3 Restaurants I will likely never eat at again.....

I really don't know where the inspiration to write this post came from. But its been one of the random things on my mind pretty frequently for the past few weeks and I hope writing about it will maybe finally get it off my mind. With that said, here are 3 fast food places I will most likely never eat at again. I decided to also include their one saving grace that could possibly entice me to eat there again.

Sorry McDonalds. I'm not loving it. Honestly, its probably already been 2 or 3 years since I've eaten here. There are just so many better options available. If I am really dying for a burger or shake I'd much rather go to 5 Guys or In-N-Out.

Saving Grace: Chicken McNuggets

As far as I'm concerned, with fast food places, its 3 strikes a you're out. The last 3 times I've eaten here I was left feeling not so hot. The first time going all the way back to 2002 I had a Guacamole 6 Dollar Burger. Got food poisoning from it and missed a devotional from President Hinckley because of it. The second time was earlier this summer when I got chicken fingers that I could not even finish because they were so gross. And finally this past Saturday I got a Western 6 dollar burger that did some weird stuff in my stomach, I don't even know. Like I said, 3 strikes and you're out.

Saving grace: Milkshakes

Ok, this one is more out of spite than anything. I don't really have anything against the food, and I really do love their Arby's sauce. But I HATE HATE HATE the stupid "good mood food" commercials they have been airing as of late. I don't know what it is about them but they make me want to stab my eyes out and cut off my ears. I obviously feel very strongly about this and if you don't believe me just as Tiff, she can bear witness. I think whoever developed this stupid advertising campaign should be fired, shot, then fired again. As you can plainly see even talking about the commercials has put me in the opposite of a "good mood". So I'm sorry Arby's, but your commercials make me want to jump off a cliff.

Saving Grace: curly fries, arby's sauce and milkshakes

Just made the cut....for now: Burger King, Sonic, Chilis, Applebees, Wingers

Guilty Pleasures

As soon as I was done posting my bake-aholic blog I noticed that Emily had posted a blog about her guilty pleasures. It seemed like a fun idea, but since I had already posted that day and for the sake of time I decided to postpone making my own guilty pleasures post.

Without further ado, here are my guilty pleasures:

Plants vs. Zombies. Yes, I take care of my zen garden almost daily. Yes, I have beat adventure mode twice. Yes, I am incredibly proficient at bowling for zombies. Yes, I have all the plants and zombies available. It took a little bit of convincing from my husband and the Maricans to get the app in the first place, but once I broke down and got it I was hooked. If you have the option of getting this app, don't waste any more time deliberating, just buy it. It will be worth the $2.99 you spend on it, I promise.

Oh, diet coke with lime how I love thee. Even though I feel like I need to drink a gallon of water after I have any type of soda I still feel the need to have one every once in a while. More often than not, I will opt for the diet coke with lime. You can't go wrong with this stuff.

Chocolate cake? Um, yes please! Really any sort of chocolate baked good will suffice though. While I am not a huge fan of straight chocolate (although I do quite enjoy dark chocolate) I absolutely LOVE anything that is baked with chocolate - cookies, brownies, cake, cupcakes. I think this goes hand in hand nicely with my previous post.

Anyone who knows me very well or has been a roommate of mine at some point knows of my love of Grey's Anatomy. I own all seasons on DVD and our DVR is set to record every new episode. I have seen all of the episodes so many times that if you were to describe a scene I could probably tell you what season and the episode's general place in the season. I can easily find an episode to match my mood whether I am sad, happy, or missing my dog. I will admit, though, that there have been some low points (ahem, almost all of season 3) and times when I have wanted to stop watching, but I always come back for more.



Confessions of a Bake-aholic

Hi, my name is Tiffany and I am addicted to baking.

Now, we know that I have always really enjoyed baking but over the course of the last month or so it has grown more into an obsession - in large part due to Annie's Eats. Believe it or not, I have even grown quite fond of cooking. I have always had a pretty fearless attitude in the kitchen, but up until now have stuck mostly with simple things. Now, however, I find myself trying all sorts of recipes. Hunter encourages this by choosing whatever looks the most difficult in the category I give him. Exhibit A: Banana Split Cupcakes. I even took the time to make Eggplant Parmesan a couple weeks ago - something I would never have dreamed of doing previously due to an irrational fear of doing something horribly wrong with the eggplant. Often, in my spare time, I find myself looking at recipe blogs and searching for more things to try. This all works out very well for Hunter because the quality, as well as variety, of our meals has greatly increased.

The only thing that hasn't really worked for me thus far is pizza and only because I don't currently (key word) have a pizza peel. The dough was delicious as was the tomato sauce and I'm sure my topping choices would have been delightful if they had ever made it onto the pizza. At great risk of mockery, here is the picture I took to send to Hunter (who was at work at the time) of my disastrous attempt:

Needless to say, there is no good way to transfer a pizza from the counter to the pizza stone without a pizza peel. Fear not, I will have one soon and this wrong will be righted.

I should probably take pictures of my successes. I promise there have been far more of those.

