy & I settle down to be lazy and watch TV in comfy clothes!
SLC Eatery: Zupas, Taco stand on State Street by Sears, The Park Cafe, R&R BBQ.
Item in my room: My Himalayan salt lamp, and my new queen size bed!
Current Book: The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up. I'm trying to de-clutter my life and mind. 
Podcast: My Favorite Murder. Duh.
Holiday: Christmas, then Halloween, then 4th of July!
Favorite Thing About Being 24: Just feeling completely content with my life and who I am. 22 was the magic year where I stopped caring what other people thought and it was a beautiful thing! I like who I am and I like my life. 

 

WEEKEND TRIP TO JEREMY'S HOMETOWN

If you didn't already know, Jeremy is from the teeny tiny town of Nephi. I just looked up the population and it's 5,389. I tease him a lot for being from Nephi but it has it's cute little quirks if small towns are your thing. They're not my thing at all, and I can't imagine growing up in a middle of nowhere desert town, but to each their own! 

Everytime we go to Nephi, we never go to any of their restaurants, but we finally did! We went to a little Mexican restaurant on the main road and got enchiladas, beans, and rice.

This trip was fun because everytime we drive to Nephi we always pass The Red Barn in Santaquin and I always want to stop but it's closed on Sundays and that's usually when we're passing by it. This time though, we drove back on Saturday so we actually were able to stop!

 

It's just exactly what you think a cute little off the freeway tourist stop would be. Chocolate covered nuts and fruits in cellophane bags, caramel apples, fruit pies, handmade jams and honey, and yummy handmade ice cream cones! If you're driving on the 15 in Utah, I suggest stopping to stretch your legs and get an ice cream cone at The Red Barn.

This photo seems like the epitome of Jeremy + I. Him always working and tinkering with his car, and me doing anything but. He had to change his oil so I sat next to him on a camping chair and painted my nails light pink. He asked "Do you want to learn how to do this?" and I just said "no thankyou." and kept on acting like the 14 year old diva that I am. ;)


One day I'll learn how to change my oil but 24 isn't the year to do that! 

BIG LIFE CHANGES ARE HAPPENING!

The other day I sat on the porch swing and talked to Mamabear for over an hour on the phone. This used to be a much more of a frequent thing in the past, but we haven't had as long of conversations recently.

We chit chatted about plans for the summer, possible trips we might go on, and life plans for the next couple of years, and I realized everything might be shifting rather drastically in the next year or so. Forrest might be moving to Southern California in the next year to be closer to his business partner for their company. Mama is planning on retiring and possibly moving into the Salt Lake City house, and I've been flirting with the idea of moving to New York City next Spring/early Summer. New York City ...or LA. One of the two!

It's all very exciting but also a lot of changes in such a short amount of time! It was weird to realize that within a year, Forrest, Mama, and I might all be living in not just new cities, but new states. 

Here's to bigger and better things, and not letting life get too stagnant!

 

MOVIE TUESDAY: 47 METERS DOWN.

Tuesday night I watched 47 Meters Down for $5 Movie Tuesday with Forrest and Alyssa, and let me just say I now have a new found fear of the ocean! That movie was so stressful and intense and made me realize just how huge and unknown the ocean truly is. 

Granted, it wasn't an amazing movie or anything but it was still pretty good! Overlook Mandy Moore's poor acting abilities and it will be much more enjoyable for you! haha.

I think what I like about that movie most is that the characters never do anything you wouldn't also do. I think that's the worst part about scary/suspenseful movies for me; when the characters do idiotic things that you're yelling at the screen "What?! Don't do that, you dumby!" I just can't stand when characters don't make normal human instinct decisions. 
 Examples: Splitting up the group to "cover more ground". Going into the dark scary attic/basement/crawlspace to "just check it out". Having someone chasing after you in a house so you run upstairs instead out the front door. (Here's the thing, if someone is already about to murder me, I'm not about to go deeper into my house by going upstairs, I'm running out that front door into the open.)

The two women in 47 Meters Down make normal decisions and I think that's refreshing in this type of genre. Except their first decision to even get in that rickety old shark cage; I wouldn't have made that decision!

