a year in review

my favorite photo of 2009

on my drive into work today [yes, i am lucky enough to work on new years eve] i was thinking about all the stuff we did in 2009. this was a big year for the payzant-wells house.

so, in keeping with tradition [see 2008's recap here, which is arguably better than this year's], here is my 2009 in review.

• started off the year in the front row of the world-famous rose parade, just up the street from our apartment
• i started my stationery blog
• i planned and staffed my first solo event for yamaha in santa rosa, CA [in a hotel with nightly cookie deliveries -- heaven!]. the event went great; my stress level, however, was so elevated i broke my phone.
• we took great "engagement" photos with mollie jane.
• i got to go to the american idol finale AND meet all the idols :) [also went to america's got talent w/ jolee]
• i sadly quit my first job after three long years [my last day was incidentally the day michael jackson died]
• celebrated another world-class birthday month with tepanyaki, the beatles, sewing and family
• we traded our warm, sunny, urban california life for MBA books, a new marketing job for me, snow and mountains when we moved to orem, utah
• we found out we're having a baby!

whew! what a year. i can only hope 2010 brings us more sunshine, a healthy baby and some more trader joe's deliveries. and tonight i'll be ringing in the new year with a dinner party, games and sleeping by 10 p.m. :)

i'm sorry.

i would just like to use this blog to send a giant apology out into the universe. i have been a lazy, home-ridden, attitude-laden brat basically since the day i got pregnant. sure, blame it on hormones or whatever -- but for real. sometimes i disgust myself.

i'm sorry.
sorry to the idiotic cheapskate women at the warehouse sale whom i continually snap at.
sorry that i tweeted my frustration about those women and that my boss saw it and called me out.
sorry to new and old friends for bailing on EVERY SINGLE holiday invitation sent my way. i really wanted to come. i just couldn't do it.
sorry to my family for laying on the couch most of the nine days we went to california for thanksgiving. i really did want to shop with you.
sorry to the h&m workers for when i had a total meltdown in the dressing room during said thanksgiving break. no joke, my mom just patted my arm and said, "honey, i'll buy those two shirts and then you can go home and take a nap."
sorry to our long-lost bff's the fackrells for months of planning a thanksgiving rendezvous and then instead showing up at their house, trying not to gag the whole time, watching an ep of yo gabba gabba and then going home early.
sorry to in n out for STILL not trying out the orem location. beef just makes me sick.
sorry to my self-image for not going shopping for two months. i have no winter clothes so i just wear the same five long-sleeve shirts over and over.
sorry to 24 hour fitness for not coming back in three months. i really miss running.
sorry to conan o'brien for not staying up late enough to watch his show live. since october.
sorry to my work roommate danielle for telling her what i'm craving and what makes me gag, each day every day.

and, most of all, sorry to b. that poor guy has SERIOUSLY taken up slack around the house. when i stopped cooking, cleaning, grocery shopping, and even washing my hair regularly he just started asking what he could do to help.

his culinary repertoire now includes chicken quesadillas, spaghetti, omelets and deconstructed chicken pot pie. he vacuums regularly. he runs errands for me while i'm at work. he did most of the family christmas shopping. he watches tv w/ me at night and then entertains himself with band of brothers for the three hours he stays up later than me. he laughs at me when i go off on emotional rants during dinner about all the morons that surround my world.

so b, this post is for you. i love you. and i'm really sorry.

doing the slam

b's australian friend recently taught him about the "tim tam slam" [yes, it actually has a wikipedia page] and he came home raving about it. last week he bought some tim tam cookies from target, but we never got around to trying it and instead i went to town on the little cookies. they are delightfully good, even without dunking them in anything.

anyway, last night we had four cookies left, so b decided it was finally time to try the slam. to try to get me pumped up, we watched this funny little video and i was ready to go.

we didn't end up getting the full effect of the "official" tim tam slam, but i will say that those cookies are DELICIOUS when dunked in hot chocolate. too bad we're out of em, because i would love to eat some more right now.

and...if you've tried the slam yourself...don't you think it looks slightly like someone snorting cocaine? haha. i'm just sayin. delicious chocolate cocaine. mmm.

guess my days of eating raw cookie dough are over...

well well well. i'm pretty sure a ton of people already know [my mom is really good at spreading news], but due to work-secret-keeping i couldn't blog about it until TODAY...so now i'm free! i'm having a baby!

baby wells [or baby dub. or zool, as the majority of my family calls it...as in, "there is no dana only zool" from ghostbusters...except there is "no lyndsey" when this baby is around, because i'm grumpy and sick and tired all the time] is due to arrive on the 4th of july, 2010 -- my favorite holiday.

