BE SELFISH (SOMETIMES).

Hello again, Friday, it's a pleasure to see you.

Do you ever have those days (or if you are me, weeks) that you throw a pity party for yourself? This week has been that for me, I've been drunk on pity aaaaaall week long and finally erupted in tears last night just because Greg gave me a hug while I was making dinner.

I have this problem. I've always had this problem. I am too nice. By just stating that, I feel like you are thinking that I am a self-righteous snob but I assure you that is not my purpose. What I am trying to say is that a lot of the time, by avoiding hurting someone else, you end up hurting yourself. I have a problem telling people 'no' and the majority of the time, that turns into me slowly killing myself by having too much on my plate. I tend to agree with someone, even though I disagree, to avoid the confrontation that could potentially hurt or anger them. I do too many favors that put a strain on me mentally, physically, financially, and emotionally, but never are they returned. It's both difficult and embarrassing to admit this but basically, I'm saying that because I want everyone to like me, I allow them to walk all over me.

The first step is admitting that you have a problem, right? So, now what? I think that I have a lot to work on, so much that working on one step at a time is the most effective way to go about it. I've decided to start with not stressing about the things that are completely out of my control. Easier said than done, I know, but I'm willing to work on it. When you really think about it, it's completely ridiculous that this problem even exists. If nothing that we do or say can change the circumstances, why do we put the energy that we do into worrying about it?

Alright, I'll stop rambling now. But I'd love to hear from you guys. Do you have this same problem? What are you going to do to fix it?

[FEATURE] ONLINE LOCATION SCOUTING.

Petite flower & herb arrangements  from Cupcakes & Cashmere.

These packing tips from Dulce Taylor are ones that I must keep in mind.

Transition your wardrobe from winter to spring.

A Bacon Bloody Mary would just complete me.

Tips on how to sneak in workouts so that you don't have any excuses.

I've been meaning to design my own budget binder but let's place bets on how long that'll take me to get around to. So for now, these are a great reference.

Cheat treat of the week? I think it may be time to invest in a doughnut pan.

HAPPY SPRING & HAPPY FRIDAY!

Spring is finally here! And so is Friday! Was everyone ready to take their weekend a day early yesterday and break out the margaritas?

I've been able to ride my bicycle everywhere this week instead of driving my car and I couldn't be more happy about it. The mornings are chilly, especially on days like today when I forget gloves, but bearable and still beautiful. I hope to get a long bike ride and possibly a hike in this weekend, depending on my self-discipline when it comes to getting out of bed.

I'm not going to lie, I get so much entertainment around Salt Lake during springtime. The highs during the day are still only about 55 degrees but because the sun is out, everyone is breaking out shorts and tank tops and flip flops while I'm over here still bundled in my sweater. Maybe I'm a wuss, maybe those people are just nuts, we'll never know.

PALEO MEATBALLS AND GARLIC MASHED CAULIFLOWER.

Trying a Paleo lifestyle, one of my biggest frustrations is finding recipes that say they are Paleo and then you go through their ingredients and they aren't Paleo at all. I tried to find a Paleo meatball recipe last night and didn't end up finding any so I decided to just create my own. Everytime that I create my own recipe, I don't tell Greg that I made it up until after he says it's good, just in case. ;-) But this one was fabulous, and completely Paleo.

PALEO MEATBALLS & GARLIC MASHED CAULIFLOWER
Makes about 12 large meatballs
Prep time: 20 minutes
Cook time: 40 minutes

Ingredients:
1 Large head of cauliflower
1 Pound of grass-fed ground beef
1/2 Yellow onion
1 Egg
2 Tbs. Minced garlic
2 Tbs. Ghee
1 Tsp. Oregano
1 Tsp. Basil
1 Tbs. Olive oil
1 Tbs. Organic ketchup
1 Tbs. Organic yellow mustard
Salt & Pepper

1 // Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Meanwhile, fill large pot with water and bring to a boil. Chop up head of cauliflower, removing the stems. Heat olive oil in a small frying pan. Chop onion finely, add to olive oil and cook until they are soft, about 10 minutes. Once water in pot is boiling, add cauliflower.
2 // Combine ground beef, 1 Tbs. garlic, onion, egg, basil, oregano, and S&P. After boiling cauliflower for 5 minutes, remove 1 cup of it, leaving the rest to boil for another 15 minutes. Drain cauliflower and dab with paper towel. If there is much water at all left in the cauliflower, it'll cause your meatballs to fall apart. Add the 1 cup of lightly cooked cauliflower to the beef mixture. Mix well.
3 // Roll beef mixture into large meatballs. Place in a glass baking dish. Bake for approximately 40 minutes, depending on your oven, until the insides are no longer pink.
4 // While meatballs are baking, once your cauliflower is soft, drain and dab with paper towels. Place in a food processor, along with your ghee and the remaining 1 Tbs. of garlic, and S&P. Blend until you have the desired texture that you want. Place in warming drawer or if you don't have one, like me, wait until the last ten minutes of your meatballs and place in the oven to warm up.
5 // Lastly, combined organic ketchup and mustard and brush lightly on top of meatballs before serving.