Last night I asked Jeremy "Can they [great white sharks] really be 25 feet?" Just out of pure disbelief that something so terrifying is allowed to be that big. It just doesn't seem fair that a creature so terrifying already is allowed to grow so big also. I feel like they should only grow to like 12 feet tops haha. 

So naturally we laid in bed watching different great white shark videos right before bed which were so awful. Luckily I didn't have any shark dreams. :)   

SHOOTING AND STUFF

But not that kind of shooting. Actual shooting. I've become so used to using "shooting" as just a photography term that I forgot it's not the original meaning. 

Jeremy + I went shooting with Forrest at a gun range in Murray because Forrest has been wanting to go with us for a while. It had been a couple years since I've been and I think I psych myself out before each time. It's not so much the fear that I will misuse a gun, but that someone else will accidentally shoot me. It's just a scary thought that someone else mistake could cost you your life. I guess that's true for most things though. 
 

 

For not being a gun fanatic whatsoever, it is actually really fun to go shooting once you're actually doing it. It's just a fun game of trying to make it as close to the bullseye as you can. And I have to just toot my own horn and say I'm actually pretty good! I mean just look at my little target guy! And he was far away on the line!

 

The next morning, a coworker asked me "How was shooting?" and for a split second I probably looked really confused as I tried to remember what photos I took the day before. Then I remembered he meant real shooting, he wasn't asking me about photos haha.

It was a lot of fun! Just invest in some good ear protection before you go and you're golden!  


The gun range: www.tntgunrange.com
(the employees there are super friendly!)

MY FIRST TRIP TO PORTLAND!

I have always wanted to go to Portland. I've only ever been as far as the Portland airport which doesn't count. Lately I've decided that I rather save up my money and spend it on experiences and trips rather than just things. So slowly but surely, that's what I'll do! 

I'll go to places I've never been. See things I've never seen. Travel as much as I can while I'm still young and can enjoy it. I think all too often people buy into this idea that they will have more time to travel once they get older and have more steady incomes, but I want to travel while I'm young and can truly enjoy it!  

Our trip was so lovely and I loved Oregon so much! We stayed a couple nights in downtown Portland at The Society Hotel and a night in Lincoln City right on the beach! It was the most peaceful thing to hear the ocean right outside our window as we slept. The whole trip we kept waking up naturally every morning no later than 6:30am. I think it was a mix of being on Utah time still and being excited for each day's adventures!

 

We went to: 

Voodoo Doughnuts. Multnomah Falls. Lincoln City Beach. Upper Left Roasters. Tea Bar. The Japanese Gardens. The Saturday Market along the river. Chipotle (this has weirdly become our travel food which we secretly love!) Powells (only because a million people told me I just HAD to go there.) The town of Tillamook, but not the factory. A yummy Mexican restaurant in Lincoln City with some of the worst service I've had. A yummy pizza/pub place across the street from our hotel for a little late night pepperoni pizza run. The prettiest waterfall near Multnomah Falls which I honestly liked better! You could walk right up to where the water hits and there were far fewer people there.

 

 

 Trip Highlights:

• Japanese Gardens.
• Falling asleep in Lincoln City to the sounds of waves crashing on the shore.
• The Froot Loop donut from Voodoo Doughnut! (and getting there when there was no line at all. Go Friday morning at 9:00am- ish!)
• Strolling through the Saturday Market near the river.
• The vanilla steamer that Jeremy got from Tea Bar that I drank way too much of.
• Watching the sun set from the rooftop garden of our hotel.
• Driving along the old highway instead of the freeway on the way back from Multnomah Falls! That old highway is so much prettier and reminds me of all the gold mining towns I love so much in the Sierra Nevada.
• Our last morning spent on the beach looking for whole sand dollars. 
• Sitting on a bench in the Rose Garden surrounded by pretty things and just being at complete peace for those 20 minutes or so.

SWISS ARMY MAN

I watched Swiss Army Man again last night and I had forgotten just how heartfelt that movie is! It's just so cute, and funny, and beautifully shot, and the music is so fun. We first watched it when it came out in theaters, but since then, I hadn't watched it again.

Really though, I know the synopsis perhaps may not seem like it will be a feel-good movie, but it really is so heartfelt! I love just how strange, and whimsical, and truly creative it feels. I haven't seen another film like this one and that's hard to do these days with how many movies, and stories, and plots we've seen.

