Crane Folding Frenzy

The wedding is drawing near ... ish. We have roughly ~130 days until THE DAY.

We are getting married at the Tracy Aviary in Salt Lake City, it's a gorgeous venue! Originally we were going to get married up in Yellowstone, but the logistics of that were going to be much too difficult to figure out. We're both pretty simple, so we want a simple, little hassle as possible wedding. Full disclosure, I've tried to convince Zach to elope multiple times, but he's said, "no way, never!!!" So instead we're going to have a birdyful wedding! Did that work? No, probably not. Either way, the wedding is coming together in a way that we are happy with.

I read that you should only DIY one big project for your wedding. I decided our project was going to be folding 1,000 paper cranes. Here is an example of people who have done this at the Aviary:

Pretty right? 

I think it is going to be awesome. In Japan, folding cranes is a way for the couple to build their relationship with each other and with their families and friends, "The time and energy put into the thousand hand-folded origami cranes symbolized the patience and trust necessary to sustain a happy marriage. A couple who could weather the long, time intensive folding process together, supporting each other, talking with each other for weeks while taking on a challenging task was proving their ability to maintain a long term, content relationship." You can read more about it here!

My friend at work thinks this a terrible idea and thinks we should just buy the cranes already folded and save ourselves some time. When I tried to explain the cool Japanese part and even that Zach lived in Japan, he responded, "You both live in America now ..." He dislikes this idea so much that he 1) offered to buy them as a wedding gift and 2) hijacked my Twitter account to post this:

Partly, he's right, this is going to be a really long process. A process, as he pointed out, that we could cut short by spending $20 - $45 on Etsy. We're currently at about 50 cranes, so only 950 more to go! Below see a wonderful example of his vs. her tracking methods ... I think he wins :/ Though, I do love to make a good spreadsheet!

Complete with formulas!!!

"Eventually, I'll run out of space on my sticky."

We're having fun and I do think it is "relationship building". The part about working through the process is true, even if we're watching TV while folding, it is still fun to do together. It is also fun to get our family and friends involved. My mom went and bought paper for us and quite a few of our friends have offered to help, it's even a fun talking point for the (good hearted) dissenters ;)

The Wrath of Gabzilla

I just woke up from a nap. It's 7 on a Friday night, I'm living the life. While this may not veer from the norm (I LOVE to nap), I like to think I have a slightly better excuse today.

Instead of going to work, I took some PTO so I could hang out with my niece Gabzilla. My brother usually has her on Fridays, but had to go out of town. Our dad and his mother-in-law also went out of town, the perfect storm of no one being able to watch the baby!!!

So, fiancé and I volunteered...

At family events there is always a lot of competition for her affections, we rarely, if ever, get one-on-one time with her.  We were both pretty excited to spend some quality time, especially since Zach is her almost uncle now.

We spent the night at my parents last night, since we're not used to waking up before 7 in the morning. This way no matter what, we'd at least be on time to watch her.

When she arrived she was in good spirits but a little grouchy. She cried when her mom left, but quickly fell back asleep. When she woke up from her nap, it was amazing! She was a whole new 13-month old child. It was great! We played games and ran around, until it was time to wake Zach up (who also took a nap).

Unfortunately, this is where things went downhill -- for Zach. We'd pictured having a great day together babysitting, spending time together and get experience taking care of an actual human child. Zilla cannot stand fiancé. She hates his face. She hates his beard. She hates all the things. Maybe she takes after her aunt a little bit on the grumpy scale?

Zach had to spend the rest of the day downstairs. We tried to just keep him out of sight, but whenever he spoke she would lose her sh*t and start screaming and crawling up me. Furthermore, when I sent him downstairs, I had to show her around the rest of the upstairs before she would believe he was gone and clam down. (I should also mention, to add insult to his injury -- my parents' dog stole half of his bagel off the counter.)

I will NOT be your friend almost-uncle Zach

Is it my scary beard?

The bright side, for me, is, that as soon as he disappeared she and I went back to bonding and playing! We had a great time and I got the best baby hugs in the world. I'm not sure if or when Zach and I are going to have kids, honestly, they terrify me. But, one thing is for sure, I definitely love being an aunt.

