We're going on a trip!

Yesterday we randomly decided that Sawyer & Grandma Susie & I would go to St. George today. I really want to get in some more sun & swimming before I resign myself to the fact that summer is actually over. Sawyer has spent every single second since being told that we were going on a trip, saying "I can't wait till we go to.... what's it called again? (it's called St. George, Sawyer) I can't wait till we go to St. George!" She packed her princess suitcase with all her most important things like Octopus, her little Book of Mormon and her pink blankie and puppies. She freaked out when I busted out our swimming suits. Even though we will miss Daddy on Halloween, he promised that as long as we took copious amounts of pictures, that it would be okay.

not really sure what to do with these things....

I need some help here. I'll just come right out with it: in all my bra-wearing life I have never really found a good way to wash them without killing the copious amounts of padding that I seem to like to wear. Just throwing them in the wash certainly doesn't work, the straps get all tangled around the other clothes & make everything all bunched up, not to mention the lovely lumpiness that results. Hand washing? Are you kidding, Victoria? I don't know about you, but my secret is that I have zero time for crap like that. I did buy a "bra buddy" contraption from Bed, Bath & Beyond, and I really liked it until it fell apart the fifth time I used it. So yeah... how often & how you ya'll "warsh" your brassieres?

Black Island Farms, my pictures

Hey, alright, at the insistence of Melissa (love you!) I will post some of my pictures from our excursion with the Kettles. They probably aren't really as bad as I think, at least not the ones that I took after Jessica adjusted my settings. First off, let me admit that I love calves. They are so sweet with the longest lashes ever and soft little pink noses. I took soooo many cow pictures. Is that weird? And here is what Jessica & I did all night. I love hanging out with her. Not only is she rad with an amazing sense of style and so kind & cool, but she also is endlessly patient with my photography questions and always willing to share her knowledge. Plus, she comes as a package deal with a darling little boy and Matt's new man-crush, Danny. I tease Matt so much about his "girlfriend Danny," but I secretly am just so grateful for his friendship. Matt is a great friend & has not had much luck with friends who seem to appreciate him. I love Danny & Matt's friendship. I also love Sawyer's relationship with him. They are so cute together.On the way out, we stopped & let Sawyer get her face painted. I have fond memories of having my face painted at the Utah Arts Festival one year, and wondered how on earth Sawyer would stay still long enough for it. I guess when she's excited about something, it is possible to focus on not wriggling that long. She never ceases to amaze me. Ya think she liked it?

Black Island Farms Corn Maze

uh..... you know what? I was going to post a few pictures from our trip to the corn maze, but then I looked at Jessica's post & threw up in my mouth when I thought about what my pictures looked like. Go here for adorable, well edited pictures and cute narration.

Cabin + Fall = Good Times

Ryan & Stacey invited us to share their cabin weekend, along with Stacey's sister Kim, her husband Ben & their cute little Liam. (we all missed you, Dru & Melissa!) We love hanging out with these people! Matt & Sawyer went up on Friday night, but I had a cake Saturday, so I had most of the weekend to myself which, frankly, was very nice. I'm kind of a loner, I really enjoy being by myself. I just like getting stuff done and not having anyone to worry about.... but only for a while. Plus I knew that Matt & Sawyer would have a great time together, so it was good all around. Friday night I finished up the cake while watching Friday night Stand-up on Comedy Network, one of my fave guilty pleasures when I'm alone on a Friday. Then Saturday I cleaned the house, worked out, shopped a bit, got a massage & delivered my cake. Lovely day. The cabin trip was great, Lando, the great white dog, wore Charlie thoroughly out with his puppiness, she's still sleeping it off. Matt made a classic Wal-Mart purchase; a bee bee gun, and had a great time shooting cans and stuff, while I read and read. It is so beautiful up there during the fall. I love it! Oh, and no trip to the cabin would be complete without a game of frisbee-golf! Please forgive the nose-picking picture, I think it's hilarious & I love her little Eskimo hood.

it's soooo quiet here....