Favorite quote from the movie:

"If you don't know Jurassic Park, you don't know shit." 

 

STRESS INDUCED SLEEPINESS

Does anyone else have stress induced sleepiness?

I feel like anytime I'm overly stressed or in the midst of any type of confrontation I get really sleepy. Like just yawning up a storm and wanting to lay down wherever I am and take a little nap. I know it must totally be a coping mechanism but I wonder just how common it is. 

Sometimes Jeremy will come to me to talk something out or try to get my input and I just feel like clocking out for a good 30 minutes. There was one time when we were thinking about buying a new camera together, and he just wanted to sit down and talk about which camera I was leaning towards, and I just kept yawning and looking over at my pillow who was just sweetly calling out my name asking me to lay down. I'm pretty sure I even ended up giving in and napping after our super short camera conversation. (I mean, that was even an exciting thing and my mind still wanted to flee from that conversation because it required some type of decision to be made.)

It's not even something that I intentionally do, it just happens. I know it's my body trying to manage stress but it really is the worst response I can think of. I remember it would happen a lot when I was in college. I would sit down to do the hours of homework I knew I had to do but end up taking a nap instead because I was too stressed to even start! Instead of trying to tackle any of it, I would just run away from all of it. Dumb haha.

So if anyone else has this, let me know what you do to push past it. Because once I get to that stress-sleepy phase, it's all downhill from there!

BIRTHDAY DINNER FOR DREW!

Wednesday was my friend Drew's birthday so we all got together to celebrate him at Porcupine Pub & Grille! I had never been there before but that place is really cool! There's these cool red garage doors that open up to join the patio seating with the inside and it feels so fun inside! Jeremy and I got a super yummy turkey sandwich to share because I was a dumby and decided to eat cereal and a cookie before we went so I just wasn't super hungry.

I'm glad Jeremy is always willing to share with me. We also got a super huge nacho appetizer plate to share with the whole table and those were so yummy!

After Porcupine, we went to Hatch Family Chocolates in the Avenues for dessert! I got a chocolate covered strawberry and chocolate covered raspberries which were SOO good! 
We all hung out, ate our treats, and chit chatted. Emily and Drew are moving next week so it was a bittersweet night; excited for Drew's 32nd Birthday but sad that they're leaving soon!

I'm so grateful to have such good friends live so close to me! It was nice to have so many friends in Rexburg and I'm so grateful so many of them now live in Salt Lake City & Provo! 

RAINY COFFEE SHOP MORNING

I love a lot of things in life, but one thing I really love is a good summer rain storm. 

There's just something so refreshing about the rain and clouds after having hot dry weather. Because we haven't been getting nice rainy days lately, Jeremy and I decided to spend our morning at the coffee shop sipping our drinks by the window.

If you live in Salt Lake City and haven't been to Blue Copper yet, you should treat yourself to yummy drinks and go! Even if you're not a coffee fan. My favorite from there is the Mocha, and when it's a really hot day they have the most delicious Vanilla Bean Lemonade that is so smooth and refreshing. So at least try one of those two! Jeremy likes the Flat White and Cortados but those are just way too strong for me. 

It really was such a nice morning to start the day! Mornings where we do something before work always make it easier to enjoy work. I mean, I enjoy my job anyway, but it's just fun to start the day a little out of the ordinary. 

MOVIE TUESDAY!

Last night for Movie Tuesday, we saw Baywatch. Not really our first pick of a movie to see, but there's not much out these days besides the ones we've already seen. It was okay. I wouldn't recommend watching it in theaters; it's easily a Redbox or Netflix watch, but it also wasn't bad. It was just... okay.

We did have fun though! We went to an early showing at 4:50pm and there were only 4 other people in our theater watching it. We got another free soda coupon from our movie points which is seriously the nicest system! We're already buying movie tickets anyway so it's fun to get free things for doing so! And I'm such a sucker for Root Beer at the movie theater. Yum!

New movies come out this Friday so hopefully we have some fun ones to choose from next Tuesday! I think the Amy Poehler/ Will Ferrell one (The House) comes out soon and I'm excited for that! I'm also excited for Spider-Man and Dunkirk!

WEEKENDS + WEDDINGS.

This past weekend was so fun! 

