Salt Lake City 2012

This time last year me and Jesse took a trip to Salt Lake City*. I had been hearing a lot of good things about the city, and plane tickets were a good price! We had 3 full days in and around the city – and I feel that we accomplished a lot in a short amount of time.

My Top Fives of Salt Lake City: 

1. The Little America & Grand America Hotels: You can spend a lot of money and stay in the Grand America, or pay significantly less and stay in the Little America. It’s right across from the Grand, so even if you stay in the Little, you can still trek over to the larger and fancier Grand America – which you should! One of the best toy stores I have ever been to is JouJou, inside this hotel. There is also a restaurant, café/bar, bakery and a few other things as well. Since we were there last year during the holiday season, they had the most awesome window displays – so fun to check out! 

2. The Salt Lake & Antelope Island: The lake is pretty desolate, as there are few living things that can actually survive in/near the heavily saline water. It’s actually a little eerie, and it has a very specific smell to it that I can’t describe. That sounds bad, but it was really interesting! The long road that cuts through the lake ends at Antelope Island. A pretty desolate island as well, though now there are bison and antelope that live there. There’s also a little museum you can check out. 

3. Alta Ski: As a Midwest girl, I did not grow up skiing like Jesse did in Colorado. To be honest, I don’t really like skiing – but I try to be adventurous (and I love the scenery), and Jesse has fun! Since we went early in the season and on a weekday it was pretty empty – less people for me to avoid skiing into – yay! Not that I have much experience, but the snow quality seemed nice and just as good if not better than Colorado. I’ve heard this is where the locals ski, and probably cheaper and less crowded than Park City. 

4. Ruby Snap: Fresh baked cookies… mmmmm. I’m a cookie girl, and this place did not disappoint. Their cookies are represented by vintage pin up girls. We tried several, but my favorite was Penelope, a peanut butter cookie dipped in chocolate. 

5. Temple Square: This was really neat to see, especially at night when all the trees were lit up. Since we’re not Mormon, we couldn’t go inside, but the outside was pretty amazing on its own. When we came back at night, a church service had just finished, and the whole square was filled with people and families, there were luminaries and trees lit up – it was really magical.

Transportation is pretty easy. The Little America is really close to the TRAX stop, and that will take you through the center of the city. We did rent a car for two days, which we took to see the Up House, Antelope Island, and Alta. Public transportation can take you to everything else in the city, and it’s really easy to use. We got in late the first night, so we took a taxi from the airport (only $20 some dollars), but leaving we took the bus, and it went directly to the airport, super easy and cheap. SLC is a very accessible city for tourists. It’s not too big or crowded and everyone was really friendly.

Other places of interest: Capital Theater & BalletWest, Eva, Takashi, Up House, and lots of vintage shops.

*Having been to SLC only once, I'm no expert on the city. But I thought I'd include some things we enjoyed, and things we figured out along the way in case you want to visit someday! I got recommendations from friends and co-workers, and it helped a lot!

Target Gift Cards

I LOVE Target gift cards. I started collecting them several years ago, and am always amazed at the new ideas they come up with. There are two seasons they go all out on their gift cards - summertime and Christmastime. Every store is arranged a little differently, but I tend to find the super fancy gift cards near the greeting cards and the toy section on an end cap of the aisle. 

In many conversations I end up being the unofficial Target gift card ambassador. So here’s the deal – gift cards are free! The only catch is that you have to put a minimum of $5 on each one. But they are gift cards, which means you can turn around and use the $5 next time you’re in Target and they never expire. If you have a smart phone and the Target app, you can even load your gift card amounts directly into that app on your phone (this helps a lot, as I always forget coupons and gift cards when going out shopping).

This year is PEZ and HexBug Bullseye. My favorite Target gift card of all time is when they teamed up with Lego. I too, LOVE Legos. Not only did you get to make a cute Bullseye the dog, but the packaging and illustration was amazing too. The illustration/design company, Invisible Creature, does many of Targets gift cards (including all the ones I’ve shown in this blog post). You should definitely check them out!

Happy Thanksgiving!!

