girl's weekend

When one of your friends finally makes the trek to Utah after 5 years, you drop everything for the week and PARTY!!! We showed her all the must-dos in the Provo/Salt Lake area. Well at least as many as we could fit in.

Our first stop was Sodalicious to get a drink.

The next day I got adventurous and decided I wanted to cut my hair. Suz did a great job!

We also ate Voodoo donuts for breakfast. It was a great morning.

After everyone got out of class, we went to the creamery to get some of the best ice cream on the planet. We also showed them campus! We were hoping there would be a basketball game this weekend but there wasn't :/

That night we went to the ice castles. I had never been here before and it was a blast! Keza brought hand and toe warmers so I was set. They played the instrumental soundtrack from Frozen and it was quite magical! 

                                

The slot canyon was my favorite part!

On Friday, we went to the new Provo City Center Temple Open House. It was GORGEOUS! I love the whole thing. It has an old feel but is very modern as well. There is tons of beautiful wood and it was cool to see how they incorporated aspects of the old tabernacle into it.

On Saturday, we went up to Salt Lake and hung out before they went to the airport. First, we went to take a tour of the Conference Center. I hadn't done that for a while and I loved it! Especially all the art work. And all the pieces that reminded me of Jerusalem.

Our tour guide was just the cutest old lady! She made it a lot of fun!

Then we took a walk around Temple Square. It wasn't raining, but it was a pretty dreary day.

We also took them to the top of the Joseph Smith Building to get this view of the temple. And stopped at the visitor's center that has the Christus. Little did I remember that they have a model of the Old City of Jerusalem. I nearly died when I walked in. I don't know how long I stared at it, but I was just taking it all in and remembering all the places I had been. I missed it! We also got to talk to a lot of the sister missionaries. It was so fun to have a couple nonmembers with us for the weekend!

Our last stop was City Creek. It's a beautiful place! Sometimes I just want to buy all the things haha!

We also ate a lot of food. Cafe Rio, Slab pizza, kolaches, Cupbop, etc. College towns know how to do food right.

It was such a blast and I'm so grateful Suz and Taylor got to visit! It's always fun to share the place you live and even though it's not our real home, it's a close second since we spend a majority of our time here. I'm also grateful for all the church things we got to do. The spirit was so strong and I'm grateful for my testimony and things that remind me of what matters most.

christmas break

It felt so good to be home! I literally hadn't been home for an ENTIRE YEAR. I love the Pacific Northwest minus the shock of the cold coming back from Jerusalem. I felt like I was coming home from a mission. I just wanted to talk about it all.the.time! I also had to start over on the essentials. Jackets, phone, computer. A new chapter was starting!

The day after I came home I taught early morning seminary. It was such a great experience. I talked about the will of God and how each person in the nativity story willingly followed God's commands. Regardless of how hard it was or who would talk about them or how they would be ridiculed, they still did it because they knew that God would provide a way and that they would receive blessings. I also learned so much about personal worship. The people there truly live their religions and especially when it comes to prayer, I know there is a lot of we can improve on. I didn't need to go to Jerusalem and walk where Jesus walked to gain a testimony of my Savior, but going to Jerusalem allowed me to learn more about His life and His teachings, it allowed me to contextualize and truly come to know Him. But more important than being there is what I'm going to do with it now. When we have opportunities like this, we need to share our experiences with others and continue to live as He did. Do the little things that help you to come near to Him.

I then got to share more experiences on Sunday during our Ward Christmas Program. The jetlag was a little rough, but I got over it eventually haha! Our family got to go to Seaside for a few days and it was glorious! I absolutely LOVE the beach.

It was so nice to relax and eat good food and ice cream and watch movies and play on the beach. We were all chillin in the hot tub and I really felt like we needed to go jump in the ocean. I didn't think that anyone would agree to do it with me. But everyone did! We hopped out and ran all the way to the beach until the waves came crashing up on our legs and our bodies started to go numb. There were people who saw us from their balcony and started cheering for us haha! I mean, it was December. kinda crazy! Definitely worth it though.

A family tradition is going to Seattle during Christmastime and seeing the gingerbread houses at the Sheraton Hotel. This year they were all Star Wars themed.

THEY CLEARED THE GUM WALL!!! It started over. It was so weird. But there's already a good start to a new collection.

 

 It was so much fun to get back together with all these ladies after so many years of being apart off at school and missions. We decided to go to the YSA New Year's dance. It wasn't that thrilling but we made the most of it haha!

 
Then headed back to Grandma's for games, food, and ring in the new year with pancake wishes and silly string attacks.

Oh, these are a little out of order but here's from Christmas Eve. Even though we're all a little grown up, we all had to participate in the nativity ha!

I got to go to the temple with my cute parents! It had been four months since I've been able to go so I loved it!

I also go to go snowshoeing for the first time! It was such a fun adventure! Exhausting and beautiful!

On Christmas, we got to talk to Jacob. Hard to believe he's been out for over a year. Time goes by fast. He's doing really well! It was so fun to catch up!

It was an absolutely fabulous winter break!