WEIRD LITTLE THINGS

1. The sound of helicopters overhead really stress me out. 
You would think I had lived through some intense war in my life by how scared helicopters make me. One just flew over my work building and I caught myself sinking low in my seat with stressed shoulders. It's an irrational fear really, but it's a deeply rooted one that I have yet to discover the source of.

2. As with a lot of people, I love the smell of coffee but don't care for the taste. Just recently however, I started really loving mochas and vanilla lattes. Essentially any coffee that has a whole lot of sweet stuff added to it is the only kind of coffee I can drink.  

So far, Blue Copper in downtown SLC wins the Olivia award for best mocha. 
They have the yummiest chocolate that they add to their coffee and it's perfection in a mug.

3. I'm still pretty scared of Pennywise from IT. Anytime I have my eyes closed for too long in the shower while I'm washing my face, I picture him being at the drain of the shower when I open my eyes. It's not fun. Don't let your kids watch IT when they're under 10, folks. It'll traumatize them even into adulthood. Maybe if I rewatch it I won't be so scared anymore? Has anyone found that to help with childhood fears?

 4. I feel like my office desk is a real office desk now that there are quarters in my drawer. It seemed like everytime I saw my teacher's desk drawers at school they always had a few quarters in the pencil tray next to their paperclips. I officially have 3 quarters now and I'm feeling reeeaal adult about it.

Photo by: Jordyn Dee

5. I've been addicted to a true crime podcast lately called My Favorite Murder. I know, it sounds morbid and crazy, and frankly, it kind of is. I can't get enough of the two ladies though! I know it sounds crazy to admit I've always slightly been fascinated by serial killers and all that jazz, but I'm just going to throw out there that there must be a lot of us in the world or all those Dateline 20/20 shows wouldn't have been so successful all these years. You guys are all just more secretive about your interest in true crime cases than I am. 

The ladies are hilarious and have a lot of the same analyzing approaches that I do. 
Also, the podcast is pretty informative. Since listening, I now have gel pepper spray, I lock my front door much more frequently than I used to, and I'm actually much more aware of odd behaviors of men around me. Let's be honest, I would say of people around me, but rarely have I ever felt threatened by another woman. In my experience, it's always been 97% male. Sorry, doods.  

One of my favorite recent quotes from the show: 

"My happiest place is laying on the couch tucking my feet under whoever is there."  

 

 Mine too, girl, mine too.

6. As much as I hate the snow in the winter, I don't mind it in the spring. I think it's a psychological thing because I know it will be over soon. In the winter, I know there are months more of cold and snow ahead and that bums me out, but in the spring I know happy sunny days are just around the corner and just that thought makes it much more bearable! 

7. I think Jeremy and I are going to switch our dating anniversary date from February to June. I just feel like June is when we really connected. We spent every single day together since February but it wasn't until June when we seemed official. So maybe we jumped the gun celebrating in February but that's okay! June just seems to fit better. 

Also it helps spread out the holidays a bit. This year was kind of crazy gift wise. 

It went from Christmas Dec 25,
to Valentine's Day Feb 14, 
to anniversary Feb 27, 
to my half birthday (yes I celebrate that) Mar 12, 
to Jeremy's real birthday Mar 29,

That's just too much stuff to buy and plan for in a 3 month span. Plus, we get to go on fun anniversary trips in June instead of February now! That's fine by me. :)

 
LINKS: 
Blue Copper: bluecopperslc.com
My Favorite Murder Podcast: MyFavoriteMurder.com
The place in that photo: Tuliebakery.com
 

THE GREAT BRITISH BAKING SHOW: THE BEST SUNDAY SHOW!

Lately, I've been hearing a lot of my friends talk about how much they love the tv show The Great British Baking Show so I told Jeremy we needed to watch it. We started from the beginning on Netflix a few days ago and we LOVE it too! 

