Happy Happy Anniversary to us! To us!

Saturday was our first anniversary. Which is super crazy. It doesn't feel like we have been married for a year, but at the same time it feels like we have been together forever.

Also, for a while, it looked like we would be spending our anniversary apart, due to stupid car issues. But, after spending $600 and then deciding to ignore the law, I drove up Friday and got to spend all Saturday with my love.

*Quick note about the car issues: My registration expires this month and I had to get my emissions tested. The check engine light was on, so I failed. It took a week and lots of visits to the mechanic to get it fixed. And then, it was taking forever to get the computer/engine "ready" which apparently it must be to pass emissions. Friday morning, after driving a ton hoping to get it ready, I still wasn't passing. After some quick soul searching, I decided that laws and car registrations are for sissies and left for Canada. I will be getting my emissions tested and my registration renewed first thing in August when we get back. So no worries.

And now on to the real reason for my post, I promised Caitlin that I would put up wedding pictures for my anniversary. This is all for you, Cait!

Just out of the temple

Families are forever. Plus, I love love love the back of this dress. My mom made the bow just for me.

Us!!

Decor at the Canada reception. This is in his parents' yard.

Food! It was so good. Plus, that banner was really cute.

Reception/luncheon pictures. We kept it small, just family and a few good friends.

Happy Anniversary: Part 2

Decorations and such for the Boise reception

More decor

Family and fun. Some of the best things in life.

Can I just brag for a moment and say what a good wedding planner I am? This was, in my humble opinion, the least painful wedding reception I have ever been to.

Hoodoos having nothing to do with voodoo

While on our honeymoon, Chizm and I went on a hike to something called the Hoodoos. Before we went, I was all confused about what exactly we were going to go see. I thought perhaps it would be some ancient Indian site where they preformed rituals or something. Probably because Hoodoo rhymes with voodoo.

I was wrong. Hoodoos are sandstone cliffs that have been carved into crazy shapes by wind and water.

You can't really tell in this picture, but this kid is right at the edge.

The trail we went on took us right to the top of the cliffs. Chizm went right up to the edge, and the whole time I was thinking, "It will suck when he falls over the edge. The headline for the newspaper will be Honeymooner Falls to His Death. How sad will that be? Married for less than a week." Anyways, I was freaked out of my mind.

Looking over the edge. It is much freakier in real life.

And then Chizm pretended to throw me off the cliff. I was never really in danger, he held on to me the to me the entire time,  but he scared me enough to make me cry.  Those cliffs freaked me out. They just didn't look stable, and it had been raining a ton. I was sure the cliff was going to crumble and take me with it.

Me holding onto a branch so I wouldn't fall over the edge when it crumbled

This sign was not helpful to my state of mind

 But the view was spectacular.

 

The Best Things in Life Are Free

Chizm and I went to Fairmont Hot Springs Resort for our honeymoon. It was lovely there. All green and mountainous, basically exactly how I pictured all of Canada looking before I came to Alberta and found rolling hills.

View from our suite.

When we arrived, we realized that "Resort" was the most important word in the title of where we were staying. They were all about making money. We had to pay to get into the hot springs, and there were no natural pools that we could find. The Resort pool was huge, with two different sections that were different temperatures. There was even a diving board. But, $12 a person per visit seemed a little steep to us, so we just went once.

On the way back to our room, we noticed a little stone building just up the hill from the Resort pool. We decided to go visit it while we were there. So, on the last day of our stay, we walked up the hill. And were promptly upset that we had spent money on the Resort pool. The little stone building was a bathhouse that had been built in the early 1900s.

Old 1900s bathhouse

There were 3 rooms, that each had a little pool carved out of the rock floor. The hot springs flowed right into the building. And beyond the bathhouse were the actual natural hot springs themselves. There were no natural pools, just ones that had been carved by people. It was awesome. And the whole thing was free.

Outside looking in

Inside looking out

We immediately went and got our swim suits and hopped into those lovely, free pools. And they were way better than the one we had to pay $24 dollars to use. There were no people, no noise, and a beautiful view.

 The moral of this story is, if you ever go to the Fairmont Hot Springs Resort, don't pay to soak in the big pool. Walk 2 minutes up the hill and have a better experience. For free!!

That building you see in the distance is the pool you have to pay for. This one is free.

