Rewind...Utah Trip April 2011

Yes, it's true...only cool people post about their General Conference Trip they took in April in August!  I had been to Salt Lake City for conference a couple of times and Jeff had never been so I wanted him to experience it.  It can be hard to get tickets for any of the sessions but thankfully when I called the guy in our stake he had some.  We started to plan our trip and after considering all the expenses with the hotel and gas we figured it just wasn't going to work out and would cost too much.  I called him back and told him that after much consideration we wouldn't need the tickets.

Our good friends Deri and Cherylee Maggard lived in UT but they were going to be gone that weekend.  One day while I was at work I was texting Cherylee and she said that the plans they had to come to AZ weren't going to work out and that they would be in town and offered for us to stay with them.  Yipee, it was an answer to my prayers...I just felt that it would be so awesome for Jeff and I to go to conference and now we could since there was an open room at Hotel Maggard!!! I think it was meant to be, because when I called the guy back he said the family who had reserved the tickets I gave back never picked them up and they were all ours again.    

If you can try and book a room at Hotel Maggard, they had incredible service and all the meals we were fed were home made!  You can't beat the fresh sweet laundry smell on the towels either...reminded me of when Cheryl and I used to live together.  We made pretty good time (12 hours) to Utah and surprisingly I didn't have to make that many potty stops, but we ran into some bad traffic when we reached Provo.

Right when we got to their place in Lehi they were cooking from scratch orange chicken and rice, it was so YUMMY!!!  We hardly had to go out to eat because they literally had a menu all set up for the days we were there.  Some of the plates included; fancy fajitas with meat that Deri grilled, waffles for my prego cravings, biscuits and gravy from scratch, and Cherylee's famous sugar cookies!  Our last night there we treated them to dinner at the Spaghetti Factory!

One morning Cheryl went out and brought us back some donuts from this local Bakery in Lehi and they are by far the most dee-lish-ous donuts we have ever had!  I don't know what they put in them but the texture, flavoring, and icing are perfect!  On our way home we did make a pit stop at the Bakery and bought some donuts...it made the ride much more enjoyable! Is it funny that I didn't take a pic of the actual donuts??? Whoopsies!!

*s*n*o*w* is falling all around...
Even though it was April when we were in UT we woke up one morning to snow!!  We were so excited just to see a change in the weather!  Cheryl had the cutest snow suit for Lincoln so we went out and played in it...he had fun for a bit but after his fall I think he was done entertaining us... :)  Jeff caught his emotions perfectly in these pictures...

Their little boy Linky Poo (Lincoln) quickly became one of my favorites...especially when he would wake up in the morning and make Chewbacca sounds with his Daddy!  He was such a sweet boy and so fun to be around.

(Sorry these pics are all distored...it was my first time using the collage design in Photobucket and I was getting impatient)

General Conference April 2011
We had tickets for the Saturday morning and Sunday afternoon sessions.  A powerful moment that stands out from conference was at our Saturday session.  The congregation was asked to stand and sing the opening Hymn "I Know That My Redeemer Lives", and there is just something so touching when you are singing that song with thousands of members and also the apostles and Prophet.  It was like we were all singing our testimonies about the gospel and at one point tears were just streaming down my face and I stopped singing so I could take it all in.  How precious and sensitive the spirit was that day at conference, I was so thankful to be there in that moment and to partake of it with Jeff.

Unfortunately we didn't leave enough time to park and walk to the Conference Center on Sunday morning and missed the session.  It was kinda ridiculous because even though we had tickets they told us you were not guaranteed a seat, so we waited outside for about an hour and it started to snow and they would not let us in.  We ended up driving back to watch the session with Deri and Cheryl.  Lesson learned: you need to show up at least an hour and a half early for conference and leave time for walking!  We both were bummed but knew it was our fault for not leaving in time.

I would have loved to do a session at the SLC Temple but a lot of the places were closed that weekend so we just walked around.  It was so amazing to be surrounded by such beautiful scenery.

The Sweets
Back in the day us 3 girls were inseparable, we did everything together.  In our single days we would hang out with a group of Show Low boys and they started to refer to us as their *sweets*  I was Caramel, Jenny was Cupcake and Cheryl was Rice Krispie. Jenny was fortunately in town for Conference with her young women group from Fresno, CA so we got to meet up with her.  These girls definitely warm my heart!

Rummikub & Buttered M&M Popcorn
One thing that quickly became a tradition for us to play every night was the game Rummikub...I after a while didn't think it was fun anymore to come up with strategies and game plans of how to rearrange the entire game to win.  The strategy award definitely went to Derick as he spent 20 minutes each turn carefully planning his attack, but then the winning award went to Jeff of course...that kid wins everything!  Then I get the whiny award cause at one point I just didn't want to play, so that leaves Cheryl with the patient award! :)

One night we decided to make some popcorn and we threw some M&M's in there too, but for some reason it tasted a bit odd...I think it was because we put too much butter, the boys kept laughing at us about it.  Come on people...I know some of you have enjoyed popcorn and M&M's too right??

Our last days there Derick wanted to take us to this waterfall so Jeff could take some family pics of them.  I just love how everything is so green in Utah, and the place we went to was so pretty and the weather was perfect.  Linky looked so cute that day too for the fam pics!

{Thank you}
It was so fun to have some girly time with Cherylee and to just chill and relax with them.  I've known Deri since my EA years and although at first I was skeptical to be his friend I decided to give him a chance because he was one of the popular kids on campus...it worked out...I got hooked on his randomness quick! :)  It's great when you have 2 good friends get married...because then it's double fun times!  Thanks again guys for all the mems and for opening your casa to us, we had a spectacular, and phenomenal time!  Let's plan our next trip...;)