More Muffins

I know this isn't a food blog, but yesterday I made a batch of muffins for my giveaway winner.

I just HAD to show them off.

These are Orange Cinnamon Streusel Muffins!

You can find the recipe here.
Trust me, they are just as delicious as they look!
Just ask Jackee's kids! (Jackee was the giveaway winner.)

Even thought I made a double batch, I was only able to get 9 muffins with my crown muffin pan. They were HUGE muffins.

Ad-nalysis Sunday: Fedex

I saw a FedEx commercial a while back, around the time I started doing these Ad-nalysis blogs. I thought it was funny, but I couldn't find it on YouTube so I never blogged about it.

Occasionally I would think about this long-lost commercial and cry a little inside because I couldn't share it with you.

Today, I was determined to find it.



What is it about a stupid man, doing a stupid thing, that always makes us smile?

I suppose I feel like I can relate to this "boss". When I get really good service somewhere, I try to let them know I'm impressed. I'll ask the person's name, and tell her she's doing a great job. It's dorky, I know.

The actor in this commercial just takes this concept to the extreme.
And it works. I love him! I love his dorkiness and sense of pride.

I love the pace of this commercial. I think that's what keeps me interested the whole time. There's a lot happening in 30 seconds.

Other than that, there's not much too this commercial. It just made me smile. What more can you ask for?


***On another topic...
Congratulations to Jackee for winning the muffin giveaway!

She said: "We would LOVE to try out your yummy muffins. And the cool thing is...it would be really easy to get them to us:)! I think something with cinnamon would be fun."

It will be easy to get them to her because she lives just down the street!

My New Obsession

It's official! I'm a "Beginner Photographer"!

I even have a certificate to prove it!

I'm going to frame it.

Here are some of the cool pictures I took over the course of my class.

Sunset on Utah Lake

Gemma modeling some Haute Couture.

Super Yoda!

And it doesn't stop there!
I'm already registered for the Intermediate Class next month!
For anyone interested, Jed Colledge (from Jedediah Photography) is a great teacher!
I would highly recommend him.

Stay tuned for more Harker Photography!

*UPDATE*
Took this picture last night.
There's a field beside our house with tons of weeds and an old rusty horse trailer.
But at night (after 10 p.m.) with a super-long shutter speed, even the ugly trailer can look pretty awesome.

I believe my shutter speed was 1/8 sec (hand-held believe it or not), f/5.6, ISO 6400.

I also framed my certificate yesterday. It's now hanging proudly in our home office.

Muffin Giveaway!!

I finally bought something I've wanted for YEARS!

A crown muffin pan!
What's a crown muffin pan, you ask? I'll show you!

This is a crown muffin pan.
When I was 16 I worked in a bakery and we used muffin pans like this to make huge muffins!
They're pretty expensive. But I won an amazon gift card a few months back, so I was going to buy myself a present!
The day my muffin pan arrived in the mail, I just HAD to use it.

Crown muffin pans are great because they take regular size muffin cups, so the bottoms are the same size as regular muffins, but the tops are HUGE!

See?
Look at that masterpiece!
Can you guess what kind of muffins we made?
The carrot shavings were Ashley's idea.
She was my official guinea pig.

If you're thinking of buying one, you should know that the muffins take twice as much batter.
One regular muffin recipe (yielding 14-16 muffins), filled all six of my muffin cups.
So when you eat one, it's like you're eating two or three.
But it's sooooooo worth it.
Are you drooling yet?

Here's the giveaway part.
If you live in Utah...
AND you leave a comment about how awesome my muffins are...
I will make you a batch (six muffins).
You can even choose what kind of muffins you want (within reason).

For an extra entry, publicly follow my blog and tell me in a separate comment you are following my blog.

Easy Peasy!
Giveaway closes Sunday night.

Ad-nalysis Sunday: Jeans Diapers and Pajama Jeans

By popular demand: The Jeans Diapers commercial.



"I poo in blue!"

Personally, I hate this commercial, and this product.
Why would you want to put your baby in something that looks like CROPPED short shorts? Jeans are pants. Pants cover legs. Diapers don't cover legs.

Buuuuuut, I can see why moms would think it was adorable.

They're probably thinking: "This would be perfect to draw even more attention to my half-naked baby!"

I have to admit, this is one commercial where bathroom humor is appropriate.

"When it's a number 2, I look like number 1."
"The coolest you'll look pooping your pants."

Unfortunately, you don't catch the clever dialog the first time to watch it. I don't know about you, but the only thing I heard the first time I saw this commercial was "My diaper is full!" Gross.

Other things I hate about this commercial:
1. The voiceover. Annoying. Why does he have a weird French accent? Is the baby supposed to look French? I don't get it.
2. The editing. The cuts in this commercial don't match the music. It bugs me every time I see it!

Moms, please don't put your kids in diaper jeans.
Put them in Pajama Jeans instead!



Now THOSE look cool!

Happy Father's Day

To my awesome DAD!

