Date Night - Forts + Love Letters

With Cameron being in Chiropractic school, we are on a pretty strict budget. This means no babysitters, unless we swap with another couple in our ward. I really don't want to stop having date night, though. It's one of my favorite times of the week. And yes, we are grateful for Nash and Gray, but I married Cameron. And our marriage will always come first to me. We are a team, and it takes time and effort to keep a marriage strong.

Because he's in school, I have taken it upon myself to plan dates. I have no issues with that. Cameron always spoils me rotten, and I love surprising him. I'm sure he'll plan a date or two when he gets the time, but for now, I don't mind making that my responsibility.

Last Friday, we went on an extremely cheap date, and it was a total blast! I had to share.

First, I sent him this invite [If you right-click it and save it, you can totally use it too, if you want!]


When he got home, we had dinner, did baths and bedtime for the boys and cleaned up the kitchen until it got dark.

I walked up to him and asked if I could take him out and our date began. I gave him a list of things that we needed to get together. A lantern, 4 blankets, a sleeping bag, 6 pillows, the laptop, an extension cord, two strands of Christmas lights, the treats, book and pen, and the fan.

And we made a fort in our backyard. I didn't have high expectations for it, but man it turned out pretty romantic! What do you think?





From there, we each ripped a page out of the book "Chocolat" and wrote love letters to each other by blacking out words on the page. I was surprised by how hard it was, but it turned out really great! We laid back and watched the leaves in the trees and just talked without interruption. Cam brought two bags of Dove Chocolates for our treat. Which we fed to each other. Don't knock it til you try it. Sounds cheesy, really is awesome. There is something so peaceful about being outside. The air was thick. And yes, there actually was a firefly! Which just makes my whole day, because I love them.

We plugged the baby monitor in outside so we didn't need a babysitter. Our boys were sleeping peacefully in their own beds, and I didn't have to worry one lick about them. I was surprised, too, by how alone we felt! After a round or two of monopoly deal, we went inside to watch Psych and call it a night. Just a simple, relaxed evening.

We will definitely be doing something like this again. We acted like teenagers. So fun. I can't wait to plan another date!

Swept Away

One of my favorite things about our marriage is that Cam really knows me, (and I really know him). There isn't one big moment where it's like "I know you!" It just generally comes across in the little things. These little things add up on a daily basis and remind me that I completely scored on the husband front. I completely married up. And I am so grateful for him. He's #1 on my "makes life golden" list every single morning.

This all has a point, I promise. We had the most fabulous, relaxed, perfect memorial day. We've given it some thought and since our anniversary is right around the first of the year, we've generally had about 2 weeks of vacation right before it. We don't really feel the need to "get away" by the time our actual wedding date rolls around. We do enjoy a nice dinner out, but nothing too crazy. We also both really like being warm. January isn't generally warm. So we'd rather take a trip when it's warm. Last year for memorial day, we went to Disneyland. Just the 2 of us. It was the most amazing vacation I've ever been on. And so, we discussed it, and we'll be celebrating our anniversary on Memorial Day weekend from here on out.

Cam planned the entire weekend and wouldn't tell me anything. I didn't even really know where we were going! He just told me to be ready to leave at noon on Friday. I took the afternoon off, he came and picked me up, and off we went!

*WARNING: PICTURE HEAVY POST*

He first took me to Lime Ricki in Salt Lake City to get a new swimsuit. I left with this:

We drove to Park City, and he took me to the outlets to browse while the hotel finished getting our room ready. We checked in and headed back out. Cam said we needed to run a few errands. We drove to downtown Park City. I had never been there before and was so charmed by the entire look of it. Old style shops, restaurants, and homes lined the entire mountain. Main Street was gorgeous. We stopped at a museum to pick up a $50 giftcard that Cam scored. [Love it when my man "coupons" :)]

We spent some time driving all over the face of the mountain and "house hunting." Stopping to pick up brochures, compare prices, talk about what we are looking for in the future. It's one of our favorite past-times.

He had also scored a $30 giftcard for Ruby Tuesdays so we enjoyed a nice cozy seafood dinner sitting side by side in the booth. Afterward, we went to the hotel for some time in the hot tub and played ping pong for an hour or two after the jacuzzi got a little crowded. I was so proud of myself for beating Cam until I noticed he had been playing with his right hand (he's left-handed)  the entire game! Ugh. I have got to polish up my skills.

We went back to the room for some late night TV, and just so happened to catch the OSU vs. U of A softball super-regional! Cam then continued to out-do himself by pulling Smart Pop popcorn and Oreos out of nowhere to snack on. There is nothing like vegging with Cam. He is a pro. While flipping through channels, we also happened upon a nice and lengthy infomercial for a new collection of 80s music. We sang, and sang, and sang. And I was actually pretty shocked at all the songs Cam knew more than 1 line to. Parents, you should be proud.

