Road Trip Part 2

I don't know why he put her on the roof
of the car... but we had adorable paw prints
on the car the whole trip afterwards.

Not only did we get to go out to Utah for our friend's beautiful wedding, we also got to spend some time with South County Boy's brother and their new little baby girl... which made the drive much easier to tolerate on both our ends.

We took our wonderful little pup along for the ride and she was a perfect little angel all weekend... in fact, several of my sister-in-law's relatives wanted to clone her and take her home with them. I was just proud that it only took her about 5 minutes to calm down and stop barking, even with the 20 plus new people to go around and sniff out. Made me a proud of her.

She didn't even growl too much with their dog Arbo (he's big enough to eat Roxy and has way more energy and always wants to play when Roxy doesn't want to). She also was really great around the little baby and the 10 plus kids that wanted to sit and pet her. Naturally this gives us some really good vibes and feelings that she will hopefully continue to love kids as we consider having one in the near distant future. I think it helped that all the kids were pretty mellow and approached her slowly and let her come to them... she gets scared and defensive when people come at her fast.

Kneaders.... I should buy into this company...

We also went to our favorite bakery and sandwich place... Kneaders......

I think SCB made us eat there each day we were out in Utah... and I say made loosely because you don't have to twist my arm too badly to get me there. Between the errands and our busy schedule I was happy to eat tasty sandwiches and salads from kneaders then junk from a fast food dive. We even came home with 3 loaves of bread for the freezer.

Since we were only in town a few days, we got to running our errands... including hitting up some of the "D.I." locations (Church owned thrift shops similar to goodwill but well organized and cleaner).

I always seem to find something really cute for just a few dollars each time we go. I think it helps that they sort similar colors and styles together to help make browsing easier and more pleasant. Its kind of like shopping in a Ross or a TJ Max and not really a thrift store. Definitely not like the goodwill stores out here in California. I ended up scoring a $6 dress, a $3 top, and another $2 top! 3 items all for $11... I call that a win.  I used my fun money for my clothes so you won't see that appear in the end of the month totals... but since we're talking about Money, lets look at what we spent:

Its the adorable baby!

$124.66 on food... (mostly from kneaders)

$187.19 on gasoline

a few dollars on the toll road... (still waiting for that credit to be reversed... had to call again when we got back from the trip)

$49.23 at Walmart on some odds and ends (including yarn to make the baby girl an adorable polar bear outfit).

So our vacation ended up being $361.19... 

Frankly, it could have been worse since I let the budget reins go and let SCB indulge a bit more. All I can say was it was a nice welcome break from watching everything, especially since we were on vacation. Woot for profit sharing checks and Costco rewards Money. ($100 of which we still have left too!)

I think it was uber helpful that gas in Utah was $3.39 a gallon as apposed to $4.09 when we left California..

We also spent $55.45 at Emergency Essentials because South County Boy really wanted to get a 15 gallon water barrel and some re-chargeable batteries... but that came from our discretionary funds. With all the drought talk in California, he thought it was best to up our water storage and since we were out there already it was going to be tons cheaper to buy it and drive it home then to get it on-line. Our new water barrel is going to live on our patio deck once its filled up.

We also spent $35.54 at Deseret Book out in Utah, but that was a gift for a friend of mine who is getting baptized later this month and the rest was a book on tape so it's getting paid with our discretionary spending.

We also put $50 in a card for a wedding present.

After all the errands, we did a lot of wedding festivities as I mentioned in my other post. The rest of the trip revolved around my sister-in-law's family and this adorable baby girl that was blessed :)

I even changed my very first diaper... it wasn't a poopy one, but I can now say I've changed a diaper. I even got the baby swaddled in a blanket... and I only got spit up on once and even then she fell asleep with me holding her a few times.

It's love I swear it is.

The drive home was pretty brutal... we got back okay, but I crashed at 5 pm without dinner and didn't really get up until SCB left for work at 7pm the next day.

