Wait. Isn't it May tomorrow?

Oh, yeah, I'm in Utah. No wonder it was 34 degrees on our ten miler this morning.


I totally cracked up when I saw Dave out mowing our lawn while it was snowing. hahaha

Soooo. . . I guess I get what I get and I can't throw a fit.

. . . at the old ball game.

Jud was so nice and gave us some tickets to see the Salt Lake Bees play against Fresno ? somethings (I can't remember). Talk about nice seats. Three rows above the roof of the dugout. Nice.

It kind of stunk that the Bees lost. But it was a fun night out with my boys.

The egg hunt

My mom and dad are such a good sports to have Easter dinner and the egg hunt at their house every year. We had more food than you can imagine. There were about 40 of us there. It was kinda funny, but not one of the kids had brought their Easter baskets for the egg hunt. So grocery bags had to do. They were also in various outfits, most of which were not their Easter outfits, including one kid (Logan) in jammies.

These were the kids who participated. The older teens opted out this year, with the exception of Hannah, who always helps the little ones. I am the only sibling with grandkids so far. None of my own kids are young enough to do it anymore.

It's actually kind of nice to be the grandma instead of the mom. I didn't have to be there for the extreme sugar high or the crash afterwards. hahaha

Easter

I wanted to give the grandkids something meaningful for Easter. I remembered how one of the talks in General Conference encouraged children to have a picture of the temple in their room. So I got pictures of the temple from the distribution center. I chose for each child a picture of the temple where his/her parents were married. Then I matted them and decorated the mattes to match their room.
I also filled baskets with some fun outdoor toys - bug catchers and holders, buckets, shovels, etc. along with a little candy. Dave and I took them around to the grandkids Saturday afternoon.

It was funny, at both homes everyone was outside enjoying the somewhat mild weather. (Jacket weather instead of winter coat weather.)

Pad Thai

We met some of Dave's siblings, etc. for dinner at Pad Thai in Layton. Good food, great company.

Pictures from South Korea

Andrew sent us 222 photos on his camera's sd card. So I want to put a few of them on my blog for my book. I will write in some of the descriptions he sent us in the letter that accompanied the card.

"This is Pak Jong Mi's baptism."
The baptism of Bay Oo Ain and Bay Jong Hyan.

Elder Choy Say Jeen and me with the city of Gumi in the background.

The night before he left Gumi.

With Elder Jong Yun Jay

With Elder Goodman in his area for greenie exchanges.

Playing soccer in Dae Gu one P Day.

My next companian Elder Jong Yun Jay.

After my last meal with the Bishop of the Gumi ward before I left.

Me with some youth from the Gumi ward.

Yong Do Island.

My new companion Elder Kim She On. His name means Zion in English.

At a flower festival.

At the baptism of bek Gyu Tak. I love him so much!

At a famous temple in Busan.

At a service activity. We wash the dishes at a home for old people.

At a flower festival.

"Christ, the Lord, is risen today."

I have had this picture of the Savior's resurrection in my box of Easter decorations for years and years. I can't imagine celebrating Easter without this reminder of what the holiday is all about.

I know Jesus Christ lives and that because of His resurrection we all will live again as well. This knowledge brings me comfort, joy and mostly, peace.

Happy Easter.

Relief Society Temple Trip

Since the Ogden Temple is closed for renovation, we took a "temple excursion" down to the Salt Lake Temple as a ward Relief Society. There were 19 of us who rode the Frontrunner train from Ogden to Salt Lake.

After the temple session, we ate lunch at The Garden restaurant at the top of the Joseph Smith Memorial building. This was the view of the temple from the window of the restaurant.

Even though it was an all day event, from 9 am to 4 pm, we had a pretty good turn out with a variety of ages of women. It was a great success and a spiritual high for all of us that day, I believe.

Arches National Park

We have celebrated our 30th anniversary for about a month now. But the actual date is April 16th so we went to Moab and Arches National Park to celebrate. Neither of us can remember for sure if we have ever been there. Kind of sad, considering we both grew up in Utah. So we hooked up our trailer and headed 5 hours south.

We got there Thursday evening and stayed that night in Moab. The next morning we went on a 7 mile run that included this bridge across the Colorado river:


(You can see Dave running across the bridge)

Resting next to the river.

Then we drove in to Arches National Park. This is Balanced Rock.

This is called The Fiery Furnace:

We stayed at Devils Garden Campground. The only campground in the park.

We hiked to Delicate Arch. It is the arch featured on our Utah license plate.

There were a few wild flowers blooming in this desert area.

We saw these petrogyphs done by Ute indians.

This cabin has been there for well over 100 years.

North Window:

Part of Double Arch:

South Window:

Turret Arch:

The Three Gossips:

Along Park Avenue:

Park Avenue again.

Skyline Arch:

I liked this shot of the moon over the area:

Part of Broken Arch:

Here is the huge pile of rocks that broke off, down below the arch:

The area on the right is when the rock fell away:

Sunset from our campground:

Dave got out his telescope and we looked at the craters on the moon.

Even though we covered 15 miles on foot the day before, we were ready the next morning to hike some more.

Tunnel Arch:

Pine Tree Arch:

Landscape Arch - the largest arch, from base to base, in the park:

Partition Arch:

Dave climbed up part of Partition Arch:

Navajo Arch:

I liked this rock:

Another view of Navajo Arch:

We were married at 11 am on April 16th, 1981. (In the Salt Lake Temple) This picture was taken at 11 am on April 16th, 2011. Double O Arch.

Hiking to Double O Arch required walking along the tops of several "fins", which was kind of freaky as the drop on both sides was hundreds of feet.

We were pretty tired of hiking and had seen all of the arches in the park except maybe one or two. So we left the park and went on a little bike ride in Klondike Bluffs.

I think I wore my brakes out on the slick rock. I'm pretty sure Dave won't take me there again. I was pretty slow. And I griped everytime we came to sand pits, too. Ha ha.

The redeeming point of the ride was the cool dinosaur tracks. (Look at the size next to Dave's foot.) There were probably 10 to 15 footprints in the area.

You can see Dave way up ahead on the crappy bike trail. Not my favorite.

We were very blessed. Just as we were about to drive home Dave looked back and saw that our trailer was falling apart. It was 4:30 pm on a Saturday afternoon and we found a place in the tiny town of Moab that could fix it. They closed at 5pm. We got it repaired before the 300 mile drive home. It would have been ruined if we had waited. Yes, the Lord was looking out for us.

We figured we had burned enough calories to make little piggies of ourselves at Pasta Jays in Moab for our anniversary dinner. We even got tiramisu for dessert. It was a great little anniversary getaway. I love my sweetheart and was sooo glad to celebrate with him.