I’m looking forward to Thanksgiving in a few days and getting to spend time with my family. Me and Jesse actually spend Thanksgiving separately. He heads down to Springfield, Missouri to spend the day with his grandma (she’s 100!) and his parents, and I go up to Iowa and get to spend time with my grandparents. It works well for us:)

One of my favorite things about Thanksgiving is watching the Macy’s parade! There’s something so nostalgic about it. Nobody else in my family shares my love for the parade, so I only catch a few minutes here and there. I love seeing the different balloons, watching the marching bands perform and seeing the different formations they do, and lastly, watching the performers fall forward when the float starts moving again:) Am I the only one that thinks that's funny?

Happy Thanksgiving!

Kansas City: Thomas Hart Benton Home & Studio

A couple of weekends ago me and Jesse took a bike ride to enjoy the beautiful fall day. We decided to venture to an undiscovered (to us) area not far from where we live, and landed in the gorgeous Roanoke neighborhood. I love neighborhoods in the city. The beautiful old homes with big trees on quite streets, with the benefits of living in the city and enjoying all it has to offer (and walking/biking distance to those things)!

As we were biking along we ended up at the home of Thomas Hart Benton. We didn’t know who he was, but it was a State Historic Site, and a beautiful house and I wanted to go inside. We got there right as a tour was beginning, learned who this guy was (a painter, born in Missouri and who spent the last 30 some years of his life in KC) and toured his studio and the inside of his home. And oh my goodness, it was a gorgeous house! The master bedroom was the best room of the house. A little area off the main part of the master had the cutest window seat and was his wife’s sewing room. Yes, that would be the perfect crafting shell for me – I could spend all day there! It even had doors that opened to a little covered porch – so perfect:)

We have talked about visiting the Missouri state capital in Jefferson City, and now we have more of a reason to go - one of Mr. Benton’s largest murals is in the capital building. Another one not too far away is in Independence, at the Harry S. Truman Library. Definitely have to check this man’s artwork out!

Fractal Quilt Phone Wallpaper

In honor of the Fractal Radiance pattern coming out, I thought I’d provide a little freebie! Not only does fractal make a fun quilt pattern, but it works great as phone wallpaper too. The colors and pattern add just enough interest as a backdrop without being too distracting. And the little bit of texture from the quilting softens it up a bit.

I’ve provided two sizes, one for iPhone 5's, and the other for Android (I’m not sure if this works on all Android phones. The one shown is a Google Nexus). For iPhones, click and hold on the image, and select ‘Save Image’. Go to your settings, under ‘Wallpapers and Brightness’ and select ‘Choose Wallpaper’. The saved image should show up in your ‘Camera Roll’. For Android, click and hold on image, and choose ‘Set as Wallpaper’.

ABOVE: iPhone 5/5c/5s

BELOW: Android

A Change of Perspective

I have a tendency to get “stuck in my head”. In those moments I start to over-think things, worry too much and become anxious. Sometimes I just need a little change of perspective to help me snap back to reality. My favorite go-to videos: Steve Jobs’ wise words and Leslie Hall’s body rolls and high kicks.

Outer Space & Sewing!

Me and Jesse went to see the movie Gravity this weekend. I was somewhat skeptical about seeing this film (I mean, how long can you watch someone stranded in space?) but it was the only movie that looked interesting, and it has a really high rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Jesse suggested going with the 3D version, and I’m so glad we did. It seems everything is going 3D, but it worked great for this film. I loved this movie despite the fact I was hyperventilating right along with Sandra Bullock the entire movie. I think space is absolutely amazing/beautiful and terrifying at the same time, and the plot of this movie totally freaked me out. There are several key plot points that are completely unrealistic, but I didn’t mind. The emotions of the characters and the zero gravity movements all seemed believable to me.

I can’t stop thinking about this movie and outer space. So, here are some photos of space from the NASA website. They have an image gallery where they put up a new image each day along with information about the photo. Also, check out this amazing print I purchased a few weeks ago. It shows all the layers of Earth and the atmosphere – it’s fun and cute (the layers have happy faces!!) AND educational.

After I wrote this post, I continued my space and astronaut research, and came across this amazing woman, Karen Nyberg (photo above in her “sewing space”) who is currently in space on the International Space Station. Not only is she an astronaut, but a quilter as well! And she has been doing some zero gravity sewing while on board (check out her Twitter page – which has lots of fun space photos too). Watch the video below! She is hosting a quilting bee from space – which I think is one of the coolest things ever!! To participate, create a 9.5 inch squared star-themed quilt block. She will sew them together to enter at the International Quilt Festival in Houston next October (2014). You can find more information here.