Utah Trip June 2010---Chapter 1

ABOVE: This is a picture representation of how each post will slowly unveil our adventures ;-) hee hee.

Alrighty! Let the story begin. In June it was vacation time for the Barlows. We were going up for one of my best friends weddings!!! We were also going to go up to Brigham City and spend a little of Thursday, Mom Barlow's birthday, & all of Saturday with the Barlows. At that time we were planning on coming back in July for the Barlow reunion, because John's older brother had a month leave from the army in July. The original plan was to head home Sunday and try to be back for Father's Day dinner. We headed up to Utah on a Wednesday after John got off work. It took us a total of 16 hours on the road (not including our over night stay) just to get to American Fork, UT. YIKES!!!! Traveling with a baby is so much different, longer, and a whole lot more work. But my baby is worth every bit of effort. We missed a turn in Kingman on the way to Vegas. We ended up going to Needles, CA and adding about an extra hour to our already lengthy trip. Oops! We stopped in Vegas and stayed the night with my cousin Heather and her family. It was wonderful! John slept. Not  Heather and I, we stayed up until like 4 or 5 in the morning. I'm not even sure how late it was. It was crazy late, well actually early. But we had the best time talking and analyzing life =D That was the first of our "weekly visits" that lasted for the next 4 weeks.

So, the next morning, Thursday, we got back on the road again about 9:30AM. We thought that we would have plenty of time to go up to Brigham City and spend some time with mom on her birthday. Then go back down to Pleasant Grove area and go out to dinner with Jenn and spend the rest of the evening with her.
Well, plans changed. Our stops took longer than planned. We got stuck in traffic approaching Spanish Fork, UT and it lasted through Provo. So, in the end we didn't go to Brigham on Thursday. We met Jenn and her parents @ Chili's for dinner. Went back to Jenn's apt. and talked and talked and enjoyed the nervousness and the anticipation on her wedding eve. The wedding was Beautiful! It was in the Mt. Timpanogos Temple. The Sealer was hilarious and gave great advice. One that really stuck with me is that he compared the trials in our marriage relationships to a wound on our hand. In a nutshell he said, if you keep "scratching" at it, meaning nagging, or fault-finding etc. it'll only gets worse and can lead to more pain. If you give it the love and attention it needs then it will heal and you can be happy. That was a rough summary, but I hope you get the point. The luncheon and reception were lovely. It was just so wonderful to see my sweet Jenn so HAPPY!!!! Jared you are one amazingly lucky guy, you got Barbie!(The Barbie thing is from an experience we had on our cruise a couple years ago) You know how many guys I've seen try to win her heart?
Anyway, the only sad part was that her wedding cake fell! It slid off the back of the table and onto the grass. It was tragic! We tried to salvage some of it. But it was still heartbreaking for the bride especially.
All in all it was a beautiful wedding, beautiful reception, beautiful couple and I'm so thrilled that I could be there.

BELOW: The happy couple and his family getting ready for a pic.

BELOW: Bryce and John in front of the Mt. Timp Temple

BELOW: Bryce and I waiting outside the temple to greet the new "Ainge" family.

BELOW:  Another happy couple and there sweet boy trying to capture a family picture.

Attempt 1

BELOW:  Attempt 2

BELOW:  Attempt 3

We never did achieve a successful family photo that day. Or since come to think of it. Sad.