at first i was super anxious about everything. but then a few weeks ago i had my first doctor's appointment and i saw the little jelly bean floating around and we heard it's heartbeat and it was all REAL. and we are so excited now.

baby dub is already the proud owner of a few gifts [thank you doris!] and a blog giveaway for some baby products, so we're well on our way. the past six weeks have been awful, feeling like i had the flu and having to be in bed by 930 p.m. every night, but i think i'm pulling out of it. i'm not showing at all yet -- in fact, i've lost seven pounds -- and the baby is currently the size of a lime [i LOVE the babycenter.com updates that tell you the corresponding fruit size of your baby every week!].

we're reading books and researching online enough to start feeling prepared...but let's be serious, i'm also freaking myself out over all the scary possibilities that could happen. i'm also avoiding lunchmeat and hot dogs [and raw cookie dough] but i REALLY want to eat them. i'm hoping for a girl, but b says he needs a boy. we'll see who wins.

and there you have it! if you noticed a drop off in blog posts, those started happening around the time i found out. i'm not good at keeping secrets, and since i didn't have much else to say besides baby stuff i just didn't post. now we should be back to regularly scheduled programming :)

the headless snowman & other funny tales

if you're a long-time follower of one-eyed wonder, you'll know b and i have been blessed to have some pretty crazy apartment-neighbors. [see: example a and example b.] most of these stories involve cats and odd pot-smoking single women.

in orem, we live on the top floor, so sadly there are no crazy cat ladies living above us. it has taken five months, but we've finally discovered something even better than a cat neighbor: the snowman drama downstairs.

we don't really know any of our neighbors here but have seen them around and delegated nicknames. the people who live directly below us are named 'ariel + husband' [the chick's name isn't actually ariel, but b heard her belting out the little mermaid soundtrack one day and it stuck]. they're nice enough; they let b borrow a wrench once, and we've smiled at each other in the parking lot.

ariel has a certain fondness for seasonal decor. every month we've lived here, her front step has been decorated with some trinket or other. scarecrow, labor day flag wreath, pilgrims, etc. a few weeks ago she put a snowman made out of white pumpkins next to her door. he was wearing a beanie and scarf and had a little painted face. not really my type of holiday display, but to each his/her own.

on sunday, we came home from church to find the snowman missing his scarf. there was also a note taped to his face in ariel's handwriting -- a full notebook-paper-page long. of course b and i read the whole thing; i SO wish i could recall the entire letter. it started off like this:

"to whom it may concern: i hope you are proud of what you've done! it's people like you that are ruining this country. why would you steal my snowman's scarf? that is rude and inconsiderate and i hope if you have children you teach them better morals than what you have. i like to put up holiday decorations and i don't know why that bothers you so much. you should leave other people alone!"

the note continued for the rest of the page; sorry i don't have more details. make them up in your head. we laughed about it and went inside and didn't think about it again [it's been in the 20s all week...we don't leave our apartment much].

yesterday i came home to eat lunch and the note was gone. also, the snowman's head was completely off and laying in the walkway! poor guy got beheaded. i was startled that the snowman war had come to blows like this. when i left to go back to work an hour later, his head was replaced.

and THEN. when i got home last night, the head was back on the sidewalk. we have a snowman civil war going on! i texted b the update and he requested a photo, which is what you see at the top of this post. poor little guy. i'm kind of hoping the next installment of this story involves a baseball bat, but i'll keep you posted.

p.s. just to keep things in the jovial mood, here's another humorous anecdote for you:
last night while we were sleeping b kicked/kneed me no less than four times. of course i kicked back every time, but i was still annoyed. this morning:
l: you're in trouble.
b: why?? what'd i do?
l: you kicked me the whole night last night!
b: sorry, i had a dream about hitler. what else do you expect me to do?

family photos

while we were home for thanksgiving, my mom made the whole fam get together for family pictures. i'm not entirely thrilled with how i look in them [hello utah-white skin :( ] but i think they're a great documentation of our little family right now. jennifer stock, photographer extraordinaire, took em.

some group shots:

the requisite couple shots...

poor sparky, the only unattached family member...but who cares. couldn't this kid be a hollister model or something?

i was hoping to use one of these photos for our christmas card this year, but ixnayed all of them due to the fact that they look too engagement photo-y. sorry. if you get a card from us, it will have no photo. feel free to refer to the blog for more photos than you could ever want.

and speaking of xmas cards...if i haven't emailed you to get your address and you want a payzant-wells card, send me your digits. we have a few extra cards and i'd love to send you one.

snow.

