Photography: The Yard Back Home-Lakeshore Utah

Last month I went down to my family's house to visit.  It's always nice to visit, especially on a day with semi-nice weather where I can take a couple of shots.  I wanted to show you lovely readers where I come from, so here's a little glimpse of the one place I consider home.  We moved a bit when we were kids, but this was the last place we landed and the place my family still lives.

I grew up here.  We raised cows, horses, and I even raised and showed a sheep at the stock show.  I lived here through some of the worst and best of my formative years.  Sometimes going back feels refreshing, and sometimes going back can be terrifying.  But it's always nice to breath the country air and see all the stars shining in that big bright sky.

This handsome fella is my little brother's dog Bernie, and the little wiley guy who decided he should be the center of attention is Odie, my sister's rescue dog.  Bernie was terrified of the camera, enough that gave me a couple good shots and then he ran off until I put it away...

What does it look like where you come from?

Review: Greenies Cat Dental Treats from Chewy.com

I received the product in this post for review. All opinions in this post are 100% mine.

My cat Emma is a total glutton.  She loves treats, food, milk (though I had to stop giving her milk since it upset her stomach), but she wont eat people food.  When I got Emma back from my mom she told me Emma would only eat this one specific kind of treats, so I kept buying them for her (they had catnip in them-go figure) until I was contacted by Chewy.com in order to do a review of Greenies Catnip Flavor Dental Treats.  They even sent Emma a cute toy too-which she loves.

Fun fact, did you know that catnip doesn't actually get the animal high?  Not in any artificial way, anyway. The smell of catnip actually triggers the release of hormones in their brain that gives them a euphoric sensation for a few minutes, they don't even need to eat it... Emma always eats it anyway.  I'm telling you, she's a little piggy, but I figure she's 13 years old and deserves to indulge a little bit (but not too much.)

I opened the bag of Greenies up and found that they didn't look at all like the treats she typically eats, and I wasn't sure she would eat them. I placed one in front of her and she snatched it right up, and then meowed at me until I would give her some more.  Getting her to hold still so I could take a picture was a little more difficult as she tried to snatch the bag out of my hands.  But don't worry, she got the treats and looked adorable doing so.

I really liked these treats and will continue to buy them for her since they help with their dental, and that's good for a cat who doesn't get her teeth brushed.  Plus, she loves them.  Snag yourself a bag for your cat, or dog, from Chewy.com!

I Miss Halloween Already {October Updates}

I know, I know... It's November-but I've been crazy busy, so this update is happening a little late.  Let's start with Halloween, because I miss it already.  It was a great Halloween-though a little different.  Every year I host a Halloween party and invite all of my friends.  However, this year I just didn't feel up to it.  I'm still dealing with missing my best friend and the financial and emotional difficulties that come from learning to live alone.  My heart wasn't in it, and it felt like no big deal until Halloween day when something felt... Off.  I also hadn't realized how many of my friends relied on it, because I was asked at least 10 times if I was hosting and why I wasn't.  I definitely have to next year.

This year was also off because I had no idea what to be.  I confess...  I literally woke up Halloween morning and thought-I can be a gypsy!  I grabbed two skirts, three scarves, a tank top, a flowy cardigan, big earrings, lots of eyeliner, and the bells that hang over my front door and just layered them.  It actually didn't turn out bad, and I got lots of compliments to my surprise.

 

I confess that also stayed up until midnight the night before baking cookies.  It's been a long time since I've done that, so it was fun! 

 

April Life & Playing Catchup

This is a quick finger sketch portrait that Rachele from Fat Babe Designs drew of me.  Isn't it darling?  She's so talented-it took her just a few minutes to put together! I loved it so much that when I saw that she's running a special on custom portraits (only $15 until April 30th) I ordered one of those too.  I'm so excited!

I confess that April has been such a fantastic month.  I really have so much to catch you up on and I don't know where to start.  I already shared my birthday weekend and ComicCon wrap up (if you missed it, see it HERE) so I'll skip over that.  This past Wednesday I took the day off of work to go to LaCaille with my roommate and his french class.  Julie and Ortie came along, and then after we went for coffee and chatted.  After coffee Ortie and I went and got pedicures and later that night a bunch of friends came over for RuPaul's Drag Race.

