Mmmmmm CANDY!

Trav and I have been busy all weekend cooking up something good. Friday night we were supposed to finish our Christmas shopping, but the weather outside was "Frightful" so we decided that it was the perfect night to do our annual candy baking tradition. We made peanut brittle, divinity, English toffee, fudge with nuts, and fudge without nuts. We made quite the team and had such a great time baking together ...minus having to redo the fudge Saturday morning since it never set up. We are pretty sure that it didn't work out because we didn't add enough chocolate chips into the mixture (FYI one regular size bag of chocolate chips is 2 cups..not 3 cups...when in doubt ALWAYS measure!)
Saturday afternoon we finished up our Christmas shopping and then came home to put the finishing touches on our candy creations. We put a little sampling of each kind onto plates and then wrapped them up with festive green Saran wrap and red/silver ribbon. We were quite pleased with the finished product and luckily we had some left to eat ourselves and share with Travis' family when we go up for Christmas on Wednesday night. Maybe instead of Travis and Sarah we will change our names to Sammy and Susie Homemaker! ; )

Quarter of a Century

I remember when I used to think that 25 was old. I can still vividly remember being as young as 2nd grade...and I am still trying to figure out where does the time go??

Yesterday I celebrated my 25th birthday and what a wonderful day it was! I woke up to Trav bringing me my breakfast and birthday presents in bed. (He got up extra early yesterday morning to make my requested meal of scrambled eggs, bacon, and toast..great guy, eh!?) After breakfast I relaxed, balanced the checkbook, watched The Price is Right, ran a few errands, went to the mall, went to the gym, then came home and relaxed some more.

For dinner we went to The Cheesecake Factory with some of our best friends John and Angela. The food was good, the dessert was delicious, and all four of us probably ate way to much! I was especially excited when I opened my gift from John and Ang--The latest New Kids on the Block CD!!! YAY! I listened to it all day in my car between all of my patients! :)



Until this year, I had never taken my birthday off of work...I didn't see the point. Now I do and I can't say that I will ever WANT to work on my birthday ever again! Thanks to everyone for all the birthday messages via calls, texts, emails, cards, etc. It was a great day! :)

Never a dull moment...

As many of you are aware, Travis and I have two dogs. Roxy, is very high strung. She loves to play ALL the time. I am convinced that she dreams about her tennis ball at night. She has a hard time relaxing and when she does decide to settle down, she wants her belly scratched...and then she wants to play fetch as soon as you finish scratching. Roxy is a VERY nimble dog. She can catch a Frisbee or tennis ball thrown at nearly any height or speed in her direction.

Noobie (pronounced "new-be" for those that don't already know) on the other hand is our cuddly, tender-hearted dog. She loves nothing more than to nuzzle up to us (or anyone who is willing to cuddle her back) and curl up and fall asleep. It does not matter to her if she is in the world's most awkward position, as long as she is next to you she is happy. Don't get me wrong, Noobie loves to run and play too, and occasionally she will surprise us and catch a ball out of mid-air. Actually, as of late she has given Roxy a run for her money at the park playing fetch.

Noobie's special talent is finding tennis balls or other toys under the couch or bed and using her long legs to maneuver them out. Just last night she about pulled a lamp off of the end table trying to squeeze herself behind the couch to get a ball. (nevermind that there were already several toys within her reach in the middle of the living room floor, she wanted that particular one!)

This afternoon I was home for lunch and Noobie was following me around with the ball in her mouth. I tossed it up in the air and the ball bounced off of her nose and into the bathroom sink. This was her initial reaction to this situation:

It was HILARIOUS to watch! The whining in the background is Roxy, "cheering" her on, which she will also do when Noobie is fishing a ball out from under the couch. Eventually, Noobie realized that today's situation may be a battle that she couldn't win without an opposable thumb and so she sat down in front of me and started barking. I am sure that what she said was to the effect of "Don't just stand there...DO SOMETHING!" Of course in the end I helped her out, but not before I got video proof and a good laugh! :)

Red Baldy

My friend Brian and I joined up with another group of people around 8:30 this morning to climb Red Baldy, an 11,000 + foot peak on the south side of little cottonwood canyon. The weather was fantastic and the views were incredible. We arrived back at the trail head around 5:00 exhausted but feeling good for spending a nice day in the mountains. Here are a few photos from the trip...