[view from my office]

i'm not so good at estimating measurements of these things, but i'd say we've gotten at least six inches of snow since saturday. it is COLD! yesterday i watched snowflakes dump from the sky for hours on end...coming from a place where it rains for maybe 20 minutes at a time, i was totally amazed that this precipitation could last for so long.

here are my thoughts on snow:

+ it is really, really pretty.
+ i love nothing more than a pure white field or sidewalk that hasn't been littered with footprints. gorgeous!
+ gives me a good reason to put on my sweats, grab a blanket and force b to watch home alone with me [movie was an early xmas gift. thanks babe! he also makes delightful homemade hot chocolate. this one's a keeper, i tell ya.]
+ sorta puts me more into the christmas spirit
+ makes me really, really thankful to live in a warm apartment with a warm bed

- it's cold. duh.
- my car is FILTHY. wow. i've never seen it so dirty. and i don't foresee a car wash in the near future because i'm currently trying to avoid anything involving water and the outdoors.
- driving in snow is scary and hard. yesterday when i left for work it was still snowing and the roads weren't plowed. i drove 10 mph the entire way to work. also, i like to drive aggressively. you can't do that when you're too scared to drive normally. therefore driving is not fun right now.
- i have a tendency to slip and fall in the snow. no all-out faceplants so far, but i have bad memories from the college days. note to self: buy more shoes with better traction.

bottom line: i guess there's a reason they say utah has the greatest snow on earth. i just wish i could stay inside until march and observe it from the comfort of my blankets.

obligated.

because i am just SO devoted to my workplace. here i am using my personal space to slang work-related ads. oh well. you were warned.

for real though. if you live around here, come! i'd love to take a break to shop with you...not to mention you will be highly rewarded. we've got awesome stuff down there for cheeeeeap.

and, just so this post isn't a total ad, here's some personal sharing.

i LOVE the thai food i ate for lunch. love love love. massaman curry tastes like candy and me likey.

also the high today is 28 degrees. BRR.

and our christmas tree is up. yay for the holidays!

tonight

tonight b took me on a super romantic dinner-date -- to a gas station. i told him it was one of my most memorable outings. [in all fairness, i had been craving subway, and the one by our house had a line out the door. so he said "i know another one!" and drove me to the subway inside the gas station at the mouth of provo canyon. it was sooo romantic...but actually kind of fun. and it wasn't THAT bad...it had its own seating area and everything.]

then we went grocery shopping, which was much needed because we had returned to a kitchen that contained only tortillas and frozen edamame. mundane date nights with my husband are actually one of my favorite kinds; i love hanging out with him.

then we came home and i finally unpacked from our trip. i felt productive.

and then i caught up on email while my saintly husband put the dishes away. in the process, one of the studs popped off our shoddy cupboard shelf and two of my olive green ceramic bowls went crashing to the floor in a million pieces. this is SAD. i always feel an empty loss when a dish dies... like it was part of the family. is that weird? anyway, these bowls are from target [wedding gifts] and they are deep and the PERFECT size for cereal or ice cream [two things we eat a lot of in this house]. so RIP green bowls. i miss you already.

and here we are. i'm going to bed. too much excitement for one night.

guess i should blog...

wow, it's been 12 days since my last post. i have become a horrible blogger. there is so much to tell...just so little time.

but we are home. nine days in california were just what i needed! i loved seeing my palm trees, my family, my friends, and of course stuffing my face with my momma's delicious cooking. and we got zero tickets on the drive.

now we're back in utah and there's no snow on the ground. yesss. b hates BYU football more than ever. work is kindly easing me back in slowly. nine days till finals. i had a hard time sleeping in my own bed last night. we have two bags of trader joe's groceries in our kitchen [including three boxes of peppermint joe joes -- regular AND dark-chocolate-covered]. and december starts tomorrow! YAY.

that's all. i promise to be better. soon :)

just lately

turns out i don't have that many pictures of our trip to idaho. just imagine a lot of cows, farmland and co eds and you get the gist.

however, there were two highlights [in addition to hanging out with my fabulous sibs] which of course involved food. first up my sister took me to rexburg's only cupcakery -- it was delightful! i liked the frosting even more than the stuff from sweet tooth fairy...don't tell anyone.



then we went to dinner at a place called "big judd's." when we arrived, i almost refused to go in because we were in the middle of nowhere and it looked like some whisky tango truck stop and i was scared. but i travailed, and we went in and ordered a 4 lb. burger. SICK. look, it's bigger than rachel's head [i shared it with three others]:


seesta + brother-in-law j-dawg

granty pants didn't make it into ANY of my pictures, what the heck. so here's one off his fb page that shows his true personality, just for fun:



we DID visit him in all his freshman glory...his boy apartment smelled like dude. he loves college. i can't wait to hang out w/ these people all next week. sibs are the best.