Road Trip part 1

So back when I was investigating the Church (you can read about that story here), we met this really awesome missionary who became more of a friend to us than anything else. On his insistence, I became friends with his girlfriend through Facebook, then his mom.... then his grandma... 

He was there when I was baptized, we had him and his companion over for Thanksgiving and later watched him Skype with his parents at Christmas time. 

We visited Utah and met up with his girlfriend in person and South County Boy relished the moment when he tortured him with pictures of his real life and missionary life clashing. Heck, SCB would even text his girlfriend while he was at our condo just hoping that she'd respond back while he was over at our house so he could tease him.    

When he left our area like missionaries eventually do, he later got transferred over to the singles ward and since our home was again in the boundaries, we had him and his companion over for dinner once more. 

When our Sealing was announced we got word to him through our current missionaries and he got special permission to come and be there. Before he left to go home for good,we got the privilege of going to the temple with him and his grandparents (they arranged it with the Mission President since they were only an hour or two north from us and wanted to see him state side).

So needless to say, we became pretty good friends over the course of the year we knew him. 

When he went home back in November, he got engaged to his girlfriend and we were very honored to get a wedding invite to help celebrate their occasion! Since they were getting Sealed (Married) out in Utah near SCB's family, we road tripped and crashed with family nearby.

While it was a short trip and we wished we could have stayed longer, it was wonderful. 

Mount Timpanogos Temple in Utah.
Check out that moon, its just as bright as the temple, right? 

We ran some errands the first day or so we where there. While we were out picking up a few things at a Church Bookstore, we bumped into his soon to be wife and asked/got invited to go to the temple with them the night before for her endowment ceremony. We had already planned to go to a temple either that night or Saturday morning before my sister-in-law's baby blessing, so it was perfect timing.   

Me outside of the Draper Temple in Utah.

Having fun while waiting for the bride and
groom to make their grand appearance. 

The next morning we attended their sealing at the Draper temple in Utah. I hadn't been to that temple either and it was such a pretty and wonderful ceremony. I think I was nearly as happy to see them get married then I was when SCB and I were sealed together back in August. We waited outside the temple and walked around the grounds with family and friends while they changed for their grand exit. 

The temple was back in the mountains and had some really pretty views, but nothing was as excited as seeing the happy couple come out!

Later that night we met up with them for the reception with the rest of their friends and family. It was my first full Mormon wedding and it sure set the bar for what I hope SCB and my future kiddos will want to have one day.

It was like other weddings I've attended with dinner, dancing, flower and guarder toss, cake smashing.... but it was also really mellow and everyone goofed off and had a great time.

Toll Road Account Fix

So, we're going out of town! Our friends are getting married and my sister-in-law has an adorable baby that's getting blessed so we are Utah bound!

Normally we pay cash when we use the toll roads to get to Utah since it saves us a good stretch of sanity... but in May the Toll Roads will be going cash less... and we aren't transponder people since we use it so infrequently.

Right now there are a lot of free credits for signing up (promo codes), and I recently designed an ad for work with a toll road promo code on it for $30 FREE dollars so we decided to go ahead and get a prepaid account set up because it would make our trip free.

Unfortunately when I set up my account I was automatically charged $60 and didn't receive my free $30 of credit. I called their customer service center and after waiting on hold about 5 minutes I got a very friendly Ann on the phone and we got to the bottom of it.

She told me they would get my $30 of free credit set up in the next day or so since it was after business hours when I called. She also told me that they will refund the balance of the $60 charged (minus what we will be using for this trip) back to my credit card. (Since we will be driving out at 2 am they won't have the credit in place by the time we drive through the lanes so we will get around $50 credited back at the end of the trip)  She will also change the amount of the auto charge to $30 when our balance goes down to $10 instead of a $60 charge when our balance hits $20.

A simple 5 minute phone call and we will have our $30 of free toll money for a future trip and a much nicer auto pay and no transponder or maintenance fees.

That my friends is a customer service win!