10.27.2011

Some SUPER Fun Times At The Utah Fair


Lately I have been such a Blogaholic!
But what can I say... my life is just that exciting! 

So a month or so ago the crew (Beth, Landon, Katelyn, Meg, and I) went to the fair... 
And lucky for us Landon and Beth are super indie, and they brought a video camera and made this super awesome video!! 

Watch and enjoy! 



Also while you are on their page, look at all their amazing videos they have done. 
You will be more then impressed! 
These two are so talented-----
it makes me sick... 
hahah LOVE!

-E

10.26.2011

Spiritual Bear



Ok allow me to explain
So this is a very different kind of post for me, but its been on my mind and I feel why not share a good thing... So here it goes....


I am so lucky to have the family and the friends that I do
I feel like I am surrounded by Spiritual Bears
Which is a term I love to use- It just means I feel like whenever I have a question, or just feel the need to talk about something related to the gospel I can ask any of my family and friends and get some really great answers and advice. Because they are all Spiritual Bears.
They teach me so much on a regular basis!
I would call myself more of a spiritual cub.
That is in no way saying I'm not spiritual, but it is saying I am growing everyday!
And right now I have made it a goal of mine to read a chapter a day in the Book Of Mormon, and while doing so writing about what I read.
Now I have been doing this for only about ten days.
But I can tell you I wouldn't be learning half of what I am with out this book...

This book is so amazing! 
If you have the chance to pick one up, do it, with out a doubt. 
This book goes through each chapter and verse with you and writes in todays type of language
and it also adds snippets of talks from General Conference that go along with what you are reading.
It also gives you more in-depth explanations about symbolisms ect. 

And in these last ten days I honestly can say I feel a difference in my everyday life.

As of recent I have been addicted to Pinterest and well here are some quotes I feel go along with this post and need to be shared




Ok now that I feel like I have bombarded my three readers with my newly found spiritual process a give you a silly photo of me   
enjoy
  -E

10.23.2011

A Week Of Catching Up With Good Company


How lucky am I
I just returned from an amazing trip from Chicago-
Shout out to my Wifey Casey- Thank you so much doll, you are the best, and Im a sad that we cant have are cuddle sessions every night, haha but really!




Anywho coming back to reality is always a little difficult. 
But I devised a plan to help me through these withdrawal symptoms.
I made plans with some people I haven't seen in AGES!

Monday I was able to go to dinner and watch Gossip Girl With Megs and Katleyn- I was able to hear about all their adventures in Vegas- like they saw Rob Kardashian and got a picture with Nick Cannon. Sounds like they had a blast and I was so glad we had a chance to catch up

Tuesday- Kath and a bunch of her friends decided to go see Footloose. I was hesitant to go because I love Kevin Bacon and I didn't want this new one to ruin the classic. 
Megs and Katleyn joined in on this adventure and lets be honest we all defiantly loved it!
If you havent see it, I would say you totally should.
And those you have you will understand my love for Willard! AHH so sweet!



Wednesday was a real treat. 
Katherine, Sara and I planned to spend some time with the 5 months newlyweds Page and Joey.
We got to see their adorable place which Page has decorated beautifully! 
Then we headed to dinner at a new pizza place. So good!
Then we headed to smart cookie to grab desert. 
And if you know Kath and I at all, you know when we get excited or sad or any emotion under the sun we hit each other (playfully) On the way there Kath accidentally hit me in the eye with the zipper of her jacket.. 
While it hurt it and decided to bleed and start swelling... but I honestly couldn't stop laughing!! 
The night went on and it was such a blast! Of course on the way home Kath and I could stop talking about how cute and in love we are with them!



Thursday night I was able to have Heather Hatch fit me in to her busy schedule so we could catch up and I could hear all about her engagement-- It was such a cute story! I have always thought that she really only deserves the the best!! So excited for her and her man... love them both!


I also got to meet up with Julie after with some fro-yo and talked until the kicked us out! When ever we get together we can stop talking. We are one... love you to death!