of course it was however nice to get home and sleep in my own bed...despite the multiple tickets. thanks for the fun time, kids!

a couple weeks ago we went to a jazz game with the mba's...our seats were not really the best. that place is so steep, it makes me dizzy. but hey, we got free tickets, so who am i to complain? b also won a gift card to some swanky steakhouse, so we went there for dessert after with alex & tj and went all out. the place had name plaques on every booth, so you know it was legit. my goal is to one day get my name on a booth.



annnnd it's almost thanksgiving break! YAY. i can't wait to get home. i'll be dining at the south pas in n out at noon on tuesday with a few friends -- if you're around, COME! i've missed you all.

my mom is awesome

oh you know, just my mom hanging out with one of the most famous bloggers ever. [if you don't know who that is, you have some serious oprah / today show /ny times / KSL watching to do.]

my mom was in AZ for the ASU/USC game, and this lady was in town for a craft fair. i told mom to go. she went, met them, and gave them my blogger business card. LOL. love it.

and someday i will post about that freaking trip to idaho. but today is not that day.

joe joes anonymous

just remembering these little guys and how much i love them:



i'm sure they're already on shelves. anyone bought them yet?

a week from tomorrow i'll be driving to california! YAY.
first stop: in n out.
second stop: trader joe's.

oh TJs whyyyyy can't you come to utah?? :(

the tale of the idaho cops

wow. i havent blogged in a week! not that any of you care, i'm sure, but i feel guilty.

maybe i'll catch up soon. or maybe i won't. but here's a little summary of recent life:
- went to a blogging workshop and met rachel from black*eiffel...definitely a highlight of the week
- been getting the NICEST cards to use for the card drive...for real, people are so sweet. i cant wait to send them off.
- went to idaho for the weekend to visit the sibs [and sib-in-law]. it involved lots of wind, giant hamburgers and many cows. more on that to come.

anyway, i do have an entertaining story, hence the title of this post. so on sunday we were getting ready to leave idaho, and b left to fill up the gas tank while i finished packing. on the way back to my sister's apartment he got pulled over by the rexburg PD for going 45 in a 25 mph zone -- this was a main road, mind you. they drive reeeeal slow in the country.

so he was upset, but not a big deal. we loaded the car, dropped my brother off and got on the highway. no joke -- less than 10 minutes later we saw a cop driving down the freeway in the opposite direction. he slowed down, put his lights on and turned around just as b started to slow down. and PULLED US OVER. 80 in a 65. second ticket in less than an hour.

b was pissed. actually, that's probably an understatement. he was really, really, really mad. and lucky me had to sit in the car with him while he cooled off. all i could do was laugh...what are the odds? honestly, if i had been driving, it probably would have happened to me too -- my average speeds are 50 mph city, 80 mph highway. i don't think my car operates at any other speeds, and those just aren't kosher in idaho.

anyway, one of the things i love most about b is that he rights himself pretty quickly, so an hour later he was back to his happy self and making plans to do online traffic school and avoid eating out for the next month to help contain some of the damage. still, gotta admit it was pretty hilarious. i guess my good cop luck ran out.

oh, and i don't think we'll be going to idaho ever again.

thats a dealbreaker ladies

tonight i had the golden touch.

first we went to tj maxx to return a coat i bought two weeks ago but decided against. [this whole buying-clothes-for-winter thing is much harder than it looks.] naturally i'd lost the receipt, and when i tried to explain this to the moronic teenage boy behind the counter he refused to do a store credit. also his voice sounded like minnie mouse on helium.

so i asked for the manager, who approved my store credit on the spot thank you very much.

then on the way to sunflower market, b made an impulse decision that he needed a hot-fresh-now krispy kreme, so we hit the drive thru. instead of giving us two glazed and one pumpkin spice we got TWO pumpkin spice & one regular, so i ran back in to ask to switch a donut out. [for him, not for me. i'm not into sweets right now for reasons i will explain in a future post.]

not only did i get my second glazed -- the lady filled the box and i exited with a complimentary half-dozen. WOOT.

and THEN i saw this -- in n out, just about to open, less than a mile from our apartment. almost feels like home!:



yeah. basically i'm in a phase to get HOOKED UP. guess i'm a deal-maker these days.

this is halloween

[barfing pumpkin...my hands-down favorite pumpkin sighting this year.]

turns out halloween kind of sucks if a.) you don't dress up for any big parties and b.) you don't have any little kids to dress up and take trick or treating. we don't qualify for either of those this year, so halloween was kind of lame.

friday night we went to our ward's chili cookoff / trunk or treat. we are both on the activities committee so really we HAD to go [and set up and take down and all the fun stuff], but it turned out great. we ate dinner at a table full of kid-less, costume-less new friends and had a really fun time. best part was that we were cleaned up and home by 8 p.m.! most successful ward activity ever, in my opinion.

