food..

Food is by far one of my favorite things. I grew up with my mom making the most delicious homemade bread.. She is an incredible cook! At Thanksgiving and Christmas, her and my dad make tons of pies.. Cream cheese-pecan being my favorite. They are both really great in the kitchen (and on the grill!), which is a huge reason I have such a deep love for food. Unfortunately, due to enjoying too much food in the past.. I don't let myself indulge as often as I'd like now. Even though I keep my meals pretty healthy now, one thing I love to do is bake. I'm known for my Hersheys Kiss filled cookies, and am always bringing in some sort of treats to the salon.

I've been buckling down on my diet, so treats haven't really been an option for a little while. However, I thought it would be a good idea yesterday to look at some recipe blogs. Okay.. maybe that isn't the best idea when you are abstaining from sugar. But I found myself hooked on a few recipe blogs salivating all over my keyboard..

I added a tab on the side of my blog with links to some of the websites that I love to get recipes from, Recipegirl.com being my favorite. I'm going to be doing a lot of baking towards the holidays so hopefully I'll have some pictures to share. If you have any uber-tasty recipes to share, please let me know!

"marry-weds" party

Fall is finally here, and I am enjoying the cooler weather. This week is predicted to be in the mid to high 70's, and I love how cold it is at night. Fall is my favorite season for so many reasons, and I am enjoying every second of it.

After all that's been going on, we realized a few weeks ago that we failed to have any sort of bridal shower for Peri. Originally, we were going to have a party for her and Neva sometime this month in Neva's backyard. Well, Betty was still wanting us to come around... so we decided to have Peri's party there. I was a little nervous about being at her house, but it turned out to be a good time. We had a Mexican theme (of course I brought Dorito Casserole) and even had a pinata. For Peri and Jacobs gifts we gave them gift cards to PF Changs and World Market, a chia pet puppy, and 8 boxes of brownies (that's only 4 double batches Peri says..). It was good to have all of the salon girls together having a fun time, it really felt like Neva was there with us. Here's some pictures from the big night.













In other news, I was very lucky to have my friend Kyle staying with me this past weekend. Kyle served his mission here in Denver, and has been home for about 3 months. I met him while he was serving with another elder from Kamas, and I used to cut their hair every 6 weeks. I didn't really know him while he was serving here, but we have become very good friends since he went back to Austin. He actually goes to school with Morgan (my best friend from Pittsburg), which makes me totally jealous that they live so close to each other and I live so far away from them both. I had an a lot of fun hanging out with Kyle this weekend, and feel very fortunate to have him as such a good friend.

Here's a picture of us before I took him back to the airport.

birthday

I guess I am a little late on the birthday update, I've just been so busy celebrating!! My birthday fun started with a pre labor day dinner at the Moore's.

(For those of you who don't know who the Moore's are.. Kathy Moore and my mom are cousins. When I first moved to Denver I lived in their basement while I found an apartment and waited for Peri to move here. They have taken me in as one of their own, and I love spending time with their family!)

Kathy's son Tommy was turning 32 on the 3rd, so we had dinner at his house to celebrate our birthdays plus labor day. It was fun playing in their brand new backyard, and catching up with everyone. I ended up spending the night at Kathy's because it got so late, and got up the next morning and bought a new DVD player for my room. I'm excited to be able to watch movies in bed now!!

I didn't really have any plans made for my birthday. I don't work Friday's, and I didn't want to plan anything too exciting because I work early on Saturdays. My new and wonderful friend Adam drove down from Arvada, so we ate pizza and watched season 4 of The Office which is one of my favorite shows! For my birthday Adam bought me 3 lotto tickets, and I won $5!! Later that night, my friends Stefen, Karen, and Dave joined us. We had some cake and watched some more of The Office. Then we decided to go see Hancock at the $1 theater. I had heard bad things about it, but I actually really enjoyed it!!

Unfortunately, I didn't return home from the movie with my phone.. I know it was in my pocket during the movie, but it never made it home. We searched the car, I tore apart my apartment, and called the theater several times to see if it had been turned in. Unfortunately, I don't think I'll ever see that phone again. I bought a new one yesterday, so I am still needing peoples phone numbers.

Saturday we celebrated my birthday for real. A bunch of us went to dinner at Hacienda Colorado. It was soooo much fun! Nearly 20 people showed up and we had a blast. The restaurant is one of many, but that particular location is only a few months old. The food was great, and I loved having a lot of my friends there with me! After dinner Natalie and I went dancing downtown, and had a lot of fun shaking our money makers.

The weekend was awesome, I am lucky to have such great friends and family! Thanks to everyone who celebrated it with me, and mostly thanks to my mom for having me! I love you all!!

here's a picture of me blowing out the candles on the cake Kathy made me. It was brownies frosted with Andes Mints. Delicious!!




Peri, me, Karen, and Natalie. My three best girlfriends in Denver.



Peri with my cake at work. It was from Coldstone. 2 layers of choclate cake, one layer of sweet cream ice cream with cookie dough, and one layer of chocoloate ice cream with peanut butter cups.



Cary (my new roommate), Kenny, and Kyra at Hacienda.

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