Masquerade 2010...

....has come and gone. Dan and I had a fun night, but I wasn't as amazed as I was last year (sshh)! We started the night off in the Mediterranean area where they served us a Greek Lamb salad and watched some belly dancers perform, then later on in the night a magician performed (well one of those magicians who is supposed to be funny because he is that bad...think of Chipps Cooney from AGT). We then made our way to the castle where it was Spanish themed. We had yummy stuffed mushrooms and veggies; the entertainment was a sword fight between men fighting for the same woman. Next, we made our way inside the grand ballroom to the Italian area. They served Alfredo and Spaghetti, and we watched a couple do a nice ballroom routine.

There was a live band playing music all night, and people were free to dance...Dan, however, wasn't too keen on the idea, and I was wearing 20 inch heels, so we skipped that activity. We got a professional picture taken inside the art gallery. There was also a silent auction, but all the prizes up for grabs were too expensive for us! They also had "It's a Beautiful Life" showing outside on a big screen TV with a bunch of couches set up for lounging. The rest of the night we were free to roam around the grounds, and because the property is so exquisite, we spend most of the night wandering around taking fun pictures. It was a nice night for a good cause.

And now, picture overload:

I like to take pics of myself while in the car...no, I wasn't the driver, this time.

Dan made a new friend.

I made a new friend

Belly dancers

freaky! (i may be talking about the woman and the snake)

My handsome man-some

These guys were on stilts and reminded me of the scary guys on Lord of the Rings

Us **post eating, I might add**

Dan and Ron, the owner/operator of the property/event

The castle, and yes, it's located in Ron's "backyard"

I leave Dan alone for two minutes, and this is where I find him

Yee-haw!

When I was in third grade, my favorite thing to do at recess was swing, meanwhile singing Ace of Base's "I saw the Sign" at the top of my lungs. Every time I swing, I think of this. No lie.

Serenading the crowd

We had a lot of fun! If you missed it this year, you need to come next year!

Labor Day Shenanigans

Can I just say I have a love/hate relationship with long weekends. Of course I love having an extra day off, to play and sleep in, and do whatever I please. But it makes it that much harder to get back to real life after-wards. This Labor Day was a hoot. Dan had spent Friday and Saturday away from home playing with friends and family, so Monday was a relief to finally have him home to spend all day with me! We woke up early and headed down to the Onion Days Grand Parade. My sister Kelee was on one of the floats; she was dressed as a scarecrow and got to hand out fliers...lucky her :) We walked around the park, and I bought a $16 necklace that seriously is worth $1. I don't know what I was thinking. I also got a cute bracelet, and got a free scarf (that I will probably never wear because I can never pull off the whole scarf look, but still, it was free!) We spent the afternoon with Dan's family which consisted of eating yummy food, and having our annual Labor Day volleyball tournament. I made banana cream and french silk pies.

Dan, Brent, and Lorin got their monster trucks out for one last bash before winter. They took them off some sweet jumps up in west mtn, but both Brent and Dan ended up wrecking hard, so the fun was over pretty quickly.

And now, some pictures of the fun:

Kelee AKA scare crow

Dan-the-handy-man tuning up the ol truck

Banana Cream

My fluting skills have improved greatly, if I do say so myself.

French Silk

Yuki did a lot of this

and this...Ava is her best friend ha ha

Christmas

Christmas came early at our house... for a few reasons.

1. Because the gifts we wanted (bikes) are not very useful in the winter time, and

2. because it is the end of the 2010 biking season so the bikes we wanted were at a really, really good price, and

3. because when I see something I want, I have a really, really hard time waiting to buy it. It can be a bit of a problem, but not this time. :)

Dan and I crossed our hearts, hoped to die, and stick a needle through our eye, to each other that this would in fact be our entire Christmas to each other.

So, yes, we now have bikes! 2010 Specialized hardrocks to be exact. I don't wanna go into detail on the specs, since most of you don't know or care anyways, but they are top of the line for entry level mountain bikers/recreational riders....which fits me to a T. It has been so much fun. The first day we got them we biked 12 miles around West Mtn/Orem. My butt was killing me the next day, but I have gotten used to it now. We also have a class Tues/Thurs at UVU at the same time, so we have been biking to school and back. It takes us about the same time as driving because we don't have to deal with traffic and parking issues.

We bought a rear basket for Yuki to be able to ride in. I took her for a short ride around our facility to get her used to the idea. When I first put her in it and strapped her down she was shaking and so scared. I felt kinda bad and wondered if it was even going to work out, but I think towards the end of the ride she was used to it. We haven't taken her on any of our longer rides because of the extra weight and such though. We plan on biking down the sundance or provo canyon bike trail this weekend, and I can't wait. I found a hobby I can see myself really getting in to! I haven't gotten a pic of Dan on his bike yet, but here are some of Yuki and me on her first ride :)