on the actual all hallow's eve, b went to the utah football game in salt lake and i stayed home to sew. i also took an ill-advised trip to the mall to get a last-minute birthday gift and saw a whoooole lot of freaky costumed people. it made me want to retreat to my apartment and stay there.

i did venture out once more to go to my new friend nichole's house [yes, i AM making friends in utah!] and we ate soup and watched my-favorite-halloween-movie-of-all-time, hocus pocus. it was fun.

maybe next year b and i will actually dress up and get more into the halloween spirit. i'm taking costume suggestions now :)

cranky pants

b was in a bad mood for, like, five days straight. a finance midterm and an accounting final will do that to some people i guess.

no problem, really, because most of the time he'll just shut himself up in our little office and leave me to sew / watch tv / read / bake. however last week he started taking his aggression out on ME which is not okay. don't worry, he wasn't beating me or anything -- he was just snapping at me for no reason and being bratty overall.

enter my mom. she is famous for making the world's best sugar cookies [i have the recipe, but have never made them...i'm sure they wouldn't be as good] and she makes them in different shapes / colors for every holiday. and sometimes she mails me a box of them when i live far away. she is the BEST.

last week we got a little box full of halloween treats from mom including five sugar cookies. b and i decided that meant we each got 2 1/2 cookies and not a crumb more. my share was gone in about...oh, two hours. b is the type that's not addicted to sugary desserts [puh] and easily saved his for a few days.

sunday he was being particularly bratty and went to our room to take a nap. i was mad at him and had to make dessert for dinner at the in laws and i was tired TOO, so i was a little cranky myself. then i saw the box of sugar cookies on the counter with one left. what did i do? ate half of his only remaining cookie. mwahaha. it was delicious.

he didn't notice until monday and i had to confess. he just laughed at me. yesterday he got the not-so-hot results of his accounting test back and IM'ed me to say he was in a bad mood again. this was the following conversation:
L: sorry :( don't worry, you'll be ok
B: i know, it just sucks
B: i'm in a bad mood
B: but i won't take it out on you
B: cuz you'll eat my cookie again

HAHA. yep, that's your punishment if you do something wrong in my house. watch out for those treats.

friend visits

i have been so spoiled lately with an influx of pasadena friends coming to visit!

last week our bff's the mcmullins came up so jeff could attend a conference at byu...and luckily melanie & henry decided to come too. they lived next door to us in p-town and we've spent many a night playing ticket to ride, painting and discussing football plays. i didn't take a picture of their visit but here's one of adorable henry, my favorite little guy [shamelessly ripped from their now-private blog]:



a week earlier, i'd had a fabulous girls' brunch with new-and-old pasadena friends -- all of whom blog, so you know we're perfect for each other. sachia came to town and planned the get-together [thanks again, friend] -- and turns out my lovely friend jen just moved to OREM of all places, so we carpooled up together with her two cute girls. at brunch i finally met laura, who moved out of pasadena right when i moved in [but i've blog stalked her ever since, so i feel like we're real friends...ha]. AND i met sachia's friend amy, who has no association to pasadena but is just a cool girl.



yeah...three high chairs, four kids meals, and plenty of fun girl talk. i was, of course, the only non-mommy there, but i had fun watching the moms try to corral their children. i was wiped out when i got home -- i don't know how these girls do it!

here's me, sachia and amy -- SO glad to know there are cool girls already living in utah. i have a feeling amy and i will be great friends:



anyone else care to visit utah county? we have a whole extra bedroom just waiting for you :)

p.s. if you're needing to cross a good deed off your list this week, i'm hosting a card drive on my paper blog. feel free to join in!

look who's coming round the bend...

[photo from last year's christmas cruise]

christmas is coming! okay, not really. halloween is actually coming. but i am totally in a christmas mood.

we've been planning for the holidays at work and i'm surrounded by paper and ribbon with snowmen and santas all over it, so that helps. but also today i am starting my christmas preparation!

for gifts, i've decided to try to go all handmade. we'll see if this actually happens. my new sewing machine [and some very helpful online tutorials] have inspired me to try to make something for every member of our two families. i figure starting in october will help me feel less stressed out.

also...christmas cards. i'm feeling pressured to have something AMAZING because, you know, i work for a freaking scrapbook company AND i have a blog all about paper and stationery. yeah. we'll see how that turns out too :)

so, basically, i'm spending this beautiful fall day planning out the aforementioned activities -- but NOT listening to christmas music [i will still stick to my principles and not bust that out until after thanksgiving].

