Hello my peeps....have I told you lately that I love you? Well I do.....but not in the same way as I love this Finnish man:



who looks freakin' hot in a suit and tie! I was uber lucky to visit the land who's language confuzzles even the most adept of English tongues last weekend. Ironically it was during the European cold spell and here are a few little things I noticed:

-31 degrees C (-23.8 F) is FREAKING COLD! So cold in fact that the bogies in your nose start to freeze, which is the a very bizarre and disgusting feeling.




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Driving to the Helsinki Temple at night, during the middle of a snow storm can be one of the most beautiful...



...and romantic experiences ever!



even with a goofball.




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and finally if you happen to go through some old photos and find one from 5 years ago be prepared to spend the rest of the evening looking at it in bewilderment knowing that at the moment that photo was taken you would have never imagined that you would be here, now, with him.



Man have I been blessed.

Toodles Sweets - Ariane

Life is strange. Very very strange. One moment you think you know which direction you are driving and then….BAM! Something attracts your attention to the left fork in the road and you can’t help but turn. It’s out of the blue, completely unexpected, totally random. A foresight of the instance you had none and occasionally it becomes so hard to believe that it’s real, that this is the path you’re now driving. The destination is rumoured to hold your strongest desires and a lot of the journey is unclear. The road is lined with compliments, desire, positivity and geeky gaming sessions and it feels so freaking fabulous that you cannot bear the thought of turning around. Why would you want to?

In short my peeps…..I’ve met someone.

Well technically I met him five years ago but I suppose I met the flirtatious side of him only recently and all of this is blasted brilliant. It’s been far too long since I felt this way. I had been intending that my next post would be writing up a play by of my American adventures but have been somewhat occupied with Finland. Expect to hear more about that as time goes on I assure you.

Oh…yeah I suppose I need to mention that I am properly divorced and was so before I started flirting with Herra Finlandia. I promise I’ve been a good girl.

The finance side of the divorce hasn’t been sorted out yet which is frustrating but at least I don’t have that feeling that I’ve been left on the shelf as “used merchandise”. One girl I met recently labeled all divorcees as such before she knew I was one.  I honestly thought that I would have to trudge through the dating scene again. I never envied the awkward wall-hugging at dances, the sad moments when a crush falls for your prettier friend and the ben and jerry tasting sessions where you raise Kleenex’s stock tenfold after a morning of remembering how pathetic you’ve become.  I thought all of that was going to be me, and it may well be again…..damn I hope not….but for the moment I’m going to live in the now and the now is good. Really really really really really really really good. I’m properly smitten and think he is too (you better be Herra Finlandia, otherwise I’m really embarrassing myself here) and in modern terms I suppose we have hit the echelon of relationship definition by making it facebook official. Feel free to stalk my peeps, but no flirting. He’s mine!

Anyhew knowing how it’s impossible for me to make a post without photos. I present to you something completley unrelated: the only option of a birthday cake to make to one of the worlds biggest Doctor Who fans, my punk of a brother. Here’s the reaction:



And here’s the cake:



Fish Fingers and Custard!

Or rather pound cake “fish fingers” and custard.  



The reaction tells it all. I love making birthdays big occasions.

Toodles Sweets – Ariane

Technically written two weeks ago but meh...

Currently I'm sitting in the my seat in a near empty plane waiting for the passagners for the "full flight" to appear. As I type this a strike by security staff is erupting outside. After my transfer from Birmingham (UK) I made it to a security line that stretched farther than I could see. A loud cocophany of shouted francais wafted over the room from the glass entrance, sadly I could not see anything and looking confuzzled and proably a bit annoyed two gorgeous (both in looks and mannerism) Italian blokes took pity on me and let me cut in front of them. I rushed to my gate just as boarding had started. I empathised with the lady at the gate and pleaded for a good seat, sadly there wasn't a window seat but CHECK OUT THIS LEG ROOM!
 


I have to stretch my feet as farrrrrrrr as possible to touch the chair in front of me.
 


Boy did she deliver! Four blokes in the past five minutes have come up and started harassing a flight attendant for one of these seets. I could see at least one giving me the evil eye. The flight attendant just told them that these seats costs extra....I didn't pay extra.... Meh dude. I deserve this mini-break. Rumours are abounding that we'll be taking off at least two hours late. I really don't care. I'm not squashed up against some smelly dude (well I should say yet, I've not met my seatmate) and whoever is in front of me can roll their seat back to their hearts content.

Captain dude with a strooonnnggg Utah accent just told us that our 5,500 + mile journey is facing a delay of 1 hr 45 mins and oddly I'm not to fussed. The people that really have cause for pity are the ones stuck in a non-moving line for hours worring if the flight has left them. The English slate the French something cruel and one of the jokes is about the ever-presence of a strike. What's French for ironic?

I'm hearing accents that I haven't heard in a long while and even saw a Zion Canyon t-shirt only a few moments ago.
I know I've spent 2/3 of my life in Utah but somehow I feel like a tourist whenever I go back....and I'm all of sudden much much more aware of the Englishness in my accent. Heaven help me if I move somewhere like Jamaca, though if I put a posh English accent on and say "Beer Can" I do get something hilarious in Jamacian.
You see I can't help but pick up accents. Other than South African I can do most of them and soon enough if I'm in an accented person's presence their accent becomes contageous. I've been in the UK for so long that my inner dialogue is a generic English and not an American accent. Odd....oh wait till the end of these two weeks and I'm sure my Utah will come a blazing back. You betcha!