A dad who isn't afraid to wear girl hats.
Not afraid to sing and dance at a weird moments.
Not afraid to scare kids in between dentist appointments.

Yep, after a long career in the Canadian military, my dad retired and became a bus driver.
The kids call him "Mr. T".

He's such a great dad, he was in the running to become Father of the Year in Canada!
My sister Victoria shot this video with a flipcam.
I fixed it with my mad editing skills. LOL.



Sometimes my dad and I fight like cats and dogs.
But I think that's because we're so much alike.
We both like to talk, eat chocolate, spend money on things we don't need, and we're both VERY good drivers. :D

I love my dad soooooo much! He's always been there for me and I love that I can always count on him to get excited about things going on in my life.

Happy Father's Day Dad!

Creating News

Part of my job is pitching story ideas for KSL 5 News.
Once in a while they're good enough to assign to a reporter!
This is one of them.
I'm the "employee" they're talking about in the intro to the story.

How cool is that!

Video Courtesy of KSL.com

Pretty awesome right?
I've never gotten a shout-out on the news before!
I feel so special.
The picture of "MOM" is also mine. (That's why it's not very good.) I'm glad they didn't give me credit for that.

Tomorrow, I think I'll have KSL do a story about how awesome Canadians are.
What do you think?

New Studio 5 Promos

Studio 5 will be on hiatus for the next two weeks, so I put together a couple promos to run in the meantime.

Just finished his one today.



And this is from a few weeks ago.



I chose the music because it reminds me of The Ting Tings song "Shut Up and Let Me Go."
Best song ever!

Ad-nalysis Sunday: Busted

A new weekly newspaper debuted in Utah this week.

It's called Busted.
Here's the cover.

That's right, it's a newspaper exclusively made up of mug shots!
I know, brilliant right?
I don't know why I didn't think of this. We laugh at mugshots on a daily basis in the newsroom. They make dependable daily entertainment.
It makes you wonder why there aren't pages of mug shots already in newspapers. They're like obituaries. Depressing, but oooooh sooooo interesting.

Here are some of my fav segments.
A segment devoted to the WACKIEST mugshots.

Click on this picture to make it bigger. These are before and after mug shots of people known to be on Meth.
And you thought the paper didn't serve a real purpose.
They're doing society a favor!

Yep, those are the fine females "wanted" in my county.

Click on this one to read the story in green.
Surprisingly this newspaper actually has a little news in it.
Seriously, click on it. You can thank me later.

And last, but not least, this is the last page of the paper.
Check out the ad on the bottom.
"Want a lasting memory of this proud moment? Order your very own framed, glossy 8x10 photo of any mugshot we print."

I didn't forget this was suppose to be an Ad-nalysis.
On the BUSTED website, there's an ad for their wonderful paper (now in 10 cities).
Try to watch it without laughing.

Is this a clever ad? No.
Is it a little trashy? Yes.
But that's their brand. And staying "on brand" is one of the first rules of advertising.
KSL did a story about the new newspaper in town. You can read it here.

Until next week!
And remember, don't get arrested, get BUSTED!

Family Visit

This is my sister Tracy!

She's my only sibling who doesn't live up in Canada. Tracy and her family live in Arizona.
But this week they came to visit me and Tom!

Don't we look like twins? (Although Tracy is 13 years older than me.)

Having Tracy and her family stay with us was GREAT! Tracy cooked for us the WHOLE TIME! And she's a good cook!

During their visit I got to practice the lessons I learned in my first photography class!
I took all these pictures on manual, and figured out all my exposure settings.

One of the first places we went to was a park by my house.

This is Christian. Not even a teenager yet and not afraid to kiss a girl!

This is Chloe. She loves to practice braiding, even on flowers.

Ian, Chloe, Christian, Ginger and our dog Yoda.
The kids LOVED Yoda.

Christian and Yoda.

Then we went to the free animal museum at BYU.

Did you know they have a real two-headed snake?

After the museum we went to a Provo staple. The BYU creamery!


This is one of my FAV pictures. Have I mentioned I took these pictures on manual?

Sunday was another exciting day.
This is how Christian went to church. LOL! His favorite color is pink and he's NOT afraid to admit it! Who knew we had so much in common?

After church we had a photo shoot at the Provo temple.
You can see a few of kids in this picture are a little wet. That's because they were playing in the fountains. That's when we decided to move on to the back of the temple.
But the reverence didn't last long.
The kids started rolling down the hill and doing handstands.
Isn't Chloe's form impressive?

It was a hot day, so the kids went a little crazy at the water fountain.
Ian looks HILARIOUS trying to get a drink.

Nathan and Ian trying to get a drink at the same time.

When we got home from the temple there was this amazing sunset!

Soooo pretty!

The next day we went to Bridal Veil Falls.

Then...my camera battery died.
But mind you, that was after taking more than 400 pictures.
You're lucky this isn't the longest post in the history of blogs.

*Tomorrow I have a really good ad-nalysis planned.
Trust me, it will make up for not having one last Sunday.*