Happy Pioneer Day

 Here in Utah there is a state holiday commemorating when the pioneers arrived into the Salt Lake Valley. This year Jenna and I walked in the Ivins City parade with the Lee Ann Riddoch campaign again. Jenna did a great job waving, though she was busy eating popsicles and candy that everyone kept giving her. Though, the highlight for her was meeting all the Disney Princesses, especially Rapunzel who she got to take a picture with.

 After the parade we stopped for some breakfast at Cravings. Delish as always! Jenna, of course, had soup. Because who doesn't love a steaming cup of broccoli cheese first thing in the morning. 

And then we headed up to Zion National Park to see if we could claim a first come, first serve camping spot for all of us to go camping tonight. I couldn't believe it, as we were driving through the campground there was a doe with her two baby fawns. I swear, I could have reached out and touched them. We've spent a lot of time in Zion and I have never seen them this close before. 

Well, gotta go get ready for tonights camping trip. xoxo

Cotton Days Parade

A few weeks ago I went to a campaign meeting for the democratic candidate for our utah house district 74. Her name is Lee Ann Riddoch, and the next thing I knew, I was the treasurer for her campaign. It's just another small way I can get involved and so far it's working out really well. All of the democratic candidates we walking in Washington City's Cotton Days Parade this morning. Jenna was absolutely darling, waving at everyone and swinging her pinwheel around. So cute. 

After the parade we spent a little time at the carnival. Jenna was loving the blow up obstacle course. Though, she still gets a little overwhelmed when other kids join her and started passing her by.  

I'm A Democratic Delegate!

So on Monday, April 16th I went to a luncheon for local democrats. The President of the Washington County Democratic Party happened to mention during the lunch that they still had spots open in our district to be a delegate for the Utah Democratic Party. So after the luncheon I approached her and said I would be interested in helping out and the next thing you now I'm at the Utah Democratic Party State Convention to place my votes in the primaries to which candidates we were going to send out into the world to run for various positions. It was a bit overwhelming, and I was very grateful that I had Casey's mom and aunt there to kind of lean on. They have both been delegate for a few years now and were a huge help in getting situated with the process and knowing which caucus to attend and the roles of the caucus'. I chose to attend the women's caucus and the stonewall caucus. They were both very interesting and it was interesting to see how they each had their own way of deliberating if and who to endorse. The whole day was such a great learning experience and I was really proud to be a part of it. 

 My mother-in-law, Lorrie and me

Below is my MiL's dog. (His name is Boo Radley, in case you were wondering) They, Lorrie and Boo, have a very co-dependent relationship, that I don't fully understand. Which is okay, I didn't understand a lot of parents until I became one myself. So, all that being said, throughout the entire morning of the state convention she was obsessed with me checking in with Casey on how Boo was doing. Asking me to text him asking to remind him to speak kindly to Book, wanting to make sure that he had defecated, that he had been out for a walk, to remind Casey that Boo was her precious baby boy. All of these being separate texts. I finally told her I was not going to discuss this topic again. Casey in response sent me the proof of life picture for his mom. {As well as proof of taking a s@%t, but I will spare you that picture.}

We spent Sunday enjoying the park and having a BBQ at Aunt Val and Uncle Larry's. Jenna got to try hitting a ball off the tee and she was phenomenal! Casey nearly exploded with pride, especially since she was batting lefty. Funny the things men find fabulous. 

And yesterday we continued our tradition of hitting up the tulip festival at Thanksgiving Point. Jenna was fabulous until we tried to take a group picture. She was bound and determined to swim in the fountain and as that was not an option, this was the consequence of being told no. Good times.

As we were wrapping up Jenna starts quoting Russell from Disney's "Up". As he and Carl are dragging the house through the wilderness, his whine begins, "I'm tired. My knee hurts..." Only Jenna changed up the words just a bit. So for the 30 minutes, in the sing song voice, Jenna crooned, "I'm NOT tired." It was hysterical! Wish I had a video, not just the pictures.  