Sawyer is at a playdate, her first official one that has no ulterior motive of babysitting. I have things I should be doing, but I really am just missing her little giggles & tugs on my jeans. She is my buddy. But now she has buddies of her own, I guess. Very strange. Okay, what shall I do with these free hours? I need to:
-make a batch of caramel buttercream
-make a batch of vanilla & raspberry moistening syup
-make a batch of chocolate glaze (can you tell I have a cake coming up?)
-clean my car out
-somehow figure out how to wash my feather bed because Sawyer had an accident on it a few weeks ago & it has been stinking up my laundry room since then because I have no idea how to go about cleaning something that large (any suggestions?)
-prep my garden for winter
-load YW pictures onto a jumpdrive for Wendy
-clean up doggy doodoo
-figure out what cabinets & flooring we need for the basement from Ikea
-study scriptures
alright, the first shall be last & the last shall be first, right?
I think I'll start with the scriptures. Thanks for helping me sort that out.

Kids Say the Darndest Things vol. I

Sawyer is just entering that stage where you need to write down every single thing that comes out of her mouth because it's just too funny! I love her observations on life & especially her sassiness. I'm sure I'll hate it when she's 13, but right now I love seeing her little personality develop. I honestly can't say that I understand "baby-people". You know, the ones who want their infants to just stop growing, they want to savor every baby thing. I have never been that way, I love seeing Sawyer learn & grow & half the time I just sit back & let her figure things out herself because I simply want to see how she figures things out. She's really so smart, I'm not even biased at all. Baby-people are crazy anyway, those first six months are pretty much my own personal hell, what with all the sleep-deprivation. Hopefully I'll be better about it the next time around.
Anyway, this week she has come up with some zingers, and since I have that whole tapeworm problem, I can't remember but two of them.
1) On Wednesday I was trying to get Sawyer to climb up into the car and she was trying to set the world's record for Most Effective Dawdling by a Two (almost three) Year Old. Anyway, I won't say I didn't have a "tone" when I said "come on Sawyer, please climb up into the car!" To which she replied "okaaay, Mom! Don't freak out!" Seriously. I laughed sooooo hard! I think she learned that phrase from her dad. It certainly wasn't me.
2) We are staying at Becky (Matt's sister) & Craig's this week to watch their kids while they are in Russia. Pretty much the greatest job ever, these kids are all so cool & are so kind to Sawyer. Anyway, we were all lounging on Becky & Craig's bed when Caroline asked Sawyer to go help her make some Orange Julius which, of course, she wanted to do. She crawled across Matt to get off the bed, who decided that she's just the perfect weight for some chest presses. She got all huffy about being delayed & said "DAD! I have no time for this!"
I cannot imagine a cooler kid. I just love her to pieces. As my good buddy Jill said on Monday, "she is just full of joy." Everything is so awesome to her. If I whisper anything to her, act like it's a big secret, no matter what I say, she'll squeal with delight! I love you, Boom-Boom!

what else was I going to say?......

UPDATE 24 hours later & I still can't remember what it was I was going to say. That is certainly not for lack of trying. It has been driving me CRAAAAAZY!

OH OH OH WAIT!!! I just got it! I'm not even lying! I just thought I'd give it one more shot & there it is! k? You ready? Alright. So. The Twilight movie is coming out on November 21st, and there is going to be some big shebang at the 3 of the Megaplex Theaters, (fyi, the Gateway is NOT one of them.) for $45 you can go to this big "red carpet premier" Twilight "Prom" party and see the midnight screening. There will be all sorts of frivolity and I'm certain that it will entail an obscene number of insane teenage girls, but would anyone be down for that? I put myself and 5 others on the list just in case, but then I realized that it was the night before my first cake competition (more info on that later.) So yeah, I dunno. Let me know if you're interested though! And go to megaplextheathers.com for more info

Dear Couch, I love you, please come home with me. Love, Celeste

Took a little trip to Downeast Outfitters tonight, where Matt & I simultaneously fell in love with the Mammoth Sofa from Z Gallerie. It retails for $1499.99, but it is at Downeast for $839.99, and is in grrrrrreat shape. We thought we wanted a leather sectional, but this couch is just too cool and would be great for making out. (Don't worry, we'll get rid of it before Sawyer is up to any of that junk.)This picture doesn't do it justice. It's so stinking deep and when you see it you will want nothing more than to nap on it. And it WANTS you to nap on it. It says "no, don't get up. Please stay in my plush comfy arms forever. Please?" And you have to say "okay couch, just for ten more minutes. I love you, couch."

moving on

It's in a lovely buttery yellow/beige micro suede and is literally as wide as a twin bed, and long enough that Matt, at 6' 2" can lay on with without touching the armrests at all. Let's just say it is very aptly named.

