Pioneer Trek

On May 21st and 22nd my stake went on a trek! Friday I got dressed in my pioneer garb that I still have from when I made it for Youth Conference. (I knew it would come in handy sometime.) Those in the ward going on the trek met in front of the Taj and loaded up cars and took sweet before pictures. We drove for 45 min (that's what they told us it would be, but it felt longer, so I don't know how long we actually drove) to get to the other side of Utah Lake to an LDS ranch designed specifically for handcart treks. There were senior missionaries there and everything. The stake leaders talked to us and gave us instructions at the beginning, and then we loaded up all our handcarts. Our ward had probably 29 or so people, so 3 families and 3 handcarts. I was the Ma of one, but it didn't really give me any special responsibilities. We have the highest ward number numerically in the stake, so we were last in the "wagon" train. Every few miles there were porta-potties, which was nice. We stopped and ate lunch that we had each packed. We took turns pushing and pulling the cart so we could all get the experience. [Here's Dave (Pa), Christina, and Angie. Then it's Becca. Then it's all them together.]

[This is Angie and Jessica from my family. Randy, Ben, and Ariel are pulling for the next family behind us.] A few other times that we took short breaks we also shared pioneer stories from our ancestry. It was cool hearing the different stories from our ward with different people having pioneer ancestors who crossed the plains and people who had just barely been baptized a few years ago. [Sean, Ie Ling, and Jessica pull while Ryan holds our ward's orange flag.] I think we did about 10 miles that day. [This last picture shows how we accidentally lost some Cheese-Its along the way. However, after eating dirt in the wind all day, we figured it wouldn't hurt to eat a few off the ground! Brother Wilson led the group in bending over for a little snack. And boy were they tasty!] We stopped and set up camp. Our ward won the tent war, 'cause we had some HUGE tents. As we were cutting up food to put in the dutch ovens for dinner, it started raining. [From L to R: Ie Ling, Zach, Jessica, Christina, Kyra in back, and Angie.] We hurried and finished and ran back to the tent.

[Nicole's taking a little nap-i-poo after a long day.] It pretty much quit raining, but it was very windy for a while. After eating, our ward played a big game of "I have never" where the person in the middle says something they've never done and if you've done it you have to get up and change chairs. Bishop Richards drove in for the night and Bro. Wilson (2nd Counselor) had been there with us all day, and it was pretty funny seeing them get so into the game and start knocking each other and us down to get a chair. There was a dance that night, but the DJ was playing lame music and it was too dark and dusty to be much fun. So I went back to our campsite early to find that half of the ward had the same idea and were already sitting around a campfire there. We talked for a little bit before the wind started picking up and it began to rain again. After the mad dash to the tents, it was a glorious sleep filled with trying to get comfortable and trying to ignore the loud sounds of the tent flapping and the rain falling.

Saturday morning we were very chilly and did not want to come out of our sleeping bags. Luckily, the guys were rill nice and cooked us breakfast. After we ate and loaded the carts up again, we were on our way. [It was an art to get it all balanced just right!] We were tired of being in the back of the train, so we cut in line. We opted to take the optional fork that led us to the Women's Pull. [Christina, Jess, and Angie up front.] It was a 1/2 mile of tilled ground (which was only made all the softer with all the rain overnight) that we pulled through. [I'm at the back pushing.] That was the part of the trek where I felt the Spirit the strongest, and it was a very cool experience. The guys just walked next to us and cheered us on (and took pictures, of course). [Here's a better view of Becca (at the far side) and me pushing.] Our cart was the first in our ward, and when we finished we looked back and saw that the other two carts were having a lot of trouble so we ran back to help them so that they wouldn't have to ask the guys to help. What a neat experience! Somehow we missed the fork that took us across water (we just blindly followed the ward in front of us, I guess), so we were all kind of bummed that we missed that part of the experience. [Lindsey rolled her ankle literally feet from the end, so she's sitting down with her foot in a bucket of ice water. Eve's rubbing her shoulders, then it's Zach, Randy, Tucker, Nicole, and Kyra.] We only did probably 3 or 4 miles that day, so it wasn't a very long trek overall. [Some wardies chillin' afterward. Tyler's in the back, with Becca, Stephanie, Ryan, Dave, and Alexay around the "circle."] We had some fruit and donuts before heading home. It was a really fun experience overall, and I recommend doing a pioneer trek at least once in your life if you haven't already.

