Minneapolis, Minnesota -- Temple and State Fair

Glen has been spending a lot of time in Minneapolis, Minnesota lately. That is where his corporate office is located.

He has been asked to head up a team to work on centralizing all the company's data (or something like that) (he can explain it much better) (just ask him all about it next time you see him). I have been calling him a "special agent for G&K" since he started this project way back in May.

He travels out of town every single week. For all those weeks. And for many more weeks to come.

Finally the time came for me to see where he works, meet his team members and explore a little of the area where he's spending so much of his time.

I arrived in Minneapolis the Thursday evening before the Labor Day weekend. Glen surprised me (the ladies on his team suggested the idea) by taking the next day off. Totally shocked me coming from Mr. Workaholic!!! But he can shock me like that any day of the week!! I did the math and came up with a full 4-day holiday weekend for him to spend every minute with me! Heavenly!!!!!

Turned out Friday was a very rainy day so we decided to go to the temple. Look at this awesome picture we got before it started to rain.

Glen was very anxious to watch the BYU football game that evening. He associates wings with sporting events. It was a torrential downpour when we got to the restaurant. I stayed dry inside the car while he ran in to get his take-out order.

 Look how happy he is after eating those wings and watching the ball game.

 Saturday proved to be the perfect weather day for us to go to the Minnesota State Fair.

Apparently 252,090 other people also thought it was a great day to attend the fair. It was wall-to-wall people. We have since learned that day broke the all-time high of number of people attending the fair on a single day. Weren't we so lucky to be part of that record-breaking statistic?

There were some interesting things for sale. Lots of different kinds of food for people to eat. At the Cheese Curds place, the people chose Mouse Hole #1, Mouse Hole #2, Mouse Hole #3 or Mouse Hole #4 to place their order.

Glen's team members were flabbergasted when they learned we had spent the entire day at the fair and did not buy one single thing to eat. We hear that's one of the main reasons people go to the fair--to eat the food.

Honestly, even if I weren't on a super restricted diet, I wouldn't have wanted to eat any of the food we saw. Looked totally disgusting to both of us.

We stopped to watch a silly play being performed by two chickens and one rooster.

It was pretty much the dumbest thing we ever saw, but at least we got to rest a few minutes sitting in the rocking chairs.

Glen heard about the tractor exhibit and wanted to make sure we saw them.

Inside a refrigerated glass cubicle we watched an artist making a butter sculpture.

The bonsai exhibit was beautiful. It's amazing how many years some of those things have been growing.

Just a little state fair humor.

Some displays by county.

Never have I seen so many ears of corn before--all looking pretty disgusting if you ask me. How do the judges ever decide which cob deserves the blue ribbon?

The show horses had their tails and manes all braided. They all had glitter sprinkled on their rumps. Weird! It's supposed to make them look all sparkly when they perform.

Here's a little tidbit of information I didn't know--about how much water a cow drinks every day.

 Just saw a fake cow and now these are the real thing.

 Goats. No--the one on the left did not get its ears cut off. That kind of goat is born with no ears.

Cock-a-doodle-dooooo!!!

We hurried back to the other side of the fairgrounds to see the lumberjack show.

By that time we were tired of walking and we were hungry. (See above where we didn't eat any of the fair food.) So we called it a day.

We knew we had picked a great restaurant when we saw the size of the shrimp we ordered for appetizers.

What a great way to end a very fun day.

Color Run and a Hostage Situation

Sarah and Ben decided to do a color run together. People throw colored chalk on the runners as they are participating in the race. This is what they looked like when they got home.

Ben informed me the exhaust fan is now red in the upstairs bathroom Sarah used. That is proof of why I wasn't excited they were going to be cleaning up after the run at our house. Guess I will give Sarah a cleaning job next time she comes to visit...

Here are the cute Excell family members (and Glen) enjoying a movie together.

 If you call the expressions on these boys' faces looks of enjoyment.

