Just another Thursday in Utah

This last week John and I had the opportunity to go to Utah. YAY! To most people this doesn't sound like as fun a trip as perhaps the Caribbean, but it holds its charms! It was a super great trip! We got to see so many friends and spend a lot of time with family, which was the main reason we went. Johns little sister Brittany's husband graduated from BYU. YAY! So to show our family support we rallied and headed out to party!  

The trip started out super exciting, even at the airport! Not only did we both get the pat down... sexy... but the recently arrived Space Shuttle Discovery was being towed out to the hanger while we were on the runway! So cool! I am a space nerd, just FYI. To celebrate the space shuttle retiring a few days earlier we watched Stark Trek.... NERD ALERT ... I know.

Do you see it? It was a bad view, and blurry and raining, but it's there in the corner, under that smear.... 

Utah was much sunnier and warmer when we got there! But I forgot all the little quirks of Utah in these last 8 months. Like for example we flew into Utah on a Thursday. Not weird to most people right? Long weekend, cheaper air fair... Well let me tell you what Utah Thursdays are like in the Salt Lake Airport. 

Screaming, cheering, and shouting. 

Flags from different countries and balloons galore. The entire family takes the day off to sit in the airport. Why you might ask? Because it's Thursday, aka Missionaries come home day! As John and I headed to baggage claim we were bombarded my mothers bawling their eyes out and Brazilian flags. 

Awesome. We love Utah. 

We headed straight to Downtown SLC once we got our rental car to take in the sights of Temple Square and catch one of Johns best friends by surprise at work! The tulips were so beautiful in Temple Square! I love Spring. And this year not only did I get Spring in Virginia, but I got an extra Spring in Utah! Beautiful yes? 

 We went to brunch with my bestie, Christyn, you might also know her as princess A-rod, Sleeping Beauty, or Aurora. We worked at Disney together and we lived together while John and I were engaged. Bottom line is she is awesome. Also we got to see my childhood friend Kendra, her husband Jeff, and their adorable little girls. They are so much fun and I wish we lived closer so we could get together more often! 

 Just another Thursday in Utah 

 We of COURSE had to grab some In-N-Out Burger. YUM. We maybe went twice... I had to ok? I know I don't eat fast food, (not since April 2011) , but I don't think this counts.... Or at least don't tell Jamie Oliver ok? 

 Don't these pictures just make you smile? Nothing says I'm going to be an awesome dad like rough housing with the nephews. John is so good with all 14 of his nieces and nephews I can't wait to start our own family. someday... in the future... distant future.... ALSO can you look at that little girl? RUBY is the perfect baby. I would have 12 children if they all turned out like her. She is all smiles and pigtails.

 John and I with his little sister Brittany and her husband Janssen. We had so much fun with them and can't wait to get together again at the Family Reunion in June! YAY Good Times. We are so blessed with so many wonderful family members! 

Whelp that's our trip in a nutshell, ya know, just another Thursday in Utah. No biggie.

xoxo
The Mrs. 

Must be the Playoffs

I love hockey.

And I love the playoffs. Because there are twice as many fights as the regular season and everyone plays way better. This was a game between the Penguins(whom I strongly dislike) and the Flyers (meh) on 4/15/12. But this tension and this fighting, that is why hockey is my favorite sport. Barbaric, maybe. Awesome, definitely. 6 players were ejected from this game and 2 left injured. Check it out.

Project Time

Some of you may remember my dining room table from our apartment in Idaho. It was large, rectangular, spray painted black and red. It functioned mostly as a place for us to put stuff and we rarely ate at it, mostly because when we actually got it, it was cheap and painted poorly.

When we were packing up to move to Virginia John and I decided to sell it and buy a new table when we got back east! Well after looking at what felt like thousands of tables on Pintrest I finally settled on the look I wanted.

White and wood country chic.

I wanted a dark stained wooden top with antique white legs, a fairly popular style so it wasn't hard to find the color combination. But.... then I got to thinking that if I was going to buy a table, I want it to be something I'm going to love for years. So that meant it had to be kid friendly as well.

Solid wood was a must, rounded edges, also a must. I wanted it to have four legs as opposed to a pedestal in the center to make it easier to clean up cheerio crumbs that I was envisioning on my floor someday. This was much trickier to find.

