Betty Crocker?

Who ever said I couldn't bake?  Okay, it was me.  But I admit I was impressed with myself for making this birthday cake for David.  I have been inspired by my roommate, Cassie.  She has been taking cake decorating classes and has made some beautiful cakes lately, so I thought I would try my hand at it since she already has all the nifty tools.  My cake wasn't as professh as hers, but it tasted good.  (As good as can be expected for chocolate, my least favorite).  The night of David's birthday we were too stuffed from eating at The Garden restaurant where they gave him a free dessert, so we didn't enjoy the cake until the next night.  I was afraid it was getting stale so I insisted we eat it then, even though there was something else going on, and I'm glad we did, for when we uncovered it, I found one of the strawberries on the top was going moldy!  Eeewww.  I removed all the strawberries (just in case) and we ate just the cake.  It was still good, thankfully.  I guess that is the problem when you make a cake that looks too good to eat!  (I flatter myself.) :)

As Flat as a Pancake

Burnett's Mound is just that....a mound. But it is the highest point in all of Topeka, Kansas. And I admit, you could see for miles, even if the thing you could see was just more flatness. David and I have been back from our trip there for a couple of weeks now, but I figured it wasn't too late to post something about it. The entire time we were there, we played a little game called "Total home-state domination" where we compared and contrasted the lovely features of Kansas and Utah, respectively. I think the consenses at the end was that Utah was, in deed, cooler all around, but I thoroughly enjoyed my short stay in Kansas none the less. We left the morning of Thursday, March 6th, and came back to Salt Lake City four days later, Sunday night. The highlight and main purpose of the trip was to go to the Winter Quarters Temple in Omaha, Nebraska. It was David's first time to go to the temple, and he wanted to go with his Father who lives in Topeka (about 3 hours from Omaha). Despite having a high temperature of 9 degrees that day (no wonder the saints didn't survive the winter) the temple trip was wonderful. It was so great to see David all cleaned up, literally and figuratively, and dressed in his white temple clothes. The experience for him was good, I think, and we enjoyed talking about lots of cool stuff in the celestial room afterwards with his dad, brother, and stepmom. In fact, we spent much of the entire weekend talking about neat temple stuff. I learned a lot, even though I've been going now for years. Aside from the temple excursion, David and I spent much of the time visiting his old stomping grounds where he grew up. We went to the house he was raised in and treked through the "woods" where he and his brothers would spend their days building forts and caves. David also showed me his elementary and high schools, and many of his old friends' homes. I really enjoyed getting the visual image of many of these places he's told me a lot about. I felt like I learned more about who he is and where he came from. And of course, there were the burned-out warehouses to explore. :) David has an obsession with the old, run-down, decrepid, abandoned, mysterious, and creepy. Perhaps that is why he likes me. It became a joke to us that he took me all the way to his home town and spent most of his time taking me to condemed and haunted buildings, including the old insane assylum where over 1200 patients are buried in unmarked graves surrounding the buildings. It was, admittedly, cool. And very creepy. I mostly enjoyed seeing David's face light up. Take him to a burned-out warehouse, and he is like a kid in a candy store. Too bad they can't capture the scent of that and put it into a perfume.
During our trip, we also visited some of his old friends. We went to lunch with some women he worked with in Topeka, and spent an evening with one of his best friends, his wife, and their son. I've heard so much about these people and it was great to put a face with a name. I felt a little under the microscope, but I think most of his friends approved of me. :) I know his Dad did. He called me his "daughter-in-law" at one point, which was funny. He even gave me a foot massage with scented lotion at one point (freaky, yet endearing) and David told me that was old-hat for him and meant he must think of me as one of his kids because he's always doing that sort of thing for them. Good to know. My own father wouldn't do that sort of thing in a million years. So, in short, it was nice to see where David gets his affection.

The vacation was just what I needed, and it was wonderful how David insisted on taking such good care of me. He wouldn't let me pay for anything, including the plane tickets. I'm really glad I got to go with him!

You know how I take "dares"

It is Sunday evening and I am going through the photos my sister sent me via email.  What did we do without email, again?  The pics are from our excursion to Beaver, Utah, for my niece Kale's baby blessing.  The funniest thing happened while we were there, after the lunch party was dying down.  I sat at the kitchen table, eating spaghetti.  My mother was leaning up against the kitchen sink.  The snow outside was coming down something fierce.  I said to my mother, "I double-dog dare you to go outside right now and make a snow-angel."  Before we even had the chance to blink, my mom was on her way out; no coat, wearing a knee-length skirt, nylons, dress pumps, and approaching 70 years old.  We ran for the cameras.  I ran for the door.  I wasn't going to miss out on this.  My sister Melanie followed right behind.  The three of us, Mom as the lead, trudged out into the back yard where at least a foot and a half of snow had just fallen, and was presently falling.  We fell straight back, almost in unison, collapsed into the snow and began our construction of the most beautiful snow angels you've ever seen.  It was wonderful.  When we came back inside, we discovered we weren't even wet.  The snow brushed off us like powder and we were warmer now than before because of the rigorous exercise of arm and leg waggling.  So why not do it again and get some really good pictures, eh?  And that is exactly what we did.  The second time, we all held hands and made pretty for the camera.  Though there is nothing really pretty about it, except for the memories that were made with the coolest mother in the world.  Later, I overheard her talking to another daughter on the phone, sharing in the joy.  "You know how I take dares,"  she said.  I never really knew she did take dares, but boy, how I will remember that in the future!  I love my mom. :)

Valentine's Day

I'm getting good at this blogging thing.  I remembered to take pictures yesterday!  I went to work in the morning, but around noon decided to go home and try to get some rest.  I had taken the day before that off work as well, due to the fact that I've picked something up and I'm hoping it's not the pnemonia that Tamara might have had!  When I got home, I was delighted to find a large bright green box on the doorstep with my name on it!  I, of course, forgot that I desperately needed to crawl into bed at that point, and instead ripped into the box with all the valentine's furry I could muster.  Two dozen beautiful hot pink, red, and white roses, and not a baby's breath in sight!

