Airborne ( Because adding an "e" makes it cooler)

No, not the cold medicine, the amazing trampoline extravaganza that we experienced Friday night! First of all, sorry that I have been on a blogging hiatus lately...finals got finished on Thursday and then we had a weekend full of family fun. I will add more pics later, but as all I have at the moment are terrible pictures from my phone, I will start with just Friday.

First of all, on Thursday night Dave had an eyelash on his cheek, so I did what any wife would do: I grabbed it off of his face and stole his wish (please tell me you still make wishes on your eyelashes. They rarely come true but I take it as some kind of jinx insurance to still do it). Dave was sad because apparently his wish was that I would get out of having to stay and work for all of graduation on Friday night, and be able to accompany him to his cousin Richard's graduation party that night. I told him that was never going to happen so it was a good thing that I used that wish up for him.

Then, miracle of miracles, I got to work the next day and I was told that I could, in fact, go home early from graduation! So I guess there is absolutely no power in an eyelash wish after all, but I was happy nevertheless.

We got in the car to go to the place that the party was supposed to be held, and much to our surprise, it was this trampoline place called Airborne. Apparently Mari and Richard's friend owns it and so they used it as a guise for him showing up for his surprise party. Although we were far from dressed for hardcore jumping (I require stretchy pants for most of my amazing tricks, and I wanted to give the people what they wanted) I got really really excited because I have always wanted to go to one of those places even though they are kind of marketed towards middle-schoolers and prom day-dates (and, besides our party, that is pretty much all that was there--loud, embarrassing flirting and all). Whatever. Luckily we had Dave's cousin's kids there to jump with and I could disguise my spider-man tricks as part of playing with the children.

If I had only known that this would be such a great photo opportunity, I would have brought my camera, but all I had on me was my phone, and therefore here are a plethora of terrible, flash-less phone pics:

Look at the little happy jumping boy! (P.S. Dave had a sprained ankle due to injuries sustained while helping our cousins move, yet he still insisted on jumping on one foot. Observe the left foot not actually touching the tramp)


Dave always leaves events that involve his nieces and nephews all sweaty from them chasing him around. I guess they like him as much as I do.


Model? (also, look how cute lil' Dallin is in the background)


And to top it off, the most awkward picture ever of the two of us, courtesy of 6-year-old Sage. Yes you would think that for how excited I was about this place that I would jump high enough to stop my toes from dragging but alas, like I said, I am nothing without my stretchy pants.

*Embarrassing story: when Dave and I started dating, he and his roommates had this weird thing where they would give code names to girls that they liked. Mine was "Operation Stretchy Pants," which I saw written on their white board but never understood. When I finally found out that it was ME, I protested because it sounded like the name you would give a fat girl who can only fit into stretchy pants. Dave said it was just because I was a dancer, and apparently all dancers wear stretchy pants all the time (kind of true...I do own many pairs of stretchy pants in all honesty). He changed it to jazz pants, which was only slightly more flattering.

How to Get Ready for Work in Under 30 Minutes

Step One: Wear the same clothes as yesterday to cut down on "closet pondering" and because you only wore them for like a few hours yesterday (I had so kindly laid them out across the floor for myself last night...).

Step Two: Only blow-dry the top-most portion of your hair and bangs, and then leave the bottom and back looking wet-dog hott. If you would like to get ready in under 20 minutes, consider leaving out hair-washing altogether.

Step Three: Depend on your husband to bring you lunch because you are incapable of packing your own.

Step Four: Balance your oatmeal on your lap while driving.

Step Five: Burn mouth on too-hot oatmeal.

Very Meaningful and Important Pictures of My Husband Sleeping

Ok so this week has been a little crazy up in hur'...think finals, working more than usual, family staying with us, etc. etc. So, while you can expect amazing posts about all of the enchanting fun that has been going on once FRIDAY is over, here is a little somethin' somethin' in the meantime:

I don't think anyone besides me really probably cares about these pics, so feel free to log off now if you want. (I feel like usually you take pictures of your little toddler asleep in funny positions, but since I have no children I have to entertain myself with gratuitous pictures of Davito.) You have already boosted my self esteem by bumping up my page-views today. Oh and, by the way, if you read this but aren't a follower, you should follow! Then I would feel better about myself and also less creepy about all of the blogs that I follow and the people probably don't even know me.