HAPPY 27th BIRTHDAY TRAVIS!!

Today is my wonderful husband's birthday and I just wanted to take a minute to remind everyone just how great he really is. One of the first things that I fell in love with about this fantastic man was his ability to make me laugh when I didn't even feel like smiling. Nearly 6 years later, he continues to go out of his way to make me smile each and every day...and his reasoning is that it makes him happy to see me smile! I always feel like the most important girl in the world when Trav and I are together. He values my opinion, he enjoys my cooking, I always feel safe and protected, and he lets me take care of him. I love you sweetheart and I am so grateful to have you in my life! Have an awesome day! ;)

They're Back!!

Thats right! Last night one of my best friends and I got to fulfill a childhood dream that we shared...to see New Kids on the Block LIVE! It was sooo much fun! Despite the fact that Danny, Donny, Jonathon, Jordan, and Joey are now in their late 30s to early 40s they still put on an AWESOME show! They had an arena full of screaming girls (ages 25-45), including the two of us. They sang all the old hits including "Cover Girl", "Step by Step", and "Hangin' Tough" ...just to name a few...as well as a couple new songs from their latest album. Danny showed off his muscles and break dancing skills, Jordan sang a couple of his own songs, including "Baby I Believe in You"...just like the old days with the white shirt blowing in the wind (and yes, he can still hit all those high notes like he used to), and Joey was still as easy on the eyes as I remember him being when I was 10! Actually, I think that they all have gotten more attractive with age! Neither Angela, nor I could stop smiling the entire evening. We were all giddy like we were teenagers again!...and then after the concert we both went home to our husbands and talked their ears off telling them all about it! Bottom line, NKOTB are just like I remember them...and more! Angela and I agreed that should they come back to Salt Lake City again, we are totally there!...maybe we will fork out the money for floor seats next time! :)...Hint: You can click on any of the pictures below to see them bigger ;)

New Portfolio Website

I'm in the process of putting together a website to use as an online portfolio for my graphic design work. I still have a lot of work to do on it, but I thought I'd throw the address out there in case everybody wanted to start checking it out. The address is travisatwooddesign.com. I don't have much on it yet, but I plan on putting up quite a bit of stuff over the next few weeks.

Snowbird with Friends

Does anyone see anything wrong with this picture??

Okay, if not then let me help. In the front you have a little girl wearing a cute little pink hat...and in the back you can see that there is clearly snow on the ground...now look in the middle...WHERE IS THAT GIRLS PANTS?? Seriously, what is wrong with some people? We went up to snowbird to ride the tram with some friends a couple of weeks ago. Down at the bottom it was a nice fall day temperature-wise, but at the top it was about 20 degrees colder with the wind blowing. Every one of us was cold and wishing we would have brought a thermos of hot cocoa and a heavier jacket along...and then we see this person walking around without pants on! I guess some people will make huge sacrifices for the sake of looking....good? Oh well, we all got a good laugh so for that we must be grateful to this young lady. This is how normal people dress when going up a mountain in 40 something degree weather...

Brian, Maggie, Me, Trav, and Angela

We all had a great time! The only thing that would have made the trip better is if John, Angela's husband could have come along!

Underwater Photo Shoot

Before we release our 2009 product at Bullfrog, we still had one more photo shoot to take care of. Of course we saved the most interesting one for last. I'll just say this, shooting underwater in a hot tub is a lot harder than you would think. to get some of the angles we needed, I had to resort to some contorted positions typically only seen in the "Cirque du Soleil" show in Vegas. It was a fun shoot and by far the most interesting environment I've had to deal with so far. Here are a few of my favorites...

