Off to Salt Lake

Madison and I took off for Salt Lake two days after my birthday. We flew out in the evening and arrived around 11pm (it was the cheapest flight). We picked up our rental car and snuck into George and Melanee's without even waking them. Here is Madison on the flight working on her math book (She says she doesn't like math. I can't figure out how that happened in our family. She is actually pretty good at catching on to the concepts, but it just isn't that interesting to her)

Then, of course, we have to show off her beautiful painted nails.

We spent a day with George and Melanee playing with their adorable children. Sam got up and the minute she saw that Madison was wearing a cinderella nightgown, she insisted on putting on her beautiful play dress. Here are some cute shots of all of them.

Watching 101 Dalmations

All these are just purely adorable!

Sam carries her baby doll around with her all day. It is so adorable.

Turning 40 ...

Well, it has happened. The end of June, I turned 40. I know that is really surprising to most of you. :) I actually felt really good about it. When I was in my late 20's, early 30's it was weird having birthdays and I went through this almost grieving period feeling like I was getting old. At this point, I just feel like life passes by quickly so I should enjoy every piece of it along the journey. The day of my birthday was marathon day for our ward. We started with a baptism at 12:00, then had a ward temple session at 4pm with a mingle afterward and a ward activity at 7:oopm. At first, I thought it would be a strange way to spend my birthday, but then after thinking about it, I realized I have always thought the best birthday celebration was to spend the day doing things you love to do, so spending time with my ward sounded like a great idea. Robin and Madison came the night before, which really added to my favorite things list and I got to spend the morning school clothes shopping for Madison, starting at 7am. I skipped the ward activity in the evening so I could spend more time with them. It was a great day.

Living the LDS lifestyle that we all do, we tend to not age quite as quickly as other people, so I have felt that I still have a lot of youth left in me and people tend to guess my age younger so I was feeling pretty good and not worrying about being old. That changed when Robin, Madison and I were all in Kohl's shopping. Robin had been trying on clothes and accidently put her shirt back on inside out. When we were at the check out, a lady pulled me aside and said, "Excuse me, maam, your daughter has her shirt on inside out." I thanked her for reminding me it was my 40th birthday, because that daughter with my granddaughter is really my sister with my neice. :) Not really, but I thought it was the perfect classic thing to happen on your 40th birthday. Here is a picture of me with the girl who got baptized that day. Her name is Cora.



PS I have been gone for a month, so expect to see more posts here soon to catch you all up on my fun trips.