in the past fifteen days...

...not much has happened.  But I've got some pictures of the not-muchness. So...you're welcome for that.

I saw this in the parking lot at work:

It wasn't even my pie, and I was so sad about it.
#happybirthdaytotheground

Here's some food I've made:

Gnocchi covered in a homemade vegetable & chicken spaghetti sauce. YUM.

Cinnamon muffins with dark chocolate chips and raspberry tidbits.
Heaven in my hand right here.

 A couple of other things:

I'm playing the March Madness game with my brothers and aunt and uncle and cousins,
and also I'm playing at work. I'm coming in very nearly last, 'cause that's how I roll.

We had a gorgeous couple of days in I.F. a couple of weeks ago, so I washed my car.
Two days later, we got a nasty blizzard, and my car looks worse now than it did all winter long.
#icontroltheweather

Aaaand Utah happened:

Janel made these cute little googly-eyed cupcakes.

This one was Derek's.

The poor little lamb was really tired and, I think, confused about the whole party...

...and when presented with his cute cupcake, he scooped the googly-eyes off
and threw them onto the floor.

I told Seth I wanted to take a picture of him, and this is what he gave me: cake face.

Naturally, Marshall thought this was hilarious and followed suit.

After cupcakes and ice cream, the "big kids" played outside.
Emmett nearly kills me dead in his almost-skinny jeans.

While the bigger kids were on the trampoline, Julie had full reign over the slide...

...which was thrilling unto her.

Whilst in Utah, I met up with Brooker...

...and we watched Muppets Most Wanted. And we laughed like children throughout.
I totally want to see it again. It may be the best Muppet movie, and that's saying something.

ALSO: Spring is happening, on occasion, here in Idaho!

It was somewhere in the 60s today, and I happily wore capris with my new TOMS. Booyah!

Another something worth note: I've gotten my folks hooked on Sherlock. Truthfully, I just lent them my copy of season 1, and they got themselves hooked. (I'm quite certain that to watch Sherlock is to love it.) I kind of love that they love it.

That's that for my life these past couple of weeks. Let the jealousy ensue!

decorating my walls

This post is not for the faint-of-heart:

I'm about to talk a lot about stuff that might be deemed "boring" by some folks,

so if you don't want to read about shopping for stuff to hang in my living room,

go ahead and skip until you see pictures.

I've been spring cleaning of late. Quite a bit on Friday. That's mostly what I did with my day off, people. But don't weep for me (I know you're not--mostly you're annoyed with me for having every Friday off, but whatever); it needed to be done, so I did it.

I also started making "crusty bread" on Friday evening; you have to let the dough sit for 12-18 hours. It's the easiest bread recipe I've ever tried, and it. is. delicious. (Especially when you dip it in raspberry balsamic vinegar with a touch of lemon olive oil. Just sayin'.)

I got up early on Saturday to finish making the breads (I made two loaves), then I ran around like a chicken with its head cut off getting last-minute things done before my folks showed up. -Except they got here before I was done with my list, so...oopsie. Mom checked out my naked living room so she could get some ideas of how to dress it up, and Dad...did other stuff. (Checked his email? I don't know.)

And then we were offski!

We went  to lunch at the Snake Bite, which was super delish, and then we went shopping at a few places near downtown. To look for awesome stuff to put on my walls.

We went to a Shabby-to-Chic type place and I purchased a few things there. Dad walked in ahead of us, and I said to Mom, "I give dad 60 seconds to be bored of this place." Five minutes later, he told us he was bored, and are we about done? I told him, "You lasted longer than I thought you would," and he said something about, "I waited a few minutes before I mentioned anything to you." Do I know my father, or what? -The store is ridiculously fun if you have two X chromosomes, so Mom and I obviously weren't done that soon; I told Dad he could walk by the river. He came back before we were quite finished.

