Voodoo Doughnuts

Back in 2011 when Ryan & I were first married we lived in Portland for the summer while he did door-to-door pest control sales. I was still re-cooping from my melanoma surgery and didn't know anyone in the area, so I didn't get out to explore Portland as much as I had wanted to. One of the main places I've been wanting to hit for ages is Voodoo Doughnuts. 

As we packed up our stuff, said our goodbyes to family, we hit the road and Ryan asked if I wanted to hit up Voodoo? I waffled back and forth "well, no it's out of the way" or "I'm not very hungry right now"...but Ryan saw through the bologna and just started driving us towards the blessed pink building. 

We had our guy at the counter pick out the 6 best Voodoo doughnuts for us to try, and OH MY GOSH. AMAZING. My favorites were the bacon maple bar and voodoo guy with raspberry jelly inside. It was the perfect road trip food for the way home. Hooray for sugar comas!

We drove through the night, dropped Taylor & Nikole off in Logan, then continued home to Provo and pulled in at 6 in the morning on Sunday. YUCK. Suffice it to say we were dead asleep till almost 2pm and were hung-over from staying up all night and sleeping all day. The next day we dived back into the grind of school and now we are trying to finish the semester alive! Even though it was a long drive...I'm glad we chose to drive up to Portland and spend time with Ryan's family before another crazy year of school, graduation, and life :)

Pit Stop in Logan

This past Monday Ryan & I started our 14 hour trek from Provo to Portland for the Thanksgiving weekend to visit his family. Instead of doing the whole ride in one shot, we decided to stay with our friends Shane & Amelia for the night. Logan is about 2 hours north of Provo, a place where all of our Utah State friends reside.

Being the tried & true Aggie fans they are, Shmelia decided they needed to try and convince us that Aggie ice cream beats the BYU creamery...I'll consent and say that it is a pretty close tie ;) We had the Aggie Blue Mint ice cream, mint ice cream with cookie pieces and white chocolate chunks, which was deeeelish! 

Before our ice cream trip, we hit up the most amazing Indian food ever! Granted, this is probably only the 3rd time ever that I've had Indian food but I couldn't stop stuffing my face with the Butter Chicken curry and Garlic Naan bread. Therefore, now I'm a connoisseur of Indian cuisine ;) This place is attached to a random gas station in town, so of course it totally looks sketchy! But it's one of those special hole-in-the-wall places that only the locals even know about, so I felt pretty cool pretending to be a Logan-ite for the evening. After a fun night of amazing food & card games, Tuesday morning we picked up Ryan's brother and his wife and started our road trip up to Portland!

Home

Blogging hiatus much? It's been one jam-packed week I can tell ya that! While Ryan was at work I got some help from my brother Jesse in packing up our entire Corona, CA apartment. After the mass cleaning & packing, I was mentally and physically exhausted. 

We hit the road soon after packing up in CA, Ryan was driving his car while my mom was keeping me company in mine. He got ahead of us on the road {cause I'm a slow-poke & refuse to use cruise control} and we told him to keep going towards Provo without us...then we hit a major roadblock. My poor 'lil Jetta overheated and got us stuck in Las Vegas {4 hours away from CA & 6 hours away from Provo}. After spending the night in a very well-air conditioned Comfort Inn {with SYTYCD on, score!} we thought the car would be done the next morning, but quickly found out that it would take a few more days to fix because the engine had blown. We decided to leave Lucille in Vegas, we felt confident and safe in leaving her there to be fixed and went on the search for a rental. After cajoling with a couple different rental car companies, we finally tracked down an available one and unloaded pretty much everything but the kitchen sink from my Jetta to the rental car...then bounced.

Ummmm, ya...just recounting the story gives me anxiety! Due to stress, frustration, exhaustion, or a combination of the above, all I wanted to do was punt a skunk. After calming down, we discovered that Lucille's damage happened at the most perfect time. My parents would be able to pick up my car and drop it off to me next weekend when they will be on their way to a wedding here in Utah. Hooray!!

We made our way the last 6 hours and hit the ground running. Unloading, re-organizing, grocery shopping, laundry, lawn care, school scheduling, re-installing internet, cleaning, decorating, and more. Our lawn is beautifully green {it better after stupid lawn-gate}, our house is inviting, we finally have an entire kitchen at our disposal {after living with one pot and one pan the entire summer}, our king size bed is divine, and it all feels so familiar and safe. Now I can take a biiiggggg deep breath and relax,  and see just how blessed my life is. Now on to school! BRING IT.

Kamikaze Utah Trip

This last weekend we {my Dad, Ryan & I} decided to make a quick trip {as in less than 3 days} up to Utah for some doctor appointments and for my twin cousins baptism. We left Thursday night and came back home Sunday afternoon. It's a 9 hour drive each way...I definitely should have taken into account that I'm not very good traveler on long drives. Now I know my lesson!

In the 24 hours we were in Provo we: went to Ryan's orthodontist appointment, both got our hair done, saw a movie, went out to lunch at Zupas, dinner at Outback, and Ryan and I met up with some of our friends {Ryan's best friend from high school} who were just about to make the trip from Provo to Oklahoma for dental school!

A "hip" place {quite literally dripping with hipsters} to grab a shake at late hours is the local hospital cafeteria. We scarfed down our Oreo shakes, took our pictures and said our goodbyes and good lucks to Blaine and Alayna before they made their way to OKC!

