Viva la Salt Lake City

Last week Spencer had to attend a work related Engineering Forum in Salt Lake. Brynlee and I tagged along for the trip because:

a. Four days without Spencer would make for a very, very long week.
b. Any get-a-way is a welcomed get-a-way.
c. Salt Lake is only 20 minutes away from Draper, Utah home of IKEA! I don’t believe anybody can say cheap Swedish décor without getting somewhat excited?

Since Spencer had to spend most of his time in different conferences and forums, Brynlee and I enjoyed a ton of mommy-daughter time. We went to the Hogle Zoo, Liberty Park, and The Gateway Discovery Museum. However, had I known when I paid my $18.00 to get me and my two year old into the museum (ridiculous, I know) that it was local Elementary School Field trip day I might have saved my money for something where there was a few less 5-8 year olds. Brynlee still had a great time though and loved the child size house, market and cars.

Discovery Museum

Hogle Zoo

Brynlee was even pretty well behaved at the Gateway Mall, but that was only if I stopped by the fountains and water shows every 10 minutes which made for a very long shopping trip.
Spencer was able to escape from the lecture torture long enough for us to meet up with two of his younger sisters and their little families at the BrickOven in Provo. We had a great time visiting with them. Brynlee’s highlight of the night was the Balloon Man who managed to create a balloon rendition of Ariel from “The Little Mermaid.”

I have to add that there were more family and friends that we would have loved to get in touch with, but we had a small cell phone accident prior to the trip. At no fault of my own, Spencer’s cell phone decided to go skinny dipping in the washing machine. Although it was squeaky clean after its soak, it didn’t seem to work with the same efficiency as it did prior. And by not the same efficiency I mean, not at all. I have been telling myself lately that I needed to make sure that all of the numbers were saved in both of our phones, but like a lot of other things just hadn’t gotten to it yet.

I am starting to think that washing something of importance prior to a trip makes any trip complete, seeing how before last trip I managed to wash Spencer's wallet.

Although Spence had to spend most of his time in the conference room at the hotel, he still managed to have a little excitement by winning the drawing for the iPod Shuffle. I'm not sure if it made the lectures worth it, but it did help shave off a little of the boredom that he had to suffer.