monday fun-day

On Monday Travis had work off for Pioneer Day (go Utah!).

We slept in until twelve after staying up until three the night before. And who says married people don't party?

Then we got ready and ate lunch and saw Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows part 2. We went to the Cinemark out in Farmington, and let me tell you - it is way snazzy. When you buy your tickets you pick your seats out on a touch screen right at the cash register. Then when you pass a ginormous concessions stand, go into the theater, and find your seats, you learn they're made out of LEATHER and they ROCK back and forth.

So, obviously, as soon as our bums hit the seats we started to giggle.

Obviously.

The last Harry Potter movie was super good, but we should have watched part 1 again before we saw this one, because I didn't remember everything. People all over the Internet have been saying that when the movie ended that they felt like their childhood had finally ended. Although that may be a bit extreme, I definitely agree somewhat since we grew up with these stories, movies, action figures, games, and characters. We grew up knowing we were all Muggles, but secretly wishing an envelope would fly down our chimney or into our bedroom courtesy of owl delivery inviting us to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. And even hoping we would be that "special" witch or wizard that would get a personal invitation by Hagrid himself. We wondered what position we would play on the Quidditch team. We wrestled over whether Hermoine should like Ron or Harry. We knew eventually Harry would defeat Voldemort, but we still shuddered at every close encounter. We cried (or at least teared up?) when characters died, turned evil, and certainly when Dumbledore was murdered. We counted down the days until the book and movie releases, then re-read and re-watched them countless times over the years. Our generation's childhood may not have ended when the final credits rolled, but this magical story WAS a huge part of many of our childhood's, and it's end certainly signifies the end of an era.

(PS - don't you secretly wish He-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named will not really be dead and will come back in the next adventure: Harry Potter and the Mid-life Crisis? Don't be ashamed; we all wish it could go on and on).

After we watched Harry Potter we hung out at home for a bit, made dinner and packed it up for another picnic in the park.

We listened to Pandora on his phone. Lady Antebellum radio :)

freakin' cutie

By the way. Travis usually would NEVER wear a purple shirt. EVER. I've suggested it and said he would look so good in purple and SO many other colors and that he should just branch out...and to no avail. Then one day I walk out wearing this grey/yellow/blue baby-doll shirt and he says, "Maybe I should get a yellow shirt?" (It gets better). So I say "yeah you'd look great in yellow," wow I was suggesting this like a year ago - does it really take you a year to realize I know what I'm talking about fashion-wise? Then he says, "I think I should branch out and wear different colors. I'm getting tired of the same old stuff." I squealed. And the next day I went to our favorite store (Ross ha) and bought him this ^ purple beauty. Hooray! I consider it a huge personal victory. It's so great because now when I wear purple, or some purple like this outfit, we can match and look so good in pictures together. I love that....

We love kiwis!

Then it got dark and it started to sprinkle so we went to Pace's Dairy Ann for some popsicles (which we do multiple times a week). The girl who works there knows us and when we come in she automatically goes back and gets us two Tiger's Blood popsicles (raspberry-coconut). We went outside and played Bananagrams (a game like Scrabble) on the patio.

Travis won even after I was killing him the whole game :(

domestic goddess (for a night...)

The other night I made this fabulous delicious meal to celebrate our new dining table that husband's sister- and brother-in-law so generously gave us!

It's so pretty isn't it?

(P.S. see that pretty flower on the table? husband gave it to me. hehe. )

Trav LOVES asparagus, it's his favorite. Ever. So for dinner I whipped up this super easy medley of:

Cream of Asparagus Soup

Tuna Salad on Avocado

Garlic Cheese Toast

Mandarin Oranges

Raspberry Passionfruit Juice

YUM. Husband looked like he wanted to do a cartwheel.

And there was a whole lot of "Babe...BABE...well aren't you little miss homemaker?!"

(he wishes)

So. I got the recipe for the asparagus soup here: http://www.skinnytaste.com/2009/04/cream-of-asparagus-soup-1-pt.html

and the recipe for the salad on the avocado here: http://fortheloveofcooking-recipes.blogspot.com/2010/11/cilantro-and-lime-crab-salad-in-avocado.html

I changed them up a little bit though so I'll list my ingredients here:

Asparagus Soup

1 lb. asparagus (1 bunch)

1 tbsp. margarine

1 medium red onion

3 cups chicken broth

2 tbsp. sour cream

salt and pepper to taste

(The Gina Skinny recipe calls for 2 bunches of asparagus and 6 cups of chicken broth. I cut these in half and it was the perfect amount for just 2 people (no leftovers, though). I kept the 2 tbsp. of sour cream though because when I made this before with the original recipe, it wasn't super creamy. So if I was making it with 2 bunches and 6 cups of broth, I would probably use 4 tbsp. of sour cream.)

1. Dice onion.

2. Melt the margarine in a large pot.

3. Sautee onion in the pan for 2-3 minutes.

4. Snap tough ends off asparagus and throw them away.

5. Cut asparagus into 2 inch pieces.

6. Add asparagus, chicken broth, and salt and pepper.

7. Cover and cook for 20-25 minutes.

8. Remove from heat and stir in sour cream.

9. Put the soup in the blender and mix until you get the desired texture (we have a tiny blender so we have to do it a few spoon-fulls at a time - ha).