and then we're going to the byu/tcu homecoming game tonight! woo hoo. college game day from espn is filming in provo today and you should SEE the little co-eds running around with delirious excitement. you'd think they'd never seen a camera before.

and p.s. -- christmas also means the 3rd annual cookie exchange! yaaaay. except that i have made maybe 4 friends here in utah, so i'm guessing it won't be quite as huge as years past. feel free to drive up for the party :)

last year's feast:


oh, and p.p.s. -- 10 points if you can name the song that contains the title of this blog. jean, i'm looking at you.

hooray for the holidays!

provo fall

**i ripped this photo from here. sorry for stealing, but that picture is just way too gorgeous not to share! and when you see MY photos below, you'll understand why i steal from others more talented than myself ;)

i cannot get over how amazing the fall colors are around here. who knew fall was so incredible??

sure, when i left for work this morning and there was ice on my windshield [and i was wearing a sweater, scarf and thick woolly jacket], i started missing the perpetual 70-degree weather back home, but...sorry, california. your palm trees got nothin' on utah's fall foliage.

this is a giant now-yellow tree right outside our apartment:

my favorite thing so far is that some trees and bushes turn BRIGHT red for fall. i get so excited whenever i see one -- they are so vibrant. [excuse the bad cell phone shot -- took it while driving]:

check out this cute post from nie for more photos of beautiful provo fall. yes i live in the same town as her and no i haven't run into her [but i DID see her sister last night at dinner! ha].

now if you'll excuse me i need to go dive into a pile of leaves.

three.

today is our THREE year anniversary.



three reasons i'm glad to be married to b today:
one. he sent flowers to me at work. but they weren't just flowers -- they came with chocolate too!! major bonus points. i think after three years of marriage b knows me quite well. i told him next year to skip the flowers and just send candy.
two. he makes me laugh. and can quote movies with me all day long. today we g-chatted jurassic park quotes throughout the afternoon.
three. he didn't even bat an eye when i decided to wear my purple tights + ankle boots to dinner. that man has more style appreciation than half the people in utah county.

b is thoughtful and appreciative and always tells me i'm pretty no matter how un-cute i'm feeling. he doesn't get mad when i eat the entire bag of halloween oreos. he plays mario kart with me even though i suck. he is my best friend.

to celebrate, we went to dinner at spark -- a swanky new-ish nightclub / restaurant in town. it was deeeeelicious. they specialize in non-alcoholic cocktails -- b had a mixed berry martini and i had a shirley temple [yes, with cotton candy on top].




dinner was filet mignon for b, cornbread-stuffed chicken for me. for dessert we shared a guava panna cotta and chocolate mousse / hazelnut ice cream / carmelized grapefruit. yes i'm still drooling.



annnnd to continue the celebration, next month we're going to see billy joel + elton john in concert. does that mean i like to hang out with 50 year olds? maybe. but i am SO excited about it. i've always looooved billy joel, and i think seeing him play with elton will be amazing.

so i guess we're giving a birthday-month touch to anniversaries now and making them last a month...which i am totally okay with.

i like tv.

something has happened to me since i got sick. my typical type A, nonstop, must-be-productive-at-all-times personality has disappeared. now i am content to sit on the couch and watch tv for hours at a time. part of me is disgusted by this, but 80% of me loooooves it. i haven't even used my planner in a week. being lazy is fun.

also yesterday i got pulled over for going 50 mph in a 25 zone. payzants don't handle cops too well [my little brother threw up in the bushes when he got pulled over once because he was so nervous...that's still one of my favorite stories] and this was no different.
i cried a little and said i just moved here, which is mostly true. the CA plates must have helped. the cop was super nice and let me go with only a warning. i must be living right. or maybe i should really tone down the driving.

and halloween candy will be the death of me. i've eaten almost a whole bag of mini reeses cups in the past five days, by myself! [dana, that is for you.]

october

b has been out of town the past few days, so i hosted a girly party one evening with some of my old roommates who still live in town. now that it's october, i naturally chose a halloween theme.





i baked pumpkin chocolate chip cookies and dipped peanut butter & jelly sandwiches in halloween sprinkles [inspired by this blog]. we had a lot of fun.

also this week i drove up to park city a few times for a work event. to get there, i had to drive through provo canyon, all along a local river and through the giant mountains that are up here. [and um...it snowed on me. twice. ugh.] the trees up there are all changing colors and it was GORGEOUS. fall is truly an amazing season.

this was my drive [i stole this pic from my friend kami...she is a much better photographer than i!]:



annnd our anniversary is coming up this month. i'm excited to celebrate the big three years -- especially since last year i was on the other side of the country on our actual anniversary. this year has got to be better than that :) plus i love october because of halloween...i can't wait to watch hocus pocus. and stuff myself on the halloween candy i've already bought.