Picture #1 is what I like to call eye cover numero uno. I returned home from the gym and Dave was still asleep. I am not sure why he needed to cover his eyes as the room was obviously dark, but the delicate and deliberate placement made me laugh:

Here is eye cover numero dos, which I found yesterday when I came home from visiting teaching. I asked Dave last week what the point of ties was....I guess this is the answer:

I asked him why he was laying at the foot of the bed, and he said to "change things up". He also used the pillows as a foot warmer. Makes perfect sense to me:



Oh and Mom I promise we have sham covers...they were just in the wash since we had taken them to a friend's house to use to sit on the floor...

This one happened a while ago. Dave had laid down on his stomach to check and see if our water heater had turned off (because it was windy and sometimes the draft can blow it out) and I was just chattering away to him and all of a sudden I heard silence:

No pillow necessary when you have a hand that does the job just fine.

And last but not least is the pathetic passed out in scrubs pic. Dave had to get up at four on Saturday so that he could drive down to Richfield and assist his Dad's partner with some oral surgeries. He had only gotten three hours of sleep since he had gone to pick his nephew up from the airport the night before. He had a good day though, but he was pretty pooped when he came home:

Literally, asleep in like two seconds. I would say that I think that is weird if I wasn't the same way...Dave has discovered that I have some sleeping oddities. Like, have you ever kind of fallen asleep but then jerked yourself awake with a big start? I do that all the time, but one time in my groggy state, to try to cover it up (I am not sure why I felt like I needed an explanation), I told him that I was "ice skating". ??? I am so strange. Dave now asks me if I was ice skating every time this happens, which is pretty much all of the time.

Time waster of the year

Does anyone else feel all sorts of bad about themselves when they waste tons of time? The thing is, I kind of judge people who do it but I am SO bad about it. My Teaching Composition teacher taught me a new term this sememster..."avoidance strategies." They are the things that we do to procrastinate doing the real thing that we don't want to do the most. I am the queen of it, but in reality, it kind of helps me get things done. Like, for example, this weekend when I decided that it was imperative that I clean my fridge and rearrange my kitchen cabinets. Seeing as I had FINALS looming, it probably wasn't that smart. But now I have a clean kitchen so...yeah, I guess that makes up for failing my classes. And, when Dave's grandma stays with us next week, she can feel like her baby grandson is in competent hands hopefully?

Seeing as this is what I am dealing with for the next week, I don't know if my avoidance strategies are the smartest thing:

I hope you enjoy this high-quality pic from my phone of my perennial finals week schedule. Neon colors mandatory.

Making a schedule is the first step to being super-productive. Since it has exhausted me, I must now site here and peruse blogs to plot what kind of treat I am going to bring to our friends' moving away party tomorrow. That was the first thing on my massive list, can't you see? It's right by "gouge out my eyes" and "go bald from stress".

April 23rd can't come soon enough...

For those who shun expiration dates...

...I highly recommend shopping at Big Lots. Actually, I made sure that everything I bought had a good date on it, so I should rephrase that to say "for those who shun feeling safe while shopping and who enjoy weird brands, I highly recommend Big Lots."

Cereal Heaven. I got enough to last me till August at least.

Let me back up. Saturday, as I pulled into the Macey's parking lot, I noticed Big Lots just down the strip mall. Always on the look-out for a deal, I decided to wander in and see what they had to offer. I have to say that I was pleasantly surprised! Sure, some of the stuff is a little obscure, and a lot of it has packaging that is a little battered, but for the most part I felt like all of the stuff was in good repair and they had some really good, as we say in Utah, "dills" (has anyone else noticed this Utaccent? It goes along with "pellow", "on sell" instead of "on sale" and "pitcher" for picture)

Does anyone else remember these gummy burgers? Me and my sisters were obsessed with them when we were little. Looking back, they are kind of disgusting but it made me happy to see that they are still in production. Even if no one wanted them and that's why they ended up at Big Lots:

I do think that I will bring Dave with me next time, though. The place was crawling with shady characters.