There are also a lot of April birthdays so that requires a lot of celebrating!  At the first of the month we went to the dog park to celebrate Julie's birthday.  After the dog park we went to dinner at a delicious Chinese place, and then we went out to a little hole-in-the-wall bar to drink.  Here is Julie with the absolute perfect gift I got her-Lonely Hearts Club Band Peg People from Makings in Mommyland!  I confess that I love giving the perfect gift.

Then the weekend of the 13th we celebrated Callie's birthday. We all met up at Piper Down and just kept buying her drinks until we got her way more drunk than I've ever seen before-but it was fun!  I was also pretty toasted that night-so I was gratefully not the driver.  It was a LOT of fun! 

I confess that there are some other personal things going on, that started that night, that I'm not quite ready to talk about... But they're good things so far and I'm excited for some interesting possibilities.  

I confess I've finally decided to give up my snake.  While I love her, and she's so beautiful, I just can't take good enough care of her.  I was never a snake person to begin with, so I don't play with her often enough and she's become kind of skittish and scared.  BUT I haven't wanted to part with her because I love her and would worry about her safety.  However, my cousin who is very experienced with snakes is taking her.  That makes me feel soooo much better! 

In other pet news, Pumpkin, the cat that used to be mine but lives with my grandma has to go in for an $800 surgery or be put down.  My grandmother is super attached, and how can you say "don't save it, let it die"?  I'm not that person... I'm really sad for my pocketbook though.  Ouch. Luckily the vet is working with us.

There are still a bunch of giveaways running, and they're all linked in the right sidebar, don't miss them!

Somehow I let myself get so far behind on school... Here I am in the second to last week and I think I'm getting Cs in both classes.  Bah.  I hate it.  But catching up has been impossible.  :(  I really can't wait for it all to be over and I've never been so glad to take the summer off! 

Work is work, nothing really to report here.  :) I just keep doing what I'm doing and enjoying days off!

Health is also the same old story.  I need to do something because I am tired of being tired and fat. bah.

I received some gorgeous April nail mail.  Look at all of these beauties:

I also used I Love Nail Polish Princton (the middle one, fourth from either side) for my last manicure.

Linking up with: 

Birthday Weekend & Salt Lake ComicCon FanX Recap

This past birthday weekend turned out to be one of the best I've had in years.  I'm not even exaggerating when I say it was spectacular, start to finish!  I took Wednesdays through Monday off of work to enjoy it, and spend Wednesday cleaning, but Thursday was time for ComicCon.  Kristina, Ken, and Jan all met me at my house and we rode down together.  After waiting for an hour to get in we rushed off first to the Shadow Cast/Rocky Horror Panel, and after that we waited in line to meet Sean Patrick Flannery-who is SO nice and hilarious.

After meeting him and getting a photo with him we headed back to the South Ballroom to see the Out of the Shadows Theatre Group performance which was a montage of Hedwig and the Angry Inch, Repo! The Genetic Opera, and Rocky Horror Picture Show.  Then our friend who was playing Frank-N-Furter met up with us and we sat through the Boondock Saints Reunion panel and the James Marsters Panel before walking around and hanging out for the day.

Friday morning we got up and headed back down to ComicCon.  We didn't really do many panels, just kind of hung around and wandered a bit-enjoyed quite a bit of beer-it was my birthday after all!  My cute godkids were with their parents for the day so they stopped to wish me a Happy Birthday, Jan brought me a tiara to wear for the day, and it was all around fun.  

After ComicCon my friends met me at Stoneground for a birthday dinner, which was fabulous!  Great food, great booze, and people I haven't seen in a while!  Even my sweet friend Cristina who I haven't seen in years (but who's been my best friend since I was 7 years old) was able to make it! 

Saturday morning I woke up and the roommate had snuck out to buy groceries to make me a birthday breakfast.  He put together an English Fry-Up and even bought stuff to make a latte-I have an espresso machine, it just never gets used!  We took our time heading to ComicCon and managed to make it into the Patrick Stewart Panel and later that evening the Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog Sing Along, which was amazing!

Sunday was a family day.  I finished up some homework (I'm so freaking behind in school right now...) and then headed over to my grandmother's for a birthday/Easter BBQ.  It was such a great weekend, and my heart is so full of love for everyone involved!