today is saturday and i have nothing to do until tonight. i'm still in my pajamas and have watched three episodes of america's next top model so far [how did i never know how great that show is??]...i predict i'll squeeze a few more episodes in before i pick b up from the airport. lazy saturdays are the BEST.

ii MEXICO !!

my little brother grant will turn 19 years old in december.
mormon boys typically go on missions for our church when they turn 19.
[maybe you've seen them around? they ride bikes and teach people about the church of jesus christ of latter-day saints.]

a couple months before your 19th birthday, you get your wisdom teeth out
go to the dr to get a perfect bill of health
fill out paperwork saying if you know another language, have family in other countries, etc etc
start saving $$ for the mission
and then you put these "papers" in the mail and wait to get a packet back, telling you where you will live for the next two years.
and TODAY his packet came!!

little granty departs february 24 to spend the next two years of his life in

TORREON, MEXICO!!!

coooool. this is not an understatement when i say this is the biggest news to hit our little family in the past few years. you can learn more about torreon here :)

when i was 19, pretty much every guy friend i had in college received a similar packet in the mail and ended up going all over the world -- japan, paraguay, canada, south africa, and of course even new york city and atlanta. [b went to germany, but came home two years before i even met him.]

so i guess you could say i've been around these missionaries and their letter-opening ceremonies many many many times before. but never my own BROTHER! typically you can get an idea of where they're going to go before they even open the envelope, but i really never would have guessed mexico for him, ever. and now that i know this is where he's going, i am so excited!

anyway. still five months before he leaves, still have the office and project runway to watch tonight and a kitchen to clean. so life goes on. but i thought i'd share the big news here first :)

p.s. feel free to ask any questions you have about missionary work...i don't think this is a very complete explanation of what they do!

the recovery

yesterday i stayed home sick from work. i haven't taken a sick day in three years, unless you count the occasional couple hours i usually skip whenever i get a migraine.

on sunday night i was still hoping for the best...i have a lot going on at work this week, so missing a day would probably not be advantageous. however on sunday night i was also still feeling like crap. b and i skyped with my parents that night and my own mother said "wow, you don't look very good." thanks.

when yesterday rolled around i could barely get out of bed. so i texted my boss the update and went back to sleep. i did work on a few work-related activities later, but i spent the rest of the day reading blogs, taking a nap and watching AMC for six hours. these are the movies i watched:

a. jumanji [wow. i used to LOVE that movie when i was 12. now it seems so cornball. and i suspect many psychological inferences due to the fact that his dad is also the hunter...hmm. also b reminded me of the 14 times i have been told i look like kirsten dunst. that's a story for another time.]
b. the secret of my success [80's michael j. fox movie. it was vaguely entertaining, though i was slightly offended to learn his "secret" was to sleep around. sleazy.]
c. raising helen [i liked it much more last night than i did the first time i saw it.]

then we finished the night up with a round of scrubs, which we watch every night. as you can see, it was glorious.

also glorious? i've had zero appetite for three days, so that's helping the waistline. today at work we had all these treats out all day for an open house and i straight up walked right past the plate of cookies TWO times without even a second glance. i won't lie -- cookies do not sound appealing to me right now. what is the world coming to??

anyway, b has been taking care of me by providing vitamin water, soup, and a friend to watch movies with. he is really nice -- even if he squirts anti-bacterial hand gel all over himself every time he holds my hand.

today i was back at work -- feeling slightly better. i think i'm on the upswing...and relieved it's not swine flu :)

conference weekend

saturday morning i woke up feeling like death...i have a cough + aches, fever, headache, etc. so you tell me -- cold or flu? who knows. basically i feel like crap and barely moved the whole weekend.

however. this weekend was the general conference of my church, something i look forward to the whole year, so this was horrible timing for me to be sick! every six months the worldwide leaders of the mormon church get together in salt lake city to share talks and guidance of what we should know for the next half-year. when i was in college we'd go up and watch it live in the conference center in downtown slc, but while i lived in CA we just watched it on satellite tv. now that we're back we had tickets for the saturday afternoon session and i was so excited to go see it in person.

also my brother came down to visit us for the weekend, all the way from idaho! b and i were so excited to have him here, and since he'd never been to conference before we were all looking forward to going.

annnnd then i felt sick. but miraculously [thanks to modern medicine + zicam] i pulled it together enough to get in the car and drive up to saturday afternoon session. i was regretting this by the end and had to come home to take a long nap, but it was so worth it.

here's the inside -- the conference center is super massive [i think it seats more than 21,000 people] and so pretty. we got to sit in the 40th-ish row on the floor. woot.



