Gita's Utah Trip: Logan Temple and City Cemetery

After sleeping in as long as we wanted, we watched General Conference as we got ready to head out the door. I asked Karina to curl Gita's hair and had to laugh as she struggled a bit. Every day I'm styling at least four heads of hair- five if I'm feeling motivated and do my own! Katrina is a bit out of practice. I think she had fun though.

Remember those brightly colored balloons in the pictures with the Up house? I wanted to deliver them to my dear friend who has been quarantining like crazy. She didn't want a full on visit so I thought I would just leave them at her door. However, her sons were outside so I asked them to take them to her. They looked at me funny, it's like I could hear the 'Stranger Danger' screaming in their heads. Then when I pulled out the balloons that had been in the trunk, they just sunk in a depressing heap. I couldn't have looked more creepy. Slowly the entire family came out to say hi and we had a quick socially distanced conversation. It did me a lot of good to see them, even for a short time.

We needed some ribbon for the flowers we were taking to the grave of Kathrine Birgette and wouldn't you know we ran into another Katrina while we were there? My sister insisted we take a photo with her which is such a Katrina thing to do! Gita and I also grabbed a huge pack of flavored chap sticks because our lips were drying out no matter how much water we drank. 

Because the Chicago temple was closed for renovation, Gita didn't get to take her baptism photos there. I packed her dress and we set aside some time to walk around the Logan temple grounds. 

Of course the gates were closed and locked, so this is as close as we could get!

Let's look at that a little closer:

 Katrina made sure to get photos of the two of us, which I always forget to do! Nuzzling noses:

Cuddling:

Gita booped me:

Brent's parents were married here as well as Adam Noah and Kathrine Birgetta. She also did a lot of temple work here so this is a special place on both sides of the family.

Katrina wanted Gita to reach as high up on those gates as she could so she lifted her up and they ended up laughing a lot about the whole thing. It was cute.

Our suitcase was so full, it didn't make sense to also pack a pair of Sunday shoes just for some quick pictures so I let her go barefoot. Somehow that is so fitting for this little girl.

Gita loved being able to feel the cool grass on her feet.

Just a couple more photos from the back side of the temple. This one is my favorite! Gita swung her barefoot back...

...and forth.

She finally got her photo shoot in her baptism dress at the temple!

From there we headed to the cemetery to visit the grave of Brigitta's (and Katrina's) namesake. Thank heavens for Katrina who has dedicated herself to family history research! She knew right where it was and brought all the appropriate cleaning supplies to tidy up the plots.

Gita really put in some elbow grease making everything as clean as possible.

I have to hand it to her, not many little girls would find this kind of thing fun but she was so excited to be where her namesake was buried.

We did red roses for Adam Noah Nielsen and pink roses for Kathrine Birgetta

Katrina suggested Gita bring a rock from Illinois to leave on her grave but we accidentally left it in the hotel room. Katrina promised to leave it another time and encouraged her to find another rock there in the cemetery. I think Gita found the biggest rock she possibly could- you can see it there on the corner of the headstone.

When my great-grandmother died and was laid to rest, my great-grandfather immediately took a dislike to the pine tree near her grave. He just knew there would be pine needles and sap dripping on her plot and man was he ever right! But he never got around to cutting down the tree so here we are, a few generations hence and we are cleaning up the pine needles and sap. But Brigitta and Katrina gave the tree a good kick nonetheless.

Final love pats to say goodbye to this kind and incredible woman for whom both of these ladies are named.

Before we could leave, we stopped by the grave of my Dad's cousin Robert and we had to take the picture of someone people who actually have a worse last name than Wuehler. 

I wonder if they ever had any progeny and if so, if they decided to change it to something simpler... they way I think we should change Wuehler to Wheeler...

We called our dad and he gave us directions from memory to his old house, describing landmarks along the way. Since we were in Logan, we had to take a picture with this and send it to our brother Logan. If memory serves, he's also a fan of the movie Hogan's Heroes so it was particularly fitting.

The foliage in the canyon was stunning! While I paired the Bluetooth in the rental car with my phone, Katrina took some pictures of Gita.

Katrina squatted down to get the best shot of Gita with the mountain in the background and inadvertently... farted!

Pretty loudly, from what I understand.

And then Gita couldn't stop giggling.

Which I think makes these pictures even more funny.

One of the many things I love about Gita...

...is that she loves to laugh.

It was so fun to watch these two connect. At one point Katrina started to go into a family history tale but was interrupted when General Conference started up again. From the backseat Gita said, "Oh good because that sounded boring" to which Katrina guffawed and I hid my smile. Katrina can really spin a yarn when it comes to our kindred dead but she was gracious about it. She's always been so kind to Gita and taken a special interest in her. I love her for that.

We enjoyed the colorful drive and I hope I never forget singing Dolly Parton's 9 to 5 at the top of our lungs.

Before dropping Katrina off at home, we stopped by Aunt Suzanne's home. She's not actually our aunt, but she and her husband are such close friends of our parents we just called them Aunt and Uncle. We had a really fun discussion about how she came to be friends with our mom when Brigitta started looking more and more beat and we finally said goodbye. We didn't get to physically go to General Conference, but I think switching gears and doing this day trip to Logan was just perfect.

Gita's Utah Trip: East High, Up House & Hogle Zoo Lights

By now, my 8-year-old trips with the girls have become legendary. Liesel and Ireland had talked up their trips so much, Brigitta was chomping at the bit to have her own adventure. She was so excited, in fact, that she woke up at 3 AM and didn't go back to sleep- just in case I slept in and she needed to wake me up. 

Of course I didn't sleep in, I woke up on time and was amazed at how quickly Gita was ready to go.  She bid all of her sisters a fond farewell and then Brent drove us to O'Hare for our flight. 

