April Trip to Utah!

So glad that we were able to be in the Provo City Center Temple for the wedding of Claire and Trevor.  It is a beautiful temple!

And a beautiful couple!

Some really cute attendants!

And not too shabby attendees!

Reid and Kathy with some of their grandchildren.

We enjoyed the reception that evening.

Always fun to anticipate catching the bouquet!

We finally got to meet Zeus!

We also got to spend some time with Aubrey and Bethany and John at the Discovery Gateway Children's Museum in Salt Lake City.

They enjoyed being car mechanics!

And shopping at the grocery store!

Trying out sitting up on a life size horse!

We were there just in time for the peregrine falcon show!

But I think their favorite was the Saving Lives exhibit with a real helicopter.

Best way to describe it from the website:

The Saving Lives exhibit features an authentic Life Flight Helicopter, a kid-sized Primary Children’s Emergency Department, and a Life Flight Rescue Hangar. Put your rescue skills to the test as a nurse, surgeon, image tech, pilot, paramedic, command center staff, hoist operator, or an engine mechanic.

They had a lot of fun here!

Another great trip in the books!

This and That in April!

The roses started blooming!

The Melanchuks went on a mystery outing to Stanford to watch BYU play volleyball.

Nathaniel made friends with the players!

Hannah got to see Wicked!

MaryAnn and Brian had a fun 2-night getaway to Lake Tahoe!

On Saturday the 16th we had the Melanchuks here and some of the Perrys for an Easter Saturday dinner.  I didn't take any pictures but we had a lot of fun and I think it was delicious.  I did take a picture of this: Grandpa was serving dessert and they had a choice of Lemon Cake or Strawberry Cake or a small piece of both.  Here is the list he made to keep track!

A  Koob tournament was in progress with one on one. (Maybe an idea for our Reunion?)  Not sure who the final winner was.  As you can see Grandpa also used the paper to figure out some Wordles!

Andrea and her girls attended a BTS concert in Las Vegas on April 9th.

We got to hear all about it on Sunday evening and they had a very fun time!

Sam entered the Provo MTC on Wednesday, April 6th.  On Sunday he got to meet up with Howard and Lissa Bangerter who serve there.  They sent us this picture.

General Conference was in April and the Perrys invited us for Conference pancakes!

It was a big month for Peter!  He was put on the liver transplant list on a Thursday and on the following Tuesday they notified them that they had a liver for him!  

The surgery was in the middle of the night April 13th to 14th and took about 9 hours!

He was released from the hospital on April 25th and will be in Kansas City for a couple of weeks at least.

We had a very nice Easter Sunday.  Hope everyone enjoyed their bouquet!

Love this picture of the McClellans on Easter Sunday in front of all the blossoms!

Here we are on Easter Sunday!

The month of April ended with a tornado touching down in Andover and doing a lot of destruction in that community.  Charles was at a store and Elizabeth was at work at Crumbl.  

Charles took this picture from where he was and could tell it was in Andover.  He phoned Sarah and Camille at home and told them to get down in the basement.

This is a Spanish teacher and the XC coach for Sarah and Elizabeth.  Courtney knows the teacher as well. They are standing in front of the remains of their home in Andover.   Next door neighbors are members of their ward and their house also looks like this. 

Heidi said people are donating money and clothes and that Elizabeth helped with some clean up at a friend's house.  It reminded me of this quote:

“When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, "Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.”

― Fred Rogers

 

Strataca Salt Mine!

The United States has 16 salt mines but only one is open to tourists and has a museum.   It's the Strataca Salt Mine near Hutchinson, Kansas which we visited with Jeff's family.

We learned a lot of interesting things!

The Hutchinson Salt bed underlies about 37,000 square miles and averages about 250 feet thick.

They even had this posted:  Matthew 5:13 "Ye are the salt of the earth." 

We travelled down the Hoist which is a 90 second ride to 650 feet below.  We walked through some massive underground tunnels wearing hard hats.  That's Eleanor.

Here's Peter.

We watched several interesting videos about how they mine salt and about the lives of the miners who spend so much time underground.  On some shifts and at certain times of the year they never see the sun.  We rode on two different tram tours.  Obviously it is very dark underground so they lighted the things to observe.  And at one point they turned out all the lights.

Salt crystal and other minerals in the mine wall

This is a picture of our shadows on the face of the wall.

Interesting formations:

There are frequent stops to point out the formations, exhibits and abandoned equipment. Since everything brought into the mine is left in the mine (No sense going to the time or expense of bringing it back up), the mine is a bit of a time capsule.  Here is a garbage pile.

Even this car was left down there.

Near the end of the dark ride, there is a stop where everyone is allowed to get off the tram, sort through a pile of rock from the active salt mine and select a rock to take home as a souvenir of their visit.  Most of the salt they mine is used for salting roads during the winter. 

Part of the mine is owned by the Underground Vaults and Storage Company.  It is a constant 68 degrees with 45% humidity so it is an ideal place for storage.  There are 26 acres of storage in a secure area but they have a mock up of what that area looks like with some costumes used in famous movies on display.  They store original camera negatives of many movies including Gone With The Wind, TV shows, medical records, oil and gas records and other valuable documents from the United States and other countries who contract for storage.

What a fascinating place!