Utahalloween!

Last week I got to go home to Utah! Greg had to stay and hold down the fort here in Illinois with the animal children. I flew to Utah on Monday, October 24, which ended up being a crazy day. I woke up at 4:30 a.m. and was at the Springfield airport ready to fly out on the 6:50 a.m. flight to Dallas. We boarded the plane and were headed out to the runway, when our pilots announced: "Actually we need to wait a little while before we can leave. There is fog in Dallas, and they aren't letting any planes land." Unfortunately "a little while" ended up being four hours, and I missed my flight out of Dallas (in fact I missed the next two Dallas to SLC flights). My original plan was to get to Salt Lake City at 12:05 p.m., but I didn't even leave Springfield until after 11:00 a.m. My 3:00 flight out of Dallas was delayed due to "mechanical problems," and I finally reached Salt Lake City at about 5:30 p.m. Unfortunately my flight delays caused me to miss a fun afternoon with Mom, Dad, Aunt Karalie, Lindy, and the cute Barrett kiddos at Gardner Village (but I'm glad they still had fun!), and we received news that Grandpa Dick had passed away in St. George, Utah earlier in the afternoon. As if it hadn't been a crazy enough day, when we got back to Mom and Dad's house at about 7:00 p.m., I plugged in my phone (my battery had died), and saw a text message that said, "Did you pick up the wrong bag?" Sure enough, I had picked up the wrong bag. So after dinner Mom and Dad had to take me back to the airport so I could pick up my bag and drop off the bag I had picked up. By the time we got home it was about 10:00 p.m., and we were all tired. But it was great to be with my family!

I got to stay at Mom, Dad, and Rich's cool new house! (I meant to take a picture of the house, but we were so busy that I forgot--I'll get one the next time I'm there.) Their house is in a great location, just down the hill from the Mount Timpanogos Temple in American Fork. The leaves at the temple were beautiful! In fact, all of the leaves in Utah were pretty--I was there at the perfect time to see the fall colors.

On Wednesday Mom and I went up to Salt Lake City so that I could meet with the director of the LDS Church History Department. I had recently applied for a job there, which I didn't get, but the director wanted to meet me, which I suppose is a good sign. So we had lunch and talked about possible future job openings. Then I met back up with Mom and we took a tour of the cool new Church History Library which is a really neat facility.

Mom and I then headed to our favorite place: Left Fork Grill (thank you for introducing us, Aunt Karalie) for some delicious pecan and blueberry slices of pie--they were divine! We then stopped to see the witches at Gardner Village since I missed out on Monday's witch outing. It was very fall-ish at Gardner Village!

On Thursday I got to have a yummy lunch with Mom and some of her friends, which was very fun. Then that evening we had a super fun movie night with the Barrett girls. Here they are anxiously waiting for their tasty El Pollo Loco dinner. We had originally planned to have a sleepover on Friday, but since we were going to be heading to St. George for Grandpa Dick's funeral over the weekend, we arranged our fun movie night instead.

Here we are ready to watch "The Little Rascals" in Mom, Dad, and Rich's AWESOME theater room! The theater room is my favorite part of their new house. It has built-in surround sound speakers, and the screen on the wall is huge. It is the perfect place for movie night. After movie night we got to watch probably the most amazing baseball game ever. It was Game #6 of the World Series, and the Cardinals were down three games to two, so if they lost, the Rangers would win the World Series. TWICE the Cardinals were one strike away from losing the World Series, but they came back both times and ended up winning the game with a home run by David Freese. It was incredible! Rich even made it home from work in time to see the winning run. It was so fun to be there with Mom, Dad, and Rich watching the game on TV--especially since the Cardinals pulled off the impossible win to force Game #7 the next evening.

On Friday Mom, Dad, Rich, and I left for St. George. We were able to stop and see Grandpa Taylor and Grandma Cathy, which was very nice. Here I am with Grandpa. I was glad to see that he is doing well! We arrived in St. George that evening and had fun watching World Series Game #7 with Grandma. She was really getting into the game. And, the Cardinals ended up winning the World Series!!!! We were SO EXCITED!

On Saturday we had Grandpa Dick's funeral which was very nice. Grandpa Dick was my step-grandpa (Grandpa Farnsworth passed away when I was three years old), but he had been a part of the family for 20 years. It was a sad occasion, but it was nice that we could be there with Grandma. We got to spend Sunday with Grandma also, and then we headed back up to American Fork on Monday. (Grandma will be moving up to American Fork this coming weekend, which will be great because now she will be much closer to the rest of the family.)

