We thought we’d try mountain biking. I mean, we’re surrounded by mountains. We want to get ourselves a pair of bikes sometime soon, so why not try biking in the mountains?

BYU advertised a guided mountain biking excursion for full-time employees, so we did it. Boy, did we do it.

It was awesome in parts, exhausting in others, and a little scary now and again. But overall really fun. There were eight bikers in our group plus three expert guides. They drove us in a van 1/2 hour south, way up into the mountains near Payson, just north of Payson Lakes. Gorgeous country up there. I wish I had a camera in parts, because the mountains and meadows and birch trees and valley views were so amazing!

We saw a whole lot of trail riders (and none of them wearing helmets! I mentioned this to John in a worried voice, especially because there were a lot of kids riding, and he said, “Well, it’s not required by law to wear a helmet riding a horse.” Obviously he and all those trail riders didn’t learn how to ride from my mom. At our house wearing a helmet when riding was like brushing your teeth before bed. When they get bucked off and end up in the hospital with a concussion they’ll wish they had been wearing a helmet, and I’ll silently thank my mom for teaching me better).

We did about three hours of biking overall, which was a sufficient taste of it. We were tired by the end! Like I said, parts of it were scenic and lovely. But most of it was downhill on a foot-wide dirt path, over rocks and logs and around 90- or 180-degree turns. Three people biffed it pretty good; one girl flipped over the front of her bike and chose to quit. All in all, John and I came out relatively unscathed. Just cuts and bruises and general soreness.

Our conclusion is that mountain biking is fun, but we might be more of the trail-riding variety of bikers. More gentle inclines and declines and not so many hairpin turns and steep dirt trails.

When we got back we were tired and dirty! Here’re my legs right after I took off my shoes. It looks like I’m wearing brown leggings, but that’s just dirt. You can sort of see some of the painful bruises on my shins.

Happy trails!

So we went to Moab last weekend to celebrate our wedding anniversary. This was #4. We went on an overnight rafting trip down the Colorado River. It was a good time, overall.

Here’s a picture of us at our campsite.

John and I both have fair skin that burns easily, so we were extra careful to slather ourselves completely in SPF 45 the morning of our first day of rafting. Even so, by nightfall we discovered that we were noticeably red and in pain in the arm, leg, and shoulder areas.

Dang SPF 45 Sun block.

Friday night we slept on cots on a beach under the stars. A storm was passing nearby, though, so it was super windy for a few hours that night–which meant no sleep for me. Somehow John (a.k.a. Mr. Insomniac) seemed to sleep fine.

But the stars were gorgeous. Or so I heard (since my contacts were out).

Here’s a photo of the red mesas surrounding our campsite.

The night before our rafting trip started we ate dinner at the fanciest restaurant in Moab called the Center Cafe, which was neither on Center Street nor a Cafe. Go figure.

But the food was fabulous. We weren’t super hungry, so we split a beef tenderloin, which I guess is like filet mignon, and was so tasty. We told the waitress we were celebrating an anniversary and she said, “Well, you better keep an appetite for dessert, because it’s on us tonight.” When we got the dessert menu we picked the $10 lemon trio dessert. It had a lemon tart with raspberries, homemade lemon ice cream, and some sort of lemon custard with a French name I can’t remember. Yumm, it was good.

We stayed the night prior to our rafting trip in the La Quinta Inn. Not a bad place to stay, but pricey for a basic motel. I guess that’s what you get for going during tourist season. We thought our room was . . . interesting. It was large, which we liked. But it was sort of odd in that it was more decorated than any other basic motel room I’ve ever been in. I mean–look at all the Indian stuff! (And this is just one tiny corner of the room.) There’s even fake leather fringe hung around the top of the lamp and our very own artificial cactus arrangement in the lower right corner. They thought of everything.

They must’ve used a different decorator for the bathroom, though, because it lost all its southwestern flavor and went for a more oceanic feel. Check out these fish.

They were above the towel rack (brown towels, by the way; a little scary to use since all dirt is hidden). Some of them are painted on and others are those plastic 3-D ones you can hang in your bathtub. Fun stuff. Borderline tacky. But at least they tried.

Saturday is supposed to be a day off work. Other times it’s a day of work. Yesterday was a little of both.

We lounged a bit in the morning but by the afternoon we were hard at work. Our mission: to clean the master bathroom.

I’m happy to say we not only successfully cleaned the entire master bath, but we also managed to clean up our bedroom a bit.

I dusted our light fixture for the first time ever since moving in last September. It probably had a couple years’ worth of dust on it.

