Halloween Party

We went to a themed Halloween party over the weekend at Alex's parent's house. They know how to throw parties! This years theme was 1920's gangstars and flappers.When I first got invited forever ago to the party I went to the DI and found a cocktail dress (originally from Express) that I could modify a bit. Laura and I found twill and sequined stuff to sew to the dress and also to make a cute headband thing. 

Then I got busy with school and didn't find time to go shopping for Mic's costume.

The day of the party I was scheduled to work at 11am until basically when the party started. So we set out at 9am when Savers opens, and headed to Savers to (*cross our fingers*) find Mic a gangster looking suit that he could wear to the party. Some suit jackets came with pants, so we looked through those first so it'd be matching, but none of them fit Mic really. Dang his super long legs. I did find one jacket that actually fit Mic's broad shoulders and was long enough in the arms. I didn't know what we would find to match with it though- none of the pants by themselves looked like they'd work. Right when I was about to give up though, I spotted the exact pattern of the jacket in a pant! I was so stoked, it was the other half of the set, and surprisingly the pant size was his same size! So for $20 he had a whole gangster suit! Not bad. 
His mom unpicked the large hem in the pants, and re hemmed them with a much shorter hem to give him an additional 2 inches probably, so the length turned out perfect. 

I thought Mace had a white tie from one of his school dances, but I guess it got donated to the DI when my mom was donating things in preparation to moving. So Mic went to Walmart and found an inexpensive white tie to complete his costume. 

The party was way fun, tons of good food and fun people. 

Afton, Laura, and I

someone made way cute high heel cupcakes

looking sharp in his suit

Mic is laughing at me, because even in my heels I wasn't tall enough to kiss his cheek so I told him to bend down to my level. Love this picture though. 

We think we're pretty tough. 

Weekend away to Park City

I was looking at my schedule for the next +6 weeks- something that I find myself doing frequently which causes crazy stress & anxiety. I really should learn to just take life a day at a time rather than looking at the 6 quizzes, 4 tests, 1 presentation, and 9 clinical shifts I have in the next 6 weeks. And that’s not counting pass offs, work, and other obligations. 

But anyway, back to realizing my schedule for November was pretty much booked, and I could maybe plan on seeing Mic around Thanksgiving... I decided that we needed a weekend away. (not to mention we never did anything for our anniversary since Mic was in Alaska).I wanted to go somewhere close since we didn't have a lot of time, and St George sounded nice, but I didn't really feel like driving 4 hrs after Mic got off work Friday. So once again we headed to Park City.

I found a deal for a lodge right near the ski resort, and close to Main Street. Going to Park City in the “off season” is actually pretty nice. There are deals for hotels, and less people.

While I was waiting for Mic to get off work, I "researched" where to go to dinner. I’m the worst at making decisions when I’m hungry so I figured it would be smarter to plan dinner before we headed to Park City and before I got to the point of “nothing sounds good, let’s just eat anywhere”/bratty. I also wanted to try new places this trip. So for dinner we went to The High West Distillery. It’s located in a 1914 two story Victorian house, and is also Utah’s first legal distillery since 1870. Very cool restaurant, and pretty good food.

After dinner we went back to our room & just relaxed/hung out. We played random games off Mic’s phone that he downloaded- some trivia games & an odd “would you rather...” game.

Saturday we went to breakfast at No Worries Café. It isn't near the touristy part of Park City, and is a cute small café out of the way of everything. But oh so delicious. Then we shopped at the outlets & redrock, but neither of us found anything that we needed. I was craving cookies from Paradise Bakery (which Park City doesn't have) but we did find a Kneaders so we got dessert from there. Almost as good as Paradise cookies.

We shared a sugar cookie, cranberry white chocolate cookie & a turtle cheesecake. YUM!

I wanted to check out the Homestead’s fall scarecrow festival that was going on Saturday and maybe try out the crater so we headed to Midway. The festival wasn’t as big as I’d thought it would be, but walking around the Homestead was fun and brought back memories from when my family had stayed there when I was a kid. We’d brought our swimsuits for if we wanted to swim at the crater but soon realized that it was more like a big hot tub (and I’d rather hot tub in our lodge’s hot tub than pay to “soak”). 

Love the Homestead, and the fall leaves.

Afterwards, I don’t know why I suggested we head to Heber, but we ended up driving there as well. I dragged Mic to two thrift stores in Heber. Both are located in what used to be old houses. Kinda odd walking room to room through an old house and looking at thift store stuff. I didn’t find anything there either. But it was still fun, for me at least. Mic dislikes thrift stores.

Back in Park City we went to dinner at Butcher’s Chophouse. We’d walked by it after dinner the night before and saw that it was crowded so I’d told Mic that we should try that place too. And unbeknownst to us, our waiter informed us that there was a special going on & most all of the entrees are priced two for one! Even better, since steak places are usually pricey. So apparently in the off season (until Nov 15^th) that place has 2 for 1 deals- so check it out. Good food, pretty good service.

We didn't take near as many pictures of the two of us as I would have liked. But it’s hard to take pictures of the two of us ourselves & they all end up looking the same anyway really.

PS Thanks to Mace for house sitting my house for the weekend, and watching our crazy pets so we could get away.

I promised Mic that I wouldn't take pictures of EVERYTHING we ate, like a crazy person, but I did HAVE to take a picture of my delicious strawberry crepes from The Eating Establishment- an all time fav place of ours- but technically we've never eaten breakfast there.. so it didn't really break my "only new places" rule. 

our kitchen

I love the tile/slate flooring

I want this sofa table thing, so I took a picture of it

weird lighting, but this is us hanging out on the couch.

