I know, I kind of fell off the face of the earth as far as blogging goes this past week. I can give you excuses or I can tell you about my week and then maybe you will understand why I didn't have the time to post blogs.
Let's start with last Friday night (this is Feb. 8th that I am referring to). I spent the day visiting my friend Jessica in West Jordan. We really just chilled at her place and rented a redbox movie. The movie we rented was Moonrise Kingdom, which was very random at times, but I really enjoyed it. I had received the recommendation to watch it from H&D. After the movie finished we watched some ghost hunter show on TV and then I mentioned that I needed to pick up a few things at IKEA for Ash, so we headed to the IKEA. It really was a quick trip to IKEA because I had made plans to meet Dana, Kiki, & friends to do karaoke at a little cafe here in Orem.
So we did that, and then I headed back toward home and went to Callie's Cafe where we proceeded to do some karaoke and dancing.
I never thought I would be able to find where the
crazy fun people of Utah lived. But I found a few of them there at Callie's. Those of y'all who know me know that I am super shy. But I wanted to get up there and sing my heart out. There really weren't too many people there and the ones that were there seemed to be nice, fun people. I don't even know how to describe my experience there in text, but the craziness going down in Callie's made me feel like I was right back home, down south. I finally worked up the nerve and picked a song to sing, I did Super Bass by Nicki Minaj. The way I see karaoke is you have to do something ridiculous, you can't take it seriously and sing your favorite ballad. At least I can't. We finished with the karaoke craziness, but decided to make a tradition of it and will go once a month.
Kiki had talked to me about hiring me to make a King Cake for her daughter's class at school so we talked about it and her and Dana said they would put the word out for me and try to get me some more customers, so Saturday I put the word out. By Sunday I had one customer besides Kiki, which honestly is one more than I thought I would have.
Monday morning I got up at 7 am to get started making King Cake, because the one customer I had wanted to pick it up that morning between 9-10 am. It typically takes about 1.5 hrs to make a cake and I wanted to give it a little time to cool before she picked it up. I also got started with making Kiki's cake plus the one she added on last minute for her family. I finished those about 11:30 and went to run a few errands before I went to drop off Kiki's cakes.
I visited with Kiki for a little bit and then headed to Rachel's house where I had dinner with the Vliet/Luke/Ingram's. It was a good time and good food with them. John (Rachel's hubby) did a quick little spiritual thought for us, so I got to have FHE* (even though I skipped out on ward FHE, which I told Ash's home teacher I would try to make).
*FHE=Family Home Evening, which is something that the LDS church strongly promotes.
Tuesday, was Mardi Gras. A friend from back home contacted me kind of last minute on Monday asking if he could get a couple King Cakes. I of course said sure! and I woke up Tuesday morning and made his cakes, then delivered them to his place of employment, which happened to be Dominos Pizza. Which, let me tell you... It was very surreal to be making a delivery to a pizza place.
Tuesday eve, a childhood friend/practically family, Michael, had invited me and Ash to a Mardi Gras shindig that his friends were throwing. Ash had planned to go to a ward RS service project so she missed out. But it was a good time again, with some great southern staples. Our host made a shrimp etouffe and red beans and rice. Michael made a jambalaya. Another of the friends made a plain king cake, and I brought a cream cheese filled one. Let me tell you, our host, who had never been down south, did southern cooking very well.
Wednesday, I don't think I did too much of anything. I did however get introduced to the froyo at Yogurtland here in Orem by my fake sister, Laura. I loved it. While Laura and I were visiting, she asked what I had planned for Friday, I said "oh nothing." So she invited me to go hiking with her.
Thursday was Valentine's day. I never have been one to celebrate that day. I've never had a valentine. Ash wanted to do something though, so we made plans to go up to SLC to shop at City Creek Center, eat at Cheesecake Factory, and have the Temple Square experience. We left a little later than we intended to, so the wait at Cheesecake Factory was a 90 minute wait. CF was the plan though, and we were going to stick with it! While we waited, we did a little shopping, but didn't make it over to Temple Square. We did see the temple, which was gorgeous.
Friday I woke up and went hiking with Laura. I was disappointed that I wasn't quite in the shape I needed to be in to hike up a mountain, in the snow, at a high altitude. So, I will be starting a strict gym regime tomorrow and will build my muscles to handle inclines and start my running training so I'll be able to complete my first goal of doing a 5k, then a 10k, then half marathon, then eventually the Disney Princess Marathon. Laura and I talked about it and we both want to do it. I think we should go together!
Friday night my friend Samantha, who is a musician, played a gig at a little dive bar in SLC called the Woodshed. Samantha plays under the alias
Vinyl Tapestries y'all should go check out her music and like her on Facebook. I met up with friends, Kaitlin and Logan, who are also Louisiana natives at the show. We all three enjoyed it, and had a grand time visiting with Sam after the show. Then we drove back toward home, but stopped in American Fork at IHOP where Ash met us.
The IHOP experience was something that the four of us will never forget. I would love to tell you about it, but what happens at the IHOP, stays at the IHOP. Plus, it would be a full blog entry on it's own. And, like the karaoke experience, I don't know how to put it down to text.
I didn't get to sleep until 4am that night. I can't remember the last time I was up so late. Yesterday was Saturday and I drove up to Centerville to visit Aunt Kathy, Uncle Steve, Jessica, and Ryan. I also had the pleasure of meeting Ryan's girlfriend, Kanille. She was a lot of fun. And I had a blast with them. We ate at Red Robin, shopped at Target, shopped at Kohl's, and went back to their house, ate popcorn, and played Bananagrams. I then came home, watched a show on Netflix, then went to bed.
Today is Sunday and I went to church, and I will be going over to Bianca and Nathan's for Sunday dinner in just a little bit. I am excited to see them. It has been too long!
That is all I have for now. I'll tell you about the BEAST of a deal I got at Kohl's in a post tomorrow, so check back!
