Lazy Dayz...

My all time favorite summer activity is to visit The Swim Club. It has been a long time tradition so spend many a summers day at this pool all growing up and I still love it to this day. It is so nice to meet up with family and friends and spend the day in the sun.
My goal this summer is to spend just about every Saturday possible sitting here, working on my tan, and just enjoying every minute of summer! I have waited so long for this bless-ed season and I am so happy it is here!

So if you need me Saturdays at 11:00, I'll be right here. Feel free to join me!

Memorial Day Weekend

Thanks to the wonderful Memorial Day, I got a three day weekend and lots of family time!

Jacob came in town for the weekend which caused the planning of a weekend get-a-way to the cabin. It was our first trip in for the year and I am so excited for many more to come this year.

One of the best parts of the early summer up there is that it isn't too dry to have a fire. Trent was nice enough to start the fire for us and we were able to enjoy our delicious S'mores.
My other favorite activity at the cabin is lounging around...

Breakfast is my favorite time at the Cabin. The family is all together and we get to eat the most delicious food!...

The weather was over-cast and slightly rainy, which I love. It made for the perfect cozy atmosphere and great 4-wheeling weather. The kids love to go on rides and taking them is always a treat...

Amy, Brooke, and I had a wonderful time together. I think we spent a good 20 minutes on the couch taking "ugly face" pictures and laughing until we cried. I realize you can't see them all, that's kind of the point, just wanted to illustrate just how long we were taking pictures...

I had a blast hanging out with these girls! We all love Amy and I love that she is just one of us, she is one of my best friends. Brooke living up in Salt Lake is of my favorite things as well!

The rest of the weekend was filled with family dinner, trips to the swimming pool, and one final meal at Cafe Rio before Jake headed home...

The weekend was so much fun and I loved getting to spend every minute with my family!

Ultimate Confidence

I know, I must have gone a little crazy in the head to do this, but I just can't contain my excitement for my latest purchase. Do you think you are ready for this...

I recently decided that I was going to spend my birthday money on a new swimming suit. I looked high and low through many different swim suits and had a hard time deciding. I decided on two suits and finally got the first of them today. I was so excited to get it and was even more excited that it fit and I LOVE it!

Here is where the crazy part comes in, what sane girls posts a picture of her in a swimming suit on the world wide web? Apparently this girl, just please don't judge too harshly.

Drum roll please.......

Ta-Da--------------

I am so excited to wear it to the pool on Saturday! Good thing I already had a scheduled reason to wear it.

Now I just need to work on my swim suit body to go with it...

Running To The Beat

Running to the beat of a song is just about one of the greatest things. I love when you are getting a bit tired and a new upbeat song comes on and totally gets you through the slump.

I am not a big time runner and often have to overcome my mental blocks just to run as little as I do. I am trying to get back into my routine of running and wanted to create the ultimate running play list.

I was wondering (and hoping) some of you might have some suggestions as to what to add to my list. If so, please share!

And He's Off...

As much as I tried to delay the inevitable, I knew the time would come that Steve would be heading off to California for summer sales. I have not been looking forward to this and did all in my power to get him to stay as long as possible. I did a pretty good job and got an additional 4 days out of him, and I did my best to fill every one of those days with as much time together as possible.

Starting the night before graduation, we spend just about every waking moment together and I loved every second! With Steve being done with school and not having any other obligations (besides packing, which I certainly can do) it opened his schedule right up for me:

• Friday we spent at graduation and BBQ
• Saturday was packing and family parties
• Sunday was a nice relaxing day and more family stuff
• Monday was more packing and moving (even on my lunch break)
• Tuesday was another lunch date then dinner and game night with our favorite people Trevor and Kara
• Wednesday I got lunch again and then had our last date night
• Thursday morning was breakfast and good-bye

Our time was filled with each other and so much fun! I just love this cute boy... Our last day together was one of my favorite days ever. We started the night with a great romantic dinner at Sam's Club. $3.75 for two slices of pizza, two drinks, and a churro - who can beat that? The Bee's Game was the next activity on the docket and I loved it! It was a surprisingly entertaining game with a lot of runs and home runs. I had a blast just sitting and talking with Steve and enjoying the game.
Thursday morning we decided to fit in a bit more time together and ran some errands and enjoyed one last meal together. We went to Market Street for breakfast and it was so good! The morning came to a sad end when the time came to say good-bye. I am a cry baby, and Steve knows it, and he told me it was ok to cry before we even started to say good-bye. I guess he knows me pretty well.

Steve is committed to 85 working days and I told him I was going to keep track of every single day (many of you may know of my joy of countdowns, and with my birthday over I need something to countdown to). We are down 2 days and only have 83 left!

2009 Commencement Ceremonies

As most of you know I graduated from college in December. The University of Utah only does one commencement ceremony a year, so anyone that graduates fall semester to summer semester the following year goes to the commencement ceremony in May. I wasn't planning on walking at all, but had a little bit of coercing and my plans changed a bit.