If you're happy and you know it,
clap your hands

I wear my pajamas on my neck

I will cough at you when I see you drinking until you give me your water

Greatest hugs in the world.

2015: In Closing

I know we still have two weeks of 2015, but I plan on being very busy and disconnected the next little while. So, since this might be my last post I want to run through all the highlights.

The year started off with a bang! My first and so far only niece was born January 2nd, but Fiance and I are getting married soon. He has one niece and one nephew, who I think already like me more than they like him.

 
 Secondly, Zach and I moved in together. At first, I was like, "Dude ... you have way too much stuff." But, he is the actual greatest person ever and things have been going really well.

Third, I chopped off a ton of my hair. I'm not sure how I feel about it. I'm really just waiting for it to grow out again. My dad definitely knows how he feels about it and says I never, ever should have cut it. It's longer than this now, but he's probably right...

Fourth, (and WAY cool) I got engaged to this guy: what a winner!!!

"Don't I kind of look like a hobbit?"

Last big thing, I graduated today (December 18th)!!! I've been working on my Master of Professional Communication for the last year and taking double the classes to finish in half the time. It has been exhausting, but I'm so glad that I'm done now! 

If you look closely, you can see that Gabby is not at all
happy about this. 

All in all, it has been a wonderful year. Two thumbs up ;)

Gratitude: It Can Change Your Life

I'm not going to complain too much in this post (though it is one of my favorite things). All I want to say, is I hate how every year we jump from Halloween straight to Christmas and completely skip Thanksgiving. Let's, just for a moment, focus on the things in our lives that we are grateful for.

Expressing gratitude has legitmate health, well being and physical benefits. See below in this lovely infographic, thingy!!!

I am grateful for a lot of things in my life. I have a wonderful family!!! Including loving parents, grandparents, two brothers and a sister-in-law (and a whole lot of almost in-laws), a gorgeous niece, a great fiance, a few quality friends, a nice home with a Kitty and a good job. I'm far better off than many people in this world and I spend far too little time expressing my gratitude. I'm going to try to do better, we all should!

So, what should we do? I usually just tell you all the funny things that happen in my life, but this time I actually have some action items: 1) focus on the things you are grateful for, write them down and consciously acknowledge them, then 2) tell someone THANK YOU. Call them up or better yet, send a hand-written card.  Let everyone know what they mean to you. 

And, then I found $20

"I'm VERY particular about who holds my stuff!"

Zach always tells me that my stories are bad. Other people, like Kent and Emily, have seconded this opinion. Emily likes to remind me, "You're not funny." And Kent insists listening to me is torture. Once, after hearing a story from me, he said, "I hated that more than I've ever hated anything." Since my stories are so bad, Zach told me that I need to add, "And then I found $20!" at the end of each tale, so at least people will know when the story is over with.

These people are all jerks.

This Saturday Emily and I went to the Farmer's Market in Salt Lake City. We got there around 9:30, which seemed like perfect timing. Except, that no one seemed to have their crap together yet. Each vendor was still setting up and didn't seem ready. We chalked it up to it being the first pop-up market of the year, and started exploring and helping ourselves to samples.

Some people gave us weird looks, but I wasn't really paying attention, since we were trying to entertain Emily's toddler, Jess, who at the moment was upset because she wanted me, not her mom, to hold her milk for her.

We're sooo sneaky!

We were making our way to the front of the market, when I heard someone say, "Are we open yet?" We looked out the front doors and noticed a whole crowd of people standing outside waiting for the market to open. We'd sneaked in the back way and didn't even notice that NO ONE ELSE was in shopping yet.

We hurried and went outside, to wait with everyone else for the last 15 minutes until the market was actually up and running. Surprisingly, when we went back inside all of the vendors were set up and ready to go! I guess waiting until the legitimate opening time actually makes a difference.

Here's where the story gets good, because guess what!? I actually found $20! When I first found it, I wanted to be a good person. I was going to take it to the front desk, in case anyone asked about it. But, unfortunately, I am a bad person.

I didn't intend to spend it, but the first stall I stopped at only accepted cash and it was the only cash I had! Even worse ... the stall was the Salt Lake County Jail's Garden Program. The program is designed to help non-violent inmates receive education and vocational training; with the garden program they grow produce and work at the markets on the weekends.

