Mich is here!

So... My friend Michelle's coming in tonight. I'm pretty excited, and that's not just because I'll be having fried Nutella and banana won tons for breakfast tomorrow. Oh, no. It's exciting, just to know I'll be spending the next 72+ hours in The Beal Dimension. (Always a good time.)

Some of you may have heard me name drop my friend Mich before. She's the one I went on Ye Olde Singles Cruise with.



Also, she swam with the sharks in San Francisco.



Mich is fabulous. She's hilarious. She loves blue cheese and butter as much as I do (which is... uh... a lot). It's gonna be a great weekend.

With any luck, I'll have some fun photos (and recipes) to share soon!

Wahoo!

Good Friend + Good Food + Good TV = Happy Tuesday for Laurie!

So, last night I headed over to my friend Myra's house to watch Lost and eat cupcakes. It was pretty much the best night ever.

Okay, I'm kidding. But not about it being about the best night ever, that part was for real. I was kidding, in that I didn't go there to watch Lost and/or eat cupcakes. I went there because I love Myra, and any excuse to spend time with her is a good one. That she has cable (which, I sadly, do not) and that she'd made THE BEST CHOCOLATE CUPCAKES OF ALL TIME were just nice side benefits. (Not that I'd ever use My for food and/or TV, I'm just saying... nice benefits.) Also, watching Lost with My is infinitely more fun than it is to watch it alone. While I might have some snarky thoughts on my own, I sure wouldn't have said "Hmmm... Sawyer's had Kate up against a fence before" at the end of last night's episode. When Myra said that last night, with one eyebrow raised, I had to laugh out loud. (I mean, head thrown back, gut busting, LOL.) Truly, Tuesdays are more fun for me when I'm at Myra's.

Myra. She's fabulous. One of the best friends I've made since I've moved here, and I'm so glad I've had her in my life. I'll miss her like crazy when her family moves to wherever-it-is-they-end-up-going.

These chocolate cupcakes. They are to die for. I mean, this chocolate sheetcake recipe is pretty fan-freaking-tastic... but turning them into cupcakes really pumps them up a notch. The rich, gooey goodness of sheetcake turned into a cupcake - with this frosting? Oh my holy-thought-I-died-and-went-to-heaven. (You just can't beat chocolate cake so rich and moist that it sticks to your teeth when you take a bit of it.) DELISH!


Lost. It is, simply put, the best TV show of all time. (If you like to try and figure stuff out and/or stare at eye candy ala Sawyer, Dr. Jack, Desmond, and my boy Sayid.) If you haven't ever seen it, you should repent right now and head over to ABC.com. They have all episodes of all seasons for free right now. If you have 3 weeks or so and you don't have anything better to do, definitely check it out. (If you don't have 3 free weeks, I'd advise you not to get started until you do. This show's addicting like none other and I'd hate for you to... you know, miss out on your life, if you got sucked in by the pilot and you couldn't turn away. Yeah, it's that good.)


I love my friends. I love yummy chocolate treats. I love Lost (even though I can't figure it out to save my soul!). I love my life.

Looky there... I shut up long enough to take a pic!

Yeah, so I'm so wishing that I had the ability crop a picture, because I promise we're even cuter up close than we are from this weird angle. (Don't get me started on how I wish people would just get brazen and use the zoom, or step 2 feet closer so they can get a centered shot when they're using my camera. But whatever.) I did have this one pic on my camera - and the good news is that Shannon had her camera, too. Between the two of us, I'm sure we have a better picture than this that I could post, but I wanted to get this up. Why? Because it was WAY TOO FUN to see these girls today, and I had to let a little of that ooze over onto the blog. So, here I am... oozing.

Aaaahhhhh!!!! What a fun day!

Two little love birds...

Yeah, you'd better know that "two little love birds" rhyme has nothing whatsoever to do with me and my love life. (Sorry, Mom, I know you'd like to have an electrician in the family... but so far, no dice.) It's all about Kathy & Paul - who were SUPER CUTE at both the ceremony and during the pics on Saturday. So cute, in fact, that I had to dedicate another post to them and their extraordinary cuteness. I love these kids.

This would be Kathy & Katy U., two of my favorite people in the whole, wide world. I'm so bummed that they aren't both looking at the camera, but hey... you take what you can get. (And I'm pretty sure the photographer they were paying to be there and take good pics got a good one of the two of them together, so I'm not gonna worry too much.)