We had never looked too closely at the light fixtures, and we actually thought they were opaque, covered in a sort of white glaze. Turns out they’re pretty clear once you clean off the dust.

And here’s our lovely bathroom view now. We can tell that it’s time to clean the shower, or, actually, that it’s way overdue, when it’s hard to see through the glass for all the soap scum. Notice now how nice and see-through it is. That’s thanks to John, Shower Power, and a scrub brush.

It feels so good to clean something that needed it. Last night I went to bed way too late and was actually very tired, but I couldn’t keep my eyes off our newly dusted light fixtures. “Look,” I kept saying to John, who was trying to read, “look how clean they are! They glimmer!”

Funny how something so small and seemingly insignificant can make you feel so accomplished.

I love a good deal.

Love it.

A true good deal is constituted by purchasing a quality item that you very much desire and/or need at a darn good price. Most often good deals are found in clearance racks.

Tonight I visited the ShopKo in Spanish Fork, looking for something specific for my husband. Naturally I didn’t find anything I had hoped but instead came away with an armful of apparel for myself.

But–everything I bought was a good deal. As is customary whenever I find a good deal, I will proceed to enumerate everything I bought and specify how much I saved. Because it still feels so good and I just have to share.

1. Blue shirt made of lightweight, stretchy material.
Reg $12.99. Sale $8.99
Save: $4

2. Tracy Evans black gauchos–look really sharp, wish I had a picture to share.
Reg $26.99. Sale $16.99
Save: $10

Now on to the clearance items!

3. Fall jacket with hood.
Reg $49.99. Clearance $12.49
Save: $37.50

4. Pretty brown scarf belt.
Reg: $9.99. Clearance: $2.49
Save: $7.50

5. Snazzy belt made of bronze plates. Again, wish I had a photo to show you. It’s a cool belt.
Reg: $12.99. Clearance: $3.24
Save: $9.75

Total Spent: $44.20.
Total Savings: $68.75

That’s enough to make anybody grin.

. . . ME!

I won a new job.

Or earned it. Whatever.

I’ll be the new curriculum standards reviewer for Independent Study. A nice step up from my previous job. I applied last week and got the official word on Wednesday. Technically, I’ve already started, payroll-wise, although they still need to find a replacement for my job and I need to train him or her. (Any takers? My job’s posted on yjobs.byu.edu.)

On Saturday John and I ate an official celebratory lunch at Ruby River Steakhouse in Provo. It was nice because the place wasn’t busy at all, so we got fast service, and we ordered anything we wanted. One plus of eating there for lunch is that prices are cheaper than dinner prices. Even so, our meal amounted to $45. But how often do you get to celebrate a new job? We had steak for each of us (him a New York strip and me bacon-wrapped filet mignon), a salad, sourdough bread with butter, and a piece of cheesecake and scoop of ice cream that we split.

Yum. It was good.

Yum. A new job is good.

I had a freak accident the other day where I tried to make up my own recipe and it worked. It started when I discovered that a bag of Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup Baking Pieces that I had bought at Reams (on sale–saved $1.50!) had fallen out of the plastic grocery bag and had been in the front seat of my car for two hot and sunny days before I found it.

At first I was dismayed. I paid two good, hard-earned dollars for those baking pieces and now they were a molten mess inside the bag.

Then I had an idea. Maybe I could use them to make brownies. Admittedly, brownies aren’t my first choice when I think of dessert. But you’ve met my husband, right? Then you know that the order of important things in his life are

1) me
2) God
3) work
4) hockey
5) chocolate, especially dark

The subcategories of that last item are as follows:

a. brownies
b. chocolate cake
c. chocolate chip cookies
d. chocolate covered nuts
e. anything else chocolate

So I tried my hand at making up a recipe that involved eight ounces of melted Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup Baking Pieces.

And guess what? It was a smash success. The brownies turned into the most moist, delectable brownies I think we’ve had in a long time. They’re more milk-chocolatey than dark, but no complaints from either of us. I thought you might like to have the recipe, straight from the test kitchen of Chef Shannon. (The recipe, by the way, is based off of a recipe I got from Ghirardelli. I just adjusted it to inclue the melted PB cups.)

Perfect Brownies
2 eggs
3/4 cup sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 cup real butter, melted
1 (8 oz) pkg Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup Baking Pieces, melted
3/4 cup cocoa
2/3 cup flour (do not sift)
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup chopped nuts
1 cup chocolate chips

Bake at 350 degrees in a greased 9 x 9 pan for 20 to 30 minutes.

Yum.