What I really want to make right now is a Neapolitan Layer Cake. My only previous attempt at a layer cake was on Valentine's Day when I made a Red Velvet Cake. It wasn't perfect, but I was pretty proud of my first attempt ever at layering cake. Unfortunately, this desire will have to be postponed until after we move. I will be sure to take pictures, as long as it is successful.

For the sake of posting a picture of something that looks somewhat appetizing, here is a picture of a Chocolate Raspberry Torte I made earlier in the year. My pictures don't look nearly as appetizing as Annie's do, but I can work on that too. Haha.

My husband is in full support of my addiction and I don't see any sort of rehab for it anytime in the near or distant future.

California Adventures

A week and a half ago we had the opportunity to spend the weekend in California! We started out in San Diego where Hunter had an Ultimate Frisbee tournament (I'll let him post pictures and go more in depth - hint hint Husband ;) ).

Before the games began though, we were able to go to the San Diego temple. Rest assured, it is even more beautiful in person. I'm not sure why I didn't realize how truly beautiful it was before this trip.

Despite the fact that our bodies were used to 95 degree weather, not 70 degree weather, we did play in the ocean! It took me until Sunday to be able to not freeze in my swimsuit. Haha.

Ah, how I love the ocean! Isn't it majestic?

I truly experienced crab for the first time in my life. Hunter convinced me to try it and I am glad that I let him. I definitely was not disappointed. Not only did it taste great, I also enjoyed the texture - which, if you know me, is a big deal especially when it comes to sea food.

Next stop: Disneyland!

When we were on the Buzz Lightyear ride, fighting Zurg's army, we got stopped. I figured it was a good picture opportunity, astro blasters and all.

There was a petting zoo in Adventureland. This goat was particularly friendly. It couldn't get enough of Hunter's arm...

...and tried to eat my hair. haha. 

This picture feels very honeymoon-ish, but it is close enough to our first anniversary to count for that, right?

Even though I have been to Disneyland a couple times (this was Hunter's first time), I have never before seen the parade. We did this time around and I am glad we opted to stay. It was fun, exciting, and very Disney. Here are a few pictures:

The curls in the princess's hair were CRAZY! I don't even know how much hairspray they had to use to make it stay as stiff as it was.

We made it a point to hit up all the classic Disneyland rides. We went to Splash Mountain pretty early because we wanted to be sure we wouldn't be waiting in line all day. Little did we know we would get a whole cart to ourselves!

We also hit up Space Mountain which was easily the biggest hit of the day. Whoever had the idea to create an indoor roller coaster was a genius! Both of us LOVED this ride. My only memories of this ride stemmed from a trip to Disneyland when I was about 8 I think. I remembered it as dark, weird and maybe a little scary. There was a child behind us about that age who came off crying and I think that was probably my reaction first go around. This time however, I could appreciate the true amazingness that is Space Mountain.

As you can tell from the two pictures above, apparently I make ridiculous faces when riding on roller coasters.

All in all, the weekend was a huge success. It was very relaxing and nice to be able to spend so much time with just Hunter. It was exactly what the Doctor ordered. I'm sure that our Riviera Maya vacation coming up in September will be just as amazing! 

While we were vacationing, this little dog stayed with my family. 

Despite the PTSD post Jimmer that Hunter and I, as well as my family, were experiencing, it went really well! Ameya had the time of her life running all around the big back yard and living life country style and my family (particularly my mom) loved having her constant companionship. It was a good practice run for when we are gone for a full week. 

The Tale of my iPhone

My iPhone has had a rough life. We got them in the end of November 2010 and we aren't able to renew our contract in order to get discounted phones until July 2012.

The following 3 incidents have made me come very close to having to fork over a large amount of money in order to replace/fix it.

1. In March of this year while I was giving Jimmer a bath it fell out of my hoodie pocket into the bath water. I swear to you it was only in the water for 2 seconds tops. However, it got water in the speaker and had to spend the night and following day in a bowl of rice. Luckily, I was able to hear people when they called me again after the rehab.

2. Sometime in the beginning of the summer it again was immersed in water. This time however, it was for much longer. I had it sitting on the counter while I was doing the dishes (which up until this point was not an uncommon occurrence). When I was done I went to pick it up and realized that it was in a pool of water. Awesome. The damage was more extensive this time and after a couple of nerve racking days that included horrible water marks on the screen and very shoddy battery life, left me with a slightly starry background. I hardly even notice it anymore.

3. When we bought our iPhones the lady helping us strongly urged us - to the point of nearly forcing us - to buy covers for our phones. At that time we opted not to because they were more money and it changes the whole look of the phone. I should have taken her advice. This is close to what my phone now looks like. The cracks on mine are more focused on the top right corner and not quite as extensive. This can be fixed, however, it does cost $125 dollars. I am having a hard time convincing myself to fork out the money when my phone functions perfectly. So until it stops working or July of next year, my phone will have lovely cracks in it. I do now have a case though. Hopefully that will prevent any further cracking of my screen.

Moral of the story: treat your iPhone with love.