And I am going to secretly buy this chair with my cake money. Matt would never approve, but I LOVALOVALOVA it. (wipe drool from chin.) Love it. Of course it's like as much money as I make doing cakes annually, but whatever, right? It's potterybarnarific.
I have decided that decorating sucks. I like love shopping for these things, but, like my dad says, (and Matt has now started saying,) I have champagne taste on a beer budget. Matt brought home a bunch of carpet samples tonight. Most frustrating thing ever! I want the basement to be nice, but it's really just kind of a starter home and so we don't want it to be too nice, but technically we could be here for a while, so I don't want to pick crappy stuff..... grrrrrr. There has to be a happy medium in there somewhere. I think if Matt had his way he'd turn the whole thing into a putting green; maybe a little mini golf course for he & Sawyer to play with. Lovely.
Here are two lovely things I learned today though:
1) THERE IS A MAC COUNTER IN MACY'S IN THE LAYTON HILLS MALL!!!!! Were you aware of that? No more going to South Salt Lake for Studio Fix or Strobe Cream anymore! Holy crap, do you know what that means? That there is the end of spare money as I know it!
2)..... uh..... I totally forgot what I was going to say. I have serious memory problems. I thought pregnancy was bad, but lately I have been dumber than EVER! I forget huge chunks of information for no reason at all, like a half a second after I was just thinking about them in depth. Matt & I will have lengthy discussions about something, make a decision on it and ten minutes later I have no idea what we decided. I think he is going to put me in a home. I honestly am pretty worried about it. I think I have a tapeworm in my brain. He eats pieces out of my cerebral cortex and ooops, there goes my memory of my thirteenth birthday. I wish he would just relocate himself to my intestine like a good tapeworm.
I still can't think of what else I was going to say.
This sucks, I'm going to bed.

This is how I feel about the election. President-Schmesident.

grrrrrrrrr

What should I make for dinner? This is my least favorite thing about being a mom/wifey type of a person.
I do not want to go to the store.
I do not have time to thaw anything.
I do not want to think about somehow figuring in some type of vegetable.
I hate planning meals.
I hate planning grocery lists for those meals.
But most of all, I hate the consequence of not planning meals or grocery lists: this nagging question in the back of my head- "what should I make for dinner?" I suppose we could just have these lovely lemon-raspberry thumbprint cookies I just made for my visiting teaching ladies. But then I'd have to make up another batch later on, which would be totally okay. Hmmmmm... sounds like I've found a solution. Do cookies count as a proper meal? They have 2 kinds of fruit in them, so that's good right?

6 quirks and the cutest thing ever.

Alright Melissa, here it is. My 6 quirks tag, brought to you by the kiwi part of a kiwi & an eagle.

I wish Matt were here to help me, I will call him. He's down in St. George tonight for a golf tournament tomorrow...(insert phone call here)...Okay, I'm back. He says that he just likes me, there isn't much that drives him crazy. But, upon further coercion, he came up with these:

1- sometimes I fart right as I'm falling asleep. I just get relaxed, okay? Geez, isn't that a lovely way to start the tag off. The first time I fell asleep with Matt, we were watching a movie & snuggling & as I drifted off into a comfy, newly in love sleep, I actually heard myself toot a little bit & just laid there praying that he was asleep too and didn't hear it. Let's just say that I was wide awake after that. He said that's when he knew he was in love with me. It can't get worse than that.

2- I HAVE to rearrange the dishwasher if it is loaded by anyone else but me. Otherwise they won't get clean and I'll have to do them all over again anyway. There is a right & a wrong way to do it, and I appear to be the only one on the planet who understands the right way. Plus, I can get way more stuff in there than anyone else I know.

3- I can't go to sleep if the duvet isn't square on the bed. I can't go to sleep with less than 3 pillows: my fancy chiropractic one for my funky neck, a flat and firm pillow between my knees, and a fluffy one to hug. Once I am ready to go to sleep, there should be no snuggling, no touching and NO TWITCHING!!!! (Matt)

4- I love, love, love to work out. Six days a week for at least 90 minutes. I know, I really should be in better shape than I am for all that, but I also love to eat, so whatever. I signed up for a gym membership right after I graduated high school and have had that schedule pretty much since then. I love that I know that this is a life-time habit now. It's more than staying in shape, it's my time to read, listen to music & challenge myself. I don't think about anything else in the world somehow, and that is a fantastic escape for me.