Later that night Davito and I went on a fun date to the BYU Philharmonic Orchestra's performance. I got the tickets for free from work, and it was really fun to go to a show together...we realized that we had both been to watch each other perform at BYU multiple times(him: Men's Chorus, me: Folk dance. Our first date was me and my sister coming to watch his concert and then me ditching her to go to dessert with him. I am such a good big sister. Especially since Grace got lost trying to find our car alone.), but we have NEVER been to what you would define as a cultural event together. Plenty of sports, though... What has happened to us? I thought we loved the arts. I guess that's what you get for being poor married students...it's worth it though :)

Dave had to grab my hand to keep me from clapping in between symphonic movements...oops. Good thing I married a former band kid who knows these things.

On Friday me and my ex-roomies threw a baby shower for one of our beloved friends Anne. She was the first to get married and now is the first to have a baby...always just gotta be one step ahead of us Anne!

We were all appalled, or rather, jealous of how many friends she had to invite. I guess that is one of the perks of being a Relief Society president. Oh, and getting that chance to serve in the church and care for others too...I still haven't figured out how to make friends in my married ward. We were so excited that Dave's cousin Kiku and her husband Tyler were moving right down the street from us, but thanks to BYU's minute ward boundaries, they are in a different ward than they are.

My church tactic is to stick by Dave for the first two hours, and then to hang out in the bathroom until right before RS starts so that I can slip in at the last moment and not have to talk to anyone. Friendly, I know. Just, whenever I try to be outgoing it fails, like today, when I wondered why the girl with the baby gave me the stink eye when I sat next to her. I tried asking her how old her baby was but it didn't really work so I just sat awkwardly in silence while she talked to her friends behind her until the meeting started, and I realized later when she had to keep climbing over me to get out with her baby that she had been trying to sit on the edge of the row so that she could easily leave with her baby. I offered to hand her all of her baby stuff when she finally got up and moved away from me to have more space. Friendliness fail. Maybe next week?

It's not as bad as I make it sound. I like my ward and there are plenty of nice people. Devoting my life to one person for the last year has just rendered me a little socially awkward so I am learning to make friends again.

Anyway, at least I have these four girls to be my friends! I love them dearly:

Dave was a little darling while I was gone and went to help our friends Garrett and Racheal move. I get really sad when people leave Provo. Don't they know that moving on with their lives in over-rated? (Larsie, I am talking to you too). Refusing to graduate from college is the answer to all of life's problems.

Oh, and I got another free flower arrangement at work:

Due to Provo's recent inclement weather, it has become imperative that I dress like a Canadian lumberjack whenever I leave the house (I can't blame my nerd face/pose on the weather though. That is all me, baby!). Dave said I was the cutest lumberjack he had ever seen though, so I felt good about myself. Also, orange floral vest lining matches really well with plaid. I think my fashion prowess was the reason that the cop who pulled us over of Friday let us off. I had never been pulled over...I might have cried a little. And I wasn't even the one driving. Luckily, he was completely stupid and got us for pulling out of a parking lot that was supposedly left turn only but had no sign. Dave politely pointed out that there is no sign there, and, since the cop must have realized that his argument of "yeah, but you can tell" made no sense, he let us go. There was really no reason for me to get so worked up...but what can I say, authority scares me and getting in trouble is the worst ever. That is why I want to be a teacher, so that I can be the one to get people in trouble and avoid it myself. I am sure that I will really enjoy all of the parents yelling at me all of the time. Again, sometimes I question the logic behind my career choice.

9 to 5

Let's all be Barney and play make believe that I am not posting twice in one day because I am so behind...

