... that it's HALLOWEEN!!!!!!!!!!!

That's right!  My favorite holiday is back again!!!
I decided We decided to go with a Harry Potter themed party this year:

The Hogwarts towers


The Quidditch field


The Hogwarts Express Platform


The Chamber of Secrets

(Complete with Basilisk)

Harry and Hermione

And my favorite part of all: Fluffy, the Three-Headed Dog


We had a sorting ceremony:

(Renee's face when she was sorted into Ravenclaw = priceless.)

And played a few "Minute To Win It" games

And a good time was had by all.

My favorite costume prizes go to Prince and Subzero:

A big big BIG thanks to my sweet husband for putting up with all my crazy party ideas and helping me bring them to life.  Thank goodness he is just as party crazy as I am.

I LOVE HALLOWEEN!!!!!!!!!!!!

... that I am a good leader?

Wednesday was our combined Young Women/Young Men activity and the girls decided they wanted to have a cooking challenge activity.  They drew numbers that corresponded with ingredients that they had to use to create an appetizer and a dessert.  These are the results:

The girls' "Papas Fritas a la Carte."  Basically a bunch of chips with BBQ sauce and ketchup on a plate.  And a few pistachios.  It might have been good if everything wasn't covered in BBQ sauce. 

I don't remember what the boys called this, but it was a tortilla sandwich with mayonnaise, mustard, doritos, bacon bits, spray cheese, and cashews.  Even grosser than the chip plate.  And I know that because I actually ate a bite.  Well, I took a bite then spit most of it out.

Dessert went much better:

The girls' "Pop-o-Dulce."  Chocolate and caramel popcorn with craisins, a cup of chocolate pudding with graham cracker crumbs, and strawberry milk.

The boys' "Cup-o-Pudding."  A cup of vanilla pudding with coolwhip, lots of stale chocolate bars, and strawberries and bananas drizzled with strawberry jam.

Girls won on presentation and naming, boys won on best pudding and... being gross.  Really it was a toss up.  But we had fun and only burned a little bit of chocolate in the microwave.  And by "we" I mean "the boys."

I love being in Young Womens :)

... that this is not how I wanted to spend my Tuesday?

8:00- Drive the Volt to work.  Car is fine.

11:00- Go out to run an errand, discover one of the tires is flatter than a pancake.

11:10- Finish cleaning out the trunk, discover Volt has no spare tire.

11:15- Discover the tire pump in the trunk.

11:30- Kind friend from the office sees me struggling through the window and comes out to help me pump up my tire.

11:31- Friend discovers what appears to be a large staple in my tire.

12:00- Get tire pumped enough to pull back into a parking spot.

12:10- Stop looking for the insurance card that is apparently not in my wallet or car anywhere.

12:15- Discover that the tire pump is also a Fix-A-Flat kit, but decide not to use it because I am not to be trusted to do such things on my own.  Go back inside to work.

12:16-5:30- Get nothing done at work.

5:30- Matt gets to my work and takes off my tire.

5:45- Matt gets the spare out of the Altima.  It is also flatter than a pancake.

6:00- Matt finishes pumping up spare.

6:15- Walmart refuses to fix the tire cause the hole is in the sidewall.

6:30- We decide to attempt to use the Fix-A-Flat kit because we have nothing to lose.  Matt takes the spare off Volt puts the tire back on.

6:40- Call Dad in Japan to wish him a happy birthday.

6:45- Fix-A-Flat appears to be ineffective.

6:50- Matt hears air leaking from the back of the tire.

6:55- Matt pulls tire off and discovers an additional rip in the side of the tire.  Fix-A-Flat is definitely not working.

7:00- Matt rolls tire around the parking lot to disperse the Fix-A-Flat substance all over the tire "just in case" (and also to cheer me up).





7:15- Matt puts spare back on the Volt so we can take the wheel to get another tire put on tomorrow.

7:25- Get Thai takeout.

At least the day ended on a happy note.  I don't love car trouble, but I love my husband and friends who stop to help.

... that I am a little bit stalkery? (and a couple walks down memory lane :)

Ever since I discovered the world of blogging, I have become a little bit obsessed.  I have found my favorite blogs and read them daily, always a little disappointed whenever there aren't any new posts for me to read.  I've definitely felt like I am staking these people that I don't even know, but it's okay because internet stalking is not really stalking.  I mean, if they didn't want me to read personal details about their daily lives, they wouldn't put it up on the World Wide Web, right?  And it's okay to admire people from afar and wonder if maybe I'll ever be able to meet these people in real life.  It's not like I'm going to their houses and looking in their windows or anything...

I actually have met/seen a couple of actual famous people before.

In elementary school, we did Mary Poppins for a school play and Dick Van Dyke came.

(Me, Kar, and Dick)

He sat in the front row and even came up on stage and sang and danced with the chimney sweeps.  Pretty cool of him!  Oh, and in case you were wondering, I am wearing a horse costume.

(Me, Kar, Cait, and Grandma)

I was a horse in the school play.  A HORSE.  In case you couldn't tell by my face in this picture, this was the single most terrible thing that happened to me in all of elementary school.  I don't want to talk about it anymore, ALRIGHT???
I have also seen Amanda Bynes and Jamie Foxx at The Cheesecake Factory in Thousand Oaks.  Perks of living in Southern California.

