Manti Utah Temple Trip

Nicole and I took the day off and drove down to Manti to do a temple session there. I have always wanted to go down there ever since I received my endowments ... and almost got married there .... 7 years ago! And I finally made it down there.

It was the neatest experience. We just took our time as we walked through the temple, admired the workmanship of the pioneers and soaked in the session. There was one room in the temple though.... IT WAS AMAZING!! There were murals on all four walls. And guess who painted them? Minerva Teichert. I loooooove her work. I won't begin to describe them to you because this article that I found on the BYU Studies website goes into great detail on it and even provides some pictures of the murals. But I will say this: those murals added new meaning and insight into the temple session for me and that contributed to my neat experience at the Manti Temple.

After the temple session was over, a temple worker showed us the "Needlepoint" sealing room where sisters in the area made the seat covers by needlepoint and how their names are imprinted on little plaques on the underside of the chairs, and the sealing room where the walls look like they have wallpaper but the pattern is actually painted. And I can't forget to mention the turquoise sealing room .... wow. Oh wow. It was so ornate and beautiful. And then the famous spiral staircases.... the temple worker told us there are only 3 such staircases of that size in the United States and the Manti Temple has 2 of them.

The Big Ouchy

Hooo-ie! Have I got a story to tell you. I took a fall. A hard one. And it was bad enough that I'm not disappointed that I'm out of biking for a little while. Yeah - it was that bad.

There was a race. At Sundance. And I just got a new rear cassette on my bike to make the gears a little more beginner-friendly (aka easier). And there is a big incline (big to beginners) on the course. I've always had to walk it before. But this time I was determined. I was determined to make it up that incline. This time I was also running on 5 hours of sleep. And a spin class in the morning where I already felt the effects of little sleep and a toll on my legs.

I was 2/3 the way up this incline!! I was SO ALMOST THERE!!!! And I was only 1 or 2 miles into the 6-mile race. All of a sudden, I spun out.... I was pedaling like a mad-woman.... but going no where. The incline is on the side of a steep mountain-side. I didn't get clipped out before I started to fall .... and fall down the down-hill side of the steep mountain-side.

After that I did what my body normally does when I'm seeing myself getting hurt. My vision went black... I went limp.... and I don't remember exactly what happened. All I know is I slid down the mountain for 10 or 15 feet and a tree stopped me... I stopped myself with my head - thank goodness for helmets. I had stopped thank goodness. And so I started to get up and drag my bike out of the branches it was stuck in. But then I started to slide down the mountain again so I had to stand against the tree. At that time, the woman that was ahead of me came running back down the trail to see if I was okay. As far as I could tell at the time, I had a lot of scrapes and cuts all over my body, some pretty good ones on my ankle that were already bleeding like a mother, and a lot of dirt in every orifice on my head - as well as down my shirt and shorts.

She helped me drag my bike up to the trail since I did not have the strength to get it done by myself. Once back up on the trail I just sat there for a few minutes. Collected myself. Got the shakes out of my system. Took a little inventory of all my wounds and determined that they were probably just surface flesh wounds, although my ankle ones were bleeding pretty good and beginning to bleed onto my sock and shoe.

But what did I do? I got back on my bike, MUCH MORE TIMIDLY, and finished the race. I wanted to cry when I finished it. I was so glad to be done... and I was really beginning to feel the pain. The first aid guy cleaned me up a bit and then I was feeling better so I went to dinner with some friends.

I also had a sweet visitor bring me a Wendy's Frosty and give me some REALLY nice hugs. :) And then I soaked in the tub for a while to clean out all my wounds. But the big cuts on my ankle were still bleeding. So my nurse friend, Lindsey, came and took a look at my ankle and dressed it. I could have gotten maybe a stitch or two on those two puncture wounds - they were that deep.

And then my ankle and foot really swelled up Thursday at work. So I went to a doc-in-the-box (as my sister calls urgent care facilities) that night - they took x-rays, gave me my first tetanus shot that I remember in forever, and told me I had sprained my ankle too.

So now I'm wearing this awful brace thing on my ankle. It is so hot. I think I'm done wearing it. It just annoys me now! As you can see by the picture of my arm, you can see I also got a pretty bad bruise on my arm. I wish you could have seen it a few days ago - when it was in its prime - black and purple like you wouldn't believe.

So yeah. That's my story. Crazy huh? I'm not really sure how I sprained my ankle, but I did it. Just like me do it too. So wanna guess how many times I've sprained my ankles in the past year? 4 times. 4 times! 2 while mountain biking. 2 just being a klutz and walking wrong. Ugh.

More on Independence Day

Coming back from our backpacking trip on Independence Day was only the beginning of the day for me! As soon as we got back, I got to work unpacking, doing laundry and cleaning up my gear and getting it put away.

Then I worked for two hours in my garden. I HAVE SLUGS IN MY GARDEN!!! They are eating all my strawberries and the leaves on my pea plants. So I decided to finally take the time to research what I can do about them and then wage a ware on them. I cleaned out all the weeds and dead leaves underneath my plants. Then I dug up the ground around the plants, put some rocks around the roots of them and threw some oats around since I hear that will help get rid of the slugs. And then.... be prepared.... I murdered all the slugs I found with salt. Yes. I know. I might have been a little sadistic yesterday afternoon.... but only towards those darn slugs! Slugs that keep eating my garden. I have several slug carcasses in little piles of salt lined up on the wood that borders my garden... let all other slugs be forewarned from entering my garden. Grrrr. :)

After my little murderous rampage, I went mountain biking with some friends up at Lambert Park. Then we came home and I finally got to shower! Just in time to ride our bikes up to campus again to watch the fireworks show from the Stadium of Fire.

And I must be in a little destructo stage right now. Last week I got into a little fender-bender on my street and then last night I totally got knocked into a car by the curb on my bike and put a scratch on this family's van. The family was sooooo nice. The dad told me not to worry about the scratch. I still feel bad though. :( I hope this stage ends soon.

A Little Stream-Crossing, Backpacking Trip

I found an amazing trail up Santaquin Canyon to go hiking/backpacking into! It was so GREEN and lush. And there was a beautiful stream running through it. The canyon was pretty narrow so we had ford through the stream several times. And we found a perfect campground too!

Jed, Jen, and I actually backpacked in and stayed the night, but Wendy and John hung out with us until after dinner on Friday night. We found our campground, set up camp, and then took off to go exploring further up the trails. There were flowers everywhere! And butterflies too. Dozens of them. You just wouldn't believe that it was so green and lush and beautiful up there. And the hike really wasn't too bad. It's a perfect trail to do on a short weekend since it was only a 30 minute drive from our house and about 30 minutes to hike into. Perfect!

My new tent that I bought over the winter when it was on sale was perfect! It was light and kept us dry during the night-time rainstorm we had. We really lucked out with the weather. The weather forecast was really sketchy and calling for rain the whole time we'd be hiking and then supposedly clear up during the night. I'm glad it came through the way it did.

I also bought a water filter and a camp pillow. The pillow - oh the pillow! - was heavenly. That was a good purchase... and the water filter is fun to have now.

And it's a good thing, Jed had his iPod Touch with him. That Monopoly game really saved us from going to bed at 8:30. Ha! It was fun to play. We saw a coyote that night and then a deer in the morning as we hiked out. Boy! Was that stream cold in the morning.