As I have mentioned, I work in the Dean's office for the College of Family, Home and Social Sciences at BYU. I feel very blessed to have gotten (word?) this job, as it is great and I love the people that I work with. As far as student jobs go, I can't think of a better one. And, once a week everyone but me goes to a meeting and I have the office to myself for an hour and can take awesome self-pics like this one. (actually, one of the other student employees is still there with me and he probably saw this. He is aware that I am weird though)

Today we had a big event where students in our college get to present posters of their mentored research projects that they have done. It is sponsored by donors and it is kind of a really big deal in our office...so needless to say it has been a lot of work leading up to it. I have mostly been counting and sorting posters and reassuring students that they did in fact RSVP to the luncheon during the conference, but still, I felt invested (I did have an increasingly-tense email exchange with a student who insisted that he had RSVP'd and hadn't. I saw him at the conference and was scared that he would see my name-tag and remember me. I think that I dodged the bullet though).

The day started early, 7 am, with Melissa and I handing out poster-hanging apparati (word? twice in one post, a new record) to people and trying to tell them where to go next. I will spare you loads of anecdotes but let's just say that people in situations where you have to give them instructions and they don't know what they are doing are hilarious. This isn't the Titanic people. Mass chaos is not necessary here. Just follow directions, and you will be fine.

It was a long day but it was really fun. I actually got to see a lot of old friends who came through the conference either presenting their projects or just looking at others' work. It was also fun to read people's projects although I felt a little dumb when I understood nothing at all in the Neuroscience row...what's a Hippocampus? I liked the Sociology projects about dance in France and Disney movies having an effect on men's kindness, thank you very much.

With my fancy work name-tag, I also got some of my best last-name confusion to date. Lots of guys who served missions in Japan getting freaked out. Dave wants me to tell people that I was adopted by kindly ninjas, instead of the real reason for my AWESOME cool last name.

After the conference ended and we were done cleaning up, I went and ran even though I was super tired from being on my feet and running around all day. I have noticed that when I run at a different time of day than usual, it makes me feel better sometimes. Like today, I was really tired starting but as soon as I got going I felt great. I even noticed that I wasn't as sore afterward and I wasn't as sweaty and thirsty as usual (tmi? maybe). Five miles turned into eight, but I was ok with that.

Dave picked me up and we were going to run home and make dinner and then go to a dance performance that I wanted to see (the group I had performed with for the last two years was showing their Spring showcase) but as soon as we got going cooking and stuff we realized that we probably wouldn't make it. I was totally fine with that, but Dave was all cute and kept apologizing and stuff (even though it was my fault for running for so long). He had to run to the store to buy eggs for our muffins, and when he came home, he also had this:

My most favorite fruity candy in the world! I had been craving them all week and I didn't even ask...he just got them to say sorry that we couldn't go to my dance thing. It was so sweet and I hugged him and might have teared up a little at his offering of sugar. This led him to asking several times if I was ok because I guess it is not expected to cry over a bag of Skittles. I would think he would know me better by now.

Also, if you look closely, you can see him doing the dishes in the background. I do love that boy. And he didn't even complain when my low-fat corn chowder was poo-ey...there is just no substitute for cream, but hey a girl can try...with pureed corn and milk, though, is not such a good idea.

Blog Slackery

Just call me the Bart Simpson of blogging (is he a slacker? I can't think of another archetypal slacker). I really have no excuses, it hasn't been like a horrible week or anything; quite the opposite, actually! Here are the highlights:


On Sunday, Dave and I watched conference, went for a walk in the fresh snow, and ate some delicious mango chicken leftovers. Dave got a call from one of his old roommates, Andy, to see if we wanted to come and play Axis and Allies. This really meant "Dave, do you want to come play a game that resembles the hideous game of risk and your wife can come and pretend she understands this game because you are a package deal". I was ok with that...although I hate games that involve strategy. I decided that I would share the amazing cookies I was planning on making that night, and it was for the best...having a whole batch of cookies for dos people spells disaster.

Here is a look at the dough:

Yes, those are chunks of Twix in the dough. I got the recipe from Lovin' from the Oven one of my new favorite baking blogs. She has mostly deserts...so yeah, I am a believer.