Kathy wanted a group pic with all her nieces and nephews. This is not actually all of them. Two little boys came running up and dove in about 3 minutes after most of the pictures had been taken. My favorite kid of the bunch is the little boy in the vest who's up front. He was blowing spit bubbles through the whole photo shoot. It was alternately hilarious and disgusting. Honestly, little boys... they're so... boy. Ugh.

And this (as I'm sure you can tell) is me with my Kathy. There was a super cute goofy pic that Katy got that I really wish I had (it was showing more "personality", let's call it), but this was what I had on my camera, so it's what you're stuck with.

Saturday was such a fabulous day. Of course I got lost every time I had to drive myself from one place to another, but I had sirius radio and enough time to allow for getting off & on the freeway twice, so it was all good. :-)

I'm so happy for my friend and for her husband. They were such a cute, sweet, happy couple, and it just thrilled me to get to see them get hitched and start their life together.

Wednesday - my new favorite day of the week

I've been hanging out with Christian on Wednesdays lately, and this week we made a little trip to our favorite store (ABC) for cake decorating supplies. Check it.

Like I needed any of this stuff (not so much). I went, knowing that I wanted to get a little thing of red dye and some more marshmallow flavoring - and a big tip for cupcakes.

What I ended up with...
2 candy/Bakerella-style-cupcake-bite forms
1 ginormous thing of red food coloring
1 little guy of burgundy food coloring
1 little guy of blue food coloring
1 bag of pink chocolate (for the afore mentioned cupcake-bites)
3 pkgs of SUPER CUTE cupcake cups
1 cupcake shaped cookie-cutter
1 pkg of Easter Bunny sprinkles
1 container of raspberry cake filling
1 4 inch cake pan

Not quite the $4 I was planning on spending, but it's all good. Because with these goods, I was able to make some pretty cute little Spring/Easter cuppycakes this week.

How cute are these cupcake cups? (Adorable, right?) On a scale of 1-10, I'm pretty sure they're a 12. I'm in love with the polka-dots.

And I got to use two of my new tips. I'm a pretty big fan of this tip. I only had to squeeze once, and a huge rush of icing came out. I'm pretty sure I'll never frost a cupcake with a knife again as long as I live.

And with this super sweet tip, I had to squeeze for a second longer than with the first. It's more than one squeeze, but it was a pretty easy little swirly move that gave me the Hershey kiss-esque look in the center.

Sprinkle the tops of my adorable little cakes with some pink Easter Bunny shaped confections, and... voila!

The cutest little cupcakes of all time. (And they tasted pretty darn good, too.)

Past, Present & Future

My mom sent me some pics yesterday, asking if I could tell her when they were taken. All I had to do was look at the series and I knew... they'd been taken in March of 1994, exactly 15 years ago this week, when Mom and I went to Provo to visit my friend Jo for her birthday. We'd stayed with my Grammy & Grandad (my mom's folks) and had dyed our hair red, just for fun. (And then, for even MORE fun, I cut my hair at the end of the week. I'd had a bad perm... as you will see... and cutting it was really the only option, as far as dealing with it went.)

As funny as these pics are - and as much trouble as I know they'll get me in with my cousin - I just have to post them. You see, I've been thinking a lot this week about how lucky I've been in my life. Because I have been, ridiculously and truly lucky (nay, blessed). Especially in the realm of friendship. I have had a lot of truly amazing people come into my life over the years (and if you're sucker enough to be a regular visitor to the blog and are reading this, please know that I count you among them). But these girls ... these girls have been constants in my life for as long as I can remember. The only people who've been my friend longer than my mother has been are Bethy, Julie, Jo, and the Solomon girls (and I give those names in no particular order). And with that having been said, here's a little trip down memory lane for your ocular enjoyment.

Bethy & Julie - all soap sudsed up...
Bethy pouring and Julie mixing red dye into my hair - note the unfortunate perm. Also, please note the unfortunate look on my sad & pathetic, 19 yr old face. (I've always thought that the smell of dye is one of the worst smells EVER - and this look says it all for how hard I have to concentrate on not puking when dyeing my hair.)