Benefits Gala/Girl's Night Out

Last Thursday I met my bff for lunch at one of my fav's-  Zupas. That place is always crazy busy btw, and oh so delicious. The Nuts about berries salad is yummy & I always get the ultimate grilled cheese. This time I tried the Milano, which is basically the ultimate grilled cheese but with ham added. 

Tif invited me to a benefits gala thing downtown for that night. Harmon's is a proud supporter of Local First Utah’s fall benefit, Celebrate the Bounty! More than 20 local restaurants served delicious food with fancy presentations. 

It was so much fun to attend, and try appetizers, desserts, etc from so many local restaurants.  Many of whom I'd heard of but had never been to.

• Amour Spreads • Avenues Bistro on Third • Beehive Cheese • Black Sheep Cafe • Cafe Trio • Cafe Supernatural • Caffe Molise • Caffe Niche • Castle Creek Winery • Communal • Dolcetti Gelato • Finca • Fresco • Frida Bistro • Hell's Backbone Grill • Harmons • Kiler Grove Vineyards • Liberty Heights Fresh • Market Street Grill • Mazza • Meditrina•  Pig & A Jelly Jar • Pizzeria 712• Red Iguana • Salt Lake Roasting Company • Slide Ridge Winery • Station 22 Cafe • Squatters •Tin Angel Cafe •The Chocolate Conspiracy• Vida Tequila

I've now added Avenues Bistro on Third, and Pig & A Jelly Jar to my list of places to try for breakfast.. since I'm on this new mission to find the best breakfast place in SLC. 

So far lately we've been to: Ruth's Diner, Silverfork Lodge, Blue Plate Diner, Eggs In The City, The Original Pancake House, The Park Cafe, Midvale Mining Cafe, The Grand America Hotel's Sunday Brunch, Market Street Grill, Citris Grill, Tin Roof Grill.. I think that's it so far.. I told you, I'm on a mission! So if you have any suggestions leave me a comment. 

Pictures from yesterday's breakfast place:

cinnamon roll french toast and eggs benedict from Tin Roof Grill

Pig & A jelly Jar has a cute name (and like my books, I tend to pick out my restaurants based off of the name) and we met the owner who was super nice & personable. And her food was delicious. So I definitely need to take Mic there next time. 

I tried to take pictures to add to this but it was dark at the gala & I was trying to be discrete, which meant no flash. But seriously this gala was fancy. I hope to go next year too. So write that down Tif ;) 

I wish I knew the names of these fancy dishes

I wish I knew the names of these fancy dishes

 Oh and a Harmon's bakery chef made the best mini cupcakes (a yummy cheesecake one, and a black velvet cake cupcake.. along with some fancy pastry dessert thing that is so fancy that I don't know the name of it.)

the cute cupcakes.. and whatever this yummy pastry was (the green one..)

PS In my next life I want to be a food critic/food photographer. 

{I heart Fall time}

It's been a busy week with school and early clinicals.. who knew I'd ever be able to wake up at 4am, and headed to the hospital at 4:45am?! One good thing about my early half hour commute is that there is no one on the road that early in the morning. I am enjoying my clinical experience, and I learn so much. Learning how to give shots is much easier when I am able to practice on real people rather then trying to learn about it from a book or practicing on a "fat pad". And so far the nurses I've been following have been so helpful and encouraging, which is nice because I know having a student slows them down.
After a week away from each other I'm glad we could have a day off together.
I woke up really craving Bear Paw & wishing we were in St. George. Home fries & stuffed french toast sounded oh so good. So I looked up restaurants close by for a substitute for Bear Paw. We love Ruth's Diner, and I saw on their menu online that they have some fancy french toast so we headed there.
I ordered the Pecan Cinnamon Roll French Toast, and Mic got his usual Chicken Fried Steak and Eggs. It was SO delicious.
After breakfast we drove up Emigration Canyon and enjoyed the fall foliage. At the top of that canyon you can head down East Canyon and into Parley's Canyon. What a fun Saturday drive.

piggy back ride :)

Sundance, a Salmon Party & a Sunday picnic.

I love fall. Last weekend we went to Sundance for the fall festival. We'd actually never been to Sundance, or really up Provo canyon before. The fall festival has fun booths, food, and music. Laura & I bought way cute (inexpensive) homemade jewelry from one of the booths. We wanted to get food from the restaurant up there but the wait was forever long, so instead we got sandwiches & drinks from the deli. But it was still delicious. We walked around Sundance & checked out the different buildings. I've known some girls who had beautiful weddings at Sundance & I wanted to see how it looked... since Laura still needs a place to have her wedding ;)

Love this pict of us, and my new cute bright blue skinny  jeans. 

cute sisters

PDA ;)

After Sundance we headed home. My dad hosted a "Salmon Party" Saturday night. After every Alaska trip he has a get-together where he makes a variety of salmon dishes & has good friends and family over. He's quite the cook. He made three different salmon dishes this time- a spinach pastry salmon dish in the oven and on the grill he made a spicy blackened salmon and grilled a regular type seasoned salmon. I made my signature "Crab Rangoon". They were a big hit too, and the recipe makes 48 rangoons! I tried all the salmon dishes. The spinach pastry one was good & not too fishy. And the spicy blackened salmon surprised me at how much I liked it. It was definitely spicy though. Which I love. His friends all brought side dishes to enjoy as well. I liked listening to my dad and Mic tell everyone about their great fishing trip. Out of all the people/couples at the lodge that week, Mic and my dad out fished them all, and always came in with the most fish that day. They were quite the team. 

Crab Rangoon

Sunday we took Sophie to a fun park in Taylorsville and had a picnic and walked along the Jordan River. Which btw is kinda gross. Too bad. 

the weirdo with her tennis ball.

This blog post is kinda long, so I'll write a new post for today's outing.