Forma Ab Exitio.

So, I am basically done with my final year of undergrad. It was over the day my final show went down. I am not really sure what to do with myself now. Except for the whole wedding planning thing. I am dreadfully behind on that.

But, to return to the original topic, I am posting pictures of my show for those of you who were unable to come. I hope that you enjoy it!

 

 A bird's eye view

read this. if you can, it explains the premise for this whole thing.

These two may look the same, but they are not. Look closely.

See? Different.

This was inside the tent. The videos are of marbles breaking and one of the Venus statues breaking. It was pretty cool, and unfortunately, impossible to take a picture of.

And there you go. A quick view of what you missed.

I have a sweet, new website!

Check it out: katiewest.prosite.com

This one is just for my art. And I think that it looks much better than that silly one I made last year for my editing class.

This is old news for most of you...

I'M ENGAGED!!!!!

So, not only am I engaged, but we finally have a date and a place! June 21st, 2013 in the Cardston Alberta Temple. We were having troubles since he is Canadian, and I am obviously not. People kept telling us that he wouldn't be able to get back into the States if we got married in Canada. 

But, we called the United States Visa people, and the Border Patrol. They both said the same thing: as long as he has a valid student visa, there will be no problem with him getting back into the country. So Canada it is! and we couldn't be more excited.

I love NYC!!!

So...I have always thought those cheesy I <3 New York shirts were dumb, but I have changed my mind. They are so true. New York is wonderful!! I have only been back for less than 24 hours and I already miss it. I hated it when I first arrived, but who can blame me? I was running on no sleep, after a 5 hour plane ride, and it was blizzarding. Not the greatest first impression. By the end of the week I knew that I had to go back to the wonderful city as soon as possible.

We shall start at the beginning. I went to New York for a school field trip. We were there to experience as much art as possible in 5 days. Our plane left Salt Lake at 11:30 pm Tuesday night. Needless to say, I got no sleep that night. We arrived in NYC at 5 or so in the morning. We were bustled onto a subway, where we were crowed into a teeny space with a gazillion other people, and then stood there, surrounded for over an hour as the subway train hurtled through the darkness. It was intense.

Me, in the subway, at 5ish in the morning. Not pretty.

Then, with no nap (and after we dropped our stuff off at the YMCA we were staying at) we went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. It was amazing. Words cannot describe my joy and happiness. I saw so much awesome stuff. Like this:

There is a real dear under those glass bubbles.

This is one of Bernini's clay models for the giant fountains he made which are all over Rome.

This was made by my favorite old sculptor, Rodin. I was so stoked to be in the presence of his work, I didn't even care that much that I couldn't see my favorite sculpture of his.

This is by the ever creepy Kiki Smith. This one is called Lilith.

Another Rodin!!

I just like this guy's expression :)

My Met exploring buddies.

 When we got out of the Met, there was a full fledged blizzard going on. I took a picture of my sadness while in the shelter of a building.

I believe that at this point (we had been walking around the Met for 6 or 7 hours), I was too exhausted to do anything, so I voted to go back to the YMCA for some rest. We also went to a food place to get some breakfast stuffs, but that isn't too important.

Thursday we got up at 7 to begin another exciting day.  We rode the subway. This is all I could ever see:

Curse being short!

 The first activity we did was go to the Strand, which is an amazing bookstore. It is huge! and has really good prices. They say that they have over 18 miles of books shelves. I believe them. I got 3 books, which I am very excited to read.
After that we went to the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA). I was given a free ticket by some nice lady, which was very lucky, since it was $14 I got to spend elsewhere.

Picasso used to paint like this before he got all weird.

I just really love this. I am going to paint something similar and put it in my front room when I grow up.

Me with a cool light sculpture.

Love it.

I walked on a Richard Serra piece! The sign told me I could, so I did. I got some really funny looks from people who didn't read the sign.

Jasper Johns, I remember learning about him in Art History.

This is what I saw every time I got off the subway to go back to the YMCA. There is cool art all over the city.

 That night when I got done with the MoMA, I went to the Phantom of the Opera. On Broadway. I know you all are jealous :)

While it was cool seeing a musical on Broadway, I actually prefer the movie, which will probably be held against me somehow.