Tuna Salad in Avocados

(I changed up this recipe a lot. Here goes.)

2 cans albacore tuna

2 tbsp. light mayonnaise

1 tbsp. red wine vinegar

1/2 chopped red onion

1/4 cup rinsed black beans

1/4 cup rinsed yellow hominy

2 avocados

1. Open and drain the cans of tuna.

2. Mix in mayonnaise and red wine vinegar.

3. Open and rinse black beans and hominy.

4. Mix them into the mix.

5. Chop the red onion and mix it in.

6. Cut 1 avocado in half and remove the pit.

7. Pile up 1/4 of tuna salad on each avocado and save the rest for lunch tomorrow!

Garlic Cheese Toast

4 slices of your favorite bread

3 tbsp. margarine

1 tsp. garlic salt

Grated mozzarella cheese

1. Mix margarine and garlic salt.

2. Spread mixture on bread

3. Top with mozzarella cheese

4. Stick in toaster oven or regular oven set to broil (if you do it this way, watch it carefully so it doesn't burn).

Garlic toast is really good if you dip it in the soup:

I cut the outside off the avocados so they would be easier to eat.

This was super super good! Only it was way too much to eat, so maybe it would have been better with 1 piece of toast instead of 2 and half a bowl of soup. All this stuff is great for leftovers (except the toast) and it was so awesome! Oh, and eat some mandarin oranges and a new juice you've never tried before... Enjoy!

true dat

"Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It’s not just in some of us; it’s in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others."

- Marianne Wilson

lucky

husband.

hottie.

hero.

I was reading way far back in my journal last night and was once again reminded of how incredibly lucky I am to have convinced such an amazing guy to marry me. This is one part I particularly liked.

May 17, 2010

"It is really weird how you can feel so sure about someone. In a lot of ways, Travis is not what I expected. in a lot of ways, my life with him won't or may not be exactly what I imagined. I knew though, from the very beginning, once Travis had made an impression on me, I was a goner. I know there could be someone else that I could probably be just as happy with, but i don't want anyone else; I want him. Travis is human; he does have a lot of faults. But he has an unbelievable strong testimony and desire to do what is right. He is incredibly sweet and gentle. His personality perfectly matches mine. He tells me the hard things, and he knows how to without being mean. He comes to me with every problem. He is always accommodating with any little thing. He always expects to give more than he gets. He is goofy and silly and loves to joke around and tease me. He is an amazing kisser and whenever he touches me at all I still get goosebumps. He is so handsome, wow. He is so smart and loves to learn. He has so much ambition and he always pushes himself. He is loving and kind. He adores his family and treats them kindly. He loves children and is so sweet with Brady and Ryan. Travis is the one I want. I love him with all my heart. He is the best thing that has ever happened to me. he makes me feel safe and secure and loved. Sometimes I just don't believe that he really loves me! Sometimes I don't believe he is really! But he is, and I can't wait to marry him."

I love you hubs. Forever and ever.

Love, wifey.

friday fun-day and fabulous finds

Wow that's a lot of f's....

Yesterday husband played hooky and stayed home to play with me instead of going to boring work. Yay! We slept in way late, made pancakes:

awwwww!

Then we cuddled on the couch and watched some Modern Family (latest obsession), got ready, ran some errands, and went to DI and found some freaking awesome stuff!

HUGE mirror! $20. (Ignore the mess, we are in the process of refinishing a dresser Trav made in high school and so the contents of the dresser are strewn about the soon to be office).

THIS lovely. such a cute little entryway table with beautiful lines. $12.

And...dun dun dun DUN

this beau-ti-ful TEAL leather (or pleather?) swivel chair that we'll use for our desk chair (unlike most office chairs, it actually supports your back) for a STEAL of $5. I squealed when I saw it. Husband even liked it too and since it was so cheap I didn't even have to do any convincing.

NOW. What to do with the little entry way table? I don't know what color to paint it. Either I want to paint it or I was thinking something like this: http://vintagerevivals.blogspot.com/2010/09/tin-foil-nightstand.html

And the huge mirror has some scratches and is a little bit damaged, so once I practice on a smaller mirror, I am eventually going to do this: http://vintagerevivals.blogspot.com/2010/11/anthropologie-acid-mirror.html.

I am really excited for this office. I am like a little kid eating cotton candy and reveling in all its sugary, sticky goodness.

moving to the loft

our apartment has a loft which makes for high ceilings, hot afternoons, tons of space, and oh yeah... a loft we NEVER used until a week ago. Trav, in all his "babe i have a great idea" glory, proposed that we move our bedroom upstairs into the loft and make our now bedroom into the office and use the upstairs futon as a couch. I wasn't so sure how I felt about sleeping way up there and more importantly having to walk up a flight of stairs multiple of times a day just to go to the bedroom (husband and I are not stairs people. I fall going down them, he trips going up them, and it's just a worrisome affair). After insisting he would initiate a strict hold-onto-the-rail-at-ALL-times policy, I felt a little better. But he finally won me over when he said we could buy new furniture (from DI, of course), refinish it, and I could decorate any way I want.

