Day 4 - Staycation Saga - Salt Lake and Sean Woodland

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Day 4 - Thursday May 28, 2009 - Salt Lake and Sean Woodland

Today we were up, packed and out the door just after 8am. We stopped by the Grocery store and then went by the hospital to see how Grandpa Burtenshaw was doing after the surgery. The surgery went great and he seemed to be alright. He was a bit tired, but they had his led in a machine all night long that kept the knee joint moving, so he did not sleep well (but then who would if you had something straightening and bending your leg all night long?). Other than a little bad sleep he seemed to be in good spirits. We will let you know how he is doing when we come back through town later.

Sorry, we were not very good about taking pictures today, so there are no photos today, which is a shame, because it would have been nice to have a picture of Sean to post.

We stopped for lunch in Nephi because they have a really nice park with HUGE trees and it is a place I remember stopping many times when making similar trips to Idaho with the family during my childhood years. Doesn't see to have changed much, but it is a very peace full park. I like it!! It also gave us a chance to get out an stretch our legs.

We arrived in Salt Lake about 3pm or so and took a wonderful tour of the Conference Center. It is a magnificent building. I was excited that I got to go up on the roof, because during conference time it is always closed. In fact, anytime there is a major production of any sort, they close the roof off. (I guess a building that seats 21,000 people is supposedly a good terrorist target.) We also got to tour all of the hallways and see all the paintings up close. If I remember right our guide said that all paintings within the Conference center are all original paintings. If you remember the old paperback copies of the Book of Mormon, all of the original paintings from those blue books are hung in one of the hallways. Also a painting of every person ordained to the office of Apostle, for the first time are all hanging in order in a single building (I guess previously the pictures of the apostles were hung in multiple buildings) The hall of the Prophets was probably one of my favorite halls as a painting of each prophet from Joseph Smith to President Hinckley is hung there (our guide said that President Monson’s painting would be finished in a couple months and then hung in there as well.) It was a cool experience.

We then went over to the visitor center and sat in the room with the Christus for a while before going down to the basement. There we saw some exhibits about all that past prophets and an entire section on the welfare that the Church gives world wide, it is amazing what we do around the world. I got a little emotional when seeing a video of President Hinkley speaking which reminded me of a loving, powerful, and miraculous event that the Chilean Saints had a number of years ago (of which I had a companion who was there), which I shared with Shari. It was good to be there in the visitor center. It is amazing to me sometimes the tender mercies that our Lord bestows upon us.

Following that we wandered around Temple square for a bit discussing the landscaping and the flowers and if certain ones might be growable in AZ. We also wanted to get a picture of us with the Salt Lake Temple. Deciding however, that with the sun shadowing the temple and us by shining directly into the camera, that we would come back first thing in the morning to take the picture that we wanted.

Shari then drove us back to UT (actually, we never left Utah, I just drove us from Salt Lake back to Provo to see my youngest brother Sean), and we went to lunch (actually, it was dinner because we got to Provo at 7:15pm and had eaten our lunch in Nephi at this favorite park of Ammon’s, which he swears he brought me to before, but seeing as how his memory is not always as sharp as others, I’ll forgive him!) with Sean at the Pizza Factory. (Thanks Mommy Debbie and Dad Woodland for the grub!) Following a yummy dinner we went back Sean’s place and helped him de-bone 5 Costco chickens for his ward luau the next day. We talked for a bit and then called it a night and went to bed. Thanks for putting us up, or putting up with us for the evening! (Sean, and his roommates, were very gracious in letting us stay with them for the night, even though having a sister and her husband sleep over might be against the BYU Housing rules.)