Sundance Film Festival

Park City was the place to be this weekend!

At least, if you ask Mitt Romney...

...who was stuck in a traffic jam and patiently ignored the fans running up to his
passenger side window and paparazzi like me...

...the founders of YouTube... 

...the two guys against the building being mobbed by fans. This was the first day of
 my life when I was glad not to be a celebrity. I now understand the big 
hats andsunglasses thing they do - out in the open they really couldn't get 
anywhere because of the fans.

... Kristin Stewart, Kira Knightly, and a bunch of other celebrities :) I felt like an A-lister just being there!

We went up for the Sundance Film Festival and had one of the best nights we've had in a while. It was SO COOL and a totally dfferent experience than anything I've done before!

Now I get why the festival is so famous and so big they had to move it from Sundance to Park City. The crowds and energy were catchy and drew us in. Downtown Park City was taken over and almost felt European because of the international crowds, foreign languages, bumper-to-bumper parking, ubiquitous cigarette smoking, and high fashion.

We realized we were not in Provo any more when there were paparazzi on rooftops.

Yes, you may have my autograph

Lots of vendors were giving away merchandise. Our favorite was Mountain Star Farms, which opened up a temporary restaurant that served full dinners... totally free. 

Stanchions and a bouncer were necessary :)

Movies were being played all around town plus in Sundance itself and Salt Lake City. One of the main venues was in downtown Park City, so that's where we spent Saturday night.

The theatre had movies being projected onto the front wall and crowds stood on the other side of the street to watch them. We didn't see any actual movies but will plan ahead next year and get tickets. This year, walking around was entertainment enough!

There was also great shopping, which I enjoyed while Matt patiently waited. :) One place was prepeared for waiting husbands and had antique ski lifts for benches next to a plate of cookies. Genius.

The whole experience was THE BEST and I'm already looking forward to next year! (Utah friends, it's still going on until the 26th!)

P.S. here's the view from a random grocery store parking lot in Park City: a full-on view of the slopes. The one on the right was where they had Olympic snowboarding trials yesterday. 

It was a really fun, high energy, totally-different-experience kind of night :)

Snapshots from the rest of the week:

Last Sunday we had friends over for a dinner party. For dessert I made chocolate cupcakes with meringue frosting. :) Perfectly delicious.

Barkley took careful notes. 

Side story: I was searching Pinterest for "merengue" recipes and couldn't understand why all I was seeing were dance tutorials. But I figured it out :)

Quality time with Bethany! One day we took the dog on a walk and asked someone to take our picture. It turned out great except they forgot to make sure we were all in frame!

Another week, another taco truck. This one is especially cool because you never know where it will show up. Actually you have to follow them on Facebook to know where they'll be on a given day. They have rave reviews in Provo so we gave it a shot!

We probably won't be going back, but I'm glad we tried it!

Work was extra enjoyable this week. In addition to achieving several goals and feeling accomplished, Kristina and I got to meet up to pack and ship about a million posters for upcoming health campaigns. They were sent to work sites across the country which made me feel important. :)

Later our CEO took all of us local account managers out to lunch at a Thai restaurant, and it was lovely :) I'm really enjoying work these days.

Especially now that I get to hang out with this guy while I work!

In case this is confusing for those of you who remember when I had like 4 jobs - that was a little overwhelming so I consolidated. Helping at the new gym that was opening up was a one-month on-the-side deal and ended as predicted. I cut back hours at the Rec Center to just group fitness instructing, and now am glad to have only one job, plus teacing on the side. Phew!

Yoga is going well too - I taught four times, including Saturday which had 48 students. Forty eight is a lot of people to instruct! And if you count the ones we had to turn away, it would be over 50. I love that there is so much enthusiasm for yoga here!, but honestly 48 was a little cray cray.

On Friday night we went to a wedding reception!

Us in the receiving line

The bride AND groom served in Matt's mission..... ;)

The receptin was so, so heartwarming! Plus they had mini Oreo cupcakes. No event with mini Oreo cupcakes has been or ever will be a disappointment.

They also had a photo booth with props, and we took full advantage!

I love weddings :)

Lots of running with Barkley out in the canyons this week.

Don't let the snow fool you. It's been warm!

Barkley is still having issues with the halty :/

And one day I came home to discover that Barkley had done a no-no.

guilty puppy

The good news is that we caught his reaction on film. We didn't like that butter anyway. :)

He licked that thing CLEAN, too. The only thing he left was tooth marks. It's amazing that he didn't have any kind of reaction to it.

The moon has been huge and bright lately. And I think that's a planet next to it?

Utah can be really beautiful :)

The grocery store has been taken over by Valentine's Day decor and I'm 100% ok with it. It means that the big holiday (really, one of my very favorite days of the year) is right around the corner. We have big plans for Valentine's Day 2014, and it may or may not involve owls. More on this to come.

And to wrap it up, have you guys seen this? I say we forget all about Sochi and just give him the gold medal now. :)

Blades of Glory, anyone? :D

Have a fantastic week!!!!