HANG IN THERE, TWO MORE HOURS.

In just a few (hopefully short) hours it'll be the weekend. Thank god. I feel like Monday through Thursday fly by and I can't decipher what happened on which days and all of that crap. Friday tends to be a completely different story. Friday drags on and on and by 3 o'clock I just feel dead. Seriously, I have been yawning so often today that I feel like my jaw just may snap anytime now.

I love weekends for a reason that a lot of people don't even care about: brunch. I tend to make brunches a big to-do. We usually go out for brunch one of the two days and then I like to make brunch at home the other. And not very often does brunch happen without mimosas, many times, too many mimosas but what the hell, that's what weekends are for.

A little over a year ago, mine and Greg's favorite restaurant, The Bayleaf, went out. They used to have the world's best chicken and waffles. Thinking that we will never have them again just about kills me. That being said, I'm feeling like chicken and waffles at home are a must this weekend. Looks like Paleo is going out the window for a day. Greg also saw a post on BuzzFeed the other day of different, unique quesadillas to make and one was a breakfast quesadilla so that may be on the horizon, too.

Now, on the opposite of the spectrum, diet and exercise! Not nearly as exciting or tasty, I know. I've been working on a lengthy post about my own lifestyle change but haven't quite figured out exactly what I want to say yet. My amazing cousin Tiffany started her clean-eating journey in January and is just killing it with recipes and progress. Visit her posts at 365 Days of Clean Eating. Trust me, it'll inspire you.

SPIRAL JETTY.

It's starting to get nice here in Salt Lake which means that camping and adventuring are upon us. Greg, Nick, Kim, and I were expecting a warm 60 degree Sunday so we decided to drive up north a little ways to Spiral Jetty. The boys decided to drive up the night before and camp and Kim and I waited until Sunday because I had an event to go to on Saturday night. By the time we got there on Sunday, the boys had finished off a 30-rack of beer, the only beer we all had, and we weren't too pleased with them when we arrived and it was gone. Good thing they are funny as hell and hard to stay angry at. Plus, they had a great night and it was fun to hear about all of their stories. You wouldn't believe what those two can come up with in just a few hours together.


If you are from Utah and haven't ever been out there, you need to add it to your list of things to do this summer. Last time that Greg and I went out there, the water level was much higher, you were knee-deep towards to end of the spiral but this time we walked all the way out there with no water. It's pretty interesting the way that the salt cracks underneath you and whatnot.

I learned about Spiral Jetty during my first year of college in Art History. I found it interesting then but it's hard to understand something completely until you see it in person.

I'm still getting used to the time change. I don't know how I feel about it yet. It keeps confusing me that it's still light out but 7 o'clock and I keep thinking that it's much earlier than it really is. I don't necessarily care about it staying light out longer until it gets warm enough to hang out outside in the evenings. I can't wait to utilize our balcony again soon. 

TEN SILLY FACTS ABOUT THIS SILLY CAT.

1 // The coloring on one of her back legs looks like a fried chicken leg.
2 // The only human food that she likes is yellow cake with Funfetti frosting.
3 // She meows at the back door everytime that I do dishes and waits for me to lift her up to look out.
4 // She runs to the front door when she hears Greg's keys coming but then runs and hides from him.
5 // She hates the smell of salsa.
6 // She steals my office chair from me every time that I stand up for even a few seconds.
7 // She despises the sound of the vacuum.
8 // I have to take her to the vet in a cardboard box because she won't get in her crate.
9 // She spends her mornings growling through the window at the birds taunting her.
10 // She accidentally fell in the toilet twice as a kitten.

Now do you understand why I love her so?

APPLE COLESLAW.

Today was one of those days that I didn't want to go to the store so I whipped up something from whatever was in my fridge. It ended up turning out so good that I thought I better share it with you guys.

APPLE COLESLAW
Makes 2 servings

1/2 red cabbage, shredded
1/2 cucumber, peeled and diced
1/2 Granny Smith apple, with peel and diced
1 carrot, diced
1 Tbsp. olive oil
1 Tbsp. honey
1/4 cup red vinegar
1/2 tsp. sesame seeds
1/2 tsp. poppy seeds
Dash of salt & pepper

25 THINGS TO STOP DOING BEFORE I'M 25.

And no, one of them is not regarding my terrible manicure. ^^^ I woke up the other morning and read an article on Refinery 29 about 25 things that you should stop doing before age 25. Many of them didn't necessarily apply to me but it did get me thinking this morning during my morning routine about a list of my own things that I could benefit from cutting out of my life.

Please excuse the scattering of my thoughts.

1 // Letting the dishes and clothes pile up before washing. I know that I would be much happier, not to mention that my apartment would always look much cleaner, if I stopped procrastinating washing dishes and clothes.

