Utah travels

On Thursday, Dec. 1st Spencer and I did something that we hadn't done in 5 1/2 years. We got on an airplane together- with no children in tow and took off for a weekend in Utah. It was an extremely fast and very eventful weekend, but amazing! Of course we missed the girls and called often, but we made sure to soak up every second of our time alone. Thursday night we stayed at Aunt Fay and Uncle Bob's new lakefront cabin in Huntsville. It's gorgeous and we can't wait to go back for a longer trip this summer.

Friday we went to Logan for the day to spend time with Grandma Jenkins (who will be turning 100 this June!!), Jeremy, Tanna, their kids, and my dearest cousin Eliza. The day couldn't have been more perfect- eating lunch (or "dinner" as they call the noon meal) at Grandma's new place and having 2 hours to just sit and get caught up with her.

Then I headed off to Liza's new house in Smithfield while Spencer went to hang with his brother Jeremy so they could do what only guys would do - go fly fishing...in the snow! It had been way too long since I'd last seen Liza (we figured over 4 years), so it was a much needed reunion. After catching up I headed back to Logan to meet up with Spencer, Jeremy, and Tanna. They got a babysitter and we all went out to the local burger joint there on Center street. I'm sure Tanna and I bored the guys to death with our mother/women conversations, but it was so wonderful to hang out with Tanna and get caught up on her life and get her thoughts on everything. We got back to their place in time to see the kids off to bed. They are such adorable kids and I hate that Madi and Elle barely know these cousins. Hopefully we'll be able to change that now that we live much closer. We left Jeremy and Tanna's later than we should- it had snowed earlier in the day and roads were a little slick. Thank goodness for our big Yukon rental. Friday night we stayed again at the Huntsville cabin, and then packed up and left Saturday morning for Salt Lake City.

Spencer and I had originally planned on getting to Salt Lake earlier to be able to walk around and do some shopping, but we were so enjoying being able to sleep in and take our time in the morning that it never happened. Saturday was packed with Bobby and Amy's sealing at 1pm, some pictures after, and then a big party at Bob & Amy's clubhouse that evening. It was a lot of fun and I was really glad that Spencer and I were both able to be there (had we been still been living on the east coast, I would have probably gone alone).

Love those big temple doors! Bob and Amy look pretty good too!

Amy finally resulted to holding her veil cause the wind kept blowing it in her face. How she's standing there without a jacket is beyond me- I could barely snap pictures my fingers were so cold.

All of my siblings except for Jen were able to make it with their spouses. Clark and Jo drove out, so they had the triplets and Tish and Curt brought Ezra. But other than that, no other kids came. We all hung out Saturday night at Aunt Annie's before saying our goodbyes Sunday morning.

(Not loving this pic of me- something about being 6 months prego and feeling extremely large. The bright red sweater didn't help me blend in much either.)

On Sunday Spencer and I were able to stop by and see Adam Eshenroder and go to sacrament meeting with him. Then we took off to go visit Jocelyn and Michael at their apartment. We stopped back by Aunt Annie's for dinner and to meet up with Karlee, Jeremy, Bobby, & Amy to drive up to Temple Square. Every year, on the first Sunday of December, Spencer makes some comment about wishing we could be at the Christmas devotional, and this year he got his wish. Bobby scored us some tickets and we were thrilled to be able to be there. After the devotional, we braved the winter cold and walked around Temple Square a bit to admire all the beautiful Christmas lights. There simply is no place like Temple Square at Christmas time! It was so beautiful and a perfect ending to our weekend getaway!

(Huge thanks to mom Jenkins for letting me borrow her coat for the weekend. All of our winter clothes were then on the moving truck, being driven across the country.)

Instead of driving all the way back to Provo just to get up and leave at 5am the next morning, we checked into a Marriott by the airport and were asleep by 9:30pm. We were exhausted! We flew out Monday morning at 8am and got into LA before 9am. We drove straight to Spencer's parents to pick up the girls who were beyond excited to see us! I loved hearing all about how much they missed us. Elle kept telling me over and over, "you go away and I miss you sooooo much!" So sweet! The moving truck was already at our new place and ready for more craziness to begin (which is the next post- coming soon)!