After Rebecca's family was here visiting one day, we noticed a few of their things had been left behind. Namely: Rebecca's seam ripper, Brooke's stuffed bear and Madison's beaded pacifier clip.

Speaking of Madison--she can now sit up all by herself.

Since Brooke is so attached to her bear, we decided we better notify the Golden family to let them know about bear. We worried Brooke may need bear to sleep with that evening.

That is when the wheels started turning in Ben's head about a clever way to clue the Goldens in about what had been left at our house.

Thus, the ransom note idea was born and boy did Ben run with it!! His face lit up as he scurried around collecting the necessary items and quickly got busy cutting and pasting to make it look authentic.

Then the staging of the photo became the next most important thing to do.

He put a blindfold on bear. He used the pacifier clip to tie up his hostage. He positioned the seam ripper to look like a weapon threatening bear if she made any wrong moves. (I did worry about the seam ripper looking a bit too scary for Brooke.)

Next Ben got busy taking pictures of the hostage and the ransom note so he could post it on Instagram for the Golden family to see.

We wondered when Dallas or Rebecca would notice the picture and we didn't have to wait long. Dallas saw it, showed it to Brooke and she began insisting they make brownies right away.

The seam ripper was a bit horrifying for Brooke as she did not want Ben to start pulling bear apart.

After some hostage negotiating such as deciding the drop off location and issuing the instructions to "come alone or an arm comes off," Rebecca's comment was "Maybe Ben's true calling in life is as a hostage negotiator. Or a terrorist."

There were definitely some good laughs at poor Brooke's expense. Once the items were delivered back to their rightful owners, we were happy to see a picture appear on Instagram of Brooke wearing a relieved, happy smile as she tightly hugged her favorite stuffed animal. She definitely considers bear a member of her family.

New Ogden Temple

One day my parents took me with them to see a movie. It was very good and I gave it a two thumbs up rating. I would have given it four if only I had four thumbs.

I was a little surprised by the view as we stepped out of the movie theater. Looking directly north I could see the new Ogden Temple.

The newly-remodeled temple doesn't look anything like the Ogden Temple where Glen and I were married.

I took advantage of the invitation to go to the Ogden Temple open house with my parents another day.

 I went back again when we took our Young Women to the open house.

Glen and I were both able to attend the dedication of the original Ogden Temple and we both got to be in the actual temple during the dedication. It was in 1972 when we were teenagers and hadn't even met yet. Who knows--we might have been in the temple at the same time way back then.

We definitely were in the original Ogden Temple at the same time on February 9, 1978.

This Sunday we will once again be able to attend the Ogden Temple dedication. We won't be inside the temple on 22nd Street in Ogden, we will be in our own chapel watching one of the three rededication sessions that will be broadcast.

Glen and I looked forward to going together to the Ogden Temple 36 years ago and we are looking forward to going there together once again.

Family Dinner in Andy and Amanda's Amazing Backyard

It was questionable for a while if the weather was going to cooperate with the family dinner we had planned when Mark and Michelle's family were in town.

Thankfully it cleared up right before the party and we were able to have a successful dinner.

I was missing Glen. He has been working every week in Minnesota since the third week of May. Sounds like that will continue to be his schedule for many more months to come.

Caroline and Rachel were doting on Madison.

Caleb and Spencer were best buddies all evening.

Andy and Amanda not only grilled chicken for us, but they made homemade ice cream for dessert. One of the ice cream makers was not motorized, so various family members took turns cranking the handle.

When Preston was at the crank, I challenged him to crank it so fast that his hand wouldn't show up in the picture.

Such a fun swing set!

Nani even had to give it a try; thereby proving why she is such a beloved aunt to her nieces and nephews.

The chicken coop was a popular hang out for the children.

Time for birthday singing and candle blowing out...

 ...for Brooke,

 ...for Caroline,

 ...for Caleb,

 ...for Samantha,

 ...and for Kenna. I hope I remembered all the birthday people who were there.

It was a super nice evening. Much thanks go out to Andy, Amanda and their family for hosting!!