Happy Hallowen

Apparently I have been a bit preoccupied lately and haven't posted any new pictures! Last Saturday night we had our annual Halloween party with Travis' family. It is a tradition that started a few years ago. We get together for dinner and to carve pumpkins, and we are not allowed in the house unless we come in costume. Therefore we all get dressed up and keep our costumes a surprise until we arrive. We have all agreed that the best part of this party is in the first 5 minutes when everyone is able to reveal their costumes! After we get done laughing at each other and taking pictures everyone (well almost everyone) takes off their costumes and changes into more comfortable clothing! Silly as it may be we all have a great time! Here are this year's get-ups:


Travis and I as G.I. Joe and Barbie..in case you were wondering, no..that is not my natural hair!

Heidi and Ben as Hippies...that is not their natural hair either ;)

My In-laws (Shallon and Bryan)...also Hippies...and they didn't even plan that...I think Bryan just had to dig out that outfit from the back of his closet! :) Nothing like seeing the world through rose colored glasses!

Parker as Nacho Libre... isn't he buff?..and yes...the kid is wearing womens underwear!! Shallon said that she had to by a package of 8 pair to get the red pair she needed! LOL :)

Keith and Heidi as Kermit and Miss Piggy...don't worry..she didn't get a permanent nose job for the party..it's fake :) They made the Kermit "mask" by taking apart a stuffed animal...cruel or creative? :)

Thanks everyone for a fun filled evening...now we all can get busy planning for next year!

Smile...It Confuses People

Yesterday someone shared this FANTASTIC picture with me and I laughed sooo hard...Seriously, if this doesn't make you AT LEAST crack a grin you are taking life WAY to seriously!

Now...go have a WONDERFUL day...and don't forget to SMILE! :)

Another Day at the Office

Things get a little crazy around this time of the year here at work (Bullfrog Spas). The three of us have to overhaul all of our marketing materials for the new model year. This means redesigning all of our brochures, owners' manuals, Showroom materials, dealer guides, and everything else we produce. Part of this process involves photo shoots to highlight the new product the will be introduced on Jan. 1st. Over the past few weeks we've had two of our photo shoots; one on location lifestyle shoot with professional models and another one in a studio to shoot all of the new product. I've been lucky to be dubbed the photographer for these shoots and even though I initially thought i'd gotten in over my head, things have actually turned out really well. Here are a few highlights from the past few weeks:


This is one of my favorites from the studio shoot.


This is our NeckBlaster JetPak.


Fall colors and a great mountain view. How would you like to have a back porch like that?

Great lighting! Nice red-orange glow as the sun goes down.

This is the older couple we used as models.

This is one of the younger models we used.

Nice view! This house belongs to our dealer up in Ogden and it's huge! I love all of the different types of lighting in this shot.

We are considering using this shot for the cover of our 2009 brochure

These photos will be used in all of the things we're redesigning now as well as in newspaper ads, billboards, websites, and other projects throughout the next year. It's really fun to see your work out in the public.

The Economy

My friend Clay showed this comic to me at work today. I thought it was pretty funny so I thought I'd share...

Salsa Time

For all of those who know me well, I am a self-proclaimed salsa guru. I believe that the quality of any given Mexican food restaurant can be determined by the goodness of the chips and salsa that they have for you to eat while waiting for your meal to come. Saturday I went up to Heber City to spend the afternoon with my mother-in-law and two sister-in-laws making our own homemade salsa. It actually didn't take near as long as what I thought that it would take and the finished product was YUMMY! I came home with 14 half-pint jars of fresh salsa...I think that should last Trav and I at least a couple months! :)

Friday night FUN!

Friday night we went up Big Cottonwood Canyon to go rock climbing with our friends Brian and Maggie. Trav has been climbing outdoors before, but I had only been indoor at the rock climbing gym that we have passes to. I was a little nervous at first, but it turned out to be tons of fun and the weather was picture perfect. We had the entire wall to ourselves which was also really nice....Here are some pictures from our adventure (you can click on the pictures to make them a little bigger and easier to see)...

brian and maggie....................the boys..........................maggie................

me climbing the wall.........me still climbing..........yay i made it!!..............

trav on the wall...........trav almost there................me and trav...............

Thanks Brian and Maggie for such a fun night...we had a blast and can't wait for our next trip! :)