Straws are a Luxury: May 2012

Sunday, May 20, 2012

Solar Eclipse

I worked my first Sunday at Wingers today... I went almost two months without getting scheduled so it was bound to happen. Joe and I went to hear AJ talk at a 9:00am meeting so we could attend church together and take the Sacrament. We came home and I got ready for work. I "fueled up" so I could stay full the whole time while at work. To my surprise I opened today and they even had fresh baked cookies for us as a treat at work. I. LOVE. CHOCOLATE. CHIP. COOKIES. I can eat them like nobody's business. I had probably 2-3 large cookies at work and a another 3-4 brownies and cookies throughout the rest of the day. I wish eating sweets didn't make you feel like such a slob. Oh well, I can have an off day right? Anyway, that was quite the passionate tangent! I got off from work in the early afternoon and trying to upkeep the reverent Sunday experience I turned on The Best Two Years while I waited for Joe to come home from Kyle's. I forgot how clever, cute and sweet that movie is. It was a great idea I thought. We ate dinner as a family and then started to prep for the solar eclipse. Doug and Joe have been looking forward to this for quite some time and the neatest part is that our area of Southern Utah was one of the best locations in the U.S. to view. Joe and I manned crazy Cedar City crowds on Friday to get the free solar glasses so we were ready to watch! Joe even managed to prep Fiona's camera with half of a pair of glasses so that they could capture a relapse of the eclipse. We had such an awesome time watching! It took about two hours for the entire eclipse to finish but man was it worth it! It was awesome. Such a fun night!

Joe and I watching the eclipse in our super cool free glasses

A picture from the "Trip to New York Date" I took Joe on this week.

We visited the "Big Apple" starting with eating some faux deep-dish pizza by the Empire State Building/Lady Liberty. Joe then got $10 to purchase a souvenir to remind him of our trip. He bought an A&W rootbeer mug. He loves mugs fyi. Then we went to Central Park and played Scrabble! We finished the night with ritzy dessert at Krave.... because that is the most posh dessert place we have. The night was a success!

Hanging out at the 1st annual Cedar City Soap Box Derby Race. Joe's boss Dr. Wilson entered a car and we went to support the cause!

Wednesday, May 9, 2012

Groomals!

These are a handful of my favorite from our Groomal session. Brad and Kathryn worked so well together and the results are obvious. Kathryn is awesome and has been editing these in her spare time. Seriously right? They both are so talented and I could not be happier with how these turned out!

School is OUT!

Final Countdown
10. We are done with school! Done. No more textbooks, tests or homework for the next three months!
9. Joe and I decided to make dessert a last Sunday. I picked out a recipe from the ultimate Pilsbury baking cookbook called the chocolate tato' cake. The secret ingredient was potato flakes. OH MY GOSH. It was probably the best tasting chocolate cake we have ever made. Joe made the chocolate frosting off the back of the hershey's baking chocolate box and it just made that thing delectable. Since everyone at our house is trying to eat less calories we only ate half the cake and took the rest to AJ's spiritual message and disney movie night. It was a hit!
8. Joe received a refund from Fafsa from last school year and I received the pell grant for next school year. It was hard having to pay for school after a full-ride for two years. What a blessing fafsa has been for us!
7. I have now made a total of two dinners! We joked around for long enough that I hadn't made Joe a meal since we had been married so I made a grilled chicken salad last week and creamy chicken enchiladas tonight. Both were a hit a think;)
6. We were able to spend time with our friends last weekend by attending Dallin and Cassidy Tait's endowment and sealing. Joe and all the boys went all out planning a bachelor party for Dallin. It's a really neat experience to be able to attend our friends temple weddings.
5. Joe is in the process of training for a triathlon at the end of the summer. He is working really hard on the swimming portion and is really dedicated on improving!
4. We have been playing a lot of Just Dance 3 on Joe's Starwars Kinnect lately. It is seriously SO. MUCH. FUN. Fiona likes to play with us too which is awesome!
3. For Easter I found this neat idea on Pinterest that used silk ties to dye the eggs. They turned out super cool! In order for me to surf pinterest I have to make at least one thing i pin a month ;) haha!
2. As a beginning of summer getaway I told Joe I thought we should camping this past weekend. After 3 hours worth of driving to two closed campgrounds on the mountain we admitted defeat. Aunt Janet was generous enough to let us use their cabin for the night. It was such a fun getaway... even though it didn't go as according to plan. Joe took me fishing at the reservoir at Cross Hollows as part of our "camping trip" It was slow coming but we caught 5 fish total! I really like fishing, I just don't like the fish once it's out of the water. They make an icky sound try to commit suicide too many times by flipping off the hook to the rocks. Joe was so concerned about all the fish and saved every single one! The last one at the expense to his Iphone.... but don't worry his protective otterbox really did wonders!
1. We saw Avengers twice! Seriously, one of the coolest movies ever.
Well that make up the majority of our life for the past couple weeks. I hope to do a better job blogging over the summer!

Danny, AJ, Ashley, Mckay, Joe, Kyle and Tanner at

Dallin and Cassidy's Reception