Get me out of here!

It happens all the time, usually when I have too many responsibilities to actually make it a feasible option. I'm sick of home. I have been very blessed in my life to have traveled all over the world, but traveling is an insatiable bug, the more you see the more you realize just how little you've actually seen, and how much more there is.

When I get in one of these moods, I start daydreaming of all the places I've been and things I've seen. I pull up photos and think back on all of the wonderful experiences I had.

Today I've been thinking a lot about Lisbon, Portugal, so I thought I'd share a few pictures and experiences I had while there.

This is the heart of Lisbon, right off the bay. It is such a beautiful area.

These are beautiful views of the city from Le Castelo de Sao George up on one of the highest hills of the city. Lisbon is absolutely beautiful, and similar to San Francisco with its several hills that the city is set on.

A unique feature of the city that I absolutely loved was their use of hand-painted tiles as the exterior of buildings, and in beautiful little courtyards around the city.

I absolutely loved the little trolly public transit, which I took to get to the Jeronimos Monastery, which has a unique mariner take on the gothic style. I loved it!

But above any other place I went my favorite place in Portugal, came as a surprise, because I didn't even know it existed. I was riding the trolly to the monastery, and saw it out the corner of my eye, and I had to make my way back to it afterwards. The Museo National dos Coaches! Every princesses dream. An entire museum of Cinderella carriages, that real princesses have ridden in over the year.

Thanks for indulging me in my reminiscing. I promise not to share every vacation I've ever been on, but it's fun to post my pictures, and remember some of my favorite memories.

more pictures here :)

Called to Serve

Most of the girls my age seem to have had a lot more guy friends than I did in High School, and all of them have gone and come back from their missions. I on the other hand had to wait till I was 21 to start having my friends leave on their missions. Its been a neat experience to have them go all over the world, and hear how their experiences are so different and yet so similar. In the past few months I have attended the homecomings for two of my longest friends: Rachel and Holli.

(Rachel and Me at her Homecoming)

Rachel and I have known each other since we were two, and even though I moved away when we were 5, we've remained friends over the years. Rach went to Independence, Missouri. I loved hearing about her faith and love develop over the course of her mission.

Holli and I have known each other since the first grade. She's one of the silliest people I know, and I totally knew she was going to Brazil. There was no doubt in my mind. When she got her call to Fiji I was totally floored, but it was the perfect fit for her, and it was fun to have her talk to my daddy about his experiences in the South Pacific years before. Randomly enough, she even encountered someone who had been a missionary there when Fiji was part of the Tonga mission, and my daddy was in that mission presidency. My daddy seriously knows EVERYONE!

They are the only two that are back from their missions so far. My friend Ysabel is having such amazing experiences in Kyiv, Ukraine. My friend Marisa is totally gung ho and incredible with her service in the Rapid City, South Dakota mission (so exotic I know). She has spent almost her whole mission so far in northern Wyoming. My friend Kelsie just left a little over a month ago, and is barely into the field in Atlanta, Georgia.

The newest and most exciting of all is my niece Mary! She actually enters the MTC tomorrow morning. She is headed to Des Moines, Iowa, and couldn't be more excited. The mission is full of church history sites, and as part of her mission she'll get to go to the Nauvoo Temple. She just had her farewell on Sunday, and she is going to be such a wonderful missionary.

I'm not one of the ones headed out on a mission at this point in my life, but I absolutely am loving the experience of having so many of my friends serve, and relay their experiences. They have had their own personal difficulties, and yet there have been many similar threads through it all. Their love of the gospel is wonderful, and I'm loving everything they are sharing. (Now I just need to be better at writing them)

Wedding Cakes and Fun!

Wow, so I never expected to be this bad at keeping my blog updated. It's been nearly a year since the last time I posted, seeing as cute little Olivia is now almost a year old! Love that little girl so much! And I had nothing to worry about, I just took advantage of being a college student with a flexible schedule and drove down after work to see her. She loves to dance, so I've found that I act like a complete dork, dancing around anywhere and everywhere we might be, just to make her laugh.