A couple days later. Jo was going red, just like the rest of us. And while Julie had been putting the dye in Jo's hair, I must've been in the kitchen scooping up some mint chip ice cream. (Don't ask me why I'm spooning it into my mouth right as the pic was taken. Ice cream always has been my #1 priority.) Oh, and how 'bout those Sally Jesse Raphael glasses that both Julie and I are sporting? Hot, right? And here (as I'm sure you noticed), I couldn't keep my eyes open. Yeah, in one pic I'm shoving ice cream in... in the other, I'm most likely laughing so hard that my eyes have involuntarily closed. Some things never change.

And, speaking of things that never change...

Here I am with my cousins, who I love and am so grateful to share blood and so many years of history with.
And here I am with my friends - the girls from home who've known me for so long that they're part of who I am.

I can't wait (uhm... except that I'll have to, literally) to see where we'll all be in another 15 years. In the meanwhile, I know that there will be more pictures, more late night hair parties and gab fests, and more ice cream. (Oh, and a heck of a lot more laughter, too, if I know us. And I do know us.) These things are certain. And I'm certainly grateful for them.

Eat, Drink & Be Merry

I am a brain donor. But hey, I'm happy... so it's okay. At least, today I'm happy. Tomorrow I'll probably be about 17 shades of tired, and most likely a little grumpy by the end of my 12 hour shift (esp after staying up past midnight tonight), but when the opportunity to go to dinner & a movie with Chris & Jo comes up, I'm .... well .... I'm just a girl who can't say no.

Tonight after work (I get off at 8:00 pm, remember) I met them for dinner - after which we drove back a little closer to home (and also to the theater where you're allowed to bring in food from the surrounding food establishments - hello, Cold Stone!) for a movie. I got home at 12:15 and, sadly, am wired as all get out ... so I thought I'd share my night with my online audience. (I know, you all wish I'd just go to bed already, but first please allow me to give you a little insight into my Fabulous Friday Night.)

Hello, PF Chang's - one of my many true loves when it comes to food. Tonight I had my fave - Mongolian Beef, with about 3 cokes (because we all know that I love myself some sweet & fizzy coke along with my salty & spicy food). It was, as always, amazing. Mmmmm......

Hello, Cold Stone - my one true love when it comes to places that serve frozen confections. Tonight I had the Very Berry (however-that-goes) with toasted almonds. Oh, that ice cream's a little piece o' heaven, I tell you...

And then we went and saw this movie, which I am not too proud to tell you ... I had no desire to see. (Renee Zellweger gives me a bit of a headache, and well ... as much I do enjoy hearing Harry sing, he's not really that great of an actor.) Nonetheless... Christine had seen it with her roommate last week and I had it on good authority that I'd think it was pretty funny, so... $9.75 later, I was in. And let me just say... holy freaking crapping cow, this movie made me laugh so hard that I thought I was going to break something loose inside of me. Honestly - the wacky Minnesotan hair-do's and the accents, not to mention the local colloquialisms.... seriously - about the funniest thing I've seen in I-don't-even-know-how-long. Wow.
So, there you have it - a night in the life of me. And my favorite part of the whole night (and you'll have to admit that topping my fab dinner, my favorite ice cream in the whole entire world and the funniest movie I've seen in a good, long time is something to say) was when Jo turned to me in the movie ticket line, as I was standing there tired and bleary eyed (but still happy to be there, out with two of my favorite people EVER) and said "I'm so glad you came... I love this spontaneous part of you ... the eat, drink & be merry part." Do you see why I love her? "The eat, drink & be merry part" ... now, that's pretty great. It's not every day I hear something that so sums my life up. And even though I know that's probably not the most flattering picture of me ever painted (if you take it in the direct scriptural meaning, which you know I don't ... as I never like to think of myself in an un-flattering light), I do think it's pretty accurate... Gosh, it's great to have friends that know me so well - and love me in spite of myself. I am, truly, the luckiest girl ever.

It's a tie...

...between the two cutest pics of the four cutest girls.

Aren't we adorable, and don't we look like we were having the most fun EVER?!


... It's because we are. And we DID! (And now I'm so tired that using these few words has worn me plum out and I must go to bed - at 9:00 pm. I know - weird.)