2 // Getting angry when someone gives me advice that isn't what I want to hear. If my mom and dad are reading this, I'm sure they will appreciate it. When I get advice that isn't  what I want to hear, I tend to get irritated and tell them that they are just being negative. In reality, they are just thinking through all of the different situations that could come about with making a decision.

3 // Taking on more than I can handle. I tend to be the type that takes on things just because I have a problem telling someone 'NO'. The majority of the time, that ends up biting me in the ass. I run out of time, run out of energy, or just simply have too much to do.

4 // Not carrying cash. This one was on the Refinery 29 list and was a bit of a wake up call for me. They say that if you don't ever carry any cash, you end up spending more money. If you carry cash, you don't spend as much because you can see it diminishing before your eyes.

5 // Panicking when I miss a call. Why is it that a missed call freaks me the hell out but I really don't care if I screen my texts? I think that in this day and age it's just because I feel that if someone calls me, it's probably more important than if they text me so if I miss it, something could be wrong or urgent. But, really, when was the last time that it actually was urgent or something was wrong? Probably never.

6 // Feeling like I need to justify myself when I tell someone 'no'. I don't owe anyone an explanation if I just simply just don't feel like it.

7 // Feeling guilty when I splurge on a gift for myself. Once in a blue moon, it's okay to buy yourself something pretty. I work hard, I save a lot, and it's okay to splurge on occasion, whether it's a new handbag or a relaxing massage.

8 // Facebook stalking. Why is it so interesting to Facebook "stalk" old flames or high school acquaintances? And honestly, what do we get out of it? I'm pretty sure that the majority of the time it just pisses me off!

9 // Justifying why I got/have tattoos. I like them, that's why.

10 // Feeling like I need to pick up the slack of others. I have enough of my own, thanks.

11 // Getting nervous when quoting the price of a project. Whenever I do freelance design and someone asks for a quote, I get nervous that they are going to think it's too much and freak out.

12 // Being caught up on the past. This one is definitely easier said than done.

13 // Not taking advantage of where I live. I live in one of the most beautiful places in the country. And yes, I'm from Utah and have never been skiing. I will someday but honestly I don't have much of a desire to. But that doesn't mean that there aren't amazing other experiences to be had here, even if it's a weekly hike or Sunday motorcycle ride, Utah is gorgeous.

14 // Caring about people's remarks about my path in life. "Wow, that's a big jump!" Yes, I went to art school. Yes, now I'm going to law school. But at the end of the day, I had to get some sort of Bachelors degree in order to go to law school AND I had some of the best experiences of my life and met lifelong friends.

15 // Feeling lazy when I take a day and do nothing. I've always had an uptight personality, I am always going, going, going. And the couple times a year that I sit in my pajamas all day and watch movies, I feel guilty the entire time that I'm not being productive. I need those times, everyone does. Your body and mind need to play catch-up once in awhile and that's A-okay.

16 // Throwing my clothes all over my closet instead of hanging them back up. And then I'm like "Where the hell did this/that go?!" Oh duh, it's probably underneath all of the other shit.

17 // Not putting things back where they belong.

18 // Feeling awkward when I use a normal camera. iPhones have really changed the way that we think at our world through photography. It can be both good and bad. I feel that whenever I take my SLR somewhere and take photos, everyone looks at me weird but at the end of the day, my photos look much better than iPhone photos.

19 // Poking myself in the eyeball with my mascara. You would think that ten years later I would be able to apply my makeup every morning without injuring myself.

20 // Forgetting an umbrella. This is the story of my day today. I get up early to curl my hair and look good for work and then forget the umbrella and now look like a drowned rat.

21 // Worrying about things that are out of my control. Sometimes there are limits on what I can do to control a situation but I can't seem to get that through my head. There's no point in stressing the outcome if there was nothing that you could do to hurt or help it.

22 // Caring if it's a Friday night and I just want to lay in my bed and watch movies. Just because I'm young doesn't mean that I have to party all weekend every weekend. Sometimes I need to just catch up on my relaxation time and that's just fine.

23 // Waiting until the last minute to pay my rent and bills. I mean, eventually that money will have to be taken out so why not in advance from when it's due?

24 // Telling myself that I'm going to workout when I get home from work and then instead have a glass of wine. The wine can wait another hour, really!

25 // Watching the same shows over and over again. I have to broaden my horizons.

BEAUTIFUL WEEKEND IN SALT LAKE CITY.

My first weekend without work was definitely a success. One of our friends, Mike, came back from Oregon where he's been working and we all had to have a little party to see him. Greg and I hang out a lot on the weekends with our friends, Nick and Kim. When Greg and Nick get together, things tend to get a little crazy. They are always encouraging each other to "act out" and "get loose" (and yes, those are the terms that they use, it's ridiculous but we secretly love the entertainment). So amidst our partying this weekend, we ended up having a motorcycle being ridden into the house, doing wheelies on a wet, rainy street, and whatever else they decided to do when we turned our backs to them. We can't take them anywhere. ;-)