Keep Calm...

and eat a cupcake. That's what I did today. Now that I've finally gotten off my emotional roller coaster, I am back to having fun and enjoying the people around me. Today was nice. Marjorie and I met Christina at the Farmer's Market that they have in the stadium parking lot every Thursday. There wasn't anything in particular I was planning to buy, but I ended up buying some pretty amazing bread. It's Asiago Basil and it's made with 45% mashed potatoes. It is heavenly when toasted with a little butter.

 There was a little stand that was selling sausages and cheesesteak. Christina mentioned a fairly new place that she heard made some pretty authentic cheese steak. We were all hungry so we decided to go there for dinner. DP Cheesesteaks (Downtown Philly Cheesesteaks) was delicious. Marjorie and Christina both got the Mushroom Cheesesteak. I was tempted because I love my mushrooms, but went for the Cream Cheese Steak (it still had some mushrooms). It was really good. The cream cheese was all warm and melty and went so well with everything else.

And what place was just a few doors down from DP Cheesesteaks? THE COCOA BEAN! I haven't been there in a while. What better way to make myself feel better after a crappy couple of days? A yummy cupcake, that I didn't have to make myself. Sadly it was not a red velvet day. I got Party In My Mouth, a chocolate cupcake with a Nutella filling and cream cheese frosting with chocolate drizzle. I loved that one! You can't go wrong with Nutella. I also got a Mango Raspberry. I loved the raspberry cupcake, but I couldn't taste the mango. I was disappointed. I didn't really eat the frosting. The cupcake was good enough without it and the was just no point to eating it since it didn't taste like it was supposed to.

Before walking out the door of The Cocoa Bean, something caught my eye. They had t-shirts for $10. I bought one.

This is what the shirt says. It's lime green and the lettering is in hot pink. It was too hard to take a picture of myself wearing it (you couldn't read it all thanks to my short arms). I'm pretty happy with today's little outing and all of my purchases (minus the disappointment of a cupcake).

Sunday Sugar Extravaganza

Christina and I decided earlier in the week that we wanted to have a dessert party. I bought some new cupcake liners (from Etsy of course) and wanted to an excuse to make cupcakes. Christina wanted to make an easy frozen pie that I made a few weeks ago (I learned from Marjorie, who got the recipe off the back of a condensed milk can). It's so good that you have to have other people around or you'll eat the whole thing. Thank goodness I had Christina around when I made it! We chose Sunday, before ward prayer. It was also perfect timing because Marjorie just got back the day before so it was kind of like a welcome home party too.

We basically invited the whole ward and told them to bring a treat if they could. I ended up making cupcakes and brownies (the kind Nana makes) because I figured more people would just come to eat instead of bringing something. I underestimated the awesomeness of my ward. We had more than enough food. The majority of the ward was in our apartment and outside our front door (it was hot inside). Everyone had a great time eating and conversing. We even heard Beth & Cody's engagement story. After ward prayer, most people stayed for the Sunday movie. This week it was The Emperor's New Groove. It was a great night.

I wish I would have taken more pictures, but I was too busy enjoying myself.

These are from before everyone came. So this is just the food my apartment and Ally provided. 

My usual red velvet, but I added my new sugar pearls.

You can't tell how many people were here from the pics, but there were a lot. Most people were in line for food or still coming through the door. These are just the people that had a good seat.

Mmmmm...Meat!

Today Ally, Jane, Christina, Katelyn and I went to Tucanos Brazilian Grill for lunch to celebrate Katelyn's birthday. It's all you can eat MEAT!!! There is a salad bar, but you don't go to Tucanos for salad or other things, you go for the meat [the edible kind and the men ;)] and the grilled pineapple. Holy Dang that pineapple is good! I don't know what heaven is like, but I sure hope there is Tucanos' grilled pineapple because it's heaven on it's own.

So you have this wooden cylinder on your table that has green, yellow, and red on it. You turn it on the green side when you're ready for meat and different guys come around with all different types of meat (chicken & fish too) and you take what you want. They slice it at your table for you or slide it off the skewer and put it on your plate. It's a nice system. When you need a break from the meat, you turn it on the red side. You lay it flat for yellow when you're ready for dessert or the check.

