4 baskets of Strawberries and 6 bananas later....

Saturday with our Bountiful Basket we got a flat of Strawberries. I was hoping for not so ripe so we could slowly eat them on our cereal and enjoy but they were the most delicious red and sweetest things. After looking at them FRUIT LEATHER was calling my name. (Have you ever made fruit leather? I was fortunate to buy Matt a food dehydrator for his birthday one year, but I have used it WAY more. We will do a post on that later...)
But they sat in my fridge and I just didn't get to it! So our sweet friends Macie and Jocelyn came over to play and we decided to dip them instead. What a better activity than fruit and chocolate!?!







These girls are serious pros. We carefully melted the chocolate ad they let their creativity run wild!!











Each girl ended up with about 4 plates of chocolate dipped strawberries and bananas. And a little bit of a sugar rush. Thanks for coming over girls!!

Have grill will travel.

Sunday we had Adam and Natalie over for dinner. Adam had some white tail that needed to be eaten and we decided that it would be a great day to grill. Got everything out and ready, Matt went to turn on the grill, and couldn't get it!! How do we have a BBQ without a grill?
Well thanks to Adam and his traveling grill- everything worked out great!





I'm sure for a small fee he'd be willing to come to you too! As long as his little Weber's wheels can make it!!!



But we did enjoy this so it was all worth it!!! Thanks Adam and Natalie!

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Ruining my lawn reputation

Don't know if it could be that for the past year we have completely neglected our yard or the thought that I might be sneaking a few of these bad boys in:






Our chances of winning yard of the month are going out the window. Ha and I would take pink flamingoes over some Award any day. Now to get Matt to agree.....

Beef jerky, pez, and a little Red Hot Chili Peppers

The road from St George to (what I have heard is FREEZING today) Lehi seems to last forever. The 4 or so hours it takes can only be survived with good music, good snacks and of course good company. The end of a wonderful weekend is coming and I am just not ready to return to sweaters and pants. Oh well here we come......



This is the only time I can ever get a picture of Matt. What do you think of the stache?









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salmonella blamanella

Craving cookies tonight. I usually want the cookies but once I start making them realize I just want a taste of the batter. So it usually results in lots of cookies sitting around the house and then get thrown away 3 weeks later. Tonight on the menu dark chocolate butterscotch chip cookies. So if you want to stop by anytime tonight there will be hot cookies waiting for you! Or if you teach my primary class like Julye did last week, you will probably get some delivered.



What's your thought on salmonella anyway? Does it scare you away from the dough?

Chicken

Does anyone else chicken out when it comes to changing their hair? For some odd reason, my long hair is somehow connected to my identity, and I am terrified at cutting it. If you haven't noticed over the past few years, it has gotten shorter and shorter (right after I had Milo, it was almost to my behind-really!?!?) But thanks to some mighty fine help from Michael (my sister's amazing hairstylist) who first got me to chop it, and my lovely sister in law Shana- who actually will come to my house and do my hair, and has done a great job of getting me to change and update my style--I have been able to let myself cut it a little at a time. I thought I was finally ready for change!!

My sweet sister Candace, asked me to help her out and take her appointment with Michael. She made it months earlier but as it got closer she realized she wasnt ready (she wants to let her hair get a bit longer for a perm!! Cannot wait to see it Candi!!). So with a few days to decide what I wanted to do I decided to go in and let him do whatever he wants. Well I chickened out and kept it pretty much the same! Its shorter and lighter in color, I have some blonde in it and it is a great change, but I was gearing up for a BIG change.

Okay- so here is the plan. I am going to make it public so I cannot go back on my plan. I mean all 5 of you reading this will hold me too it, and I cannot let you down:

Please tell me I am not the only one who has loved America's Next Top Model, since like day one of the show? You can find it on anytime of the day, between Bravo, VH1, any of those stations that love to play reruns, yep I watch it (okay not everytime it is on, but you get my point), so I fell in love with Brittani's hair here and think this might be the cut. But instead of the jet black, or even red hair that I have now, I am thinking of going blonde. It's really the one color that Matt hasn't see my hair (that was high school days, and sometimes those days arent worth repeating haha), but I think with the help of a good colorist- not my friend Ashleah in her bathroom, we can make it look great.

Something like this. Little golden honey. We will see. But now it is out on the table, and I cannot go back. haha.

What are your thoughts? Terrible idea? My hair grows like a weed, so it will be great for Summer, and if it is a terrible idea, then it will quickly grow back!

Why does my mind do this?

It seems at the oddest times of the day and at the most awkward timing but my mind is constantly running on new fun things to do. My other life other than being a mom and wife, is completely wrapped up in all things Orson Gygi.

I love it. I do. They give me complete freedom and really allow me to express my taste through buying for the store. I have a lot of fun. Some things are a complete gamble and somethings are a perfect fit. For example, measuring cups. Perfect item to sell in a kitchen store right? We have a huge selection. From cast aluminum that have fancy designs to square plastic ones for the colorful modern home. And they all seem to sell, so I thought I would bring in a couple of these babies:

yes they measure and yes they might sell but they were fun and like I said a gamble. Well not even a year later, it's only been since November 2010, we have sold over 200 of these bad boys. No that's night a typo, over 12 dozen little lady stacking measuring cups, and I cannot get them in fast enough {it doesn't help that the manufacturer is out too}. But people love them and they want more!! Our sales rep called me the other day and asked what in the world we were doing with them? He was shocked at how many were flying out the door.
So like anyone cares about how many measuring cups Gygi's sales, well there is a point here, I am feeling like the world is missing out on all the wonderful things Gygi's has and I am trying to find the best way to get the word out. So this is where my mind comes in......we all know the power of the Internet, it brought you here today didn't it? I mean I haven't written like I promised I would, and your being so sweet or just bored, noticed that I finally updated!!! Well Gygi's has a site, it's soon to be changing to be a much more user friendly informational site, {which I might add the man behind it is one hot cookie!!!!}, but what it's main focus is on is our best sellers. What is that you ask? It's chocolate!!!!! Gygi's sells over 200,000 POUNDS of chocolate in the months of November and December. Yep. Thats not another typo. And its projected to increase this year. Our cookie sheets, spices and cake decorating supplies, all round out the top 10 spots but nothing compares to chocolate. So why would someone looking for 10 pounds of Callebaut Chocolate buy one of my cute measuring cup sets? It does happen and once in the store I catch them every time!!!! But online they for one thing aren't all up yet and two I think they get overloooked and people really miss out.

So here is my thought, and where I need your opinion.... I'm thinking out starting a sub-site. Something linked off the gygi site, something that will help people who haven't been raised at Orson Gygi know what they can really find and do at Gygi's. This is the large comparison, but I frequent the GAP Inc sites. My kids and I love the Gap, but it's nice knowing that I can shop at Old Navy, and drool over Banana Republic and Piperlime. Every once in a while their items just happen to jump in to my shopping cart and when they arrive all together I act like a child on Christmas Day surprised as ever. But they have a samd comfort level as I jump from site to site and I know that I will not be taken advantage of. So that's my question- do we leave it all in one site just like then store? Or do we sub-site it and create more of a boutiquey feel and see what happens? What are your thoughts? And if you are still reading this and haven't been to Gygi's please call me. I will personal give you the grand tour and might even throw a brownie spatula in at the end?