celebrating year four: part two.

the rest of our weekend was spent in the beautiful town of midway, where we stayed at the zermatt resort.  it was so nice!  we slept in, ate at our favorite places, got some sun and swam in the pool, took long drives, ate some more, and relaxed.  both of us had worked like crazy before the weekend so we could go away and we were exhausted!  it was so nice to get away from the world for a few days with my hubby and reminisce about our 4 years together and make plans for our 5th.  

see part one of our weekend here. 

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the time has finally come!  this morning we leave on our long drive to washington!!  we are so excited.  thank you for all the recommendations for our trip!  i may or may not pop in and say hi while on the trip, but you can bet i'll have lots of goodies to share when we get back.  adios amigos!

thanksgiving point 5k 2013.

this was our second year running the thanksgiving point 5k and it was so much fun!  tyler and jude joined us this year for the 5k and we loved it.  isaac was our cheerleader/photographer because of his bad knee and he got some really great shots thanks to mal's new camera!  malorie and i were determined to beat our time of 35 minutes last year and we did it in 33!  neither of us are runners and we definitely didn't train so we were pretty proud of ourselves.  next year maybe we'll shave off another 2 minutes...we'll see.  i think it's time to step up our game and run a 10k.  or maybe a mini triathlon?  you know, one where you swim a tiny bit, run a little bit, and bike a little more?  i think i could do that.  maybe...

i was pretty excited they had mini fat boys as a post-race treat.  who cares about the bananas and oranges...

where's emma?

amanda met us after the race {she was supposed to sign up and forgot!} and we had breakfast at kneaders and then went back to thanksgiving point for the tulip festival.  photo cred goes to mal for the fabulous flower photos!  we didn't get to see as many baby animals as last year which was a total rip off!  the baby animals are the best part if you ask me.  it was such a lovely spring day, i love this little tradition.

and my favorite photo of the day...

isaac posted this on instagram and said "go follow your dreams...i'll hold your bags."  that hubby of mine!  so freaking funny.

chocolate chip banana cookies.

a friend of mine in my ward/neighborhood made these cookies for me and i just died over them.  i begged her for the recipe and she told me it was her grandma's recipe - which makes it probably 75+ years old.  the original recipe doesn't have a temperature for the oven because back then there wasn't such a thing and she called the chocolate chips "chocolate bits".   they are a very fluffy, moist, and cake-like cookie, which i love.

ingredients:

2 1/4 cups flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/4 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

2/3 cup mashed bananas {about 1 1/2 - 2 bananas)

1/3 cup evaporated milk

1 teaspoon vanilla

2/3 cup shortening

2/3 cup sugar

2 eggs

1 cup chocolate bits {chips - i used semi-sweet}

directions:

preheat oven to 375.  whisk together and set aside the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.  mix together and set aside the mashed banana, evaporated milk, and vanilla.  cream shortening and sugar together in a mixer bowl and beat in one egg at a time.  then stir in 1/3 of the flour mixture, followed by 1/2 of the milk mixture, then 1/3 more of the flour mixture, then the rest of the milk mixture, followed by the rest of the flour mixture.  fold in chocolate bits.

drop on lightly greased cookie sheet and bake about 10 minutes.  remove from pan at once.  

makes about 2 dozen cookies.

enjoy! 

living traditions festival.

on friday night kat and i were deciding what we wanted to do when isaac suggested the living traditions festival!  we had never been before and were drawn by the 21 different food booths that made up their food market.  it truly was a multicultural dining adventure.  emma 5 years ago wouldn't have ventured to try so much ethnic food, but not anymore!  isaac has made me a much braver eater.  between the 4 of us {5 + the jude!} we had mexican, chinese, laotian, pakistani, thai, swiss, basque, italian and vietnamese food.  my favorite was the vietnamese fried rice & spring roll and the basque churros!  so good.  it was so much fun, we loved every single minute of it.  we can't wait to go next year - and isaac, we promise to do more than eat next time!  