Aaaaanyway, one of my favorite bloggers recently moved back to Salt Lake City and posted on his blog that he was going to be participating in a story telling show in Provo.  His blog is HYSTERICAL and I've been a fan for a long time and I really wanted to go!  He is basically famous in my mind and I totally wanted to meet him!  So I went online and bought some tickets and we made it a date night!

We started out the night with some delicious Indian food

Matt isn't crazy about Indian food, but I love it and I knew I could convert him if I found a place that was good.  Luckily, this place was a huge hit!!  Right down the street from my work and absolutely delicious.  Matt is now a fellow Indian food lover, although obviously he would still pick a burger if he had his druthers.

After dinner we headed down to Provo, visited Ne Ne for a little while, then headed over to Muse Music Cafe where the storytelling was taking place.

Going to Muse reminded me of my old Provo days.  A friend of mine in Provo had started a non-profit organization to help schools in Swaziland, Africa, and one of the fundraisers we did was throwing a concert at Muse.  Being there again brought back some pretty good memories :)

Aaaaanyway, as soon as Eli walked in, I turned into some sort of embarrassing wreck.  I wanted to meet him so bad!  But I made myself be patient.  We sat and listened to quite a few stories that night.  The theme was "Kind of Kindness," and the storytellers told a lot of cute stories of people being kind to them and the like.

Eli was the last storyteller, and when the show was over, I dragged Matt up to him and introduced myself.  And confessed my obsession with his blog.  And asked for a picture.

He was totally nice about it, didn't even act like I was a psycho weirdo.  Which I totally was, but I did not even care one little bit.

I love blog stalking and meeting idols and good memories :)

... that it's Conference time?

I got a call the other day from a girl in our ward asking if Matt and I wanted to go down with their family to her parents' second home in St. George for Conference weekend.  These people have the cutest little boy (that we sit next to almost every Sunday) and a brand new baby girl.  And they wanted us to spend the weekend with them!  We are popular!!! We have friends!!!!!

We drove down Friday after work and basically spent the whole weekend watching Conference and eating and playing

And picking pomegranates

Oh and looking for scorpions with a blacklight




As if scorpions aren't terrifying enough, they GLOW NEON GREEN under a blacklight like a freaking living Creepy Crawler.  Truth.  And they were everywhere.  But there was lots of Nielsen's Frozen Custard to balance it out, so it was alright.

So delicious.

All in all, a good trip.  Good food, good friends, good weather, and good spiritual feeding.

I love Conference time!

... that I just can't say no?

Let's just start by saying, I love my husband dearly.

A few weeks ago, Matty informed me that there was going to be a meeting of the Utah Herpitological Something or Other Society and that he wanted to go.  He asked me if I wanted to attend with him, and after giving it much thought, I opted to let him attend on his own.  He came back 3 hours later telling me about how much fun he had had and all the people he had met.  And I was happy for him.

Last week, he informed me that members of this Society were invited to come to the Reptile Expo a day early, set up their booths (if they were a sponsor), participate in a potluck, and just hang out to celebrate the start of the Expo.  Matt has been waiting for the Reptile Expo ALL YEAR LONG, and now he had the chance to make it last for TWO DAYS?????  He was beyond ecstatic.  And I was happy for him.

Friday morning he got up early, woke me up with a hug and a kiss, and made waffles for me while I got ready for work.  Then, while I was enjoying my lovely waffles, he asked me oh-so-sweetly if I wanted to go to the potluck with him and meet all of his Reptile Society friends.  And that is how I ended up spending my Friday night at a pot luck with the Snake People.

Matt's face as we were walking into the potluck.  I mean, how could I even THINK of saying no to that face??

Matt made himself right at home


while I stood off to the side trying not to make eye contact with people and debating whether or not it was worth it to eat the food that was brought to this function.  Yes, I am extremely judgmental.  Sorry.  I did eventually eat, and we even talked to quite a few people.  You know, the "friends" that Matt had made at the meeting the week before.

The next day, we were back there again, just a couple of snake loving nerds.


There were the regular snakes, frogs, lizards, spiders, and turtles

 A very friendly green tree python

 AND A BABY HEDGEHOG!!!!!!!!!!!!
One of the greatest things that has ever happened to me.

Matt picked up a few mice for our snakes.


And then we had... a talk.  A very long talk.  About how Matt wanted another snake.  And about how we already have four at our house.  And about how I don't want to become "the crazy snake people."  And about how I want people not to be afraid to come to our house.  And about how people have to have limits.  And behave rationally.  And act like adults.

And then we bought another snake.

A beautiful little albino Hognose.  I just can't say no to that boy.

As we were leaving the expo, we waved at the woman at the door, who we had met the night before.  As she waved back, she called to me, "Do you want a t shirt?"  She then proceeded to hand me a Wasatch Reptile Expo t shirt.  When I asked her how much it cost, she answered, "Oh you can have it! You've been here for two days!"  And that is how we ended up with a free Expo t shirt.

And we will forever be members of the Snake People Club.

It's a good thing I love my husband.