After that, we went to a bazaar right next door, and Dad promptly got bored there, too. He did wander around a bit longer, finding blocks with cute sayings that he figured my mom might like, but the poor fellow was bored stupid within 10 minutes. So he called his younger brother Shawn, who lives in town. And Shawn totally saved the day; he showed up and "rescued" my dad from Craft Shop Craziness, and Mom and I were able to look around unhindered by the tall bald man looking at us all forlorn-like. (Thanks again for "rescuing" my dad, Uncle Shawn! You're the hero!)

We only hit one more store after the bazaar. Mom found a fun, gigantic painting to hang on my wall; we weren't sure exactly where to put it on my wall at home, but I couldn't walk away from it.

I carried that painting under my armpit as it rested on the top of my foot to the checkout line while Mom looked around a bit more, and I couldn't help but think that there was no way this painting would fit in my folks' car.  I made my purchase and then laughed right out loud as Mom and I tried to carefully make it fit into the Jetta.

It. Didn't. Fit.

Mom said she'd stay with the painting while Dad and I went to get my car (a Nissan Altima, with a much larger back seat). We left her there outside the store as the wind raged. Without a cell phone. (She has one, but left it at home.) We hit every red light, and it took us a long time to get back to her with my car. (Probably 20 minutes, and I only live 2 miles away from where we left her.)

The painting didn't fit in my car, either.

No, really.

The picture was too big by about an inch and a half, if we wanted to shut the door (which is absolutely what we wanted).

That's when my dad volunteered to walk that damn painting to my house. Two miles away. (Let it be noted: the painting is light-weight. But let it also be noted that it's freakishly large, and the wind was blowing.)

I just measured my painting, guys. It's 39" by 59".

Thanks, Dad, for walking my painting home. In the wind. You are the hero.

Mom and I got home before Dad by, like, 25 minutes, probably. So we got to work hanging a shelf up in my room. (We didn't want to start hanging any of the rest of my purchases on the living room walls until we got the painting home. You understand.)

Dad walked in and said he was about to pass out, and that he should probably eat some carbs, stat. (Dad is diabetic, see.) I gave him a little handful of Cadbury eggs and had him sit down for a bit.

WOW, I'm long-winded!

I know it's too late for  the "long story, short" thing, but I'll condense it from here on out: Mom helped me figure out what should go where, and my living room looks so much better now! After we finished hanging everything, I fed my folks some delicious crockpot cheesy taco soup with homemade crusty bread (dipped in raspberry balsamic with a touch of lemon olive oil)...and then my folks headed back to Brigham City.

I know Mom and I nearly killed Dad from boredom. And then from my ginormous painting. But I had a stellar weekend, and I'm glad I was able to spend time with my folks. They're awesome people, and I miss seeing them on a more regular basis.

Here are two rather hastily-taken pictures of some of my new walls:

The black word on the dining room wall says "Delish"
Mom said, "It's totally a Gina word."
Then there's the freakishly large painting, roosting garishly between dining and living.

And here's a shelf I bought at that Shabby-to-Chic store. I LOVE IT.

I am sincerely content with my newly dressed walls. They were outright barren before, and the giant, untouched space between the dining and living rooms was dreary to my soul.

Aaaanyway.

This was one of the loaves of crusty bread I made Friday/Saturday.
Ri-dang-diculously delish.

And this happened Friday evening.

I thought about taking a picture or two of Mom, Dad and me on Saturday, but that was before I realized I wasn't wearing any makeup.

Not one stitch of it.

I'd been out in a number of very public places for roughly 3 hours before I looked in a mirror and realized that my face was as naked as my walls at home. I chastised my parents for letting me out of the house in such a state: Dad hadn't noticed at all (no real surprise there); Mom noticed, but she thought I knew and that I was fine with it, "because it's Saturday." I mean...ugh.

Here's the worst part, though: I was walking around the bazaar, looking at this and that, when I looked up and saw a tall and handsome stranger walking towards me. He looked at me and smiled, and I totally smiled back (because that's how I "flirt" without coming off...wrong). I thought we had a moment, you know? But now I can't help but think that smile must've been a figment of my imagination, you know? Because I feel gremlin-esque sans makeup. I don't wear a ton of foundation anyway, but since I can't wear mascara any more, I never leave the house without at least a bit of shadow and liner. 

