school started again. well, nicolaus and i will only be in classes tuesdays/thursdays this semester, so we only start tomorrow. but that means today we need to start slowly getting back into productivity mode and maybe get to bed before 2 am...it also means that saturday we took advantage of one of our last days of freedom.

first, we slept in and lazed around the house. then, we went to get a bbq lunch at this placed called smokehouse in orem. it was my first time ever going there and it was sooo delicious. bbq food is not necessarily something i'm ever dying for, but that might change now. 

things really got exciting after lunch, when we had to stop by milo (the skate shop nick works at) and somebody was in there with their FRENCH BULLDOG. i'm kind of a dog freak and unfortunately can't own my own where we live, so i go a little nuts when somebody else has one...but seriously, she was the cutest little thing and completely worth all the dog hair i was unable to get off my sweater.

after nick managed to pry the french bulldog from my hands, we headed up on the prettiest drive through the canyon and to some amazing ice castles! it was magical. i wish these photos did it justice. but it was just this huge maze of the tallest walls of icicles and not like anything i've ever experienced before. if you are ever in utah over winter, go to midway and walk through the ice castles.

once our noses and toes were sufficiently frozen, we drove up to park city and had a wonderful evening of strolling around all the outlet stores. we shopped ourselves to near-starvation then met up with our friend, derek, and had dinner at whole foods.

after park city, we went up to my parent's house to visit my dad who just had neck surgery. we hung out there for the rest of the night and watched the movie dark shadows. which was every bit as bizarre as i expected it to be. 

all in all, it was the best kind of day to finish up an all-too-short christmas break. happy monday and good luck to all you other vacationers who are getting back into the grind of things this week!