I woke up from a nap this afternoon and told Jeremy all I wanted to do was cuddle on the couch and watch The Great British Baking Show, so that's what we're currently doing. He's also editing photos and I'm about to put my laptop away so I can sew skirts but this is just exactly how I want to spend my Sunday afternoon.

Let me just say, this show is the PERFECT Sunday show to watch. It's so calming, peaceful, fun, informative, and just a happy show to watch. And the music is so happy and cheery! The two judges on the show are the sweetest, cutest judges and I think Mary Berry is just the cutest lady! 

Also, they get to bake in the happiest setting! It's just a huge outdoor tent in the middle of the greenest lawn in the UK. It's constantly raining in the background while they bake, and it just looks like the most pleasant place to bake pastries and cakes. 

Long story short: We love The Great British Baking Show! It might be our new obsession for the next couple weeks and I'm totally okay with that. :)

IS IT VAIN TO LOVE A VIDEO OF YOURSELF?

For our anniversary, Jeremy made me the sweetest little video of different clips of me that he slyly filmed in San Francisco. It is the cutest little video with one of my favorite songs. (If you haven't watched Beasts of the Southern Wild yet, do yourself a favor and go watch it! The movie is beautiful, and the soundtrack is incredible!)

It's strange how much I love this video! It makes me feel really vain for loving it so much, but it just reminds me of two things.

1. How much I love traveling. It just brings such a joy into my life. 
2. How happy Jeremy makes me. He captures such happy little moments and I love that so much!

So, as vain as it may be, here is the video for you all to watch also. :)

SNOWBOARDING IN PARK CITY FOR THE FIRST TIME!

On Sunday, I went snowboarding for the first time in Park City with Jeremy!

It was the most gorgeous day! It was sunny and 55 degrees all day. We did one run in all our snow clothes and quickly learned it was way too warm for the layers we were wearing. We went back to the car and took off everything we didn't need, and before we knew it, we just had snow pants and t-shirts left on!

Snowboarding in just a t-shirt is my new favorite thing. It's very freeing.

I'm slowly but surely getting better at snowboarding with each try. I'm still super slow, and I'm seriously on the same level as the cutest little 4 year olds you'll ever see, but I'm totally okay with that!

With enough tries, I'll eventually not be intimidated by getting off the ski lift, or try scarier things than just snowplowing my way down a hill. Until then, I'll just keep getting passed up by 8 year olds. :)

CABIN TRIP WITH THE FOSTERS

Jeremy and I went on a snowboarding cabin trip with his family to Eagle Point! Eagle Point is about 3 1/2 hours south east of Salt Lake City.

I had only ever been snowboarding once before, when I was 16, and I really didn't learn much in that one day of snowboarding, so essentially, this was my first time. Jeremy was super patient and stayed by my side all day which was so nice! I really was kind of scared. I may or may not have cried more than once that day. I blame it on fear of falling, and feeling way too claustophobic in all the layers of clothes I had to wear to combat the 10 degree weather. I kept reassuring him I was having fun even though I was crying. The phrase of the day was "I think the fear is just overcoming the excitement of it." haha.

He was so nice about it all, and he is such a good snowboarder too! I knew this already, but it's so different actually being able to watch him snowboard in person and see his cool tricks. That guy can do backflips! What?! Backflips, you guys. I can't even do a backflip at all, and here he is doing them with a snowboard attached to his feet.

The first night there we all went to the hot tub down by the lodge. I was seriously so excited for the hot tub! Maybe even more than snowboarding... ;)

There were two hot tubs side by side outside where we had the prettiest view of the sunset while we relaxed. The relaxing only really lasted less than 10 minutes though because his siblings in the hot tub next to ours schemed up a plan to turn their hot tub into a bubble bath. They poured 1/3 Solo cup of hand soap into their hot tub and I don't know if I've ever seen more bubbles in my life! The bubbles were overflowing the tub walls and running down the sidewalk blending in with the snow part of way down the path. A lodge worker came outside and just asked "Did one of you put soap in the hot tub?" and they all lied and said no! He asked them to get out so they could drain it, clean it, and refill it. It was awkward. Just really uncomfortable to have multiple workers come out to start draining the water, and grumble to each other about what they had to do to take care of it. Meanwhile, all the sudsy siblings were now in our hot tub as we awkwardly didn't talk each time a worker came outside. It was weird. I'm sure it will be a funny memory in a year, but for now, I just felt so awkward and bad for those workers having to clean up after adults putting waaaay too much soap in a hot tub. Sorry, lodge workerbees.