BUT, I am happy to inform you that after a solid month of scouring Craigslist and furniture stores we found our perfect dining table, and it was 50% off! Impressed yet?

I absolutely love this table, the only reason it was in the scratch and dent section of the furniture store was because the manufactures accidentally forgot to ship the leaf with it so it had been a floor model.

SCORE.

It is a six seater, made right here in the USA out of solid maple. The only problem? no chairs. Because the table wasn't discontinued the chairs were still full price at a lovely $249.99. YIKES. We opted to take the table and figure out the chairs later. Which brings me to the title of this post. John and I repeated our furniture shopping process and started scouring Craigslist and other stores looking for some chairs to go with our new table. Finally we found this place called Bare Wood Furniture. They have all sorts of unfinished wooden furniture, you can either customize your finish and have them do it before they ship it to you, or you can take the unfinished piece and finish it yourself. We choose option #2!

These are the chairs we got to go with our table, they are very comfortable and hit your back just right! We are going to paint the legs and back a white color to match the table legs and stain the seat to match the table! Now the only challenge is fining the right paint colors!

Too many choices! Wish us luck! I'll post pictures as the project progresses!

XOXO

The Mrs.

Crabby can be good...

Happy Easter Weekend friends! I wanted to post a most delicious recipe for you all to enjoy as summer approaches. This is such a delicious way to prepare crab cakes, the recipe is courtesy of Southern Living, my favorite magazine. They are sweet yet savory! My Mr. and I have throughly enjoyed them and they aren't half bad reheated for lunches either! We also decided to try them as mini crab cake sliders. We got these amazing pretzel rolls from Costco(our favorite store) and put just a little bit of mustard on the bun. DELISH! I didn't make the cilantro/jalepeno/sour cream sauce. So if you make that let me know how it turns out!

ENJOY!

Ingredients:

1 lb lump crab meat (It is much more affordable at stores like Costco and Sam's club)

2/3 cup red bell pepper

1/2 cup sliced green onions

2 teaspoons EVOO

1 garlic clove, minced

1/3 cup mayonaise

1/4 cup parsley

2 large eggs lightly beaten

1 tsp hot sauce (Use franks red hot cause it's so much better than anything else)

1 tsp old bay seasoning

1 tsp lemon zest

2 cups cornbread crumbs (I cheated and used a Jiffy mix, worked just fine)

Sauté bell pepper and onions in hot oil in a small nonstick skillet over medium-high heat 1 minute; add garlic, and sauté 1 minute. Remove from heat; cool 15 minutes.

Bake cornbread while you are prepping your ingredients and sauteing peppers, onions, and garlic.

Combine bell pepper mixture, mayonnaise, and next 5 ingredients in a large bowl.

Fold in cornbread and crabmeat.

Shape mixture into cakes, place on a lightly greased baking sheet, cover loosely with plastic wrap and chill for at least 1 hour.

Lightly coat cakes with cooking spray. ( I just put some more EVOO on the pan and it was fine.) Cook crab cakes, in batches, in a large nonstick skillet or griddle over medium heat 3 to 4 minutes on each side or until lightly browned. Serve immediately.

nom nom nom......

This is what John and I did, crab cake sliders on pretzel rolls with mustard! YUM!

However you decide to make them, enjoy this is a fabulous and easy recipe!

For the original recipe go here!

XOXO

The Mrs.

Spring Blooms!

One of the amazing things about living here in VA is the Springtime. I am fortunate to not suffer from allergies like many of you fellow springtime lovers, or haters depending on the severity of your allergies. This year is the first time I have ever experienced a real Spring.

Growing up in South Florida everything is always bloomed and always green year round. And in Idaho the weather seemed to jump from Winter to Summer over night, and Spring was the extension of Winter that caused the snow to go from beautiful and white to brown and muddy. But not here! Here, Spring is a true renewal of life! It is beautiful and vibrant and colorful! John and I went to Downtown DC to experience the 100th annual Cherry Blossom festival.

GORGEOUS!

If you ever have an opportunity to go I highly suggest it. You have to time the trip just right because depending on the weather the blooms only last roughly 1 week! But they are a beautiful site to see! The entire water front is just lined with the most brilliant pink and white cherry blossoms! It was so much fun and maybe even bumped Spring up fairly close to Fall on my favorite seasons list! Enjoy the pics and Happy Spring!!