The next morning, after we didn't wake up to an alarm, Cam gave me 3 puzzles to solve that would tell me what we were going to do that day. He. is. brilliant. I love puzzles! He spoils me.

Apparently, he had also scored a great deal for passes to the Olympic Park. We picked them up and drove about 5 minutes to the park. After watching the Alpine Skiers Train in the pool for a while, we walked on down to the "Gravity Zone" where all the rides are.

We took a nice long ride up the chair-lift and rode 2 zip-lines and the Alpine Slide. What a blast!

The Olympic Park actually has a pretty cool museum about the Olympics that is free to walk through. We got to watch some of the footage of the Olympic Games and hear some of the back-stories of the athletes. They also had a lot of the props and costumes used in the opening and closing ceremonies, and a lot of information about and examples of the medals. I love seeing how things are made (that was my favorite part of Mr. Rogers growing up...) & the medals were really cool!

After the museum, we browsed the local library book sale, grabbed some Mexican food at a cute little place downtown and headed back to the hotel room for game 2 of the OSU/U of A super-regional. [Can we just talk a little bit about how selfless Cam is? It takes a special kind of man to watch over 5 hours of softball without complaining while on vacation. My father is one of those men. My husband is another.]

Cam then informed me that he had purchased a Groupon for the sushi place downtown that I had swooned over the night before. AH! We decided to figure out the free public transportation system and took the bus from our hotel. At this point, it was kind of blustery and very rainy. I was not exactly dressed for the weather, but I wanted to look cute! [My mom understands. :)] The food was delicious. But, Cam outshined it completely. Saturday night was delicious in every sense of the word.

After a long and unrushed dinner, we were greeted by this as soon as we walked outside:

The nice thing about Cam is he just embraces everything. We didn't even use the umbrella, just enjoyed the magical snowfall on a beautiful street. To celebrate, we walked to the Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory and bought a caramel apple, a hunk of peanut butter fudge and 2 truffles.

We walked to the bus station, which looks quite similar to a historic train station, and played HP all the way home. :)

Sunday morning, we slept in again and got ready for church. It was just down the street and the ward was extremely friendly. Living in Park City, I'm sure they get used to having visitors. Sacrament Meeting was packed and a family with 4 little boys sat right next to us. I really enjoyed watching 2 of the boys fold the most intricate paper planes I've ever seen. The talks were incredible, though. I've never enjoyed a talk on pioneers so much. It was the 5th Sunday of the month, which meant that RS and Priesthood met together for the 3rd hour. The teacher was a former member of the Salt Lake City Temple Presidency. He spoke about the temple for the full hour. It was really cool! Cam was totally prepared for Sunday at the hotel. It was still snowing, but he had brought a Charles Wysocki puzzle to do in the lobby and he had my knitting stuff stashed in his backpack! To make things even better, right after we started the puzzle next to the fireplace in the lobby, a tray of fresh baked cookies were brought out for the hotel guests. We probably both ate 4 or 5 while sitting there working on the puzzle!

We finished in just under 2 hours and went back up to the room to read Harry Potter and knit until dinner. It's one of my favorite traditions. Cam reads out loud, we talk about the books, and I get to create something the entire time. It's wonderful.

For dinner, we ate at a charming little place called Good Thymes Bistro. I ordered a salad based solely on the dressing. It came with a "wasabi vinaigrette" and I wanted to try it. Hands down, it was the best salad I've ever had! I can't wait to go back! It had fresh cashew crusted tuna, ginger, julienned veggies, and these things that pretty closely resembled corn nuts. Oh, it was divine. Sushi in a salad. Genius. [I'm taking you there, mom. You will LOVE it. It's "less scary" sushi. You can do it!]

We stayed up late watching movies and slept in the next morning again, no alarm! Cam had scored a $40 giftcard to the outlets and we spent the morning enjoying all the sales for memorial day on top of the outlet prices! I sure love shopping. sheesh. We drove to another mall and watched Soul Surfer (which, if you haven't seen, you really REALLY should. Made me cry. I love inspiring movies) and headed home for more knitting and Harry Potter.

It sure was a blast of a weekend! Next time, I get to plan the getaway and cater it all to Cam. It's gonna be great!

 

 

 

 

Alone

Cam took me out to Karaoke Night at Guru's tonight with our friends the Heldts. (love them!) We'd never done karaoke before at an actual place- meaning not in the living room in front of the wii. It was nerve-wrecking but SO FUN!

Our awesome friend Bethany snapped a picture with my cell phone and then had the stroke of brilliance to record it on video. The sound quality isn't the best (it was LOUD in there!), but it was a total blast! Cam was awesome and solicited a whole lot of whistles/cat calls when he soloed in the second verse. That's my man!