5- I am a picker and a popper. I am physically unable to not pop a zit, pick a scab or pluck an errant eyebrow. The other day, Sawyer had a bit of a hang-nail & I just, without thinking, ripped the sucker out, causing my little girl to bleeeeeeeed like crazy. I was too quick, it didn't really hurt her, but she was a bit freaked out by the amount of blood and the fact that I had caused it. Ooops. Good thing she's so forgiving at this age. The rest of the day she showed everyone she saw her princess bandaid and said "Momma do it." I hope they thought she meant that I put the cute bandaid on, not caused the wound.

6- I am allergic to chocolate. But who cares. What's a little itchy tounge, phlegmy throat, and headache compared to a chunk of semi-sweet? But it has to be good quality chocolate, I don't mess around.
There ya go. I hope that wasn't a total waste of your time. Well, actually, isn't that what you're looking for if you're cruising blogs? Thought so.

And now for the cutest thing ever. Sawyer has chosen her Halloween costume. I've done the last two years of choosing due to the fact that she didn't have the abilty to speak properly. But this is her first and probably will be the best costume she will ever choose. But before you can see it, here are the last two years. First, the dinosaur. Second, the octopus. Now, in her third year on this planet, Sawyer has unveiled.... Princess riding a Unicorn!!!! She skips around with her legs in the hind legs, knows how to use the reins and makes the cutest little clop-clop sound. It is sooooo stinking cute. She even fell asleep hugging it. One of those times where you normally would NEVER spend that much for a costume that will be worn for one night only, but when you see how it makes their eyes light up..... you melt into a puddle right there in the seasonal aisle in Target. Same thing happened with Matt when he saw her trotting around the house in it. I love him.
good night.

while I was out

Remember how Matt got so much stuff done while I was away a few weekends ago? Made me feel like a total inefficient loser? Well, one of the things he did was go to the state fair with Danny, Jessica, Max & the Moodys. Luckily Jessica is one hell of a photographer, so that particular night of my daughter's life is documented, even though I missed it. Check out her fantastic pictures of the fair, just keep in mind that I was not around to approve the outfit selections or hairstyling that weekend.

oh, and also...

On the way home from dinner at Susie's tonight, Matt & Paisa & I were talking about the big huge houses in her neighborhood and what kind of a house we each would or would not like.
Paisa said, "I want horses, I want to live on a farm & be a farmer."
Matt said, "I want to golf everyday. I want to live down in Oakridge & be a golfer."
Sawyer, who I thought was just ignoring us & looking out the window, suddenly piped up and said "I want to be a princess!"

BTW, Paisa is our little semi-adopted Samoan teenage son. He is living with a family in our ward and stays with us sometimes when his parents go on vacations. He is a total stud, and Sawyer LOVES him!

Weekend Update

So we are finally moving forward again on finishing the basement, and I am so stinking excited I can't even tell you! Our contractor is just fantastic, very detail oriented and has great ideas & actually cleans up after himself, which is quite a change from the last few guys who have worked down there. (not you, Doug.) He busted down the wall and door at the bottom of the stairs which was such a good idea, its so much more open and nice now. I'm very excited to have my own little "office/work out room/craft room/land" and more storage & closets and to not have only one area for people to be. I'll be able to have a place where I can leave my cake crap out while I work on them and not feel like I have to order pizza because there is simply no room to cook. We're making a little under-the-stairs play-place for Sawyer, which she is very excited about and most importantly....duh duh duh-da..... we'll have multiple places for my family to stay when they come to visit!!! Because I have a feeling that my parents are just going to keep going on missions, so their house will probably be unavailable pretty frequently. I have a few ideas as to how I want to decorate, but unfortunately, they all involve the Pottery Barn, so they probably won't happen. This is kinda the sectional look I'm shooting for in the family room, obviously white wouldn't be the best choice though. And this is what I'm hoping for in an office, only not red, but I love that project table & I actually have the craft organizer on the wall. And this is the sink console I totally want, but I'm going to get it at Costco instead, if they bring it back. And I want like rainforest green walls in the bathroom, with that dark wood and white linens! We'll see what we end up with. Finding my own style and understanding what I like and making it happen is like one of the more challenging things for me, so this'll be interesting.

Help!

