Spring in Soda Springs

 This afternoon. I'm pretty sick of it. Nuff said!

Modesty Out The Window

This is Rhoda's favorite sleeping position. It's almost embarrassing.

The Last Leg

The last leg of our trip was to the Grand Canyon. We went to Williams and took the Grand Canyon Railway. That was a fun experience. Before we left Williams, they had a "Wild West Show".

Then we boarded the train. On board they had entertainment for the ride. On the way there, a guitar player performed and on the way back, there was a banjo player. They were both pretty good and we enjoyed them.

 I realize that we are the record holders for Arizona natives who had never visited the Grand Canyon, but we finally made it and it was really beautiful. We were pretty cautious about getting too close to the Canyon.

 Not like these people who were a little braver.

Here are a couple of shots I thought were particularly neat.

It is so vast a colorful and we just saw a very small portion of it. We were there for about 4 hours but we didn't want to stray too far because we didn't want to miss our train ride back.  There was a train robbery on the way back, which, quite honestly, was pretty lame. The robbers got on and collected tips.

That was actually the sheriff that was coming after the robbers. Hopefully they shared their tips with him because we didn't tip him. Anyway, I enjoyed the experience. We stayed in Flagstaff that night and to Salt Lake the next day. After spending the morning with Judy, we headed home. This is what we found on our door when we arrived.

We also came home to a smaller pile of snow and a clearer lawn. But compare the lawn of the Mesa Temple in the previous post with what our lawn looks like. Please spring, hurry up!

Arizona

From New Mexico, we dropped into Arizona and to Snowflake.  We lived in Heber for many years with no temple closer than Mesa. The Snowflake temple was built after we left and we have wanted to go to it since it was built. We were able to see a few people we knew and visit for a minute.

We were able to get a missionary to take our picture so we could actually both be in a photo. From Snowflake, we drove to Pima to see my mom. It had been almost two years since we had been there and mom has built a new room on her house and a nice new carport. She had new windows put in, a new layer of stucco and painted it tan.  It looks like a totally different house than I grew up in. She has a new laundry room in the new section and now she doesn't have to go outside to put clothes in the dryer as she has had to do all her life. It is so nice.

 Those of you who knew the house before will see a real difference. I got to meet my brother, Randy's new wife. They were married on the 5th of March. Her name is Mary and she is awesome. Randy has found someone he can spend the rest of his life with. I'm very happy for him.

We were all able to attend the Gila Valley temple, which was built on my Granny Elmer's old property. Randy, Mary and Mom all work in the temple and it is really a wonderful thing.

From the Gila Valley, we went to Mesa, where we were able to visit lots of family and friends. We saw Kathleen & Lo, Kris & Eliza and family, Chuck & Susan and Stephanie. We were also able to spend some time with our good friends, Roxanne and Dennis Karges. Then we stayed with my sister and bro-in-law, Gina and Buck for a couple of nights. We really had a blast and loved seeing everyone.

Gina took us for a great all-you-can-eat buffet of crab legs and prime rib, etc., which turned out to be FREE, which is more than we could even imagine. Anyway, it was a great time. From there we went to Prescott to see Doug's mom and sister, but by some glitch in our memory, we didn't get one picture while we were there. But it was great to see them.

We were also able to visit our 4th temple on our trip, the one where we were married, the Mesa Temple. It was so much bigger than I remember and I actually got lost in it, confusing it with the Idaho Falls temple, and ended up in the cafeteria.

Spring Break Trip - Part 2

After we left Colorado Springs, which you may have missed at the end of my last post, we drove to Taos, New Mexico. It is an artsy place with typical adobe structures throughout the whole town. We walked and shopped the square there for a few hours. My favorite sculpture below looks like a big face, but if you look closer, it is 3 people in robes, 2 looking forward and the middle one with his back turned.

You can see the adobe stores in the background.  The picture below is Doug standing next to a painting that is on the wall of the Chamber of Commerce building next to where we parked to go walk around. It was really fun.

From there we went to Santa Fe. Our hotel (more of an inn or motel) was an older one but it was right in the center of town.  Just across the street from it was the Loretto Chapel. This was by far my favorite place in Santa Fe.

Inside this chapel is a spiral staircase that has no center supports. It has 2 complete 360 degree turns in it. The legend is that when it was built, they used a ladder to get up to the choir loft. But it was used as a girls school and a ladder didn't work well for that, so they fasted and prayed that someone would come who could build a staircase to it because there was no room for a normal staircase in the church. After 9 days of praying, a man showed up who said he could do it.  He worked on it until it was finished and then disappeared, never to be seen again.
 

We looked at the Cathedral Basilica, which was just beautiful too. It was very ornate.

The above picture is the baptistry in the cathedral. We spent the rest of the day shopping in many different shops on the square. The Native American art forms are so interesting and I admit, I couldn't resist some of their things and spent way too much money. Some of my favorite purchases include:

 My storyteller. We couldn't find one anywhere with 6 children on it, so we settled on one with just 2 children, one to represent our boys and one to represent our girls.

I just love my duck. All of the color is inlaid clay, not paint. They had all sorts of animals but I just fell in love with the duck and its intricate design.

Spring Break Trip - Part 1

We left on our 30th anniversary/Spring Break trip with a lot of snow still on the ground in Soda Springs. We were really looking forward to warmer weather the further south we went.The first day we drove to Denver.  We lived in Denver for a year and a half shortly after we were married. Logan was about a month old when we moved there and Lindsay was born while we were there. Also, while we lived there, the Denver temple was announced. We were so excited to have a temple close to us.  Then we moved back to Arizona before it was done.  We have always wanted to go back to see the temple. We did that on this trip.

It was just gorgeous and we loved every minute.


From Denver we drove to Colorado Springs.  We had never really been there for any length of time before but we thought it would be good to get an hour closer to our next destination, so we went for it. We ended up with a reservation at the Antler's Hilton, thanks to Hotwire, which was a big, beautiful hotel. When we drove up to check in, someone came out and asked us if we needed vallet parking. We didn't want to spend the extra $20 for that, but it was cool to stay in a place that actually did it!

When we arrived, we asked the attendant about good ice cream places in the vicinity. She told us about a little shop that was just down the street, so we thought we would give it a try.  I tell you, it was a bare-wall hole-in-the-wall. Always the best kind!

It was called Josh and John's. In the front window were several huge old fashioned ice cream freezers. I think they each made 5 gallons. They were powered by enormous motors compared to regular freezers.  That is where they made their ice cream.

 

Their ice cream was great and definitely rivaled Reed's Dairy in Idaho Falls, for those of you who know. But one of the most fun things about this place is that they have a list of at least 100 flavors that they make. You can mark your favorite flavors and when they have those in stock, they will email you to tell you they have it. Of course, it doesn't do us any good, but what a great idea for those who frequent it often. This was definitely a good find.

Jealousy?

Lindsay and Ronnie's little dog, Mercedes, might be just a little jealous of the new arrival. Actually, she has been pretty good considering she isn't the only one getting attention these days.