Here's the video for your viewing pleasure. :) There's an 8-measure musical interlude at 1:08. We didn't know what to do, so we decided to please the kids in the back. lol. We'll be going back for sure!

Valentine's Day is for Adventurers!

This Valentine's Day was quite possibly the best one I've ever had. This is pretty shocking, actually, considering I am absolutely not a morning person and there was a mandatory breakfast at work that started at 7am. Gross. (No offense to my stellar co-workers, but I'd much rather spend Valentine's Day breakfast with C.)

I got up and looked semi-ok and stumbled out the door. Breakfast went on for about a half hour when the caterer walks in with this fabulous bouquet:

There was a card tucked in the back of it just for me. I was blushing pretty  bad at that point, but mostly I thought is was incredibly sweet! I mean really guys, my MAN made a bunch of different styled hand-made valentines, LAMINATED THEM, and arranged them beautifully like a vase of flowers. I was  (and still am, really) impressed.

I wasn't too embarrassed until I opened the card. I pulled it about an inch out of the envelope, saw what it said on the front, and shoved it back into the envelope so fast I'm surprised it didn't rip. Ladies, if your man surprises you with something on Valentine's Day in a public place, don't open the card in front of everyone. That's all I'm gonna say.

Work went on FOREVER. I felt like it was never going to end, but that tends to happen when you're really excited for something. In this case, I was excited to take C on a "Choose-Your-Own-Adventure Date."

I went home at lunch and heart attacked C's car and left a note for him on the windshield. It said, "Hi My Love!, Tonight, we're going on an adventure and it's all about you! First you need to choose your dinner. Text me when you've made your decision and I'll pick you up at 5:45. Love, K"

Around the note were 4 little cartoons of us. In each one we were doing something different. C chose the one of stick-figure me feeding stick figure him with a spoon and saying "Open Up, You!" (<--10 points to anyone who can name that movie).

This meant that we made dinner together (P.F. Changs Dinners for 2, Spinach Salad, and Cheesy Bread) and then fed each other every single bite, including drinks. It really was a blast! I don't think we've ever taken that long to sit and eat together, even in a nice restaurant. We laughed, had good conversation, relaxed and enjoyed SERIOUSLY good food. After Dinner, I pulled out 4  more cartoons of us.

C picked the one of us with a disco ball. This meant that we took off for Classic Skating! We skated around until we had blisters. Sung along to Michael Jackson, Katy Perry, and other choice artists, learned how to skate backwards, held hands, and stole a kiss or two.

We stayed until the skating rink closed (which really isn't all that impressive, considering it closes at 9 on weeknights), and I gave C 4 more cartoons to choose from. He chose hot chocolate floats. :) (No Sugar Added Ice Cream).

We sat on the couch and got warm for a while. We were both just so relaxed! (C is taking 18.5 credit hours this semester...relaxing does not come easy to us.) It was SO nice!

It's funny, the romance Hot Cocoa can bring when it's way too cold outside and you haven't had uninterrupted time with the man you love in a while. :) And the great thing is, I didn't tell C what the other 3 cartoons meant in each category, so we can do another Choose-Your-Own-Adventure Date really soon!

Hope you all had a wonderful Valentine's Day!

Suns Game!

While I realize that certain members in my extended family may refer to this game as the "Jazz" game, we'll just avoid all silly-talk and call it what it was. :) The Suns won by 16! woot.

C & I, and C's twin Kiara & her friend Sarah represented in the Orange & Purple for the Suns. We were not really among friends. I had never been to an NBA game before, & I really had a great time! Thanks Adam & Em for scoring us some tickets!

I had no idea how intense fans can be, especially AT the games. I will say, though, that we enjoyed watching the fans sitting near us as much as, if not more than the game itself. lol. cracks me up. I think someone needs to explain to them that they are NOT the ones on the court playing. Too much.

Hello. My Name is Kristin. I'm a Star Wars Fan.

C & I met in June of 2008. October 2008 came and went. We dressed up like Lois Lane & Clark Kent. We got married & October 2009 came and went. We dressed up as EFY counselors. October 2010 is now upon us. We've got our halloween costumes all figured out [face paint and blue spandex pants included], but we've decided to FINALLY take part in a traditional Halloween activity: carving pumpkins. And I dare say, we outdid ourselves this time.

The past 2 weeks, I've been gaining wife points by watching Star Wars episodes 1 and 4-6. I only knitted through 2 of them. And I'll admit, I actually really like them. Once I figured out that they have a story line, the characters are easy enough to remember, and there really isn't any gore. I can actually see why people enjoy them. [I don't consider "Star Wars" a lifestyle, for heaven's sake. But I'll watch them without weeping or wailing.]

And just to seal the deal on how much of a Star Wars fan I really am, please check out our galactic jack-o-lanterns.