Oh, also, I was just asked by the Relief Society presidency to do a bit of a class/demonstration on cake decorating at our Super Saturday activity in October. Since every time I've tried to do something like this in the past, I've felt like an unintelligible & poorly organized idiot, I thought I'd ask ya'll for your thoughts on what you might like to learn about cake decorating in a setting like this. I will only have about 20 minutes.... so yeah. I was thinking maybe just focusing on one thing, like what though? Fondant isn't nearly as intimidating as it looks, especially not if you use my fabulous marshmallow fondant, so maybe that??? I have no idea. Just learning how to use that set of piping bags & tips that you've had for 20 years & never used? Filling & crumb coating & final coating with buttercream? Give me some feedback here, please!

Gianna Jessen

My cute friend Nicky had this on her blog today & I thought it was very, very cool to hear the story of this amazing woman. It's a little "come-to-Jesus" for me, it's an issue on which every person of every religion should form their opinion. My thoughts on abortion are more along the lines of this: Being Pro-Choice should really mean that you choose to control yourself sexually & respect the amazing powers of creation that you have been blessed with. That's about as feminist as you can get, that's respecting & demanding respect of your femininity. Anyway. There's my stolen rant, thanks Nicky.

...LA is a great big freeway, put a hundred thousand miles on...

(if you can tell me the name of the song that line comes from then you win a prize!)
So much freaking fun. Let me just say that my friend Rossi is one of those people that you wish had been born into your family just so that you could spend more time with them. We don't get to hang out a whole lot, but when we do I am so in love with her and I wonder why we don't do it more often. Anyway, we went to LA last Friday. We had amazing food. We saw Maroon 5 and Counting Crows & Augustana. We sang duets in the car at the top of our lungs. We yelled at the navigation system together. We talked to random people and saw really cool street performers. We saw Wicked! We had life-changing cupcakes. And then we went back & bought more. We had good talks. Then we came home. And there, my friends, is a quick summary of the weekend. Maroon 5 was pretty much exactly what you'd expect; Adam was sexy, the music was great and all in all it was a great performance. But they totally got upstaged a bit by the AMAZING Adam Duritz of Counting Crows. I wasn't even really that excited to see them, it's been so long since I've liked anything they've put out, but holy cow, his stage presence is riveting! He's just so stinking emotional and he sucks you in and you find yourself holding your breath & hoping that things are going to be okay. He's kind of crazy, I'm not going to lie, but I LOVED it. They brought Augustana back out for their last few songs and they all sang together and it was awesome. It's awesome to see people who are so good at what they do, just enjoying it and each other. I guess it's particularly amazing to me because I am so NOT musical. Then Maroon 5 came out and just performed and didn't really enteract with anyone, but it was good, just not as good as their openers.
Rossi & I went to the 3rd street promenade and there were these amazing guys doing all sorts of stunts and break-dancing. I took more pictures of them than really anything else (for obvious reasons.) They were very fun to watch. That bottom picture is kinda hard to understand, but the guy in the black pants is just chillin' there in this diagonal push up position, while the cute frizzy headed guy locked his legs around his waist and leans back until the back of his head rests on the Mexican kids back who also is in a funky handstand/push up position. And this conglomeration of bodies becomes a bridge for the other guy to do a flip/turny/twisty thing over. It was pretty amazing. Kind of like their abs. Wicked was awesome, go see it if you haven't yet. I took pictures of the stage after the show and got thoroughly yelled at by an usher, but that stinkin' dragon was too cool. I'm just glad he didn't take my fancy new camera away. Not that I used it near enough, I feel like a dork about that. Anyway, it is good to be home, where there are a normal number of people on the freeway, and where you can actually see the sky before 3 pm. I don't know if this is normal or not, but every day we were there, it was completely overcast & smoggy until the afternoon & then it was beautiful. I kind of wish I had followed through on my plans to go to makeup school out there, I think I would have loved it. At least it would have gotten me away from Jared. But my life would probably be quite a different story now & that would not be cool at all.
I was kind of hoping that Matt would have a hard time being a single dad for the weekend, and would just wonder how I did it everyday, but not so much. He got more done in 2 days than I get done in a week. Nice. Not only did he organize the basement and the garage, he cleaned the house like crazy, did the dishes, but he also took Sawyer to the state fair on Friday and took her to hang out with his friends on Saturday night. Lovely. Apparently I need to step it up.

Au Revoir

Tomorrow there will be this:
And Saturday night will be filled with this:
With a girl who is willing to wear this and make Matt & I laugh our heads off:
I am sooooo excited. I invited you all, it's your fault if you are jealous.

Holly's Cake

LOVE LOVE LOVE the cake the bride the setting her dress LOVE!