 ^ THAT ^ is me being dramatic. I went the entire day without makeup, and it was a really good day so it doesn't even matter.

My weekend was stupendous, I love my house, and my parents are the best. I'm a very lucky girl.

rearranging (the living room) and stuff

January and February flew on by with indecent rapidity. I mean, those are my two least favorite months of the entire year, but I swear: I blinked and now it's March. I mean...how did that even happen?

Nothing too exciting has happened in my life over the past week. (Which further astounds me: how can life rush on by with nothing to report?)

Anyway...here's what's going on, according to Blanche. (Blanche is my iPhone, by the way. I sometimes like to name items I use frequently (we all know my car is called Handsome Rob), and I was going to call my phone a boy's name, but then I thought, "Hmm...I ask my phone very personal stuff that I'd not normally ask a guy, so I decided on Blanche. Not sure what thought process brought me to that name, so don't ask.)

*Katie and I rearranged our living room.
I took these pictures and sent 'em to my folks,

because Momma was curious.
*story to follow the pictures, hold tight

I know, the grainy quality of this photo is breathtaking and jealousy-inducing.

Can you tell that the skull and crossbones area makes me feel sad?

This area will be taken care of as soon as we can get our hands on a stud-finder.

See? I told you I don't love this area. 

Although I do believe that "less is more," I also believe that
this area is just far too naked.

I kinda like this view (but maybe with a clock or picture above the basket?

I was talking with my Mumsy on Friday night shortly after Katie and I had finished rearranging, in the midst of my newly acquired "naked wall" conundrum, and Mom was all, "I have some ideas." And I was all, "I do not." And she was all, "I could keep my eye peeled and let you know where to find them." And I was all, "Ooooor you could come up and visit me this weekend and take a look at the space in person and we could go shopping together," or something like unto it. And she was all, "Maybe. I'll have to talk it over with Dad." 

Aaaanyway, due, in part, to the bare state of the area between the living room and the dining room, I was able to talk my folks into coming to visit me this Saturday. (I win!)

*The story as to why Katie and I rearranged our living room in the first place? My folks gave me a DVD player for Christmas (plus some other stuff, dear folks). When Michelle moved out a few weeks ago, I set up my TV, TV stand, DVD player, etc. And I set up a Netflix account. Because my DVD player is rad and you can watch Netflix with it. There's no phone jack anywhere near the place where my TV was set up before. Nope, the nearest one was on the other wall, and Katie and I weren't about to run a cable from one wall to the other, because NO. Also, I love The Netflix, because the first two seasons of Sherlock is on there. Katie introduced me to Sherlock a few weeks ago, and I have very efficiently become obsessed with that darned show. So...yeah. I've been watching a lot of Sherlock in the past few weeks. And by "a lot," I mean to say all nine episodes. I know I just got on this Sherlock train, but I'm super annoyed that there are only 3 episodes per season. And also I'm annoyed that, I hear, season 4 won't happen for something like two more years. (That's my only beef with the show, though. It's just so darned good.)

Also on Friday (the last day of February), the weather looked a little something like this:

Isn't it lovely? I didn't even wear a jacket when I was out and about.

March 1st happened on Saturday, and it looked like this:

In like a lion, right? The snow has since disappeared, but it provided slick roads all weekend long.

I saw this just 1/4 of a block from my house on Saturday night...

Also this weekend, my dear friend Tracie put together my DVD shelf thingy. And I helped. I had full intentions of doing it all by myself, but I was immediately overwhelmed the moment I dumped all the parts out of the box. Tracie showed up and was like, "Can I put this together?" And I was all, "Umm, noooo! That's not why you're here!" (She came over to watch Pride & Prejudice.) And she was all, "But I like doing projects!" And I was all, "Okay, then. You're a dream." And then she put it together. And I helped.

It wasn't even that hard. (Thanks, entirely, to Tracie.)

Aaaand, according to Blanche, I ate this for dinner last week sometime:

BBQ pork salad.
I know, right?!

Aaaand that's all for now, folks!