Friday was another intense day. Up at 6:30 so that I could go to the Ground Zero 9/11 Memorial. It is beautiful. They did a really good job catching the loss and devastation caused by the attacks, while at the same time giving a sense of hope.

After visiting Ground Zero, we moved onto another activity that was kind of sad. We went to visit the galleries in Chelsea. The only problem is that Hurricane Sandy destroyed most of them. We just kept walking around, looking for galleries, but most of them were closed for remodel. You could still see the water marks in some places. Even though there was a lot of destruction, there were a few galleries open, so we did get to see some stuff.

Like this graffiti.

And this sweet video/animation piece by Michal Rovner

And a whole show by Antony Gormley, who is one of my favorites!! Here I am holding his hand. (all of his pieces are based on his own body)

Just interacting with the sculptures. 

After the rather disappointing visit to Chelsea, we headed off to PS-1 MoMA, which is an outpost of the MoMA that I mentioned earlier. The only thing worth mentioning that I saw there was a beautiful piece by James Turrell, another one of my art heroes. It was one of the most powerful pieces I have ever experienced. You go into this room, and he has benches all around walls, with lighting just above them. The main part of the piece is the giant hole that he has cut into the ceiling. The sky looks like it was painted on. I sat there and watched the sky go dark, since I had timed it perfectly to see the sunset. It was life changing.

When I first entered the room.

Just before I left. The whole sky was black when I actually left.

After leaving PS-1, we headed to Union Square to do a little shopping, but that is nothing to write home about.

Saturday was by far my favorite day in New York. We went to the Dia Beacon. I wasn't actually too excited for this one, I just wanted to go on the train ride to get there. The train ride was beautiful, but the museum was definitely up there on my favorites list. It was amazing.

View from the train. It was like this the whole time.

Me and Heather.

Another beautiful scene

And another. Somewhere on the train ride, we passed a castle. No joke. Look up Bannerman Castle.

 The next pictures were taken inside the Dia Beacon. Which is illegal. Oops.

A piece by Robert Smithson. I had to be super sneaky because there was a guard right behind me.

Richard Serra. Who is my very favorite artist at the moment because of this trip.

Creepy spider thing by Louise Bourgeois

Another Richard Serra. I totally had a moment of pure joy with this piece, which consists of four HUGE metal structures.

On the train ride back.

After getting back from the Dia Beacon, Heather, Robin and I headed out to Little Italy for some delicious foods and cheap souvenirs. We saw a creepy baby Hulk graffiti.

Weird, huh?

Then we went to the Brooklyn bridge, which was also cooler than I expected. 

Heather smiling behind me, and Robin taking a picture.

Sky line

I love New York

After the Brooklyn bridge, we met up with some of our other classmates and professors at the Guggenheim, which had the dumbest exhibit of Picasso up, but had super cool architecture. You win some, you lose some.

Ashley and me outside the Guggenheim.

Inside the Guggenheim

 After the waste of time they call the Guggenheim, we decided to go see the Statue of Liberty. It was quite the adventure. Here is a picture from halfway down the world's longest escalator. It was trippy.

The subway was closed down three stops before where we needed to get off to get to the ferry, so we had to get on a different train, then walk 4 blocks to the ferry. We totally got lost, talked to a nice guard, and ran on a freeway past a lot of construction workers. And missed the ferry by 8 minutes.
We had to wait another hour for the next one, but we decided that it would be dumb to have gone to all that trouble to get there just to give up. So we went on the 9:30 ferry to Staten Island, which goes right past the Statue.

The next day, Sunday, we went to church, were I saw one of my ex-boyfriends. It was only slightly awkward.
We also went to the Frick Museum, which was pretty cool, especially since it used to be someone's house. It was like being in Downton Abbey. Beautiful.
Then we went and hung out in Central Park for the last few hours before we had to head to the airport.

New York skyline.

This park is seriously gorgeous.

There was a sweet pond with sailboats you could steer around.

The whole group watching the boats. Starting from the left: Sariah, Heather, Robin, random boat man, the Zendels, and Fidalis (a professor)

Alice in Wonderland statue

Colorful girl with balloons.

Cool dancing roller skater with waterbottles on his head. He had five or six at one point.

Oh, I miss it already.

 And I leave you with a little piece of advice from the Big City:

Sorry the post was so long. It was either one big one, or several small ones. I decided this would be easier.