Friday I was able to join up with Grace Warner and a few of her friends (Julie included) for dinner  and hear all about her engagement. After dinner we ended up at Footloose... Not mad about it! 


This week has been full of catching up with dear friends, which was very much needed-  and I have loved avery moment of it! Every week should be like this!



10.18.2011

The Rest Of The Many Adventures Of Chi-Town

Disclaimer- this is a super long post- But there was just so much to share,  I had to! And the pictures where a must!


Hey Ho Everyone I’m picking up where I left off….
The rest of our trip was packed full of adventures!
Day 4 was supposed to rain so I had decided to wear my adorable Hunter boot.
We started our day walking to the post office for Kath to send something home to her sweet mama.
Then we decided to walk to Navy Pier..
Ok
1.) It was a bit further away then we ever thought
2.) It was about 78 degrees…. This sucked for my feet…they were dying!!

So in true Madsen style and since we were passing Michigan Avenue I made Kath stop as a purchased a pair a flats (added bonus, they are cute) from Guess.

Then we were off again to Navy Pier where the Ferris wheel was invented. We finally made it! We of course went on the Ferris wheel saw the amazing view/ had a blast!












The view from the Ferris wheel
After Navy Pier we took a quick cab ride over to Wrigley Park to make it for the two o'clock tour.
Thank goodness Kath is amazing and thought of this idea. 
The tour was so much fun!
We were able to go to all sides of the stands and the press box, both locker rooms, and the dugout!!! 
We also learned some way fun facts like-
 Ferris Bueller Day Off, and A League Of Their Own were filmed there with tons more.
The Field

Us on the Field
Dugout time



we got yelled at for taking these photos- Totally worth it!



Press box

Then we headed to meet up with Casey and her good friend Jill. Jill is a Kindergarten teacher, which was very fun for me to pick her brain and swap stories. We went to dinner and Del Soul, which is Korean BBQ.. Delightful!

Then we headed to a bar where we ordered Shirley temples for the table.  
We also met up with some more of Casey's friends to play bar trivia! Our team name was Hakuna Matata- 
We were super competitive...
We also lost... Rough times...
But we did our best and that is all that matter! And we also got to meet some more of Casey super nice and fun friends!
love this lady



The next day it was pouring like crazy So we wanted to make it an “inside day” So we headed to meet up with Casey on her lunch break at Magnolia Bakery We had such delicious cupcakes and a snicker type pie.... bible it's to die for!


Then we ran off to the Chicago Art Institute. This place was amazing and packed full of beauty. We ran around and saw everything we possibly could, Oh the things we saw! So amazing!
so amazing!



Can't believe we actually saw this! 

Kaths favorite thing!

After we ran into Starbucks to get away from the rain and spent about an hour in there catching up with our families and what not.
Then we made our way to the Sears Tower... Only to find out that Katherine’s wallet had been stolen!!
Can you believe it! This is so unreal, so we had to call the police and found out we had to go to the police station to fill an official report… 
But she defiantly needed to go so we could get a piece of paper so Kath would be able to fly home in 2 days, because she didn't have her id anymore.

The Police station was less then friendly.
We had a very upset black woman helping us report the stolen wallet, where she keep telling us it was lost because we didn’t see it get stolen.. Even though someone had already spent 500+ dollars on her credit cards… but whatever you say!
 After we had filled out the report we called a cab company to come take us home. 

As we got in the cab we learned that the heavy rain meant he wouldn't be able to take a credit card. Are you kidding me? Who carries cash anymore? I don’t!  So we had to have him stop at an ATM to get some cash out. agh...
Well I had no idea if I even had money in my debit account.. So while I was pulling money out I was praying it wouldn’t get declined and I could pull enough to pay for the cab ride home. 
Praise the lord I had money in it! 
This is just adding to our night. Luckily for us it worked in my favor!

We finally got home to the loving arms of Casey and Sarah, as we were emotionally, physical exhausted! We all went to bed early that night.