Also included in the box was a nice vase and care instructions, which, since I followed perfectly, my roses should be lasting me a good long time.  I trimmed the stems and arranged them in the vase, put them on the nightstand in my bedroom, crawled into bed, and spent the next several hours toggling between coughing fits, unrest, and staring at my lovely roses.

At about six o'clock I decided I'd better get out of bed and take a shower so I'd be all ready for the date David had planned.  I knew he was making me dinner (he tried to surprise me, but asking me if he could borrow my table sort of gave it away).  It was perfect because I was too sick to really go out into the cold, and the dinner he made was better than anything we would have ordered at a fancy restaurant!  

  He made filet minon with a wonderful lime-butter sauce, stir-fried vegetables, and homemade mashed potatoes.  I was very impressed!  This was a first for him at making any of it, and I told him he is now designated as the official cook in the relationship.  We ate at my small table set up with candlelight in my bedroom, and enjoyed tablespoonfuls of milk out of my miniature wine glasses.  For dessert David had bought two pints of creme brulee ice cream which tasted exactly like the real thing.  The entire meal and evening was wonderful.  

I gave David four hand-made gift certificates for a date night, foot rub, home-cooked meal, and movie of his choice.  When he opened them he said, "Loralee, you should be a designer."  Yes, David, I'll look into that. :)  Anyway, the night was a success all around.  How nice to actually have a Valentine this year!

Montage-Creative Daily Documentary

So shortly after announcing my CD release party, I got an email from a man named Dallas, asking me if I wouldn't help him with a project he is working on called Daily Documentaries. Dallas is a photographer who embarked on the monumental task of making a documentary about someone he thought was interesting every day of the year 2008. That's 365 cool folks, people. I was honored and flattered to be considered one of them, so last Saturday we met at his house and made the "documentary." What it consisted of was about 30 minutes of a recorded interview (pod-cast is download-able from his blog) and then another half-an-hour of me getting embarrassed while he took pictures of me in front of his grey wall in his bedroom. I was never so awkward at having my picture taken in all my life. Well, you can be the judge, I guess. To view the pics and download the pod-cast interview, go to montage-creative.blogspot.com. You'll get a kick out of the fact that I completely forgot the words to my own song while singing it for the interview. I just couldn't handle the pressure! Just to be warned, the mic was too close to my mouth during the songs and it sounds, well, very bad. At least it was only a voice-recording, and not a video recording. My face had turned the color of those Valentine hearts that I bought the other day. Not a pretty sight.

My CD has been released into the wild

The official party was almost a month ago, January 19th. I was incredibly nervous for it. I didn't think anyone would show up, and I almost hoped nobody would show up. I guess that is because I was having a bit of a perfectionist's panic attack. I knew the CD wasn't perfect, and now everyone would know it, too. I've sung these songs a hundred times for large numbers of people, but this time it was different. The crowd could go home and listen closely to the words, and think all sorts of things about me. The songs are, after all, my life story in no uncertain terms. How would you li

ke to publish your journal to the world? I got scared, to say the least. But the party was a hit as far as I was concerned; we had about 60 people or so, and my good friend Davin's band opened up for me. I sold a good number of CD's that night, as well as quite a few before and since then. I still have some available if anyone is interested. You can purchase them for $12. Just send me an email, and I'll make the arrangements.

Full-Time work? I must be crazy

I'm bored at work, and since I get paid on commission and there are no customers in the store right now, I don't feel bad using company time to do this. Well, I might feel a little bad, but I'm letting it go. :) I started an additional job at a place called ArtWorks two days a week, so with my three to four days a week at the Black Goose Design, I am now working full time for the first time in three and a half years. It is quite a change for me. I don't know when normal people have time to do little things like laundry and cleaning the bathroom. I had a hard time getting those things done when I had three or four days off a week! Now I don't know when I'll do it. And don't get me started on Christmas gift purchasing. I was planning on making everything this year for Christmas, but now there is just no time. People are getting store-bought this year from me.
Well, enough complaining about my full-time schedule. I actually am very happy with my two jobs. I think they are a good combo and it gives me a nice variety throughout the week, not to mention actual money! ArtWorks is an art-design company that works mainly with commercial clients. We go into their space, tell them where they need art, pick out the art, and then install it for them. We've done large projects like hospitals and universities, and tons of corporate offices. So far I've only worked there two weeks, but I really enjoy it. My boss is a Zen master. He hired me right on the spot without even seeing my resume. His decision was soley based on a recommendation from Joni Johnson who is the sales manager now, and of course, meeting me during the interview. :) I was very flattered. It is going to be a good job.
I must admit, it was hard to go back to full-time work, but I think it was time. I sort of feel like I "sold-out" but not really. I am happy in the work, and I am not lonely anymore during the day. It was so rough being all alone all day working from home.
Well, I think there is a customer in the store for me to help now. Better sign off for today.