• 2 cups flour
  
• ½ tsp. baking soda
• ½ tsp. salt
• 12 tbsp. unsalted butter, softened
• 1 cup packed brown sugar
• ½ cup granulated sugar
• 1 large egg plus 1 egg yolk
• 2 tsp. vanilla extract
• 2 cups coarsely chopped Twix bars

1. Preheat oven 325°.
2. Whisk together the flour, baking soda and salt in a medium bowl; set aside.
3. In a separate bowl, cream together the butter and sugars. Beat in egg, yolk, and vanilla until combined.
4. Slowly add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients. Gently stir in the Twix chunks.
5. Roll the dough into balls and bake on a baking sheet for 15-18 minutes.
6. Allow the cookies to cool for ten minutes before removing them off the baking sheet.

They were pdg ("pretty dang good"...spread it around, it's gonna be huge), which I gauged by the fact that they were devoured within five minutes of entering the guys' apartment.

At game night I re-learned two things:

One boy living with you smells 100x better than six boys living in one apartment...and he is a lot cleaner too. Let's just say we don't have Taco Bell on our floor. (we love you apartment One Fo' Two! :))

Having to flirt is the worst. I am so glad that I never have to do it for new again. We were observing Dave's friends interact with the girls that they had over and it was so weird...do any other married people feel like that? It wasn't very long ago that I had to act cute and laugh really loudly at everything and try to make boys think I was cool. Good thing I got out of that world and now I can just be lame and let myself go!

On Monday I picked what we did for FHE. I told Dave that he has to start making me do sit-ups and push-ups at night, as a way to help me gently move into weight-training. I seriously hate weights and anything other than cardio, which is super typical for runners I have come to find out. It's kinda boring methinks...however, I know it is so important. As a result, I decided that we would use some of our "play instantly" workouts on Netflix to do a little ab workout for FHE! I found out that Dave is really good at dance workouts but he wouldn't let me take pictures :( Being the attention hog that I am, I always let him take pictures of me:

Tyler on Oprah would approve of our wrapping paper blinds and flashlight by the door...safety first is my motto.

We have been having the world's most annoying sporadic weather here in Provo. I really wish that Utah was a little more stable sometimes...maybe it is depressed or something. It was beautiful last week and then this week was horrible and cloudy! We woke up to snow on Sunday. Monday and Tuesday were ok though, and I found that the cute little girl next door to us had drawn this on our front porch (there are actually cute little girls on both sides of us, which only serves to aggravate my baby hunger. I think my loud blender use in the morning probably wakes them up. Sorry girls.):

Mother Nature, won't you please be nice so that these girls can play outside? The other day we heard this tapping on the window and I peeked out and it was the one-year-old girl knocking on our window. Her mom apologized (Like I cared, she was being so cute. I was just freaked out because we happened to be watching a youtube video with laughing babies--a normal occurrence-- when she was tapping and I thought that maybe she understood them...trippy) and said they want to let her crawl in the grass, but it is so wet and gross that she has to stay up on the porch. Free the children!

Dave also made us Gyoza, aka, the Japanese Elixir of Love:

Such an arduous process...good thing I am never in charge of making them. They are the most delish little meat dumplings with all of these seasonings and stuff, wrapped in wonton wrappers and steamed (with a little oil too...oops). I can inhale like 20.

P.S. I want to just update my mileage for this year...312 miles to date! I am so slow though! I really am just going to have to push myself in that category.

A 9-miler, Conference, and a Costco Victory

Happy April everyone! Yesterday was absolutely beautiful here in scenic Provo, so we tried to take advantage of it as best we could (seeing as, once again, Provo's weather was sporadic and rando and it is again cold and rainy). We walked to the park that is right by our house to toss around the ol' Frisbee, and it was sooooo fun to be outside. I didn't want to carry anything with me so I took a pre-outside pic:

It is a winner, I know. I am telling you, double-side chins and bright red capris circa 2005 are the next big thing. So is using Christmas wrapping paper taped over your window as blinds.