One talent I've been slowly developing over the years is cake decorating. I was doing it before Ace of Cakes started to air (LOVE that show!) or *shudder* Cake Boss. I'm not amazing, but it's something I enjoy doing, and lately its turned into my gift for close friends and family when they get married, and boy have I had lots of opportunities as of late! My good friend Lindsey got married on April 30th, and I was way excited. A few weeks after I found out that date, my niece Emily got engaged and set her date for 3 weeks later on May 20th. I was starting to get excited and freak out. 2 cakes in 3 weeks?!? Then, as if to make things as insane as humanly possible, my nephew Jake got engaged and set his date for June 10th, just 3 more weeks after Emily's.

3 cakes in 6 weeks! Was I nuts? Well, yes, but that's beside the point. I had an absolute blast baking and decorating 3 very different cakes, but they turned out pretty well, I think.

Lindsey and Steven: April 30th, 2011

She had a vintage theme with Purple, Gold, and Cream as her colors. I wanted it to be simple, and elegant, but still with something unique and fun for them. The bottom two layers were chocolate with raspberry filling. The top two were styrofoam, which allowed me to cut the top layer into an octagon. I put their monogram on the front center panel of the top, and left it tall and elegant. She seemed to love it, and that's my biggest priority, especially when the bride is a close friend or family.

Emily and Richard: May 20th, 2011

Although they had similar themes, and color schemes, Emily was a bride of a totally different feather. Where Lindsey had a few ideas, and then worked with me once I'd drawn out a design, Emily came in with what she wanted fairly strongly in place. She wanted vintage. She did not want stacked. She did not want white. And she certainly did not want it to look like any other cake you've ever seen. She had a theme of feathers, lace, and pearls, and wanted each cake to reflect that. We laughed and had a great time drawing it out and figuring out exactly what she wanted. We got the idea that the cakes would be somewhat of an artistic take on hat boxes, and we had fun. The large cake was the only real layer (the other 2 being styrofoam again), and this is where she and Rich had so much fun. They didn't care so much about my fun recipe's, "we're just box mix kind of people" they said. We talked flavors, but nothing seemed too exciting, until someone asked if I could do a Neapolitan cake. Well of course! So it was decided, and when they cut the cake they were excited to see the perfect stripes of Chocolate, Vanilla, Strawberry, and another chocolate. I hand painted the fondunt gold to give it a vintage patina, and used what Emily gave me, and few things I had on hand to put together this fun, unique, cake.

Jake and Andrea: June 10th, 2011

Last, but certainly not least, were Jake and Andrea. They were so much fun, because they really had no idea what they wanted. We spent a while talking about shapes and layouts, and they determined they liked the simplicity of a three tiered, round, white, stacked cake. Ribbon and flowers seemed simple and perfect for them, and their fun yellows and reds wedding. We tried to decide on a design for the side, but they just weren't sure. All they knew was that they wanted it to be simple, but not plain, so they said to keep it monochromatic, and have fun designing it as I wished. Thats a big responsibility, when someone trusts you enough to let you do your own thing. I wanted it to be perfect, and I must have scraped off and repiped some of the details a dozen or more times. In the end they were really happy with it. Oh, the flavor! I almost forgot. They kept going back and forth between carmel or mint as the filling of a chocolate cake, and eventually settled on mint. I didn't have a recipe for a mint filling, so I kind of adjusted some chocolate chip frosting recipes I found online and used the green melting mints you can get at Gygi, or other restaurant supply stores. It worked really well, and I licked more of the bowl than I usually do before washing it, after it was frosted of course.

The whole thing was nuts, and I had a bittersweet feeling when it was all done. I had an absolute blast making 3 very different, and individualized cakes, but it was a lot of work, and I was glad to be done for a little bit. No cakes are in my immediate future, and I'm enjoying the break, but having fun speculating who will be next. We shall see.