We played games at night in the living room of the cabin which was really fun! My family was never really a game family so it's a big change hanging out with the Fosters who play so many games! For real, it seems like every time we go visit I learn about a new game that I've never heard of haha.

It was such a fun trip! So, thank you Fosters for letting me tag along. :)

HAPPY LITTLE THINGS

Maybe it's because it's Friday, but I'm just a happy little bear today! It's beautiful outside today, everyone has been so nice to me, I ate the yummiest lunch that Jeremy made for me this morning, and I'm just grateful for my life.

So, here's a Happy Little Things list. Things that I love or just things that are making me a little extra happy these days. :)

1. My office at work. I've never had my own office at a job and it really is as nice as I thought it would be. I've hung up maps of Yosemite and Yellowstone on my walls. I have grapefruit oil in my oil defuser so it always smells yummy. I get to listen to all The National or Edward Sharpe as I want without bugging anyone else. And I just get to have my own little space to do my work as I please.

2. The closing scene on Saturday Night Live. I always love when the host says goodbye and the next 30 seconds of credits rolling over footage of all the actors smiling, laughing, and hugging each other on stage. It always makes me so happy. One day I will see that in person.

3. Jeremy & I decided today that we're going to buy Lagoon season passes this year! The season starts March 25 which seems so soon and I can't wait! The park is always so empty on Sunday so we talked about making Lagoon our cute little Sunday tradition. I told him it can be our church. :)

4. The feel in the air on a beautiful crisp day just before the rain comes. There's just something about the shift in weather and temperature that makes a day feel so fun! I really love the chilly wind that comes right before it starts to rain.

5. Diet Mountain Dew. I know it's bad for me, I know it's slowly destroying my body from the inside out, but oh baby do I love me some Diet MD! (If it makes you feel any better about my health, I do drink a ton of water everyday so maybe that helps outweigh the MD? I don't know. I just like to justify it haha.)

6. My bed. Lately I get a really big smile on my face every night when I lie down in bed. Jeremy & I seem to always be on the go so it's just so pleasant to climb into bed after a long day.

7. The book "The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up". I'm still reading it and learning from it but I'm so excited to downsize and declutter my life! I have so many unnecessary things that I'm excited to rid myself of.

8. Our ski cabin trip that's coming up with Jeremy's family! They're renting a cabin somewhere south of here (I should probably find out where) and we're going for the weekend at the end of February! I'll finally get to snowboard with Jeremy and see all his cool tricks. :)

9. Saving money. I've never really been a huge spender, but lately I've really been trying to crack down and save a lot more, and it's just fun to watch my account grow! I kind of love saving money. It's crazy to me that some people live paycheck to paycheck; that sounds like the most stressful life.

10. $5 Movie Tuesday! Jeremy and I make it a point to go into and get off work early so we can go to the movies after. All the theaters in Utah do $5 movies all day on Tuesdays (including IMAX, and the crazy seats, 3D, everything!). It's so fun and it makes me look forward to Tuesday evenings with him.

OUR FIRST VALENTINE'S DAY!

This was our first Valentine's Day together so naturally I was pretty excited for it!

I think me being so excited stressed Jeremy out a bit though. I wasn't trying to make him feel like he had to do anything extravagant; I just have always loved Valentine's Day so I always get way too excited the week leading up to it. It really is the only holiday I care about between New Year's Eve and the Fourth of July which is a pretty long stretch without a fun holiday if you think about it. (Sorry, Easter. You cute, but you ain't in the top 5 or anything.)

