Busy Bees

We haven't had vacationers to our house in a long time. Also the weather has been perfect lately. Perfect! So naturally we've been running around everywhere showing Debi and Barry all of our favorite places. First things first though, Valentine's Day.

Valentine's Day was a Friday so naturally.... we climbed. And hiked. We hiked out to Turtle Wall and spent the afternoon climbing, taking pictures and videos and just enjoying nature. It was perfect. We thought maybe we would go out to dinner once we got home but we were all pooped from the afternoon/evening. It was late so we ordered pizza and breadsticks and stayed inside :) Chocolate covered strawberries and Swig sugar cookies rounded out our meal! We had a blast being outdoors and sharing what we love with Debi and Barry.

A Lovey List for a Lovey Day

From way back when at BYU when we first started dating.

Happy 9th Valentine's Day to my very favorite person. In honor of 9 big ones together here are 9 things that I absolutely love about Chad in no particular order.

1. He does the laundry and the dishes on a regular basis. In fact, I rarely do the laundry, and "rarely" is being generous. Also, I never vacuum. Or clean much of anything really.  #spoiled

2. His curly hair.

3. His generosity. He's given away his last $10 before to a (crazy) man who said he really needed it, we've turned the car around so he could help people with car troubles or chase down loose dogs for kids, and he'll always buy coupon cards from any kids that come to our door.

4. His passion for new hobbies. Once Chad gets excited about something he learns everything there is to know about it. He eats, breathes and lives it. Whether it's photography or climbing he's all in!

5. He pushes me to be better and to try new things. I'm a creature of habit and comfort. New things, people, experience, places all terrify me. Thanks to this guy I've become much braver and done things that I never would have dreamed of, and loosened up a little along the way.

6. His love for kids. Chad loves kids, loves being around them, talking to them and (duh) playing with them. Our primary class stole his heart in the Clarkston Ward and his nephews and nieces are his absolute favorite. We routinely come up with plans on how we can steal away our nieces and nephews and bring them home to live with us :) You've been warned parents.

7. His love of our fur babies. At one point we had a dog, 2 cats and a rabbit. We may be down to a cat and dog, but he loves them and we never would have gotten them if it hadn't been for Chad.

8. His love of the outdoors. Camping, Hiking, Climbing, Biking, he loves it all. I love it too but I know I wouldn't be out in it nearly as often without this guy. I love all the adventures that we go on and the many places that we've been able to see and enjoy together. We've hiked Angel's Landing and camped in Arches National Park among others. We've got many more on our list! I adore being outdoors with him.

9. That he truly is my best friend. There isn't anyone else I would rather spend my life with. I love waking up with him in the morning and spending all of my time with him until we fall asleep. I love adventuring with him, shopping with him, walking our dog, running to the gas station for caffeine, making dinner with him, driving around aimlessly late at night, doing crazy yoga poses with him, and just living my life with him. I love all of our fun adventures, but even more, I love the everyday with him.

Happy Valentine's!

Awkward and Awesome Thursday

Debi and her new hubby Barry got here Sunday night! We are super excited to spend a couple weeks with them, showing off our favorite outdoor spots and eating an ridiculous amount of dessert. They've only been here 3 full days and we've already made brownie sundaes, giant chocolate chip cookies, bought krispy kremes, and restocked the snickers stash. Side Note: We may have a candy drawer that has turned into a snicker's/Chocolate Chip drawer. Livin' large at the Lewis House. I've got plans to test out a new sugar cookie recipe and am pretty sure I can trick everyone into going to my favorite Chinese Buffet on the way back from Zion's. Clearly my most important plans involve eating massive amounts food.

Awkward:

• An old man doing a ring check on me at the Nursing Home. Why yes sir, I am married. Good thing I remembered to put it on after rock climbing, who knows how that could have played out.
• Getting back from a nursing home and finding a weird brown stain the size of my fist on my thigh. Hmmmm.... Poop or Chocolate?
• Speaking of poop, finding poop on our bed Tuesday night after staying up until 2am with Debi and Barry. Poop on the bed is never good, at 2am, it's down right horrific.
• Trying to tell older patients my name. Danielle is absolutely exotic to most people over a certain age. And after yelling it 10 times in a row, directly into someone's ear, it starts to sound strange to me too. I'm thinking I should just tell anyone over 80 or hard of hearing that my name is Kate.
• Shoving all of our clean clothes (we hadn't done laundry for weeks) into a random closet when Debi and Barry got here. Folding? Ain't nobody got time for that!
• Mountain Biking in broad daylight and tipping over into a bush, that's right, tipped over. Granted I was wearing a giant backpack so I do have a bit of an excuse.

Awesome:

• Trying to replicate Panera's Chocolate Chip Cookies. I haven't found the right recipe yet but we are sure enjoying the process!
• Getting to the top of my harder climb without having to rest on the rope once! A clean climb is the best feeling!
• Mountain Biking in the dark and not totally wiping out.
• Attempting crazy yoga moves and realizing I have the strength to attempt them. Attempt being the key word. I may not be at all flexible, not at all, but I am getting stronger! 
• Garlic Bread.
• Our back Patio! Barry cleaned it up and rigged up our tarp for our bikes!

