Final El Salvador Post

Finally - the rest of the pics posted.  My sisters and I decided this was a once in a life time experience.  Everything about it was amazing!  Here are my parents and their counselors on either side of them on the front row for the Youth Cultural Celebration.  Amazing!

 Here we are in VIP seating at the Celebration.  We saw three groups of people come and then get ushered out and more important "VIP"s came.  Luckily we got to keep our seats!

 Here is a fabulous YW from El Salvador.  She received her medallion when she was 13.  It was pretty great seeing a yw with her medallion in a foreign country.  All YW across the world are working on personal progress!

 My sister entertaining a young girl with her iPhone.  She was pretty good at it!

 Pres. Eyring speaking.  This was taken without any use of a zoom lens - we were that close!

 At the entrance to the temple at the open house.  Yep, it's in the middle of the rainy season - hence all the tents.

At the entrance to the temple at the dedication.  It was the middle of rainy season - hence all the tents.

 At the sign.

 At the sign with the temple in the background.

 The cornerstone.  Yes, our pictures made it into the cornerstone box - long story.  Don't ask.

 Just hanging out at the temple during the dedication.  It was so fun to walk around and talk to people and just feel of the Spirit.

 This was taken from my parent's kitchen window.  It is the most spectacular view!

 After all three sessions of the dedication.  We finally got to walk around with my parents.  And my dad's stress level had gone down so now he could just enjoy it all!

 Presidente and the Directora!

 The next morning at 5:30am - leaving for the first training and endowment sessions at the temple.

 My dad waving goodbye to us as walked over to the temple.  What an amazing experience.  We love you mom and dad and are so proud of your willingness to serve.  You are wonderful people!

Second Post of Many

My fabulous mother, this was another sneak attack photo.  She is so great!

We ate lunch at the cafeteria on the first floor of their apt building.  After the meal they offered us ice cream. They brought out one dish and served it to my father.  Hmmm, I think he feels the love.  They did eventually bring out more and then some bright red ice cream cones.  Very fun.

This is my attempt to look useful during "cooking" time.  Yes, when I am with my mother and sisters, I let them take over in the kitchen.  Not one of my many talents for sure.

We did a lot of this, sitting and talking.  It's so fun to be all grown up and talk about grown up things and then be able to be silly sisters also.

I have never seen my dad work so diligently on a talk.  He practiced, he revised, he discussed, he studied.  It was wonderful to see.

And if speaking in front of one of the First Presidency wasn't enough, he put on his "dr" hat and took out an ingrown toenail for my sister.  She said it didn't hurt that bad but you couldn't tell by the look on her face.

First Post of Many

So, many of you know my two sisters and I were able to go to El Salvador for the temple dedication. I knew it would be a wonderful trip - a once in a life time. What I didn't count on was all the fun we would have. Three grown women visiting their parents sans children and husbands. Let's just say - it got a bit goofy!

Now, I have done my fair share of world travel - albeit a while ago. Both my sisters currently travel internationally, quite frequently, and we were going to visit our parents. Yet, once we got to the airport in San Salvador - we realized we were woefully unprepared and were actually lucky to make it out alive! But that goes with the pictures a little bit down in the post.

This is all going to be random because I don't have the patience to post all the pictures in the right order - so just go with it.

Here are Jen and I. We were all tucked in bed for the night when a blinding flash of light burned our retinas! Janie had snuck in to take a pic. So that of course woke us up and let the mayhem begin! After we got riled up - we decided to go jump in my parents' bed. They have a beautiful four poster bed with TONS of pillows. Yep - it was like we were little kids again. (See first pic in the post.)

Here we are in at the airport. We got through customs and came to this...an outdoor courtyard with a few authentic food choices and a pizza hut. There were a total of about 12 chairs that were highly prized and you really couldn't get a seat. We were there about 11:30am and my mom wasn't coming until 3pm. Once we were there we realized we didn't have their phone number, address, or a phone that worked internationally...yep three intelligent women were stranded at the airport!
Here is a nice guy who was going to try to call our parents but we only had a skype number for them...didn't work out so well. More waiting. We kept wondering about places to sit and to eat or shop - after all, this was an international airport. Come to find out, if we would have walked about 75 feet down the sidewalk we would have found the indoor waiting area full of shops and restaurants and even air conditioning. We had to laugh - what a great way to start our trip. (Oh - and at customs - we put our destination as the Mormon Temple - the guy thought we were crazy - he just wanted to know which city we were going to...)