[caption id="attachment_1172" align="aligncenter" width="550" caption="the whole fleet"][/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1173" align="aligncenter" width="550" caption="yoda"][/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1174" align="aligncenter" width="550" caption="the jedi"][/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1175" align="aligncenter" width="550" caption="darth vader"][/caption]

And my personal favorite:
[caption id="attachment_1176" align="aligncenter" width="550" caption="R2D2"][/caption]

He's carved into a little pie pumpkin. I think he's adorable. :)

How about you? Got anything fun cooked up for this Halloween?

Harry Potter 7 part 1: Are YOU ready?

C and I are big fans of Harry Potter, and the first part of the 7th movie is coming out in November. You better believe that we're getting ticket to the midnight showing. Allow me to refresh your memory if you don't remember the midnight showing of the 6th:

We do the whole dress up, scar on the face, best seat in the house thing. That premiere was in July of 2009, summertime.

This premiere is in November. Which means it's going to be cold, and possibly snowy. And what do Hogwarts students do in the wintertime?

They wear scarves.

And just for a perk, what do Hogwarts students have?

They have owls. That is an OWL on my HAT that I KNITTED. Bammo. I'm thrilled. :) Pattern from here. :)

We're going to the midnight showing with our friends, the Heldts. We're each wearing a scarf with one of the house colors on it. C gets to be Gryffindor. I have to be Hufflepuff. And the Heldts are Ravenclaw and Slytherin. We are dorks. and we are OK with that. :) I now have to go about finding a way to make a yellow and black scarf less heinous. I'm thinking ochre will fix my problem...and perhaps I'll make the black optional? idk. Any ideas are more than welcome!

The Big Apple

Remember how I lost my job? It's actually been a really good thing. I found a new job at Mikarose and we have enough to get by for now. The sudden drop in our income, though, has caused us to be a little more creative with our dates. Last weekend, I decided to take C to New York City. He's talked a lot about how much he would love to visit the Big Apple, and since we won't be able to afford the real thing any time soon, this was the perfect way to spend a Saturday night.

C was going to be at school all day long studying and I told him I would get him all the information he'd need through e-mail. This is what he received:

I just did a quick photoshop job of an existing boarding pass. But, note to self, make it a little more obvious that it's fake next time! I successfully stressed C out of his mind. He was looking at the boarding time and figuring out when he needed to leave Provo in order to be in SLC on time. Not to mention my phone was dead. Basically, I was trying to tell him that I would pick him up at 6:23 at the WSC turnaround. Message failed. He was waiting for me for a n hour because it says "please be at the boarding gate well ahead of departure time..." darn. after our "rocky departure," I took him to a real life New York Pizzeria!

Homemade pizza, salad and breadsticks, with cherry limeade to drink. It was yummy! The card on the table said "dessert." Inside was a note asking him if he'd like to go biking through "central park" and to meet me out back. I had borrowed his cousin's bike and bikerack so we could haul the bikes and take a ride up the canyon. I haven't been on a bike in about 5 years and it was a blast! We're definitely going to have to look into getting me a bike. We were outside, exercising, and talking. It was a whole new world for me!We rode up to a park along the river where his cousin Eric was having a birthday party with homemade cobbler and ice cream. C has basically left me on the no-sugar front, so he enjoyed a big bowl of it before we headed back.

We started and ended the bike ride at the Shops at Riverwoods mall. When we got back, in true New York City fashion, there was a dance party going on. We took a walk around, observed the "nightlife" and headed back to the car, where I surprised C with these:

We cuddled up on the couch and watched the Phantom of the Opera. I was sort of worried C would think this date idea was kind of childish or dumb, but we both had the absolute best time! We'll see where our next trip takes us. We'll definitely be doing this again!

At the Drive In

C totally spoiled me and took me to see Toy Story 3 at the drive-in in West Valley. We decided to go the "The Mayan" restaurant in Sandy before the show. I was totally blown away!

For those of you who don't know, The Mayan restaurant is like a Disneyland ride. The entryway is all decked out like a cave, inside there are treehouses, different platforms, tons of greenery, cliffs, waterfalls, etc. Every ten minutes or so, the water in the waterfalls gets really loud and these divers appear. They jump off pipes in the ceiling, off the waterfalls, everywhere. It's incredible! I loved it.

After dinner, we drove over to West Valley and hit up the drive-in for Toy Story 3. We drove Max [our little old-school BMW convertible] so we could lounge in the backseat and enjoy the show. It was awesome! I'd never been to the drive-in before. It rocked.

Because it was my first time to the drive-in, I didn't know that you get to watch both movies for one price. Prince of Persia started at around midnight. By one o'clock, I was fast asleep, so we took off and drove home. Next time I'll have to psyche up for the double feature!