The Time Has Come

Well, we leave tomorrow for Salt Lake City.  We will stay with Tom and Patti, Bob's son and wife, for a couple of nights and then to the MTC on Monday morning at 9:00.  We are starting to get a little nervous--not that we will not be able to do the work but that we are actually going to live in an unfamiliar country for a whole year.  I keep saying we can handle anything for a year, and I think that is true, but... We will spend a week in the MTC in Provo and then the next week we will be in Salt Lake for more specific training for the Perpetual Education Fund.  I am hoping to be able to see my sister, Marie and her husband, Greg in Salt Lake that week as they report for their mission in the Salt Lake City Family and Church History Mission 5 days after we report in Provo.

We are packing everything in two suitcases each.  That has been a big concern for me but now that it is almost done I think everything is going to fit okay.  I just hope we are packing the right things.  If it is cold in Utah I definitely will not have the right clothes as I am packing for warm to hot year round in Jamaica.  I am happy I will be able to go with out hose and will even be able to wear open toed sandals.  We were even advised to bring swim wear for preparation day outings.  This could be one of the biggest adventures of our lives!  Really though, we are very anxious to work with the Perpetual Education Fund.  It is such a wonderful program for helping make a real difference in the lives of many people.  I hope I will have lots of inspiring stories to share in the next few months.

More and hopefully better to come...

Catching up

I suspect this may be the title for most of my blogs as I seem to get involved in too many other things to be able to finish what I start.

I was talking in the last post about the trip Bob and I took which we both felt was one of the best we had ever had.  After the wedding we went to Vernal and Dinosaur National Monument which we really enjoyed. Then we took a nice drive down the center of Utah toward Moab.  We stopped on the way to visit Dead Horse Point Park and Canyon Lands National Park.  We got in a nice little hike here too which was hot but beautiful as it followed along the top of a beautiful canyon with the Colorado River snaking below.

We spent the night in Moab and then the next day hiking and taking pictures of about every rock formation in Arches National Park.  What a beautiful place.

We took a nice long hike out to Delicate Arch in the heat of the day and just about tired ourselves out too much for the rest of the beautiful things to see.  But it is a place you could return to many times.

From there we drove to Monument Valley in northern Arizona.  Again a most beautiful place!

While in Arizona we took a boat ride on Lake Powell out to see Rainbow Bridge.  I will not bore anyone with all the pictures I took from the boat.

We headed north after our wonderful day on Lake Powell.  We stayed a few days with our friends the Lows in Plane City Utah while we attended some really first quality musical productions in Logan.  We also got in a couple of golf games with Richard and Judy while we were there.  We left Utah and spent a couple of days with Linda and Lavern, Bob's sister, in Downey, Idaho; stopped for a while to see Brooklynn, Bob' s granddaughter and her family; and then again at my sister Marie's overnight before returning home.

I think some of the many reasons we felt like this was such a special trip was that we saw many family members, friends, lots of beautiful and interesting sights, four wonderful musical productions, did quite a bit of hiking, played golf, and attended four different temples besides. (Mt Timpanogas, Vernal, Montecello, and Logan).  We will remember this trip for a long time.

Two and a Half Weeks Packed with Fun

Bob and I returned this week from a wonderful trip that started with the wedding of one of his granddaughters in Provo and progressed through some of the beautiful National Parks in Utah and four outstanding musical productions at the Logan (UT) Arts Festival and ended with a visit to Downey, ID to visit his sister, a quick stop visit with Brooklynn, another of his granddaughters, and in Richland, WA to visit my sister.  I will post some pictures by categories as I have several hundred to choose from.  I will start with family pictures from the wedding as people always love to see family pictures.  ;)

 Tim and Debbie's kids.  Amanda and Adam's wedding.

Bob's (not Bob Senior) Daughters Lindsey and Stephanie

 Stephanie and Adam's kids

TJ and Amy's kids

 Brian and Katie's Family

Karen and her kids (Eric and Jacob missing)

Tom

There were other family members there who's pictures I may or may not have taken, but this is a pretty good representation of Bob's Kids, Grand Kids and Great Grand Kids.  It was a lovely occasion to be able to see so many of the kids.

We drove from Salt Lake to Vernal UT where we stayed a couple of nights so we could go to the Temple there and out to Dinosaur National Monument and Flaming Gorge Dam.  We loved seeing the actual remains of dinosaurs embedded in the mountain which had been excavated and then preserved within a building/museum.  There was an amazing amount of bones in this one location.  There is indication there may actually be more in the surrounding mountains, hills, and mounds.  We took a little mile hike back to the visitor's center and were actually able to see more dinosaur bones along the trail.  Amazing.