We woke up early so we could get off work early. That's the nice thing about our jobs, as long as we get our work done it doesn't matter when we go in. Going in at 7:00am and getting off at 3:00pm really is such a nice thing! Especially in the winter. There's nothing more depressing than getting off work when it's dark and feeling like your day is gone. Right?

When we first came home we exchanged gifts. He got me the prettiest flowers, chocolate covered strawberries from a local chocolate shop here in downtown SLC, and the special edition blue vinyl La La Land record! Oh I wanted that record so bad and he got it for me! It's the prettiest blue transparent vinyl and I'm so excited to listen to it! I listen to that soundtrack way too much.

 

Jeremy made us dinner reservations at this Italian restaurant we've been wanting to try on Main St called Michelangelo's. It was super yummy! I got a yummy chicken and pasta dish and tomato basil soup. After dinner, we walked over to the Capitol Theatre to see Ballet West perform The Sleeping Beauty! I hadn't been to any of Ballet West's performances but I've always heard such good things and I love the ballet so as soon as I found out they were doing a Valentine's Day show, I knew that's what we had to do!

It was sooo good, you guys! I seriously loved it! That was the first ballet Jeremy had ever been to and he loved it too. I really want to go to another Ballet West performance soon! Also, I really want to go photograph them while they're practicing so if anyone knows anyone involved with Ballet West, let me know! I just think it would be so fun to take photos of them practicing or running through dress rehearsals.

P.S. All night I kept thinking how badly I want to be a ballerina. Sure I haven't done ballet since I was in 5th grade, and maybe I have no rhythm whatsoever... but I kept thinking "this is what I want to do!" haha. Next week I'll be deeply inspired to do something else, but for now, it's a ballet dancer. :)

A TRIP TO THE MOUNTAINS

I meant to post this a while ago but I always seem to step away from blog posts thinking I'll come back and perfect them later but that rarely happens. I seemed to just forget about this one so it sat in my draft posts for a while.

 This little trip was from August 8th when my brother David and his family, and my mom were in town. They were all here together for about 2 weeks and it was such a fun time! I don't really realize just how much I miss my family, and miss living near my family until we're back together again.

We went on hikes, went to the waterpark a few times, and all played black jack together just about every night. (Black jack is way more addicting than I remembered it being!) 

On this day, it was my mom's last day in Utah before she had to head back to start her school year so we wanted to do something fun as a last little hoorah. We packed a picnic and headed up Little Cottonwood Canyon to Albion Basin where we rented a day campsite for the evening. My poor family though, none of them had been there before so I really led them astray when I said it would be just a little cooler than it was in the city. Oh how wrong I was! I had just been up there a couple days before and it was still warm and pleasant, but for some reason, this evening got super chilly as soon as the sun started setting! Luckily I had some extra sweaters in the trunk of my car for whoever needed one. We also built a fire so that was the true lifesaver!

Jacob is the silliest boy but I made him hold still for a few seconds so I could take some more serious portraits of him.

FIRST WEEKEND OF OCTOBER

This past weekend Jeremy and I went down to Nephi for the weekend. We were supposed to leave Saturday morning, but we got a really late start leaving because to be completely honest, I wasn't too excited to go to Nephi so I was being way too lazy about packing and getting going. We ended up making breakfast, watching a few episodes of The Office, and went to a coffee shop before Jeremy reeeaaally encouraged me to pack and get ready. :)

Despite not initially wanting to go to Nephi, I'm so glad we went! It was such a fun trip and we were finally able to take a little drive through Nebo Loop. Jeremy has told me about Nebo Loop for a while now but we just haven't found the time to go. It really is such a beautiful drive and area! They even have a "Mini Bryce Canyon" in the middle of all the trees and greenery.

It was a fun weekend! We saw pretty sights, played addicting card games with his family, and ate yummy food. October is off to a lovely start!