Deal!

(we shook hands...it was very official)

Then a couple of days later when we were bored we decided to move our bed upstairs and the futon downstairs (quite a feat). And after an hour of bumping the walls, groaning, Trav getting mad when he noticed I had stopped lifting, and scooting the bed this way and that to get it centered against the wall, voila!

Since then I have been trying to decide how to decorate the new office on a very limited budget and have it look fabulous. The problem is I am so creative that I have way too many ideas (.....). But here's what I have so far.

I went to Hobby Lobby and found so many goodies I loved but only bought a few things (self control, people).

Knobs galore!

(If not for some dresser in the spare room, these Reds will be replacing the boring knobs on my kitchen cupboards! Eeeee)

Love this color combo, most of all.

But navy blue will always be one of my true, true loves.

Bought this M doo-dad to put on a dresser or something in a little vignette.

I love bright vases.

THEN. The Winners!

These awesome pillows were half off and I may or may have not jumped up and down like a little kid when I saw them. Eek!

And then did the same thing when I saw these giant chess pieces! Eeek eek!

So when I got home I put the pillows on the futon and felt this little burst of happiness.

But as you can see the futon is not a pretty color and I couldn't decide what to put over it so I put a teal fitted sheet and put that on for now, but I can't decide if I like it. What do you think??

This is not a very good picture because the lighting in our whole apartment is sucky, but you can get the idea. It woks for now. (PS teal is my new favorite color...)

These are some things I'm thinking about for this office:

painting the inside of cabinets

yellow dresser

carpet squares as inspiration boards

wallpapered closet

hang a huge mural?

curtained cabinet shelves

dresser drawers with carpet and pretty things inside

make your own wall art via Costco super cheap printing and big Michael's frames

fabric magnetic boards

photo extravaganza

covered light switches

wallpapered doors (eee!)

wall papered shelves

I need a chair like this...

love Chevron print and this bright green is surprisingly appealing to me...

love.

LOVE.

So that's it for now. We'll see how this all comes to fit together!

Home Away From Home

Tonight, I think of home. I think of hot monsoon storms that rage like swift bursts of emotion, swirling around the valley in fits of anger, or fear. I think of our first monsoon together. After the thunder and lightning dared us for hours to show our faces we climbed up to your roof. We kissed as our intrepid fingers traced drops of rain and sweat in each other’s hair and down each other’s arms. My heart raged as an unguarded storm. Prompted by the smell of coming clean, I allowed myself to love you.

I think of the chill when climbing out from the chlorine water followed by the hot flash of lying on the burning deck. I think of the day we stretched out on that pink deck. The sun tickled evaporating water off our bodies. I stared at you and noticed the divine transparency of your pale skin, showing so many blue veins underneath. Though pulled taut over strong limbs, it seemed to be tissue paper, so thin and fragile. Imagining I could rip open your body like a birthday present made me fear for all the times I would probably tear through you over the years, but I knew we would remain intact.

I think of soft winter grass overshadowed by swooping citrus trees with ripe fruit. I think of us sitting cross-legged from the vantage point in the yard where everything looks magical. Wind rustled the leaves and branches creaked as we mixed childhood memories with plans to make new memories in our own yard. Dazzled by your country-boy hopes for football games beyond the porch you’d build and long weekend barbeques, I admired your aspirations for a family.

I think of long walks through the neighborhood, strolls down those familiar streets where I had trick-or-treated, learned to ride my bike, and ran like mad during Capture the Flag. I think of announcing “We’re going on a walk,” to my mom who then begged us to take the under-exercised dogs with us. You agreed even though you don’t really care to spend any extended amount of time with animals beyond a pat on the head and an occasional scratch behind the ears. And you agreed again when she and I came out with the camera and you knew you were in for a long haul of posing. You played with my lifelong, furry friends for hours. Although I knew our main differences might never change, I realized you would stop at nothing to make me happy.

I think of my parents’ gorgeous home, especially the ornate front room with the baby grand piano, blush walls, and collections of mom’s figurines and dad’s Shakespeare. I think of long talks with you on couches almost too beautiful to sit on. It was there we first felt the magnetic pull to one another as pressing deadlines got pressed further and further back into the evening. You kept announcing “Ten more minutes,” and “Fifteen minutes, for real this time,” but hours passed as we delved deeper with story after story. As that first summer’s sun set, we said goodnight and I hoped we would last past the summer’s end goodbye.

Tonight, I think of home. But just like you fill every part of my life now as my husband, you consume every memory. This seems to be a sign of what’s yet to come. As years pass and we become so intertwined, I will strain to remember a time without you. Your memories will become mine at dinners, grandkids weddings and our golden anniversary, and vice versa. We will know each other’s every quirk and hope and dream and lifelong secret. And I realize that although I am away from the Arizona sun, fresh oranges picked from trees by the trampoline, and Pomegranate Street, in you I have a new home.

Tonight, I think of you.