On Monday (Halloween) evening, we got to have a fun Halloween party at the Barrett's house--complete with cheddar sweet potato soup in pumpkin-shaped bread bowls! The Barrett girls looked great in their costumes--we have 80s girl Riley, Frankie Stein Camden, and Flairy (not to be confused with fairy) Sidney! (A flairy is a fairy with FLAIR instead of wings.)

And here is Mom (aka Grandma) with Adam's Family baby Ben! He was so funny with his little mustache. He wasn't quite sure about the mustache at first, but he decided it was kind of fun after a little while.

And here is the trick-or-treating crew ready to head out. Jack Sparrow there is one of their neighborhood friends.

As you can see, it was the most perfect evening for trick-or-treating. The weather was beautiful, and the mountains looked so pretty as the sun was setting (I miss mountains in Illinois!!!). After trick-or-treating we frosted some yummy Halloween cookies--it was such a fun evening. Somebody flipped the weather switch that night because it started snowing as Mom, Dad, and I headed up to the airport on Tuesday morning. I was sad to leave Utah, but I'm glad that we had such a nice time together and that I was able to be there for Grandpa Dick's funeral. Fortunately my travel day on Tuesday was much less eventful than my trip out to Utah.

While we were having fun Halloween celebrations in Utah, the Illinois contingents of the family were having fun as well. Here are the CUTE Agate kiddos in Carbondale. Eliza looked great as Hermoine Granger from "Harry Potter," and don't you think Leo, with his cute little face, makes the perfect garden gnome?


And in Springfield Greg got the animal children all dressed up for HOWLoween. Here is Lily in her Howloween tie. Big Spike got to be a squirrel again, and Little Spike can be nothing else but a football--he makes such a perfect football.


I enjoyed celebrating Halloween in Utah and seeing pictures from the Illinois festivities. I am glad that I was able to go to Utah before things get crazy at work this coming week with our Veteran's Day World War I Encampment and school visits. I have also been having some car adventures lately. My car keeps breaking down, stranding me at work or wherever, so we have it towed to the car place. But when it is at the car repair place, it works perfectly, and the mechanics can find nothing wrong with it! This has literally happened three times already. It had been at the car place while I was out in Utah, and Greg just picked it up right before I got back, but it broke down again on me as I tried to leave work on Wednesday. I picked it up from the car place again today (even though the car worked perfectly for them again, the mechanics switched out some filters), so hopefully the car will be good to go for a while. It has been an eventful last couple of weeks, and I'm glad for the time I was able to spend with my family in Utah!

Return of the Rally Squirrel

On Tuesday I returned from a trip to Utah--it was so wonderful to see my family! Unfortunately Grandpa Dick passed away while I was on my way out there on Oct. 24, but it was nice that I was able to see Grandma and be there for his funeral. Things have been so crazy since I returned (work and car troubles--more to come on these topics) that I haven't had a chance to do a blog post with my Utah pictures yet, but I will do a post a.s.a.p. within the next couple of days. One of the exciting things that happened while I was in Utah was that the Cardinals won the World Series! I still can't believe it. In honor of their great win I wanted to post this funny rally squirrel video that makes me laugh every time I see it:



The rally squirrel video is a spoof of the cool post season commercials they showed on TV. Here is the real commercial they showed featuring the Cardinals. It is awesome!

WORLD SERIES!

On Thursday, Greg and I got to continue our anniversary celebrations with another trip to St. Louis--this time for the World Series! We lucked out to get a good deal on tickets from Greg's cousin. We got down the stadium a little while before the gates opened, and it was already packed with people. We got to see the Budweiser Clydesdales lining up to head into the stadium, which was really cool. They are so pretty!

We couldn't believe that we were actually at the World Series! It was so exciting! The Cardinals had won their game the night before, and we were hopeful that they could get a 2-0 lead over the Texas Rangers. We had to bundle up because it was a bit chilly out (at least it wasn't raining like the night before).

Even though the temp. was cold, it was a beautiful evening at the ballpark.