also, aren't kat and i cute in our hunters?!  this photo truly displays just how bowlegged i am.  it's cool.  and get ready to see me in that jacket a lot.  we bought it at the north face for our trip and you can literally run it under water and the water just runs right off of it.  rainy seattle/portland here i come!  although i am praying for sunshine...

on saturday we did lots of prep for our trip and made time for a little baking {new recipe coming soon!} and the great gatsby.  we both really liked it!  everything was just sooooo beautiful.  it really is such a sad story.  and leo in that pink suit!  #dreamy

how was your weekend?!

upcoming adventure: sasquatch music festival.

 these are just a few of the amazing bands isaac and i will be seeing memorial day weekend at the sasquatch music festival!!!!  we are sooooo excited.  a few months ago isaac found out about said music festival in washington {one of our favorite places in the world - isaac served an lds mission there} and begged me to go.  i initially said no because we need to be saving every cent for a freaking house!!!  he then showed me the awesome lineup, the crazy fab venue, and proposed a road trip to washington and oregon and i was convinced.  this is one of those "we will never have a chance to do this once we have kids!" experiences so i told my music loving hubby yes.  it is going to be quite the adventure, and i am definitely going to be out of my comfort zone!  i love concerts, but i hate people.  and there are going to be sooooo many people there.  most of the people who go camp on site {it is included in the ticket price} but we both said no way to that so we're staying in a motel in a little town about 15 miles away.  this gal could not attend a 4 day music festival while camping.  

after the festival we are headed to seattle and some other parts of washington for a few days and then on to oregon!  it is going to be a two week adventure and we can't wait. 

so, i need your help.  are there any places we must visit in seattle or portland?!  we would love your recommendations!  you guys are the best.

images clipped from here.

celebrating year four: part one.

 our fourth anniversary was one for the books!  we spent the first part of our day with isaac's family - his dad just got an awesome new job as the state of utah's historical society director and is leaving his job at the lds church's history department.  we met for lunch and then got a special tour of the church's vault where we saw some pretty amazing things from our church history {for my fellow lds friends - we saw a page of the original transcript of the translation of the book of mormon and other really cool things, i loved it!}  it was a really neat experience and i'm so glad we got to do it together as a family before brad changed jobs!  afterward isaac and i walked around temple square and talked about our special day there four years ago.  i love the temple so much and the flowers were gorgeous!  then it was on to eating fest usa...

 it was my year to plan our anniversary and i didn't do a very good job including isaac specific activities...i mean, isaac loves treats almost as much as i do {i've turned him into a sweet tooth}, but we all know the little bakery tour we went on was 100% for me!  our first stop was at eva's bakery which was absolutely gorgeous, inside and out.  their treat selection was pretty slim so we opted out of purchasing anything...but we both agreed we would head back soon for some delicious bread when we weren't on a mini vacation.  so we went to les madeleines instead!  isaac took me there for the first time on our second anniversary so it's an anniversary must.  i got like four different goodies and devoured them on the spot.  yum.  afterward we switched gears to an isaac activity and visited the strangest little park downtown called gilgal sculpture garden...it was veeerrrry interesting.  but i'm really glad we went.  i won't post any pictures because they will just confuse you.  ha!  have any of you ever been there?

and where did we have our anniversary dinner?!  the copper onion of course.  we never venture to try anything new when we're really celebrating because it is just so dang delicious.  i will let the pictures speak for themselves...but oh, man it was good.  with our bellies full we headed up to the beautiful city of midway for the rest of our weekend...part two to come.

year three.
year two.
year one.
our big day.

celebrating baby frei.

we are so excited to welcome another baby into our group of friendsies!  brynne and her husband have been living in california while her hubby goes to law school but they are making their way back to utah and we are so happy!  we had a fun night full of food and really cute baby things.  two thumbs way up on the food jelissa!  and of course i baked cupcakes.  i made my fresh strawberry cupcakes and they were delicious as ever. 

can i just say buying baby things is so much fun.  sometimes it is hard to give them away once i buy them.  i may or may not already have a collection of baby clothes...yeah.  i am in big trouble once i actually have a baby to buy for!

yay brynne and baby frei!  we love you.