Because we left so early, we had the privilege of seeing the sunrise above the clouds.

Per tradition, I had Brigitta read the arrival and departure boards and the signs around the airport and followed her to our connecting flight from Phoenix. She really is the cutest little travel companion.

I'm loathe to admit that I was annoyed I couldn't find a direct flight from Chicago to SLC. As we hit cruising altitude, one of the pilots said that in his experience, this stretch is one of the most beautiful in all the US as we would pass right over the Grand Canyon. He was right, and I was grateful for the scenery that unfolded. 

Brigitta finally switched seats with me because she wasn't quite as enthralled as I was.

The red, desert canyons slowly gave way to mountains poking through the cloud cover.

We were good and hungry when we arrived so after collecting luggage and the rental car, we made our way to the nearest Café Rio.

I've always taken the girls to the Deseret Book right across from Temple Square to get a CTR ring of their choice, but it was completely closed! Normally it is open between sessions but not this year. The place was pretty deserted so we took advantage of this amazing window display.

We checked out City Creek a bit and of course Gita was more interested in the creek running through the place than any shopping. 

Still, it was nice to stretch our legs a bit and walk off the burrito we'd eaten.

Tim attended East High where High School Musical was filmed. Once he casually mentioned to the girls there was an opportunity for him to be an extra and he turned it down. They were so disappointed and I'm pretty sure he's never going to live that one down. We found this t-shirt at the Disney store in Schaumburg:

We decided to make our own pilgrimage to East High (where my mother also attended high school). I don't know why, but I became intensely intimidated and we drove around the block 3 times before I summoned the courage to pull in the back and park. We could easily see the lunch room where they filmed a bunch of dance scenes through the huge windows. Here's Brigitta giving her disappointed face to Tim:

Then she couldn't stop giggling:

Next we had to get some jumping photos because... well that's just what you do when it comes to High School Musical:

We pulled out of the back lot and looped around to the front of the school. There was one group of kids taking pictures, but not cars parked in front. I boldly parked right in the front circle and seemingly within minutes there were half a dozen cars parked right by mine. 

This is my favorite photo:

Here are a couple more:

It also seemed like everyone was copying our photos. One teenage girl was trying to explain to her dad how to capture the jumping photo we had just done.

As soon as Gita hopped down from this planter, that girl parked herself in the same spot. We sent this one to my mom.

From here, we headed south to pick up Katrina who was going to hang out with us for a couple of days. A few people in her house were sick so it was the briefest of brief hellos. I'd brought their Christmas presents (because I'm that crazy lady who plans for Christmas months in advance) which created so much more space in my luggage! Ironically, Katrina knew Brigitta was bringing her American Girl doll and so she had bought and made tons and tons and tons of doll clothes for her! All that room in my luggage was quickly taken up again- ha! We grabbed a delicious peach shake and said a quick hi to cousin Abigail at the local grocery store. 

From one grocery store to another, I picked up a bunch of brightly colored balloons to take pictures at the Up house in Herriman. When I saw this video about the family who bought it, I found myself crying and I couldn't wait to see it in person.

Apparently a lot of people couldn't wait to see it in person! It was a bit of a trick getting a good photo (it is after all, an actual family's home) but we managed a few.  

I love that Gita's adult teeth are growing in so there are some missing and they are crooked, just like Ellie's are in the beginning of the movie.

I brought the hat and aviator goggles I used when I was Amelie Earhart for Halloween and they looked just perfect!

The Zoo Lights at Hogle Zoo were only available on Friday and Saturday evenings so if we were going to see them, we had to squeeze it in that night. I really wanted to do it because 1- I hadn't done it with any other girls and both Liesel and Ireland wanted their Utah trip to be just theirs, they didn't want me to repeat activities so it would be something special just with them. 2- With the pandemic, I didn't know if Gita would even be able to wear her costume as school celebrations and Trick or Treating were iffy. Friendly reminder, Gita had been up since 3AM and the weariness of travel combined with the change in altitude meant that we were both seriously flagging. She soldiered on though, and changed into her Belle costume in the car.  

I've always said one of the benefits of Utah is there are so many family-friendly activities but one of the drawbacks is there are so many families! We arrived early- before the zoo opened- and scored a good parking spot. I could see the train ride was going to be popular so we made a bee line for that attraction.

On the one hand, it was nice to see the lights from a different vantage point. And they really do go all out with the lights!

There are areas of the zoo we just wouldn't have seen otherwise, like this bridge.

On the other hand, there isn't much to see beyond the lights. They had set up some Halloween scenes along the tracks, but I really think the train ride is for little kids who are just nuts about trains. Gita was a bit beyond the age of interest for this one.

It was nice to sit down for a bit before giving our last gasp at the day's adventures.

It was close to the giraffe enclosure too, so Gita did get a good look at a couple of them! 

The layout of the zoo is kind of long rather than in a spoke and wheel kind of design. If we wanted to see something, it was a long walk there and then a long walk back. They did have lots of creative lights though!

Loved this one by Ichabod Crane, Gita is trying to take Katrina's head off... since she is a Crane- haha!

Even the lion statues had masks on.

Katrina pointed out they had this same drinking fountain way back when we were kids. I vaguely remembered it but never would have put that together if she hadn't mentioned it.

Here's a picture of Katrina using it in the summer of 1975- before I was even born! My brother Joey is there behind her.

We put in a decent amount of time and saw lions, elephants and monkeys. Gita became more and more quiet and finally we decided to head back to the car. 

The poor girl was just exhausted.

For dinner we stopped by Bombay House to get some butter chicken and Gita just picked at it before giving me a pleading look and said, "Can I please go to bed now?" The girl crashed and she crashed hard. It had been quite the day!