What have been your experiences with pioneer treks?

Legal

Finally!! The car is officially legal. Remember this? I fixed it! It only took me months and months and months, but I feel accomplished. After getting the tint taken off the front windows and a lighter tint put back on, after getting new wiper blades, after getting the safety inspection done, after getting the emissions test done, after visiting the DMV and getting rejected since only Mom's name was on the Texas title, after getting a special permission letter and signature from Mom, after visiting the DMV and getting Mom a new Utah title, after putting the decals on the plates and switching them out on the car, and after many sessions of complaining to Mom (sorry!), the car is finally legal.

Unfortunately, that means the car no longer has Texas plates.


Today, I believe the weather echoed my mood about said situation because it was rainy and overcast. Don't worry, though. I did leave some proof of Texas on the car!
Now I just gotta get a Utah DL and become a Utah resident, register to vote in Utah, get the oil changed, and buy a new jack for the car. Ah, the joys of moving.

Promise of Eternity

Sometimes I just can't wait for the future to come already. I see fun boyfriends/girlfriends and it makes me feel lonely. I see missionaries who are helping people find the truth and it makes me want to go out right now and serve as a full-time missionary. I see cute, newly married couples and it makes me want a husband right now. I see people who are on the hunt for a real job now that they've graduated, and it makes me wish I had a reason to be so brave in my own life. I see middle-aged couples with four kids and it makes me want to be a mom. I see wise grandparent-type people and it makes me want to spoil my very own grandkids.

And then, I remember this...

“Some of us look forward to a time in the future – salvation and exaltation in the world to come – but today is part of eternity.” -- President Uchtdorf

"Give me a young woman who is virtuous and who has maintained her personal purity, who will not settle for anything less than a temple marriage, and I will give you a young woman who will perform miracles for the Lord now and throughout eternity." — President Ezra Taft Benson

What great thoughts! Don't thoughts of eternity just make you want to jump for joy? I know that's what I want to do.

Tulip Festival

Jennifer and I went to the Tulip Festival at Thanksgiving Point. I wanted to go ever since I saw the pretty pictures others had taken while they were there last year. Luckily for me, Jennifer kept reminding me about it so that I didn't miss the opportunity. In fact, we just ended up going together and taking a bunch of fun pictures! I wish I had room for more on this post (I guess my pictures are such big files that they take up too much space to have more that 5 pictures per post). It was really cold and thus deserted while we walked around. We had mucho funo, though.

Being Blakes, we had to do a typical imitate the statue picture!
Jen made me pose for this one.

Idn't my sister a cutie? She's available!

Nature is rill nice and rill perdy.

We were missing our "special someones." Any takers?
Thanks for the fun, Jen!

Kickin' Butt! I mean... Cookin' Butt!

A few weeks ago as I was getting ready for bed (after midnight), we ran out of toilet paper in our bathroom. I went, as usual, to the closet where we keep extra TP and such, and found a horrific sight. We were completely OUT of toilet paper!
"Kara! What do we do? We're out of toilet paper!!"
"Did you check in the bathroom downstairs?"
"Yeah, and there's not any in the cupboard down there, either. Even the roll down there is bare!" (We often forget to keep that bathroom stocked since we don't use it a ton. Sorry, visitors.)
"Uh...."
"I guess I'll grab a roll of paper towels that we can use..."
When I pulled out the roll, I experienced great disappointment as I envisioned my future bathroom trips until we could get to the store to buy TP. I mean, do you remember how awful it was to have to blow your nose on those hard, brown paper towels in elementary school? I had a feeling that paper towels instead of TP were going to have a similar effect. Then, another emotion came to mind when I looked more closely at the roll of paper towels: Concern.Look closely at what the paper towels say! Hmmmm.....

p.s. Luckily I think I only had to use the bathroom one more time before we were able to buy real toilet paper.