Speaking of Engurrrland, I know it's be a long while since I've been on. Things have been massivly stressy. I'm not anywhere closer to the divorce finances being sorted which bums me out and add the fact that I was working for a company that never heard of the word "morale" which ended my contract early (maternity lady wanted to come back, nothing to do with me I assure you) you can see why I was disinclined to post. I really should have done. Things have happened and I present them to you in the most random of ways possible:

Our country of the month dinner club lovingly decided to pitch in and we managed to have a proper American Thanksgiving Dinner!
 


There is not way I would have been able to afford it without their help and that makes me super thankfull. I forced the only American bloke to carve the turkey and this is the responce I received:
 


Welcome to the world of Elder Hutchings and his ever comical faces:
 


One night in December Gareth invited me over to his house to help decorate his tree:
 


very little tree decorating happened
 
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Hola mi amigos. Como estas? Come closer, El Jefe has a mission to ask of you:



No one upsets El Jefe, especially with his muscle around.



You must take down the notorious La Familia Cubana Loca before their operation takes over all of Cuba. El Jefe's muscle has already infiltrated their ranks, however you must work your way to the top of the family tree



( Should you choose to accept it mission instructions are under here )

Oh how I love Halloween. Love. Love. Love.



and miss it. Terribly. In the seemingly short 8 Halloweens I've spent over here I've seen the UK merge more towards the American attitude of "LETS CELEBRATE THE HECK OUTTA THIS SUCKER!".....but it's still not there yet. Which means that I am therefore forced to implant my crazy to properly educate the populace. So without further rambling I present to you the scariest costume I could think of:



( Clicky Here For Photo Nutrition )

Deep in the heart of the second emerald isle tucked neatly between the north and the south lays a little hamlet. So little in fact that only one household can fit into its borders. This hamlet is a curiosity for the claims of colonisation by different nations happens so frequently that local historians have a ‘eck of a job working out to where they belong each week. At least for the setting a few Sundays ago this amateur historian can confirm that the Republic of Ireland had taken claim to our hamlet and as such enslaved…*cough*….entranced our occupants into celebrating all things Irish.
 
Including completely traditional viking hats
 


And folkloric makeup



and the new Lord of the Dance
 


Indeed our hamlet happened to be blessed by their Spanish cousins who for one-night-only lent us their Minister of Mischief and Mayhem….BILL!



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Well once again it has been far far too long since I’ve posted on here. I have been busy....and for once it isn’t a yaddi – yaddya excuse. Last week I received a phone call from two wonderful friends (and Jo's in-laws) who asked me to help out at a church activity. I spent most of the day in the kitchen and anyone who knows my the bane in my life that is dishes must understand this is highly unusual. I felt as if my feet were going to fall off by the end of the night but boy howdy did I have fun! I mean real fun....*sigh* I met some awesome new people (y’all know who you are) and would love to get to know them much better (hint hint wink wink).

You see I have been in a bit of a funk at the moment. I love my church and the gospel. There are loads of activities and social gathering for families and for singles....the problem is when you are in transition between the two just where do you fit in? Someone awesome who had been through something similar likened it to falling through a gap which is a perfect analogy. The two friends (with Bishop permission) actually found a safety net, as it were, for me to fit into until I once again officially become single and I love them all the more for it.

However I do believe that my mindset was predisposed to fun due to the fact that this happened at the start of the week:

It was a gloomy and rainy day. The dark clouds blocked out the heat of the sun which invoked gargantuan groans from two of the three occupants in my car when this little madame piped up with:
 
“Oh well, we’ll be in Egypt soon”



Continuing with our new Sunday dinner tradition costumes and ridiculous makeup were adorned on Cleopatra
 


And the Goddess Isis


 
Even Horus the dog-faced god had a golden headband
 
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Getting divorced is a bitch. Yes, understatement of the century, I know. Friday was particularly fractious. Mike was up and we had to discuss the ins and outs of who gets what. Trying to discuss what ideally would work best if treated as a business matter without excess emotion and not getting riled is impossible. Absolutely impossible and if anyone ever tells me that they've been divorced and are "still friends" expect an eyebrow to reach epic skeptical altitude. I struggle to keep a blog that is truthful without being slanderous, but grrrrrrr.....I am irked. Irked. Irked. Irked.

The only thing keeping me moderately sane (well lets face it I was hardly sane to begin with) is my friends. Of course my family is a support but with them being thousands of miles away it’s a bit difficult to stop by for tea. When I'm with my posse of nutters I seem to just have fun. I'm not wracked with worry over money, or fending for myself (though I must digress and exclaim squee on how I changed a rear brake light by myself recently!) or of having to go through the whole dating nonsense all over again. Indeed it makes me wish my contingency groom (mutual contingency mind you, we both decided to wed if we turned 35 and were still single) were still available....almost. His wife is awesome. Damn it Debbie, why couldn't you suck? 

Anyhew last Sunday was the second edition of our world cuisine tour. Austria! My three gorgeous Fräuleins...

...set the theme with their costumes and *cough* traditional Austrian folk dances.

Which were hilarious.

Our very own Austrian, who’s name no one with English as a first language can pronounce has been christened Elder K first instructed his staff

And then set the slaves to work on the apfelstrudel whilst he made the schnitzel.

Do you have and idea how long it has been since I had a man cook for me?

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