Birthday Celebration

Last Sunday was my birthday, so Jon and I spent the weekend celebrating.

Saturday night we started off the festivities by going to Stoneground for dinner. Their food is fabulous and we always end up eating way too much, but it is always worth it. We ended the meal with their fabulous tiramisu.

(pics courtesy of Stoneground's website)

Sunday was a relaxing day. We had brunch and went to go see a matinee of Alice in Wonderland.

Monday we both took the day off. We ran a bunch of errands just spent the day enjoying the great weather. We went to lunch at Tony Caputos.


While there we picked up a few things from their store and got a lesson in fancy cheeses.

Once of the cheeses we picked up was this 4 year gouda. It's great.

We also got this insane cheese called Testun Folglie di Castagno. It's super sharp and we were told that it has to be made just right in order for it to turn out. Also the cheese is wrapped in chestnut leaves, which gives the cheese three layers of flavor. The stuff is insane! A little piece is all that you need.

All in all the weekend was wonderful and a much needed break from the craziness that has been life lately.

I've been published...

well kind of. Maybe not really.

A few months back I had to travel to Memphis for work. While there my co-worker and I wandered around the city during our off time. I took a bunch of pictures and posted them to my flickr account. Well I was contacted by the people at Schmap!! and was told that they liked one of my pictures and wanted my authorization to possibly use the picture. My picture was then put in a pool of other pictures for them to choose from.

I just found out that they decided on my picture and it has been posted on their site. There is even photo credit given to me. Awesome!

The page can be found here.

Papercuts

I can't remember if I have blog about this before, but if I have I will again. I am absolutely in love with the paper-cut art made by Madebyjulene. She makes the most fabulous custom hand cut pieces of art. I would love to hang one on my wall.

Here are a few of her pieces.


And my absolute favorite!


Her Etsy store can be found here and be sure to also check out her website.

Would you like bacon with that?

Although Jon has been vegetarian for forever, he still misses bacon. Unfortunately, he has had to put up with me and some friends teasing him about his forbidden love of bacon.

While at work today I was cruising the eBay daily deals and came across this:

The seller of this item feels that everything "Everything Should Taste Like Bacon". The best part of this quirky item is that it's vegetarian.

Although I am weirded out about the thought of bacon flavored mayonnaise, part of me wants to get this.

Spring Cleaning

I've got the Spring Cleaning bug, only problem is that we've outgrown our current place. Granted we do have clutter and things to get rid of, but we also just don't have room for the things we want to keep. The house just doesn't have the layout or storage that we need. So I ask you, what do I do?

I really would like to put the place up for sale this year and move on up in the world. But here we are at the same problem again, we need to downsize to help in making the house more attractive. We could move stuff to a storage unit, but when we use it on a regular basis that doesn't really work.

I am feeling overwhelmed.

Hobbies and side businesses take up a lot of space...

While I was out...

During my blogging hiatus we took a trip to California. I was stressed from work and we decided that a break between Thanksgiving and Christmas would help with all of that holiday stress.

We flew into Long Beach, picked up our car and headed to Newport where we were going to stay for a few days. We didn't really have anything planned other than to hang out, visit the beach and just relax.

The first day was beautiful! The sun was out. It was much warmer than Utah and we didn't have to go to work.

The day was awesome! Unfortunately, the next morning a storm that was supposed to come the next week started to rain on our parade. It was still sunny and beautiful but the wind had a not so friendly chill to it. We decided we would take a drive down the 101 and see what we could find.

And of course it was that day that the ocean and I got into a fight. There I am standing on the beach admiring the scenery and listening to the ocean, when a big wave suddenly washes ashore and before I can get out of the way I get hit.

It's cool I can survive. We jump in the car and I make Jon run the floor heater to try and dry out my shoes. I pretty much dry off, just have sand in my shoes. Oh well, a souvenir.

We get back in the car and head out to another beach. Since Jon usually takes the pictures, we find this cool spot and I tell him to go out and stand on the rock. It's in the ocean so he has to wait for the tide to go back to get to the rock. I am hoping for this awe inspiring picture where the waves are crashing behind him.

I think he stood there for a good 5 minutes and this was the best shot I could get.

Not what I was imagining.

Jon comes back and then it's my turn to go to the rock. No problem, right? Wrong! Remember how I said the ocean and I got in a fight?

Enter me running to the rock.

Right as I jump up on the rock, what do I see?

That huge wave that is supposed to make the impressive picture, only it's WAY bigger than I thought and I have no where to go.

Ocean - 2 Bekah - 0 and soaked. Now I am completely wet and covered in sand. The ocean just knew how to get me. It waited until I wore the most absorbent hoodie I packed and then got me.

On the last day we went out to Balboa Island, just to see what we could see. We went out on the Pier and were lucky enough to see some dolphins.

And this guy

We went to our last beach and watched the sailboats and the storm come in before we had to head back to the car and drive to the aiport.

The End.

Valentine Surprise

Jon surprised me this year by kidnapping my Vespa from my parent's house and taking it down to Beehive scooters to get it restored. If you are reading this and are shocked to learn that I have a Vespa, I not really surprised. I purchased this lovely back in high school. I was beyond excited to get it. However, I really didn't have the knowledge or means to get it restored to the condition that I wanted.

Over the past years there have been a few moments of inspiration to get the scooter up and running, but then those are quickly killed by frustration of Italian engineering. I guess in an attempt of out of side out of mind, the scooter had been left at my parent's house. My mom had been using it as a place to put her bucket of gardening tools.

Since Jon has been making plans to build his Triumph motorcycle I have been wanting to get my Vespa up and running. Once again that feeling of intimidation had filled my head. Especially when I think of the shoe box full of parts we had previously taken off the bike, that I was sure we didn't know where or how to put back on.

Jon and I would talk about getting the scooter up and running and joke about me putting around on it, but that was as far as it got. We weren't sure were to take it, or even how to get it there since we don't have a truck.

Over the weekend I was helping Jon at the shop and he surprised me by telling me the story of my Valentine Day Surprise, which can be found in his words here. I was beyond shocked and overjoyed. We discussed color schemes, design ideas and what additional parts we may need. When we got home we started putting the list together.

When all of this is done I will have the most fabulous vintage Vespa ever!

Stay tuned for updates, we are hoping to have this project done in a few months.