FRIDAY
It started off with my friend's Alex & Holly's wedding at La Caille on Friday!  The venue was beautiful and at the base of Little Cottonwood Canyon so the views of the mountains were just so beautiful! 

It felt like a little Rexburg friend reunion and I loved every minute of it! It honestly kind of made me miss Rexburg too. Not so much the town but just that time of my life and having 30 really fun, good friends living in a mile radius of me. I guess I just have missed a lot of them more than I realized, so it was a pretty nostalgic night. It was also cute to meet friend's babies, and see ones who have grown what feels like 4 years in a matter of a year. 

We ate yummy food. We danced. We had the yummiest little desserts! I'm talking mini pecan pie bites, mini key lime bites, and chocolate covered strawberries. So good! It was just a really fun night and I was so happy to see old friend who I hadn't seen in a couple years.

SATURDAY
Saturday I had checks to cash and since I'm still old fashion I have to actually take them to the bank to get them cashed. I should get that mobile deposit thing though. So I went to City Creek to get that done and decided to walk across the street to Temple Square to walk around. I hadn't done that in a while so it was lovely to be able to just walk around on my own and sit by the fountain watching all the bride and grooms take photos. I always really enjoy watching other photographers at Temple Square to see how they direct and engage with their clients.  

I also got myself a little Lion House roll and honey butter and just sat outside on a bench in the sunshine eating it. I'm so glad they let you just buy one! It's one dollar on the dot if you're curious. 

SUNDAY
Jeremy and I usually eat at The Park either Saturday or Sunday morning, but this Sunday morning we decided just to do cereal and poptarts at home while we watched a little bit of Orange is the New Black! We then went to Blue Copper for coffee and bagels.

Then it was time for Lagoon! I'm so happy that Jeremy is always willing to go to Lagoon when I suggest it. We've been three times this year and it's so fun each time!
My favorite rides lately are: Cannibal, Turn of the Century (the swings), and an airplane ride that I'm not sure the name of. It's the one where you can control your own little airplane propeller to make yourself swing higher as the ride goes. That one is so fun but always slightly scary because we make ourselves go too high and it starts to kind of snap at the cables. 

Also I know I'm getting older because Jeremy and I both willingly killed about an hour in Pioneer Village just walking around and going in all the shops to look at the old artifacts. I know if I was any younger than I am now I would have been annoyed by the fact that we were spending time looking at all the old buildings and carriages instead of going on rides, but we both were just loving it so much! We saw all the old carriages, went inside the printing press shop, and looked at all the old merchandise and clothing from the late 1800s. We really were acting like a cute little old couple just happy as can be in Pioneer Village. :)



 
 

NEW BED, NEW ME

I got a new bed, and boy oh boy am I already in love!

I upgraded from a double (or full, I get those confused) to a Queen and that little bit of extra room is just what I needed. It's so soft and cushion-y, and I bought brand new white sheets and a new comfy mattress cover that has a lot of plush to it. Basically I'm sleeping on a little cloud now you guys, and it's magical! 

And perhaps I may sleep like a star fish sideways in bed so I'm excited to have even more space to sprawl myself out! Jeremy hates it, but I can't help that I sleep like that; I mean... how do you really control something when you're asleep? :]

It's funny how just something like getting new sheets and a bed makes it exciting again to go to sleep. Once I got everything set up, I was so excited to lay down and try it out.
I mean, I've always loved sleeping, but not so much the actual act of making myself stop what I'm doing and go to bed. 

This new bed is so lovely and just what I needed to encourage me to go to bed at a reasonable hour. 

 

WONDER WOMAN DATE NIGHT

Tuesday night, as we typically do on Tuesday nights, we went to the movies. We watched Wonder Woman and I loved it! I've never been a huge super hero movie fan (with the exception of Spider-Man and the Dark Knight Trilogy) but I really loved this one. It was entertaining and fun, but I also really loved that it was so female driven and also directed by a woman. Yay for more women in the movie industry!

I just really love strong female leads in movies. Even in a lot of movies where you would initially consider the lead character to be a strong, independent woman, there always seems to be a male character that comes in to save her, or save the day. I just really loved how bad ass Wonder Woman is in this movie.  

