Snowshoeing With Our New Toy

On the 24th we drove down to Rebecca's parents' house in Orem. After unloading the luggage, laundry, pet bird, presents, bedding, and food from the car we had lunch then headed out to Tibble Fork Resevoir to go snowshoeing. And even though it was a little early, we opened our Christmas gift to ourselves (a hiking GPS) to use on the trip. Now you all can see exactly where we hiked (within error limits of the device, of course). Right click Here and save the link then open it in Google Earth.

We had meant to go along the Silver Lake Flat trail but went the wrong way and just followed the main road. We didn't really need the snowshoes, but it was still very pretty.

Eventually we found a turn-off from the main road that was not already packed down from snowmobiles and actually got to make use of our snowshoes.

We're not sure what the road is for, but we came to a cabin at one point with some amazing views, and later we found an entrance to a mine.

By then, it was time to turn around, but since the sun was starting to set, we got some more beautiful views even though it was the same path we came up on. The small leg of trail down to the river was especially worth it.

Temple Square

Since we enjoyed our visit to Salt Lake City so much last year, we decided to do it again this year. So, last week on Thursday, Nate took the day off of work and we drove down Salt Lake City. We went through a session in the temple, visited the Clark Planetarium, and used a gift card for our dinner at Macaroni Grill. Then we returned to Temple Square to see the lights and listen to a local high school choir perform in the Assembly Hall. It was so nice to spend the day enjoying each others company. And the lights on Temple Square were beautiful. Something about being surrounded by trees completely covered with little red, yellow, and white lights is so magical. The beautiful white temple in the background and the white nativity figures only accentuate that feeling of wonder.





Even the drinking fountain looked impressive as it reflected the lights in the trees above it.

Christmas Parties and Such

We finally went out and chopped down a Christmas tree to put up in our apartment this last week. The people who owned the lot were very nice to us. When they saw what a small tree we had, they only charged us $5 for it. Our large tree stand is overkill for it; the screws that are designed to hold the tree in place barely reach the trunk when they are screwed in all the way. It is not a perfect tree, but we like it, and it fits well in the small space we have available for it.

Friday night we went to our ward Christmas party. The party itself was...different. The theme was "Christmas with Emma and Joseph." But they did have a ginger bread house contest as well. We were told we could use any material, so we designed a card-stock paper pop-up gingerbread house.

It took us awhile to make, but we had fun with it. Gluing the "candy" pieces on took an especially long time, but we thought the results were pretty good.

Saturday evening we attended a white elephant party with a bunch of my cousins. It was pretty fun. We brought two white elephant gifts: a snowman decoration Nate got from his company party that we didn't want, and a foot massager we found at DI that looked like two large fuzzy blue slippers and vibrated when you turned it on. We both ended up with a box of See's chocolates, that obviously came from someone who didn't understand what a white elephant is. We also enjoyed seeing other people's white elephant gifts: a blow-up guitar and sparkly red hat (pictured below), an enormous pink calculator (designed for old people so they can seen the numbers better), a container of Sponge Bob shampoo accompanied by a mermaid toy that grows in water and a rubber ducky, and a reindeer toy that plays music and does a wiggly dance when turned on (pictured below) to name a few.

Unfortunately, we were late for the party since we didn't know they had closed part of the I-15 freeway. We didn't even see much to warn us of the closure. Traffic backed up for quite a ways as they narrowed the freeway down to one lane and forced you to exit, drive through the city, and then re-enter the freeway after the construction area. We took a different route home!

Opportunity to Help

Looking for a way to provide service this holiday season? Here is a great opportunity. Starting Thursday, December 10th, there will be a charity auction at BLOOM to benefit Claire and Benson Skinner.

As explained by their parents, "Benson and Claire were born with a rare genetic disease in which their liver produces too much oxalate--called primary hyperoxaluria. Claire's condition has progressed much faster than Benson's. She has been on dialysis since she was 3 months old and is on dialysis 3 hours a day, 6 days a week. She is now on the waiting list to receive a combined kidney / liver transplant. It is expected Benson will eventually need similar transplants."

You can read more about the Skinners' experience HERE.

All proceeds from the auction at BLOOM will go directly to Claire's COTA (Children's Organ Transplant Association) account to help pay for her transplant. Please head over to BLOOM Thursday-Saturday for the auction!