I am sad that we didn't take my camera though, because we saw the biggest dang pile of ants that I have ever seen. Dave was fascinated and we stopped both on the way there and back to observe.

We then hit up Little Caesar's, and watched Unstoppable. It's the movie about the runaway train. It was ok...entertaining, but the preview made it look like it was going to be better than it was. It had Denzel Washington as a lovable veteran train operator though, and everyone loves Denzel.


Today dawned bright and early for me and I was determined to run before General Conference started at 10...and I wanted to run 9 miles, the most I have ever run! I am happy to say that I did it, but it took me an embarrassingly long amount of time. If I could sell a limb on the black market (preferably an arm or else this scheme would be obsolete) I would buy myself a Garmin (it's a watch that tells your your distance and pace) but since $300=over a week of life for us, I will have to refrain for now...

I popped some Skittles at the halfway point for a burst of energy. Candy is the poor woman's Gu gel or Shot Blocks.

When I got home we made some cinnamon rolls (just the Rhodes kind) and what I named a "morning sunrise smoothie". I thought that if I named it something tropical, Dave wouldn't notice the lack of flavor. Growing up, my Dad made the most DELICIOUS smoothies! They were so, so good. But, they had tons of sugar and flavored syrup and stuff. My mom, on the other hand, tried to sell us on putting Protein powder in smoothies...I am still really wary of powders and stuff in drinks. I just always think they're gross. I think you should just eat normal food items. I try to strike a happy medium, because I don't put any sugar or ice cream or anything in my smoothies, but I don't put weird stuff in either. Just fruit, ice, milk, or yogurt. This one had ice cubes, a little oj, an orange, some strawberry yogurt, and some pineapple. I thought it was pretty good, if I do say so myself, and at least it had fruit, right?


Conference was wonderful as usual! I am going to do a recap of my favorite talks, but for now I will just say that most of the day was spent like this:'

Just look at the tone on those legs...should have been a dancer

Cutest little note-taker I ever did see

Note: we were super disappointed that our favorite Mo-Taber, the famous Alex Boye, seemed to be MIA this time. As Dave said, "maybe he has quit the small-time?" Anyone know what's up?...we haven't seen him since the 4th of July BYU special and we need our souls to be lifted by the dulcet tones only Alex can provide.

After Conference we just did homework and stuff and then Dave got ready to go to Priesthood session. Due to poor planning, we had failed to go to Costco earlier that day, and realized that I would have to go without Dave if I was to get the tortillas that we needed for dinner that night. You see, after you have had the Costco tortillas that you cook yourself, you just can't go back to Mission or whatever brand you get at the grocery store. It had to be Tortilla Factory or bust. Well, I had no problem running to Costco, especially since I love that place and for some reason Dave doesn't see the need to wander down every aisle when we only need one thing, but I don't actually have my own Costco card (Dave got his before we were married and still has the membership) and since I do not in any way resemble a cute Japanese boy, and still have Hopkin on my debit card (we are taking the whole "transitioning into married life" thing slowly obviously) this might be a problem.

I walked in and flashed the card, picture side down, feeling like I was stealing or something. I darted to the tortillas, taking a slight detour at the bagels and swiping two samples, and ran to the front. I wanted to get it over with if they were going to deny me my tortillas. I scoped out what I thought looked like the nicest/most laid-back cashier, and luckily, he didn't say a thing about me using Dave's card. Whew! It might have been because I caused a slight distraction by bumping into the guy behind me who then dropped a whole carton of apple danishes, but either way, I got my stuff and got out of there.

On my way out of Costco I saw the creepiest/most intimidating teenager I have ever seen...I can't describe it, but he looked like the 16-year-old punk version of Voldemort. He kept starring me down and I got super scared and locked my doors and then realized...how am I going to teach high school if teenage boys scare me? When I was volunteering in a school a couple of weeks ago I totally got shut down by this scary huge kid who was 18 but looked 30 and I determined that maybe I need to teach at a school for quiet girl midgets.