Here I am ready for the game to start. They handed out World Series towels to the fans coming into the game--but Greg and I brought our own "rally squirrel" towel that we picked up at the mall the other day. The "rally squirrel" is that funny little squirrel that ran out onto the field during the game we were at against the Phillies earlier in the playoffs. Since the squirrel showed up the very next night, and the Cardinals then started to win their games, they adopted the idea of the rally squirrel. There was squirrel stuff for sale all around the stadium! And, a squirrel (we don't know if it was THE rally squirrel or not) ran right under our seats before the game started. I am bundled up in this picture, but I have not yet added my big, red, marshmallow-style down coat--I saved that for a little later in the night as the temperature dropped.

The sunset was beautiful! This is a nice picture of the field just before game time. Before the game started they presented the Roberto Clemente Award to Boston Red Sox player David Ortiz, which was pretty cool to see.



And here are the Budweiser Clydesdales making their pre-game lap around the stadium!






Since we were sitting right above the Cardinals bullpen, we got to see Yadier Molina, the catcher, up close and personal! He and the pitcher, Jaime Garcia, were warming up right in front of us.








It was a great game. The Cardinals scored first, and the stadium went absolutely crazy! They were ahead 1-0 clear up until the 9th inning when their pitching went downhill, and sadly the Rangers ended up scoring two runs--and the Cards didn't score again. This was Albert Pujols' last at-bat appearance of the night. Conceivably this could be his last at-bat as a Cardinal at Busch Stadium (if one of the teams wins all three games in Texas and then Albert Pujols leaves the Cardinals next season), but we hope he'll be a Cardinal forever!

After the game we hung around the stadium for a little while waiting for the crowds to clear out a bit. Here are ESPN's Baseball Tonight guys doing their post-game show.



And here is a nice view from the other side of the stadium with the Arch in the background. Even though the Cardinals lost it was SO NEAT to be there at a World Series game. It was a once-in-a-lifetime experience! Now we'll hope that the Cardinals can win tonight in Texas!

The Big #3

The week has been CRAZY! It can be summed up in two words: Saint Louis. :-) Last Saturday I had my nice trip to St. Louis with our fun ward Young Women president, Laura, then on Sunday evening the St. Louis Cardinals beat the Milwaukee Brewers to send themselves to the World Series! On Tuesday Greg and I went to St. Louis so we could go to the temple for our big #3 anniversary! I had actually never been to the St. Louis Temple before, which is weird since we are in the St. Louis Temple district, but we usually go to Nauvoo when we go to the temple. So we had a very nice day at the temple. Then, we ended up going BACK to St. Louis on Thursday for a World Series game (a World Series post is soon to come), and Greg will once again be going to St. Louis on Sunday to pick up someone who passed away out-of-state. We've been burning up the road between here and St. Louie!

But out of all the things that happened this week, the most important was our anniversary. The St. Louis Temple is so beautiful! It was nice to go there and be reminded of the importance of our temple marriage and to feel the spirit of such a special place. It's hard to believe that it has already been three years since we got married! Tuesday was kind of a gray, cold, dreary day in St. Louis, but it made us appreciate the beautiful, Utah fall weather we had on our wedding day. What a week it has been!

Sister Dalton in St. Louis

Yesterday I had a really neat opportunity! At church I am currently the first counselor in the Young Women presidency, which means I get to work with the 12-18 year old girls in our ward. It has been a lot of fun so far, but I still have a lot to learn. Yesterday Sister Elaine S. Dalton, the General Young Women President for the entire LDS Church, was in St. Louis to offer some training for Young Women presidencies in the area. I got to go to St. Louis with our ward Young Women president, and we had a great time. I even got to shake Sister Dalton's hand! She shared some neat experiences and advice with us. Later in the evening she had a special meeting where she spoke to all of the young women from the area. (Only six of our girls were able to make it, but they sure had a great time.) She talked about making good choices in our lives and reminded us that Heavenly Father knows each of us personally. It was a wonderful talk and a wonderful day! Sister Dalton recently spoke in General Conference. You can read or listen to her talk by clicking here. She is a really neat lady, and I'm grateful for the opportunity I had to listen to her words yesterday. Also at the meeting yesterday, I ran into my fun friends the Stowells from Charleston! They were my family away from home while I was at graduate school, and it was wonderful to see them again.

In other news, the Cardinals lost the other night, but then they won a game, so now they just have to win one more game to go to the World Series! We'll be cheering for them tonight!