Birthdays past

It's my birthday! Go eat something sweet and listen to my favorite birthday song by the Beatles.
What are my big plans for today?
1. Go eat lunch with my bff Angi at the Pendulum Court. Sounds fancy? It's in the science center at BYU.
2. Get picked up by my darling husband from school.
3. Do something fun...yet to be determined.
4. Eat at Tucanos.
5. Do something else fun.
6. Possibly make cupcakes and eat a lot of them.

Sounds awesome? It makes me think about what I have done in the past for my birthdays. Curious? Sit down and enjoy. You can guess how old I was for each of these.
-One birthday, my siblings opened all my presents for me. I was quite capable of doing it, but they were just too excited to wait for my slow hands to tear off the paper.
- I had a friend birthday party with a dress up theme. All the little girls showed up as princesses except for my best friend Rachel. She came as a lion.
-My entire family went to the Utah Fun Dome (formally known as the 49th Street Galleria).
-My entire family went to see....the Lion King.
-I had a sleepover with my closest of friends.
-Two years in a row, I threw myself awesome parties. One year was Beatles themed and the other year was just a rocking party. (My brother still remembers how loudly and gross my friend Justin sang.)
-My family decided to throw a surprise party for me but I figured it out in the early stages of them planning it. I would like to apologize again to anyone I gave a hard time to because I knew what they were up to.
-Last but not least, my most memorable birthday. I threw myself a surprise party. I wrote about it eons ago here. (Don't judge me. It's not my best work.)

Cooking: A Dying Art Form

Okay, so cooking really is not a dying art form for lots of the world, but it has been for me ever since June 2, 2011. ("Wait! Isn't that when you got married?") How very observant of you.
Once upon a time, I got married to my handsome chef musician redhead prince and I stopped cooking. Mr. Handsome chef musician redhead prince was not only one of the best chefs west of the Mississippi, but he adored cooking. He will even cook me meat even though he is a vegetarian.
It made sense for Wolf to cook when we were first married. I was going to school and working, but he only had work. Once fall semester started, we were already in the habit of enjoying his gourmet meals so I have really only cooked five or six times (and that is being generous) until this weekend.
Following is my meandering monologue of how I came to cook as much as all the meals added together in the 7.5 months preceding this weekend.
On Tuesday my Wolf had a tickle in his throat but he still cooked for me.
By Thursday darling Wolf could tell the tickle was turning into something mightily nastier but he still cooked up dan dan noodles (try it; you won't be sorry), tres leche cake, and helped me make spring rolls for a dinner with my brother Mark and Jill.
Thursday evening poor Wolf collapsed.
Friday brought on a school-less day for Wolf, and by the time I got home from my day, we were both exhausted and opted for take out from our wonderful neighborhood Brick Oven.
Saturday arrived with Wolf feeling even worse and I was craving ATK's German Apple Pancakes (sorry, you have to be a member to see the link. Google it and you can find a recipe. That was an order. Google it and find that recipe.) I made it and we both were in heaven as we finished the entire batch in under five minutes. (I also burned my hand pretty badly, but that's another story.)

I heated up leftovers for the rest of my meals and begged Wolf to eat anything.
Fast forward to today.
I head off to church with my wonderful brother because my car doors are frozen shut (thank you Mark!)
As I get home, I am craving cupcakes like something bad. (Thank you Jill...)
Instead I go for Smitten Kitchen's homemade oreos.

They are amazing. Trust me. Try every single one of these recipes that I list. They are some of my favorites.
Dinner? ATK's Nut-Crusted Chicken Cutlets with oregano. It was easily the best crusted chicken I have ever eaten in my life.

I now feel like a successful housewife.
My house is clean, my husband is almost all the way better, and I have successfully created (or helped create) several delicious delicacies.

Oh, and if you want an oreo, I have several sitting on a plate in my kitchen. We still have some tres leche cake in the fridge and do not need this many sweets. Please. Take them off my hands.

I'm movin' out.

Billy Joel, how nice of you to describe it perfectly.
Just over a week ago, my husband got the call from our landlady. Because Wolfie promised to do a blog post about this, I will just say that we were told we had to move. in. less. than. 30. days.
I hate moving. Abhor it. I hate packing up everything, leaving nothing except a few memories and driving down the street to a new place. Then it takes a few days to unpack everything and remember where you unpacked everything.
Now I get the opportunity to move in the middle of a semester.
I have done that once before, but it was my single little self moving a few weeks into an easy semester. The move took all of four hours.
This time, it will be one month into a harder semester with more hours at work and more junk to move. Two little newlyweds can accumulate quite a bit of junk. Especially two little newlyweds that have more kitchen gadgets then you have in your kitchen. (I would almost be willing to make a bet on that. Unless you are a professional chef.)
My darling Wolf thinks it will only take a few hours.
I love his innocent optimism.
Where is it that we are moving? Back to my favorite city. O-Town. I love Orem. I love it more than I hate moving. I love that in some parts of it there will be two feet of snow but in another part, it will be bare. I love that it blooms at different times in the spring.
Where more specifically? Close enough to the mall that we can see it out of our gorgeous large windows in our living room and spare bedroom.
It makes sense; I have less than two months left at BYU, I work in AF, Wolfie works at the mall, and he has over a year left at UVU.
If you never visited me at my current place, you have just about two weeks left in which to do so.
Come visit me.
Come visit me any evening--except Friday--and entertain me while my husband is at work.