Salt Lake City, Utah: Sundance Film Festival

Last weekend John and I took a fun trip to Salt Lake City, Utah to visit some friends and attend the Sundance Film Festival. We had a really great time getting to visit with Josh and Lisa and also see some sights. Salt Lake City is very nice, John and I both felt that it was very clean, quiet, and was a great size for a city while still being very accessible. There are also lots of great restaurants and bars to try out as well as shopping areas. Here are some of my pics from the weekend. 

You can't visit Salt Lake City without checking out the Morman Temple; whatever you believe it is undeniable that it is breathtaking inside and out. The artwork and architecture are very impressive! My pictures do not do it justice, and the Temple is much larger that you can tell from my photos. 

Walking around Salt Lake City we even saw a few pay phones, it's been quite a while since I've seen one of these!

Here we are right before our first movie: Blue Ruin, a revenge thriller. Despite having some blood and guts, it was very enjoyable. After the movie was a Q&A with the cast and director of the film, which was very cool.

Devin Ratray, Eve Plumb (Jan from the Brady Bunch), Jeremy Saulnier, Macon Blair

The next day we went to see Zip, Zap & the Marble Gang. I don't have any photos from this movie, but it was a good film. It's a childrens movie filmed in Spanish with subtitles, and has a very 80s "Goonies" feel to it. The Q&A was also entertaining to listen to. After that movie we headed down to Park City to walk around the main street and see some of the more crazy Sundance stuff. There were lots of people walking around and it was a strange thing to walk down the street looking at all of the people, wondering if you'll see someone from a movie or show you know, and at the same time knowing that they are doing the same to you. We stopped in front of the Egyptian Theatre to snap a few pictures.

Then we headed to a bar to have a few drinks and hang out before our next movie. After hanging out for a bit Josh noticed that Christina Hendricks was right behind us. We said hi and asked to snap a picture and next thing you know they are sitting right next to us (in Lisa's seat- she had gotten up to go to the bathroom) and sharing their chicken wings with us. Umm... I think John could have died and gone to Heaven ;)  Christina and her husband Geoffrey Arend were very nice and spent quite some time hanging out and chatting with us- especially Josh and Lisa. We were all star struck to say the least, and decided not to leave when it was time to get in line for our next movie!

After that excitement we turned our attention to Joseph Gordan Levitt, who had a group gathered to watch the premier of his new tv show in the room directly behind us. We were pretty close and had a great view, but with a window between us. So the closest I got to a photo with him was this (he's in the blue t-shirt behind me):

 Then Josh had the brilliant idea to type out a message on his phone and hold it up to the window, with some liquid courage I agreed to do it. The message said something like "JGL-Love your new show!" After a second of holding it up he noticed, smiled, and gave me a thumbs-up. I waved and blew a kiss like the 13 year old I am ;)  A few people in his crowd snapped a pic of me holding up the phone.  I am still waiting for my call from People magazine to do an interview on my brush with fame -wink wink!

Here's a shot of the main street in Park City

 On our way out of town we stopped to check out some of the beautiful snow covered mountains of Utah, it truly is beautiful there everywhere you look. We had a fantastic time- thank you to Lisa and Josh for hosting us!

Baby it's cold outside!

We started off the week going to to friends wedding, the groom is one of John's old  fraternity brothers and the bride is a lovely lady we have gotten to know and love over the last few years- we had a great time.  When cleaning out a closet recently I came across my old junior prom dress, it is a little black sparkly dress. Perfect for a wedding so close to New Years Eve, with a bride who loves all things sparkly. I was happy to be able to still wear it, 17 years after its original outing! I think the highlight was when I got a compliment from a young teenager while walking through the lobby- made this 35 year old still feel like she can rock it!

Just for jokes John put on his bow tie from Junior prom too!

Monday morning we were hit with a cold snap, temps dropped down to -14 overnight with -40 windchills. We always wondered if our car display would read negative numbers? Guess now we know!

We spent a lot of time inside the next few days ...

We tried to copy this cute Pinterest snowman idea...

It did not come out so well- lol!!

Finally we were able to play outside a little and enjoy the snow!

On Saturday Anabelle and John started ice skating lessons. Even though it was very difficult for them, they both did a great job!

Learning how to stand up.

And she's up!

With her teacher Ms. Heather

Sadly I got no photos of John, I'm sure he is thankful ;)

Thoughts for the new year!

Take time
 to do
 what makes
 your soul happy.

Wrapping up the Holidays

Christmas came and went quickly this year, here are the last of the pictures from our fun times. Getting the girls to sit for a photo can be challenging, I managed to get a few ;) 

Top row: Kari, Joe, John, Grandpa Mike, Alex

Bottom row: Charlotte, Christy, Abby, Anabelle, Grandma Pat, Zac

John, Grandpa Smith

Christy, Anabelle, Grandma Smith, Charlotte

Opening presents ranged from either fast and furious; ripping paper with tornado-like excitement or a slower paced let's stop and play with every little thing for 2 hours before moving on to the next gift. Hence gift opening on Christmas Eve took about 15 minutes and gift opening on Christmas day took the entire day and into the next. 

On Christmas Eve we made Reindeer Food

And sprinkled it on the lawn

We also made sure to leave some cookies and a note for Santa

Finally it was time for some games. This year we tried out several "minute to win it" style games for the grown-ups. I needed to be a little more organized with the scoring- next year I will be better prepared. We still had fun, and even Anabelle was able to get in on some of the fun. Here she is trying to move a cookie from her forehead to her mouth (without using her hands)

We also had a game where you had to move an ornament across the floor using a baseball in a pair of tights on your head. Very funny to watch :)

 There are no other photos of the rest of the games, I think the only way I got most of the people to participate was b/c I promised no pictures would end up on Facebook or the blog, but we had a good time.

Grandpa and Grandma Smith spent the night and Christmas morning, Anabelle and Charlotte woke up to find a new pink soccer ball and some blocks from Santa! Just what they asked for- imagine that ;)

Rudolph pancakes and bacon for breakfast

Sometimes it's nice to be able to surprise your husband and see him smile like a little kid!

We had a lovely relaxing day of eating, playing, and present opening!

Time to decorate some gingerbread houses-yum!

A couple of days after Christmas it snowed lightly and we were able to do something we've been wanting to do for a few years. Danada Equestrian Center offers sleigh rides, so we decided to try it out. Anabelle was a little disappointed at the slow pace, but otherwise it was fun, and a beautiful sunny day!

So glad my Mom and Dad were able to come along, my Mom has been wanting to do this for a long time!

Happy New Year!