The meat. I don't know what to say about it besides it was AMAZING! There was sirloin, brisket, chicken wings, chicken hearts, and fish. I really liked this one garlic sirloin or whatever it was. It was melt in your mouth good. Now that's some good meat! There was also cod with a mango sauce that was pretty good. There was  bacon wrapped turkey and some sweet pork that was also really good. Basically everything was to die for. I tried a chicken heart too. It wasn't that bad, but it's kind of a gross thought, eating a chicken heart. When I was done, I felt like I had eaten my weight in meat, which is perfectly fine with me.

To help with the digestion process, we walked around the nearby shops. I didn't buy anything, which was probably a good thing. It was a fun day.

Under the Tuscan Sun

 I wasn't literally, but I pretty much felt that way. Oh how I wish I was really feelin' the rays somewhere Italy! But here is good too. Today was so sunny and warm! I am loving this perfect weather we are currently experiencing in P-town. I can only hope and pray it continues and that we don't see snow again until the winter months.

This evening for dinner I made soup, which was similar to the Tusan soup that's served at Olive Garden. Mind you, mine wasn't as fancy, but it tasted great. That's all that matters, right? Anyways, I ate it sitting on the couch with the blinds wide open and the sun light pouring through. Eating hot soup on a warm day never felt so good! 

The only thing that could've made it better would be eating it at Tuscan villa with a great view.

Seriously, I want to go to Italy SO bad! You have no idea. By the time I finally make it there (maybe it'll end up being where I go on my honeymoon whenever I end up getting married, which isn't any time soon), the temple in Rome will be done. I was so excited when I heard that they're are building a temple there. I mean Italy is already beautiful and has tons of beautiful buildings, but add an LDS temple into the mix and oi! Can't get more breathtaking than that!

What it will look like

An aerial rendition of what it will look like

Look out Italy, here I come! I just don't know when.

Food And A Fireside

Tonight there was a CES Fireside at six. Since we have a t.v. now (no one has watched it yet, besides tonight), we decided to invite people over to watch it and eat treats. We just went around knocking on all the doors of people in our ward. Everyone. We weren't sure how many to people to expect so we were wondering how it was going to turn out.

We made mini cinnamon rolls, had some left over cupcakes from Friday, the girls from one apartment were making cookies when we invited them so they brought those, and one guy brought a random bag of chocolate chips. 

When people started coming, we were worried about space. Our living room isn't that big, as it is a small apartment. We ended up with around 30 people at the beginning and 20 stayed to watch the fireside. It was fun having our apartment full of people eating, socializing and being spiritually enlightened. 

I'm sure this won't be the last time we do this. I thought it was funny how it was literally a fireside since we still have our little fireplace up from Christmas. Lots of people thought it was creative and they liked it. Now that we have a t.v. and DVD player (we're just missing the cord that connects the two together), I foresee many movie nights in the future. No surprise there, huh? 

Super Sunday

So today was one of the most eventful Sundays I've had in awhile. It was our last Sunday going to church all together as roommates (well, minus Kristin) so we decided to end with a bang. This morning, I made German pancakes with fruit and whipped cream for everyone. For dinner, Arianna prepared a roast with carrots, potatoes and onions that cooked while were at church. We also wrapped potatoes and carrots in tin foil to cook so they wouldn't touch the meat because Manju is a vegetarian (something I could NEVER be). We invited Ally and Marjorie (but Ally forgot and made plans to go home) and Rylee's cousin came. We moved the table to the living room and used Arianna's nice plates (she was the only one that had enough matching plates). We made the table look as fancy as we could with what [random] little we had. I attempted to make gravy (no one else wanted to) and it turned out okay. Could've been better, but it was my first time so I'd call it a success. Everyone ate it. There was also a salad. For dessert, Marjorie brought us chocolate chip banana muffins. They were yummy! It was a nice and fun dinner that really made us feel like a little family. I'm glad my roommate situation has taken a complete 180 from last year.

Arianna and Manju's home teachers came over at 5:00. Chas is one of them, he's pretty awesome. I've written about him before. Anyway, I sat in because my home teachers haven't come this semester. I don't even know their names. Well, I know one, but not the other. Chas brought over his guitar and played What a Wonderful World and we all sang along. That was pretty much the lesson. He said it kind of goes with the resurrection. Isn't he a cool home teacher? He may not be conventional, but at least he gets the job done.