I had the unique pleasure of waking up at 6AM to go stand in line (in the freezing cold) till 8:15AM at the apple store to get the iphone 4s. Even though I was hating life at the time, it was totally worth it. I have a brand new phone that can do amazing things that I have no idea how to work yet! But regardless I have fallen in love with it.

After I got home and started fighting with the apple care people on the phone to learn how to get all my stuff back we headed to Gino’s East, for round two of deep dish pizza.
While we were ordering our waiter told us a man wanted to buy our table some shots, hello flattering. So we went to the bar to take the shots and meet Tony. Tony was a beautiful black man who has a huge crush oh Casey, as all black men do! SO Casey had a shot and Tony bought Kath and I Shirley Temples, how sweet!
After a short chat we headed back to our table and ate amazing pizza and wrote on the walls (like every one does)

Us and Tony

What Kath wrote all over the wall-- didn't hate it!



After lunch we headed to a place everyone told us we had to go to.. The staff is very rude in true old time Chicago called Ed Debevic’s. 
We got some killer milk shakes.



Kath and I walked 6 or so blocks to the “Sears Tower” Which turned out to be the John Hancock building that look the same as the Sears Tower… eff

When we finally made it to the real Sears Tower in time to see the city during sunset and darkness. The view was breath taking, just so stunning! 
We were surrounded by couples falling in love with the views and each other so Kath and I decided to take thousands of pictures and  “fall in love” with each other. Such a delightful night!









We got back to the apartment and spent the rest of the night watching movies with Casey- the ideal night.

We left the next day after having a beautiful brunch with Casey. Shout out to the best hostess ever (Sarah and Casey). Thank you so much for making our trip so fun and all the quality time I was desperate for. Love you to death wifely!

Kath and I fell in love with Chi-Town, and all the people we met. This was such an amazing fall break adventure! Thanks to everyone who made it amazing! 




10.11.2011

Chicago Day 3

I cant believe that we have only been here 3 days! 
 We have done SO much!
As you have perviously read we have:

-Made the plane (which was sketchy times).
-Had real Chicago deep dish pizza at Lou Malnati's.
-Had my first real Vegan meal at the Chicago Diner.
-Seen the Fountain in Grant Park.
-The Bean in Millennium Park.
-Architecture Boat Tour on the Chicago River.


And today we went straight to the Untouchable tour
This is a Chicago Historical Gangster Tour.

 This was our tour guide.
And you know I had to wear my mob wife ring! 

This was so so fun! It was a two hour tour that went all around the town and heard about all the big time gangsters like Al Capone, and it was all based in the Prohibition-era. 
Couldn't have been more fun, I would suggest it to anybody going to Chicago- so fun!


Then we headed to my motherland----
The Miracle Mile!!!! AHHH I was so excited to get a little (ok maybe a lot) of shopping! 
Kath and I headed down the mile and spent the rest of the day shopping. 
We had to hit Zara, Urban, Kate Sade, Lulu Lemon just to name a few. 
As we passed the apple store the windows we full of sticky notes from people saying what they loved about apple and Steve Jobs.
 It was amazing to see!  This picture is just a small section on the window. 

During our shopping adventure we got a little hungry and found a Sprinkles! 
AHHH YES! 
I was jumping up and down from excitement, and they were Halloween themed. 
Bible- They were to die for!



After our beautiful day of shopping and tours Casey met up with us while we finished up at Nordstrom's. And while walking home we ran into a famous church that we saw on our tour today. This church was where Earl "Hymie" Weiss died during his bosses funeral Dion C'Banion. This hole we are pointing at is a real bullet hole from this murder. Pretty cool,  Right?





Then we headed to dinner at Carmines- Amazing Italian food.
   

Needless to say these days have been filled with Enormous amount laughter, hugs, food and sweet nothings. 
And Casey's roommate Sarah is so amazing, and an instant Bestie!

4 more fun filled days, I will for sure keep you posted! 
-E