After spending Friday in Provo we made our way a couple hours south to Joseph for my twin cousins baptisms {so proud of those cute girls}. It was also their older sister's birthday a few weeks back so I had some fun picking out presents and gift cards then decorating the gift bags for my little cousins! After the baptism we hit up this deeelish mom&pop grill in Joseph which is where I got the most amazing chicken alfredo pasta, yummmmmmm!

Saturday night we drove another 2 hours south of Joseph and stayed the night in St. George, then proceeded to make the rest of our 6 hour drive home on Sunday...definitely not the smartest to drive through Vegas on a Sunday, yikes! Although I had a blast with my Dad & Ry, this whole week I've still been re-cooping from the lack of sleep and copious amounts of Red Bull!

Road Trip Gone Rogue

{Our rental 'stang for the weekend}

This past Thursday morning we drove south on the 15 freeway towards So-Cal for our mini vacation we have had planned for months, 

when Ryan & I hear this really weird puttering going on in his car.

We pull over and try driving it on the shoulder to see if it kept making that that noise.

Didn't sound good!

I hopped on the phone with AAA, got our car towed to the Beaver mechanic shop and had it looked at.

Ummm, ya.

The freaking engine blew. 

Worst nightmare right?

I really tried being optimistic.

For those who don't know Utah...Beaver is literally in the middle of NOWHERE.

The closest city was an hour away, Cedar City.

We hop on the phone to get a rental.

Only one rental place, Avis, has one rental car left in it's lot...and they refuse to come pick us up.

{Chillin' in the convertible}

That's when I was about to rip someones head off.

ISN'T THAT THE POINT OF A RENTAL COMPANY?!

Thankfully one of the mechanics took pity on us and drove us to Cedar City.

By this point I was seething.

A red eyed, fire breathing, starving BEEZY MONSTER.

I stomp into the rental place and ask:

"What the hell do I have to do to get a car and leave?"

After the many phone calls with them while we were stuck in Beaver,

 they had neglected to tell us about their insurance policy.

Flaming idiots I tell you.

Finally we get it figured out, and we end up with the last rental in Cedar City.

A red convertible Mustang.

Hmmm ya. I'll take it.

It was seriously a blast rip roaring around in that thing.

{Cha Cha's Latin Kitchen in Brea. SO AMAZING}

{Evan's call to Villahermosa, Mexico!}

We got in late Thursday night and was greeted by family and homemade chili.

Yummmmmmmmmmm.

Friday we spent with our friend Cody, then went out to dinner with my best friend Sam and her boyfriend, then opened up my brothers mission call...

VILLAHERMOSA, MEXICO!!!

Evan was so excited!

He wanted to serve a foreign mission and to speak another language, preferably Spanish.

I got to get crackin' on my Spanish now!!

{Before we got rained on at the USC/UCLA game}

{The Rose Bowl in Pasadena, CA}

Saturday we finally got to our game....

GO USC!!!

Ya, until we lost!

Even though we lost, were rained on more than half the game, saw a huge brawl fight only a few seats away from us, there were scary Mexicans trying to pick a fight with Ryan cause he is buff, and practically smoked pot just by the smelling it...this was definitely a way fun experience!!

Totes scrapbook worthy.

 It was Ryan's first college football game other than a BYU game and

 he practically wet his pants when we first laid eyes on the Rose Bowl.

Definitely worth it :)

Can't wait for next year when we will absolutely DOMINATE UCLA!!

Early Sunday morning we started making our way back to good ole Provo, Utah because I had a test at 9am Monday morning {lame!}.

For as stressful the car situation was, I totally forgot about it when I was with all my family & ripping around in the Mustang with Ryan and the top down.

Now it's time for another mini-vacay toooo St. George for Thanksgiving!

Leaving tomorrow {Wednesday} then coming back Friday morning for work.

Black Friday. Working in the mall...

Now that oughta be a day full of stories.

Benexa Wedding Part 1

If you haven't noticed, I've been gone for ohhhhhh about 5 days.

At least from the blog world!!

I was a tad bit busy carpooling 10 hours down to Phoenix, Arizona, hitting up the wedding, checkin' out Phoenix nightlife and food, sleeping, poolin' it up, and driving back to Provo, Utah.

Other than that it's been pretty boring.

Ryan & I carpooled with a choice group and had a blast on the way down.

We stopped in Kanab at a 'lil cafe called Rocking V.

We all decided to try out the Buffalo Burgers, they were absolutely deeee-lish but at 18 bucks worth?

Pretty much almost had a heart attack when I got the check.

GUL!

We continued on our journey through Southern Utah, Flagstaff, then finally landed in Phoenix around 7pm on Wednesday night.

Thursday we took it easy because we knew the wedding festivities of Friday would kick our butts.

So we chilled in the pool, went to JCPenny's for suspenders, took naps, ate yummy breakfast burritos with the soon to be married couple, and then Thursday night we decided to drive around Downtown Phoenix to check it out.

We drove by this huge blue tornado lookin' thing and heard some pretty rockin' musica, so we knew  we had to stop!

Ricky Martin and John Mayer covers galore!

All in 90 degree heat.

Yes, AT NIGHT.

I swear I was sweating 24/7, it's a really hot look.

{so punny!}

Then we drove through Mickey D's for some DC's and headed home to hit the sheets to prepare for the wedding festivities to come :)

<3 Bri