Around 6:30, I decided to take a nap. I had been running on four hours of sleep. Last  night I was feeling tired around midnight, but Manju was talking on the phone and I didn't want to kick her out. By the time she was done talking (sometime after one), the tired feeling had passed. I tried to fall asleep, but I couldn't. After laying in bed for over an hour, I tried listening to my iPod, but it didn't work. The last time I looked at the time before falling asleep was around 4:30. I'm one of those people where I'm awake if I'm woken up from sleeping, even if I'm tired. I can't go back to sleep right away. Sometimes I can, but not usually. If I'm tired, but don't go to sleep, the feeling fades and I'm stuck staying awake for a while.

 So I fell asleep and I was woken up (by Manju, Arianna told me she didn't planning on waking me up cause she knew how tired I was) to be asked if I wanted to go with them to fly Chas's plane that he made for a class. I had only been asleep for 10 minutes! I have to admit, I seriously wanted to cry because I was so tired and had finally gotten to sleep, only to be woken up right away. I said no initially, but because of my weird sleeping problems (ugh!), I couldn't fall back to sleep so I decided to go. They could tell I was a little annoyed (understatement).

We went behind the temple to the same place we go ice blocking to fly his plane. The steep hills did not make collecting the plane fun once it landed (more like crashed). We had a few okay flights and then Arianna took over the control. She crashed it and it broke. We all laughed, except Arianna. She felt so bad, but Chas had already gotten it graded and he said it was an easy fix so it was all good.

Chas with his dead plane.

What made flying the plane even better was that Chas's friend who also came (and helped build the plane) read President Uchtdorf's talk titled, "Of Things That Matter Most" (October 2010 Conference). Why? Because he mentions a plane [no surprise there :)] so it justified going to fly a plane on Sunday. 

All in all it was a great day, except for being dead tired and woken up right after falling asleep.

Baby Trees

I love eating baby trees, more commonly known (at least to those that don't spend time around kids) as broccoli. I think it's fascinating and a good thing that tastes change as we get older. Most vegetables were once my enemy, as is the case with most kids. Some still are (brussel sprouts, blech!). Now I really like eating broccoli. Tonight for dinner I made broccoli & chicken alfredo. It was delicious! One of the best real meals I've made this semester. I like to make legit meals from time to time, but usually I just make really quick and easy things. Hey, I'm a college student. That's what we do. I'm proud of myself because I still haven't succumbed to the ramen diet. I eat it sometimes, but I don't live on it. Anyway, I was pretty happy with myself because it tasted as good as it looked. Arianna laughed at me for smelling it. It smelled like alfredo sauce. I wish I would've taken a picture. It looked good enough to be in a cookbook or one of those home living magazines. Seriously. Sorry I don't have anything else to write about besides my amazing dinner. 

Special Delivery

Today I really wished that I could have groceries delivered to my door. I even turned to Google just to make sure, but there's nothing in Provo. If I was in SLC then it would be a different story. I'm out of food. Pretty much completely. I ate the last of my pasta for dinner, which I've eaten for the last couple days. For the last three days, my breakfast has been canned fruit. For lunch I've eaten leftover rice that my roommate brought back from a catering event. Tonight I even ate spoonfuls of peanut butter. I think my body is craving protein. I've actually had an upset stomach a couple times the last few days because my diet has been so poor.  I have no milk, bread, fruits or veggies. I basically have nothing to eat. Oh, the life of a college student with no car. I would walk to the BYU Creamery because it's the closest store, but walking back is the problem. I can't carry that much. [Maybe if I get desperate enough I could purchase a few things at a time over the course of a few days. That's only if I get really desperate. The creamery isn't the cheapest place either, which is why I try to avoid shopping there.] I don't want to bug others for a ride either. I feel bad asking my roommate when she doesn't need to go and when she's busy. I guess I really shouldn't complain because there are so many people far worse off than I am, but it's a little tough. Having grown up in an environment where I've always been provided for and never had to really worry about food, it stinks not having food in the fridge or cupboards. The next couple times I go to the store I'm going to really have to stock up to prepare for when Arianna leaves for the summer. I have found a new grocery buddy, but I don't want to rely on her too much. Hopefully we can go shopping soon or might start living off pizza since Little Caesars is across the street.