here's me and the hermano inside, to prove we were there:



and of course the three of us out front, after conference [you can see the salt lake temple, where b and i got married, in the upper right corner]. if i look like crap, it's because i felt like crap:



i LOVE general conference. it just feels so good to take a time out every six months, reevaluate how i'm living my life, and figure out what i can do to be a better person. i get to listen to our prophet and learn what God wants me to do. i feel inspired and happy about life -- my church gives me hope, peace and answers to those things i wonder / worry about. yay for conference!

about a boy

almost all my real-life friends post regular updates on their kids, including their recent milestones, likes and dislikes, etc. that's all well and good for them. but, since i don't have any kids i decided i would write an update post about b :)

b joined a flag football team at byu. he doesn't really love it because, as he constantly tells me, he just "really wants to tackle someone." sorry, buddy -- hands-off policy at the Y. but, it's the closest thing he'll get to achieving his dream of playing college football.

[picture taken last night, when i showed up for only the last five minutes of his game:]


b is busy busy with school, but it's manageable. he stays on campus from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. every day, then comes home to eat dinner and hang out with me for a little while before heading into our little office to study. second bedrooms are so convenient! if they weren't also so expensive in LA, i'm sure i would have discovered this long ago.

his favorite class is marketing. his least favorite is accounting. this is funny because it's the FOURTH accounting class he's taken in the past two years. you'd think he'd like it by now.

b has been interviewing with tonsssss of companies all over the country, trying to get an idea of where he'd like to intern next summer. basically we could end up anywhere. i'm voting for germany :)

this is b's favorite time of year: football season. he obsessively reads football blogs every day and enjoys our new ottoman for 4 - 5 hours each saturday, watching parts of the USC, BYU and Utah football games. too bad none of those teams are doing very well.

even though b is so busy, he still makes time for date nights, dinners out, tv time, and my favorite: couch chats. my favorite thing since we got married is just to lay on the couch and talk. he's good at allowing me my daily brandon time :) he ALSO still makes time to do his chores -- dishes, bathroom and making the bed. all my least favorites.

b taped a whole marathon of "band of brothers" and watches it regularly. i usually do not participate because my heart is still wounded from 9/11 and a late-night showing of boy in the striped pajamas. i think i'm too sensitive to media. [if you want to cry, rent the pajama movie. i bawled for 10 minutes after it ended.]

it's like 40 degrees outside. b came home from a study group and made me a mug of his world-famous homemade hot chocolate. he is my favorite boy. and probably the only person who could make me move to utah :)

just some things

i have been a bad blogger lately :(
so here is some random catching up.

i cook now. i made dinner from SCRATCH [not a box] five out of seven nights last week.
good tv is pretty much back on, with the exception of 30 rock, so our dvr schedule is booked right up. wed + thurs nights are the best.
my hands bleed a lot at my job. i get paper cuts daily. good thing it's from beautiful stylish paper.

speaking of work. my desk chair looks like a dog chewed on it. one of the arms is broken and falls halfway off unless you wiggle it back together. the cushion is scratched. you get the idea. today our IT guy installed windows 2007 [yay!!] on my computer, and two hours later i got this email:
"lyndsey - i couldn't help but notice how horrific your desk chair is. i've ordered you a new one and it should arrive tomorrow."
HA! that was nice. i wasn't complaining or anything :)

we've finally rounded out the front room by purchasing this lovely ottoman. it was on CLEARANCE at target. oh how i love target.



this means b spends a lot of time like this now on football saturdays [except on weekdays. because it's 8:30 p.m. and he's STILL at school. geez, i thought i spent a lot of time on my own when he had the crazy nintendo hours -- mba school is quite comparable. i need new, solo, time-consuming hobbies]:



speaking of nintendo. we finally got ourselves another wii -- yay! mario kart here i come. it was a sad sad day when we had to give back all our "loaner" units. that is one thing i miss about b's old job.


oh, and, back to my cooking. one year ago this week we returned from our whirlwind european extravaganza. while in paris i bought some adorable eiffel tower-shaped pasta [at the top of said tower, naturally] and couldn't wait to cook it -- but then of course i didn't because i wanted to "save it" for something special. i finally busted it out a couple weeks ago. it was just as cute as i remembered.



oh, and btw, my mom came and hung out with us over a weekend two weeks ago. it was SO SO great to have her here. i miss having her just 30 minutes down the freeway :( we shopped, we ate, we read books, we shopped again, we got cupcakes.
and we took NO pictures together. sad! i do however have this one, which will suffice to document the weekend. she canned cinammon pears with my grandma and brought us a delicious jar -- thanks momma! we miss you already.



annnnd that's a wrap. hope you feel caught up with the payzant-wells family.
and p.s. we still miss california.