Andrew Bird comes to Salt Lake

Andrew Bird is a classically-trained-violinist-turned-folk-singer who I started listening to this year. When I found out he was coming to Salt Lake, I was worried I wouldn't be able to find anyone who would want to go with me... meaning I was worried I wouldn't have a ride to Salt Lake. But randomly enough I found out Leilani likes him too and she wanted to come with me. So Wednesday night we trekked over to Salt Lake.

I was so impressed by his versatility: he sang, whistled, and played the violin, guitar, and glockenspiel (sometimes all in the same song.)

this is the best picture I got of Andrew playing the glockenspiel

Martin Dosh. His drum kit was really sparkly

We got pretty close to the stage (maybe three people back) so we had a really good view (once this giant guy with a fro moved out of our way). I took tons of videos, so here's a little sample of the concert:

Nervous Tic Motion of the Head to the Left

Oh No

I loved when Andrew would just talk to the audience and joke around. I'm still amazed by how good he is live.

how I survived winter

When you grow up in a place as beautiful as California, is can be difficult to spend upwards of four months with no sun and tons of snow. The only way to counteract the depressing effects of a Utah winter is to constantly do fun things. I can't say I always succeed in this, but I try, so I thought I'd show a few of my recent attempts to survive winter

My friend RT helped me make Crème Brûlée. The best part was when we got to use a cooking torch to caramelize the sugar on top. They turned out surprisingly good (considering my last attempt at making crème brûlée tasted like pure egg yolk)

The MOA (Museum of Art) typically has some cool exhibits. Currently there is an exhibit by Dan Steinhilber. I went to the reception with Alyx and Allison, and we got to meet the artist. The artist had some BYU students (mainly art majors) help him set up all his pieces, so Alyx and I both helped work on this one which is made up of balloons

This piece is made up of hundreds of packets of duck sauce. I thought it looked like a tile mosaic. The color was amazing.
When Ryan went to California for his volleyball tournament, I had the car for a week, and we definitely tried to make the most of our time with the car. We went thrift shopping in Salt Lake and then had lunch at the Bakery (which has the most amazing food). I got a turkey and avocado sandwich with French onion soup.
...which I devoured.

And of course we got dessert: you can't skip dessert at a French bakery.

We found an old phone booth near the bakery and had fun taking tons of pictures in it.
Allison brought me Valentine's Day cookies. I thought the cupid one was hilarious. Alyssa and I made tons of sugar cookies, and had a semi-party with people from my ward.