Over the past few years, a couple of John's Brothers (and their families) have moved to Utah.
We've enjoyed "hearing" about their homes and adventures in Pleasant Grove and Heber City, but had never quite made the trip down to see them ourselves. (We can be flakes like that, and it might be because I have a strange aversion to long 12 hour drives.)
We are sure glad that John's siblings are so inviting, and persistent, ...and inviting, because after years of putting off the trip, we finally took them up on their invitation, loaded up the kids, and headed down to Utah!
The day before we left was kinda crazy. The AC on our Van broke and we realized we had to get it fixed before we left. What we didn't realize was how much that was going to cost. sob;( Then, our Water Heater started leaking and we needed to have an emergency visit from a plumber and make arrangements for him to come work on it while we were gone. THEN, Abby and I both had to get in for last minute dental work and I didn't get to have any freezing!!! Gah!!!!! Then there was packing, mowing, gardening, cleaning, cleaning out the fridge, emptying garbage, tying up lose ends, folding all laundry and changing the water in the fish tank..... and on and on.
Is every "day before a trip" that bad, or do I just make things harder then they have to be?
Needless to say, when two sweet and amazing woman in my ward stopped by with a bag full of travel goodies for my family, I almost started sobbing. Right there. In front of them;)
They had gone to great lengths to make a travel bag for each of us, filled with things we could pull out along the way. It was GENIUS, not too mention such a highlight for my kids!
What a fun way to enjoy a long drive!
We wanted to make sure we hit Salt lake City with time to spare so we ended up leaving a day earlier then planned and stopping part way in Idaho Falls. The hotel we stayed at was seriously one of our new favourites! The kids LOVED that it had a pool, and John and I loved that it had a complimentary Supper AND Breakfast!!!
That night, after we ate, the kids wanted to hit the pool. That meant it was the perfect time for me to go for a drive and take pictures of Idaho Falls. (I'm not a fan of hotel pools, but I am a fan of beautiful views like this one!)
We left our hotel the next morning, and arrived in Salt Lake City early in the day- giving us lots of time to explore Temple Square with the kids. It was a place we've described to them before, but they really could not have imagined all that there was to see.
Here they are in the Joseph Smith Building. John's brother Jordan and his wife Luci had their wedding luncheon here ten years ago. In fact, Abby actually took some of her very first steps in that back room there!
Here's another shot of the kids on Temple Square. (Did I mention yet, that as soon as we got on Temple Square my camera battery died. Grrrrr!!!!! All of these temple shots had to be taken with our dumb little point and shoot) It made me so sad!
We didn't take a tour of the Conference Centre but we did go in and look at the seating. The kids enjoyed seeing just where it is that our prophet and apostles are speaking from when we watch them during General Conference.
Right after we took this picture, Nate peed his pants. Only his diaper had gotten lop sided and everything just pretty much landed on the ground right there. So he pretty much just peed on Temple Square. Is there anything worse then that? Nope. I didn't think so.
John got the chance to take us into the old Tabernacle. He told the kids of the time one of his University Professors brought him here and let him play the pipe organ. It was a real cool memory for him.
Despite all of John's and my interest and fascination with Temple Square, what the kids wanted to do more then anything else was ride the "TRAIN!" haha (of course;)
So, we paid $20 for the kids to ride up 5 stops and then back. And they were happy. (They've always wanted to ride on one of those things, and you know John and I are just all about making their dreams come true;)
I was so grateful for those few hours in which we were able to show our kids some of these important parts of our church history, as well as some of the landmark buildings that are important to us today! Hopefully next time we bring them here, they'll be slightly more in awe of it:)
I can't be too hard on them though, because all the kids really wanted to do, was get to "Libby and Jax's house." We rolled in around 5:00 Thursday evening and the kids literally flew out of the van, happy to have finally arrived!
And so began our adventurous week in UTAH!!!
No comments:
Post a Comment