Washington DC

Casey & I took his mom Lorrie to Washington DC for the Inauguration of President Obama. It was a pretty incredible experience. Certainly once in a lifetime. We arrived (after a red eye flight to NYC and then driving to DC) Sunday afternoon. We didn't even attempt to make it down to the concert. We spent Sunday lying pretty low. Our hotel had a kitchenette, so we did a little grocery shopping and went out to dinner. Monday we got up early and headed out. The Metro station was absolute madness. (Little did we know the next day was going to be worse) We waited in this crazy line to buy our Metro passes. However, while in line, something fantastic happened. We met this darling girl, Nancye (she was just a little younger than me, but woman sounds so old) Nancye ended up being a life saver. She's living in Park City working for the US Ski & Snowboarding Assoc. She, like our group, got tickets to the Inauguration from Senator Bennett. But the bonus was that she had interned for a Senator and had lived in DC. She knew right where to go and a few shortcuts to make it happen. Like I said, life saver. Anyway, with the assistance of the lovely Nancye, and despite a slight altercation between my mother in law and a pro-lifer where some profanity was rallied about, we made it to the Senate office buildings, where we stood in yet another line, it will end up being the theme of the trip. We got our tickets for the Silver ticket area and went on our way. We spent the rest of the day on the Mall. We shopped a lot, watched MSNBC film Hardball with Chris Matthews, and took in some of the memorials. We ran into this woman who decided not to bring her three year old daughter. And since her daughter couldn't be there she stood all day long on the Mall getting people to sign a book; leave a message if you would like, where you were from, all for her daughter. She would then take your picture and mark which picture number corresponded with which signature. (Just a little side bar, they ran out of hot chocolate at the refreshment stand on the mall at 7:30 pm the night BEFORE the Inauguration. How are you not better prepared than that?) It was a great day. Every person you ran into was positive, happy, freezing, considerate, respectful. The energy was absolutely amazing. I was surprised how many non-Americans had come. They just wanted to be a part of history. The next morning we left the hotel at 6:30. It took us 5 hours to get from our hotel next to BWI to the Capital. That is just insanity. It took us an hour and half in line just to get on the Metro. The thing was a really cool hour and a half. The group was singing patriotic songs, with the police officer standing on the road above us leading the singing. There was a woman, outlandishly dressed chanting, "Rosa sat so that Martin could walk. Martin walked so Obama could run. Obama won so that our children could fly." She was convinced that each time she said it the line would move. We rode the Metro with a Chicago Tribune writer and Political Analysis, Clarence Page. He was so nice. He was writing notes of our conversation. It was totally surreal. Once we arrived in DC it was utter chaos. I have to never seen or experienced crowds like this. When we got off the Metro, there was no Silver ticket entrance directions. We were flying a little blind, and each officer, secret service, national guardsmen, we asked told us to go somewhere else. The had street after street barricaded. We finally arrived at what we thought was the correct entrance only to find it wasn't and once again the way was blocked. I felt like we were in a rat maze with no exit. We finally did find the proper entrance only to find it was closed for some unknown reason. The crowd was chanting, "Two, four, six, eight. Open up the f*%#ing gate." Which they did, and the three of us got swooped up into this rushing crowd. You couldn't lift your arms past your side and got moved against your will. That was when I had had enough! The Utah Congressional Delegation was hosting a reception on the top floor of the Hart Senate Building. So we went there and watched the ceremony on Fox News (God help us). But we were warm, and relatively away from the crowds. We had an amazing view of W leaving on Marine One. We had hot chocolate and snacks. We also ran into Nancye there. Her group had tickets even closer than ours. Their entrance was closed because the metal detectors had broken down. So they nearly missed the ceremony as well. Even with the disappointment of not getting in, the energy in the room was still so great. Hope, excitement, pride, patriotism, it was all there. After the Swearing in, everyone that was outside came in from the cold and the room got quite crowded. So we took off. My claustro had had enough for one day and I went back to the hotel. Casey and Lorrie attempted to see a little more. They did get to see the staging area for the parade and spent a little more time on the Mall. I can tell you we all slept very well that night. We flew home the next day and were all quite grateful to have had the experience.