Steve graduated this spring and thought it would be fun if we walked together. I wasn't sold on the idea, but when I was able get the day off, borrow a gown from a girl at work, and had the incentive of spending the day with Steve, it seemed like a no brainer.

We had commencement together that morning at 9:00 and had to be at the school by 8:00, so othe day was off to an early start. It was surprisingly exciting to be up there with everyone graduating and be proud of my accomplishments.

After the commencement were our individual college convocations. Mine was right after and I was lucky enough to have my parents come up. I was so happy to have them there and was grateful for all their help in getting me to this point in my life.
Steve's convocation was later on in the afternoon, so we took some time to get ready for the BBQ that night and I got a chance to catch a little nap since I wasn't feeling well. It was so nice to just have a quite afternoon.

After Steve's convocation, we headed to the park with his family and friends for a celebratory BBQ. It was fun to hang out, play games, and eat good food all night...

It took a little convincing, but I am SO glad that I decided to walk and got to share this day with Steve. It was fun to have a big celebration to mark this exciting event.

Thanks Mom and Dad for coming, it meant a lot that you would be there and all that you did for me to push me to finish school. I love you both very much!

Birthday Re-cap

Yes, I am alive. Life have been crazy busy, but crazy good these past few weeks. I am finally getting around to updating my blog and feel like I have a million things to update! I will start back where I left off with my birthday.

My celebrations continued on Wednesday night when Steve and I celebrated by re-enacting one of his past birthdays. We started out with dinner at Training Table, one of my favorites, and ventured to Nickel-Cade after. It was way fun and a night full of laughter and the realization that I would be an awful gambler. I threw most of my nickels away thinking that just one more nickel would push the rest off the shelf and give me all the tickets. Didn't quite happen that way, but we still had fun.
Thursday night Brooke moved home, and her being home was a present in and of itself. It was so fun to have her home. We had a sleep over and I got to spend my birthday morning at home. After getting ready I met up with all my sisters and Maga for lunch at Citrus Grill. I love my sisters and was so happy to get to see them all on my birthday. Brooke, Mom, and I headed over to the Spa Club for pedicures and were able to relax a bit.

I headed to Bountiful to hook up with my wonderful friends for my surprise birthday evening. We headed out to Thanksgiving Point for the Tulip Festival. It was beautiful and we had so much fun taking pictures and walking around. The rest of the night was filled with activities from dinner at Texas Roadhouse, an appearance at a graduation party, car problem adventures, and a little improv. I think Shannon did an exellent job of summarizing the night on her blog, if you want a little bit more detail. The night was so fun and I laughed so hard all night. I am so lucky to have such good friends!

Saturday morning I was able to have breakfast with Kimmy at my all time favorite breakfast establishment: Market Street. It was fun to catch up and be able to celebrate both of our birthdays.

Sunday was my big birthday party with my family. My wonderful mom made a delicious meal of all my favorite foods, with help from my sisters as well. I ate lots and enjoyed every minute of being with my family. Shannon and Steve were able to join us and it was great to have all of my favorite people in one place (minus Jake, who was missed). The evening was filled with food, our birthday tradition of saying our favorite thing about the birthday girl, gifts, and even a little concert by Steve who wrote a song for me. The night was perfect and I couldn't ask for a better way to celebrate my birthday.

The concluding activity to my birthday was dinner with my mom at the Melting Pot. This is one of my favorite restaurants and not one I frequent. It was so fun to have the evening with my mom and enjoy the wonderful food.

Every year my birthday seems to get better and better. I have wonderful people in my life that are so good to put up with my incessant birthday celebrations. Thank you to everyone who made my birthday so wonderful!

P.S. I don't have all of the pictures from every event that this post may be edited and updated at a later date.

The Unexpected

I think one of my favorite things about my birthday is the unexpected kindness of others. This year was no exception and probably reached a new level of kindness from others. I will just share a few with you (although, there are many others)...

The Tulip Festival: My birthday evening was filled with unexpected plans and surprises from my dear friends. The first surprise of the evening was a trip to the tulip festival and it was beautiful!...
Cutest Cup Cakes: Thursday at work, a co-worker of mine brought me these cute cup cakes. He said he settled for store bought after his home-made cup cakes didn't turn out so well...
An Amazing Bouquet of Flowers: These arrived from an unexpected friend. He was so nice to send them to me and he picked such an amazing arrangements, the colors are incredible...
A Beautiful Bird of Paradise: Maga (my grandma) and I have a special bond with my birthday since it just happens to fall on "Lei Day" in Hawaii. We spent my 12 year old birthday there together and have celebrated both holidays ever since...

There were many more birthday surprises and such nice gestures that I could go on and on, but I thought I would highlight just a few.

My birthday is over (although the celebrations are not) and it will be another 365 days until my next one, might as well start the countdown now. A much more detailed post is coming and boy do I have a lot to report. Thanks to all of you who put so much effort into making my birthday so wonderful. I am so lucky to have such great people in my life.