Happy Early Valentines Day! Hopefully it's full of love from friends and family, and lots (and lots) of chocolate!

My Phone Has Eyes

Betcha can't guess what we did this weekend...

Happy {1}

I read somewhere that happiness isn't simply a state of being but rather something that you do. This month I've tried to do things that make me happy :)

I've spent 2 weekends in Vegas.
I've painted my nails.
I've bought 2 new dresses and a kickin' new pair of girly shoes for them.
I've done headstands while cooking dinner.
I've slept in way too late after staying up way too late.
I've ate breakfast.
I've channeled my inner Chad and laid in the shower while watching Scandal.
I've stretched more.
I've taken my vitamins.
I've done a pull up. Yup, one. It was amazing.

Here's to 11 more months of doing all the things that make us happy, whether it's quitting your thesis or making chocolate chip cookies :)

Awkward and Awesome Thursday

I thought the lights were out on my oven. Sadly I was wrong. Some mornings there are as many as three cockroaches in there.

Awkward:

• Attempting to stay awake at work while taking 2 Benadryl every 4 hours. Hardest thing I've ever done. I managed to do it only because I ate constantly until I could go home and pass out.
• The patient who refers to me as sweetie and hun called in to talk to my office manager to complain about me. Apparently I never put his shoes back on one time, "not that I should be fired or anything". Really? Thanks for basically saying I should be fired because you don't feel like putting your shoes back on yourself.
• Kneeling down to take off a lady's shoes (noticing what most of my job consists of?... sigh) at the nursing home only to be assaulted by the smell of urine. Seriously, punched in the face by it. Then I reached down and grabbed her sock....her soaking wet sock.
• A nursing home patient left us with this little nugget as he exited, "They've got a saying in Russia, Adios Amigo!". He's also the one whose favorite phrase is "true story".

Awesome:

• TGI{almost}Friday
• Costco rotisserie Chickens
• Dominos Pizza
• Restocked Candy Drawers
• Chad's Ab Ripper results ;)
• Sparkly Nail Polish
• Benadryl and the ridiculous amount of sleep I've gotten since Monday.

Allergic to Mondays

So I fully intended on posting this yesterday, but as you will find out, as soon as I got out of work I started pounding Benadryl's like it was my job. Which also means I was out by 8. In fact I'm still downing 2 every 4 hours like clockwork so the sleepies have taken over my brain and it's all I can do to stay conscious at work today. So instead of going through and fixing the days and tenses you are getting yesterday's post like it happened today. Laziness for the win.

I woke up this morning to find myself covered in a rash. My stomach, back, neck, arms, hands, ankles, thighs, and knees. Ashley told I just must be allergic to Mondays. Unfortunately I don't think that will get me out of work today. Unless the rash spreads to my face. I think a face rash might get me out of it... I'm counting down until I can go home and chug some Benadryl.

The weekend went a whole lot better, after we tackled Friday, than my morning has though. Friday was a giant suck fest at the DMV. Renewing registration, attempting to renew my drivers license, rain... Good news is I get to go back this Friday with mountains of paperwork and actually renew my license. Stupid name change.

The rest of the weekend we climbed! Climbed and slept and ate pancakes and French toast. We ignored the sink full of dishes and piles of unwashed clothes and ate brownies and watched movies instead.

Taking a little snooze on the climb

I climbed Puppet Strings again. The climb scares me. I don't like the moves and the ending is Hard. Although everything up until the end is pretty easy, I'm really just being a baby. So I had a bit of a breakdown before climbing it on Sunday. I'm up there freaking out because I don't want to do the last big moves and finally decide the sooner I try the sooner I will fall and can just dangle there and pull my ish together. So I go for it. And I stuck the hold! And then I pulled myself up like a freaking champ. I climbed that beast on the first try that night. I've seen countless guys fail or give up on the ending of this climb and somehow it was almost easy for me yesterday. I tricked myself into thinking if I climbed it once I could be done with it, but I'm pretty sure I'll need to climb it a few more times so I can conquer the fear. Of course, I may be singing a different tune when the time comes to climb again...

As a side note there was another climb where if you fell, you swung... FAR. So of course I was swinging around because home girl loves to fall. On my third fall I was swinging around and coming at the wall backwards (which, hello, no biggie, your not going to smash into the wall genius, weren't you some sort of science major Danielle, come on!) so I start screaming... and crying... and laughing... all at the same time. Seriously it was outrageous. Also, I never really knew you could be laughing and crying hysterically at the same time. It's possible folks.

Clearly Chad is not afraid of Puppet Strings.

Luckily the rash was looking so much better this morning. It's gone from angry, screaming red, to a light blushy pink.