in honor of jenny

Last week Bret and I went to hear Bon Iver and Jenny Lewis play at the Twilight Concert Series downtown. Bon Iver is great but I'm a big fan of Jenny Lewis and her band Rilo Kiley so I was especially excited to hear her. Not only is her music great but I think she's pretty cool too and I kind of want to be her (perhaps it's my red hair envy).

At the concert with my friend Molly Farmer

Just when I thought I couldn't like her any more, Molly told me some amazing information about Jenny. Apparently she started her career as a child actor. You may remember her from such 8os classics as Uncle Tom's Cabin, the Wizard and my personal favorite, Troop Beverly Hills.

Perhaps many of you were already aware of this but I had yet to make the connection. Bret was blown away as well. Apparently The Wizard was one of his favorite movies as a kid. I hadn't heard of it so he pretty much talked about it the whole way home from the concert. So in honor of Jenny, we rented the Wizard. Basically the whole thing is about three kids trying to get to a video game tournament in LA. Please enjoy this amazing clip from the movie.

Being a child star doesn't always bring out the worst in people apparently.

bret and his games

Those of you that know Bret well probably already appreciate his ‘talent’ (we’ll call it) of making up the most random games on the fly. He's also really good at getting people psyched about playing these games. This is both a good and bad talent in my opinion. It’s good because he can turn the most ordinary, boring objects and/or situations into something that's pretty entertaining. It’s bad because this usually happens when he’s with his guy friends and girls are typically not involved (the reason most likely being that girls lose interest in these games a lot quicker, but whatever). It's also bad because these games tend to last a very long time. Last weekend we went up to a cabin with some friends and Bret’s games were taken to a whole new level.

Nevermind that we brought plenty of entertainment with us including board games, a wii system and several movies to choose from. No, they decided to play these games.

Game #1: How far can you let out a measuring tape before it snaps? ( I know this game isn’t new but they took it way too seriously)

Game #2: Throw the hacky-sacks into the sombrero (which was really a chip and dip bowl) with the middle hole as the jackpot. This initial game led to several variations and elaborations that kept the boys up through the wee hours of the morning, but I was far beyond wanting to document it at that point. They also had a game of how "how high can you build a structure made of firewood without it falling?" earlier but I didn’t get any shots of that.

Us. Watching them. All night.

In truth this isn’t all we did at the cabin. We had an incredible BBQ, made delicious smores and had some quality time in the hot tub. Good times for certain. Thanks friends.

the latest

It's official, Bret and I will be moving here this summer. We'd love you to come visit so if you've never been before, are a big Twilight and/or Gray's Anatomy fan or you just plain like us a lot, please come see us.

*clarification for those who are not (painfully) aware of our situation: Bret interviewed there in March for a job with J.P. Morgan Chase and it finally came through. We'll be up there in August.

tempting

Now that the heat of summer has finally set in, these options are looking all the more appealing.

So what do you think, do I dare? Whose "do" is the best?

why i love the fourth

Why I love the 4th of July....

morning hikes

neighborhood parades

the traditional Udall family 4th of July quilt

delicious food

(I realize America is older than 31, the 4th is also my bro-in-law's b-day)

including popsicles

and fireworks with the fam.

(photo credit- my bro jim)

It's my favorite holiday.

park city

A couple of weekends ago my family spent the day up at a ranch house in Park City (my dad's friend runs the place). Between the horseback riding, swimming and one of my nieces getting knocked into the lake by two over-excited Labradors, it was a pretty memorable day.