Bows for Baby & Me

For those of you who aren't caught up on the current events of my life... I have a new niece. According to all the pictures that my brother/parents have emailed (and or pixed to me), she is adorable. I, sadly, have been unable to meet her as yet, due to an infection that started the week she was born, and just keeps on hanging on. (Per the doc, the antibiotic that I'm on now should clear any and all traces of the infection and I should be able to see her on Friday... on her 2 week birthday. Halle-freakin-lujah, and it's about time!)

Anyhoo... though I have been unable to actually see/hold/play with Baby Hazel, I've been thinking about her A LOT. So when I went to my friend Lizzie's Girls Night In Party last night, I commissioned matching hair flower/bows to be made for both of us. Check it.

Lizzie made these for us. (She is THE NICEST!) Aren't they awesome? I wore them on my head just over my ears for most of the night, Princess Leia style. (Anything to get Han Solo, y'know.) I ended up moving them up to the top of my head, for the sake of my hearing and... the claustrophobia. Not to mention, Han was nowhere in sight, so the obtrusive flower/buns on the side of the head look wasn't doing anything for me. (And yeah, I know I'm looking a little peaked in this photo... Don't be cruel. I told you I've been sick - my color is still a bit off. Clearly. And yet I continue to post pics of myself online. I know, it cannot be explained.)

I live in anticipation of the day that I get to see the new babe and we can have an Aunt/Niece photoshoot in our matching super cute really really big flower clips. Wahoo! (Oh yeah, you gotta KNOW I'll be blogging about it as soon as it happens!)

Princesses Who Know How To Party!

For those of you who don't know my friends Belle & Aurora... please allow me to introduce them. (Belle is on the left in blue, Aurora is to the right of her, wearing black & pink (Flora must've gotten her way this time) and you all know me, Cinderella, there in the back (where the tall kids always go).

Christian, Christine and I took a trip to Disneyland a few months ago. Christine and I are both BIG FANS of Disneyland, and when we realized that our friend Christian had never been, well... we had to remedy that. We were lucky enough to have some free tickets fall into our laps (thank you, Cousins Julie & Bethie!), and we even had a free place to stay (muchas gracias, Aunt Deb & Uncle Rob!)... so all we had to do was buy the gas to get there. We left after work Friday, drove to CA that night and then got up Saturday morning and spent the full day in the park (yup, from open to close). The highlights of the day were lunch at The Blue Bayou (we fell in love with the deep fried Monte Cristo... and who could blame us, really?) and the FOUR, thankyouverymuch, stops by the Dole Whip stand outside the Tiki Tiki Room. And okay, the back-to-back rides on The Matterhorn were pretty sweet... as were the four times getting off and then right back on again at Thunder Mountain Railway at closing time. Let's face it... it was a fantastic day!We drove back to D&R's house that night totally and completely wasted, slept like the very dead, and then got up and drove back to AZ on Sunday. It was the absolute most fun I've ever packed into a 48 hour period. (And I've never been more tired in my life, I'm pretty sure.) It took us almost 3 days back at the grindstone in our daily lives before we started to wonder where else we could buy Pineapple ice cream, and wondering why on earth no one in Sunny AZ knows that they should batter & fry a Monte Cristo. (I mean, honestly, we were ordered every Monte Cristo we could find on a menu, and not one restaurant fried them up right...) We took matters into our own hands, and... gave Google a shot, hoping it would help us in our quest. Sure enough... it's true, what they say, you can find anything online. Enter the recipes for Pineapple Whip ice cream and the Disneyland Monte Cristo - and the first Princess Party.

We had the first princess party in May and the pineapple ice cream and (deep fried) Monte Cristos were so fantastic that we planned our next party straightaway. Our second party was mid-June, and... our third party is scheduled for today/night. This princess party is gonna be special, because... (drum roll please), we're having a sleepover this time. Yes, you read that right folks, a full blown princess sleepover party, complete with biscuits & gravy in the morning before we disburse and go our seperate churching ways (I'm just hoping that no one puts a pea under my 22 mattress. I'd hate to wake up with my princessy hide black & blue from a cursed little pea). We're planning to swim in the princess pool, watch multiple back-to-back princess movies (Ever After is at the top of the list - since we did Beauty & The Beast and Enchanted at the previous parties, I figure it's time that I had some representation), eat ourselves under the table, and... party like we're, well... royalty or something. Wahoo!