We also pigged out at the theater last night which was so yummy! I got points for a free soda, and then we each got a mini pepperoni pizza, and nachos to share. Oh it was so yummy! Way too much junk food for my diet I'm supposed to be on, but so yummy! And only 10 bucks for all that which seems like such a good deal at a movie theater.

During the previews, Jeremy leaned over and said "I'm really glad that we do this. It's crazy I didn't even know about $5 Tuesday until we met."
Oh how I love $5 Movie Tuesdays!

SUNNY WEEKEND IN LA!

This weekend I went to Los Angeles to help out at Forrest's company booth at the Cine Gear Expo. It was super fun and the expo was in the Paramount Pictures studio lot so it was so cool to be able to walk around and explore the lot in between helping at the booth.

 

Forrest started a company with his business partner Dan Kanes called Atlas Lens Co. They make anamorphic camera lenses and this weekend they were demo-ing them at the Cine Gear Expo. I went to be a model so when people were trying out the lenses they had something to focus on and compare. It was really fun! Anytime a huge crowd would build up someone would lean in and ask if I felt weird having everyone stare at me and I just told them I didn't mind at all. It really didn't feel weird because I know that it was all technical based. People were just trying to see how sharp the lens was and test the bokeh and flares. Plus a secret part of me always likes being on camera. :)

  

My mom and dad both drove down to see the booth so that was so nice to see both of them this weekend also! Mama actually stayed at the show both days and helped also, and my dad came down Saturday and spent the day with us. This photo was right before we started taking down the booth at the end of the show.

The expo was only Friday + Saturday so we had Sunday just to play!
We went up to the Griffith Observatory and then down to the Hollywood Walk of Fame. I hadn't been there in years so it was fun to see all the craziness again! 

Also, the amount of snakes there are NOT fun! I am so terrified of snakes and people had huge ones around their necks for tourists to take photos with and I hated every single moment of that! I would see one so I would walk further away from it on the sidewalk only to be confronted by another guy with another huge snake around him right beside me. Man do I hate snakes! 

We stopped and got ice cream cones at Ghiradelli which were so yummy! I've never been the biggest ice cream fan but it was so warm outside that ice cream just sounded exactly like what we needed! I also really want to go back on a weekday to go to a showing of Jimmy Kimmel Live which is filmed on that street. 

We drove around the neighborhoods and looked at all the huge beautiful houses and Jeremy and I brainstormed how we can get rich quick so we can afford to move into a mini mansion in LA. We've yet to hit our big idea yet but it's coming, I can feel it! 

We also stopped by Tiffen in Burbank to see another little set up Forrest and Dan were doing at the Tiffen Open House. We saw Garrett Brown there (the inventor of the steadicam) who actually filmed The Shining! Those steadicam Shining shots really changed the game for the movie industry, so it was cool to see him there with his steadicams letting people try them on and do some mock filming.

 

Trips like this always light that little traveling/moving flame in me. Maybe come November or so I can think more about moving so I can have one last summer and fall in Salt Lake City. Who knows. But it sure is fun to daydream about! :)

Atlas Lens Co:  atlaslensco.com

"The Steadicam and The Shining":  www.tested.com/art/movies/457145-shining-and-steadicam

SOMETIMES YOU HAVE REALLY GOOD DAYS

And sometimes you lay in bed and on the couch for 15 hours throwing up and feeling like you might pass out at any given moment.
Gross, I know. 

But that was my life yesterday. Jeremy and I both woke up yesterday morning super sick with the same exact thing. I don't know if it was the stomach flu or food poisoning but I haven't felt that sick in years. I can't even remember the last time I've had the stomach flu honestly. Probably since I lived at home and that was at least 5 years ago.

Also yesterday I realized I go to a very dark place when I'm that miserable. I kept telling Jeremy I couldn't do it anymore and I just wanted to die. Obviously I didn't want to die but that's how much pain and agony I was in. I think more realistically I wanted to take a four day hibernation nap and wake up when it was all over. Poor Jeremy though had to not only deal with his own pain, but also an overly dramatic girlfriend. Oof. Sorry about that. 

I still feel so weak and light headed today but at least all the stomach stuff is over. I'm trying so hard to drink liquids and put food in my stomach but it's scary to think anything might trigger all that pain again. 

Yesterday was truly a miserable miserable day. 
But it definitely makes me appreciate my health so much more!