It is a really cool program and I love to buy something from them every time I go to the market, except this time ... I gave the prisoners stolen money. I find this kind of funny and kind of wrong. Well, maybe super wrong.

Luckily once we left the market with all of our goodies, nothing else happened. We went to Even Stevens for lunch, a sandwich shop that donates meals to the homeless, and I didn't even use stolen money to buy my soup! ... because Emily bought it for me. 

The Great Outdoors

Last weekend Fiance experienced an important rite of passage -- he went deer hunting with my dad. Hunting in my family (I know this is weird on a veg blog, so let's skip over that. K?) is not like normal hunting.

My great-grandpa started going to the La Sal mountains roughly sixty years ago, since then this tradition has continued to grow. My dad has been hunting in the same spot since he was eight. His friends from high school come and bring their kids. His sister and her family come. Sometimes, family from New Mexico comes in.

Last year, I went up hunting as a bystander, and it was more of a family event. However this year, my mom and I opted out and decided to go on our own trip -- leaving Fiance alone with my dad, his friends and my younger brother -- some of the craziest people I know.

OK. So I'm going to start by saying, he survived. But barely. First, he might have crashed my dad's four-wheeler. Apparently it looked pretty bad, but he was lucky enough to escape with a few scrapes on his hands and a sore neck.

Secondly, he gorged himself on so much fried pork, chicken wings, cheese burgers and bratwursts that (in one meal) that he woke up in the middle of the night to puke. Twice.

Finally! While Fiance survived, so did the deer that he saw! Huzzah!

I knew it was a success because a couple days after the hunt, my brother Nick called. When I asked how things went, he said, "Is Zach around?" And then said, he'd tell me later, when he wasn't around. I called him when I was walking over to the gym and said, "What did you want to talk about that you wouldn't say in front of Zach?" He replied, "Oh, just that we had a good time and it was a lot fun," followed by a lot of laughing (he's a weird kid). This is a glorious compliment, considering he hasn't liked anyone else I've been in a serious relationship with.

So, win for everyone! Hopefully, Fiance will go back next year and continue his survival streak, for both himself and the deer.

Last year's crowd!

Fall is HERE!

Fall is here and fall is the greatest time ever!!!
There are so many things to love about fall!

This is my Top Ten list:
1. It is no longer as hot as balls!
2. The leaves are changing to fabulous colors.
3. Everything smells like cinnamon and spiced lattes!
4. Crisp morning air.
5. If I ever decide to stop wearing jeans and a t-shirt everyday -- fall fashions are the best fashions
6. Pumpkins! -- pie, jack-o-lanterns!
7. Soup weather
8. Soft, glowy light that's makes the world look like Rivendale
9. Sweaters that look like blankets!!!
10. Gorgeous hiking!

It  has been pretty busy lately, but not in a bad way. I finished my MBA seminar so I've had a little, three week break from school. Fiance and I went to New Hampshire so he could interview at Darmouth's MBA program. I fell in love with the town and the school! Hanover was small and quite, just my kind of place. I could imagine running around for hours and not worrying about going into a bad part of town. I know it is small-minded, but a lot of the schools Zach is applying too are in big cities. As a small, Utah girl, I don't know if I could be comfortable living in one.  But, New England is beautiful, hopefully soon we will have a reason to go back.

I've also taken advantage of the hiking weather. This Saturday, Kevin and I hiked Mount Ogden. It was about 10 miles round trip and we crushed it, finishing in less than three and a half hours (3:25). The ascent was about 3,200 ft.  Overall, it was a great hike. Pretty quick and not to difficult with the exceptions of some steep ascents at the summit. It didn't rain on us, but at some points became incredibly foggy! We were walking in the clouds.

I am surprised that I've spent my whole life in Utah and have never gotten around to doing some of the major peak hikes in the area. Especially since I try to hike as often as I can. Luckily, when we did Mount Ogden we got a pretty early start, so we were already making our way back down the mountain when others were heading up.

Finally, in true October fashion (stole the idea!!) Fiance and I are going to start watching scary movies in the evenings this month. I'm open to suggestions if you have any good ones you want to share or any Netflix-bad ones.