Anyway, my parent's did end up coming at 2:30pm and luckily we found each other and we just laughed and laughed all the way to their house. My dad told the Bishop that we were riding with we were a little bit loco - he didn't disagree!

Thanks for all the great memories - Hainey and No-eye! Sure do love you. More to come. Love, Julia!

Back Yard Bash

Our neighborhood does a great party every August - the Backyard Bash. Movie in the park, vb tournament, games for kids, 5k Run, a BBQ. It's very fun. This year my friend and I got a group of girls together to be the Back Yard Bash Dancers. They danced to Party Rock and it was awesome!

John and his team got 2nd in the Golf Tournament. Check out all his loot! I think the hat would have been enough - he loves it!

Here we are ready for the movie in the park. It was on a giant blow up screen - Rio.

Maddie and Jack with Grama in the afternoon during the kids games.

Maddie and Jada were not part of the dance routine - but they were both made-up like they were. Free spirits, those two.

Here they are practicing for the big performance. Her teacher was so great - here she is during "80s day". She was so fun!

El Salvadoor

Well...I didn't take my camera on my trip to El Salvador because I figured I would just use my phone camera - which is what I always use now. Well, in Atlanta, John totally freaked me out and told me to just completely shut off my phone because he didn't want to explain how to turn off my data plan. He was worried we would be charged $80million if I had my data plan running in a foreign country. So, for once, I was very obedient and didn't turn on my phone. So, as a result, I have two picture - both in Atlanta.

The above is of Janie trying to steal the Delta Airlines blanket. She thought if she wore it as a scarf they would not notice it was one of their blankets - even if it did have the Delta logo stitched to the corner! She even told me if I didn't rat her out, I might be lucky enough to get a similar red scarf for Christmas!

Here we are trying to sleep on the floor in the Atlanta airport. Our flight from SLC left at 12:50am and arrived in Atlanta at 6am local time (4am our time) and our connecting flight left at 10am local time. Well, we were exhausted, because instead of sleeping on the plan, we chatted all night. We tried to find a piece of comfy floor and arranged our purses and lumpy pillows to try to catch a few zzzzzzzzz...well, we didn't sleep very well.

Every time I looked over at Janie she seemed to be comfy and sleeping peacefully, she said the same about me. After an hour or so we realized neither was comfy or sleeping, so we went to find some hot chocolate since we were FREEZING and wait it out.

Even with adventured like this, we had a fabulous time. More info to come...

Back To School

Hmmm, I am trying a new app from my phone. The pics turned out weird but oh well.

Maddie eating her After school snack.

Jacee at lunch with some best friends.
Jack's awesome pose before school.

After dad's back to school priesthood blessing.

Yummy treats!
Maddie would not be left out of any pictures. We did get her a new outfit to wear, she put it on for about a minute, declared it itchy, and went to put on her traditional non-matching ensemble.

Our traditional 1st day of school - after school treats.

She looks so grown up - I'm freaking out a little bit.
Maddie insisted on pics with mom and dad. Glad I actually woke up and showered!

Yes, I did go for his first school lunch. I was so glad it was pizza instead of the potato-crusted fish they served today.
Jacee's blessing with dad.

I keep wondering when it is going to be easier for me to send my kids to school. So far I have cried every year. And I miss them so much. They, on the other hand, can't wait to get out the door to the school bus. I should be grateful they love school. I sure love them. At least I still have one more year with Mads.

Off They Go

I went home to help my mom and dad pack up and drive them to the airport. We worked pretty hard all day. We all took a break on the stairs and didn't seem to get back to work very quickly. It always is a daunting task to get them ready to go, but we do it, and they go...

4am - time to leave for the TF airport.

My mom was very good this time and followed all the rules. One was that you could not take a purse if you were carrying on a laptop. Well, we got there and all the other women had purses with them. My mom had packed hers and they were already whisked away with her luggage. The only thing I had in my car was a "U" bag. Here she is transferring her stuff into her make shift purse. When you are desperate, even a "U" Bag will do.

She told me she carried it with the "U" facing the inside most of the time, except the layover in SLC. She figured it was ok there.

My dad trying to work out VISA problems. It seems there is something wrong everytime they fly out of Twin. Luckily this was easily solved and did not cause too much stress.

My mom waving goodbye once she passed through security.

Finally getting ready to go.

I have missed them so much. We haven't really figured out the phone thing so I've only talked with them once. I can't wait to see them next week. I love and miss them so much!